Dragon Quest IX Randomizer

Version 1.6

A randomizer for Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies (Nintendo DS). Drop your ROM on the application, pick what to shuffle, and play a new game: other monsters, other bosses, other loot, other shops, other spells.

Demo video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gUc4pJak4o

Quick start

1. Get the right ROM. Only the European multilingual release works (English, French, German, Spanish and Italian are all inside): Dragon Quest IX - Sentinels of the Starry Skies (Europe) (En,Fr,De,Es,It).nds, MD5 3a63438fff7db282fa3133e8fd020e85. The file name does not matter; the application checks the contents and refuses anything else. No ROM is distributed here: use your own copy.
2. Run the application. Download DQIX-Randomizer.exe from the latest release and double-click it. Nothing to install. Drop your ROM on the window, choose a preset, click Randomize. About 25 seconds later, DQIX-Randomizer-seed<seed>.nds is written next to your ROM.
3. Play that file in an emulator, from a new game. Tested with melonDS (through BizHawk) and DeSmuME; with DeSmuME, turn off the Dynamic Recompiler.

The same seed with the same options always gives the same game: share the seed and the options, and a friend plays exactly your run.

What can be randomized

The window has four tabs. Every option is a checkbox; the two presets tick a sensible set for you.

Monsters

• Field monsters, in one of three modes:

  • random at every spawn: any of the 256 bestiary monsters each time a monster appears, never the same one twice on screen at once;
  • 1-to-1 per area: in each area, a monster is always replaced by the same other one;
  • 1-to-1 for the whole game: a monster is replaced by the same other one everywhere.

  The two 1-to-1 modes change only the game's data, not its code.

• Monsters come in groups, as in the original game.

• Monster spells and abilities (experimental): in every battle, monsters draw new spells and abilities, abilities shown with their real animation.

• Monster stats (experimental).

Bosses

• Story bosses: every scripted boss fight is against another boss. Options: keep the first boss (Hexagoon, fought alone); story, grotto and legacy bosses as often as each other; story bosses only; bosses or ordinary monsters; a new boss at every attempt.
• Bosses on the field (experimental): some bosses wander the map.

Items & shops

• Chests, pots, barrels, cupboards and monster drops can hold any of the game's regular items, and every one of them can be found. Gold amounts are redrawn too.
• New drops every battle: what a monster drops is drawn again each time.
• Shops sell a new stock, fixed for the whole run.

Party

• Spells each vocation learns as it levels up.
• Skill trees: what each skill-point milestone gives, abilities and stat bonuses alike, within each tree or across all of them. Optionally, a weapon technique keeps needing its original weapon.
• Vocations: all twelve open at the abbey from the start, random vocation for recruits and for the hero, or (as a challenge) vocations locked.

How it works, for players: monsters - loot - shops - spells and abilities - where every chest is

The two presets

	Balanced	Total chaos
Loot	rare items come from rare places; consumables keep a fair share	anything anywhere, legendary gear in the first barrel
Shops	each shop keeps its specialty and its price range	anything in any shop, at any price
Spells and skills	weak spells early, strong ones late; skills stay in their tree	no order; skills move between trees
Bosses	untouched	every boss fight against another boss

"Balanced" is still a randomizer, and it is still hard: the game's difficulty is not rebalanced.

What never changes

• Key items and the items the story needs (the dragon warrior equipment, Sterling's whistle): never handed out by chests, drops or shops.
• The chronocrystal shop, and the prologue fight.
• Four- and five-star items are only sold in Dourbridge's secret shop and the two Stornway stalls that open after the final boss, in every mode.

Troubleshooting

Problem	Solution
"Not the supported ROM"	Only the European release above works.
"Windows protected your PC"	The application is not code-signed: More info, then Run anyway, or build it yourself.
Your antivirus quarantines the .exe	A known false positive with packaged Python programs. Building it yourself avoids it.
Crash on DeSmuME	Turn off the Dynamic Recompiler.

Known issues

• Tested from a fresh game start only, and on emulators only.
• In random at every spawn mode, when the model memory is full, a new monster waits until another one leaves before it appears.
• Sometimes a battle's command window turns light blue, or a monster shows the wrong colours. The cause has not been found yet.
• An emulator savestate only works with the exact ROM it was made on.

Building from source

pip install ndspy keystone-engine capstone
python interface.py                      # the window
python randomizer.py --help              # every command-line option
pip install pyinstaller tkinterdnd2
python scripts/build_exe.py              # writes dist/DQIX-Randomizer.exe

Sources

• ArchipelagoDQIX by kid2407
• dqix-decomp by ZevyaDev
• Guide to RNG systems in DQIX for game manipulation by hurblub
• The research notes behind every change: docs/research

Disclaimer

This project does not distribute any copyrighted game ROM or other copyrighted game assets. You must provide your own legally obtained copy of Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies. The randomizer is provided as-is; use it at your own risk.