Incredibly hard. The Non-FF Four Fiends that were there too, impeded a lot of progress.

I'm a mainly FF kinda guy and have been dipping my toes into DQ, but I was somewhat satisfied with DQII, more so than DQI.

I have a friend who's been pestering me to play through DQIII & DQVII, so it'll be fun delving into what he loves so much about these two games.

Check out the original PC version if you're on the fence. The XBLA version streamlines the controls a bit, making bombs and ropes much easier to handle under pressure, as well as adding a good deal of new content and offline multiplayer. Still the same solid core with consistently interesting random level generation, tons of dynamic systems to learn, and obstacles that aren't afraid to punish an aggressive player.

The good things you've heard about Xenoblade aren't without merit at all. For a game to hop above Dark Souls (even if barely) as best game I've beaten this year, it really has to be impressive because I loved DS. Most elements of the game are at least good, with many of the more important (to me) ones being very good or great. The overall plot is executed very well, with lots of emotional moments as well as some just generally awesome cutscenes. I wouldn't put it as my favorite video game story ever or anything, but it is among the better ones for sure. As far as gameplay, it is very combat-heavy, but the battles all take place on the exploration field, and the actual system is very fun and engaging. While you may find yourself doing the same things a lot across many battles, you are constantly doing something and not just waiting on auto-attacks to kill off everything. Overall, the battle system is one of my favorites as JRPGs go.

The soundtrack is also really solid all the way through, featuring lots of excellent standouts, and the VA is much more reserved than what is common for the genre. Exploration creates quite a great feeling in the game given the sheer size and open-ended nature of many areas, though useful quick travel points are scattered throughout each area in the game to make getting where you need to go a breeze once you've traveled there once on foot. Visually, most of these areas are really impressive as well, especially for the Wii. One point of contention with the game is that, while offering a whole lot of sidequests, many of these are very samey and are of the fetch/kill some # of these enemies variety. If you're enjoying the battle system, then most of these aren't too bad, but they could have been better.

So, all-in-all, definitely one you shouldn't miss out on as a JRPG fan. And it even has the value factor in bang for your buck, considering you could easily hit 100 hours on one run if you're doing a lot of the sidequesting (as I did).