1-3 are a trilogy, 4-6 all share an extra-main world location (sky castle Zenithia,) 7 and 8 are both standalone; I assume IX is as well.

1-3 (Loto Trilogy) and 4-6 (Zenithia Trilogy) all interconnect their worlds and stories.

I really liked DQ8, but it's far from the best in the series imo (I'd put DQ3/4/5/6/7 all ahead of it).  Dungeon design is bland and battle are WAY too slow.  It's gorgeous though, and the sense of scale is unmatched in any other JRPG.  The overworld is breathtaking.

I've been waiting for this game for awhile. I heard it will come. I'm hoping the reason why it's taking so long is because they are putting the Action Combat system back in. NA prefer a little more fast paced in regards to the mass consumer. The turn based in niche. I'm hoping mostly for the option of either. Having both would add little work, but benefit from both groups of players.

Dissidia did something like it already

They already stated they're targeting for a June release. But they're just getting held up by SquareEnix, as they're the ones localizing the game.

Its pretty sad that its taken this long, as DQIX is one of the highest budget titles on the DS. Not to mention was getting a large amount of free hype and publicity when it launched in Japan as it was. If they were smart, they would have launched it in the west soon after the Japanese launch to take advantage of the hype, but now all of that is lost.

And most likely, most of the delay is just due to the emphasis on Kingdom Hearts 328 and Final Fantasy XIII. Not to mention all the changes they're doing to DQIX localization (accents, puns and name changes).

Plus Alpha Translations usually does the DQ localizations, SE doesn't handle them internally so I doubt FFXIII or KH 358/2d took away much in terms of resources. DQ's usually take about a year to make it, DQVIII did and it was pretty substantially enhanced in the process. I'm hoping the same holds true for DQIX (c'mon Wi-Fi Surechegai!).

Yes, they outsorce their translation to Plus Alpha, but they still work with them with the translation.  And we can't forget Wada's infamous announcement last year where he said 'We're not thinking about any new localizations until sometime next year'.  Its quite possible they hadn't even started localizing the game until March or later of this year.  And with a projected June release date, that's cutting it REAL close.  Especially for a noted translation team known for cutting content at the last minute if they can't get all their 'accents' and 'puns' in (Dragon Quest IV DS).

Suffice to say, I'm worried about how DQIX is being handled.

Wada's so hands off with DQ, I wouldn't take anything he says about the series as gospel.  In fact, I'm betting Hori's internal pull within SE is partially why he goes with an external translation group (rather that SE USA, which is really the remnants of Square USA).

They were working on even Rocket Slime for almost a year, I really, really doubt DQIX is going to be a 3 month rushjob.  Especially with Nintendo involved...