Am 30. Oktober 2025 erscheint Dragon Quest I + II HD-2D Remake unter anderem für Nintendo Switch und Switch 2. Ich hatte die Möglichkeit, das Spielebundle auf der gamescom anzuspielen und anschließend zusammen mit zwei weiteren Kollegen anderer Online-Magazine den Director höchstpersönlich – natürlich mit Dolmetscher – in einem kleinen Q&A zu interviewen. Nachfolgend findet ihr die Fragen aller (anonym; außer meine, mit einem ‚M‘ gekennzeichnet und fett markiert) und die Antworten (kursiv formatiert) von Masaaki Hayasaka.
Zunächst nur auf Englisch. Werde später noch ins Deutsche übersetzen. Viel Spaß beim Lesen!
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English version:
Dragon Quest I + II HD-2D Remake will be released on October 30, 2025, for Nintendo Switch and Switch 2, among other platforms. I had the opportunity to play the game bundle at gamescom and after that, I had the opportunity to interview the director himself in a short Q&A – together with two other colleagues from other online magazines. Below you will find the questions from everyone (anonymous, except for mine, which are marked with an “M” and highlighted in bold) and the answers (formatted in italics) from Masaaki Hayasaka.
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Q&A with Masaaki Hayasaka
M: I’d be interested in how long the game was in development overall and what challenges you had to face in reworking it into the HD-2D graphic style?
Hayasaka-san: In terms how long it took to develop – we started after we’ve done [Dragon Quest] III and we could reuse some of the resources and some of the flows and structures that we already had in place for III, so that speeded things up quite a lot. I think it was two years in total. And in terms to the second part of your question, which were one of the challenges: I think it was to make it that the HD-2D was getting the visual identity of Dragon Quest right. Certainly all of the previous HD-2D games we’ve done like Octopath Traveler etc they follow perhaps more of the old Squaresoft visual style. Like to get the color palettes right, the vividness, make it look like a Dragon Quest game within the HD-2D style. I think that was where a lot of the challenge lied, so we did a lot of everything from that.
Q: What did you improve in terms of quality of life?
Hayasaka-san: I think for the most quality of life improvements, most of them were already decided on when we did III. We worked out what the best demands to have what the things people wanted will be when we made III. So we used basically the same ones as last time and kept the ones peoples used when playing III and could just carry on. In terms of new things for I & II that we didn’t do with III – the only addition there is the shortcut commands so you can map like spells or abilities to single button presses, use them whenever you like. Apart from that, it was basically the same features.
Q: So the game is a remake, but I still think there are a lot of details that have changed. I wanted to know what are your favourite parts that have changed or what is one thing that players that have never played Dragon Quest in total should definitely experience?
Hayasaka-san: I think, the answer to both of those questions is probably the same thing, which is the story additions – the new story put in the game. Certainly when we did III, our policy was very much to stick to the original storyline as much as possible and a little on top of it, but basically keep it the same. But with Dragon Quest II in particular, because the original game didn’t have that much of a story to it, we really added in a lot more and fleshed that out, so I think certainly in terms of creating the idea of the new surprises for players, which delight them as they go through the stories in III, I and then II planning all that output, which was my favourite new addition. I think that’s what players really look out for as well.
M: I think, this question might be a bit tricky, but given that you’ve now made classic games available to everyone: Do you have any plans to reissue other titles that were previously only released in Japan or only in select regions of the world in the same style? I have several examples: Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy VI or Terranigma.
Hayasaka-san: I think there is a very good chance and we will be doing more things like that in future. I mean, actual fact, we’ve done it already if you remember we did Live A Live. One of the very first HD-2D games that was a game that was only originally released in Japan. But we’ve made it for HD-2D, so I think the thing is, one of the reasons why we used HD-2D for the Dragon Quest remakes is because we saw it was really well received outside of Japan. We got very good following and people really seemed to like it over here and in various places around the world. So that’d be a really good opportunity to get these older games out in the style that people like and now within the company you’ve got a development line purely for HD-2D games set up now and established. We’re making remakes of old games and new games in the style as well, like The Adventures of Elliot, which was recently announced. So there’s very much a good chance, that we may do more of that stuff.
Q: What about the Switch 2 version of the game?
Hayasaka-san: I think one of the big things for the Switch 2 version in particular, is something that we could do now that we couldn’t do on Switch 1 is the Switch 2 now has the different graphic settings. You’ve got the frame rate priority mode and you’ve got the rendering priority mode, so to be able to create dedicated graphics output to both of those modes and allow the player to choose between them. I think that’s probably the biggest thing we needed to improve with the Switch 2 version.
Q: Looking beyond this project, do you see the HD-2D style continuing with later entries of Dragon Quest, like one of the other parts or more remakes planned in the future? Especially looking at my favourite Dragon Quest IX.
Hayasaka-san: Again, there’s a very good chance of it happening in the future. I think obviously before we may be getting a little ahead of ourselves, we need to see how these ones do. If III, I & II sell really really well, everyone likes them, it’s very likely to go on and do other ones, too. Dragon Quest is a huge series, a lot older games, there’s a lot of potential here. So we’ll see what happens in the future, but we need to see how these things go first.
M: The next question would be a bit of a personal note. Concerning your career at Square Enix, the first titles I found you are credited in as an assistant producer of Bravely Second and Octopath Traveler. After that you worked as a sound artist of Bravely Default II. Are you originating from the music section or which is your main working area?
Hayasaka-san: [Before answering: I’m looking forward to that. I don’t get these questions a lot, but I really like that and am looking forward to saying this!] So I mean, obviously my main job, my job title is producer. That’s why I was employed by Square Enix. I joined Square Enix after university, but I always loved music. It’s been a hobby of mine. Certainly for the university, I went to study computer science, but I’ve always loved music and it’s been a hobby, so I actually wanted to become a composer, but I failed to do that, so they employed me as a producer. But I remember for Bravely, I went to my boss and said ‘I really want to be the sound director of one, please let me be sound director’, so it’s both.
Q: What do you think is the target audience of the remakes?
Hayasaka-san: I think first of all, number one has to be the fans of the original games. However, you reach many new people with it. If it isn’t liked by the people who played the original games, the original plans, I think, that it’s over for a remake and it’s not a good remake. So that’s the first priority. It really has to get to deliver to the old fans. Having said that, also very much you want new people to come in. I think as a series, if you don’t get new players and build up that audience, the series won’t expand and won’t grow so especially overseas, actually outside Japan, because the original games weren’t released here. Getting those new people in and experiencing these games is really important. That links into why we had those accessibility and quality of life improvements, making the story more interesting for newcomers as well. So the old fans come first, but the new group is important as well.
Q: A last addition to that, I was asked by our community a lot: Are there any visual or audio easter eggs hidden in the remake that maybe especially longtime players rembember from the 8-bit version?
Hayasaka-san: Let’s just talk about the music. First of all, because we’re using orchestral sound this time, I think there’s a lot of people who played the original, listening to the orchestral version and said ‘Wow, that’s what they were intending, that’s what this was supposed to be, that’s interesting.’
There is definitely something I’m not allowed to say now , it’s a hidden thing, but it’s something I’m really looking forward to seeing that old fan reaction for, when they hear it ‘Oh wow, that’s an interesting way of using that music there’. So there definitely are easter eggs in there, but I’m not going to tell you what they are.
M: After Bravely Default II, you were credited as ‘Special Thanks’, too, so what does this mean?
Hayasaka-san: So it was quite a special way that I worked on Bravely Default II. Actually, because I’m a producer, like I said, that’s my main job, but I was doing nothing producer related for that game at all. Essentially, I was a sound planner on that game. So it was basically working out, where the background music comes in and all the scenes checking out all the sound effects, all the music and ordering the new ones and asking them to do the briefing to those. So I was basically a member of the sound team for that game, which is quite an usual thing, that’s not what my main job is, so that’s why I was in the ‘Special Thanks’ for that.
Producer Takahashi came to me and said ‘Look, the sound is really behind on this game. We’ve no idea where we need to be with this. You can do sound, right? Please take over and you do that’. So I tried to do it as best I could.
M: Arigatō gozaimasu!
Vielen Dank an MSM.digital fürs Vermitteln des Termins und an Square Enix für diese einmalige Möglichkeit!
Marcel ist im Jahr 1986 geboren, dem Jahr, wo seine Lieblings-Spielereihe ihren Ursprung hat: The Legend of Zelda. Mit seinen nun mehr als 30 Jahren Lebens- und ca. 25 Jahren Nintendo-Erfahrung versucht er euch mit Liebe und Leidenschaft auf dem Laufenden zu halten!
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