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Video Game / Dragon Quest Monsters

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A Dragon Quest Spin-Off series published by Square Enix (formerly just Enix, before they merged with Square), where you control a youth who wanders the world, collecting, battling, and breeding monsters and eventually using them to save the world. Dragon Quest Monsters and both versions of Dragon Quest Monsters 2 were released in America and Europe as "Dragon Warrior Monsters".

To date, the games in the series are:

There are also multiple spin-offs of the Monsters series on mobile phones, such as Dragon Quest Monsters: Wanted! and Dragon Quest Monsters: Super Light. Unfortunately, Caravan Heart, Joker 3 and all of the rereleases and mobile games (including Joker 2 Professional) are No Export for You. However, Caravan Heart was translated into English through two years of work by dedicated fans; available here.

Note that the Dragon Quest: Monster Battle Road games, which include three arcade games and Dragon Quest: Monster Battle Road Victory for the Nintendo Wii, are a Collectible Card Game series that plays quite differently from the Monsters series. The cards had a barcode on the back, you scanned 3 cards in the arcade console to determine your party in the arcade, and you fought various monsters in an arena hosted by Morrie the arena master from Dragon Quest VIII. When you first started the game, it spat out 3 random cards, and you could get more random cards by putting in more money.

Also see Dragon Quest Treasures, which started development as a Monsters title starring Erik and Mia from Dragon Quest XI, but was reworked into a new concept during its time in Development Hell.

Tropes present in this series include:

    Series-Wide/Unsorted 
  • Absurdly Low Level Cap: Each monster species has their own innate level cap in the first two games, some of which can be very low, though through breeding the level caps can be raised and eventually every monster can hit the maximum cap of 99. The monster that most exemplifies this is the secret Dimensaur in the second game, who has the maximum possible growth rates in all its stats but has an absolutely pitiful level cap of 9 (which also means if you were one of the lucky people who got one legitimately back in the day and didn't cheat it into your game, it would be impossible to breed it and increase the level cap).
  • Big Bad: Interestingly averted for the first two games, who don't have any sort of overarching villain. The closest there is are the kings of the rival kingdoms in Terry's Wonderland. The remake of DQM2 adds in a new villain for the post-game, the dark dimensional force known as Gloom. Played straight in the Joker games, which have Dr. Snap in the first one, Rigor Mortex in the second one, Dr. Snap (Again) in the third game.
  • Cap:
    • The first two games were pretty much cap-free, with 999 being the only stat limit, and all monsters had it. This changed in Joker — individual monsters now have distinct caps. Oddly enough, the monster with the highest total caps? The humble Lump Wizard.note  (The second-highest was the See Butterfly.)
    • Terry's Wonderland had odd caps for agility (Maxed at 511), and Intel (255), but every other stat could be maxed to 999.
  • Com Mons: Slime and the other Mascot Mooks et al. In Joker 2, they gave this a nod in the "X/XY" system. Every family (other than ???) has an "X" and "XY" monster, based on the common monster of that family — Slime, Dragon, Conklave, etc, and breeding them with themselves results in a higher tier version of the same critter. This can be repeated again for a still higher tier version of the same Com Mons you ran into at the start of the game.
    • To elaborate: You can get a Rank C Slime X by breeding 2 level 20 Rank F Slimes, and you can get a Rank S Slime XY by breeding 2 level 50 Slime Xs. These variants look exactly the same as the original variants, but have much higher stat growth and caps, and in the case of the XY versions they have a bonus "Ultimate" skilltree thrown in, as well.
    • They try and fail to make the standard Slime a lethal joke monster by giving them Mega magic, but the effort to breed one actually able to get that move is far less effective than just getting a Rainhawk that would be a superior monster. However they succeed in Joker by making it part of the Disc 1 nuke.....
    • They also succeed in the first two games in a different way, Slimes are really common and easy to recruit. Other common monsters are those of Insect family and Beast family. After you can breed, breed a Slime with an insect for a Snaily, who has high attack, massive defense and agility, decent all around stats, and grows at ridiculous rate. With a Beast, you get the Spotslime who has good growth rate, and decent stats. And if you reach +5 with the slime, you can get a Spotking, who has awesome stats and still retain its growth rate, and has tons of inherited skills (especially if you add a Healer in the middle of the process).
  • Creature-Breeding Mechanic: The first several games in the series have a breeding system in which offspring may not have a similar appearance to their parents, but they will inherit their parents' powers. Joker and afterward changed this to a fusion system.
  • Crutch Character: In the first two games, Birds and Bugs generally leveled up faster than monsters of other families, which got them stronger quicker, but had weaker stat growths and lower level caps that left them weaker than other families in the end. In practice though this really only affected Bugs, as there were still plenty of high-end and even middle-end Birds that had decent-to-great level caps and stat growth while still leveling up faster than equivalent-strength monsters of other families, which made Birds one of the best families to use.
  • Defeat Means Friendship:
    • In the pre-Joker games, defeated monsters will occasionally get up after being defeated and ask to join you. Chances are improved by feeding the enemies meat in battle.
    • In the Joker games, a variation is used through scouting. You don't actually HURT the the target monster when scouting, but you "show them your strength". Depending on how strong your mons are, the target may join you in admiration or refuse to be dragged around with weaklings.
    • The Dark Prince incorporates both systems, allowing monsters to join either by active scouting or by random chance afterward.
  • Disc-One Nuke:
    • In the original game you can get a ??? and a Goldslime before completing the C division in the Tournament. The game gives you JUST the right high power monsters via auto-joining bosses in the first few Traveler's gates to accomplish the feat, making the entire rest of the game a breeze
    • Players with knowledge of how Slimes turn into King Slimesnote  allows for an early game, powerful monster in the first 2 games — any Slime that is +5 or above, bred with another Slime, results in a King Slime with vastly improved stats and spells. In Joker, this was turned into a "Quad Fusion" — any monster with 4 grandparents who are Slimes is a King Slime.
      • King Slimes in Joker are Rank C, which means you can jump from Rank F to Rank C in one go, skipping the first 3rd of the game. In addition, King Slime is one of only 2 monsters (the other being a postgame exclusive dragon deity) that receives "Courage" (mistranslated as "Cleric" in the US version) as a skillset. Courage is based off the skillset of the Heroes from the main Dragon Quest games, which includes their iconic attack Gigaslash and several high end spells they commonly learn such as Kazap and Multiheal. This means that not only is making the King Slime a huge stat increase for the point in the game; it gains access to some of the franchise's strongest abilities. Say goodbye to most of the challenge until endgame and postgame content!
    • The "4 Slimes = 1 King Slime" combination was removed in Joker 2 due to the specific fusion being tied to the Slime XY line, but the King Slime is still an extremely easy monster to make early considering how strong it is. Instead of fusing four Slimes, you instead need to first fuse a Mecha-Mynah with a low rank Slime to get a "Behemoth Slime". Getting two these Behemoth Slimes then fusing them together will result in the King Slime in all its earlygame-breaking glory. There are other combos for the Behemoth Slime such as Angel Slime+Swarmtroop and Wild Slime+Angel Slime, but the aforementioned is the easiest because both mons are obtainable right away.
      • Additionally, a pair of similar combines was added in Joker 2 — Great Sabercat (breed 4 Great Sabercat Cubs) and Great Dracky (4 Drackys), both monsters available in the first map. These two monsters have downsides (traits that make them sub-par) but can be bred away to make other rank C monsters that are equally powerful, and still allow you to skip ranks F, E, and D.
    • In both Joker and Joker 2, you can simply breed monsters to get a similar monster of the same rank. In Joker 2, doing this enough times in the same rank will move you up a rank, no matter what — for example, breeding a Beast monster and continually choosing the Beast monster child will have you go through 1-3 "generic" beast monsters for that rank. Upon reaching the final generic monster of said rank, breeding again with almost anything will cause the resultant child to be a generic monster of the next highest rank, all the way up to Rank A (there are no generic rank S monsters). With enough time and effort, it's entirely possible to have an entire team of Rank A monsters the second you can breed monsters, trivializing the rest of the game.
    • Manipulating Slimes combination in the first two games can lead to this. In the second game, after you can breed, you also get Sailor Ring which increases defense growth. You started with a Slime and its likely that you caught some Insects. Snaily +1 equipped with Sailor Ring while leveling its first few levels can Solo the Aquatic wild monsters of the second world after a bit of grinding(while having awesome spells from Slimes to boot).
    • If you want to take it further, the second world supplied you with monsters with awesome skillsets, namely Healers, and the optional recruit Octo. The third world (which the same Snaily can solo relatively well with a +3 and a Sailor Ring enhanced growth) has Grizzly who has some useful skills, and there's an Armorpede breeding opportunity ready to make some vicious Snaily that can solo the entire main game from that point while making the lower class Tournaments a total joke (and get a Magic Key for another nuke).
    • It doesn't stop there, Roboster deserves mention simply because it by far the best Mon for passing on physical skills (BiAttack, RainSlash, SquallHit) in both DQM1 AND DQM2. It is also very easy to make in both games: Breed any Beast-type monster with a Devil-type for a Grizzly. Breed any Material-type monster with the Grizzly to get Roboster. The Grizzly's insane Attack growth means the Roboster will hit like a truck as well. You can choose to use the Roboster for a portion of the storyline, or simply breed it to pass on its skills.
      • In particular, BiAttack and later QuadHits is a extremely good skill because it is so easy to learn and gets better the better stats and personality your monster has. Even Boss-type monsters will get a lot of mileage from having BiAttack/QuadHits, even when they rocking top-level skills such as HellBlast, Gigaslash, and MegaMagic.
    • In DQM1 and DQM2, breed a Bug-type monster with a Material-type for a Stagbug. On it's own, it's nothing special, but if you breed two stagbugs using the mentioned Roboster to make one of them, you get Hornbeet; a monster with insanely good growths, an insanely fast leveling speed, and with some of the best physical skills to complement its stat growths. And this is a monster you can easily get within an hour of level grinding once you are allowed to breed monsters. The insane stat growth, fast leveling curve, and the inherited skills ensures that the Hornbeet will be able solo the rest of the main storyline of both games without needing to 'upgrade' it in between. And even when the Hornbeet does starts to fall behind in the postgame, you can simply... breed any Boss-type monster with the Hornbeet to get that same Boss-type monster with the moves and stats the Hornbeet had.
    • In particular for DQM2, the simple, low cost, and easy to obtain Increase spell (which raises the defense of your entire party when used). Up until the Sky World (which is past the halfway point of the main game), very few enemies have skills that deal damage regardless of defense, have support moves to weaken, or just simply have really high attack to still hurt you despite defense boosts. So to get through anything up past the halfway point, you can simply use the Increase spell a few times in a battle and then be left completely untouchable (especially easy if you're using high defense monsters).
    • In Terry's Wonderland, there are several Non Player Characters willing to breed with you after you pass a certain class. One example is Teto, who after you beat him, apologizes for his behavior and offers to breed his Firn Fiend with you. If you breed it with a bird, you get a Snowbird, a high-end monster with high HP, agility, and defense. It is also used in many lucrative breeds of other high-end monsters when it starts to cap itself.
    • Also in Terry's Wonderland, there are a number of optional gates you can enter throughout the game that have bosses that are significantly stronger than what you should be able to take...and thus are significantly stronger than what you can get without abusing the other entries on this list. As such, if you can take them down (which requires a bit of luck and some status ailments), they'll be mainstays. The first of these, Knight Aberrant, can even take himself down without ailments, since his Frenzy skill can target himself!
  • Distaff Counterpart:
  • Dub Name Change: Pretty much a given. Most notable with Caravan Heart and the Joker games. Outside of Japan, most of the boss monsters and their new names had an Early-Bird Cameo because of this (as their respective games had not come out yet overseas).
  • Early Game Hell: Caravan Heart gets hit pretty hard with this in the beginning compared to the other Dragon Quest games. You start out with only one monster, can't even befriend any more monsters since the monsters in Caravan Heart are named characters that join at set parts of the game, and you have to learn how to handle the caravan mechanic, where each step taken on the map consumes rations, which have to be refilled either with food items or gold. This means that not only are you fighting with only one party member for the first hour or so of the game, but you're also incredibly strapped for gold since regular exploration on the map is consuming a finite resource. It's not uncommon for players to get stuck before they reach the first Illusion.
  • Forced Level-Grinding:
    • In Joker, when you have to deal with quadrilinear synthesis in order to Catch em' All, you'll have to do a ton of grinding to raise and synthesize the ridiculous requirements, many of which require high end metallic slimes (which in turn require you to get a lot of the very difficult and annoying to get lower end Metal Slimes).
    • Thankfully, in Joker 2, it's been made somewhat easier. The English release gets Meddle Slimes, which are incredibly easy to catch post-game and turn into Metal Slimes when caught (allowing you to catch many of them without them becoming harder to scout). Not to mention that post-game, an entire, easy-to-access area composed of almost entirely Liquid Metal Slimes and Metal King Slimes is available, speeding up level grinding much faster.
  • Fusion Dance: Called "synthesis", this is what "breeding" has been presented as since Joker. Potentially a Woolseyism, as it explains where the "parents" disappear to, averts Hot Skitty-on-Wailord Action, and allows for a rare third "gender" used in the breeding system (neutral, as opposed to positive and negative). The lack of defined genders also can be a relief for some people who would otherwise go to the trouble of catching a monster again if it turned out to be a girl after planning to give it a boy's name. That said, "gender" was abandoned entirely starting with Joker 3, allowing any monsters to synthesize.
  • Global Currency Exception: There's an NPC in both of the first two games who will trade you medals for rare monster eggs. Including the Big Bad, once you beat the game. In Caravan Heart, it's medals for rare monster hearts.
  • Gotta Catch 'Em All: You get bonuses for it. Although some people just pick one or two families until the post-game.
  • Guide Dang It!:
    • Breeding most of the boss-type monsters. (Some are based on Dragon Quest mythos, such as the boss of Dragon Quest II requiring his Dragon as one of its parents.)
    • "Quadrilinear" synthesis combos, which first appeared in Joker, were especially bad about this, with nearly all of them requiring ridiculous and nonsensical combinations.
  • Hot Skitty-on-Wailord Action: The earlier games use this even more so than Pokémon, as any two monsters can breed, no matter how terrifying or improbable that is. Later games avoid the problem by presenting the mechanic as a Fusion Dance instead.
  • Inevitable Tournament: Every game has a tournament arc somewhere along the line.
  • Infinity -1 Sword: The higher rank monsters of the non-??? monster families in the various games, as well as any of the bosses that join you automatically. Most of the series' Dragons are included in the "higher rank monsters" list, and most of those are used in the creation of Infinity +1 Sword monsters.
    • DQM1 / DQM2: Any of the bosses that join you automatically (especially early game), any metal slime family monster.
    • Caravan Heart: Reincarnated human party members.
    • Joker: King Slime (VERY easily available, gets an overpowered skilltree based on the Dragon Quest III hero's spells and abilities)
    • Joker 2: Swarm, Conklave (Swarm gets 5-6 hits a turn and can equip anti-Metal Slime weapons, Conklave gets 4 hits per attack, attacks 1-2 times a turn, and can equip anti-Metal Slime weapons). Joker 2 also added specific Infinity -1 Sword monsters, in the form of X (Rank C) and XY (Rank S) versions of iconic Rank F monsters (Slime, Green Dragon, Conklave, etc). You get these by breeding 2 of the normal monsters together when they're level 20, or in the case of XY, by breeding 2 Xs at level 50.
    • Joker 2 Professional: Any monster can now do the X/XY system, meaning that with work, you can turn any monster in the game into a Rank S IMOS. (This also means there are over 800 monsters in the game. But hey, nobody argued with Battle Road Victory.)
  • Infinity +1 Sword: The ???? family of monsters in all games but Caravan Heart. They are all exclusively based on the Big Bads and Superbosses of previous Dragon Quest games, all supremely powerful as a rule, and all fairly difficult to breed. DQM2 even had Mythology Gags in the form of "evolved" super-versions of the Dragon Quest bosses, such as a Berserk Dragonlord, or "Asura Zoma".
  • Initialism Title: All three Joker games had logos that presented them as DQM [number], with Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker in much smaller text underneath. It didn't stick, as later games not in the Joker subseries went back to spelling out the title in full.
  • Just Add Water: Any pair of monsters will create viable offspring. A very large number of monsters are never seen in game outside of breeding.
  • Leaked Experience: Monsters you aren't actively using will still slowly gain experience, though in the Game Boy games it's at the cost of becoming much more wild.
  • Level Grinding: It's a Dragon Quest game, 'nuff said. Part of the Level Grinding will come naturally, as you attempt, for the Four Hundred Billionth Time, to get a certain monster you need for a combination to join you.
  • Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards: Inverted. Physical attacks can hit the damage cap, while magic and breath attacks have set values.
  • Magikarp Power: Through skilled breeding and training, any monster can have any skill, and completely maxed-out stats. Or at least, in the first two games.
    • An example is the humble Slime. The first monster you get in every game except Joker/Joker 2/Dark Prince (where it's the first monster you catch), Slimes can learn Madante (Magic Burst), the most powerful magic spell in the game. Or at least, could, if they could ever hope to get their stats high enough to pass the minimum stat requirements to learn it.
    • Metal Slime monsters tend to be this. At the start, they only have a decent defense and speed stat, and their unique immunity to magic — but defense scales oddly, meaning their single digit hit points won't save them. They also level up slower than anything else in the game. However, give them a few levels, and perhaps a few healing or support abilities, and they become some of the most game breaking monsters you can use.
  • Market-Based Title: The first two games were renamed Dragon Warrior Monsters and lost their subtitles for the Western releases. The Dark Prince also lost the "3" from the Japanese title and had its subtitle shortened.
  • Marshmallow Hell: You can teach your monsters the famous Puff-Puff move in the first two games, though it is called "Ahh" in the English translation.
  • Mascot Mook: The iconic Slime is usually the first monster you get or capture, and in each game the Slimes make up an entire monster family on their own, with a few of them being designed specifically for the Mons games.
  • Metal Slime: And Liquid Metal Slime, and Metal King Slime, and Liquid Metal King Slime, and Metal Kaiser Slime, and Gem Slime... Somewhat difficult to catch, but makes incredible monsters as when they are a part of your team, they retain the outrageous agility, defense, and immunity to negative status and all magic... But gain more than single digit hit points and actually get good spells.
  • Mons: The main series has had monster catching all the way back in Dragon Quest V for the Super Nintendo, and this spinoff codified the DQ way of raising mons.
  • Mythology Gag: In the original DQM and DQM2, breeding the bosses made somewhat logical sense — getting the Dragonlord's (Dragon Quest) true form required you to use his first form. Most boss monsters were similar references to their original games. One notable exception to this is Hargon (Dragon Quest II), who isn't used to breed Sidoh, but instead is used to breed Baramos (Dragon Quest III). Likewise, Baramos, who is NOT used for Zoma, but instead used for Mudou (Dragon Quest VI) (Murdaw in modern translations). Murdaw himself isn't used for Deathmoore (Mortamor), but rather is the only way to get Poseidon, an original monster for Monsters 2.note  What do all these bosses have in common? They're all famous Disc One Final Bosses — each of them were played up as the main antagonist of their respective games, quite famously in DQ3's case, only to be revealed as only a middling flunky at best.
  • Nintendo Hard: Joker 3 is perhaps the hardest game in the series, having especially hard boss fights that require a great deal more grinding and strategy than usual.
  • No Kill like Overkill: Battle Road Victory's Coup de Graces. Not in terms of damage (though by the time a player successfully pulls one off, it will be a One-Hit Kill), but in execution. Here's what some of them look like.
  • Olympus Mons:
    • Most of the bosses from the main series, and all of the ones from the game itself, are recruitable, mostly through breeding, with Mythology Gag after Mythology Gag included in the process. For example, to get the true last boss of Dragon Quest II, you need to use his dragon. In most of the games, the last boss is available using Mini Medals after you finish the credits.
    • In the original 2 for the Gameboy Color, they added Olympus Mons Plus 1 — upgraded and evolved versions of the other Olympus Mons, such as a Zoma with a huge scythe ("Asura Zoma"), or a berserk Dragonlord (Lord Draco).
    • Joker would introduce even more, including many that are unique the Monsters franchise including a Metal Slime Death Star.
  • Palette Swap: A staple of the Dragon Quest series, this was actually mostly averted in most of the DQM games, with some exceptions — for example, Slime / Metal Slime, or Phoenix / Blizzardy in the original. The fact that Joker 2 returned to the series's roots with a large number of them actually pleased the fanbase as these were all Mythology Gags. The fact that it made Joker 2 really really complex, especially when breeding, especially when breeding old DQ bosses, was also a factor.
  • Power Creep, Power Seep: Monster strengths and powers in the Monsters series have only a tangential relation to their equivalents in the main games.
  • Power Nullifier: Mute status effects for spellcasters, surround status effects for melee, "trip" and other "waste a turn" effects for everyone.
  • Prequel:
  • Rank Inflation: Classes of monsters from Joker onwards go from F to A, then S (for Japanese "shin", aka "perfect"), then X. In Joker 2, they renamed X as "SS". The Dark Prince expands the range by setting the bottom even lower, to Rank G.
  • Randomly Generated Levels: The early games had an increasingly complex roguelike system, which was eventually ported to the main Dragon Quest series proper in DQ9's "grotto" system.
    • DQM1 had nothing but a City of Adventure and dungeons that were completely randomly generated, making it a very simplistic Mons Roguelike.
    • DQM2 added some more static areas, but also random worlds (including random towns, random monsters, random bosses, and 1-10 random dungeons each) through the "key" system.
    • Caravan Heart had a very static world map (it was the map from Dragon Quest II set centuries after the events of that game) but had very random dungeons.
    • Joker and Joker 2 mostly removed this element of the series to make way for the 3D, although Joker 2's "Hell" has random elements to it.
    • The Updated Rereleases of DQM1 and DQM2 for the 3DS retained the randomization.
  • Schizo Tech: The setting in the Joker games is medievalesque, but the main character of the first game uses a jet-ski to reach new islands and the second game involves airships. Joker 3 is full-on Science Fantasy, taking place in a sci-fi environment complete with futuristic cities with highly advanced technology, but still containing magic and medieval-fantasy styled monsters.
  • Sequel Number Snarl: As of The Dark Prince, the Japanese series numbering goes 1, 2, Caravan Heart, Joker, Joker 2, Joker 3, and 3.
  • Spin-Off: The entire series to Dragon Quest, but more specifically, to the monster scouting found in Dragon Quest V.
    • Caravan Heart is a direct spinoff of Dragon Quest VII — Keifer is sucked into the Dragon Quest II world (a few centuries after the events of the Loto/Erdrick trilogy) and has to fix things that have gone wrong in the years since a hero last visited.
    • Dragon Quest Monsters Battle Road is a spin off to this spin off.
  • Spinoff Babies: Both Terry's Wonderland and Caravan Heart feature party members from the mainline titles as kids. (But not The Dark Prince; Psaro just looks younger than he did in IV, and even then he's still a teen or young adult.)
  • Starter Mon: A Slime is always the first monster you own in the first two games. Mostly it's because Slimes are the Mascot Mook, as they're very common and weak, but they do have Magikarp Power in that they can learn Mega Magic. Later games will have other low-rank monsters as the starters, while Slimes will be the first ones you encounter in the field. Some of the later games (Joker 2, DQM2 3D, and Joker 3) feature unique starter monsters that the player can customize to some degree.
  • Tastes Like Friendship: In the first two games and Dark Prince, you can woo monsters to your side by feeding them quality meat.
  • Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny: A very weird In-Universe version of this. Ever wanted to see if Zoma could take on Estark? Well, now you can. The intro to Monster Battle Road Victory dials this up to 11.
  • Updated Re-release: And each one can generally be expected to have newer, cooler monsters that you will never see in the West.
    • DQM 1+2 PSX, a Playstation remake of Dragon Quest Monsters 1 and 2, with improved graphics and the ability to do various things cross generations (breed between a DQM and DQM2 save, for example).
    • Both Dragon Quest Monsters Joker 2 and Dragon Quest Monsters Joker 3 got "Professional" re-releases relatively shortly after release, which were similar to Expansion Packs — hundreds of new monsters, rebalancing, additional storyline content, et cetera. They also had a more heavy focus on online competitive play.
    • Terry's Wonderland 3D is a remake of the first game for the Nintendo 3DS. The game retains the roguelike elements of the first game, but is fully 3D, implements the Joker skilltree and monster size system, and includes an expansive epilogue that takes place after the original game's ending.
    • Similarly, DQM2 got a remake, as a single 3DS title: Dragon Quest Monsters 2: Iru and Luca's Marvelous Mysterious Key. Beyond the additions in Terry's Wonderland, "Super G" monsters that count as entire parties by themselves are added, as well as the item forging mechanic and rarefied monsters from Dragon Quest X, in addition to a double speed mode for combat.
  • Useless Useful Spell: Subverted. The status effect spells are actually pretty useful, especially against other Tamers.
  • Your Princess Is in Another Castle!: In Caravan Heart, you beat the Big Bad, causing him to flee the (good) High Demon Lord he was possessing, only... he ... fled... right? Whoops. After the credits, you see the 4 other (good) Demon Lords who helped you out throughout the game floating in the darkness... then the darkness sprouts a hideous face. Cue the hero having to run screaming back to the Alternate Universe to sort that little mess out....

    Dragon Quest Monsters 
  • Bait-and-Switch Boss: In the remake, a Mimic prepares to fight Terry and his monsters in the Door of Power, but bolts when it sees another monster. Said monster turns out to be the Quadrahead, the true boss, who also replaces the Living Statue boss from the original.
  • Break the Haughty: After being losing to Terry in the Starry Night Tournament, the King of Great Log and the King of Dead tree are humbled and become a lot more polite to him.
  • Catchphrase: The King in the first game. "Busy, busy, busy..." Also in the first game is the left clown's "Oh... King...", translated as "That's a bit much!" in remake.
  • Continuing is Painful: Being wiped out in the first game results in the loss of all your items.
  • Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: The King of Great Tree is bit of a scatterbrained bumbler, but there are hints he was a great monster master in his youth. He proves he still has it with his fairly potent team of metal monsters in the tournament. He can also be surprisingly wise and he comes up with a surprisingly brilliant solution to the fight over the spirit stone.
  • Cutting the Knot: How the King of Great Tree solves the problem with the spirit stone, rather literally too. Instead of keeping it for humans or giving it to the monsters he breaks it in half and gives each broken half to a side, ensuring life for all and that they will always need one another.
  • Evil Counterpart: The mysterious swordsman in the original game, which series vets recognized.
  • Evil Twin: Terry? in the first game, who looked like an older version of the protagonist wielding a sword. This may have been intentionally done for die-hard fans of the series.
  • Foil: The Kings of Great Tree and Great Log. The former is a goofy but kindly Reasonable Authority Figure who wants Terry to be the champion of Great Tree but never at any point forces him, the latter is a serious and rude ruler who forces Milly to fight for Great Log.
  • Ghost Leg Lottery: The final boss of the Gate of Wisdom in DQM1 is Ethereal Serpent, and his boss arena resembles a Ghost Leg Lottery. Both your position and the Ethereal Serpent's are visible at all times, but its starting position will change based on which legs you choose. The arena is a reference to Fifer's Spire in Dragon Quest III, the fifth floor of said dungeon using a similar layout.
  • Luke, I Am Your Father: The Rival in the original Dragon Quest Monsters turns out to be Milly, the sister Terry thinks he has to rescue. Turns out she could take care of herself after all.
  • Marshmallow Hell: In the ending of 3DS remake of DQM1, Terry receives this from a bunny girl as congratulations for winning the Starry Night Tournament. This is notably one of the only times in the whole series it isn't a fake-out.
  • Mythology Gag:
    • Every single dungeon in the first Dragon Quest Monsters is based on an iconic boss fight from a previous Dragon Quest game. For example, the first 2 dungeons are from Dragon Quest, and have you fighting the Golem and Green Dragon, who join you. They even had plans to add a 99 floor dungeon that ended with the Superboss of Dragon Quest VI: "Dark Dream" or Nokturnus, the local Satan analogue, but it was Dummied Out for time's sake. Dragon Quest Monsters 2 has "evolved" versions of all the iconic bosses, such as Asura Zoma, Lord Dragon, et cetera, as well. You discover in Caravan Heart most of the way through the game that you're in the world of Dragon Quest II, centuries after the events of the original series.
    • Mixed with Continuity Nod; the main character of Terry's Wonderland is, as it happens, Terry, and his kidnapped sister's name is Milayou. Both of these kids share names with two major characters of Dragon Quest VI (which wasn't actually localized until 2011). This becomes especially relevant during the Final Boss sequence in Wonderland, when The Dragon is summoned to fight Terry. The game heavily implies the Dragon to be an older version of Terry, after a Deal With the Devil that saw him sell his soul for power while desperately searching for his sister — which describes Terry's character arc in DQVI exactly. "Terry?" even tells the main character to take care of his sister and not lose himself to the pursuit of power.
  • Plot Hole: Terry and his sister Milly, the main two children in Terry's Wonderland are also important characters (as adults) in Dragon Quest VI, but events as they play out in VI raise questions about their DQM adventures. Terry and Milly are both accomplished champions of monster breeding in DQM, and Milly was even dating a prince, but at some point between DQM and VI they lose all access to the world of monsters and don't care. Events in Terry's Wonderland specifically seem to inspire his path as an adult. In Wonderland, Terry encounters a mysterious older swordsman wearing similar garb to him; in the end, the mysterious swordsman charges Terry with looking after his sister, no matter what. While western gamers wouldn't know it (since VI wasn't localized until 2011) the swordsman is actually a grown Terry, currently embroiled in a quest to find his sister that gets sidetracked by a Deal With the Devil — the Devil in this case being Dhuran, the Final Boss of Wonderland; the swordsman's presence in DQM is actually part of a Stable Time Loop.
  • The Rival: In the original, Terry is constantly compared to a "Mystery Trainer" from the kingdom of Great Log, who is allegedly not only really good, but one of the scariest damn people you'll ever met. You don't actually get to meet this rival of yours until the final tournament, though. That's because your sister that you were supposed to be "rescuing" is the "Mystery Trainer."
  • Royals Who Actually Do Something: In the Terry's Wonderland remake, the kings of Great Tree, Great Log, and Dead Tree accompany Terry to Blight Tree to protect the spirit stone.
  • Samus Is a Girl: The "Mystery Trainer" in the original whom everyone speaks of in fearful terms. Not only is she a girl, she's your sister. You know, the one you THOUGHT you were "rescuing."
  • Took a Level in Kindness: The King of Great Log is a lot nicer in subsequent appearances. This includes the remake where he becomes an ally after you defeat his champion in the tournament.
  • Warmup Boss: In Terry's Wonderland, Hale is a Healer with only his regular attack and can heal himself. If you have recruited a full team, he can go down in a couple of turns.
  • Well-Intentioned Extremist: The Celestial Fiends in the remake of Terry's Wonderland want to take the spirit stone from the humans so that they can save their own kingdom. In the end they aren't evil at all, they are even willing to listen to the humans if they can supply an alternate solution.
  • World Tree: Lots of kingdoms in the DQM world live inside of enormous trees: Great Tree, Big Stump/Big Tree, Dead Tree, Great Log, and Blight Tree.

    Dragon Quest Monsters 2 
  • Adaptational Intelligence: In Dragon Quest Monsters 2 the citizens of Great Log don't believe Cobi's or Tara's warnings that Great Log is sinking and don't even notice their island is dying until it is almost too late, not even their parents. In the remake they catch on Great Log is in serious trouble sooner and Cobi's and Tara's parents believe them from the start, their dad even helps directly by giving side-quests to help them train.
  • Anti-Frustration Features: In the second game, to obtain the Ice key, you need to give away an Army Ant and Mad Gopher to a shopkeeper and your father respectively. As such, obtaining these monsters from the Pirate world are mandatory to beat the game, but they are given the highest possible join rate, to where they'll have a decent chance of joining without even being given any meat. And normally when you obtain a monster, in the main worlds it becomes significantly harder to get them to join you even if you no longer have one of it in possession, with even Com Mons having little chance of joining you without Sirloin or copious amount of Ribs. However Army Ant and Mad Gopher are not given this penalty, in case the player obtained one of them and released or bred them, saving the player much frustration in trying to get another one to progress when Sirloin is effectively unfeasible to obtain at this point.
  • Awesome, but Impractical: The combo moves in Dragon Quest Monsters 2. When they actually work, they're awesomely powerful and have some really impressive animations compared to the normal attack skills in the game. But even assuming you knew of their existence and the working combos, while ensuring your monsters had compatible personalities so you can use them, it's a low random chance of them actually working each turn. Thus unless you're lucky, trying to intentionally use them will mostly result in you spamming moves less effective than what you would do in conventional strategy, so unless the skills required for a combo are actually optimal at the time, you're better off using moves that net you more consistent damage than gambling on proccing a combo move.
  • Cassandra Truth: In the original version of Monsters II, nobody believes you about the island sinking, especially not powerful Monster Masters. Not even your character's parents believe you.
  • Dump Stat: In the second game, Agility was squarely this; like in Pokémon it's supposed to be used to determine which monsters go first in battle, but instead of being deterministic with "faster goes first", the game randomly decides the monsters' order each turn with Agility only being an influence, a rather minor influence at that. It's so bad that a monster can have nearly half the Agility of another monster and still frequently go first, making Agility by far the least useful stat and nearly a nonfactor. And other than being used as part of the requirements to learn a few skills, Agility has no other effect at all (not even for running away, which is determined entirely by your monsters' levels). In the first game, turn orders were still decided randomly, but Agility played a much bigger influence in determing the turn order, so faster monsters would actually go first most of the time, making it a bit more useful.
  • Early-Bird Boss: The Hood Squid, the third boss of DQM2 and the first boss of the Pirate world, is the first boss to pose a real threat to the player. While it doesn't have that threatening of skills and its stats aren't outrageous, it's much stronger and durable than anything the player has fought thus far, hitting a lot harder than the Warmup Bosses of Oasis, while the player doesn't have that strong of monsters nor have monsters with access to much skills (as well as likely lacking any healing skills).
  • Green Hill Zone: DQM2 has this in its first world, Oasis. The Oasis world is a desert-themed world, with a simple story, incredibly basic and weak random encounters, and just two very simple bosses that can each just be beaten by taking any random minimally-leveled team of monsters and ordering attack over and over with no strategy at all.
  • Guide Dang It!:
    • Dragon Quest Monsters 2 had the Dream Egg system, which would allow you to get any monster in the game, except for the three hidden monsters (contrary to popular belief). While the game gives you a vague description of how it works, how it really works (which is really convoluted) is not explained.
    • Also in the second game, the combo moves. If your monsters use certain skills on the same turn, they can combine their moves into an ultra-powerful attack that is far more powerful than the attack skills in the game (e.g. one monster uses Blizzard and one uses Blazemost, they can combine their moves into Blitzer, an attack that strikes a single monster for around 800 damage). The existence of this phenomenon is not mentioned in the manual nor even remotely hinted at by any NPC in the game. Then there's actually figuring out what moves combo with each other, and the fact that if you do use the correct moves for a combo, your monsters need to have compatible personalities and it's a random chance for the combo to actually happen if all conditions are satisfied, a random chance that is still pretty low. As such, the vast majority of players weren't even aware of the existence of combo moves, much less knew the working combos in the game.
  • Jerk with a Heart of Gold:
    • Warubou/Rottney is a total jerk in Terry's Wonderland, but turns out to be this in the sequel. He is rude and has a penchant for pranks, but when Great Log is in danger he immediately takes things seriously and gives the player sound advice in saving the island. When it turns out Great Log is on the verge of death, Warubou/Rottney reassures that the player did their best and is not at all hesitant to sacrifice himself to save Great Log.
    • Prince Kameha is a spoiled brat who nonetheless wants to make up for the mischief that endangers his island and goes to great lengths to do this.
  • Knight of Cerebus: Gloom from the remake of DQM2 falls into this, especially in comparison to Darck who was made goofier than in the original version.
  • Missing Secret:
    • In the second game, after beating Kameha's team for the second time in the postgame, talking to him again has him give the same dialogue from between the two battles about how he's training to beat you, implying there's a third battle with him once you satisfy some conditions like the second battle required. However, even if you complete the rest of the postgame content and obtain every monster, he still gives the same dialogue when you talk to him, as there's no third battle.
    • Dialogue in the second game also implies you'll be able to gain access to the door in the Starry Shrine behind the professor and the Starry Night Tournament will happen in this game with you competing in it, yet neither event ever occurs.
  • Oh, Crap!: In DQM2, the people of Great Log finally realize their island is sinking when almost all of it is submerged and react accordingly.
  • One Game for the Price of Two: Dragon Quest Monsters 2 came in two versions, Cobi's Journey and Tara's Adventure. The main differences between the two lied not in the main quest (although they had different random encounter tables), but in the Playable Epilogue, where both versions featured completely different bonus worlds to explore. Each one had its own little plot. And, of course, following the trope to the letter, the best (non-randomly generated) bonus world required an item from both games to access.
  • Optional Boss: In DQM2, after clearing the Pirate world, a King Squid appears in the world and will join you if you defeat it. However, it appears less than halfway through the main game, while being as strong as the demon lord bosses at the end of the main game. So while you gain access to it early, you won't reasonably be able to take it on until near the end of the main game or after some extreme grinding that would make you strong enough to easily handle anything in the main game outside of the final boss.
  • Peninsula of Power Leveling:
    • DQM2's second main world, the Pirate World, has this. In the Pirate world, you immediately have access to water to surf on, where the water possesses random encounters much stronger than what you'll find on land in Pirate World until the very end of it. While the water's random encounters may be too strong for a player who first enters Pirate, they naturally provide much more experience than the random encounters the player will encounter for a while through natural progression, so a player could grind on the water monsters to get some quick levels in and make most of Pirate a breeze. It's also possible to recruit these monsters upon immediately entering the world, so a player could get a relatively strong monster on their team very early on Pirate, especially if they're playing Tara's version and it's an Octoreach (which not only has the highest base stats of any random encounter in Pirate, but also has incredibly high growth rates for an early game monster, potentially being a Disc-One Nuke for the player).
    • DQM2's third main world, the Ice World, prevents the player from accessing the rest of the world before resolving a plot point within the world, with the mountain pass cut off by guards and ice preventing the player from surfing on the world's water. However, next to the port town that is immediately accessible, there's a four square stretch of water before water-blocking ice that can be surfed on, where water-based random encounters can be fought. Like in Pirate, these water monsters are stronger than what you'll find early on in the world and give more experience. Unlike Pirate though, the water monsters here aren't that much stronger than the early inland monsters while being weaker than the later inland monsters, so they're not as helpful for providing quicker levelling and have no potential as a Disc-One Nuke.
  • The Rival: Prince Kameha from Cobi and Tara's Adventure tries to be this, but he is too inept and inexperienced to be one. It isn't until the post-game he gets a proper monster team.
  • Royals Who Actually Do Something:
    • In the second game, the king of the Oasis world actually goes out to address the concerns of his people, going into the well by himself to find the source of the water shortage and then later leading his men to the thieves' hideout, instead of just sitting on his throne and expecting you to solve everything like almost every other member of royalty in the series.
    • Also in the second game, Kameha is a spoiled brat of a prince, but he does try to help in fixing the crisis he caused for Great Log, venturing out alongside you, and while he is mostly inept (including not even getting his own monster team until the post game), he is geninuenly helpful when he helps breaks the two of you and the real Norden king out of the dungeon after being imprisoned by the impostor Norden king. He also legitimately obtains the Light Orb from the Sky world before you do, and after it failed to plug Great Log, he would use the Light Orb to become the Sky world king and create a bounty to give the Orb to anyone who brought him the Heaven equipment, with the intention of trying them to plug Great Log, though you're not informed of this until you bring the Heaven equipment to the Sky world king, still on the quest to get the Light Orb.
  • Secret Character: In Dragon Quest Monsters 2, there are three hidden monsters (Dimensaur, Lamia, and Kagebou), that can't be legitimately obtained ingame by any means. The game's library will also never have any data on them or even count them (even after you obtain the monsters). The only way they could be obtained were through prizes from promotional contests (though since these contest have long since stopped happening, the only way to get them now is through cheat devices). Many myths and theories were thought of to get these monsters ingame, particularly through the Dream Egg system, but all of them have been debunked or never had any proof to back up the claims.
  • Skippable Boss:
    • In Dragon Quest Monsters 2, during the Pirate World you'll typically progress by beating the Hood Squid to get it to join you, where you then take it to the bard in a nearby town to get its dancing to summon a mermaid, which talking to the mermaid queen is required to get the ghost ship to appear. However it's not the Hood Squid's dancing specifically that attracts the mermaid, just any monster on your team with a dancing skill will do, so for example you could go get an Octoreach with Odd Dance instead and skip fighting the Hood Squid altogether.
    • In the same game's Sky World, at the end when you go to see the king with all three Heaven equipment, you'll have to fight some Evil Armors blocking various points in the castle, which serve as some mini-bosses. Using the Change Staff to transform yourself into an Evil Armor to make them think you're one of them doesn't work, as they'll question your rank and who you are, and then attack you when you can't answer. However if instead you use the Change Staff to transform yourself into one of the Demonites around the castle, they'll think you're one of the cooks and will let you through, disappearing permanently in the process and allowing you to skip fighting them.
  • Starter Mon: In the remake of Dragon Quest Monsters 2, you get a special monster whom you can change the appearance and stat growth of. This monster learns special skills no other monster does, is ???-type, and is gifted to you by a godlike monster who wants you to look after her child.
  • Superboss: In the second game, there's Milayou from the first game, whose teams you can fight after beating the Traveler world, though despite being by far the most difficult challenge in the game outside of some top-end magic key world bosses, you get no reward for beating her other than some experience.
  • Temporary Online Content: Predating the "online" part, the Game Boy version had three special monsters that (at least in the US) were only awarded in a Nintendo Power contest where winners had to ship in their game cartridge; much like Mew was distributed in Pokémon Red and Blue: Dimensaur, Lamia, and Kagebou.
  • Warmup Boss: In DQM2, the first boss Beavern fulfills this role, being a simplistic boss with no threatening skills. He's only slightly stronger than the normal enemies you been fighting, and is there to give players experience against an enemy that could pose a threat to them if they're rushing through without levelling up their team at all. The second and final boss of the Oasis world, Curselamp, also qualifies; while its stats, particularly its durability, are a bit beefier than Beavern's, its attack power is mediocre and the only skill it knows is Upper. So with any team that's a bit levelled up, it poses low offensive threat, and by just ordering attack over and over with no strategy, you can easily beat it before it can raise its defense enough with Upper to be impervious to your attacks.
  • Wasted Song:
    • In DQM2, Limbo has its own unique overworld music, but unless you spend a lot of time grinding with Limbo's random encounters before fighting the final boss, you'll get to barely hear it, as the world is extremely short and devoid of content, and once you beat the world, its overworld music reverts to the generic overworld theme that plays in the rest of the main worlds, which then makes the Limbo overworld theme gone on that file. The theme that plays inside the final boss' castle, a remix of the Limbo overworld theme, also qualifies, as unless you grind against the random encounters there, you'll also only hear it for a couple minutes before fighting the final boss, and once you beat him, his castle disappears permanently, making it inaccessible for the rest of that file (you can still enter the entrance area before the castle after beating him and hear the castle's theme, but the bridge to the castle is gone and there's absolutely nothing to do there).
    • The Ice World also has its own unique overworld theme that plays nowhere else in the game, and like Limbo, it turns to the generic overworld theme after clearing the world, making it permanently gone on that file upon clearing the world. However, unlike Limbo, the Ice world is very large and elaborate with a lot to explore, so you'll spend some time there with its unique overworld theme before clearing it.

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