GamerNode: Columns - The Ups and Downs of the 8-Bit RPG, Part Two: Dragon Warrior

The Ups and Downs of the 8-Bit RPG, Part Two: Dragon Warrior

Nothing I witnessed or read attracted me to Dragon Warrior. The game itself provides little visual appeal, and when I think back to the articles written for it in Nintendo Power, nothing about Dragon Warrior really captured my imagination or got me excited in the way that Ultima: Exodus had. I think my initial seven-year old reaction was that this game looks like a half-assed Zelda with boring text and less action. In the end I think I only played this game because it received so much exposure, whether it was a top ten list, featured articles, or just available in every store that sold games. This game was all over the place and whether I liked it or not, Dragon Warrior was going to be shoved down my throat and slammed into my Nintendo Entertainment System for my viewing pleasure.

Although Dragon Warrior initially did not whet my appetite, my curiosity was piqued enough so that I gave in to advertising pressure and rented the game. Even when I rented the game, nothing about it really wowed me. If anything, after getting a taste of how weak the "club" and "bamboo pole" were I was certainly was left to wonder what it was like when you could actually kill something in one hit. So, despite the lackluster impression Dragon Warrior left, somehow it ended up on my Christmas list and with a little help from Santa, the mediocre Dragon Warrior was all mine.

Most video games at that time not only came with an instruction manual but they usually had some sort of poster either promoting the game or the company that made the game. Dragon Warrior took this one step further. Inside, along with the typical advertisement poster, there was a much larger map of the entire overworld. The map was color coded, highlighting what enemies you could find in certain areas and unveiling the location of all the towns and caves. I believe I spent many moments scanning the map, planning out where I would venture next and imagining what the coolest monsters (like the gold golem and blue dragons) would be like when I actually faced them. Unfortunately none of the cooler monsters were much different from the slimes and ghosts of Dragon Warrior.

With or without the map, the world of Dragon Warrior was not terribly impressive. The landscape was bland and the world was somewhat small which lead to exploration that was not exciting. In fact, there was very little to explore and once you were able to handle the class of enemies in a particular area, it took little time to discover the boundaries of where to go and where not to go.

Unfortunately, the majority of the time invested in this game takes place in the fight menu. This is mainly the case for two reasons. Almost every fight in the game occurs randomly as you travel overland or inside of caves. Although the fights are randomly occurring and you may have long stretches of not fighting anything, more so than not, you end up frequently encountering monsters. I have had several stretches where in three consecutive steps I encountered three fights. During the instances where I actually wanted to get from point A to point B, the random fights became extremely annoying and tiresome.

The second problem with the game is that leveling is vital to survival. As you move from one area to another, you often see huge jumps in the strength of the monsters you face. Since the jumps in difficulty are so drastic, moving on to another area of the overland map usually requires a significant amount of time getting your character on par with the potential opponents. The problem lies in the SLOWNESS of the leveling. The monsters you can handle quickly usually do not give you enough experience. The monsters that are a little stronger you usually can't kill without significant effort or luck, and even when you do succeed, the reward in extra experience isn't that great. During my recent attempt to revisit this game, I thought I would be able to level rather quickly with the help of my emulator's speed boost, but even with the settings at maximum speed, the leveling task was extremely slow and tiresome. Thinking back, I find it astounding that I actually got enough levels to beat the game when I was younger. Talk about a waste of life! On regular speed, the amount of time it takes to get to a decent level (about level 21) must feel like a lifetime.

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