The series has met with positive critical reception, and despite its simplicity has been praised for its gameplay mechanics and graphic design, though sales have been mixed.
Yoshiki Watabe, producer of Dragon Quest VIII, thought of the idea and approached series creator Yuji Horii and together they brainstormed the games genre and style.
[6] When the second game was localized for the American audience, there was concern about the slime's identifiability with the public, and so Dragon Quest was added to the title.
[4][6] Early in the title's life, the developers had a version of it that uses the touch screen to use Rocket's Elasto Blast technique, but scrapped the idea, due to it being too hard to control.
[5] Watabe said that if Dragon Quest Heroes sold well, that the developer would look into a sequel, and they may also include Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection support.
[15] The slime can die if attacked too many times by enemies, as well as if the player takes too long to complete a dungeon, as in the game night falls and they are kidnapped by the Tails brigade like the rest of their village.
In the first two titles he saves his family, friends and countrymen that were kidnapped by a group of monsters known as the Tails Brigade, or the Plob in the English version.
[16] It was also chosen as the number four best Nintendo DS game of 2006 by GameSpy, calling it an "engrossing" RPG and enjoyable tank battles.