Next Level Upgrades

It’s rare that we get remakes that go above and beyond. Many developers—Square Enix included—will typically add a filter and throw together some small tweaks before re-releasing it and leaving fans feeling ripped off. This wasn’t the case with Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake, however. Not only did it vastly upgrade the visuals into a now iconic HD-2D style, it added a new class and gameplay tweaks that make it the definitive version to play.

With my short time playing Dragon Quest I & II HD-2D Remake at Tokyo Game Show 2025 on a PlayStation 5, I can confidently say the first two Dragon Quests are getting the premium remake treatment, not the half-assed one. Not only is Square Enix expanding the story in both games and tying them more tightly to their canonical prequel Dragon Quest III, they’ve also added a handful of new features that promise to modernize these decades-old titles.

View Full-size

You’ll still only have just the Hero in Dragon Quest I HD-2D Remake.

Now, I have to preface this by saying I never played Dragon Quest I. From what I understand, it’s a rough game to get through, as you only have a single character in your party, the Hero, making it a massive grind. I spent about 15 minutes playing the HD2D version of Dragon Quest I, and while that isn’t enough time to concretely tell, it seems a lot of the cracks in a nearly 40-year-old game have been patched up.

It began with a scene where a swindling merchant tried to extort a bunch of adventurers by selling the coveted Thief’s Key for 1,000,000 gold. Unfortunately for the merchant, Robin ‘Ood’s lackeys were listening in and mugged him. As you need the Thief’s Key to progress the story, the Hero sets out to confront Robin ‘Ood and take the key back.

I traveled across a wide breadth of the map on my way to Robin ‘Ood’s lair, defeating spirits and other iconic Dragon Quest monsters in one-on-one or one-on-two battles along the way. For the demo, the Hero was level 10 and equipped with a Thorn Whip, making it much easier to take out groups of foes, but I didn’t really run into any groups to use it on. Instead, I spammed a handy Zap spell that made short work of most enemies.

One new addition I noticed was not present in Dragon Quest III HD-2D were highlighted spells or abilities that denoted whether an enemy was weak to it or not. Typically, in Dragon Quest, you have to guess at what spells hit monsters harder: wind spells for flying enemies, lightning spells against dragons, and so on. Now, that seems much more streamlined and leaves out the guesswork, though I’m curious if this feature is disabled if the Draconian quest difficulty is selected.

View Full-size

Being able to travel underwater is new to this version of Dragon Quest II.

Anyway, getting to Robin ‘Oods lair wasn’t too much of a problem for the lone Hero; however, the fight against Robin ‘Ood and his two lackeys was a different matter. They dealt quite a lot of damage and I couldn’t keep up both healing and damage output. As a result, they defeated my lone Hero quite easily even though I’m certain this wasn’t the Draconian difficulty. Time will tell if this is a tedious fight that requires a lot of grinding or I just need to get good.

I’m sure there’s a technique to get through this fight: maybe putting the lackeys to sleep would work. However, I wanted to get ample time with Dragon Quest II HD-2D, so I jumped back to the main menu and loaded the sequel.

I have played Dragon Quest II on the Game Boy Color way back in the day and never finished it: it was an obtuse title that 10-year-old me had trouble grasping. I’m happy to say that the HD-2D version seems on par with Dragon Quest III, making it easier to digest. It also comes with a voiced cast of characters that you do not create yourself, meaning you can jump right in without researching classes and personalities.

While we’ll have to wait for the full version in order to see how much tedium was axed in this second ever Dragon Quest, I enjoyed traveling south from the town of Beran, hopping in my ship with a party all around level 30. We sailed south to an island and met a mermaid there; here, the party—aside from the lead—all had something to say when the mermaid offered a kiss that would bless them with the ability to breathe underwater.

The Prince of Cannock—inexplicably named Cookie in this demo—had a small panic attack at the thought of the pretty mermaid kissing him, for example, while the two female party members didn’t seem too fussed about it. While not all scenes were fully voiced, I’m looking forward to getting to know these characters again.

More importantly, I got to experience the newest mechanic: underwater travel. Exploring down there seems much the same as exploring on the surface. I found a mermaid town and a dungeon with sparkly spots to pick up some items from in between. Your ship can float up and down in the water and, of course, battle monsters down there. One of these was called a Neanderdrohl, a version of a Drohl species that might be new to the series.

While it was certainly beautiful down there with pale coral covering the landscape, I’m not certain how much traveling underwater is going to add to the adventure. I only saw one town and one dungeon despite covering a wide breadth of sea, so I’m a bit worried there’s not a lot to do down there.

I’m more interested to see how the pacing and battles have been tweaked in this version, as Dragon Quest II was not for the faint of heart. Much like the Dragon Quest I HD-2D demo, what I played was clearly not Draconian quest difficulty; I had very little trouble switching my party to Show No Mercy and obliterating the monsters that I ran into.

View Full-size

You’ll have a party of four to use in Dragon Quest II HD-2D Remake.

Without the customization that comes from choosing your party members in Dragon Quest III, I’m also looking forward to seeing how these three set companions hold up over the course of the full game. They all had varied abilities to hit the weaknesses of the enemies I went up against, and I have to wonder if a lack of build customization will make this a much more straightforward—and perhaps forgettable—adventure.

Regardless, I won’t have to wait long to find out how these classic JRPGs hold up when Dragon Quest I & II HD-2D Remake releases right before Halloween on October 30th.