I'm really just speaking in terms of highly hypothetical "what if" scenarios.

But it's certain that DQ's problems in the west started with Enix's difficulties in the west... but honestly that was during the 90s and a LOT of other IPs(including Nintendo's own Fire Emblem, which was never expected to see light in the west) have managed a transition from Japan-exclusive niches to worldwide appeal since then yet DQ still remains primarily seen as "primarily Japanese" as an IP.

Like SE might be a japanese company, but just like many other japanese companies(Like Nintendo and "Nintendo of America") it has it's own american/western branchses in charge of promoting/marketing/etc franchises for territories outside of Japan.

So yeah in a way there's reasons to believe SE don't know how to get DQ to be an "acceptable" success in the west.

Or at least, their american division seriously doesn't know what to do with the IP.

If Nintendo of America could get something as niche Fire Emblem to not only have a foothold in North America.... but eventually grow into the success where Three House sold already 800k copies on digital purchase alone. And that's digital, and thus not even counting retail which brings the sum even higher for a game that barely released a month ago.

Well, all I'm saying is perhaps SE should start eyeing what's Nintendo is doing.

Or at this rate... perhaps give them exclusive publishing rights in the west for the whole franchise rather than individual titles since it feels like Dragon Quest would sell more in the west as a Switch-exclusive published/promoted/localized by Nintendo in the west(SE Japan could continue doing whatever they want with the IP in Japan) than as a crossplatform franchise.with whom SE's american divisions seem to have no ideas what to do with.

Like I feel we got more people knowing of Dragon Quest now because of the mere hero DLC in Nintendo's Smash Bros and the continued promotions Nintendo has been doing for DQ11S ever since than anything the SE-published PS4/PC release achieved.

I don't expect Switch-exclusive DQ11S to top DQ11's worldwide sales because DQ11 has already been a great success in Japan but.... honestly?

I can see it's western sales overiding those of DQ11 in the west.

And while it releases at the end of a packed month, it also release after all the other IPs like Zelda will have moved out of the way. So when it release it won't be eclipsed by Zelda after a single week because Zelda will be out of the way by then... which leaves only Luigi's Mansion at the end of October before another Switch/Nintendo IP could eclipse it.

So it would have most of October entirely to itself to build momentum.

In comparison, DQ11 on PS4 had to contend with Spider Man releasing on the exact same console(and with Sony themselves doing a lot to promote that Spider Man game) the exact same day.

Nintendo might be promoting Link's Awakening a lot, but they're also still promoting Dragon Quest XI and perhaps even just as much than the Zelda game.

Another thing, more directly about that what-if scenario's feasability, is the core of Dragon Quest's development team(particularly series creator Yuji Horii) isn't at Square Enix but at the Armor Project studio.

It's a weird deal reminiscent of Game Freak and Nintendo's own relationships, but Armor Project is actually mostly independent from SquareEnix.

In fact, it's in part because of their own past relationship with Enix.

Enix did own the DQ intelectual property(and now SE owns it), but they always worked almost exclusively through external contractors rather than developing their own internal studios. They thus owned IPs, but not the actual development teams which were generally independent and working on a contract to contract basis.

So when Squaresoft merged with Enix, they got the Dragon Quest IP but not ownership of the creators' own studios... though renewed the "contract" that let those creators(now Horii's Armor Project studio) continue to work on the IP ever since while remaining otherwise technically independent.

So while the value of the DQ intellectual property(since it is such a success in Japan after all) would make such a scenario unlikely to ever happen.... theoretically one could buy the DQ IP and still access most of the original creator by simply contracting Armor Project themselves since the later aren't owned by SE. This still mean somehow buying off the IP from SE first, but on paper it could be "possible".

Now would it ever happen?

Honestly I doubt it. At least, I don't think Nintendo buying the Dragon Quest IP outright. But at the same time I could see, perhaps in informal fashion, Nintendo getting some form of informal exclusivity contract for the franchise outside of Japan. Especially if they can prove being able to do a better job of getting it known in the west than SE's own "Square-Enix of America" division.

This might not even change that much honestly, at least on paper. Pretty much a lot of the ports and remakes of Dragon Quest games already see Nintendo as the acting publisher.

But if such an informal contract ever happen(especially ones that could more formally involves Nintendo's own localization teams)... I could see a situation were a lot of the side games of the franchises once exclusive to Japan might start being released to the west at a more regular pace. And I could see more case of simultaneous rather than delayed releases/localizations for these games. If that's a skill Nintendo is starting to be surprising at, it's definitely their localization teams and ability to ship simultaneous worldwide releases for games under their care.

I doubt anything ever so formal would ever happen, but if it ever did.... even if it was as a Switch-exclusive in the west, I could see something like Dragon Quest XII releasing in the west on the same year than it did in Japan rather than one year later. Especially if SE leaves the localization of that "Switch-exclusive western port" to Nintendo themselves.

Like said there's a lot about Dragon Quest(re: Armor Project Studio, the fact so many games are already published by Nintendo themselves in the west on their own consoles, etc) that make this less unlikely than it might seem.