New Dragon Quest IX Footage

[jj984jj]

This doesn't sound good, but the one-save slot thing is really irrelivant, for the most part. MOST of the time, I only use one save for games, particularly for games that are not save-anywhere. Anyone who would not buy a game simply because it only allows for one save is being super-anal IMHO. Now, the rest of the stuff doesn't sound too appealing. The thing that made DQVIII and DQV for me were the character personalities. You're saying that your characters are silent? Does that mean they have no personalities? That's a game killer for me.

BTW: is it voice acted?

The main Dragon Quest games never contained VA in Japan, only the English version of DQVIII did. DQIX doesn't have any VA in the Japanese version, but I doubt it'll get the same treatment DQVIII did, they were trying to relaunch the brand here and it didn't go very well.

[Hoshino_Kid]

Famitsu stopped being relevant years ago.

Famitsu gave FFXII 40/40.

They give almost any SE game above 32/40, especially if it's Final Fantasy or Dragon Quest.

[Eusis]

The main Dragon Quest games never contained VA in Japan, only the English version of DQVIII did. DQIX doesn't have any VA in the Japanese version, but I doubt it'll get the same treatment DQVIII did, they were trying to relaunch the brand here and it didn't go very well.

I don't know if it did THAT poorly, VIII sold several hundred thousand copies and that's pretty amazing for a JRPG, and more importantly it did well enough to become a Greatest Hit. However, I don't think IX will have VA simply due the effort likely not being worth it due to the lack of a characterized party like VIII did, dubbing likely a pain on the DS, and as a consequence people don't REALLY expect a dub. Also note how Covenant of the Plume had all of its non-battle VA scrapped, showing that unlike consoles, SE is willing to remove voice acting for DS localization.

[Prime Mover]

What's so difficult about adding VA to the DS as opposed to any other system? It'll probably use a different audio codec (highly compressed), but that's not any more time consuming than anything else. There may be a realistic space limitation that simply doesn't allow for very much audio data, but there shouldn't be ANY concievable reason that the DS is harder to master audio to than anything else... in fact, isn't the DS supposed to be one of the simplest systems to program on?

[Eusis]

There may be a realistic space limitation that simply doesn't allow for very much audio data

This is all that matters, the rest of your post is irrelevant and can be thrown out. We're talking about a system with 256 Megabytes at most, and a game that is already really huge. It's a huge game as it is, and is already on the largest cart, and I should point out most video games weren't heavily voice acted unless they covered more than one CD (650 Megabytes at a minimum!) or were on a DVD. I hear a lot of the cart is empty, but that may be to improve load times and I'd rather not have those screwed up for some crappy, low quality voice acting in a game that doesn't even benefit from it as much as its immediate sequel.

Besides, look at that fairy. Do you REALLY want to have her voice acted? Especially when she seems to be the only character to accompany you with a pre-defined personality?

[daschrier]

Did anyone ever expect character personalities?

I always assumed it was going back to the DQ3 system when I heard that you could make your own characters.