- Square Enix held a press conference in Tokyo today to announce the next entry in the main Dragon Quest series. In a surprise move, Japan's most popular series will continue not on the PS3 or the Wii, as many had expected. Instead, Square Enix will be bringing the game to the DS. The full name of Dragon Quest 9 is Dragon Quest 9: Hoshizora no Mamoribito. The surname can be translated to "Protectors of the sky." Level 5 will be handling development on the game. The hot-shot development studio headed up development on Dragon Quest 8, before turning to a couple of projects for Sony. On the DS, the studio is currently working on Professor Layton and the Mysterious Village, to be self-published early next year. Development staff on Level 5's end is the same as from Dragon Quest 8, right down to company president Akihiro Hino, who's serving as producer. Other staff members should come as no surprise. Series father Yuji Horii, heading up the project once again, was in attendance at the press conference, and said, "The DS version is not a side-story, but a true part of the series." Kouichi Sugiyama will be lending his talents to the game's soundtrack. And all future Dragon Quest soundtracks, it seems, as he took the stage today to say "I will continue making Dragon Quest music until I die." Development seems to be quite far along. Famitsu.com and Gemaga.com, the online arms of two big Japanese magazines, report that a demo was held at the press conference, with Horii and other guests playing the game live. Dragon Quest 9 features an action-oriented battle system playable cooperatively by up to four players via Wi-Fi. This is the first network-based Dragon Quest, Horii noted. The DS's dual screen setup is also put to use, with the top screen showing a map and the bottom screen housing all the action. Horii is aiming for a Japanese release some time in 2007. With Dragon Quest 8 pulling in favorable sales internationally, expect a release outside of Japan to follow Here are some screenshots of the upcoming game Dragon Quest IX Img 1 Img 2
Cool! This looks like it could actually be very interesting. Maybe the DS will allow them to alter the battle system so that the game doesn't get as old as DQ8 did. I loved the story for 8, but I still haven't finished it because I'm stuck at Empryea(sp?) and have no strong will to continue.
The reason this is done, is probably to not make a mistake yet, they don't know which Nex-Gen is worthy of this title yet, as due to Dragon Quest hitting Nintendo as much as Sony which company deserves the want of Dragon Quest on their Next-Gen is whichever Next-Gen sells better. http://youtube.com/watch?v=a7JN9BXB_RA First Official Promo Oh yes the Genre for Dragon Quest IX is "Action RPG"
i cant wait for this game. its going from turn based to action rpg like they did with FFXII. i also like how you can just drag the armors and stuff to your characters. if they are actually making this a main game and not just a side game, then this could be one of the best handheld games ever ^_^. I know im definitely gonna reserve this.
The fighting did get repetitive on DQ8. By the looks of it, on DQ9, the fighting should be different, which should be good.
