Dragon Quest, where to start?

[Xeogred]

DS version looks nasty. lol, maybe I'll just jump to one of the SNES games...

That kind of sucks about your party. I figured it was maybe just Healie, but I guess not.

[Randyretro]

For those systems I have I recommend Dragon Warrior VII. Big Dragon Warrior/Quest fan who played through I,II,III,IV,VII,VIII,(working on IX). Most of them are generally huge games (especially VII and IX) IX to me seems like an upgrade from a VII and more enjoyable than VIII. I would probably play em in this order VII, VIII and then IX. That's just my opinion though. There is no real order or wrong way to get into the series.