Dragon Quest Treasures

Dragon Quest Treasures is a solid but not really exciting spin-off of the Dragon Quest series. Eric and Mida are recruiting monsters to find treasures all over Draconia. Graphic and storyline feel old and outdated but at least it's fun to play for some hours, even though the tasks get repetitive after some time.

Dragon Quest Treasures is a new challenge for this long-running series. It is full of Dragon Quest’s unique charm and delivers a wonderful experience that lasts for many hours. However, altogether the experience feels a bit too shallow. Deeper character development and more monsters could have gone a long here. Still, as a more compact game, Dragon Quest Treasures is a great open world to casually have some fun in.

Although it has good ideas, Dragon Quest Treasures is an average game. When you take out the generic combat and stale treasure hunting, you're left with just the beloved Dragon Quest universe.

With the usual Dragon Quest charm, Treasures convinces with its main elements: Exploration and collecting know how to entertain despite the simple story and optics. Treasures is a fun and engaging gameplay loop.

DRAGON QUEST TREASURES is fun for a while and any series fan will be happy to see the return of many familiar monsters. However, the gameplay loop gets repetitive quite early and it failed to keep my attention as well as the other DRAGON QUEST spin-offs do.

Dragon Quest Treasures isn’t a massive 100-hour epic like Dragon Quest XI. The game can still comfortably occupy a couple dozen hours at least. The islands are large and hold plenty of secrets, side quests, and monsters to discover. It’s definitely aimed at younger gamers to get them into JRPGs with its young protagonists, cute graphics, and monster collecting gameplay, but it's fun for all ages.

Dragon Quest Treasures is far from the richest jewel in the Dragon Quest crown, but a laid-back structure, charming world, and endless stream of rewards make it a relaxing RPG still worth admiring.

It's a testament to how strong the other elements of Dragon Quest Treasures are that, in spite of combat frequently being unfulfilling, the game still manages to keep you eagerly coming back for more exploration and treasure-scouting. Its bright-eyed, adventurous atmosphere and rewarding core gameplay loop go a long way in carrying the game to its conclusion. It might not be the richest game out there, but for the length of its runtime, Dragon Quest Treasures does a fine job of making you feel like a bandit king.

I managed to get through the campaign in twenty hours, even though I went out of my way to complete some quest chains. Thankfully there’s a decent post-game with more quest lines, and an endless dungeon you can challenge. While there are performance issues and lackluster bosses, I always treasure a game that encourages exploration and gives me plenty to do. Dragon Quest Treasures has some trash in the hoard but is a quality addition to the series.

Dragon Quest Treasures offers plenty of charm, solid core mechanics, and a certain slot-machine-style appeal, but fortune favors the bold, and the game holds back in too many ways. Unremarkable visuals, simplistic combat, and the eventual repetitive feeling of treasure hunting limit the experience. Younger players and hardcore fans of the franchise may still covet Dragon Quest Treasures, but the game could have truly sparkled with a bit more polish.

Charming and relaxing is not how you’d describe the average action role-player but this wholesome Dragon Quest spin-off is an enjoyably undemanding, family friendly adventure.

Dragon Quest Treasures is a fun game for those looking to just wander around a Dragon Quest world and dig up treasure. Long-time series fans and those used to deeper ARPG combat systems might find the game to be too feature-lite though, with a dearth of monsters being the primary culprit from a series with more than a thousand to choose from. The main narrative can be breezed through in about 20 hours, but there are easily several times as many hours of fun to be had for those that enjoy a game with sidequests galore and post-game content. For a series with upwards of three dozen titles to its name over more than 36 years, it’s been a surprisingly long time since fans received a Dragon Quest console release. Mobile games aside, Dragon Quest Treasures is the first new release since 2019’s Dragon Quest Builders 2. While not as feature-rich as that preceding spin-off, Treasures forges its own way with a mountain of treasure to find and an expansive world that’s endlessly fun to explore.

It’s with these pleasant vibes where Dragon Quest Treasures finds its strength. At its best, Treasures is JRPG candy that acts either as a solid first JRPG for new players or a relaxing diversion for series fans. I just wish the game wouldn’t get in its own way so much. If Treasures had more monsters, a more thoughtful combat experience, fewer annoying interruptions, and some more bosses, Treasures would hit the Saturday morning cartoon highs of Level-5s best titles. This, unfortunately, misses the mark a bit.

It’s this buildup of minor annoyances that makes it hard to recommend Dragon Quest Treasures. The experience is driven by charm and nostalgia, but if you don’t have an existing appreciation for the series, there isn’t much here that I could recommend over most other open-world role-playing games. It’s an experience that would greatly vary depending on the player; in other words, one player’s Dragon Quest trash is another player’s Dragon Quest Treasure.

Grab your spade, your flying pig and your pirate hat: it's treasure hunting time in Dragon Quest Treasures. There is some fine loot to claim, though not all that glitters is gold. Our conclusion: Treasures mainly is a good introduction to the series for somewhat younger or less experienced gamers.

Not quite a serious Pokemon challenger, then, but with pressure on The Pokemon Company to bring in an experienced development partner for future titles, this is a fine calling card for Tose. [Issue#381, p.104]

If Dragon Quest Treasures didn't insist on forcing players to engage in its bland combat, the experience would be much better. Thankfully, the world, exploration, and treasure hunting system is a lot of fun. Investigating every nook and cranny or poking around each new landmark does not get old through the game's over 55-hour runtime (with completing most quests and extras), and the rush of discovering new treasure and watching your gang's value grow is satisfying and exciting. Despite its failures, the ways in which Dragon Quests Treasures succeeds outweigh them, if only slightly.

Dragon Quest Treasures could have been a Switch's little gem, but it will remain in the shadow of its elder brother. With its efficient collecting, taming and crafting mechanics, the spin-off could get any gamer hooked. The exploration is generous, engaging, but the annoying back and forth, the lack of fast travel, the laughably poor combat system and the shaky technique will get the better of the most patient. A fun game, captivating at its best, with wasted potential.

Dragon Quest Treasures is a pleasant adventure despite its insistence on being a game for a younger audience. Unfortunately, its core gameplay loop isn’t satisfying enough to sink a huge amount of hours into it. In the flurry of games released this holiday season, picking up this game will largely depend on how much you love the Dragon Quest franchise.

Though its core treasure-hunting loop is tedious, there's a lot of charm worth digging up in Dragon Quest Treasures.

Treasures has a lot of good building blocks, but they don’t add up to much. The gameplay loop starts out compelling, but it quickly goes stale. The visual presentation is alright, but the music is terribly flat. And the act of traversal, of actually exploring, left me unsatisfied. Worse, I never felt like I was working towards anything particularly interesting. Money eventually ends up meaningless in most RPGs, and this game does not buck that trend. If you find yourself hopelessly compelled by the prospect of hunting for loot, this might be your game. Otherwise, I can’t really recommend Dragon Quest Treasures.