I recently beat version 1.0 of Dragon Quest X, commonly called “Awakening of the Five Tribes.” It was a fun journey that sometimes took a frustrating amount of effort, but felt mostly worthwhile. I’m working on a review of the game (and still summing stuff up in the “Adventures in Astoltia” series, where you can find these bosses within the context of the story).

The game gives a unique screen with artwork of the boss before every boss fight. Along the way, I took screenshots of these “boss screens” (for lack of a better term) in the game. I thought they were really cool, and I wanted to compile them here.

Two quick notes before we get started.

Note One: I played through the weddie (wetling) storyline. That means I missed out on the starter bosses that go along with the beginning areas of the other tribes. If you’ve got screenshots of those bosses and want to share them, feel free to do that.

Note Two: Let’s talk about boss names. Dragon Quest X was never localized in the West, so who knows what these bosses would’ve been called over here. Would they have been close to their literal translations from Japanese? Or would they have been completely different (a situation like in Dragon Quest XI, where Kurucci gets called Ickle)? And because people have used different translation methods, even the literal translations of these bosses get mixed around. For instance, translators on YouTube sometimes have different names than the ones posted on the Dragon Quest X Wiki (which you can find here).

Translating is a tricky business. Traduttore, traditore, as the expression goes. Liberties get taken, and (for all we know), characters like the cat Ruberio may have been called Captain Catpants in the States (but probably not).

All of this is to say, if the name that goes along with these photos doesn’t always match their wiki entry or the name some YouTuber uses, it’s because we don’t have canon names for these characters in English. Most of the translations I have here are literal, taken from the screen using the Google Translate app (which, by the way, sometimes gave more than one name for the same thing). Confusing? Maybe. But it was often pretty entertaining. Personally, not knowing the names doesn’t really bug me. Call them whatever you want. Just don’t call them late for dinner (nyuck, nyuck, nyuck).

Anyway, I still hope you enjoy the screenshots.

Mage Demon

Black Groom (as in, Groom of Darkness)

Reberio/Reperio (Captain Catpants, natch)

Oren (sometimes Swine Oren. Let’s just call him Bone Daddy)

Water Dragon Gilgish

Monster Busgon/Pusgon

Uber Genie Soldier (I kinda like that one, actually)

Devil Zaigas

Devil Soldier Bibs and Devil Soldier Tanato (sometimes shows up “Magic Soldier” instead)

Magus Id (kinda disappointed it’s not just Lizard Wizard, tbh)

Youma Guiliante

Magician Marine

Poetry Guardian (coming to a coffeehouse near you)

Mister Passa Grande (I don’t even know what to say about that one)

Let’s Go (I tried the app on this, like, six times. It kept saying “Let’s Go”)

Tenma Kuvarna

The Old and Newly Old Tree

Missus Arane (So, Miss Spider, basically)

Guardian Razburn (at one point, Google translated this to “Lustborne in Australia,” which I kind of like even better)

Hades Nergel/Pluto Gulf (more commonly known as Nelgel in the fandom)

Nergel the Underlord (or, you know, Nelgel the Underlord)

That’s it folks! That’s all the boss screens in the main story (assuming you follow the weddie storyline). Overall, I enjoyed the game (and had some laughs looking at the translations).