Dragon Quest Builders Nintendo Switch Review: Mobile Housing

If you're here, you have one of two questions. Either you're unfamiliar with Dragon Quest Builders and you want to know if it's worth it, or else you're very familiar with Dragon Quest Builders, and you're wondering if it's worth it on Nintendo Switch. I can gladly answer both of those questions in the affirmative. Dragon Quest Builders has, in this author's opinion, found a perfect home on the Switch, but we are getting a bit ahead of ourselves. Let me begin by explaining to you apprentice builders why this game is so delightful.

Dragon Quest Builders is Minecraft with a purpose; it's a sandbox crafting game with quests and goals. It not only inspires the imagination, it also demands a player's focus, which is exactly why I love it so much. For anyone who ever found Minecraft a bit too open-ended, to the point of aimlessness or boredom, Dragon Quest Builders offers a more guided experience without conceding any of the joy that comes from viewing the world around you as a blank canvas.

Intention, and not necessarily invention, is what drives players in Dragon Quest Builders. You can absolutely break down and convert any building, fence, tree, wall, or decoration into raw building materials to use how you please, but you are confined to building within the set borders a town. There is a free building mode if you want it, but the real meat of the game is in its campaign. It's up to you to turn what are basically four piles of rubble into thriving towns. You will do this by aiding its growing population of residents, and constructing everything they need to live comfortably and develop their lost culture.

You'll also need to fortify your towns with hardy defenses. At regular intervals -- sometimes randomly, and sometimes as part of a story quest -- monsters will attempt to assail your town and tear it back down. Through the cunning placement of traps and walls, and by the might of your sword, you will defend your town and its people.

There's an unseen hand that deftly urges you along a cycle of exploration, discovery, building, reinforcement, and defense, and it keeps things feeling fresh and interesting for dozens of hours.

The world of Dragon Quest Builders is absolutely bursting with personality and charm. Long-time Dragon Quest fans' hearts will soar as they encounter iconic enemies, legendary musical compositions, familiar sound effects, and themes. It's also quite funny. Most NPCs will have something snarky to say about how unattractive you are, and the fourth wall is regularly cast aside. Dragon Quest Builders knows exactly what it is, and it's not afraid to frolic and splash about in the JRPG meta.

Dragon Quest Builders weaves a tale that is more than serviceable. This is not your average hero's tale. In fact, you're told at the beginning of the game to remember that you're not a hero. The payoff, and even the introductory setup, are interesting enough to merit guarding yourself from spoilers, and for a game that many erroneously wrote off as a Minecraft clone, that's impressive.

And now for our second consideration: how is Dragon Quest Builders on the Nintendo Switch? Honestly, I think that this is the best way to play Builders. The pitiful draw-distance, slowdown, and resolution woes that plagued the Vita version are a nonissue here. While it's not quite a one-to-one equivalent to its PS4 brother, Dragon Quest Builders does look fantastic and run smoothly on the Switch -- docked and undocked. The truly picky among you may notice the occasional stutter when panning the camera in quick sweeps. It didn't bother me a bit, and I'm generally pretty sensitive about performance hiccups.

You might not think that this game (or simply this type of game) is for you, but it really is. If you've been itching for a beautiful, open timesink that challenges your wits without dragging you through a linear storyline quest by quest, Dragon Quest Builders offers an incredible balance of freedom, creativity, and purpose. Being able to play, suspend, and pick the game back up at a moment's notice on Switch makes it even more accessible, and I can guarantee that this is something you'll be taking to bed with you at night. It's an utter freaking delight, and something that most of you will cherish.

WWG's Score: 4 / 5