Now playing Dragon Quest 8 again...

The Evil Jessica arc was much shorter than I remember it being, though thanks to a monumental cock up on my part (I accidentally tried to flee at one point when I meant to open up Angelo's spell menu to heal) both Angelo and Yangus died, leaving Hero alone against Jessica and six spectres, thus making the fight much, much harder than it would have been.

Twenty three hours in, and Sir Leopold is now evilled up, and I'm heading north into the frozen wastes in search of him. Yay.

I've been slack, I know.

The timer's just hit thirty hours, and I'm stuck. Well, not stuck per se, I just have no idea where I'm meant to go now. Sir Leopold claimed the life of the old lady in the frozen place, then took off. I was told it was time to get ourselves ariborne, which seemed like agood idea but no one knew how exactly to do it. I spent a while wondering the world map then realised I still hadn't visited the northern continent thing (the one with the church that hosts the marriage in the end credits), so I headed up there and got almost sweet FA. Almost. Little cut scene with Vegeta Marcello, then overheard a random NPC talking about a Pirate who has the map I need to access.

Ok, found the cove, beat the Pirate boss (who was a pushover, even if he did manage to OHKO Jessica) and got the map. Onto the Godbird island, into the world of Darkness, save the egg. Ah. Or not. Anyway, I can now fly.

I just don't know where the hell I meant to fly too. I don't want anyone to spell it out for me, but you guys got any vague pointers?

A vague pointer would be to go to the fortune teller from the first town.

Forgot about him. Thanks.

I'll be buying this as soon as my new debit card activates.

Okay, found the Monster Village, beat Marcello, Rhapthorne is free and I've just escaped purgatory. Into Rhapthorne's castle, and a fight with the little squirt himself. Wow, that was easy. Now fatty just absorbed the castle, and he's huge. And shielded. I need to pick up the Sage's Orbs to break down his shield, but I've got to find those first...

Right, that's all the orbs. Just got Fatso left to fight...

His Dr. Claw-esque voice was hilarious.

Heh, Rhapthorne's pretty tough. I remember him being easier, though the last time I fought him was on my PS2 playthrough, where I had gone through the Dragovian trials and my levels were much higher, Hero sittng at 69 rather than 38 as he is now.

No matter, Rhapthorne did manage to take down Hero and Jessica breifly, but he still fell before my might. Now watching the credits, and I can see what my total finish time was. I'm guessing around 35 hours 30 mins, give or take.

Okay, finish time for first ending was thirty five hours, thirty five minutes, and I finished the game at level 38. I reckon it'd be possible to shave at least a couple of hours off that time if I were going to do a true speed run, because I spent a while at the Casino in Baccarat, I got lost a couple of times and wandered around not doing anything, and I spent a short amount of time grinding on Metal Slimes, though I still think I was slightly underlevelled by the end of the game given how Rhapthorne could one shot Hero.

Having not played the game for years, it still feels remarkably fresh. Yes, the gameplay is deliberately old-school, but otherwise it's barely aged at all and the graphics (despite the low PS2-era resolution) still look great. An HD remake would be something very special indeed. Story wise, only at the very end with Rhapthorn'es resurrection did it seem like it was starting to drag slightly, and there's enough variety and humour to keep things interesting, given the fetch nature of most of the quests.

I'm now going to make a start on post-game and get the true ending.

I think I was at least level 50 when I finished the game.

Fifty? Heck, that's got to take around 200,000 exp points more than I got. You grind on Metal King Slimes? The two I saw both instantly ran away, the closest I got to decent grinding was some regular Metal Slimes early on (when 1000exp was a big deal), and a couple of Liquid Metal Slimes later in Trodain.

I got lucky with my MKS encounters, as those flies would revive them so I could kill them again.

I just spent two hours in the Dragon Graveyard and only came across three MKS. All three ran away before I could make an attempt on them. Grr.

If I remember correctly, it was very close to the entrance they appeared the most for me. I have a max level file, although it is def over 100 hours so it must have taken forever.

My previous PS2 play through topped out at lvl 69, but I cannot remember how I got there.

EDIT: I stand corrected on my highest level. I thought it was 69, but it was actually 58. 69 was almost the number of hours I'd played, that being 65. I beat the Dragovian Trials at level 58. Yay me.

I think I beat Rhapthorne at level 48 and the Dragon boss (the one to get the true ending, not the Trials) at level 55 or so.

i beat everything sub 40

Superbuu3 wrote:

i beat everything sub 40

I very much doubt it. A level 39 party would be wiped out in a single round against at least half of the Dragons in the Dragovian Trial.

What level does Angelo get multi-heal? That's the level I beat the game at. Fuck those trials, I never bothered.

Around level 30 I believe. That's still a very low level to be beating the game with.

Then I think it might have been Omni-Heal. I remember one those healing moves saving my ass. My characters were so pathetically weak that they would be near fainting almost every turn so I had to constantly spam multi-heal.

Angelo doesn't learn Omniheal, Hero does, though it's part of the Courage skill tree rather than learned at a specific level.

Is Kazing also skilled based? Because then forget it, I have absolutely no clue what level I was.

I just remember most of my strategy (if you can call it that) for Rapthourne.

Yangus - Spam Helm splitter.
Hero - Heal and Attack
Jessica - Timbrel of Tension
Angelo - Multi-heal and Kazing constantly because someone was either fainted or nearly there.

Angelo learns Kazing at level 34, Jessica learns it when her Staves skill is maxed.