Dragon Quest Swords: The Masked Queen and the Tower of Mirrors

"Absorbing first-person swordplay in the world of Dragon Quest"

Dragon Quest Swords is a game that tries to make you feel as though you were using a sword to slay monsters in the Dragon Quest world.

You are the son of the great swordsman, Claymore, of the kingdom of Avalonia. It is your sixteenth birthday and you are to be tested as a young swordsman. You are to have an audience with the queen, but a problem occurs - she does not wish to see you. Her son, Prince Anlace, tells you that she has been acting weird lately, and that he wishes you to investigate. You find out that this situation has something to do with Xiphos - the Bringer of Death.

Throughout the game, you will have three companions. You won't learn much about them, and they'll rarely talk about anything except the current situation. With the little character development there is, you won't be caring much for any of the characters.

The game is linear; there is absolutely no exploration. In town, you are given pre-defined paths. All stages are built in the same sense, except that once in a while there will be an optional path, but most of these are dead-ends anyways.

While in town, you can do a number of things. There are several shopkeepers that sell items, and one that will temper your equipment. Tempering is the only way to make swords stronger - it becomes necessary to seek out materials that are required to upgrade swords. The main problem with this is that certain stages in the game will be the only ones to give certain materials, meaning you'll have to repeat them constantly to get what you need. There are some mini-games throughout the town (that can be played with other players), but they're just there to help you with your sword accuracy.

Progression through the game happens after stages are beaten. A stage will consist of going to a certain place and running through it to get to the boss. Once you defeat the boss, you complete the stage, and the story then continues. After completing a stage, you will be given a rank based on how well you did (such as time taken, attacking accuracy, and number of enemies killed). This is a nice system that encourages you to do well if you want to get a little extra for putting in some effort.

Using your sword with the Wiimote is what the game is all about. Before you attack, you can choose a point on the screen where you want to focus your attacks, or you can keep the attacks at the center of the screen. You can slash vertically, horizontally, and diagonally by moving your Wiimote in the direction you choose. You can also do a thrust by thrusting your Wiimote towards the screen. The main problem with using the sword is that it isn't detected very well. When trying to slash horizontally, the game sometimes slashes vertically. Also, the game seems to constantly think you're trying to thrust when you're actually trying to slash. What's worse is that many times in the game you'll need to slash diagonally, but I realized that it could never be perfectly done. It gets so annoying to the point where you realize that slashing diagonally just isn't going to happen.

The way these few attacks are used to fight are rather creative. For example, some enemies will block your slashes, but a single thrust will knock them back and allow you to attack them. Other enemies will leave openings while they are about to attack. Projectiles can be blocked with a shield, and some of them can even be knocked back at the attacker. The closer the projectile is to you, the more damage it will do when it's knocked back. It's rather fun to see an enemy die from their own projectiles.

Blocking is done by holding a button and moving your cursor (which turns into your shield) in front of where you are about to get hit. When you take damage, your ally also takes damage. Your ally cannot attack, but can instead cast up to six spells. Instead of actually fighting, your ally says things about the current situation at random, which get annoying after a while.

The game's cel-shaded look is very appealing. When I turned the game on for the first time, it instantly reminded of Dragon Quest VIII, because the graphics are very similar. My only gripe is that characters seem to "glide" when moving.

Dragon Quest Swords has a nice soundtrack. While some songs are rather relaxing, some pump you up for battle. The battle music is very upbeat and makes you ready to fight. As with any Dragon Quest game, the sound are what you'd expect from any Dragon Quest game - sounds of menus, enemies, and such are just like they are in other DQ games. Voice acting is done rather well, but the voices of bosses are just awful. It's obvious that boss voices were done in a somewhat comical style, but they are so annoying that you won't care what they have to say. The main character doesn't speak, as any Dragon Quest fan would have guessed.

Although it is a rather short game, some replayability is handed to you. You can expect around twenty hours of gameplay if you decide to do everything. The story only takes about ten hours at most to complete, but it is interesting while it lasts.

Dragon Quest Swords is a creative game. While the presentation is very well done, there's not much that envelops you into the plot. Coupled with mediocre Wiimote controls and a short amount of playtime, the game might not appeal to hardcore gamers. The game is worth a playthrough if you're looking for a nice, rather intense several hours - it's guaranteed to make your arms hurt from all of that sword swinging.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 07/10/09

Game Release: Dragon Quest Swords: The Masked Queen and the Tower of Mirrors (US, 02/19/08)