Dragon Quest Heroes: The World Tree's Woe and the Blight Below

If you're looking for a classic Dragon Quest game with a twist, then this more than fits the bill, so long as you don't mind playing alone the whole through way through. As unexpected as it might be, Omega Force has proven that it can adapt popular franchises with surprising consistency.

It’s all just that little bit disappointing, especially after I came away from the demo earlier in the year feeling so positive [link]. It gets off to such a strong start, but the game never quite manages to build on that. Even the story starts to repeat itself - there doesn’t seem to be much of a reason to visit new towns other than ‘uh-oh, there are monsters over there now’.

The balance that Dragon Quest Heroes walks between trivial fun and deeper strategizing is precarious. At any point in the 30-plus hours I played, I felt like it could have tipped over, leaving a boring, button-mashing shell of a game. Amazingly, it never did. Developer Omega Force has, perhaps more than ever before, found a winning combination of empowering players to wipe out thousands of foes while still challenging them to think and pay attention to the refreshingly colorful world surrounding them.