Dragon Quest (ドラゴンクエスト ,Doragon Kuesuto), published as Dragon Warrior in North America until the 2005 release of Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King, is a series of role-playing games created by Yūji Horii and published by Square Enix (formerly Enix). Installments of the series have appeared on MSX computers, Famicom/NES, Super Famicom/Super NES, Game Boy Color, Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS, PlayStation, PlayStation 2 and Wii video game consoles, as well as on several models of mobile phone. As of February 2009, the Dragon Quest series has sold nearly 45 million units worldwide. It is Square Enix's second most successful franchise after Final Fantasy and is one of the most popular video game franchises in Japan.

Dragon Quest's North American name was changed due to a trademark conflict with the role-playing game DragonQuest, which was published by veteran wargame publisher SPI in the 1980s until the company's bankruptcy in 1982 and purchase by TSR, which then published it as an alternate line to Dungeons & Dragons until 1987. In 2003, Square Enix registered the Dragon Quest trademark in the US, making the Dragon Warrior name obsolete.

Development

History

In 1982, Enix sponsored a national video game programming contest, which brought much of the Dragon Quest team together, including Yūji Horii.[6] The prize of the competition was a trip to the United States, and a visit to AppleFest '83 in San Francisco, where Horii discovered Wizardry.[7] Koichi Nakamura and Yukinobu Chida, two other winners of the contest, along with Horii, released The Portopia Serial Murder Case for the Famicom for Enix. Sugiyama, already famous for jingles and pop songs, impressed with the group's work, sent a postcard to Enix, commenting on the software.[8] In response, Enix asked him to write music for some of its games. The group then decided to make a console role-playing game, using a combination of Wizardry and Ultima. Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama, who knew Horii through the manga magazine Shonen Jump, was commissioned to illustrate the characters and monsters to separate the game from other RPGs of the time and the Dragon Quest "team" was born.[9][10]

Dragon Quest was created by Yūji Horii, who has been the scenario director since. The series monster and character designs, as well as box art, are done by famed Dragon Ball manga artist, Akira Toriyama.[11] All of the music for the Dragon Quest series has been composed by Koichi Sugiyama.[6] Dragon Quest games have been developed by Chunsoft, Heartbeat, Artepiazza, and starting with Dragon Quest VIII, Level-5.[12] Horii's own company, Armor Project, is in charge of the Dragon Quest games, which were published by Enix and now Square Enix. While Toriyama is the series' character designer, the primary designs are first conceived by Horii, before being handed to Toriyama to re-draw under Horii's supervision.[13] When Horii first created Dragon Quest, most people doubted that a fantasy series with swords and dungeons instead of science fiction would become popular in Japan; but the series has become a phenomenon there.[14]

Dragon Quest is not nearly as successful outside Japan, having been eclipsed by Final Fantasy and other RPG series. Because of Enix America Corporation's closure in the mid 1990's, Dragon Quest V and Dragon Quest VI were never officially released in North America. In Europe, none of the games have seen release prior to the spin-off Dragon Warrior Monsters then Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King. With the merger of Square with Enix in 2003, the number of places that Dragon Quest games are released has greatly increased.[14] In May 2008, Square Enix announced localizations of the Nintendo DS remakes of Dragon Quest IV, V, and VI, known collectively as the Zenithia trilogy, for North America and the PAL region.[15][16] With this announcement, all the main games in the Dragon Quest series will now have seen release outside Japan at least once.

The ninth installment is due to be released in Japan for Nintendo DS in July 2009. North American and European and other PAL region releases are suspected to follow. The tenth installment of the main series is currently in development for the Wii.

Creation and design

At the time I first made Dragon Quest, role-playing games on the computer were still very much in the realm of hardcore fans and not very accessible to other players. So I decided to create a system that was easy to understand and emotionally involving, and then placed my story within that framework.

—Yūji Horii[9]

Yūji Horii originally used the full-screen map of Ultima and the battle and stats oriented Wizardry screen to create the gameplay of Dragon Quest.[7] The first six Dragon Quest games' stories are divided into two trilogies. The first three games of the series tell the story of the legendary hero known as Roto (also known as Erdrick or Loto in the American NES and GBC versions, respectively). Dragon Quest IV-VI are based around a castle in the sky called Zenithia, and are referred to as the Tenku in Japan, meaning Heaven. The main series from Dragon Quest VII on are independent of each other and stand alone.[17]

The typical Dragon Quest plot involves a certain villain to be defeated at the end of the game, usually one who threatens the world in some way. However, the plotline often consists of smaller stories involving different NPC's the player meets as the adventure goes on.[18] The games themselves feature a number of religious overtones--saving the game (in later games) and reviving characters who have died is performed by clergy in churches. Bishops are often seen wandering around the overworld of Dragon Warrior Monsters and have the ability to heal. The final enemy in some of the Dragon Quest games is known as the Demon Lord. For instance, in Dragon Warrior VII, the Demon Lord, known as Orgodemir in that particular game, is the final boss, and there is also a sidequest to battle God himself.[10] The first four Dragon Warrior titles suffered from substantial censorship in their North American localizations, largely in keeping with Nintendo of America's content guidelines at the time, which placed severe restrictions on religious iconography and mature content. When these games were remade for the Game Boy Color, many of these censorships were taken out.[19] Since Dragon Warrior VII, the games have been kept similar to their original versions when going through localization.[20]