3D Dot Game Heroes is an action role-playing video game developed by Silicon Studio for the PlayStation 3. The game is presented using voxel-based graphics in a 3D environment to emulate the 2D graphics of earlier video games. The game was published in Japan by FromSoftware in November 2009, and in North America and Europe by Atlus USA and SouthPeak Games in May 2010, respectively. Upon release, 3D Dot Game Heroes garnered positive reviews from critics, praising the nostalgic gameplay and graphics.

The game follows a hero on a quest to rid the Dotnia Kingdom of a dark plague caused by the forces of evil in order to restore peace to the land. Legend tells of an evil king known as the Dark King Onyx who brought tragedy and darkness to the kingdom by stealing six magical orbs. However a hero rose up against the Dark King and with his legendary sword as well as the power of the orbs, he sealed Onyx away within another orb. However, the forces of evil rose again as the Dark Bishop Fuelle stole the orb and threw the Kingdom of Dotnia into a state of chaos once more. The game's main protagonist is the grandchild of the brave hero who sealed away the Dark King and thus is entrusted with the responsibility to save the land.

The kingdom was once a 2D pixelated world but as the King of the Land felt that sprites were outdated he thus decreed for the kingdom to make the switch to 3D. This caused the entire world to become 3D while still retaining its original pixelated look.

Silicon Studio developed 3D Dot Game Heroes in just 10 months despite none of the development team having prior experience with PS3 development. The game was actually created as a way to showcase Silicon Studio's middleware technology, and the speed at which development could progress with it. The game was teased by From Software on August 10, 2009 with a teaser site showing a cube and a countdown-timer to August 20, 2009. The game was unveiled before the countdown ended by Japanese gaming magazine Famitsu, on August 18, 2009. A North American release of the game was confirmed by the Twitter account of Sony Computer Entertainment America which said that the game was "definitely" coming to North America. On November 17, 2009, Atlus confirmed that they would be localizing and publishing the game in North America for a May 11, 2010 release.