Two legendary Japanese franchises are finally collaborating after over 40 years. Dragon Ball and Dragon Quest, two of the most influential works by the late Akira Toriyama, are coming together for the 40th anniversary of Dragon Ball.
The official accounts of Dragon Ball and Dragon Quest announced their surprising collaboration across their social media channels on March 6, 2025. The upcoming crossover will be featured in the popular mobile video game Dragon Quest Walk to celebrate Dragon Ball’s 40th anniversary. Toriyama, who passed away in March 2024, was the creator of the Dragon Ball series for Shonen Jump and the character designer of the Dragon Quest video games by Square Enix.
Akira Toriyama’s Dragon Ball & Dragon Quest Get a Long Overdue Crossover
Full details about the Dragon Ball x Dragon Quest crossover event remain scarce, but the official Dragon Quest Walk YouTube channel has uploaded a new trailer advertising the collaboration. The humorous trailer shows the iconic Slime monster from Dragon Quest going on a world adventure to collect the seven Dragon Balls on Earth. The adorable little creature is seen traveling on Goku’s Flying Nimbus with Bulma’s Dragon Radar attached to the tip of his head. Promotional artwork for the collaboration shows Goku as a child from the original Dragon Ball anime series.
Dragon Quest Walk is a geolocation-based role-playing video game for Android and iOS devices. The gameplay is similar to titles like Pokémon GO, Pikmin Bloom and Monster Hunter Now, where players can interact with classic Dragon Quest monsters and characters by traversing real-life locations that are transformed into classic game settings via the mobile app. Unfortunately for North American fans, Dragon Quest Walk has remained exclusively in Japan since its release on Sept. 14, 2019. The mobile division of Square Enix has yet to announce an international release for Dragon Quest Walk.
Dragon Quest is one of the many beloved franchises Toriyama worked on as a professional illustrator. Yuji Horii, the creator of the Dragon Quest series, spoke positively about Toriyama’s contribution to the highly regarded RPG series in a 2007 interview with IGN. According to Horii, the iconic design of the Slime monster was envisioned as an “icky pool of slime.” However, Toriyama delivered a character design that shaped the Slime into a teardrop monster. “That’s part of Toriyama’s power,” Horii said, “to take something like a pool of slime and use his imagination to make it a great character.”
All episodes of Dragon Ball Daima, Akira Toriyama’s final Dragon Ball work, are available to stream on Crunchyroll. The English dub, starring Stephanie Nadolny as Goku (Mini), began premiering one new episode per week from Jan. 10. “Goku and company were living peaceful lives when they suddenly turned small due to a conspiracy!” the series’ official description reads. “When they discover that the reason for this may lie in a world known as the ‘Demon Realm,’ a mysterious young Majin named Glorio appears before them.”
