Dragon Quest Treasures will soon be released for the Nintendo Switch, and the game’s producer Taichi Inuzuka has agreed to talk to us about the game via an email interview.

Tachi Inuzuka has been with the Dragon Quest series for decades. He was the producer of the popular Dragon Quest Monsters and Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker series. These are spin-off titles that focus more on catching and collecting the various iconic enemies throughout the series.

For this interview, he told us more about Dragon Quest Treasures. This is a new spin-off game for the series starring one of the main characters of Dragon Quest XI: Erik and his sister Mia. Inuzuka gives us some brief comments about what we can expect from this new adventure.

Erik and Mia’s Adventure

The first thing that stood out to me about Dragon Quest Treasures was that it would star Erik. He became quite the fan favorite from Dragon Quest XI so it’d make sense to have him be the main character of his own game. Still, we asked Inuzuka-san more about why Erik was chosen as the protagonist. He was quick to point out though, that it’s not just Erik but his sister Mia as well.

“The game features not just Erik, but also Mia as protagonists. After deciding that we wanted to position a male and female character combination from the popular “Dragon Quest XI” as the center of the game, we felt that this brother-sister pair was the obvious choice”.

Similarities to Dragon Quest Monsters

The next notable thing about the game was its use of monsters. Erik and Mia can recruit various Dragon Quests monsters to fight for them and help them find treasure. It sounds a lot like the Dragon Quest Monsters games that Inuzuka previously produced. Here’s what he had to say about the differences between the two.

“The main difference [between the two sub-series] is whether the core element is either “monsters” or “treasures.” In “Dragon Quest Treasures,” the element of monsters are there to help players enjoy treasure hunting”.

How Many Monsters?

This leads to another question. How many Monsters are there in the game that the player can befriend? According to the producer, there is quite a range:

“The game features over 70 different types of monsters”.

From what we’ve seen in trailers, this will include franchise favorites like the Slimes, Dracky, Golems, and the Great Sabrecats.

Action Based Combat

Unlike most Dragon Quest games which have a turn-based battle system, Dragon Quest Treasures has an action combat system. We wondered if the Dragon Quest Treasures team had trouble adapting the series’ traditional gameplay to an action-based system. The response from Inuzuka was that they aimed for a more simple battle system that even those unfamiliar with action RPGs could still find accessible.

“It was extremely challenging as we feel that most Dragon Quest players would be familiar with the turn-based command battles. Therefore, our aim was to create a battle system that was simple and enjoyable to use even by players who were not familiar with action battles”.

Dragon Quest Spin-Offs

For our final interview question, we asked more about Dragon Quest Treasures as a spin-off title. Like many large franchises, Dragon Quest has a lot of spin-offs that tend to deviate from the formula of the mainline games. As someone who’s produced so many Dragon Quest spin-offs, we asked Inuzuka what he felt the role of these titles was in the franchise.

“I believe they exist as a platform to attempt new challenges, which cannot be done within the framework of the main series”.

He has a good point. Spin-offs like Treasures allow the franchise to implement new, more experimental styles of gameplay that might be too risky for the core-numbered games. It’s always great to see a franchise try new things with unique spin-off entries.

We’re thankful to Mr. Taichi Inuzuka for speaking to us in this interview. We wish him and his team all the best for the launch of Dragon Quest Treasures and any of their future projects.

Dragon Quest Treasures will be available for the Nintendo Switch on December 9th.