Quote:
Originally Posted by Brad
So, I've heard some people are disappointed by DQX being a paid-subscription MMO for the Wii. I've never particularly cared for the series. What's your take, Robo?
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Idunno, I haven't had the chance to try it out yet.
In all seriousness, they haven't released a lot of material (
one direct-feed screen!), and AFAICT it's still not exactly clear if it's a true MMORPG or a
Phantasy Star Online-style MORPG. The fact that you can apparently play the first few hours offline suggests that it's not a typical MMO...but I think some people might be confusing "offline" and "single-player."
WRT the paid subscription: several games in Japan have required paid subscriptions that end up not requiring fees outside of Japan (
Monster Hunter being the obvious comparison) so who knows.
In general, it seems like they're drawing from familiar tropes in recent Japanese games (
Monster Hunter, White Knight Chronicles, and
Dragon Quest IX's multiplayer)...even single-player games like
Xenoblade have been adopting that sort of "questing" structure.
Dragon Quest isn't a series known for changing much — Squeenix originally planned for
DQ IX to be a substantially different installment, and the changed it back after fans revolted — so who knows if that will happen this time. Really, though, after
DQ IX, anybody who didn't think the series wasn't going in this direction wasn't paying attention.
FFXI and
MH3 remain big moneymakers for their respective companies; they weren't going to
not try it with DQ.
The biggest surprise was the Wii U version.
Dragon Quest games — none of which, until now, have been multi-platform — typically come out well after a system has established itself (and often at the end of the system's life); Squeenix considers DQ Japan's "national RPG" and wants it to be available to people who aren't early adopters (this mirrors Nintendo's attitude toward
Pokémon). But now we have a multi-platform DQ, which is a pretty big deal, especially for Nintendo. It'll give the Wii U a big boost. Some are speculating that the Wii U version is going to be the only version we see outside of Japan; considering the Wii version will apparently a require an (included?) USB stick to run, there might be some truth to that. But I think Nintendo really wants to publish DQX in 2012 in the US, so if the Wii U version isn't ready the Wii version it will be.
In one week, companies announce a
Dragon Quest for the Wii U and a
Monster Hunter for the 3DS and all everybody talks about is that stupid controller.
Nintendo will never win.