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When people talk about Dragon Quest, they usually talk about comfort.
Comfort in familiar turn-based combat. Comfort in orchestral music that feels like coming home. Comfort in worlds where villages still matter, kings still ask heroes for help, and slime monsters still smile at you like mascots from a gentler era of gaming.
But beneath that comforting surface, Dragon Quest may now be facing the greatest identity crisis in its nearly forty-year history.
Because Akira Toriyama is dead.
And that changes everything.
For decades, Toriyama wasn’t just “the artist” behind Dragon Quest. He was one of the three sacred pillars holding the entire franchise together alongside Yuji Horii’s game design and Koichi Sugiyama’s music. If Horii defined the soul of Dragon Quest, Toriyama defined its face. The series’ visual identity is so deeply intertwined with his art that imagining Dragon Quest without him feels almost impossible.
Now Square Enix has to answer a terrifying question:
What is Dragon Quest without Akira Toriyama?
And even more frightening:
Will people still emotionally recognize it as Dragon Quest if the answer changes too much?
Toriyama Wasn’t Just A Character Designer
A lot of people who don’t closely follow the series misunderstand Toriyama’s role. They think of him as a celebrity illustrator who simply “provided designs” while the games themselves could continue unchanged.
That fundamentally misses how Dragon Quest works.
Toriyama’s art was not decorative. It was structural.
His aesthetic established the emotional language of the franchise. Every rounded monster shape, every exaggerated grin, every goofy helmet, every warm village NPC design communicated something essential about Dragon Quest: this world is adventurous, whimsical, safe, and sincere.
Even when the stories became darker — and they often did — the Toriyama art style acted like a stabilizing force. It reassured players that the world still possessed innocence. Tragedy in Dragon Quest hits hard precisely because it exists inside a visual universe that feels hopeful.
Without Toriyama, that balance becomes incredibly difficult to preserve.
You can already see how inseparable his style is from the franchise simply by imagining alternatives. Picture Dragon Quest with hyper-realistic art. It stops feeling like Dragon Quest. Picture it with modern anime aesthetics inspired by trendy gacha games. Again, it no longer feels like Dragon Quest. Picture it with dark fantasy visuals inspired by Final Fantasy XVI or Elden Ring. The entire emotional atmosphere collapses.
That’s because Toriyama didn’t just design characters.
He designed the tone.
Slimes Are More Important Than Sephiroth
One of the greatest artistic achievements in gaming history is the humble Slime.
Not Cloud Strife.
Not Sephiroth.
Not Master Chief.
The Slime.
That tiny blue teardrop creature may genuinely be one of the most successful pieces of game character design ever created. It perfectly encapsulates the entire Dragon Quest philosophy in a single image.
Friendly.
Simple.
Charming.
Approachable.
Memorable.
Most RPG franchises portray monsters as threats first and designs second. Toriyama made monsters lovable. He transformed enemies into mascots, merchandise, plush toys, cultural icons, and emotional anchors for players.
That fundamentally changed the identity of Dragon Quest. It also helped separate the series from the increasingly grim direction many RPGs moved toward over the years.
The problem is that this sensibility was uniquely Toriyama’s.
You cannot simply hire another artist and expect them to replicate decades of instinctive visual philosophy. You can imitate linework. You can imitate proportions. You can imitate color palettes.
You cannot imitate the exact creative intuition that made a one-eyed blue jelly creature one of gaming’s most enduring icons.
The Franchise Was Already Vulnerable
The uncomfortable truth is that Dragon Quest was already approaching a crossroads before Toriyama passed away.
The franchise remains massively important in Japan, but globally it occupies a strange position. It is respected more than it is dominant. Loved more than it is culturally explosive. Outside Japan, Dragon Quest often feels like a legendary institution that never fully conquered the worldwide mainstream in the way Final Fantasy did.
At the same time, the gaming industry itself has changed dramatically.
Modern AAA development pushes franchises toward cinematic realism, live-service mechanics, open worlds, action combat, endless monetization systems, and social-media-driven aesthetics. Younger audiences increasingly grow up on games with entirely different pacing and visual expectations.
Yet Dragon Quest survived by refusing to chase trends too aggressively.
That refusal worked because the franchise had a timeless identity. Toriyama’s art was a massive part of that timelessness. His designs made Dragon Quest feel eternal, almost untouched by the shifting fashions of the industry.
Now the franchise faces an impossible balancing act:
Stay too faithful, and future games risk feeling like preserved museum pieces desperately imitating a dead artist.
Change too much, and the franchise risks severing the emotional continuity that defines it.
There may not actually be a perfect solution.
Dragon Ball And Dragon Quest Are Different Cases
Some people argue that Toriyama’s death will not fundamentally affect Dragon Quest because franchises often continue after creators die.
But Dragon Quest is not Batman.
It is not Star Wars.
It is not even Dragon Ball.
Ironically, Dragon Ball is probably more adaptable because its identity evolved through anime studios, multiple art teams, merchandise ecosystems, and decades of reinterpretation. Fans already accept visual inconsistency across eras of Dragon Ball.
Dragon Quest is the opposite.
Consistency is the point.
Its identity is ritualistic. Familiarity is sacred. Every numbered entry is supposed to feel like reconnecting with an old friend. The visual continuity across nearly four decades is part of the emotional contract between the series and its audience.
Toriyama’s art was central to maintaining that continuity.
That makes replacing him uniquely dangerous.
The Imitation Trap
Square Enix now faces a creative trap with no easy escape.
Option one is imitation.
Hire artists who perfectly emulate Toriyama’s style. Continue producing games that visually resemble classic Dragon Quest. Preserve continuity at all costs.
This is probably the safest commercial decision in the short term. Most fans would initially prefer this over radical reinvention.
But imitation creates another problem: eventually the franchise risks becoming haunted by absence. Players may constantly compare new work against what Toriyama himself would have done. Every design becomes an act of approximation rather than creation.
Over time, the series could begin feeling less alive.
There is also the ethical and artistic question of whether endlessly reproducing a dead artist’s style freezes the franchise creatively. At what point does preservation become stagnation?
The Reinvention Trap
Option two is reinvention.
Allow new artists to evolve the visual language of Dragon Quest. Keep the spirit while gradually introducing fresh artistic DNA.
This sounds creatively healthy in theory.
In practice, it is incredibly risky.
Because Dragon Quest fans are unusually sensitive to tonal shifts. Even subtle deviations in monster design philosophy or character aesthetics could produce a feeling that something intangible has been lost.
And honestly? They might be right.
People underestimate how much emotional memory is embedded in visual style. Toriyama’s art is tied to childhood memories for millions of players. It represents comfort, nostalgia, and continuity across generations.
You are not simply changing art direction.
You are altering emotional inheritance.
That can fracture a fanbase very quickly.
Dragon Quest May Become A Legacy Franchise
There is another possibility people rarely discuss.
What if Dragon Quest slowly transitions from a living evolving franchise into a legacy-preservation franchise?
Not dead.
Not cancelled.
But culturally frozen.
A series maintained carefully through remakes, remasters, occasional sequels, anniversary projects, and faithful recreations rather than bold innovation.
In some ways, this may already be happening.
Look at the industry around it. Modern RPG design increasingly prioritizes spectacle, speed, and endless engagement systems. Dragon Quest intentionally resists many of those trends. That resistance is admirable, but it also makes the series feel increasingly like a guardian of older design philosophy.
Without Toriyama’s living creative presence, the temptation to preserve rather than evolve may become even stronger.
The danger is that preservation can quietly become creative paralysis.
Why This Matters Beyond Dragon Quest
The situation surrounding Dragon Quest reflects a larger problem facing long-running creative works.
What happens when a franchise becomes inseparable from a single artistic voice?
At some point, every legendary series confronts mortality. Creators age. Artists die. Industries change. The original cultural context disappears.
Most franchises survive by becoming flexible enough to outlive their creators.
But Dragon Quest built its greatness on consistency instead of flexibility.
That consistency gave the franchise extraordinary emotional durability for decades. It also made the series uniquely vulnerable to losing one of its defining architects.
Toriyama’s death forces the franchise into a confrontation with its own identity.
Can Dragon Quest remain Dragon Quest without the man whose art defined its visual soul?
Nobody knows yet.
And Square Enix probably does not know either.
The Most Difficult Part
The hardest truth may be this:
Even if future Dragon Quest games are excellent, something irreplaceable is still gone.
Not because artists cannot imitate Toriyama.
Not because talented designers do not exist.
Not because the franchise is doomed.
But because cultural works are shaped by people, not just intellectual property.
Toriyama’s sensibilities — his humor, softness, warmth, playfulness, and visual optimism — emerged from a specific human being. Once that person is gone, future works inevitably become interpretations rather than direct expressions.
That does not mean future games cannot still be wonderful.
But it does mean the series has entered a fundamentally new era.
For decades, Dragon Quest felt timeless, almost immune to the erosion that affects long-running franchises.
Now, for the first time, it feels mortal.
And maybe that is the real existential crisis.
Not whether the next game will sell well.
Not whether the art style can be replicated.
Not whether fans will complain online.
But whether a franchise built on continuity can emotionally survive the loss of one of the people who made that continuity possible in the first place.
Panda Grande, Writer (Freelance)
Panda Grande is the mysterious new writer for The Technovore. Nobody knows where Panda Grande came from, just that he/she is a friend to mankind and lover of furry animals. Panda Grande is so mysterious he/she doesn't even have a display picture!
