THE DRAGON CURSE
Legend of Mana - https://youtu.be/TKeE_yiV4Q4
For a good while there I was certain Drakonis was the game's final boss.
Now I feel like it has at least three: dragon, sproutling and Jumi stories. And although the title references the end of the dragon arc, I think the majority of this stream was spent finding general mechanics that I should have had for a while: pets, instruments and seeds. I feel close to the end of the Jumi arc, but quests have prerequisites that aren't necessarily in their line (and now I want to see the lock & key flowchart for this game) and so the next one on the list doesn't seem to be spawning in the location given by the quest walkthrough I looked up.
Why do I need a quest walkthrough? Well, while I don't strictly require it, I also don't like spending stream time wandering around with no idea what I'm doing and certainty that I'm not getting anything done. Even with the insane amount of wandering that I've done during playthroughs of the Xenoblade series (esp. in chapter 5 of XC3), I always knew where I was supposed to go. There was that quest marker on the map. I just ignored it other than to stay away until I'd finished my side area explorations. This game (and several others like it) has the problem of not telling you any hints on where to go, and just expecting you to wander until you find something. And that something isn't even necessarily marked as a quest when you find it. I was halfway through the "Rachel" quest when the quest marker showed up! While that style of gameplay might be okay if I had limitless time to kill, I don't. I have other games I want to play. And so, I look up a walkthrough.
I should note that I'm not reading the entire walkthrough. I'm just skimming it for key words on where I'm supposed to go. Hence getting lost halfway through the Lucky Clover quest…
The story of the game overall seems to be with the sproutling story, though the dragon story does share themes with the "of Mana" series as a whole. I do wonder if the stories will be tied together beyond just that the player character is part of all of them, but I suppose they don't need to be. Other RPGs don't do that with their side quests. Although I feel like the dragon and Jumi stories are at least a little more significant than what is normally called a "side quest."
