People on the internet like to say “God gives His hardest battles to His mighty soldiers,” and I think that statement applies to people like me who love RPGs but can’t honestly recommend them to friends because most are a few hours long.
This problem is often made worse by remakes or re-releases of older RPGs, which add new content that extends the playtimes of existing ones. Dragon Quest VII reimagined from Square Enix is an interesting exception to the trend, as it takes the popular 100+ hour game from 26 years ago (which already received an extended update on the 3DS in 2013) and actually condenses it into a more digestible format for players who don’t want to devote that much time to the game.
Square Enix went so far as to cut all areas and stories out of the game, and speed up the development of the machines. The result is a very reliable, fast, entry-level version DQVII. It’s a great game for Dragon Quest beginners like me, but I admit, it left me wanting to see what’s left of the cutting room.
‘Citizen Evil: Requiem’ may have its cake and eat it too
A unique island hopping tour
You are a real watcher.
Credit: Square Enix/Steam
We can argue about the need to do it again Dragon Quest VII second this century, but there’s no doubt that its premise and design make it one of the most compelling games in the venerable RPG series. For that reason alone, I’m glad that Square found a way to get this game in front of people again.
At the beginning of the journey, the silent main character and his friends live on a small island with a few villages, a palace, and a mysterious temple. As far as they know, that’s the whole known world. There are no other islands or continents in the great ocean, and no one really knows why or cares to ask. Before long, though, you’ll find yourself using the aforementioned sanctuary to travel back to the islands that once existed, save them from whatever dangers they faced, and then travel back now to find them restored.
While DQVII it has a great plot hanging over all of this, in fact, it feels more like a collection of short stories than many other RPGs. Each island has a little story to tell that you can get through in an hour or two, and as a reward, you get to revisit the island in the present to see how your actions in the past have affected you. It’s an attractive way to organize a game, and it does DQVII Reconsidered a little scary.
Another aspect of DQVII that makes it stand out compared to recent entries (like also-excellent Dragon Quest XI) that its story has a somewhat dark tone. You can’t always solve everyone’s problem cleanly. Few stories end in outright tragedy or at least bitterly; one that really stuck with me involved traveling to the present to find the body of an inventor I helped in the past being watched by a robot that didn’t understand the concept of death.
It’s often sad without resorting to over-the-top tactics, and in a way that marries well with the late, colorful and personable art direction of Akira Toriyama.
Extremely cold, probably a mistake
I love fighting, but it can’t be denied that it can be very low impact.
Credit: Square Enix/Steam
The clash of voices and loud character designs feel complementary Dragon Quest in general, like the fun, humorous vibe the series has always had belies its nature as one of the more straightforward “sit down and watch the numbers go up” video games.
DQVII it continues the same basic turn-based combat that the franchise has had since day one. The first-person perspective of the older games has long since been replaced by a modern third-person view with excellent attack graphics, but by default it’s still a game about doing whatever you can to make the stats work for you.
You can do that by grinding to become more powerful or by carefully equipping your characters with certain gear that will make random battle effects happen more often. Either way, you’re manipulating numbers in the service of getting large numbers out of enemies when you attack them.
I fully embrace this approach, as do many other people, judging by the enduring popularity of Dragon Quest both in Japan and elsewhere. However, it cannot be denied that I wasted a lot of time DQVII Reconsidered with auto-battle and the speed of combat is set high, I’m actually watching the game play out in front of me instead of fully participating in the battles.
Arguably, this is the way the series should be played (of course, I turned off the automatic battle for boss encounters), but I also understand why modern gamers might question a game that doesn’t play a bit in the normal way.
The cities are very well rendered here.
Credit: Square Enix/Steam
For me, the fun is always working towards something. DQVII Reconsidered it includes the same job system as previous versions of the game. You can equip different character archetypes like Mage, Warrior, and Priest to any character you want, and the more time you spend with that job equipped, the more abilities you’ll unlock. Mastering certain job combinations will allow you to equip high-level jobs with exciting game-breaking abilities.
DQVII Reconsidered made one major change to this system, that is after a point, you can equip two jobs on a character at the same time, reaping the benefits of both at the same time. This allows more flexibility in crafting (having a beefy tank that can heal is useful in itself), but also allows you to level up jobs much faster, giving access to endgame variants in a more efficient way.
I am honestly amazed at how quickly you can master tasks and open new ones. You end up not spending too much time with any given task, which adds to the sense of mechanical variety, but also makes it clearly feel like you’re just playing to fill the meter rather than fully engaging in certain long-term combat roles.
All of that is compounded by the lack of random encounters, as enemies appear all over the world. That means you can skip battles if you want, which works to increase speed DQVII Reconsidered. You can also swing a weapon at enemies on the ground, and if your level is high enough compared to theirs, you’ll take them out instantly instead of switching to reaction-based combat.
This is probably my favorite gameplay mechanic in the remake, as I feel like it’s very loosely balanced in favor of the player. I spent a lot of late game dungeons doing very little combat because I could take out enemies that way.
I’m rarely the type to complain that a game is too easy. I am a grown man and I have nothing to prove to anyone. I’m just not interested in a challenge in terms of culture. But there is no denying that, in the end DQVII ReconsideredI was a little eager for the main story to provide more difficulty than it did in the end. Anyway, experience DQVII Reconsidered the offering is fun and satisfying enough, putting it on par with other games in the series.
As good as this remodeling is, it will never feel perfect
This lovingly rendered take on Akira Toriyama’s character designs.
Credit: Square Enix/Steam
Before we wrap up here, I want to give a shout out to the visual presentation DQVII Reconsidered. Toriyama’s most iconic character designs are brought to life in full, immersive 3D, thanks to the use of physical models that the developers actually designed and then scanned for use in the game.
The characters look great, and they are all timeless DQ monsters look as good as ever. It’s a bright, colorful game that’s full of verve everywhere you go, and some of the more modern visual additions, like depth-of-field effects, serve to enhance the look. The PlayStation 5 version I played also works flawlessly.
Finally, I must mention that this version of the DQVII only it took me about 35 hours to complete. That is which is important time reduction compared to other versions of this game, mainly due to things like increased combat speed and being able to skip combat. However, I should also note that at least a few islands and stories from the original game have been completely removed here, while others have been done voluntarily.
It leaves me in a strange place where I genuinely like this version DQVIIbut as someone who was playing it for the first time, I felt it slowly modified briefly. Now I want to go back to the original PS1 or even the 3DS remake to see what was removed. I applaud Square Enix for having the gall to make a short version of an obnoxiously long game, but there’s no doubt that this isn’t the definitive version. DQVII.
However, with those caveats, DQVII Reconsidered a great time and fun way to kick off 2026 for RPG fans looking for something that goes down easier than a 100 hour juggernaut.
Dragon Quest VII Reimagined was relaunched on Feb. 5 for PC, PS5, Xbox Series S/X, and Nintendo Switch 1 and 2.
Credit: Square Enix/Steam
