Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter: Difference between revisions

An unspecified amount of time [[Cyberpunk|in the future]], humanity has fled the barren, polluted surface world [[After the End|after a catastrophe]] to live [[Beneath the Earth|underground]]. However, the world below is [[Crapsack World|just as miserable]];: only the rich and powerful have access to the upper levels where the air is clean, and every single citizen is [[You Are Number Six|assigned a number]] referred to as a D-ratio, which determines one's place in society. The highest possible number that can be achieved is 1/4, the [[Title Drop|dragon quarter]] of the title.

Our lead character, Ryu, possesses the abysmally low D-ratio of 1/8192 and is expected to spend his entire life toiling away with nearly no chance at promotion. Everything changes when he accidentally bonds with a dragon and gains the ability to morph into one [[Deadly Upgrade|at the expense of his humanity]]. Along the way, he meets [[Cute Mute|Nina]], [[Mysterious Waif|a mysterious young woman]] with wings grafted onto her back, and becomes determined to escape to the surface with her. They are eventually joined by [[Cool Big Sis|Lin]], a [[La Résistance|Trinity]] member who helps them for reasons of her own.

''Dragon Quarter'' has some very interesting gameplay mechanics. The SOL (Scenario Overlay) system encourages you to restart the game from the beginning of the story while retaining items and experience and raising your D-ratio, which allows you to access new cutscenes. The [[Deadly Upgrade|dangers]] of morphing into a dragon are reflected in the D-Counter, which goes up in percentage every time you use those abilites (and even outside of battle, when you aren't) and can only be lowered through restarting the game through the SOL system. While you're allowed to suspend your game through quicksaves that are deleted once you resume, permanent save files could only be created through rare save tokens, making the game quite [[Nintendo Hard|a challenge]].