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Dragon Quest 7 Reimagined getting a demo on 1/7 for all platforms. Progress carries over.

I played the demo on Switch 2 for about 20 minutes or so last night and thought it was neat. Ages ago, I played several hours of the 3DS version but never saw it through to the end. I don't know if it speaks to the game being very memorable (despite me dropping it) but it was weird how many small things gave me a sense of deja vu. I hate that it's being released physically as a game key card, but honestly, I might pick it up anyway.

I've seen it mentioned that the download size is surprisingly small (less than 64GB), but the game is so close to release, I can't see Squenix doing an about face and putting the actual game on one of the rumored smaller capacity game cards.
 
Interesting story developments with Balleymaloy. Sounds like we travel to the past to fix islands and then visit them in the present?

Stopped there for the night. Would love if I got some more combat options though as it's pretty dull on that front. But overall, this is enjoyable so far.
 
TintoConCasera said:
I wonder if that might be the kind of thing that one can fix via mods or ENBs.

But yeah I'm not impressed by the overall visual design. Some parts look cool but it can look quite dull and muted as well.


I keep reading praises for Star Ocean: Second Story R. Scenarios look better indeed but the clash between 2D sprites and all that cool 3D is a bit too much for me, but maybe I could get used to it. How's the game? I think the only Star Ocean game I've ever played is the first one for the SNES. :goog_relieved:
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I'm biased because I was a SO2 fanboy and I have a ton of nostalgia but I love it. It feels like the people who made it understood exactly what made the original good. They made a ton of welcome improvements while keeping the core intact. Fast spammy combat, lots of ridiculous characters with crazy special moves, and a zillion ways to break the game and become OP as hell.

Yeah it's weird having pixel sprites with high-res 3D backgrounds but I love those old sprites. I feel like if they tried to make the characters 3D they'd just end up looking like generic Tales/Trails characters.

It's got a demo that transfers to the full game if you want to try before you buy.


Anyway yeah, should be interesting to see if we get some good mods/reshade to DQ7R. I'll give it another shot tonight.
 
DonkeyPunchJr said:
It feels like the people who made it understood exactly what made the original good.
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Sadly this seems to be the exception to the rule nowadays. You make the game sound super cool, might get it on the next sale. Thanks!
 
TintoConCasera said:
I wonder if that might be the kind of thing that one can fix via mods or ENBs.

But yeah I'm not impressed by the overall visual design. Some parts look cool but it can look quite dull and muted as well.


I keep reading praises for Star Ocean: Second Story R. Scenarios look better indeed but the clash between 2D sprites and all that cool 3D is a bit too much for me, but maybe I could get used to it. How's the game? I think the only Star Ocean game I've ever played is the first one for the SNES. :goog_relieved:
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I've played star ocean 2 remake, it is amazing, yes the 2d sprites look out of place in screenshots, but they feel a lot better in motion.

I think it's the best square enix HD-2D so far, story is great (not amazing like some classic like ff7, but still great nonetheless), soundtrack is top tier, and combat is better than most jrpg.
 
Hudo said:
If it is Unreal Engine 5, you might be able to disable DoF in the config files. That's also how I disabled DoF and set the rendering resolution in borderless window mode higher than 1080p in the DQ3 HD-2D and DQ1&2 HD-2D Remakes, which also use Unreal Engine.
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Yeah I'm sure it can be done on pc which would lean me to pick it up on steamdeck, had originally planned to get it switch 2 or ps5 depending on performance but those both look identical, will try the pc demo when it turns up
 
DonkeyPunchJr said:
ehh

The visual style is OK, but not as impressive as I was hoping. You play from a zoomed out perspective where you don't see much detail. The interiors are all these plain, ugly rectangular rooms with copy/pasted furniture and flat lighting.

That while "old school 16-bit tile-based graphics…but in 3D" aesthetic is starting to feel so played out for me.

I think even the 3DS version had more charm and visual appeal despite being on much weaker hardware. Here are some examples I stole from the Steam forums:

3DS:
lBa6J3jM6HGQyeME.png
7xCvWNuqole3H4nA.png


Reimagined:
jI3jBcIV27SVWKS8.jpeg

arQGfepb4qhwh8L2.jpeg
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It was a ps1 game not a 2d tile based game.
And honestly it was pretty janky. This remakes solves a lot the originals problems.
 
touchfuzzy said:
I've always wondered how this translation work compares to the Japanese version. To me all the stuff you mentioned is like the heart and soul of DQ, and it's weird to think that it's all been done through the English translators and in Japan it's just standard anime writing.
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I'm no expert but from what I understand, Yuji Horii is an excellent writer and is a fan of puns himself, so there's still plenty of playful dialogue in the JPN versions as well. You can tell from the games' character designs and some of the lighthearted scenarios that a sense of humor is a big part of the DQ experience.
 
RoboFu said:
It was a ps1 game not a 2d tile based game.
And honestly it was pretty janky. This remakes solves a lot the originals problems.
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Yeah I get that but even the PS1 version was designed like a grid-based, retro-styled DQ done with 3D environments. Maybe you could call it the first HD-2D game lol
 
I can't handle the character art style, just too gross for me. Shame, because I was SO looking forward to the idea of a remake like this. Everything DQ should look exactly like DQ XI. Fight me. Via menus.
 
Finished the 3DS version a couple of years ago… and you know I will be getting this and going another round, despite the length (need to get onto XI and the other remakes first).

I've played DQI-IX in various ports and VII is def amongst the best story wise though they all have buckets of charming character episodes.

Weird that IV-VI were not tackled first though.
 
TintoConCasera said:
They might want to do those in HD-2D and, if that's the case, going with them right after I, II and III might be too much.
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This is probably the most likely reason, since 4 was an NES game and 5/6 were both SNES games. They would lend themselves to the HD-2D treatment. Although there was a PS2 remake of 5 that never made it West, but a translation patch is available.

I think 4, 5, 6 also form a trilogy of their own, similar to 1, 2, & 3.
 
Poppinfresh said:
This is probably the most likely reason, since 4 was an NES game and 5/6 were both SNES games. They would lend themselves to the HD-2D treatment. Although there was a PS2 remake of 5 that never made it West, but a translation patch is available.

I think 4, 5, 6 also form a trilogy of their own, similar to 1, 2, & 3.
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Yeah they do, the Zenithian Trilogy. I played them on the NDS and they are probably my favorite games for the system. They play super nice on the portable console and look really nice with the mix of simple 3D environments and 2D sprites. Oh and speaking of 2D sprites, the ones for the enemies during battle are amazing: super smooth animations with a lot of detail and care put into them.

1*lRPWwX1G6Nn2PswK0oZJHA.gif
1*SVOjsnpYDECKHGbP51f6NA.gif
1*hV_boKq-NauNcgwFyiHbTg.gif


Love those games.
 
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TintoConCasera said:
I wonder if that might be the kind of thing that one can fix via mods or ENBs.

But yeah I'm not impressed by the overall visual design. Some parts look cool but it can look quite dull and muted as well.


I keep reading praises for Star Ocean: Second Story R. Scenarios look better indeed but the clash between 2D sprites and all that cool 3D is a bit too much for me, but maybe I could get used to it. How's the game? I think the only Star Ocean game I've ever played is the first one for the SNES. :goog_relieved:
Click to expand...

Second Story R plays masterfully and the combat is improved tenfold. The sprites look best in combat, but they are fine in the overworld. The game keeps the PSX atmosphere despite being a huge upgrade overall. Its one of the best games I've played this gen, and the original was probably 7.5-8/10 for me.
 
Played for a bit.

Honestly, much prefer older SE games where they were tighter due to hardware limitations.

Too many interruptions just cause they can put them in there.

Looking forward to playing Octopath 2 and Final Fantasy 8 R instead.
 
I really like this growing trend of making a demo with save data that carries over to the full game. Falcom, SE and some other big Japanese jrpg developers seem to be predominantly doing this and it's a wonderful QoL feature that we didn't have last gen (as far as I recall).
 
foamdino said:
I really like this growing trend of making a demo with save data that carries over to the full game. Falcom, SE and some other big Japanese jrpg developers seem to be predominantly doing this and it's a wonderful QoL feature that we didn't have last gen (as far as I recall).
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Yeah, i agree, its kinda fun to carry over your progress from the Demo to the full game.
 
Tried the demo and loved it. Previous Dragon Quest games never really clicked with me, so hopefully this one will be different.

I will probably get it for the Switch 2 instead of the Steamdeck since the kids are also showing an interest.
 
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foamdino said:
I really like this growing trend of making a demo with save data that carries over to the full game. Falcom, SE and some other big Japanese jrpg developers seem to be predominantly doing this and it's a wonderful QoL feature that we didn't have last gen (as far as I recall).
Click to expand...
Agreed, it's a lot more fun playing a JRPG demo when you know all your progress won't be wasted.

Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete on PS1 was the first game I remember doing this.no idea why it didn't become common until now.
 
Finished the demo as well and yeah I'm leaning towards buying the game. So considering I had no intention of buying this game before playing the demo, releasing a demo was a good idea.
 
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Curious how many are loving it, considering that DQ7 had been somewhat criticized in its original release for being a very slow burner and an absolute time devourer.

I'd be interested in comparisons between this new release and the 3DS remake. I have that one, but I've never played it because I really don't know if I can manage to see it through to the end. And I think one version of DQ7 should be enough for a lifetime, lol.

I'm not really a DQ type, actually. I only finished the GBC version of I (a slog), and 8, which is ridiculously long too, but at least on PS2 at release was a graphical sensation and I found the strength to finish it just because the scenery was so beautiful.
 
I'm floored by how beautiful this game is. I was worried that the graphical overhaul wouldn't hold up the magic of the 2D DQ games, and thankfully this isn't the case here. Wow.
 
NeoIkaruGAF said:
Curious how many are loving it, considering that DQ7 had been somewhat criticized in its original release for being a very slow burner and an absolute time devourer.

I'd be interested in comparisons between this new release and the 3DS remake. I have that one, but I've never played it because I really don't know if I can manage to see it through to the end. And I think one version of DQ7 should be enough for a lifetime, lol.

I'm not really a DQ type, actually. I only finished the GBC version of I (a slog), and 8, which is ridiculously long too, but at least on PS2 at release was a graphical sensation and I found the strength to finish it just because the scenery was so beautiful.
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The DQ games are known to be very long games. You are probably in the ball park of 80-100 hours on average for the main plot and probably another 40-50 for the post game stuff. DQ 7 in particular is known to be the longest in the series as they wanted it to be the ultimate game in the series back when it came out and they packed it with content. I recently went through and finished IV, V, and VI on the DS after III HD 2D Remake and just fell in love with how addictive each title can be. I have VII and VIII on the 3DS as well, but gave them a rest in anticipation for VII Reimagined. When I and II HD 2D remake hit it took every ounce of my being to not go further into debt to get them, too. I've always liked the series, but like you have said, the length of each can impede actually finishing them completely. So, on this go around I decided not to play any other video games and just solely play DQ and to me that was the key.

The plots aren't anything to write home about and are generally very simplistic on purpose. But, the gameplay loop becomes video game crack cocaine IF you don't play anything else to interrupt the dose. That's the best way that I can explain it.

Think of them sort of like fantasy setting Dragon Ball. You don't play them for the plot like other RPGs it's more about the gameplay loop and sticking with it. When it takes hold you are playing it again and again just to grind overcome the next part. The endgame post plot stuff is really where all of the challenge lies and usually adds an additional twist or two to the plot line sometimes with an additional character you can only get in the post game to spice things up, but not always.
 
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DoktorCoktor said:
Yeah I was expecting this outcome, but man some of the already known changes and removals are pretty disappointing.
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Agreed: it looks like they're changing a character's fate in a way that's going to lessen that particular emotional impact.

DQ always did character stuff well in a kind of quiet understated way so I'm a little annoyed.
 
DoktorCoktor said:

Make of this what you will. He's not wrong though.
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It does seem as if developers are so afraid that people playing their games can't think for themselves and figure things out, so they have to do the thinking for you.

It's seems more Deimagined to be honest.
 
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Heimdall_Xtreme said:
Does the game maintain the longevity of the PS1 version or is it shorter?
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I saw from a preview that the developers cut some parts of the game to have a better flow with the story. We'll have to see with the full version

I really hope they did because the game was such a drag sometimes
 
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I gave it another shot.

Got a much better feel for it.

Am understanding a bit better how to play this. Loitering around at same place, trying to get all the details is absolutely not how to play this.
 
I keep trying to like dragons quest. But this was putting me to sleep. Literally. I was even skipping talking to random NPCs. I played over an hour and fought something once and drifted off like 3 times.
 
just got to the cutoff point of the demo got my main guy at the level 10 in the prince of the level 8.
i loved it pre-ordered the deluxe edition cannot wait for February 5th.
 
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