METALSLIMEHUNTER'S PROFILE

Definition of style over substance.
The game sort of looks the part, which you'd hope to be true since it's not difficult to go to The Spriter's Resource and gather up the necessary odds and ends to make a Dragon Quest clone game. But things like the full-screen filters get annoying after a while and don't actually look as good as you think they do.

So much time was spent chasing "the look" that while the game may seem and appear mostly authentic to DQ, it is evident that not a single shred of effort was put into dealing with the most basic RPG-Maker 2003 bugs that arise from custom menu and battle systems -- bugs that can largely be considered "solved" at this point in time.

There are too many issues with using the CMS to bypass events/transfers, softlocks induced by activating the custom systems simultaneously, plenty of simple ways to gain player movement while a menu is still open, ways to trick the game into thinking you're cycling through menu A when you're actually in menu B, ways to bring up the menu during times when you shouldn't be able to, and more.

These problems should have been among the first to find solutions during the game's lengthy and troubled development, but it's abundantly clear where the priorities were, and where they weren't.

That, and the insistence to use sketchy, outdated dynRPG plugins rather than taking advantage of the newer Maniacs Patch which boasts better features and superior performance. The fact that there now exists a 2D Dragon Quest/RPG Maker 2003 game that runs poorly on mighty machines is not something to be proud of.

There are a lot of things done "right" here, but they are all let down hard by the countless missteps. You chased the "definitive edition" label and the clout so hard that you failed to notice and take care of the many detailed issues along the way.