"Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies (ドラゴンクエストIX 星空の守り人, Doragon Kuesuto Nain Hoshizora no Mamoribito, lit. "Dragon Quest IX: Defenders of the Starry Sky") is a video game for the Nintendo DS released on July 11, 2009 in Japan. It is the ninth installment in the acclaimed Dragon Quest series by Yūji Horii, developed by Level-5 and published by Square Enix. The game was primarily designed around multiplayer and to be able to sell well overseas, particularly the United States and Europe. The basic plot involves an ex-angel who has fallen to earth becoming a human. Dragon Quest IX marks several firsts for the main series: it is the first to be initially launched for a handheld system; first to have no random encounters (except when sailing); and the first to be designed primarily with the intent of being a multiplayer video game. In addition, it is the first Dragon Quest title to use a graphical menu system in the Japanese-language version. Dragon Quest IX was designed to be more difficult than any previous game in the series, including spinoff titles. The sales of Dragon Quest IX set new records in Japan; these sales helped boost Nintendo's earnings and have impacted future plannings by the company. The game has been generally well received by critics, but has had more mixed commentary from the general public in Japan." Source: Wikipedia, "Dragon_Quest_IX:_Sentinels_of_the_Starry_Skies," available under the CC-BY-SA License.