Erdrick The Hero

So, my best friend (we'll call him Danicka - that's the name of his DQX character) and I both just received offers for a nice job that pays more than I've ever made and offers full medical/dental/optical benefits, as well as all sorts of on-site benefits including a gym and a cafeteria run by gourmet chefs. We're already guaranteed at least twice the amount of hours I work now (my current job only gives 20-25 hrs/week) with built-in overtime each day and alternating 3-4 day weekends (the shifts are really long to make this work, but it sounds totally worth it). Suffice to say, we both accepted the offer. There's a problem though: It's in a city about 2 hours north and we are both broke. Like, we have no money. My current job, as stated above, doesn't give me very many hours, and it pays minimum wage. As it is, I've already had to start living with Danicka at his grandmother's home just to stay off the streets. He currently works delivering the local newspaper. It used to be a decent gig, but subscriptions are dropping like flies and the price of gas has risen to the point where between the two of us, he can barely afford to make the deliveries. Once gas is bought and we pay off the bills, we've barely got money for food. Neither one of us can afford to move. And we have to move in less than a month, now. Rent in the area is bare minimum $1200/month for a two-bedroom or $1600/month for a three-bedroom. Now, we plan on renting a three-bedroom with another friend of mine (who also got the job, he starts a week or two before us) as soon as we can afford to, but we have to save money first (he lives just close enough now that he can afford to carpool to work with a few others in the area, but he's about an hour in the opposite direction of our destination as we are). Right now, our best plan is to camp in Danicka's van on public land in the area for 3-4 days a week on worknights, and come back down to his home for the weekends. We've got a deep-cycle leisure battery in the van with a power inverter so we'll have power (though we still need a charger of some sort, whether it be a wall-powered charger we can charge when we're home/parked somewhere, or a split-charger powered by the alternator), and we're looking into starting memberships at a gym in the area so we'll have access to a bathroom/shower. (We both could use some time at the gym anyway. We don't get access to the company gym until we've been there for a few months.) Obviously, that doesn't sound ideal. That's why I've written up this post, asking for advice. If you guys have any ideas, I'd love to hear them. Thank you for your time.

I've never run across one myself, but I was under the impression that Dragon Potions were one-time use. @Woodus sure, if I find it.

@woodus

A Dragon Quest IX remake should look like DQXI Unreal and play like DQX. DQVC should be random or cycle based on system time rather than having to connect to internet. Multiplayer should be peer-to-peer over the internet without needing to connect to a server. The battle system should be active-turn based, like X, but retain the coup de grace / co-op de grace mechanics. Oh, and there should be an orchestral soundtrack regardless of region (and on every platform, if it goes multiplat). Though Sandy's theme sounds off in the Symphonic Suite, so maybe take that one from the Synthesizer Suite (which is actually different than the DS in-game music sequences). With these changes, I would actually play the game. EDIT: OH! The boat should dock anywhere along the shore like in old DQ games. Dunno why they've been so lazy about the boat lately.

Perhaps instead of "Travel Scrolls", you could use Dragon Potions/Rebirth Stones from II? (Although the item is dummied out in the mobile remake, our own Choppasmith has discovered that the Dragon Potion item is listed in DQII Android/iOS as "Rebirth Stone" - so we have a modern official localization for it!)

...I actually haven't had a chance to try the latest demo, unfortunately. Internet here is total crap so I haven't been able to download it. I saw the screenshots, though. I have my own recreation of the NES font somewhere that should be visually identical to Woodus' (I think he made the other one floating around), but was very likely created by a different piece of software as his (I used the website, FontStruct). If I can find it/redownload it, I can send it to you for you to try out if you'd prefer it over Garrick Bold.

Sounds like people's accounts are getting flagged for playing in the USA on PC now...? I was just connected on Switch though with no issues. I guess we'll see what the deal is when the current maintenance period is over.

While we're talking of modding DQ6... I'd love to hear the original SFC music sequences and samples inserted into the DS version. The instrument set used in the remake sounds rather bland and Happy Humming took a huge dive with the synth voice and "billiards percussion" (for lack of a better term) removed. That and Eternal Lullaby is nowhere near as epic sounding in the remake.

Hmm, I'll have to try this when the game finishes downloading (at 75% now).

Hey @foxfirenelli, since you don't seem keen on using the old Dragon Warrior NES font, I thought I might share this with you: https://fontzone.net/font-details/garrick-bold Garrick Bold is the font used in Dragon Quest XI and maybe even VIII (not sure but it's not in front of me).

Ah, I see. Oops!

This is happening because the game is trying to display Japanese characters, but your Windows locale is not Japanese. There was a solution through Windows 7 using the built-in locale emulator, AppLocale, but AppLocale has been removed in Windows 8/8.1/10. I never used Windows 8/8.1 and this is my first computer with Windows 10... I haven't had a good enough internet connection to even download the game (the launcher is installed but when trying to update it is stuck at 0%) so I haven't had a chance to solve this issue yet. At least I can tell you *why* it happens, though. If you find a solution, please share it! (Technically you *could* change your Windows locale to Japanese, but then Windows will be in Japanese.)

The Den has ads?

That doesn't really work when you can read the spelling. Nice try though.

Surely there's a story here.