I'm an awful man, but double post because it's review time.
I've now put a few hours into Dragon Quest VIII Android version and feel I've had long enough to make a judgement on it, after all it is a port so I know how the game goes.
[collapse=The Controls]The Controls:
I played it mostly on a train commute, it's clear home ground, as well as in waiting rooms and a little bit of time put aside in my bedroom, and it's important to make these distinctions because how the control scheme handles is reliant on them.
On the train they were exactly what I wanted, allowing me to play one-handed while I stood there, I could walk around perfectly well and the ability to tap on objects to walk up and interact with them made the somewhat fiddly swipe movement perfectly adequate, when you're jostling on a train it feels entirely comfortable to tap those controls as you're not in the perfect position to control your in game direction as you steady your out of game one too. The battle and inventory controls are also fine, with large enough buttons spread far enough apart that if you shake slightly you'll still more than likely click what you want to (something that can't be said for most mobile RPGs that have such small button you don't need to be shaken around for it to mess up your input). The inventory's a little smaller than the battle, but it's much lower tension so the odd mispress isn't quite as important. All in all it's clear this game was designed with commuters in mind.
In the waiting room it again felt fine, but this time you start to realise the problem with one handed play, while it's perfect when one hand is used, when the other is free and you're sat waiting you just want to flip the game sideways and play it the way you've been bought up to, and your arm becomes tired far more quickly than you'd think. Maybe it's that you're not expecting to use it like you do on the train, but either way, it's uncomfortable for long-ish periods of waiting. Moreover sitting still you feel far more confident in your ability to traverse the world, but that confidence is mis-placed. The swipe controls are just as inaccurate as ever, and though you can change to a smaller control pad I'd advise against it as it ends up interpreting my movements about 20 degrees out from my intentions whenever I use it (maybe I just have fat fingers). In all they work, and it's still a good way to while away your hours, but it's better to take a 3DS, or just play another, more dip in dip out, mobile game
At home though it becomes silly. I popped it on the table to play this time to save my wrist, but my god is it awkward. The larger buttons then fall into it's disfavour in a way as I want to use my smaller fingers for the controls and they all seem unnecessarily spread apart. It becomes tiresome, and it's just more convenient to play it on my PS2.
All in All though I've got to give it a positive, because it was intended for the Japanese market, where everyone takes a train... it doesn't mesh so well with our western world, but in Japan it's clearly the right decision. As such this is a phone game, and not a tablet game though, keep that in mind.[/collapse]
[collapse=The Framrate]The Framrate:
And here comes some of the bigger problems of the port. The frame-rate has been dropped to I believe 30, cutting the mid-frames to save processor power, without slowing the game down, which is much the same as watching a youtube video of DQ8 and is certainly not jerky enough to be a problem in of itself, but the problem is more the way it's encoded and when it over-stresses the graphics.
In those cases the framerate drops, but not in the jerky mobile youtube way where it skips a few between the keyframes, nope! Instead it just slows them down and shows you each frame in crawling detail. The game moves sluggishly and jerkily for a half second it needs to process, and then goes back to normal. On the train you might miss it, but it's still a bit jarring when you do spot it. My phone isn't super new mind you, so a newer system may have fewer problems, but I've heard the iOS version is less efficient than the Android one, which sounds pretty horendous! The most jarring problems I've found are in text boxes though suddenly cutting the frames as the swoop across the screen... this could cause the faint of stomached amoung you some discomfort, especially when in motion. If you don't have a powerful phone this game really isn't for you, and for the perfect experience... I'm not sure the phone's been made available yet?
A real downer, but if that's what you pay for in pocket convenience of this still gorgeous game then I guess it's passable if you have a good enough phone. If not, stick to the PS2[/collapse]
[collapse=Load Times]Load Times:
Another problem the game suffers from is loading times, and this is something the PS2 version had too... but not in the Japanese. Fans who reviewed this compared to the Japanese game where really harsh on the load times, but as a westerner it really isn't that much different, of course it does depend on the power of your phone, but as long as you've got one that has only minor issues with the frame rate you'll find the loading times to be only a fraction longer than the PS2 version, and with the added benefit of having a constantly moving views out your train window they'll be far less annoying! In all while fans of the Japanese game will be dissapointed, and I wish they didn't exist, the loading times aren't a new issue by any stretch.[/collapse]
[collapse=The Sound]The Sound:
Those of you who are fans of the PS2 version may be dissapointed. This version does not come with the (not particularly great) Voice Acting or the Symphonic Soundtrack the western release received, instead reverting to the Japanese soundtrack, which is perfectly adequate, and does save on load times! It seems a toss up, but honestly it's not. This is a mobile game designed for trains, and this means you'll be playing it on mute, like always. The fact there's music at all is nice for when the coach is empty, but you'll never hear it so anyone complaining bout the sound is missing the point, and the quicker loading times are more than worth it![/collapse]
[collapse=Stability]Stability:
A mixed bag here. On it's original release in Japan it was notorious for crashes, and I've heard again that the iOS version still has it's issues there, but I've actually not had any in-game! Not to say I've not had any though, as the game loads it's crashed more than a few times, and I'd say about 1/10 sessions has ended before it began, meaning I've had to close the program and load it up again... considering the main appeal of the mobile version is convenience that's really not a good start. Though, this is still better than it crashing in-game, and since it's been patched since the JPN release it's stability has improved greatly in-game, probably making it more stable than some of the other games on my phone, but also those games aren't 60+ hour RPGs where loosing a game session can set you back a long way.
There is a problem though, it crashes if you switch to a different application... which isn't exactly stability, but if you're just looking for crashes, this is one that happens every time as far as I can tell!
The fact there are any stability issues is a problem for jRPGs, but I've not experienced any problems so that's a good sign.[/collapse]
[collapse=Power Draw]Power Draw:
There is however one place I can give this game nothing but praise! The guys at Square Enix clearly understand how long there games are, and how long a session can be so they thought this through, and made sure that the game ran in power saving mode! Yes the framerates are annoying, but when a simple game like Super Hexagon gets my phone warm fairly quickly and a beautiful game like Dragon Quest VIII runs cool as a cucumber it really does mean something. I've managed an hour play session with 12% of my battery, which is pretty comparable to the terrible social games like Clash of Clans, or more fittingly as a comparison for SE, Million Arthur! And I can tell you that DQVIII is a lot more impressive than them! Games like PvZ2 run about twice as hot, and that's a 2D game, that while fun, can't really compare. Comparing orangess to oranges this game's low power consumption is really impressive, and an absolute feat from the guys at SE!
But comparing them to the ripe juicy apple of the PS2 version that never runs out of battery... it all comes down to if mobile is convenient for you.[/collapse]
[collapse=Logistics]
Let's keep this simple, the game's not a mobile game. It's a port of a PS2 game designed for long play sessions, and cutting it up into little commutes doesn't really work... Even with quick saving making it playable you just loose the scope of the adventure somewhat. That said it's still a long game at a good price, so if you have an hour long commute (like I do), this game is fine, but if you'll be playing for 15 minutes at a time this is not the best.
One thing though, it doesn't let you switch windows without crashing, so if you're expecting an important call, don't play this game!
Generally I don't think the mobility is as convenient for the type of game it is... it's still good for journeys, but the game is better suited to home console play![/collapse]
As for game play, story etc, it's the same as the PS2 version, so go read a review for that! (it should tell you that it's great)
In all I think this is better than never playing DQVIII at all, but unless you are a commuter with a good phone then it's better to go buy the PS2 version and a cheap second hand console... a quick search leads me to it being about twice the price, but given the you need a good (preferably android) phone to play this version anyway I'd imagine you'll either have the money, or be saving yourself money compared to a phone upgrade... and moreover seeing the Majesty of this game on PS2 with proper frame rate and symphonic music is worth a few extra quid!
I'm pretty much expecting the announcement at E3 now though, so soon!
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