Parallel to Square Enix‘s drop of the Dragon Quest VII Reimagined news, reactions are largely gloriously divergent. What gives? They insist that it is really a reimagination, so the typical “They are going to re-make it” is being overwhelmed by the unorthodox manner of their decision, leaving behind a trail of bewildered martyrs. The visuals are going to compare nothing with either the one from the original PlayStation or the one from the 3DS remake-gone-now. It has been given a new art style which is, to say the least, disputable.
A completely hyped first tweet by Square Enix immediately forced every fan down the path to the blog post for further reading. But the responses? Ah, so many mixed ones. Naturally, some players are downright thrilled. For one thing, @Telominas simply states that “this looks amazing!!!” Dangerously, she places four exclamation marks for the world to see. Yet @penguindayzero is in absolute opposition to it, claiming it should have been HD-2D and legit “easy skip.” In contrast, @AlphaBlastX stands that it is just “disrespect to Akira Toriyama art.” Boy! Toriyama is the real paws-down artist behind Dragon Quest’s trademark look, so that’s heavy.
And it really just went downhill from here! And people are more interested in stuff unrelated to Dragon Quest. @tabithaoncoffee and @Grummz started arguing about this employee named Kate, who does the delocalization for Final Fantasy XIV and her supposed other life where she posts violently-themed stuff online. @tabithaoncoffee makes some declaration about not supporting this game until “people like this lose their jobs,” which is… quite intense. And @Grummz is rallying everyone to call Square Enix and complain about it. Guys, this is a Dragon Quest thread, what are we doing here?
Continuing with the game. Many players have been asking for Brazilian Portuguese subtitles, with @FaelKenji_BR citing that there are so many fans in Brazil and that they don’t even require dubbing, just subtitles. @RGarrouba says they’re not gonna buy it if it doesn’t have Pt-BR subs, which is loud enough to be heard several times over in this reply. Localization is always a big hot topic on Square Enix titles, and it seems like they’re already getting called for it on this one.
The Final Fantasy fans take over the comments: @mattnobouken celebrates “Okay, but where the heck is Final Fantasy IX reimagined cause whaaaat.” “@jicke90: Another great announce, but it is not FF9 Remake,” and “@usernmwho: I feel for all the FF9 fans surely at TGS.” I guess it is funny that all Square Enix announcements become a platform for fans to cry about their fave remakes.
A few are just confused as to what this game actually is. @jbiancapretoriu was excited for a moment before realizing it was simply another remake of a past game and saying that they were still waiting for Dragon Quest Builders 3. @Zephiros is mad about the possibility of it being released as a game key card, a very weirdly specific complaint, but hey, priorities.
But to the good: @Weltallid40: “Actually looks really good,” and @CoryGaston: “Huge best 1” and “remaking the right games but want FF8 and 9 as well.” Then there is @utsunoshinsei28, who is finally hoping to complete it after someone smashed their discs years ago, which is a whole story there.
Everything should be answered within the blog write-up that Square Enix gave the link to about what this new visuals means and what will be expected, but judging from some reactions, pockets of subjects appeared who were simply not on board with the chosen path. Being so radical a change, the difference in the art style is quite a subject for such a much-loved franchise such as Dragon Quest, so really it’s one of those decisions some players are just bouncing off of or trashing.
And then there is this whole side story with the FFXIV incident that is just… messy. Can we just talk about the game, please? But that’s Twitter for you, always derailing into something else.
Overall, Dragon Quest VII Reimagined seems to be one of those passionate releases whereby the whole community is talking. At this point, whether you’d like your own slant on or not, it has already garnered the attention of the world. Now the wait to see what exactly this reimagination means and whether the localization issues some players have already brought up will be addressed by Square Enix begins. Also, they really need to take a look at what’s going down with their FFXIV team because that’s an entirely different can of worms.
