From RPGamer

"Dragon Quest IX is currently lighting up the sales charts in Japan, but exactly when (or if) it would be given the chance to do so in other areas of the world has remained unknown. That is, until recently, when Square Enix President and CEO Yoichi Wada revealed that the company is now "considering" other territories to possibly release the game in.

Whichever territories are chosen, Square Enix has no plans to release the game outside of Japan until after April 2010, similar to what was said about Final Fantasy XIII back in January. Wada believes that Dragon Quest IX will become the best-selling game in the series to date."

Not that any Dragon Quest fan should be surprised, its taken roughly a year to get most Dragon Quest games over here...

I don't quite know what this site is about, but it breaks down some of the cliche's the game uses and it calls Marcello a Magnificent Bastard, so it wins points with me.

It's worth mentioning that Eight was winning... Eight vs Zack squat competition.

P.S. I have way too much time on my hands.

The Dragon Quest VIII Artbook/Strategy Guide is over 200 pages, it has illustrations of all the major characters, some minor characters(no Marcello wtf?) with comments by Toriyama throughout. It also has a short little comic in the middle with the hero, Yangus and Trode. It also has ads for all the action figures, the slime controller, and other toys available, I have to say, the Americans got the better bargain in the action figure department, the Japanese versions look... odd.
Scanner didn't want to work with me so I pointed my camera right at the pages, they didn't turn out half bad.
Hero: page1, page 2
Yangus: page1, page 2
Jessica: page 1, page 2
Angelo: page 1, page 2
"People"

It's a long, yet very interesting read, Reflections on Dragon Quest VIII.  It only blew my mind a little bit and gave me even more respect for one of my favorite games.

For anyone reading, DQ5 comes out next week!  I wonder if it will have bonus content like DQIV had?

A bit of fiction (one of my few gen fics!), a bit of art, and a couple links.

First, the fiction. ( 'Fall Flowers' by Dragovian Knight, Dragon Quest VIII (with an implied Dragon Warrior IV crossover), spoilers post-Dark Ruins )

( Now, the art: a pair of Templar rings created and rendered using Poser. )

And finally, links to Square Enix's Japanese Dragon Quest Swords site and the official Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker site (which is also in Japanese).