WhileDragon Questhas had a burgeoning growth internationally since the launch of Dragon Quest 11, it’s important not to forget how much of a cultural phenomenon it is in Japan. While Final Fantasy took a fairly strong foothold internationally, Dragon Quest became one of the most ubiquitous series in Japanese culture.

With such a strong presence, you might expect there to be quite a few Dragon Quest games, and in that regard, you would be correct! Thankfully, it has none of the confusion that Final Fantasy has in terms of how numbered entries are handled, though some localisation quibbles definitely throw a wrench into the works. Let’s find out exactly how many there are.

We’re going based on theJapanese release datesas our baseline for the games in this article.

How Many Mainline Dragon Quest Games Are There?

In terms of numbered releases, Dragon Quest couldn’t be simpler. Nice and easy-to-read numbers that go up with each entry. Theystandalmost entirely independentlyas well, so each is its own starting point.Here’s each of themand when they first launched.

Release date

May 27th, 1986

January 26th, 1987

February 10th, 1988

February 11th, 1990

September 27th, 1992

December 9th, 1995

August 26th, 2000

November 27th, 2004

July 11th, 2009

August 2nd, 2012

PS4, 3DS

July 29th, 2017

Until Dragon Quest 8, the series was known as Dragon Warrior in America. Dragon Quest 8 is also the first game in the series released in Europe.

There are11 Dragon Quest mainline games. No major re-releases, remakes or anything of the sort. What you see is what you get. A pleasant change of pace. Even better, the majority of games areavailable digitally nowadaysas well across various platforms, so they’ve not beenrelegated to historyeither.

How Many Spin-Off Dragon Quest Games Are There?

Square Enix loves to make spin-offs, Final Fantasy is a testament to that. Except in the Western world, we don’t tend to see, really, just how big a deal Dragon Quest is in Japan. If you thought Final Fantasy had anobscene number of spin-offs, just wait until you see how many that Dragon Quest has.

There are genuinely so many spin-off games that we haveonly included those that were released internationallyor are part of a larger subseries.

September 25th, 1998

March 8th, 2001

March 29th, 2003

December 28th, 2006

April 28th, 2010

3DS

March 24th, 2016

December 1st, 2023

September 19th, 1993

September 15th, 1999

October 31st, 2002

Dragon Quest: Young Yangus and the Mystery Dungeon

April 20th, 2006

November 14th, 2003

December 1st, 2005

November 2nd, 2011

July 15th, 2010

June 23rd, 2016

September 28th, 2021

October 22nd, 2020

PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox Series, PC

September 28th, 2023

Dragon Quest Swords: The Masked Queen and the Tower of Mirrors

July 12th, 2007

Wii

June 24th, 2009

Dragon Quest Heroes: The World Tree’s Woe and the Blight Below

February 26th, 2015

October 15th, 2015

January 28th, 2016

May 27th, 2016

December 20th, 2018

July 16th, 2020

Switch

December 9th, 2022

Going through just those we’ve included,there are 30 Dragon Quest spin-offs, and so many more if you count those that are exclusive to Japan.The Monsters and Builders subseriesare the most well-known in the West, though some smaller entries have also been released internationally.

How Many Dragon Quest Games Are There In Total?

While following the main series is relatively simple, the spin-offs are so numerous thatit would be difficult to play all of them, especially seeing as the vast majority have not been released internationally. Thankfully, outside of some cameos and extended details in some games, they all can be played without knowledge of any other entries.

Here are the approximate numbers for every game across the Dragon Quest series:

While the mainline entries can still be found quite easily, many of the spin-off games are locked to their original consoles, making it much harder to enjoy them in the modern day.