Dragon Warrior 1 & 2
Reviewer: Piccolo
System: Game Boy Color
Developer: Enix
Year of Release: 2000
Genre: RPG
Number of Players: 1
Save: Battery-based, three slots each for both games
ESRB Rating: E

Notes: I am aware that this game series is also commonly known as Dragon Quest. Sorry to offend any purists. Special thanks goes out to Rei for giving me this game as a birthday gift.

Like any good RPG, this game has menu-based battles, townsfolk to speak with, shops to spend your GP from killing monsters you meet in the overworld and in caverns, a birds-eye view, and many other familiar elements. What makes this game special, though, is the fact that this game popularized these features in the late 80s. It did not invent the genre; there were RPGs before this, but none had the magic this game had. Nearly every RPG that followed built upon this game's basic form. Even if the RPG you play today looks nothing like, sounds nothing like, or doesn't even play like this game, look deeper. It may be some tiny, nearly invisible aspect, but nearly any of today's RPGs can be traced back to the granddaddy of them all, Dragon Warrior.

I anticipate a good portion of the readers of this review have played these games before on their NES and wonder what this new version has to offer. Most noticeably, the graphics are more colorful and detailed due to this being a port of the Super Famicom game. Heard about it before and wanted to play it? Well now's your chance. All bosses in these games are now visible onscreen before you fight them, and are twice as large as your character. The towns are more detailed, with beds, desks, and drawers to fill them out. Full-screen artwork with some animation (drawn just for this game) serves as a prologue for both of the games. The game shines in full color on the Game Boy Color, but it is compatable with the regular Game Boy as well. It also is enhanced for the Super Game Boy, including several full color borders that change depending on your location in the games, however it has no special pallete. The music has also been enhanced. The sound engineers of this title were able to take the arrangements of the Dragon Quest Symphonic Suite CDs and translate them to 8-bit PCM. The lack of real instruments is noticeable of course, but the longer versions of these tunes are more pleasing to listen to. The scripts of these games are more accurate to the original Japanese, with the original names kept for the characters and spells. The dialogue seems more mature and is not afraid of mentioning death, violence, and even occasional sexual innuendo for laughs. If you get the game new, included is a small poster with Akira Toriyama's artwork for the boxes of the Famicom versions of Dragon Quest 1 and 2. I have noticed that thought the instruction manual is more original artwork by Toriyama. What makes this special is the fact that it is even there. The NES versions of this game had more American looking comic-book style art. I hope this symbolizes American gamers' accepting of anime as an art form. Either that or Enix of America is catering to the fans, which I don't mind either.

What is the charm of the Dragon Warrior series that makes it so appealing? Perhaps it was simply that few had played a game before quite like this one. I know that is what happened in my case. I was so used to the thumb twitching action of most video games that this title's menus and strategy was a great change of pace. Perhaps it is the exploration element; the tile based terrain starts to look familiar after a while, but you can see how it forms valleys, pockets of forest, and other natural features. None of these two games have an on-screen map, so you'll be relying on clues from people (or perhaps your own memory from when you played the game's original incarnation years ago). It could be Akira Toriyama's monster designs. Creatures you encounter early on such as the infamous Slime are cute and quite memorable, while stronger monsters appear more threatening but never terrifying. It could be the era in which it takes place, not a single symbol of modern times or a post-apocalyptic world is to be found, creating a sense of escape into a simpler time. In any case, people from any generation have enjoyed this game.

If you have never played a Dragon Warrior title before, do yourself a favor and escape from the modern style of RPG and take a step back in time. If these games are familiar to you already, then why not play them again? For those of us lucky enough to own this game and a still operable NES, you'd do yourself well to see what has been enhanced, as well as check out the game's more accurate translation. If you don't have the cash to shell out for the upgrade, then I encourage you to go back and play these games over again anyway, and reminisce.