also known as Dragon Quest Monsters 2 - Maruta no Fushigi na Kagi - Ruka no Tabidachi
Game Boy Color
🇬🇧
Reviewed in 2002
78
✪ Reviewed on October 31, 2023
72
The boys' counterpart to the Maruta adventure, this time with young Ruka in charge. Same islands to explore, same deep catch and fuse system, same staggering depth. Perfect if a male lead suits your style better.
Your verdict
Category
RPG1 player7+
Description
Young Ruka explores magical islands connected by the Maruta keys and collects monsters in this Dragon Quest Monsters entry. Published by Enix, released in Japan in March 2001. Wild monster collection, fusion to create more powerful creatures, interconnected islands with varied environments. Japanese Ruka edition.
This version gives the lead to a heroine whose silhouette and expression change every dialogue scene, and her starting island is given a brighter treatment than in the parallel version. Attention falls above all on the breeding screens: during a fusion, the two creatures appear side by side before giving way to the new sprite that results.
Still fed by Koichi Sugiyama's themes, the sequel unfurls warm melodies across the islands linked by the Maruta keys. Rousing refrains and dynamic battle themes pace the gathering of creatures. This melodic generosity, joyful and polished, wonderfully extends the pleasure of the first game.
Gameplay
"Excellent"
Fun
"From the very first minutes"
Addictiveness
"Obsessive"
Raising your monsters, scouring generated worlds and fusing two beasts to reveal a stronger one endlessly extends the quest for the perfect team. Each exploration yields new companions and each crossbreeding holds its surprise, enough to relaunch an expedition the moment the last one ends. The dungeons look alike, but the breeding obsession keeps a stubborn hold.
Difficulty
"Balanced"
Lifespan
"Massive"
Exploring magical islands linked by the keys of Maruta draws you into a long hunt for monsters to tame and crossbreed. Synthesising rare creatures and building the ideal team demands patient investment over many hours. That wealth of collecting and combination, true to the series, offers a lifespan dear to Dragon Quest Monsters fans.
Dragon Warrior Monsters 2 - Tara's Adventure, the twin version of Cobi's Journey published by Enix on Game Boy Color, in which young Ruka roams the same magical islands from another angle. Designed to be traded with its counterpart, it offers a complementary bestiary essential to completists. Its desirability lies in that version system, the esteem of the Dragon Quest franchise and the pleasure of gathering the pair in full.
A questionable morality
Here you don't fight the monsters, you recruit them: you coax them mid-dungeon, breed them together for finer specimens and send them to brawl in your stead. Sold as tender domestication, the breeding really amounts to engineering a stable of creatures bred for combat, which raises a smile the moment you stop to think about it.
