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The story
Discussion broke out on 5ch’s Hardware/Industry (Geha) board over the HD-2D remakes of Dragon Quest I, II, and III. The thread repeatedly settled on the verdict “1 is trash, 2 is a great game, 3 is just okay,” while some posters pointed out that III’s sales have dropped compared to the rest of the series. Opinions split title by title — over near-instant-death damage from status ailments in I, the pros and cons of collecting Mini Medals and the new voice acting, and how well the post-patch balance adjustments landed.
What people said
Doesn't really matter either way — you either get the first strike and wipe them out, or you get killed yourself. Stuff like putting a Golem to sleep with a flute only for it to wake up instantly and kill you, or failing status-ailment/evasion rolls back-to-back and dying outright, comes down to luck way more than anything else.
The fact that sales have dropped by half since III is nothing but the "denden effect" (getting more praise while selling worse) at this point.
II was fun, sure, but do you honestly think I is fun?
This, basically. Even my old man, who bought the HD-2D version, ended up buying the original 2D version all over again.
Yeah, exactly. Make it fully 3D and remake it properly. HD-2D is the unwanted stepchild nobody asked for.
And yet I and II still managed to slip under that rock-bottom bar. You can feel public opinion shifting from "FF is bad" to "Square Enix itself is bad."
On the flip side, if you run Monster/Monster/Thief, it stops being fun once you've farmed enough EXP, and if you don't self-restrict, you can just cheese it by calling monsters and spamming sleep. Even after the patch, you still end up fighting sleep RNG because of the Beast Hypnos Hunt.
1: Trash
2: Great game
No way II counts as a great game. Given how underpowered the Prince of Cannock used to be, buffing him hard makes sense, but the dialogue is terrible across the board — a total waste of the voice cast.
As for classes, Warrior, Martial Artist, and Priest feel underpowered, and as for battle balance, it's fine as-is since all you have to do is avoid using Monster Wrangler, which exists purely to coddle beginners.
Even if you ban Monster Wrangler, you can still just run Mage and Thief. Outside of the Hypnos Hunt fight, you're better off just spamming Echo Flute + Kaboom anyway.
The Mini Medal system just doesn't fit with how games are designed these days.
In the II remake, Loare's job isn't dealing damage — it's being the punching bag.
2: Great
3: Meh
That's the general consensus.
https://x.com/nullgame0220/status/2112738218068398092?s=46&t=yFtZ7Jgq4XA1sVUvUvnt_w
Lol, maybe 10% of them are actually praising it.
Lmao, turns out you get the same effect as the patch even without updating.
Same. It just looks cheap.
Having a difficulty option is pretty normal these days. Whether Dragon Quest's own tuning was actually good is a separate issue though.
Ramia (the flying dragon) got faster.
It's a little better, but not a game worth full price. If it were a $5 doujin indie game, the price would match the quality — the fundamental gaps are still there, and in some spots they've actually gotten wider.
Without any hints you'd basically never notice (it only triggers once your HP drops below half, so there's no lead-in to discovering other conditions). For example, Zombie Slash upgrading into Grand Cross loses its bonus damage against zombies and gains Bagi (wind) element instead — so depending on the enemy, switching to the "ultimate" version can actually lower your damage output.
Even with no hints, since it works once your HP hits half, you'd naturally try to stay in that danger zone or brute-force search for triggers. Take Focus (a meditation skill) — even knowing about it, you'd only use it when you're desperate to heal HP.
Like hell you can just "maintain danger mode"! lol In the back half of the game, getting one-shot for a third to half your HP is just normal — especially right before you learn Omniheal (Behoimi).
Background and Points of Contention
The HD-2D remakes are a project to release Dragon Quest I, II, and III in sequence on the same engine, and since III came out after I and II, comparisons with its two predecessors tend to shape how it’s judged. The thread mainly split over two points: how to view I’s balance (where status ailments can amount to instant death), and how to rate III’s difficulty tuning and sales. Figures like “sales halved since III” or “Steam ratings recovered” come from individual posters in the thread, not official data — something readers can easily mistake for hard numbers. The disagreement over Mini Medal collecting and the new voice acting likewise comes down to a difference in values — whether a remake should stay faithful to the original or be brought up to today’s standards — making it a question that can’t be settled with a simple good-or-bad verdict.
※This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Hardware/Industry [Geha]) thread “[Sad News] Debate Over Whether Dragon Quest HD-2D Remakes I, II & III Are Any Good Heats Up on X!“.
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