Dragon Quest Heroes' Localization Could Mean More Dragon Quest Coming West

Dragon Quest Heroes, an action role-playing game developed in partnership between Square Enix and Koei Tecmo, could lead the charge for more localized Dragon Quest titles if the game does well in the West.

Dragon Quest Heroes is a spin-off title featuring two new characters--created by franchise designer Akira Toriyama--and a handful of heroes from previous Dragon Quest titles. The game launched in Japan for PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4 in February and will be available in North America this October for PS4 only. It's the first Dragon Quest game since 2011's Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker 2 to be released in North America.

When asked if Square Enix could bring more Dragon Quest games West if Heroes sold well, producer Ryota Aomi was optimistic. He also said developers plan to leverage the PS4's popularity to create more new Dragon Quest in their native Japan.

"We really are looking to expand on the series in a number of different ways, and we're not just looking to expand into North American but more in Asia as well," he said through a translator. "Using the PlayStation platform is one big way of doing that. So we'll look at how the game does and how that's working, and then maybe use that to think seriously about which of the previous Dragon Quest titles we want to bring out to other regions."

Dragon Quest Heroes will launch in North America on October 13 and in Europe on October 16.