Ever since the release of the first Dragon Quest game in 1986, the Japanese role-playing franchise has become a household name at Square Enix, and is one of its longest-running video game series. The last entry in the franchise, Dragon Quest 11, was just released a couple of years ago in Japan and less than a year everywhere else, and received mostly positive reviews. Given the short period of time since that game's launch, it appeared that Square Enix would not be talking about Dragon Quest anytime soon.

However, it appears that the creators of the franchise unofficially confirmed that preparations have begun for the development of Dragon Quest 12. In a report by Gematsu, series producer Yuu Miyake revealed some of the studio's plans for the development of a future Dragon Quest game in a live stream. "By the way, about Dragon Quest XII, which I'm sure is on everyone's mind--[Yuji] Hori and I are currently making preparations on series developments that will connect to XII. I think it's still too early, but we would like to announce it in some form, so please wait a little while longer."

Miyake also clarified that Dragon Quest 12 is still not in production, which probably means that the team behind it is still laying the groundwork for the game such as the overall theme, story, characters, and so forth. Now that E3 is only a few days away, it is interesting to see if Square Enix will make an official announcement at the event. However, this would appear unlikely given that the game is still in its early stages. Besides, Square Enix should be well-aware by now on the consequences of announcing games too early.

Although it would probably take some time before we see anything concrete on Dragon Quest 12, Square Enix announced recently that it is developing a mobile game based on the Dragon Quest franchise. Dragon Quest Walk appears to be Square Enix's take on Niantic's Pokemon GO. Based on the trailer showcased during the announcement, Dragon Quest Walk will feature several locations in Japan, where players will encounter iconic monsters from the franchise to battle against.

Dragon Quest 12 is in pre-production for unspecified platforms.

Source: Gematsu