Surprised it took so long to hit PC when the sequel was there much earlier. Well, anyway.
If you've never played Dragon Quest Builders (either game,) this is certainly a fun little side-series. As the first outing, 1 has a few clunkier aspects that 2 would improve on significantly - giving you a central hub to come back to and build freely, some clunky controls and mapping, weaker combat and the need to gather all materials piece by piece (there are legitimately at least three major QOL improvements in 2 that were made simply by adding the companion NPC,) and 2 would add the glider and some major QOL upgrades in the form of building tools. In other words, if you've played 2 first, it can be rough going back to 1.
Even still, I'm very glad I picked up the original before 2 came out - the core idea of RPG Minecraft playing off the first Dragon Quest game is fun, even if the mechanics would be refined later, and the story does some legitimately VERY interesting things, both in general and with specific pieces of lore from the original. I still have yet to play a Dragon Quest, but it does a good job selling the setting as post-apocalyptic and contrasting for players who don't remember what this world USED to look like. (This isn't a spoiler, you get the information in the first ten minutes of gameplay.) And players who've already picked up 2 will probably find it interesting seeing what story aspects set up in this game would be carried over into the sequel. In particular, I don't believe 2 ever makes it quite as explicit as 1 does that building, expanded to mean all human acts of transformation and creation, is a thing inherently associated with humanity - which makes the decision to play up Malroth's title of "Master of Destruction" and make it the counterpart to creation, and flesh out the Children of Hargon's theology so thoroughly with it, even better. I also found the late-stage reveals here were really well-executed - I'd say the game's worth looking into for the way it handles the PC's backstory alone.
DQB 2 was my favorite game of 2019, and while 1 isn't as strong as its sequel, it's still a really solid game, and well worth taking a look. If you thought Minecraft could use a little more structure and a LOT more puns, I highly recommend it.
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Well, this is a bit odd, ain't it? Well, I won't say DQB1 is a bad game -- it ain't -- but this series is so mechanically focused I can't really imagine many, if any, people wanting to play it over DQB2, which is such a significant improvement in so many aspects.
Well, at least it means they haven't totally forgotten the series yet. I'm still holding out hope for a DQB3!
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