4/5 ★ – JacccBlaccc's review of Dragon's Dogma 2.

Finished: Dragon's Dogma 2 Platform: Playstation 5 Pro Time: 27 Hours Verdict: SUPERB Word: Dragon's Dogma 2 is an Action RPG by Capcom with a dynamic Open World, set in a Fantasy setting The Gameplay is GOOD. The strongest component being exploration. It is super satisfying to come across a Point of Interest by traveling the world and gain rewards driven by the urge the Game has created. The Traversal is extremely bold. Having Fast Travel held by a rather limited item based mechanic is fascinating and frustrating at the same time. It forced me to tackle every Quest, when leaving a city or a village, with care and a plan - the path is the goal. Even the Ox Cart traversal mechanic manifests itself being stubborn and dynamic. Unknown, if the cart is being attacked or not, keeps the ride uncertain. The Pawn mechanic is a helping hand that provides an indirect passive multiplayer layer to it as you can summon other players' created pawns that travel with you as long as they dont die. It is a SUPERB gameplay mechanic to make the gameplay experience unique and less lonely. The Combat without the Skills is really DISAPPOINTING. The lack of combos and damage makes it boring. Yet, the Skill Attacks is the core of the combat, which is attached to the endurance system and combined, levitates the Combat to a Skill Based endeavor and makes it SOLID overall. The Bosses is a peak point of Dragon's Dogma 2. The sheer presence of a Boss by its size, design, and sound is astonishing. Their movesets are also really Superb. Regardless, most Boss arenas are part of the vistiable world, 2 Boss Arenas are outstandingly AMAZING, one being the Talos Arena which is a pathway and the other being The Dragons arena. Even though the Boss Fights themselves don't hold up because of the protagonists combat design, the overall Bosses are GREAT. The AMAZING amount of Enemy Types is incredible. Some of em are day and night based. Some of em location based. All of em are unique, more or less. Good Movesets, Superb designs, Great sounds. SUPERB Enemy Types. The Main Quests are pretty much a mixed bag of good and bit bad and bold. Ive barely remembered a Video Game that dares to make reaching a quest such a journey itself. Going from one City to a village or any other Point of Interest is clustered with vigorous occurrences. Even the choice of which daytime you start the quest influences the journey fundamentally like most games simply arent brave to pull off. There are 2 or 3 Main Quests that are stealth focused and they are inherently TRASH. Besides those though, the Main Quest Designs vary between Solid and Great and altogether they end up being SUPERB. There is a ton of Side Content. Most of em, if not all, are Side Quests. Ive only played around a dozen of em so my judgment is like every other point highly subjective. But they are very GOOD. Boldness is a recurring theme in Dragon's Dogma 2. And the Upgrade System is no exception. Upgrading your weaponry - the stats vary depending on the region you upgrade them. If you focus more on physical stats, going to the Smith in Batthal is your way. If you want a more balanced weapon stat upgrade, the Smith in Vermund is your city. And that system applies to all regions and their dwelling Smiths. That alone is Amazing, and gives the world and the different Smiths within so much more authenticity, importance and uniqueness. Aside from your weaponry and armor, you can also upgrade your Combat skills by the Vocation Guild for the DCP currency. Which changes the animations quite a bit and enhances the damage it inflicts. Very SOLID. The third pillar of upgrade possibilities is thru Combat and Quest completions and the XP you gain from them. It upgrades the characters stats per level. SOLID The Upgrade System is SUPERB The Loot System is GREAT. From the quantity to the quality. From the Inventory Management to the value of the loot through sales or usage in general or in specific situations. From the combining to the real time based expireablity. It's really thought out. The Story - even the premise of the world story was BAD. It never explains why the Arisen has all those pawns that are willing to kill and die for him without any backstory. Mere puppets with no own will, the serve and obey blindly. A limitless resource whose deaths have no consequences period. They just respawn - dafuck. The Arisen looping story line is never an underdog story as he has pretty much an army from the get go. Whether its a gameplay mechanic with very cheap implementation of a story bit to make it seem reasonable - its not. The endless loop of The Dragon and its Dogma. Super stupid. There are some Good and Superb story lines within the Side Content though. The Plot is just in the way of the final boss battle. Nothing about the Plot is creative. A mad scientist inventing an artefact to control pawns to fool people to have the Arisen to summon a lesser Dragon to end the cycle. Yet, causing The Dragon to arrive. The whole “let's prevent catastrophe by doing that, then causing the catastrophe by trying to prevent this” plot has never been good. Just frustrating and DISAPPOINTING. Similar quality applies to the Screenplay - just worse. Just BAD Dragon's Dogma 2 features a ton of characters. The sole amount is very impressive. They have personalities and facial characteristics. Even Shopkeepers, Innkeepers and Smiths vary in identities and provide story lines. Every region has unique leaders and people. The Characters are GREAT would have even been better, if the protagonist was a preset character with an own personality and voice. The Voice Acting is SUPERB. The vocal animations of the characters are on point. Nevertheless, the protagonist should have been synchronized. And the lack of that voice actor role is a complete SHITSHOW. A Lot of vocal interactions lose weight as there are no natural dialogues with the main character. The Dialogs & Texts are SUPERB as mentioned above though, the lack of the protagonists dialogs lessens the quality. The Texts are well written and provide information of the world, characters and events. Dragon's Dogma 2 has humongous towns full of life. Villages are compact and simple. The deserts are abandoned by civilization but inhabited by threats and despair. The forests hold thieves and bandits in its spissitude. The mountaintops feel unreachable, and once reached, victorious. The caves cause claustrophobia and finders keepers drive. The landscapes are eye candies. The World Building is GREAT. The Level Designs are SUPERB. Topnotch connected. Long and wide routes with various pathways and objects to climb or get around to avoid Enemy groups or something bigger. Nice shortcuts and hidden paths. The deep water being a No Go Zone is quite annoying and is used to make the traversal unnecessarily harder. The CGI and Cut-Scenes in Dragon's Dogma 2 have some bombastic moments. Especially in the final chapter. Those in between Side Content are rather SOLID. Those among the Main Quests are balancing it to a SUPERB. They are high budget and superbly executed. Dragon's Dogma 2 is Capcom's very first 8. Gen Game. Capcom's premiere on that generation is graphically SUPERB. The clothing pieces look like leather or cloth. Steel shines by the reflection of the sun. The surroundings appear clear and near. The faces look distinct. The Art Style works. And the meat in the pan looks lifelike. The Animations look natural and smooth. Lesser so is the stiff walking of the NPCs and some death animations of certain Enemy Types. Sleek animations when traveling through the world over objects and in battle. A Griffin in full attack mode looks impressive and scary. A collapsing Minotaur is something to behold. A fire spitting Dragon is always awesome. A big SUPERB The OST is SUPERB. A nice collection of Songs that support the mood, action and victory moments. The Audio Design is SUPERB. Hearing animals in the distance in a forest. The wing beat of a Griffin above you passing by. The howling of a pack of wolves in the night while gleaming eyes staring at you. The swing of your weapon or the parry of an attack. All that and much more are ears pleasers in Capcom's Dragon's Dogma 2. The Characters Creation is simply AMAZING. The possibilities are attached to your imagination and time. Gameplay GOOD Combat SOLID Bosses GREAT Enemy Types SUPERB Main Quest Designs SUPERB Side Content Designs GOOD Upgrade Systems SUPERB Loot System GREAT Story BAD Plot DISAPPOINTING Screenplay BAD Characters GREAT Voice Acting SUPERB Dialogs & Texts SUPERB World Building GREAT Level Designs SUPERB CGI / Cut-Scenes SUPERB Graphics SUPERB Animations SUPERB OST SUPERB Audio Design SUPERB EXTRAS Characters Creation AMAZING BREAKDOWN Combat - Combat DISAPPOINTING Combat - Skills GOOD Enemy Types - Quantity AMAZING Main Quest Designs - Stealth Quests TRASH Story - World Premise BAD Voice Acting - Main Character SHITSHOW