Dragon Quest 1 & 2 HD-2D Remake review: A curious combo
Around this time last year, I was thinking a lot about remakes and their value, especially in the context of *Dragon Quest*. With the HD-2D remake of *Dragon Quest 3*, I was happy to revisit a classic, but not so excited to do so—as that particular well has been pulled from so many times.
This time, with the *Dragon Quest 1 & 2 HD-2D Remake*, my approach was more fueled by curiosity. Here’s another set of games we’ve seen several versions of over the years, but with a much more aggressive promise that they’re full of new stuff. What would that “new stuff” entail exactly, and to what extent would it reform what these games are in my mind? How the heck, in particular, do you expand the original *Dragon Quest* without overdoing it? Does *Dragon Quest 2*, one of my least favorites, benefit from meddling, or does my stubborn respect for history and authenticity form too strong a barrier?
My questions were answered, that much is certain.
## The First Quest
*Dragon Quest 1* is an odd duck of an early RPG in Current Year because it’s so simple. You’re one man on a mission to rescue the princess, defeat the bad guy, and go back home to live well and have kids and stuff. It’s a simple loop around a mostly uncomplicated world map, during which you pick up a couple key items to open some “gates.” That’s about it, with much of the charm coming from *Dragon Ball* creator Akira Toriyama’s brilliant monster designs, strong music from aspiring war criminal Koichi Sugiyama, and the simple novelty of a digitized, accessible Dungeons & Dragons campaign.
As I said in our/my series ranking list, the original *Dragon Quest* is best played on “a Nintendo, on a CRT, in a dark room, under a blanket, between eight and 15-years-old.”
This version yanks the blanket off, kicks you in the ass, dumps a book in your hands, and tells you to get to work. It’s probably the least fun I’ve ever had playing *Dragon Quest 1*, a game I hold in my heart next to the original *Final Fantasy* as replay-friendly RPG comfort food.
It throws off the loop with lots of extra, largely uninteresting padding and absurdly cranked-up difficulty that serves no observable purpose beyond making the runtime a lot longer. It feels like the developers were afraid to simply let *Dragon Quest 1* be *Dragon Quest 1*, as if the audience that showed up for *DQ 3* last year would turn their noses up at something so “bare bones” in comparison.
This is not a story or structure that benefits from moving pieces around and adding things.
To give credit where it’s due, there’s a fascinating effort in retrofitting modern *Dragon Quest* abilities and spells into this, and making them matter. Enemy weaknesses and resistances are super pronounced, and since fights are no longer one-on-one, you have to be on your toes at every moment after the first few hours or so.
But things get gnarly when most bosses and enemies get to take multiple actions on their turn about halfway through, while you’re still stuck as just the one guy who didn’t get the memo that cheating was allowed this time. Enemies getting extra turns isn’t a new concept in this series, but the frequency at which it happens and your lack of options as a solo character makes it feel egregious almost every time.
Many boss fights become more about prayer and RNG than strategy, as getting blown up faster than you can keep up with healing (and unable to return damage) is an easy corner to get backed into no matter how much level grinding you do (I’m exaggerating a little, mind).
It’s no coincidence that difficulty settings even let you toggle invincibility, as I doubt curious parties or *Dragon Quest* newbies will stick around on the default settings long enough to appreciate the effort here, and walk away thinking less of the game as a result—the thing these changes were ostensibly made to avoid.
## Part Two Is a Different Story
While the first *Dragon Quest* remake left a bad taste in my mouth, *Dragon Quest 2* benefits a lot from some of the same adjustments I’ve just been complaining about.
If *Dragon Quest 1* is a fun, little, fledgling RPG adventure, the second game is more of a hardcore dungeon-crawler, just friendly enough it avoids direct comparisons to the likes of *Wizardry*. It’s often seen as a tedious grind, and while the story starts strong with its novel (at the time) party structure, the narrative quickly takes a back seat to unending combat gauntlets.
In this case, the “padding” is quite welcome, as it fleshes out the bigger world and busier pool of characters in a productive way. Contemporary *Dragon Quest* games are well known for anthology-like storytelling, as each new location you come across has its own little vignette in addition to the main plot.
That has been injected here, and the material is more substantive than the dull subplot grafted onto the first game. The main party has also been given life and personality (minus the silent guy you control, of course) that gives more human energy to the quest you’re on in the first place.
There’s even a fourth character introduced to help you get through the earlier solo hours easier, and balance out the encounter difficulty later (after a sizable chunk of normal *DQ 2* with the group of three you’d expect).
A weird juxtaposition from the “you’re gonna get your ass beat by yourself and enjoy it, loser” energy in *DQ 1* HD-2D, but we’ll take a dub for *DQ 2*.
## A Tale of Two Entries
I’ve been greatly enjoying this expanded, longer, and frankly effectively rebalanced take on *Dragon Quest 2* a lot more than I expected to, and that’s great. *DQ 2* is on the bottom of my list, after all, so it had the least to lose in my eyes and the team at Square Enix exceeded my expectations and then some.
It’s a tremendous bummer, then, that I was more stressed, unhappy, and unenthused than I ever thought I would be playing the original *Dragon Quest*.
I wouldn’t be surprised if anyone out there calling it breezy or short simply cranked the difficulty down and blew through the main objectives before moving on, barely taking in what I was hoping to pleasantly experience in HD-2D—that being the totality of taking my time on the adventure, gathering all the Erdrick gear, and finding new secrets such as mini medals and other gimmicks (like the new scrolls, which is another weird padding endeavor I’m not sure what to think of, to be honest).
Instead, it was arduous, frustrating, and a harsh contradiction of what I used to love about that original adventure.
My questions at the beginning were answered pretty clearly. *Dragon Quest 1* is a game that’s hard to mess with too much, as its simplicity holds most of its lasting appeal. Adding too much makes it top-heavy, although it doesn’t help when what is added feels shallow and poorly balanced. Perhaps there’s another version of this project that’s simply better in my eyes that pulls the effort off more cleanly.
In fact, I can see the vision in *Dragon Quest 2*, which is a more robust, thoughtful, and gracefully implemented set of updates to what is at heart a Famicom game from the earliest days of RPG history.
## The Final Word
The end result of this package is strangely funny: two sides of a coin I never would have expected. It’s the worst time I’ve ever had with *Dragon Quest 1*, and the best time I’ve ever had with *Dragon Quest 2*.
If this is your first time with this pair of historically powerful journeys, I almost don’t know what to tell you. But if you enjoyed your time with *DQ 3* last year, you owe it to yourself to see the story through to the end. These are classics in every sense of the word, warts and all.
*Dragon Quest 1 & 2 HD-2D Remake* is available on October 30, 2025, for the PC, Nintendo Switch and Switch 2, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S.
A Switch 2 code was provided by the publisher for this review.
https://www.shacknews.com/article/146558/dragon-quest-1-2-hd-2d-remake-review-score
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