Dragon Quest III

Dragon Quest III rounds out the original Dragon Quest trilogy by casting the player as the son/daughter of the hero Ortega, who... didn't quite finish his grand journey to slay the evil Baramos. So, now that you're sixteen, everyone expects you to pick up where he left off and get to villain slaying already! Thankfully, you're not expected to do this alone; the local tavern serves as an excellent adventurer's hub, where you can recruit a number of loyal party members, including:

• Hero: Your main character. A Magic Knight and all-around fighter with access to powerful attacks and spells. Good thing he (or she) is so well-rounded, since class change is impossible for the hero.
• Soldier: The Mighty Glacier. Is able to use the strongest and most durable weapons and armor in the game, but is slow as molasses.
• Fighter: A Glass Cannon martial artist. Doesn't use very much equipment, but makes up for it with high agility and attack power.
• Priest: (were renamed Pilgrims in the NES English localisation) Your typical healer class. Can use a number of healing spells, buffs and some minor attack magic. Is surprisingly durable, too.
• Wizard: The attack magician. Blasts enemies into little piles of dust, at least until he runs out of MP.
• Merchant: Jack of All Stats. A middle-of-the-road physical fighter whose main talents are the ability to appraise items and find extra gold after battles.
• Thief: The Fragile Speedster. Only appears in the Updated Rerelease. A quick, agile character who uses whips to hit multiple enemies and steals extra items after battle.
• Jester: The Spoony Bard. Seems useless at first, since he tends to do random things during battles. But there's an extra bonus if you level him up enough...
• Sage: Combines the powers of a Priest and a Wizard. Not available at the beginning of the game, but there are a few ways to make an existing character into one later.

Dragon Quest III was such an outstanding success in Japan-so much so that people were actually being mugged on the street for their copy, something that just did not happen with video games back then. The insane amount of hype to led to these events wasn't totally unfounded though: while Dragon Quest II had introduced the concept of multiple-PC parties to most players at the time, it was restrictive to the point that some people complained directly to Enix itself. In response to these out cries, Dragon Quest III introduced the job system that would appear in various Dragon Quest games, allowing you to customize your party to some degree. You could also pick everyone's gender, meaning that if you wanted a team of Action Girls, nothing was stopping you... and female characters got to enjoy a few benefits barred to their male counterparts.

Tropes used in Dragon Quest III include:

• Acquired Situational Narcissism: While helping the growing pioneer town, the Merchant you left there ends up letting the important role they're playing in its growth go to their head and turns it into Egopolis, resulting in a riot and them getting thrown in jail. They get better after thinking things over, and even rejoin your team. Though you'll likely not need them.
• Akira Toriyama
• Ancestral Weapon: Inverted. Your weapon becomes the ancestral sword of the first two games.
  • And averted for a while. There actually was an ancestral weapon, but Zoma stole and destroyed it! Yours is a fresh copy made from the same stuff, and arguably better because it's loaded with Good Hurts Evil fresh off the anvil.
• Artifact of Doom: The Golden Claw. Far worse in the original game, where it causes an enemy fight every step of the game. In the Updated Rerelease, this only happens while you are in the pyramid; exiting the pyramid breaks the curse. Also in the original, this was the only additional claw the martial artist could use other than the standard.
  • Anything that curses you when equipped. Unlike most Dragon Quest games, they don't have any uses as items either.
  • Bonus points, however, go to the Sword of Destruction, a cursed weapon that is second only to the Sword of Kings in terms of sheer damage, and has a much higher critical hit rate than comparable weapons, but carries the downside of preventing you from attacking about every 1 in 3 rounds. In the original NES version, this weapon is actually sold in a weapon shop in Rimuldar(!) despite the curse.
• Awesome Moment of Crowning: Provides a sort of temporary Nonstandard Game Over at one point.
• Bare-Fisted Monk: Fighters. This makes them a very good pick because you don't have to get them weapons for the most part. Most weapons actually decrease their attack power.
• Battle Bikini: Female characters can equip these, drastically raising their evasion and making the enemy react erratically. Also, the female Soldiers wear this all the time (oddly changing into a one-piece when they equip the actual bikini "armor"). Amusingly, until the remix, Bikinis were the weakest armor. Afterwards, two more are added: one is a magical version that's pretty good when you get it, and the other is a "sacred" version that blows away the best armor and is second only to dress made of concentrated holy light! Game Favored Gender? Yes, and we all love it.
• Betting Minigame: The monster arenas.
• Big Bad: Zoma turns out to be the one that's behind all of this, with Baramos serving as The Dragon.
• Bittersweet Ending: The Hero defeats Zoma, saving the world, but the portal to his/her reality is sealed off in the process, and Zoma declares a prophesy that long after the Hero is dead, another evil will appear. The king bestows upon the Hero the title of Loto, the highest honor of the land. The Hero spends the rest of his/her days in this new world, giving his/her gear to various families for protection, and eventually having a child (or children), thus starting the bloodline of descendants who become the heroes of Dragon Quest I and Dragon Quest II.
• Black and White Magic: Wizards for 'black' magic, Priests for 'white' magic. Sages get both.
• Bowdlerise: The girl that gives you the puff-puff massage simply tells your fortune in the NES. Somewhat odd because she later asks if your shoulder feels any better, which only makes sense in the original context. The Game Boy version calls it a "powderpuff massage". This one is not a Bowdlerization, as the context is still there.
  • Priests were renamed Pilgrims in the NES localization, and the tavern where you recruit party members became an "eatery".
• But Thou Must!: One particularly irritating example: having to let the Recurring Boss Kandar go (twice) after beating him. Can't kill him off when he's still got problems to cause, right? To be fair, he does help you with a useful bit of information near the end of the game to repay you for sparing him.
  • Another example occurs when the King of Romaly offers his throne to you. He simply will not take no for an answer. In the remake, he does give up if you tell him no five times.
• Can't Argue with Elves: The Elf Queen is so pissed that her daughter eloped with a human that she curses everyone in his hometown to sleep eternally, never aging. She later regrets her harshness when she learns that she had actually driven her daughter to more drastic measures than she realized. She agrees to free the village because she says that is what her daughter would've wanted, not because of any sympathy for the inhabitants.
• Can't Drop the Hero: Not until you beat the game, that is. After that, you can drop him/her off at the tavern at any time.
• Cast from Hit Points: The Double-Edge sword is a weapon-version of this before it became a skill to be used.
• Cat Scare: In Zipangu, checking the pots in one basement causes you to discover a human head. ...Which turns out to be attached to the still-very-much-alive body of a young girl hiding out in there to avoid being sacrificed.
• Combat Medic: Priests have a far better selection of weapons than Wizards, while Sages outdo them both, even able to wield some of the strongest weapons available.
• Cute Bruiser: Female Fighters are twin pig-tailed, big-eyed Badasses.
• Cute Witch: Female Wizards are the epitome of this.
• Dangerous Sixteenth Birthday: On your sixteenth birthday, the king officially sends you off on your father's quest. Nice present, eh?
• Disappeared Dad: Ortega, obviously.
• Disproportionate Retribution: When you enter Samanao, there will be a funeral in the town for someone that was executed for bad-mouthing the Fake king.
• Distaff Counterpart: The only differences between men/women of each class are... physical appearance, female-exclusive armor, and a few personalities in the Remix (only male recruits get access to an amusing Easter Egg involving the series' Fan Service Running Gag though).
• The Dragon: In addition to Baramos, the Big Bad Zoma has three of them. King Hydra, Baramos Bomus and Baramos Gonus.
• Dub Name Change: Most towns, but only very few people. The most significant being the title of Loto/Erdrick.
• Dying Like Animals: The people of Zipangu are mostly Sheep who trust their leader Himiko and continue sacrificing young girls to the Orochi.
• Eagle Land: The new town that you create corresponds to New York in Real Life.
• Emotion Eater: NPC dialogue reveals that the only reason Zoma keeps the people of the dark world alive is to feed on their negative emotions.
• Fake King: The king of Samanao was kidnapped and replaced by a BossTroll using the Change Staff to take his form.
• Fantasy Counterpart Culture: The world map is loosely based on that of the real world, with many cities corresponding to actual nations. In addition to Japan-analogue Zipangu, there's Isis (a desert kingdom, complete with pyramid, pretty clearly based on ancient Egypt), Romaly (i.e. Rome), the tower of "Shanpane" located in the area corresponding to France, Portoga (a seafaring trading kingdom based on medieval Portugal), Assaram (Baghdad), Baharata (ancient India), the northern island of "Greenlad", Eginbear (apparently a portmanteau of "England" and "Edinburgh") and the Soo (nomads based on various native American tribes). The continent that the Hero grows up on is the only entirely fictional landmass in the game world, situated halfway between Australia and South America. (Mu, perhaps?)
• Fast Forward Mechanic: The 'lamp of darkness' that instantly turns day to night.
• Fragile Speedster: Fighters and Thieves.
• Game Favored Gender: Males and females have no statistical-based differences, but female characters have more exclusive armors, accessories and Personalities to pick from.
• Glass Cannon: Fighters are impressively strong even without a big weapon set, and boast a naturally high Critical rate. However, while they have decent HP, their defense tends to be pretty low, and their armor choices are... lacking.
• God Save Us From the Queen: One personality-defining scenario involves a selfish queen misleading the king for her own profit. The Elf Queen is a vengeful witch fond of Disproportionate Retribution. And later on, you discover Zipangu's leader, Himiko, is actually the Orochi.
• Good Morning, Crono: At the very beginning.
• Gotta Catch Them All: In the GBC Video Game Remake, every monster Randomly Drops a medal; first Bronze, then Silver, then Gold. Getting enough of them gives you access to Bonus Dungeons. Getting all of them makes the Grandragon fall asleep. Wait, what?
  • The latter had an explanation, although it took a significant amount of work to discover it. They had intended to do a similar Dragon Quest IV remake with the same Monster Coin system. These coins are even hidden in Dragon Quest III's data files. You would have, in theory, been able to transfer your coins to the other game in order to complete the full set... which they replaced at the last second with Grandragon falling asleep, when they decided to port Dragon Quest IV to the PSX instead.
• Healing Hands: The main reason for bringing Priests along, though The Hero also gains considerable talent in this area.
• Hello, Insert Name Here: Not just The Hero, but everyone you create/recruit as well. Though the Hero does have a canon name, it's Loto/Erdrick in the flesh, the fabled legendary hero from the first and second installments of the series.
• Heroic Mime: Once again, our hero.
  • Averted in the English NES (?) translation, where he yells for a kidnapped couple to run away from Kandar.
• Holding Out for a Hero: After Ortega's death, it feels like the whole world basically just waited for his heir to come of age. Certainly everyone in your hometown did. But hey.... no pressure, right?
• Hot Amazon: One of the female-exclusive 'Personalities' in the remakes.
• Human Sacrifice: Zipangu is terrorized by the Orochi, who demands a regular sacrifice of young maidens. Upon confronting the beast, you learn that Zipangu's leader, Himiko, is actually the Orochi, explaining her Dying Like Animals attitude.
• I Am Who?: Loto/Edrick, that's who!
• Improbable Weapon User: Before Torneko, abacuses appeared here. In the remix, the best abacus is one of best weapons in the game!
• In-Universe Game Clock: The game introduced a day/night cycle. Sleeping at an inn would always take you to morning, and there were also spells and items that would change it from day to night or back.
• Infinity+1 Sword: The Sword of Kings, in both gameplay and story. The original was actually stolen and destroyed by Zoma, but it took him THREE YEARS to do it. Even if he slept, that's a lot of effort for one of the series' strongest villains, especially when the sword wasn't even new like the copy you eventually get.
  • This may also explain why the sword is so much weaker in Dragon Quest I. Any villains left hiding away and possibly Dragonlord himself, have been trying to break it, but could only weaken it. They eventually gave up and just buried it in some obscure spot in Dragonlord's castle.
  • The same would apply to the armor and gear you hand down to your descendants, but since those were never damaged, one could guess they're just old.
• Intrepid Merchant: Merchants.
• Irony: You buy the Zombie Slasher from a ghost merchant who doesn't realize he's passed on.
• Jack of All Stats: The Hero... and, surprisingly, Merchants qualify for this early on, with well-balanced stats that can out-Jack the hero during the early game.
• Joke Character: Jesters like to waste turns telling jokes and fooling around instead of doing whatever you actually told them to, and the chances of them goofing off rises along with their level. There are times when their antics actually result in something useful, however.
• Kill It with Fire: Wizards are also 'ice people', but the vast majority of their most powerful spells are explosions.
• Locked Out of the Fight: Everyone except the Hero for the Navel of the Earth.
  • Also the Ortega and King Hydra fight in the final dungeon, apparently.
• Magic Knight: The Sages almost hit this; they learn all the spells of Wizards and Priests, and have much better choices for weapons and armor.
  • The Sage's weapon and armor selections map closely if not identically to the Jester's.
  • The Hero is a straight example of the type. Class-changing a Wizard or Priest into a fighting class can also yield a Magic Knight.
• Magikarp Power: The Jester class seems useless at first, but they can eventually change straight to the powerful Sage class without using a rare item, unlike everyone else.
  • Plus, in the later versions, they learn Whistle, which summons monsters... potentially shaving hours off of your Level Grinding.
  • They also have an absurdly high Luck stat, which has a few helpful effects, including helping them save against magic attacks.
• Mana Drain: Traditional version of this as a spell and a weapon version that powers up by draining the wielders MP
  • The latter is surprisingly useful in areas that prevent casting spells.
• Mighty Glacier: Soldiers. Powerful and durable, but very, very slow.
• One Man Party: Because supporting party members are optional, and XP is split between the party members rather than copied, having the Hero go it alone means that he's earning 4x the "normal" experience and can easily level up enough to make up for the lack of support.
• Orcus on His Throne: Baramos doesn't seem to actually do much besides wait in his castle for you to show up and kick his ass.
• Orochi: Eating sacrificial young women in Zipangu, of course.
• Personality Powers: The remakes add one-word descriptions of all of your party members: 'Naive', 'Bully', 'Weepy', 'Sharp', 'Tomboy', 'Lewd/Sexy' and so on. This actually has an effect on how their stats grow when they level up...
• Playboy Bunny: Worn by all female Jesters. Naturally.
• Prequel: The game is surprisingly very subtle about it until you kill the Disc One Final Boss.
• Prestige Class: The Sage class. Only accessible by changing to that class at the Shrine of Dharma (and only then by using a special one-use scroll, or invoking the Jester's Magikarp Power), they learn all the Wizard and Priest spells. And have a better selection of weapons and armor than the other spellcaster classes.
• Purely Aesthetic Gender: Again, aside from a few exclusive weapons/armor/Personalities and such, gender is a matter of preference.
  • In the original NES translation, the script repeatedly referred to the Hero as Ortega's son, male or female. This was referenced in the GBC version at the start, when the king starts to call your heroine son, corrects himself and adds, "But that dauntless look -- no man could hope to match you!".
• Randomly Drops: Monster Medals in the GBC remake. There are random items as well, approaching the ludicrous; for example, Shoes of Happiness, which have an impossibly low chance to drop off a Metal Slime.
• Razor Wind: The main combat spells for Priests.
• Real Men Wear Pink: All Soldiers wear pink armor, male and female alike. It's made a bit darker in the remakes... but only a little.
• Regional Bonus: The opening cinematic, a proper title screen, and a proper Ortega sprite. The original version of the last more than likely confused a lot of players because it was a Palette Swap Kandar. Although it also caused many a Fan Theory.
• Retroactive Legacy: The Hero is eventually revealed to be Erdrick, the legendary champion whom the heroes of Dragon Quest I and Dragon Quest II are descended from.
• The Reveal: One of the most epic reveals in the history of videogaming, and the one that cemented the game's place in the zeitgeist (especially in Japan): in the last quarter of the game, the world you travel to is the one with the kingdom of Tantagel on it. The player character is none other than Erdrick/Loto, and you play out the events that precede the rest of the trilogy.
• Revive Kills Zombie: After using the Light Orb, healing spells work wonders against Zoma. So do medicinal herbs. (250 damage a pop!)
• The Rez: Soo.
• Robe and Wizard Hat: Male Wizards add long white beards; female Wizards are cute witches.
• Schrodingers Cat: In the Bonus stage of the Updated Rerelease, it is possible to get a wish from the Zenith Dragon to resurrect Ortega.
• Secret Test of Character: To determine your hero's personality in the remakes, a mysterious voice asks a series of questions, then throws you into one of these based on your answers. Your reaction to whatever issue you face determines your personality. Said tests range from dealing with a greedy queen leading her country to war based on lies, to exploring a cavern, to deciding whether or not to take a leap of faith off a tower.
• Shifting Sand Land: Isis and its surrounding area, complete with a pyramid. This area corresponds to Egypt in Real Life.
• Spell My Name with an "S": Dub Name Change aside, there's still some disjointment between proper spellings of a few towns: the biggest being Sioux/Soo, Jipang/Zipangu and Assaram/Ashalam. The last of which gets a few raised eyebrows.
• Squishy Wizard: Wizards. Priests have a few elements of this, but are better about growing out of it.
• Star-Crossed Lovers: Elven princess Ann and her human lover, who chose to be Together in Death, leaving behind an angry Elf Queen who thought they just eloped. And cursed everyone in his hometown to sleep forever.
• Super OCD: A requirement of any player who tries to assemble a full set of the bronze, silver and gold monster medals.
• Timey-Wimey Ball: Affects one of the towns, which is destroyed during the day, but intact and stuck in the past at night.
• Trouble Magnet Gambit: Inverted with the Golden Claw. Dangerous in the pyramid (every step's a random encounter, and you can't use magic in the basement where you get it), but once you leave, as long as you don't return to the pyramid, it's the Fighter's best weapon.
• Updated Rerelease: The Remix on Super Famicom, Game Boy Color and recent modern Cell Phones. All are chock full of extra goodies from Dragon Quest IV, Dragon Quest V and Dragon Quest VI.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: The Change Staff lets you randomly change to different forms. Including monsters. NPCs react accordingly to this. Except for elves, who can see right through most disguises... yet will still sell to you if you transform into a dwarf or other creature they're friendly with.
• Walking Swimsuit Scene: The swimsuit armors let the player turn any female member into this.
• Whip It Good: One of the best weapons, actually...
• With This Herring: It's your Dangerous Sixteenth Birthday, and you're off to face the greatest threat to the world the kingdom has ever known. The king is so impressed with your decision to take up arms that he rewards you with a whopping 300 gold pieces, which wouldn't cover a full set of the (crappy) equipment for sale in the very first town.
• Wolverine Claws: One of the very few weapons beneficial to Fighters.
• Wutai: Zipangu.
• You All Meet in An Inn: Invoked; you create/pick up/drop off your party members at your hometown tavern.
• Your Princess Is in Another Castle: Baramos has a boss. You find this out during a Fake Ending after exploring literally the entire world, spending 40+ hours to do so. It comes out of complete left field and cemented Dragon Quest III's status as a legendary RPG in Japan... 40+ hours was already incredibly long for a NES era RPG, and then it opens up an entire second world map. A very familiar one at that, which led to an even bigger, more awesome revelation of just who the player character was.