Dragon Quest 3 HD-2D Remake may have "never happened" if its devs didn't have access to the art style Square Enix used to freshen up other beloved JRPGs

Sep. 4, 2024

“We wanted to keep what made the original so special”

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Dragon Quest 3 HD-2D Remake may have “never happened” if it wasn’t for the popular art style.

Dragon Quest 3 is the latest JRPG banger from yesteryear to get some HD-2D TLC. Speaking at a Gamescom group interview through an interpreter, producer Masaaki Hayasaka says approaching the remake with that specific art style was so important that it might not have happened at all if the team didn’t have access to it.

“They are quite retro games, and we just thought that this HD-2D style was the perfect style to represent them graphically in a remake,” Hayasaka says. “I think pretty much everyone in the company was in agreement about that.

“There wasn’t ever a question, so in terms of how important it is, I think it would be fair to say that if we didn’t have this HD-2D art style accessible to us, then maybe this remake would have never happened.”

Series creator Yuji Horii adds: “And I think that rather than 3D, being able to explore this space in 2D is really what was part of the enjoyment of the original. So we wanted to keep what made the original so special and so fun and bring it into the modern era, which is why this HD-2D style just works so well.”

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