Dragon Warrior

In most Dragon Quest games, players control a character or party of characters that can walk into towns and buy weapons, armor, and items to defeat monsters outside of the towns: on the world map or in a dungeon. However, in the original Dragon Quest, there was only one character walking on the map. In most of the games, battles occur through random monster attacks and improving the characters' levels requires players to grind. The series uses cursed items, difficult dungeons where players need to use their resources wisely to complete them, and difficult boss battles. When the party encounters monsters the view switches perspective and players are presented with several options on a menu; these turn-based menu-driven battles have become a staple of the series. Players use the menus to select weapons, magic, and other items used to attack and defeat the monsters, or can attempt to flee the fight; though characters cannot flee during a boss battle. Once the party defeats the monsters by winning the battle, each party member gains experience points in order to reach new levels. When a character gains a new level, the statistics (stats) of the character are upgraded. Winning battles also rewards players with gold which can be used to purchase items. In addition to the experience points and gold awarded for successfully defeating monsters, occasionally, items will be dropped as well that are added to the player's inventory. In most Dragon Quest games, players must visit a church (known as a House of Healing in the NES translations) and talk to a priest or nun to save the games' progress; in Dragon Warrior, players had to talk to a king to save their progress, though the first two Dragon Quest titles for Famicom use a password save system. If the party dies in battle the group loses half of its gold and warps to the nearest save location where the hero is revived; players must then pay a priest or nun to revive their party members. Dragon Quest features "Puff Puff" – massage girls that the player can hire with text describing their actions in some of the games; it is a pun on a Japanese onomatopoeia for a girl rubbing her breasts in someone's face, which can also be used for the general term of a girl jiggling her own breasts. In later games gags were used since breasts could not be displayed. The text descriptions were removed from some North American translations. In Dragon Quest III, Dragon Quest VI, Dragon Quest VII, and Dragon Quest IX, several character classes can be chosen for the party members. Each game has its particular set of classes with typical options, including the Cleric, Fighter, Jester, Thief, Warrior, and Mage. All the aforementioned games also include advanced classes such as the Sage. In addition, Dragon Quest VI and VII include monster classes. In Dragon Quest IV: Chapters of the Chosen, a new collectible item known as mini medals, resembling small gold coins with a five-pointed star in the middle, was introduced; they have nothing to do with winning the game, but they can be traded with a certain character for items. Players collect them throughout the game, primarily by opening chests, breaking pots and barrels, and searching in sacks and drawers. Horii introduced them as he wanted to have something players collected that were similar to the crests and orbs in the previous Dragon Quest games but did not want to repeat the necessity for players having to collect a certain number of them before they could complete the game.