Tuesday, March 24, 2020

Dragon Quest III Finale - Restless

You mean the space between the breasts? Anyone can reach that place.


Our heroes warp up into the sky as Wayne and Garth do that "doodoodoo!" thing. This...is the postgame.

Here's the beginning of the new dungeon. It promptly kicks my ass, so I leave and go do some leveling at that tower in Alefgard.

I was underleveled against Zoma, and there are a number of very potent abilities that I hadn't obtained yet for the hero. HealUsAll is a big one, fully restoring the whole group.

Lightning is another big one. It's the upgrade to Zap, and fries all enemies onscreen.

Now powered up by six levels or so, I return to the postgame dungeon. This place has multiple Baramos-es attacking at a time. They're stronger than the original Baramos, too.

That said, they're nothing compared to...

...CRAAAAB PEO-PLE. CRAAAAAAB PEO-PLE.

King Hydras also attack randomly in here, sometimes with other enemies in tow. Ortega would have gotten obliterated. If only he knew how to work with others, he'd still be alive!

Much like the bonus dungeon for Chrono Trigger on the DS or Final Fantasy IV on the Game Boy Advance, this place is a bunch of earlier locations randomly stuck together. Not really a fan of this kind of design. It seems lazy, and it makes for some very unmemorable areas that have no identity of their own.

Whoa, a healing spring. This is extremely useful at this point, and a good place to stop and chill for a bit until you're strong enough to continue. And yeah, this is identical to the healing spring room from that one early dungeon where I did a lot of building-up.

Our heroes randomly get dropped into an arena, where they must fight the dastardly miniboss known as...

...this guy. When reached for comment, Boss Troll said "his kind don't win world titles" and then hit Dark Troll with the Pedigree before pinning him two minutes later.

After climbing a steep tower, we arrive in Zenithia. This is basically the heaven of the Dragon Quest world, if I'm not mistaken.

Our heroes get sent on a scavenger hunt around the world. Luckily I get air support for this.

These items aren't necessary to proceed, but they sure help. Here's the best claw in the game, and unsurprisingly it turns Faith into a beast.

I really enjoy the simplicity of Fighters in this game. They exist only to hit really hard. They're the monk class.

The next item is a super-strong armor. Good luck finding these items without guide help, since they're in extremely obscure locations.

Third and final item is a second Sage's Stone. That's a lot of extra healing and I'll need it. My levels are still around 15 short of what is recommended for the postgame boss. Fifteen.

My reward for finding those three items? This guy tells me something I already knew. Old news, pal. On the bright side, said three items will be a huge help against...

...this guy, the postgame uberboss.

He looks familiar.

VRRRR
DUNDUN
DUN DUN DUNNNNN-DUN
DUNDUN
DUN (WAOOO WAHHH!)

DRAGON DRAGON! ROCK THE DRAGON!

He'll grant us one wish... but only if we fight him first. And he's all-powerful, so this is going to be rough.

This fight makes Zoma look like a blue slime.

Gotta say, for 1996, this remake was ahead of its time. RPGs didn't reliably start having postgame bosses until Final Fantasy VII in 1997. Then again, Culex in Super Mario RPG might have been the real start of the trend. Can't think of anything earlier, unless you want to count Warmech in the original Final Fantasy. I don't really see Warmech in the same categories as these other fights, since it's a recurring regular enemy that is simply really strong. Personally I find the final boss more challenging than Warmech, as well, whereas Culex and the God Dragon here are much deadlier than the final bosses of their games.

His strongest attack - and for that matter the strongest attack in the game - is "takes a nap". It wrecks the entire party.

He constantly dispels the party's buffs (meaning attack power buffs, primarily). As a result, spell damage makes a comeback in a big way here. Spike actually does more damage than anyone else in this fight, thanks to Blazemost (the strongest single-target attack spell).

On the second try, I barely eke out a win. At the end I was using Wizard's Rings to give Spike more MP so he could keep Blazemosting.

That was a looooong fight. Apparently, you only truly defeated him (aka get any rewards) if you won in fewer than 35 rounds. Any more and you have to try again. Luckily, I got in under the wire.

Since I won, I get to make a wish. I wish for nude pictures of Bulma reviving Ortega. The other two choices are jokes... not sure what would happen if you actually pick them.

DRAGON DRAGON! ROCK THE DRAGON! COME! A-COME GET MEEEAAHHH!

DOOON DOOOOON DOOOON DOOOOOON DOOOOOOOOOOOOON DOOON DOOOON DOOOON!

Yeah dude, make with the reviving.

Whoa. It's Christmas for Buffy.

Our heroes return to Aliahan, which is abuzz with hubbub over the return of Ortega. Weird thing is that Ortega's wife doesn't notice him in the room until we talk to her.

Pretty cool. This definitely wasn't in the NES version. In that one, Ortega is quite dead at the end. I love that this postgame was one big Dragonball reference.

Our heroes walk out of the house in slow-mo as the Buffy the Vampire Slayer theme plays. Awesome game, this one.


4 comments:

  1. Amazingly I've never done the post-game for this, but I intend to someday.

    The wish for the new pachisi track will be granted, it's probably a super post-game version of one with great stuff on it. You can always beat this guy again to get another wish, too.

    Great post series! Dragon Quest 3 will always be one of my favorites.

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  2. WHOOOA this was so postgame I didn't find it until I was working my way through Live a Live! They did this in 1996?! Premium stuff. Great wish. You even get to go home again!! This game wins.

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