Dragon Quest: The Adventure of Dai

Dragon Quest: The Adventure of Dai (DRAGON QUEST -ダイの大冒険-, "Dragon Quest: Dai's Great Adventure") is a long-running manga by Sanjo Riku and Inada Koji set in the Dragon Quest world, based mainly on Dragon Quest III, Dragon Quest IV and Dragon Quest V. It features filler pages giving game-like character stats of the heroes, and often explains details of the spells used in the games. The manga was originally published in Shueisha's Weekly Shonen Jump from 1990 to 1996, and was compiled into 37 paperback volumes.

The plot centers around the revival of the Demon Lord defeated in an earlier war, his attempts to conquer the world and the fight of the heroes against him.

Two anime television series based on the manga were produced by Toei Animation, the first being an incomplete adaptation in 1991, and a new adaptation starting in 2020.

Characters

Heroes

• Dai, the main hero. He has grown up on an island full of friendly monsters. For a short time, he has been trained by Avan, but he always has difficulty casting spells, usually it works only when he is very angry. His birth name, given by Baran is Dino.

• Avan, who trains the hero for a short time, but then dies fighting Hadlar. He remains ever-present as a role model, and many of the characters are former disciples or comrades of Avan. Near the end, it turns out that Avan is alive after all.

• Popp, another disciple of Avan who came to Dai's island with him. He is the first party member to join, so to say. A magic user with a lazy and cowardly streak who often has to be shamed into doing the right (heroic) thing, he provides the comic relief in the series.

• Maam, daughter of the warrior and the priest who fought with Avan in the previous war, and a former disciple of his, is the next to join. She is described as a white mage warrior. She has no offensive spells, but a gun Avan gave her that can fire spells on bullets. Popp, who initially detests her, later develops a crush on Maam. When her gun breaks, she trains to become a Warrior.

• Leona, the young princess of Papnica, a land of sages. Early in the manga, Dai saves her from a conspiracy that tries to use a ritual on the island to kill her, and falls in love with her.

• Gomechan, a gold metal slime with wings. He rarely takes an active part in battle, but is something like the mascot of the series.

• Hyunkcel, the only human commander in the Demon Army. He later defects into the good side. He is one of Avan's disciples.

• Beast King Crocodine, commander of the Beast Army, who later defects into the good side.

The Demon Army

• Dark Lord Hadlar, who was defeated by Avan in the previous war and kills him early in the manga. He later defects into the good side in his final moments.
• Baran, Dai's birth father. He is the commander of the Dragon Army. Also, he is a Dragon Knight, like Dai. He is killed by Hadlar.
• Demon Lord Vearn, head of the Dark Army planning to destroy the world with his Dark Army regiments and generals.

Minor characters

• Brass, Dai's adoptive father.

• The fake heroes, a group who act as heroes but are really just after money. The members in detail:
  • Derolin (でろりん), hero.
  • Zurbon (ずるぼん), priest (female).
  • Masopho (まぞっほ), mage.
  • Hero-Hero (へろへろ), soldier.

• The King of Romos, a typical elderly, rotund Dragon Quest King.

• Matoriv, a sadistic and lecherous old mage who fought on the side of Avan in the previous war. Reluctantly he agrees to help the heroes again and trains Pop for a while. Graphically, Matoriv sticks out among the characters; both his design and the style in which he is drawn resemble Moebius rather than anything from the Dragon Quest series.

Influence on the series

Being the most popular and longest-running Dragon Quest spin-off, Dai no Daibouken left an impact on the video games that inspired it. The most significant influence is the introduction of Skills performed by human characters. Characters routinely perform extraordinary feats that go beyond the scope of the generic attack battle command seen in the series up until IV.

In particular, the Giga Break sword technique and Hyunkcel's Grand Cross ability would be incorporated beginning with VI as Gigaslash and Pearly Gates. Interestingly, such skills are presented in the manga as being immensely dangerous to the user, requiring perfect execution to prevent one's body from tearing itself apart due to the incredible power output.

In Videogames

Starting around 2017, the Dai series started having presence in videogames through collaborations, and starting in 2020 it starting seeing full games adapting the manga series.

Xross Blade

Xross blade is a card-based arcade game where players can place and move cards on a board. The positioning of the cards is key to the gameplay, as players can do attack combos if placed correctly. Xross blade follows the story of Adventure of Dai but also has a new story with new characters. The game has recieved a few collaborations with mainline Dragon Quest titles like Dragon Quest XI.

A Hero's Bonds

A Hero's Bonds is a mobile title developed by DeNa. Players can move forward in three lanes and attack the incoming monsters, using skills and changing lanes when needed. The game has equipment gacha -like Dragon Quest of the Stars and Dragon Quest Walk-, and supports real-time multiplayer for up to three players.

It includes two story modes: Dragon Tracks and Bonding Journey. The former is a retelling of the story from the Adventure of Dai, while the later is a brand new story written under the supervision of Riku Sanjo, the original writer of the series. Koji Inada, the original artist of the Dai series, designed Pinky, the pink dracky that accompanies players through the Bonding Journey storyline.

Infinity Strash

Infinity Strash is an action console game. Not much is known about it yet.

Portable Adventure

Portable Adventure is a small handheld device with Tamagochi-like depictions of Dai. It has connectivity with Xross Blade

Collaborations

Some characters and monsters from the Adventure of Dai series including Gome, Chiu and Mystvearn among others are featured in Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker 3 Professional.

The Adventure of Dai has had collaborations with some mobile games including: Dragon Quest Monsters Super Light, Dragon Quest of the Stars, and Puzzles and Dragons.

Dai is a playable character in the base roster of Jump Force, a console fighting game featuring many other characters from Shonen Jump comics like Goku, Luffy or Yusuke Urameshi.

See Also

• List of Dragon Quest: Dai no Daibouken manga chapters
• List of Dragon Quest: Dai no Daibouken anime episodes

Gallery

• 

  The cover of the first volume of the series.

External links

• Wikipedia