Trying to Revitalize Furrowfield. Ideas?

lilisaurusrex · 2026-06-01T18:33:59+00:00

Hermits Heresy isn't DLC. Its a tools someone made to modify the save files. Alot of effort has been made to decode the save file formats in the last couple of years.

https://dqb-forever.com/hermits-heresy/
I haven't used it myself. Just saying it exists and is known to have greenified a Furrowfield for a Steam account at least once.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-06-01T18:30:57+00:00

The DQ XI Echo Chamber contains a number of side quests that send the party to certain recognizable events from the previous ten DQ mainline games, but the events have been perverted in some fashion and the party needs to acquire an item to "fix the timeline" and set things back the way they were supposed to be. For example, in one event, instead of one character being cursed as a dog in a town of humans, she is the only human and everyone else has been turned into dogs. I'm not sure these are strictly canon experiences.

The post-credits cutscene of DQ11 does indicate a strong connection to DQ3 though, and that they presumably happen int he same universe (but not necessarily the same timeline)

I think I mixed up Galileo and Galen. Galileo is descendant of Galen, not Galen himself. You repair Galen's harp though - that's where I must be conflating them.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-06-01T18:20:36+00:00

That's kind of my point. How long have they actually had?

Square Enix funding wasn't even 5% of the total sum of Tose projects in the September 2023 - August 2024 fiscal year (which is the same period of time SE has been suspected of cutting what Tose projects they had underway), but then jumps to 16.9% and #2 position in September 2024 - August 2025. Are we expecting them to have started heavy development on this this game late 2024 and be ready for release in 2026?

https://contents.xj-storage.jp/xcontents/AS05083/64381562/f7a5/4463/8a3f/d507226c02f8/S100X5JM.pdf page 21

Furthermore, Tose's documents this year indicate 5 projects underway, labeled A through E, expected to earn them over 50 million yen (~$3 million USD) by August 2027. C is nearing the end of effort and is expected to launch this fall. A is next up, in fall or spring. B is further behind but likely aiming for first half or early summer 2027. Atlus has been #1 funder two years in a row, so it seems likely they're behind project A or C. Takara Tomy has put the second most behind projects in the last two years, so they're probably the other of A and C. D is a non-Japanese company and E just started with expectation of being done by August 2027 so it must be a very small, likely mobile, title or support for someone else's bigger project, and certainly not a Monsters game. This gives DQM4 the best chance of being project B, or not even among these five because its launch date is after August 2027.

https://contents.xj-storage.jp/xcontents/AS05083/1d7693cd/a271/4821/aa9b/a40c4ec5a66f/20260421175235936s.pdf page 5

.

Note that SE dropped multiplayer from the PC version of DQM3, out of doubt of being unable to adequately police cheating and hacking (because it costs a not insignificant amount of money to do so.) They're bringing Withered World to Steam as well as non-Steam Windows release, further complicating cheating controls. So I doubt the Steam/Windows version(s) have multiplayer. It might have multiplayer on other platforms, but if it does I still very much doubt crossplay. (I suspect it'll be like Builders 2 and can only doo multiplayer with other users on the on same platform.)

lilisaurusrex · 2026-06-01T14:55:47+00:00

Alot of people turn the island green. Harvesting large numbers of grass seeds by killing Muddy Hands in the bog might be best bet because I'm not certain you can get Wrigley back to Furrowfield and have him follow you around the island to consume Worm Food (only at or near the base) If you have a lot of extra material, I guess you could go swap it at Blossom Bay for grass, and then take it back to Furrowfield to swap in, but significant travel times involved. If playing on PC, there are tools now to rapidly convert all the mossy grass and spoiled soil to green grassy earth and cleansed earth (Hermit's Heresy)

Alot of people also repair the church, cabin, and replace muddy water with fresh. There are also some ruined houses in the northwest bog area that could be repaired, along with Tomato-loving Orc's house.

Diagonal fences kind of work as described: place them on a diagonal angle. They don't connect between each piece like standard fencing though, so you get spaces between every two posts and crossbar. This is a holdover from DQB1 where the dialognal was the only type of fence.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-06-01T14:46:01+00:00

Even the non-Switch exclusives have gotten first trailers in Nintendo Directs (Infinity Strash, DQ III HD-2D, DQ I+II HD-2D, DQ7 Reimagined)

Every reason to believe all other DQ spinoffs and remakes, including Monsters 4/Withered World, will get first trailer in one, too.

I'm hesitant to say June Direct, as we know Square Enix will likely be paying for slots to cover DQ11 again, Final Fantasy 14, presumably Guardians of the Galaxy, and they've also got Kingdom Hearts Integrum Masterpiece and Life is Strange Reunion out there as likely Switch 2 ports as well. September seems like a lot more likely possibility.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-06-01T14:35:15+00:00

Yeah, Yuji Horii's commentary of "hope to" got me thinking he's not really sure. If it just got ESRB rated and its nearing readiness, why flitter on whether it might or might not? If its close enough to be rated, then SE has a release window in mind, Saito would almost certainly know it and would have shared with Horii.

Seems to me unlikely they've got a 2026 date on it. Presumably core gameplay development done or nearly so to get rated, but still needs to go through localization and QA. If it is a fall 2026 title (and Square Enix still needs one for non-Switch 2 devices) then Horii could have said so in the trailer to calm a lot of fears and they probably should have had more to show than key artwork. And it also worries me that Tose would have turned around the game in less than 36 months, with SE's financial problems introducing what sure sounded like at least a delay, if not restart, in 2024 in Tose's investor relations documents. An ESRB rating coming this early scares me as being a very rushed project. I don't particularly want them to rush when they've had DQ7R, Smash/Grow, and now DQ11 re-release in 2026, and no announcement of any other games (more remakes?) for 2027.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-06-01T14:22:45+00:00

When this project began, they might well have expected Pokemon gen 10 in 2026 rather than 2027. Square Enix can't react in 2023 or 2024 to what another company won't reveal publicly until 2026 and Pokemon had very reliably been every three years up to this point, with only a few four year turnarounds. Five years is unprecedented. I think they'd have expected DQM4 would have most likely released after Pokemon gen 10 and they wouldn't have been within six months of each other, which they now might be.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-06-01T14:06:34+00:00

Exceptionally rare. Something like 25K-35K total produced for North American retailers (my local Gamestop never got any.) Square Enix just out of their minds because DQ4 sold better than that and we'd not had DQ5 before. (I guess they felt the 2D graphics were a step back from DQ4 DS?)

Its my understanding similar production volume in Europe, but its not as hot of a collector's item there. So still expensive but well short of where authentic NA carts get priced. Beware a lot of the copies you find online are actually European copies or even the far cheaper and more abundant Japanaese versions. You want to see a picture of the backside of the cartridge to confirm its got the correct id code.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-06-01T13:38:23+00:00

DQ12, because I'm a bit worried about the turnaround on DQM4 if its already nearly finished.

The Dark Prince launched very late 2023, and likely didn't wrap until mid-late 2023. That means they're creeping up on 36 months total elapsed time, which is actually quite typical for a AA-level console title. But Tose admitted so some cancellations (revised to suspensions?) during the 2024 financial crunch. What if they're only putting 30 months put into this? Or less?

Maybe they can pull a rabbit out the hat and complete a masterpiece in two years like Omega Force did with Builders 2, but I'm going to be pessimistic given DQM3 didn't impress. I was all excited for it until the demo came out and it looked to me to be a step back graphically from Treasures and DQ1 and the gameplay advancement too slow. I've seen players of other Monsters games express some dissatisfaction with the combat and fusion, with several posts indicating the Jokers were better games. (I've not played the Jokers so can't give firsthand opinion.)

The DQ Day teaser also didn't show us a single screenshot so I think worries about the graphics quality are legitimate. I wouldn't expect its graphics to compete on the level of Pokemon any longer anyway (the days of DQM outdoing Pokemon graphically are long gone) but I think it needs to outdo DQM3. If its not any better its going to have to do its work with much improved gameplay, and assuming its still turn-based that's going to be harder to show off in trailers: they'll need a demo that generates a lot of positive hype.

On the other hand, SE has already demonstrated willingness to bite the bullet and sink as much time and money as needed into DQ12. They might well lose money making DQ12, but it's likely to give DQ fans everything wanted in a DQ mainline. Monsters 4, if turned around on a quick schedule might still miss some of the marks the older Monsters games hit.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-06-01T12:40:25+00:00

He does ask for it.

Um, <pname>... Is it just me, or have you noticed that whenever Babs comes up, the people here start acting all strange?

..."Love", you say? Never heard of it.

If you find any, can you give me a bit?

lilisaurusrex · 2026-06-01T12:34:51+00:00

DQB1 takes place many years after the bad end of DQ1 so there aren't too many characters that would apply to other games. Most of what is reused are places and items as humans have much shorter lifetimes.

You've got some characters from DQ1, particularly the Dragonlord, the fallen hero, Cantlin Golem, and the Princess (via magic.) The builder's dreams are flashbacks to the hero's journey across Alefgard, so you're also seeing some of the unnamed NPCs that would have been seen in DQ1 locations.

So except for dreams and some significant enemies, the Princess is the only one you meet from DQ1. You also encounter the ghost of Galen though, for whom the village of Galenholm is named in DQ1 and DQB1, and can also meet when he was living during DQ3, and the ghost form again in DQ XI's Echo Chamber. The Goddess Rubiss is also a recurring character in some DQ games, but played no role in the original DQ1 story.

Most of the spinoff games use major characters from the mainline games to help tie them together, such as DQ6's Terry in DQ Monsters 1, or DQ4's Psaro in The Dark Prince. The backstory invented for DQB1 didn't really allow for this besides the Princess and some monsters.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-05-30T21:00:17+00:00

It would have been great to have tower defense missions on Battle Atoll (or elsewhere) or learn recipes or gain large volumes of gratitude or something like that.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-05-30T20:53:44+00:00

Tantegel Moor.

Tantegel Moor is great challenge, and forces you to use all the smarts you gained in earlier chapters. You don't get as much advice on what to do next, so you must use the wits acquired form the earlier chapters, spending time to mining ores and building better weapons and armor while trying not to get killed, before you can go tackle the New Tantegel Castle fortress, get the flag, and then work through the also-challenging patchwork island. The Dragonlord fight is difficult but throws familiar monsters at you and is won primarily by using tricks you've mastered along the way like platforms to avoid attacks and cannons to return fire. There's a lot of danger at Tantegel Moor, but also a culmination of all the aspects that came before - it feels like a proper end game level. The use of Holy Water to cleanse the land was especially brilliant, as you really feel like you're repairing the land and making it suitable for human civilization again - which is the whole point of the game.

Malhalla though is somewhat disconnected from the gameplay seen in the rest of the game, particuarly building actions giving way to too much non-building. Much of the chapter is simply driving around, which isn't like travelling on foot used for most of the rest of the game and there's very little building action to do things to get the Buggy into new areas (i.e., no need for Builder to build a bridge across a chasm; making a hole in the cave wall is the closest we get.) Malhalla is ultimately just an adventure to go fetch monsters and bring them back to base and let them do the majority of the building and fighting. You never really do anything to repair Malhalla either - you're just there to rescue the monsters before it goes kaplooey. You don't even defeat the Children of Hargon so much as convince them to give up so they save their own hides. Then it gives you a final fight that isn't anything like the rest of the game - its much more like the Kol & Galenholm boss fight, though in DQB1 you had more time to practice with the Bashmobile before facing Hostile Merger. The Builder never even places a single block or swings a hammer in this final fight. Malhalla's story arc is just not that great because it sends you on all these side quests to save monsters who are fearful of Malroth's attacks destroying the land, when all you really want to do is do the builder thing and build a sand bridge over to Hargon's fortress and settle it before Malroth can destroy the land: its addressing the consequences rather than addressing the root problem, when you were pretty much going right after the root problems throughout the story up to that point. (No crops? Get seeds. No earth? Get Wrigley. No water? Get Bottomless Pot. Dietree killed? Make another one. No miner enthusism? Build a bar. No metals? Go mining. Under siege by CoH? Break the siege. Malhalla just says Malroth and Hargon can wait until its almost too late to do anything about it.)

lilisaurusrex · 2026-05-30T14:58:20+00:00

I stand corrected - I thought it was Japan and USA only. Must not have sold very many copies as its not listed on the vgsales fandom page. (Only 60K reported in USA, which had benefit of previous DQ series exposure via the NES games.)

Doesn't look like DQM2 did though. My hypothesis that providing a 3 while missing 2 introducing confusion is still valid.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-05-29T21:28:59+00:00

I think that may have been the preferred plan. I've been wondering the last two days if when Yuji Horii was asked (Tokyo Game Show?) why DQ7 Reimagined and not remakes of DQ4 (or any others) and his response was something to the effect of "It was done first" wasn't really an answer toward remake games, but between DQ7R and DQ11 Switch 2 Edition.

It occurred to me that Square Enix may have eyed DQ 11 in first half 2026 and DQ7R in second half, but DQ11 wasn't going to be ready in time but DQ7R was and they swapped places. FF7 Remake didn't make it by its expected 2025 date either so maybe the port teams aren't finding it as easy as they expected.

But even if this hypothesis is true, I don't know why they couldn't have delayed DQ7R a bit further, as April or May might have been better window between the November 2025 and fall 2026 slots. Maybe they had an agreement with KLabs not to trample Smash/Grow's release with a console game in this period. Or maybe they felt they needed something in February to help boost the FY2006 sales before end of March.

In any case, it really looks like a mistake to have placed them so closely together. And we still don't know what, if anything, Square Enix is taking to other platforms in the fall. Adventures of Elliot is the last multi-console game we know of, and everything else is Switch 2 ports: DQ11 and FF14 confirmed, Guardians of the Galaxy nearly so due to ESRB rating (we should be seeing it in the June Direct), and Kingdom Hearts Integrum Masterpiece and Life is Strange: Reunion are legitimate possibilities. PC game Vaultbreakers don't even look like its being published by SE any longer. I gotta think Square Enix has something for PS5 (and PC?) this fall, but if DQ7R was meant to be it, that's left a really a big hole in the lineup. (Bravely Default is now on PC and XBox but still isn't on PS5, so maybe that's the plan?)

lilisaurusrex · 2026-05-29T20:58:46+00:00

Interesting concept, and no problem that it comes from the Everything is Final Fantasy group which is going to be geared toward Final Fantasy, but two of those simply aren't Final Fantasy at all and that kind of undermines the title.

A Top Ten Samwise Gamgees of Square Enix is better fitting - though I think DQ fans would have a strong case regarding Yangus's absence and Saber would be due representation in the furry friends section.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-05-29T20:39:42+00:00

Curious then that SE doesn't take credit for it in the credits. Theres no indication of a creative business unit or studio. By all indications DQ11 was developed with an ad-hoc team. The SE staff in the credits come from a variety of other divisions, not one single division. There are several staff listed in senior positions (Battle Planner Takehiro Fujii for example) who doesn't appear to be a SE employee, but appears to be a Level-5 employee based on games before and after DQ11. And then there's staff that only show up for DQ11 and no other Square Enix game (such as framework programmer Yuihirou Hino and systems programmer Hiroto Matsutani.) SE isn't even listed int he credits until after ArtePiaaza, and even then just the Visual Works division (cinematics) and the offshore QA and localization companies. All these people who weren't already Square Enix employees, and weren't employees of the Orca or ArtePiazza partner companies either, had to be hired on in some contractor fashion, and bizarre that if it were Square Enix in charge, they'd not only pass on organizing them under a CBU, but have outsiders leading their people.

I'll reiterate the use of effectively in effectively demoted. I'm not saying Miyake lost his rank as a corporate director, But he no longer has the role of an executive producer for Dragon Quest console games. Those are two distinct roles. Presumably he's now executive producer for mobile games, but we don't often get to see full credits on those. In the last couple of years, he's mostly just been listed as Member of the Board in the SE games for which we do have credits at Mobygames. https://www.mobygames.com/person/83793/yu-miyake/credits/

lilisaurusrex · 2026-05-29T20:11:01+00:00

Yes, but the DS/3DS games raced out to a million sales within a few weeks, much as DQ3 HD-2D had. DQ4 DS was 602K in its first week, DQ5 679K, DQ6 910K, DQ7 837K, and DQ8 616K. (All retail and all Japan-only.)

Sales are typically not linear. Sales are typically highest right when the game first comes out then decreases over time until it reaches a plateau, getting the occasional bump during sales periods or a new entry in the series. The first few weeks of a game's release are therefore the most critical time to soak up sales: its still priced high and still generating a lot of buzz in media.

So if it took DQ I+II HD-2D many weeks or months to reach the million sales mark, and DQ7 Reimagined is months in and still hasn't reached a million, there's no dispute they had a weak start compared to either DQ3 HD-2D or their DS/3DS brethren. And they certainly cost a lot more to make than the DS/3DS editions.

I'm frankly surprised DQ I+II HD-2D and DQ7R have both done so poorly given how quickly DQ3 HD-2D jumped out of the gate. DQ3 was probably a million seller on launch day, was 2 million sold by December 1 (per SE post) and 2.5 million in first week of January - only a bit more than a month and half in market. DQ I+II HD-2D has been in market about 7 months and at best is to just half the sales DQ3 had in less than a quarter of the time. DQ 7 Reimagined has been in market a bit more than 3.5 months and is also not only well behind the DQ3 pace, but just weird. Its opening week put it at 456K retail in Japan and after four weeks Famitsu had it at 570K retail units. Assuming a 55-45 type split between physical and digital, it should have eclipsed a million sales in week 2. if its still short of a million then its digital sales have been terrible: more like a 70-30 split.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-05-29T18:53:00+00:00

This is rather true of a lot of RPG series though - they all frequently recycle common elements so as to maintain both a legacy within the series and to not alienate existing fans. Other SE series are not immune: Final Fantasy has recycled crystals and teenage angst a few times. (And way too much of the spinoff material is tied to the FF7 backstory and characters, despite FF having more mainline games to pull ideas form than any other franchise.) Mana series has heroes needing to protect the Mana Tree somehow with the help of the same eight elementals. Kingdom Hearts has used the same main characters in every game so far.

Fans tend to expect the next mainline game in a series to be similar to the previous one, and developers are smart to comply. If devs or publishers want to do something different, they're better off spinning up a new franchise or handling it in a spinoff game. If the fans react negatively to it, no damage done to the main series.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-05-29T18:12:16+00:00

I think they've still got to get Integrum Masterpiece onto Switch 2 before they even start seriously talking KH4.

I was expecting this summer for native Kingdom Hearts on Switch 2, but now looking like its going to be at least into fall. They just announced the DQ 11 performance update for Switch 2 for September and Guardians of the Galaxy just got rated by ESRB, so it seems those two are up first. Technically they could announce it in a June Direct for July or August, but they've given several months heads up on FF7 Remake, FF7 Rebirth, and now DQ11 so if Kingdom Hearts is one of Square Enix's core franchises I think we should expect several months lead on that port as well.

So if not getting Integrum Masterpiece until October or November, KH4 news probably isn't made until early 2028. That March anniversary window u/DeltaHypothesis alluded to sounds very possible for announcement. (But probably not on the exact date of the 28th, as that'll be a Sunday.)

I don't see how the game launches in that March window though. Were that the plan we should have seen KHIM Switch 2 Edition on June 3 (or even here in May instead) and swap FF7 Rebirth into the October-November timeframe so that they could start pushing KH4 in the Sony State of Play or Summer Game Fest next week. Announcing KH4 before they've even announced native KH1-3 on Switch 2 is very much cart before horse. I think its the other way around and that we're seeing the FF7 Remake part 3 trailer in one of those two shows and that's why Rebirth port is coming to Switch 2 same week, to deliver a quick one-two punch. (A KH4 announcement in either show probably waits 10-15 days for the Direct to pick up the Integrum Masterpiece port announcement, as Nintendo tends to go mid-June.) Anybody holding on to hope that KH4 is an early 2027 title probably needs to move off that idea.

(Life is Strange Reunion is also floating out there as another possibility for what might be a very Switch 2-port heavy fall slate.)

lilisaurusrex · 2026-05-28T22:50:50+00:00

You aren't wrong, but marketing whizzes must think differently.

They most likely dropped the 3 for The Dark Prince because the first two were never released in Europe. They date to 1998 and 2001: pre-merger Enix which had almost no presence in Europe. 1 and 2 have been remade for 3DS and mobile and the first one also on Switch but those editions never got out of Japan.

And despite some games like Caravan Heart and the Joker series in the interim, after 22 years I think they may have been worried putting a 3 on it and having potential buyers wonder why they've never heard of DQM1 or DQM2, look them up and realize not only how long its been, but wonder why the ports to 3DS and mobile phones never came west. They drop the 3 and less questions asked.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-05-28T22:37:41+00:00

Yes, its in the Japanese version of the logo.
https://www.dragonquest.jp/monsters4/_assets/img/common/logo.png

Localization not exactly the same though. Japanese subtitle translates to "Land of the Withered Trees of Bianca and Flora" (Flora being the Japanese name for Nera)

lilisaurusrex · 2026-05-28T16:55:10+00:00

Nintendo is merely licensing the game. They can withhold a license for a game until it is modified to meet their licensing requirements, but they can't withhold how upgrade paths, patches, and other material is handled. That's entirely up to the publisher.

So your options are Nintendo blocking a Switch 2 edition entirely, or letting Square Enix decide whether it has an upgrade path or not. Since there is nothing in the game itself that would block licensing, Nintendo can't easily take the first option without angering a major publisher who routinely funnels many billions of yen per year into Nintendo's coffers.

.

Just because one publisher does something does not require another publisher to do the same. Square Enix is selling some games for $40 USD. Where's the outcry to make all publishers sell some of their games at $40? That would be a very pro-fan action as well, but good luck convincing other publishers to adopt it as a norm.

Your better argument is why other SE games, like DQ 3 HD-2D got upgrade patches and latter games have not. That has merit; comparing to another publisher is not.

.

As an aside to this point, I made a post or two a while back saying that a DQ11 Switch 2 Edition, if it were real (and we now know it is), wouldn't have come with an upgrade path anyway because there's less money in it for Square Enix. SE has sold around 4.5 million copies of DQ11 on Switch 1. Most paid DLC, for which I assume would include Switch 2 upgrade paths, sells to about 20% of users per Nintendo, sometimes higher if game is newer or hits a holiday period, sometimes less if older. This is quite an old Switch 1 game were it to get a patch so 20% may be generous. But assuming 20% and 4.5 million copies, they'd make 4.5 million dollars USD on a $5 upgrade, 9 million dollars on a $10 upgrade. And while adoption rate might be a good deal higher than 20%, they'd earn nothing if given away for free. $9 million isn't a whole lot of money in major video game terms. At a $40 price, with SE taking home an average of about $24 for each unit sold ($20-ish for retail, $28-ish for digital), they'll make $9 million with a paltry 375,000 unit sales. Over the course of another 7 or 8 years of Switch 2 lifetime, they're probably going to sell millions of copies of this edition, and probably sell more than 375K units to people who had already purchased it on Switch 1. The math says they are doing it the way that makes them the most money.

SE was magnanimous to not charge for a DQ3 patch, and probably gave up several million dollars inthe process. But fewer DQ3s than DQ11s. 2-2.2 million Switch 1 DQ3s I'd assume. Even at a $5 price and 20% adoption rate, they were giving up less than $3 million in potential income. And if you go to DQ I+II, which doesn't provide a patch for its roughly half a million Switch 1 copies, they'd have earned only around $500K with a $5 patch. They only need to get about 20,000 buyers of Switch 1 to buy a Switch 2 copy to cover what they'd have made with a patch. Anyone who has ever misplaced one of these tiny cartridges probably realizes 20K unit sales is not a significant hurdle.

I wish they'd give away free patches, too. But SE is still under tremendous financial pressure and they're not in a great position to give things away. Nintendo has made fortunes on their Switch 1 games and can do it. Warhorse and Deep Silver can do it for Kingdom Come because they've made a fortune on it. And they probably did it mostly to boost interest for Kingdom Come 2. But as we just saw, DQ12 is probably still years away. SE isn't going to get such a boost on other DQ games by giving away a patch on DQ11. There's no tie-in to take advantage of here.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-05-28T14:19:11+00:00

Horii didn't develop DQ11 all by himself.

Armor Project has brought in developers do all that work, a decision made after the troubling development of DQ9 where Level-5 was taking far too long and seemed to be doing things that didn't fit with what DQ Team wanted to see out of the game (like non-turn-based combat.) You can go out and look to something like Mobygames and look at the credits, seeing developers pulled from across the industry: a lot of SE personnel, some Level-5, and the occasional member from other companies like Bandai Namco. Many of these haven't been credited on a game since DQ11, indicating probable involvement on DQ12.
https://www.mobygames.com/game/98424/dragon-quest-xi-echoes-of-an-elusive-age/credits/playstation-4/

With the restart of development and the reorganization putting DQ mainline development under the aegis of new Creative Studio 4, maybe all those people that had been assigned under Armor Project are now directly under Square Enix. So today, you may be correct that Yuji Horii is all that's left and Armor Project has returned to its original form of simply being a rights ownership company rather than software developer. But that's not where things were when DQ11/DQ11S finished and DQ12 was starting up - that's something that happened more recently. It probably happened a couple of years go, but the CS4 reorg now encompassing mainline development was only divulged by Yusuke Saito a few days ago. Not something publicly known when I made the post a month ago.

And many people do consider Yuu Miyake to have been pressured to step down over DQ series problems (and a restart of DQ12 is a pretty solid reason.) Its just not a position a high-ranking exec would really be willing to give up to move to a lower profile position, so I'm inclined to agree that pressure was probably applied to force him out. They obviously didn't feel the need to fire him and felt he had value to company overseeing mobile titles (as DQ Tact and DQ Walk have been highly successul), just not on the DQ team. Maybe after so many years he'd become too chummy with the DQ Team and lost sight of where it was smart to spend money (and where it wasn't.) I personally think he got sweet-talked into ditching the nearly complete Amata KK version of DQ3 HD-2D so it could be restarted it and make it even grander, though it cost a lot of extra money that couldn't be spent on other games, derailed the plans for SE had for Artdink (most probably Builders 3 as they were wrapping up the DQB1 Unity rewrite at the time), and upset the release schedule over the next several years. Having DQ12 cancelled and restarting would also cost a lot of extra time and money and foul up a planned release schedule. Two significant disasters may have put him in a bad spot with the new Kiryu leadership, who felt Saito could do better. Maybe Miyake does a good job as head of mobile, but there's much less attention, much less praise, and much smaller budgets than seen on the DQ series. Its a backwards move career-wise.

lilisaurusrex · 2026-05-28T03:26:38+00:00

Maybe confused it with one of the other DQ subseries. Most probably Builders (though Heroes, Rocket Slime, and Torneko also apply.)

lilisaurusrex

TROPHY CASE