Cor slimey - Dragon Quest 7 and 8 coming to your 3DS (in English) next year

If you're a 3DS owner with a few hundred hours to spare, two highly demanded JRPGs from the celebrated Dragon Quest series will be there to devour your free time in 2016. Announced during today's Nintendo Direct, both Dragon Quest 7: Fragments of the Forgotten Past and Dragon Quest 8: Journey of the Cursed King will be released to Western audiences next year, with an 'early summer' debut for the former and no specified window for the latter.

The Dragon Quest series is what defined the Enix in Square Enix, and is just as essential to the JRPG tapestry as the Final Fantasy series. DQ7 and DQ8 both feature the series' trademark of vibrant, colorful, Akira Toriyama-drawn visuals in 3D, and sold millions in their original PS1 and PS2 iterations.

This announcement has assuaged any fears that these retouched 3DS ports would be reserved for Japanese gamers, meaning you can also expect the stellar English localizations to make a return. Considering some Dragon Quest fans have been anxiously awaiting an English version of the DQ7 port for two years now, this is a momentous day for fans of unnamed heroes and jolly blue slimes.

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Lucas Sullivan

Lucas Sullivan is the former US Managing Editor of GamesRadar+. Lucas spent seven years working for GR, starting as an Associate Editor in 2012 before climbing the ranks. He left us in 2019 to pursue a career path on the other side of the fence, joining 2K Games as a Global Content Manager. Lucas doesn't get to write about games like Borderlands and Mafia anymore, but he does get to help make and market them.