Man, this game could have been great

[Anonymous No.5954206]

Against what people said about Dragon Quest II, I decided to give it a try anyhow. Soon I found myself enjoying this far more than Dragon Quest, which by today's standards is very archaic and barebones.

But then I get the ship, and everything goes to hell. The problem is not so much the "lack of directions", because at the very least I knew two things:

1. Something something Alefgard.
2. There was a sunken ship with treasure in it.

So it's just a matter of finding each of those things. Finding Alefgard was easy. The sunken ship, however? The ocean is gigantic. I admit I have played without consulting the manual, but a look at both the Japanese and U.S. manuals shows there is no indication whatsoever of where the sunken ship may be.

One thing that really bothers me is that I've read how people consistently talk about the ending dungeons behind a massive pain in the ass, both because of grinding and cheap tricks. The near lack of conscious grinding (which is experienced in Dragon Quest I) is one of the things that made me love Dragon Quest II from the get go, so hearing the game betrays itself in the 3rd Act is a massive turn-off.

Am I wrong and should I restart my playthrough, or should I move onto Dragon Quest III? thnx

[Anonymous No.5954414]

There's no grinding in DQ2, because no amount of experience will save you from an unavoidable full party instant-kill.

[Anonymous No.5954417]

>>5954414
Yes it will. The monsters with the party wipe skill will never use it on the first turn, so being strong enough to one-shot them makes a HUGE difference.

[Anonymous No.5954424]

the last boss fights are all a matter of luck and will be a pain in the ass no matter how much you grind?
Will Atlas decide to target the princess? Will Bazuzu use Sacrifice? Will Belial, Hargon and Malroth decide to cast Healall?
It's all down to luck

buy three strength shields

[Anonymous No.5954427]

If you're playing the original NES/Famicom version, know that the bosses will only respawn if you reset the game. You'd be surprised how many people think all of the final boss run has to be done without going back to heal.

[Anonymous No.5954592]

>>5954424
How does that help?

[Anonymous No.5955287]

Well, I think I will replay this game. If anything, I will play it in bits when it gets tedious, because one thing I find is that trying to force yourself on this grindy games for hours is never a good idea.

[Anonymous No.5955346]

Gonna start III soon, lads. What's the most broken, easy mode party I can make?

[Anonymous No.5955372]

Someone in the port town will tell you that the ship sunk north of town, and there's one NPC in Tantegel that will trigger the correct tile you have to search to animate (swirl of water on NES, bubbling water on the 16-bit remake and "sparkles" in the mobile remakes) by speaking to him and answering his question correctly.

[Anonymous No.5955376]

>>5955372
meant to post a pic with that post

[Anonymous No.5955383]

>>5955346
Solder, Pilgrim/Cleric, Wizard. You'll have half your party be strong physical, and half be strong magic. Fighters are great early on, but the lack of armor makes them too crunchy later on. Then during the late game, use the book you found to turn your Soldier into a Sage, the Pilgrim/Cleric into a Wizard, and the Wizard into a Pilgrim/Cleric. Boom, all three of your followers will have access to every spell in the game.

[Anonymous No.5955393]

>>5955372
>>5955376
Hmmm, maybe this is the problem. I did talk to that person in the port town and I did went north, and found absolutely nothing. And when I talked to the NPC in Tantegel, I sailed north of Tantegel (since he was talking about the wide sea on the north) as opposed to going back to the port town and repeating my steps there. A retarded and unnecessary middle step, to be honest.

[Anonymous No.5955394]

>>5955383
Not that anon, but if I just wing it during character creation/customization/reclassing/whatever, will I probably be okay?

Or is it the kind of rpg where you end up on nightmare mode if you end up speccing into the wrong class?

[Anonymous No.5955430]

Just finish it. You're so far ahead already. Also, we want to see you suffer the Road to Rhone.

Really like DQ2. It's flawed, but parts of it are great. I believe it was pretty rushed. I think its mistakes led to DQ3 on the long run.

[Anonymous No.5955435]

>>5955430
It was absolutely rushed. The devs said in interviews they couldn't even play-test it beyond the ship.

[Anonymous No.5955445]

what's her name again?

[Anonymous No.5955545]

>>5955445
>"Alright, technically she doesn't have a name, but we have to call her something for marketing reasons. She's descended from the great hero, so I'm thinking we can give her a noble name."
>"Princess Princessa. Next!"
>"Can't you take this localization job seriously just once?"
>"Not now. I'm thinking up new puns to put everywhere."

Dragon Quest VIII was a fucking mistake.

[Anonymous No.5955567]

>>5954206
Talk to everyone everywhere to solve exploration-based puzzles.
As for grinding, don't worry about it. The cleverer you are, the less you need to grind. If you don't get killed, you have more gold and have to fight fewer battles etc.

[Anonymous No.5955569]

>>5955545
Dragon Quest scripts are not serious though. Most character names are puns.

[Anonymous No.5955574]

>>5955545
>>5955569
I just played through 11 and was pleasantly surprised how restrained it was. The accents weren't as clownshoes compared to, say, the DS translations, and puns were limited to just a few town names and special moves.

[Anonymous No.5955581]

>>5955574
Now if only DQXI didn't tell you where exactly to go, how to get that, with a map marker and several reminders on the way and a journal note. Who knows? It might've even passed for a real DQ game.

[Anonymous No.5955583]

>>5955569
No, but for the ones that came before VIII, the localization played it all straight and didn't try to make a thing out of milking every stupid pun, accent, and acronym they could think of.

[Anonymous No.5955594]

>>5955583
That's what Japanese scripts do, though, including the accents.

[Anonymous No.5955601]

>>5955594
Can you give some actual examples in Japanese?

[Anonymous No.5955602]

>>5955601
Of course.

[Anonymous No.5955610]

>>5955594
False.
t. playing DQ 4 DS right now. Stop spreading this rumor.

[Anonymous No.5955613]

>>5955610
It's デマ.

[Anonymous No.5955616]

>>5955394
You can play through the game with just about any party, and beating the original game with a party of 3 Goof-Off's is considered a challenge. You don't spec your party, you just request a class member and get one. You can respec from any class to any other class except Sage, which requires you to use a special item or have a Goof-Off at a high enough level.

This isn't Wizardry where you are encouraged to reroll until you have 15+ bonus points to spend on stats when starting out.

[Anonymous No.5955618]

>>5955610
If you are really playing it then you can clearly see that I'm right, dipshit.

[Anonymous No.5955627]

>>5955618
Who is going to believe you if you have nothing to back up your claims?

[Anonymous No.5955631]

>>5955618
Not at all? DQ4 on DS has retarded accents absolutely everywhere in English, causing the characters to sound stupid at best and barely comprehensible ESL at worst. The characters in the JP version have distinct manners of speaking, but they never sound like they barely know Japanese at all. I've only played the first three chapters so far, but it really pisses me off when I see people pushing this meme.

[Anonymous No.5955682]

>>5955567
I did this, but found no info about the fire shrine.
Did I miss something?

[Anonymous No.5955715]

>>5954592
free healing, you'll need it

[Anonymous No.5955763]

>>5955682
Fire Shrine is literally that small building full of traveler's gates and torches that you can get to from another gate. I forget which, but if you've tried them all you'll eventually find yourself there.

[Anonymous No.5955765]

2 is an unpolished 3. I'm really surprised with the jump of quality between them, like suddenly they figured the correct map proportions and amount of content for each zone.
Sailing with the ship is actually the most fun, there is a lot to see and unlike openworlds, every quest is actually important.

[Anonymous No.5955782]

The colorful localizations of the games from the DS onward are pure soul. I can’t imagine being such a boring pissbaby that you cry about a generic script not being translated 1:1.

[Anonymous No.5955827]

>>5955763
I don't remember anyone mention Fire Shrine anywhere.
Also the location of that thing you need from there is bullshit.

[Anonymous No.5956010]

>>5955782
The real experience is to play it in Japanese. Nothing else comes even close.

[Anonymous No.5956086]

>>5955581
You seem salty.

[Anonymous No.5956260]

>>5955765
>2 is an unpolished 3
No, it's a polished 1.
2 is pretty weird since even though there are defined "classes", nobody is 100% pure at one specific job except Lorasia (fuck Midenhall). Sumaltria is a "Paladin" yet like DQ1's hero and a standard hero from DQ3 onward, takes from both Cleric and Mage trees without getting the best of either. However, he has no exclusive "power" spell like the Zap line or even some shit like Gigasword. You "could" count Sacrifice/Kamikazee, but that one sucks. In earlier versions, only he learned Revive though. Moonbrooke is something of a physically weak Sage, yet she never learns the Fire/Sizz line of spells nor the basic Heal spell. She also has some of her spells like Healus/Multiheal locked behind the shitty Chance/Hocus Pocus spell.

Goddamn I hate the new localization so much.

[Anonymous No.5956267]

>>5955682
The hint you get is that it's "on an island". There are only a couple of small islands that have buildings on them, so it's pretty easy to find if you're looking for it and know to play the flute.