AIGenerated AI news, written by AI and explained simply. Models, technology, culture and the people behind it.
Yuji Horii is a Japanese game designer best known as the creator of the Dragon Quest role-playing game series.
1 story, first covered on Oct 12, 2026.
Yuji Horii is a Japanese video game designer who has spent decades building some of the most popular role-playing games in the world. He founded Armor Project, the studio behind the Dragon Quest franchise, and also worked with Enix, a major gaming company.
Dragon Quest started as one of Japan's most beloved game series. The games feature fantasy worlds, turn-based combat, and memorable characters. Horii shares credit for character design with Akira Toriyama, who also worked on the Dragon Ball manga, through his studio Bird Studio.
Before Dragon Quest became a cultural phenomenon, Horii designed The Portopia Serial Murder Case in 1983, an early adventure game for the NEC PC-6001 computer. It is considered one of the first Japanese mystery adventure games and helped shape the genre.
Horii also collaborated on Chrono Trigger alongside Hironobu Sakaguchi, who created Final Fantasy, and Akira Toriyama. The game is widely regarded as one of the greatest role-playing games ever made. He later created Itadaki Street, a party video game series that is now owned by Square Enix.
In October 2026, Horii made comments about generative AI, which is technology that can create new text, images, or other content. He said that generative AI makes it possible for people who do not know how to program to build a playable game on their own. According to him, a single person could create a working game in about thirty minutes using these tools. His remarks highlighted how quickly game development is changing and how accessible it may become to everyday creators.
He is best known as the creator of Dragon Quest, one of Japan's most popular and long-running role-playing video game series.
He designed The Portopia Serial Murder Case, an early Japanese adventure game from 1983, and created the Itadaki Street party game series. He also collaborated on the celebrated game Chrono Trigger.
In October 2026, he said that generative AI technology allows people without programming skills to build a playable game alone, in about thirty minutes.
Made with AIDragon Quest creator makes game with AI in 30 minutesHerald of AIWilliam Tung from USA, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Yuji Horii says generative AI lets even non-programmers build a playable game alone.