At PAX West 2025, we had the opportunity to check out Dragon Quest I & II HD-2D Remake from Square Enix. This is the HD-2D remake of the first two Dragon Quest games, in case that wasn’t obvious from the title. Square Enix gave us 20 minutes on each game to try and settle us into the world and figure out what we were doing.
Hands on with Dragon Quest 1
In the first Dragon Quest, you are a solo character adventuring out into the world. In this segment of the demo, you are at a town where a merchant is trying to sell the Thief’s Key to a party of adventurers. They are interested until he gives them the price of 800,000 gold. (This probably means that we won’t need to constantly get keys over and over like in the original Dragon Quest.) After the party says no, he tells them where they can find him in case they change their mind and wander out of the town. Now we are given control of the character, and we can adventure to the world map.
If you go to the world map, you will see a yellow circle that highlights the area you need to go next. This was brought over from the Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake. Dragon Quest 1 has a much different balance to the game than the rest of the Dragon Quest titles. In most of the other titles, you have party members you can choose to spec into a variety of different playstyles. In this one, you have to make your one character the strongest of everything. That means spells, defence, offence, and HP. Everything is there to help your character become powerful.
As you make it to the inn, you meet the merchant who was on the ground unconscious. When you wake him up, he gets flustered and mentions that the thief Robin ‘ood stole the key from him. It is now your mission to find Robin ‘ood and get the key back from him. You’re told where his cave is, and now it’s off to the races as you follow in his footsteps and find the cave. You can do two things: try going through the poison to get to the cave, or travel south near a destroyed village to avoid the poison. I went south and ventured into the destroyed village. While there, I found the ruby wristband that gives my hero more defense.
It was then that I made it to the cave. Robin ood is there and fights you with two of his men. As I mentioned earlier, the balance in this game is far different than other Dragon Quest games. You have to really focus on dishing out damage quickly to the groups of enemies first. After a few sizz attacks to the guards, they tumbled down to the ground, and it was only Robin ‘ood and I taking turns back and forth. In a straight-up one vs one encounter, my character defeats Robin ‘ood without much trouble. I then grab the key, and the demo is done.
Dragon Quest I, in this new HD-2D style, looks and feels amazing. Still somewhat sad that there isn’t a legit quest journal, but it is easy enough to get yourself back on track. I hope more events are linked to Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake now that the twist is already out there in the open. This could add more ties down the line!
Hands on with Dragon Quest II
This is where the change really flies off when we get to start Dragon Quest II HD-2D Remake. For starters, no, you don’t have to complete one to start the other. On the title screen, you are given the option to play Dragon Quest I or Dragon Quest II. Once selected, a separate menu opens up that lets you start a new adventure or continue an already ongoing one.
In this demo, we take control of a four-person party consisting of four descendants of Erdrick. Your goal is to scout out the lighthouse. This demo was all about helping you explore a dungeon and understanding how important using the Peep spell really is. In this lighthouse, some treasure chests house treasures, others house mimics. If you use Peep, you can tell the difference based on the color the treasure chest shines. Red for mimics, and blue for treasure.
Similar to the demo I played of Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake last year, the characters were set to automatically perform actions in combat. I decided to keep all my characters on auto, and after thinking back on it, I regret it a bit for one big reason. In combat, as you are exploring, your characters constantly use spells or abilities that dwindle your MP significantly. On auto, every character was doing large group attack spells or, in Peronel’s case, the BANG spell. Otherwise, auto is a good option since characters will generally heal the hurt character the same turn they are hurt. Usually, when you are selecting the actions, you will need to do it a turn later since you aren’t sure who the monsters will attack.
I didn’t get to the top of the lighthouse because I ran back to town to get some MP items and to take a rest at the inn. I zoomed back to the lighthouse and was able to enter it and get a few more floors up before I had to get off the demo. I was starting to make some serious progress at the end, though. I kept my characters on Auto, but with MP items, I no longer worried about using spells as much.
Verdict
The takeaway from this experience is that Dragon Quest I & II HD-2D Remake is going to be in the same engine as Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake, but with much more substance to tie it to that game. I can’t wait to see what surprises these games will have in store, especially for those of us who have played the games elsewhere.
Dragon Quest I & II HD-2D Remake will release October 30th, 2025 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC.
