Square Enix may have spilled the beans on a possible appearance of Dragon Quest XI on Nintendo’s unreleased new system.
Well, this is certainly something that nobody expected. Earlier this week, Square Enix revealed that they were currently developing a sequel in the hugely popular JRPG series Dragon Quest. It was revealed that the game would come to both 3DS and the PlayStation 4. What came as a shock to everyone, however, was the fact that Square Enix seemed to confirm that Dragon Quest XI would be coming to the Nintendo NX. Square has since clarified that the company is “considering” this move only and hasn’t made anything final.
This huge news for a number of reasons. The big one being that even though the NX has yet to be officially revealed to the public, it is already getting third party support which strengthens Nintendo’s library. Dragon Quest is just not some throw away franchise either; while it may not huge in North America, it is absolutely enormous in Japan. If Square Enix did not feel that the NX would do well, there is no way that they would possibly tarnish one of their biggest franchises by porting it over to this unproven console. Also, if Dragon Quest XI turns out to be one of the launch titles for the NX, it will definitely guarantee to push sales at launch.
Square Enix also revealed that the game would be coming out in 2016. Given that information and the fact that this could be a potential launch title means that the rumors of a 2016 NX release could be spot on. This might seem like a long shot since Nintendo still hasn’t really revealed anything about the NX, but it’s still possible given the fact that the Wii U, while an awesome console, is not selling well. Personally, having the Wii U’s lifespan cut so short while it still has so much potential really sounds disappointing, but it just may be time for Nintendo to move on to something hopefully bigger and better. It’s even possible that the game could be released on PS4 and 3DS in 2016 while the NX version comes out in sometime of 2017 or even later.
Square Enix stated that the game was being developed with Unreal Engine 4, possibly confirming an NX hardware detail not yet shared. What this seems to confirm for the NX is that it is at least more powerful than the Wii U as Nintendo’s current home console cannot run Unreal Engine 4 at all. Even if the NX’s specs are not up to par with the PS4, at least it would be close enough to the point where we could potentially see more NX versions of third party titles from this generation of software.
As soon as we hear anything more on Dragon Quest XI or the Nintendo NX, we will let you as soon as possible!
(Source: IGN)
