While Final Fantasy has been popular in the US since the first game hit the original Nintendo Entertainment System decades ago, another franchise that equally shaped the roleplaying game genre, Dragon Quest, took longer to catch on here.
Next year will mark the 40th anniversary of the original Dragon Quest’s release in the US — where it was titled Dragon Warrior — making it a great time for a rerelease of the game so that veterans and newcomers can adventure with the hero Erdrick and appreciate gaming history. Dragon Quest 1 & 2 HD-2D Remake came out Oct. 30 for PC and current consoles, giving the venerable games some quality-of-life upgrades along with a refreshing graphical facelift.
The HD-2D graphics style places 2D sprites in lush 3D environments with light and shadow effects.
Most modernized versions of older 2D games either faithfully reproduce their pixel graphics or attempt to adapt them to 3D, as with the Final Fantasy 3 and 4 remakes for the Nintendo DS. The HD-2D system blends both, but preserves the pixel art, which Hayasaka views as an established graphics style that remains alive and well in indie games released on Steam, even as 3D graphics have become the norm for games nowadays.
“Playing a game in the HD-2D style with these pixel art sprites can feel like touching upon a piece of history for modern users, and it might be something like hearing a rock version of a classical piece by Beethoven or something like that,” Hayasaka said.
Which isn’t to say that every HD-2D game looks the same. Games like Octopath Traveler had color and taste more aligned with Final Fantasy titles, Hayasaka explained, with more chic or mature and dark color schemes. When the team transitioned to the Dragon Quest games, they took almost the complete opposite approach, opting for vivid, bright and colorful tones.
