4/5 ★ – Tye_Boy's review of Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen.

Having been introduced to it years ago and sitting in my backlog for the longest time, playing Dragon’s Dogma has truly been a long time coming for me. While it took some time to grow accustomed to its design and controls, I became rather engrossed in the combat and exploration the game had to offer, the former being the closest I’ve come to feeling the same rush of excitement as I did when playing Shadow of the Colossus, even down to some clunk in the controls, although this game’s are much better than Shadow’s. It looks alright visually, while the music is fantastic! The whole game carries this overall jank to it, but I could overlook that most of the time. It really surprised me how much I got into the game, just enjoying the gameplay loop of checking out the world and slaying enemies as I level up and travel with my pawns. Although I much enjoyed Dragon’s Dogma, there were a number of issues I had with it, greatly bogging down my upmost enjoyment. Quest design is a mixture of repetitive and non-functional, some tasks and their directions given to the player being completely wrong at times. The day to night cycle being tied to some quests, as well as invisible time limits to complete certain ones, frustrated me to no end. How am I supposed to know that these specific quests would become inaccessible after some time has passed, and on my first playthrough nonetheless? It’s this specific issue that makes me compare Dragon’s Dogma to Deadly Premonition. The story, for the most part, is satisfactory, with only select moments standing out to me. I surprisingly found myself growing accustomed to some NPCs, but otherwise, the game’s affinity system is weak and lacklustre. Its attempts at reworking this mechanic into a pivotal moment near the end completely fell flat on its face for me. Between its considerable pros and cons, I see why Dragon’s Dogma has been hailed as a cult classic over the years. Although I still have some post-game and DLC to perhaps check out, having finished the base game is cause enough for me to to claim having generally beaten the game. If there’s one thing I’ve come out of my 30+ hours with Dragon’s Dogma, it’s that I greatly look forward to its sequel. This game is almost like a foundation, somewhat solid yet greatly flawed that a follow-up game could shape into something incredible. Let’s hope that’s what happens with Dragon’s Dogma 2, but as for the original, it’s a terrific game.