Dragon's Dogma II (2024)

Still having a great time with this. Now finally got to a new city and area. The world is now twice as big. Changed to the Mystic Spearhand after maxing sorcerer levels and combat is reality different and I needed to adjust my party composition. I like that you can just change vocations on a whim.

I noticed that higher level pawns, whose owners presumably have more choice for armour, are more likely than not skimpily dressed.

I'm also noticing that the NPC AI is embarrassingly terrible. They all do their barks at the same time after being loaded in and even if they are not in eyeshot. So business owners will welcome to their shop grub behind closed doors or through sills walls. It's amazing that this sort of incompetent scripting was so CPU taxing that the framerate suffered if they didn't cut the render distance to like 1.5 m.

As much as I’d be happy for Metaphor: ReFantazio to win best RPG, I’d love for the win to go to Dragon’s Dogma 2. I’d like an award to go to a game that is willing to incorporate interesting friction and encourages players to really soak in the landscape and take a break from rushing from fast travel point to fast travel point. And how can a game that includes one of the best series of problem solving quests given by a terrifying yet mesmerizing riddle master lose in this category?

Now, Metaphor: ReFantazio is definitely a tough one to beat; and it’s ironic to me that both games have thoroughly enjoyable job systems, but as stylish and well written as Metaphor is, it is a very conventional RPG in certain ways, and I’d like something that took bigger mechanical risks to prevail in this category.

Hideaki Itsuno heading up a studio sounds great, until you realize it’s a Japanese branch of a studio owned by Tencent, the same Tencent that has already shut down other Japanese studios after deciding to scale back operations in Japan due to the Japanese market not meeting their sales expectations.

I’d love a new game from the mind behind Dragon’s Dogma but I don’t know if Tencent will be excited by games that don’t have the widest appeal possible.

I'm really loving the game. In some ways it feels like a remake of the first one, "but better this time". Combat is fun, the world looks lovely and is interesting to walk around, and the pawns have a bit more personality (although they're still almost braindead). I like how the oxcart fast travel system works. How you can reveal the map if you say awake or if you're awaken with a random encounter.

The story and dialogue is the only major problem. The whole deal with you having to prove you're the Arisen doesn't make any sense. Every other NPC knows you're Arisen but the queen regent is completely unaware of you and that one of her guards is betraying her? I think the nature of the game just doesn't lend itself to a good story because is more about the systems and world, so there's no space left for characters or a coherent linear story.

Ok folks, I think that’s it. Time to force myself to finally put this down, at least until there is DLC. I’ve reached the moment that triggers the unmoored world which is the point of no return at the end of the game and unless I want to play it a fourth time, this seems like the place to retire the game. Letting go is bittersweet but it’s time to move on to games like Indika, Lorelei and the Laser Eyes and Nine Sols.

Farewell Arisen (for now)!

I’m not typically a person who wants DLC for the games I play, with a tendency to either skip DLC that drops after I’ve completed a game or wait until I can buy a complete edition before playing it, but boy am I looking forward to DLC for this game. Namely, I’d love something like Dark Arisen’s Bitterblack Isle. I wasn’t deep into Dark Arisen enough to fully appreciate the appeal of a huge dungeon area, but now that I’ve basically scoured every centimetre of this game, and hunted bigger monsters in the unmoored world twice, I’m ready for some bigger challenges. I’m almost tempted to go back to the unmoored world just to crawl the less friendly areas of the game again but then I’m forced to start a new game if I do that. I plan to leave my Arisen at the end moment before travelling to the unmoored world just in case something like Bitterblack Isle drops and it’s only available in the base game given the time constraints in the unmoored world. And even if that’s not necessary, I can pop in and finish the game quickly enough.

I’m never excited for DLC or “more content” for games I’ve completed in full, but I’m really keen this time (ok, ME3 is an exception to that rule, but there are few like that).