It’s a big day for Dragon Quest, with May 27 marking the 40th anniversary of the iconic RPG series’ debut on the NES. To celebrate, Square Enix aired a special anniversary livestream that featured a number of announcements about past and future Dragon Quest games, the most notable being Dragon Quest XII.
But before you get too excited, the main takeaway is that development for the next mainline entry in the series was at one point rebooted in the five years since it was first announced (during Dragon Quest’s last big anniversary livestream). So while Square Enix says development is going well, those hoping for an imminent release will likely be disappointed.
“Working on the original version, Dragon Quest XII: Flames of Destinyencountered many obstacles along the way,” said executive producer Yosuke Saito, who was alongside Dragon Quest creator Yuji Horii, in a video presentation translated from Japanese to English. “But as we continued to talk with Mr. Horii and figure out what a mainline Dragon Quest game should look like, we decided to move things around and start from scratch. It was a major decision, but I think it was the right decision to ensure that the next Dragon Quest game is one that all fans of the series will truly love. »
As part of the Great Reset, the game’s original subtitle has disappeared and it will now be called Dragon Quest XII: Beyond Dreams. The new name refers to the game’s story, which will follow a young adventurer whose sleep is interrupted by strange visions. “What is beyond dreams?” Horii teased. “Surely not a world of darkness, but a bright and exciting future.”
That’s about all we got in terms of details, but the dev team also released some brief gameplay footage. Dragon Quest XII already looks quite nice, enhanced, as usual, by the character designs of the late Akira Toriyama. The game looks so good, in fact, that Square Enix has made a few other announcements to make up for what might still be a long way to go.
The publisher also announced the latest installment in its Pokémon-inspired spinoff series Dragon Quest Monsters, with Dragon Quest Monsters: The Withered World soon available on Switch, Switch 2, PS5, Xbox Series X|S and PC. We’re also getting a Switch 2 version of Dragon Quest XI on September 24. Dragon Quest XI S: Echoes of an Elusive Time – Definitive Edition features new story content, the ability to switch between 3D and 2D graphics modes on the fly, and separate frame rate and fidelity settings.
Unfortunately, you won’t be able to transfer your save data from the Switch 2019 version, and it doesn’t appear that an upgrade path is available either. The game will cost $40 when it launches in early fall.
Dragon Quest is particularly huge in its native Japan, but Echoes of an elusive era was a global success, with nearly 9 million units sold worldwide, and Square Enix capitalized on the series’ growing popularity in recent years. We’ve had sumptuous HD-2D remakes of the first three games in the series, and earlier this year the publisher released the toylike. Dragon Quest VII reinvented on most platforms. This month, the original Dragon Quest was inducted into the World Gaming Hall of Fame.
