Square Enix has pumped out a lot of HD-2D games over the past few years, and the producer of the Dragon Quest 3 remake is worried you might get “bored” of them.
The HD-2D style that Square Enix introduced with Octopath Traveler is one that has generally gone down pretty well with fans, with the developer going on to use it in a number of other titles, like the Live A Live remake, and most recently Dragon Quest 3 HD-2D Remake. We also know that Dragon Quest 1 and 2 are getting the same treatment, and In a recent interview with Bloomberg, the JRPG remake’s producer Masaaki Hayasaka shared that even more remakes of games from the series is something he’d “love to consider”, but that partially depends on how well this one does.
Hayasaka goes on to explain that if Square Enix was “to release too many games in succession, that would lead to people being bored of those games. On the flipside, if there’s too much of a span between launches, that can also lead to the series not seeming as vibrant and robust anymore. It’s a sensitive topic. It’s something that even my supervisors are constantly unsure and mulling over.”
Personally, I do understand the hesitation, especially considering that even now there are people that don’t like games that look remotely retro, and with Square Enix struggling quite a bit at the moment, the hesitancy is warranted. Lucky for it, Dragon Quest 3 HD-2D Remake seems to be going quite well, as just yesterday it hit a peak of more than 45,000 players on Steam alone (via SteamDB), a very healthy figure for a remake of a single-player RPG.
Whether those numbers hold up for the upcoming remakes of the first and second games is another question, but at least for now more HD-2D remakes seem like they could be on the table.