The most recognizable outcome of this partnership is the Dragon Quest mascot, Slime, a gelatinous blue onion-shaped thing, albeit a very cute gelatinous blue onion-shaped thing. Slime has appeared in every Dragon Quest title, usually as the first monster encountered, unless you’re playing one of the Slime MoriMori titles- Dragon Quest Heroes Rocket Slime being the only MoriMori title to make it out of Japan- in which he takes center stage as a rather squishy hero.
Koichi Sugiyama, a classically trained conductor, was already working for Enix on PC Engine titles before composing his first Dragon Quest score for the NES- a selection of tunes heavily influenced by composers Bach and Handel, and for many Japanese gamers the first introduction to orchestral music. Sugiyama holds the title of the first video game composer to record his music with a live orchestra, releasing the Dragon Quest I Symphonic Suite in 1986, with his previously beepy melodies grand-ified by the London Philharmonic Orchestra.
