Dragon Warrior IV
Introduction
Dragon Warrior IV, known in Japan as Dragon Quest IV, was developed by Chunsoft and published by Enix, originally releasing for the Famicom in February 1990 before Enix’s American subsidiary brought it to the NES in October 1992, making it the last Dragon Quest title that subsidiary would localize before it closed a few years later. Its biggest structural departure from earlier entries was a five-chapter story format: the first four chapters each follow a different future party member through their own self-contained hardships and adventures, from a princess in disguise to a traveling merchant, before the fifth chapter finally unites them all under the series’ usual chosen Hero for the main quest. That chaptered storytelling gave the game a noticeably different pace and sense of character focus compared to the more straightforward hero’s-journey structure of the first three games, letting players get attached to companions before ever controlling the protagonist who eventually leads them. Nintendo Power would later rank it among the best games on the entire console, singling out its inventive five-act structure as the high point of the NES-era Dragon Quest trilogy, and it remains one of the most fondly remembered entries in the series’ console history.
