Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama sadly passed away in March, but like all great artists, the legend lives on through his work. While Toriyama was known primarily as the creator of Dragon Ball and character designer for Dragon Quest, he had a hand in many other projects over the years, contributing to games like Chrono Trigger as well as other manga series.
Toriyama’s art is prominently featured in every Dragon Quest game. He designed characters and monsters as well as box art. His tenure working on Square Enix’s fantasy role-playing series ran from 1986 with the first Dragon Quest game for NES until his death. Many of Toriyama’s iconic character and monster illustrations, including Slimes, are compiled in this stunning hardcover book titled Dragon Quest Illustrations: 30th Anniversary Edition. With over 500 illustrations covering most of the games in the series, this is a must-have book for Dragon Quest fans and anyone looking to see more of Toriyama’s imaginative art. It’s currently on sale at Amazon or $26.25, down from $35..
Another great showcase of the artist’s work is Akira Toriyama’s Manga Theater, a special collection of short stories spanning the first few decades of his career. This is a hardcover book celebrating his Shonen manga work outside of Dragon Ball and Dr. Slump, and with over 600 pages to flip through, there’s a lot to read and visually appreciate. It’s full of Toriyama’s cool designs, playful art, and underrated mechanical designs, and has been discounted by 25% at Amazon.
Other great Toriyama works include the Dragon Quest 25th Anniversary Encyclopedia of Monsters–all the text is in Japanese by the way–and Dragon Ball: A Visual History, a hardcover art book in a collector’s slipcase that showcases the work of Toriyama’s best-selling manga series. The Dragon Ball art book is currently only available from third-party sellers on Amazon. Barnes and Noble has it available to order ahead of its May 31 restock. Unsurprisingly, Dragon Ball: A Visual History has been a popular book in recent weeks.
