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I used the provided 'Amnethen Apocalypse' patch to have all the benefits wrapped into one so that's what I'll be reviewing. I've been following DXO and DXO2 for a while so I was interested in trying this out and seeing how it goes.

First, the Dragoon X Omega rom hack itself. I love the story, creepy/unsettling atmosphere, and the tons of custom new sprites (everything is redone!). There are a few odd choices in NPC dialogue but they add to the charm for me. The biggest fault of the original rom hack is how much of a relentless and tedious GRIND it is just to slowly and painfully eke out some levels so you don't get insta-killed by yet another random encounter.

That's where Amnethen Apocalypse seeks to swoop in and remedy the situation. The results are...interesting. Time to break it down!

• The XP grind was reduced, the item costs and weapon/armor costs were reduced, and even some PSI costs were either reduced or made free (!) which is a pretty nice touch. I've found Bolt and Repel to be useful up to a point but it is nice that you won't be punished by accidentally selecting it when scrolling through the menu.

• The biggest benefit to this specific addendum patch would be the drastic overhaul of the world and individual area maps. Nearly everything was changed and the constant unsettling atmosphere seemed to be enhanced even MORE by the changes. I am SO happy that there's alternate entry points in nearly every house/shop so that stupid NPCs blocking the way can go fall of a bridge already.

• The biggest downsides are minor but present. The encounter rate is unchanged so that's still a pain. There's still those time-wasting enemies that waste your time every few steps, though this is mitigated by free use of Repel once you get it. There is that one guard in the starting castle that gets stuck in the wall sometimes (and in the ending) though he is indeed a jerk so I'll let that slide. There's also one girl who refills your PSI but she's no longer behind a locked door. It kinda makes the 'guard' dialogue about her being a prisoner seem silly/pointless and I hope that the card key door can be put back in since you can just talk to her behind the desk.

• There are some (useful) exploits to be had. There's one area in the starting castle with 4 (!) key card doors and you gain significantly more money without much effort. It basically breaks any need for grinding for money and may have been intentional. There's an area in Phuun where you can obtain Filthy Helms just by walking up and taking them so you can fill up your inventory with them pretty easily (for no cost) and pop a Gate and sell them for a nice profit. Although the castle-door method is faster it seems that this Phuun helm thing was yet another money-tree thing added in.

• None of the dialogue is changed so that's both a good and bad thing. There are more than a few places where I wish it had changed because the original was misleading or inaccurate.

• I still find the 'Scaly Horror' to Phuun an exercise in tedium and frustration. You barely have a 50% chance of success if you can manage to stun them with Stare and then beat them up before they snap out of it. Good luck with that. Took me ~5 tries at level 13 with best equipment thus far and in frustration I ended up just using savestates right before the fight so I wouldn't have to trek all the way back each time. I wish this particular encounter had been nerfed a bit in difficulty so that we don't need to grind forever.

• Despite the useful map changes, there are a few 'holy cow' moments where the difficulty of monsters suddenly changes and you can get killed far too easily by a random encounter with little recourse if you are unlucky with running.

Most of these are nitpicks but I just find them odd, to say the least. I do recommend them but I wish I didn't have to do a 'double patch' and instead just have this be an all-in-one solution.

I'll be honest, I've beaten the original Dragon Warrior a bazillion times-it was the first RPG I ever owned as a kid back in the early 90's. But there was always something about the DXO hack I didn't like, and I never got far into it.

This hack made the game SO much better. You will still do a bit of grinding even with all the exp and price hacks, but you will still finish this faster than any DW1 playthrough ever. I really liked how the patch made the game play so much smoother, and let me enjoy what was a decent hack. I never would've finished without this.

Unless you're jonesing for the original DW experience, definitely use this hack!