Version 1.7
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
- 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, MD53a63438fff7db282fa3133e8fd020e85. The file name does not matter; the application checks the contents and refuses anything else. No ROM is distributed here: use your own copy. - Run the application. Download
DQIX-Randomizer.exefrom 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>.ndsis written next to your ROM, in a folder of the same name. - 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.
The window has four tabs of options, plus Create your ROM (below). Every option is a checkbox; the two presets tick a sensible set for you.
Monsters
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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.
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Monster spells and abilities: in every battle, monsters draw new spells and abilities, abilities shown with their real animation; or a fixed kit for each monster, drawn once (every slime has the same spells and abilities for the whole game), abilities also with their real animation.
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Monster stats: HP, MP, attack, defence, agility and resistances (7 elements, 14 ailments), drawn between ×0.5 and ×2 of the original (resistances one step up or down), or over the whole range (chaos), at build time or again in every battle. The tutorial fight of the prologue is never touched. Bosses have the same option, set apart in the Bosses tab.
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. Legacy bosses come at their first level only, so they do not crowd out the others; an option brings back all three levels. Two lists choose from which story boss on grotto bosses and legacy bosses can turn up in story fights (from the start, from a given boss, or never). The battle music follows the boss you get.
- Bosses on the field (experimental): some bosses wander the map and chase you.
Items & shops
- Chests (grotto chests included), 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. By default any item can come from any container; untick rare items everywhere to make rarity follow the container's rank, and tick balance equipment and consumables for about a third of herbs, potions and seeds.
- Sparkly spots give any regular item (never equipment, never a quest item): each map has its own pool of up to 127 items, 16 of them are drawn each time you enter the map and one at each pickup, and all 143 items can be found somewhere. Options: a fixed item per spot, or items close to the original rank.
- New drops every battle: what a monster drops is drawn again each time. The bestiary shows the drops of your ROM.
- Shops sell a new stock, fixed for the whole run. The flowing dress, the watermaul wand and the silver shield stay in their original shops, at their original price: a post-game quest asks for them.
- Alchemy ingredients: every Krak Pot recipe makes the same item from other ingredients, in the same quantities (in both presets).
- Cap'n Max Meddlin's rewards (in both presets): his ten milestones and his shop give other items, and need a quarter of the mini medals, since medals are rare once the loot is randomized.
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.
Create your ROM
- Decide every case yourself: each boss fight, each shop's stock, chests, pots and grottos, alchemy, Cap'n Max Meddlin', skill trees, vocation spells, vocations, field monsters per area or for the whole game, battle drops, each monster's six actions (fixed, or a spell or ability drawn at every battle, from a pool you choose), each monster's stats and resistances (fixed, or drawn between bounds you set), and each map's sparkly spot items. A search field finds a line in the long lists.
- Start from the original game, from your options or from a file; re-roll one category; a case you change by hand stays pinned. Save it all in a file to share: the same file always gives the same ROM.
- Anything goes, even unbalanced. Only what would make the game unfinishable is locked, and the locks can be lifted.
- The button follows the tab you are on: from Create your ROM it builds your custom ROM (the options of the other tabs do not count); from the other tabs, it uses their options.
How it works, for players: monsters - loot - shops - spells and abilities - where every chest is
| Balanced | Total chaos | |
|---|---|---|
| Loot | anything anywhere, legendary gear in the first barrel (since 1.7, in both presets) | same |
| 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 |
| Alchemy | new ingredients for every recipe, same quantities | same |
| Cap'n Max Meddlin' | rewards within one star of the original, a quarter of the medals | any item, a quarter of the medals |
| Sparkly spots | any regular item, 16 drawn per map at every visit | same |
"Balanced" is still a randomizer, and it is still hard: the game's difficulty is not rebalanced.
Your in-game save is a separate file: it keeps working on a new ROM. Drop
the ROM of your game on the window (or click Change a randomized
ROM...): the window ticks its seed and options again, read from the log
next to it, and takes back your original ROM from the same log (if it moved,
the window asks you to drop it). Change what you
want and click Randomize: the ROM is rebuilt from your original ROM and
replaces the old one under the same name (the old one is kept as
..._avant_modif.nds), so your emulator finds your save as usual. What is
already done in your game stays done (opened chests, beaten bosses, items in
your bag). Emulator savestates do not carry over: use the in-game save.
Each of the newer options only changes its own data (measured): adding sparkly spots, monster stats or fixed monster kits leaves the rest of the ROM untouched.
- 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.
| 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. |
- Tested 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.
- An emulator savestate only works with the exact ROM it was made on.
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- 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
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.