The announcement that Dragon Warrior fans have been awaiting for what seems like an eternity has finally been made: Dragon Warrior VII will be released in North America, with a release targeted for this fall. Enix has been hinting at this announcement for a few weeks now, publishing Flash movies on its website, each with a different filename. When these filenames were combined, they spelled out a message: "If you can figure out what this is for, you are truly worthy of the title 'Dragon Warrior.'" Whereas perceptive readers were probably able to guess the meaning of this message as it was completed, it was only today that a formal announcement was made on Enix's website that the Dragon Warrior series would make a return to North America.

The Dragon Warrior series, though not as popular in North America as it once was, is an extremely high-profile RPG series in Japan -- so high, in fact, that Enix cannot release new games in the series on non-holiday weekdays, for fear that school and workplace responsibilities will be avoided in order to be first in line to enter the Dragon Warrior world once again. Dragon Warrior VII, when released in Japan as Dragon Quest VII, managed to sell two million copies in three days. One of the biggest RPG series will be making a return to North America shortly -- before long, players will be able to return to a universe that they left so long ago.