Yuji Horii uses AI for new game after Portopia and Dragon Quest
Yuji Horii says AI lets him make a game without drawing or coding, recalling his work on Portopia Serial Murder Case.
- In an October 11, 2026 post, he said AI now lets him make a “decent” game by giving instructions to the AI, without drawing or coding himself.
- According to Kotaku, Horii used Claude for a short browser game, Komiya in the Interrogation Room, which centers on the interrogation of a 72-year-old suspect.
What happened
Yuji Horii, best known as the creator of Dragon Quest and in Japan also as the maker of The Portopia Serial Murder Case, shared a post on October 11, 2026 reflecting on his early work. In that post, he said that for Portopia on PC, he came up with the story, created the illustrations, and handled the programming himself, effectively building the game alone.
Horii went on to say that AI changes that process. According to his post, even without being able to draw or program himself, he can now still make a “decent” game on his own by giving instructions to AI. The post was published on October 11, 2026 and was picked up the next day in a Kotaku article.
Kotaku reports that Horii used Claude for a short browser game titled Komiya in the Interrogation Room. The game takes place entirely during the questioning of Komiya, a 72-year-old suspect in a case involving a possible safe robbery. The report also says Horii noted on social media that he spent about 30 minutes on the game, though it remains unclear exactly which tasks were included in that time.
Timeline
1983 — The Portopia Serial Murder Case is released on PC.
October 11, 2026 — Yuji Horii posts that he once handled the story, art, and programming for Portopia himself, and that AI now helps him make a game without drawing or coding.
October 12, 2026 — Kotaku publishes a story about Horii’s AI experiment and names Komiya in the Interrogation Room as the browser game made with Claude.
Background
The Portopia Serial Murder Case was released in 1983 and is one of Horii’s best-known early works. In the provided sources, it serves as a reference point for how game development looked for him in the past: one creator handling the story, visuals, and code.
The current reporting places Horii in the context of AI-assisted game development. The sources confirm that he describes AI as a tool and that Kotaku connects a specific project, Komiya in the Interrogation Room, to that experiment. The available information does not fully confirm whether Horii made that project entirely alone or as part of a broader collaboration, nor where the game is publicly playable.