Dragon Quest 1 & 2 HD-2D Remake content guidelines seem pointless?

Square Enix has released content creation guidelines around Dragon Quest 1 & 2 HD-2D Remake, its latest reentry in the series. These will be applied until November 29, one month after its release, to ensure that no spoilers are released.

The company isn’t trying to neutralize coverage of the game, but is apparently concerned about its story. Specifically, it emphasizes that streamers and videographers will not be able to share details of what happens after the “second Dragon Quest II credits sequence.” This potentially ties into what series creator Yuji Horii said.

According to Horii, there will be a surprise for those who play the games in chronological order. The Dragon Quest III remake launched in November last year and is a prequel to the first two games. Presumably the post-credits sequence that Square really doesn’t want anyone to see has something to do with it.

However, this is not the only rule to disappear. Among the usual requests for proper credit and monetization approval, Square is pushing for channels that release soundtracks and cinematics not to do so:

“You may not create edited video content or playlists for the purpose of only showing cinematic scenes (as opposed to gameplay), or solely for listening. [to] music from the game.”

There’s no way Square Enix can stop Dragon Quest spoilers

It will be interesting to see how Square manages to solve this problem, and if it can. Over the past few days, I’ve seen players who agreed to a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) for Bungie’s Marathon testing posting clips and generally breaching the NDA. With a massive ocean of creators, across multiple platforms, there is absolutely no way this will be enforced correctly.

Once the secret Horii alluded to leaks onto the web, it’s only a matter of time before someone posts an “EXPLAINED” article or video. It’s funny that a company like Square Enix, which has been “aggressive” in other areas of technology, like artificial intelligence, would hope that the Internet would actually listen to its directives.

Then again, after years of listening to podcasts from industry veterans explaining how Square Enix (and other Japanese companies) ran websites in the 1990s and very early 2000s, I’m not entirely surprised that they came to the conclusion that this will totally work.

In the past, Square wouldn’t allow websites to access CD or cassette trailers because they believed it was the work of the devil, in a nutshell. These were TV shows that only devoted five minutes of their time to anything.

It’s not like the 2D-HD remakes of Dragon Quest are the only games to get this treatment. Every time I see these guidelines increase, I have the same reaction: Who reads them and follows them? The Final Fantasy Pixel Remaster series also received guidelines, as did a few of their other more recent releases (or re-releases, did we need guidelines for the LIVE A LIVE remaster?).

Anyway, Dragon Quest 1 & 2 HD-2D Remake will be released tomorrow, October 30, for Nintendo Switch and Switch 2, PlayStation, Xbox Series and PC.