Dragon Quest X is set in the world of Astoltia, with the player character being initially human before an attack by Nelgel the Netherlord which he forces their soul into the body of another race.

Gameplay follows a combination of elements from the Dragon Quest and other contemporary MMORPGs, such as real-time combat in an open world environment and a job system tied to skills and abilities.

Critical reception to the game have been generally positive, with praise going to its integrating of Dragon Quest features into an MMORPG structure.

[7] Weapons and items are acquired either in battle alongside in-game currency or through Guilds scattered through Bazaars located in major towns.

The protagonist's mission is made clear when they realize that a sacred vessel called the Ark of the Heavens is the only thing that can penetrate Nelgel's defenses.

After fighting Razban, a demon bent on bringing Nelgel to life, the protagonist forges a friendship with a young boy who knew the secret to using the Ark of the Heavens.

[9][11] In the second expansion, the protagonist becomes embroiled in a royal power struggle, at the same time as a massive monster invasion of Astoltia, controlled by a mysterious hooded man.

In the fourth expansion, the protagonist travels to the world of the demons themselves, and fights to stop an evil plaguing Astoltia since the time of its creation.

[13][14] This was the first modern Dragon Quest title to be developed by Square Enix, as earlier mainline entries had been handled by external companies.

[18][19] One of the chief planners was Naoki Yoshida, who had worked on earlier Dragon Quest spin-offs, and was later assigned as the director of Final Fantasy XIV and its reboot A Realm Reborn.

After Cavia closed in 2010, Saito formed his own company Orca, which was chosen by Square Enix to support the development of Dragon Quest X.

[23] A second newcomer was Chikara Saito who, after working on Dragon Quest X during its development alongside Cross Treasures, would take over as the game's director in 2013.

[15] Despite this, Fujisawa was a novice at both developing and playing MMORPGs, putting him in stark contrast with other staff members such as Saito, Yoshida and second chief planner Takashi Anzai.

[25] The change to a new genre presented multiple challenges to the team: while standard RPGs were designed around a scripted experience, MMORPGs were more reliant on a true sense of unscripted adventure.

While this appeared discouraging, there had not been many titles of similar scale and success within the country, so there was both space for and detractions against an equivalent MMORPG experience.

The first was hardware related, as the Wii had a limited lifespan as a viable console; the second was the requirement of a subscription, a necessity to make the game profitable; and the third was a natural reticence against playing an online-only title.

To combat the monetary concerns, the team looked at the typical flat rate subscription, which at the time was between ¥1200 (US$12) and ¥2000 (US$20), then set it at ¥1000 (US$10) so it would be attractive to more casual gamers while still being profitable.

During an earlier development phase, the UI featured a large amount of information showing the various player statuses, but seeking to streamline and simplify the game, they removed most of the display.

A different gameplay challenge was presented by the move from turn-based to real-time battles, which went against the traditions of the Dragon Quest series.

[13] Dragon Quest X was first hinted at during a Square Enix press conference in December 2008 when Horii revealed that the game was being developed for the Wii.

[35] The game is region locked to Japan, as Square Enix implements IP blocking software to prevent external access.

[54] Titled Dragon Quest X: Rise of the Five Tribes Offline,[g] the remake features the same story as Volume 1 of the original but reworks it into a more traditional JRPG experience.

The active-time battle system was removed in favor of classic Dragon Quest turn-based combat, and the customizable player character is joined by five party members of different races: Maille (ogre), Ragus (poppet), Fuura (elf), Fuser (wetling), and Dasuton (dwarf); all previously appeared as non-player characters in the original game.

The visuals were heavily reworked, with characters appearing in super-deformed style and locations similarly redesigned to fit the smaller scale.

[55] The games feature limited cross-connectivity: beating the main story of Offline grants the player an option to start from level 70 in Online, transfer the names of the protagonist and their sibling, and skip to the second expansion.

They also praised the gameplay and its openness to accept novice players, despite the reviewer noting that it seemed to take longer to level up a character compared to offline Dragon Quest entries.

[63] In an import preview, Kotaku's Richard Eisenbeis shared Famitsu's praise of how the game was welcoming to players without experience of MMORPGs.

His main criticisms were the Chat systems, which were clumsy and difficult to use even with the right hardware peripheral, and the overly high amount of experience grinding he needed to do.

He finished the preview by calling Dragon Quest X "surprisingly backwards in its execution despite its sometimes inspired ideas and low entry bar".

As to the graphics, which suffered a slowdown in areas with multiple players, he was impressed by the amount of textures and environmental effects when compared to other Wii titles.