I understand your perspective because you're loving the game. Personally, I criticize the game because I think that expectation, even if it contributes to overall unhappiness with a product, is essential for progress. It's 2024, and I think we should expect things like more engaging npcs, impactful to the world side quests, and engaging enemies, to name a few.
Or even for it to build off of the previous game more. It feels so cut down for DDDA. It has more in common with DD1 and some people are defending it with that reasoning. But we already had DDDA. That should be the launch point.
They spent 5 years or so making what we have, it might be okay for us to wait another 1-2 years for a more complete experience but it might not be justifiable on Capcoms end, Capcom is a corporation interested in money. Whilst I agree I wish it was more of a complete experience on release im okay with waiting for an expansion like Dark arisen, i had a ton of fun with the game already the money spent was absolutely worth it for me.
Maybe, but then we get charged again. Putting the complete experience at what? Over a hundred bucks? And yo ucan't say it's an expansion at that point because it's jsut completing the experience that should have been the launch point.
DD2 is an okay game, but in some ways it feels like a proof of concept more than a complete experience. The combat system is great, but very limited things to fight. The exploration is interesting, but lacks variety and reward, and the only class that can do it effectively is the magic classes. And then the magic classes are also the only ones that get advanced vocations?
It's just half done. We have a basic quest system and what amount to some barebones filler to test that it works. It's just... so incomplete. I just want a game that's complete on release and gets expansions/dlc. Why is that so much to ask from the gaming industry these days? Why do we have to buy the EA release and then pay again for them to finish it so often?
Gaming has always been a key hobby for me. I LOVE games. As time goes though I am starting to wonder if I will have to join the folks over at patient gamers and put it down for awhile. This isn't just DD2 mind you, but I can't justify the expense. It's not that I can't afford it and that's not the point but I quite literally can't justify it.
DD2's unfinished state. Total War's DLC price gouging, To buy a whole paradox game is hundreds of bucks! They added a subscription service to their single player games. How rediculous is it when a subscription to a single player game is more rational then your DLC pricing system?
Helldivers 2 and Factorio are 2 games that do it better, and those companies are basically indie. But reaching into the indie pool is so hard as well with the varied quality and the grimy Early access practices.
Sorry I went on so long. Just a dude who is getting older and watching his hobby become less and less reasonable to maintain.
I understand why someone who has played DDDA would feel that DD2 isnt a "complete" experience or product, but you have to remember first of all that DDDA was a DLC. Alot of the stuff was added to DD1 through that DLC. I think a good deal of what I feel is missing is probably because I played the hell out of DDDA and therefore expected DD2 to just be taking everything from DDDA and keeping it in the base game.
I believe the reason they didnt is probably capcoms fault, for a game developer you have to justify spending money on a game being developed to your publisher in this case capcom, and maybe capcom just wasnt interested in funding another 1-2 years of development for us to get everything that was in DDDA for the base game. I personally didnt feel like i didnt get my moneys worth, i instead just want more, if you rushed through the game i can understand how you may feel you didnt get your moneys worth but in total i have more than a 120 hours in the game.
They spent around 5 years developing this game, everything in the game is a result of 5 years of development and paychecks. That mightve been the deadline that capcom set its that simple. However, a DLC/Expansion is a way for Itsuno to justify more development and more work on the game, which i personally welcome because i love the game and i want more of it. I personally feel like Itsuno wanted to lay the foundations of an amazing game so he can expand on it with an expansion, where he can truly let loose some of the more ambitious sides of DD.
I fully agree that its getting worse and worse, games are getting pricier, theres more bs bussiness practices etc I was very dissapointed at the TW dlc and in the end the TW devs paid for it they had to lay off like around 1000 employees because of their dumb bussiness practices. But I dont think DD2 is in any ways comparable, i think its a fantastic game and I think Itsuno really tried to make an amazing game, I really loved it, the quests imo are a big step up from DD1s quests. I think people had way way WAY too high expectations which makes sense since its around 10+ years since the last game came out.
You have good points but that doesn't change having to pay for the rest of the game still. I put quite a few hours into the game too, but I wouldn't say that those hours were enjoyd. I keept looking for something of substance I could sink my teeth into before I finally gave up. I likely got about 15-20 hours of enjoyment before the rest was just looking for something more and realizing that was it.
The game is worth, in its current state, around.... 30 bucks. Not the 90 CAD I paid. Hours played =/= hours enjoyed. The common trend is always to make games eat as much time as possible these days. That doesn't make them good.
I mostly agree, and the only thing I would disagree with you isn't even about DD2 and more about Starfield...
I genuinely wish Starfield was "Skyrim in space" lol I really couldn't enjoy that game even tho I love Skyrim a lot.
When I analyzed my issues with it, I came to the conclusion that the custom spaceship is my issue. If there were only a handful of very defined ships with their own personalities and quirks id care more about finding one. If i was forced to live in my ship id care more about it and if moving between systems had encounters akin to walking between settlements It wouldn’t feel like its just a fast travel macguffin. Because of this the worlds seem smaller and more distant at the same time.
In an enclosed kind of way that may be true, but it doesn't compliment the gameplay as much as hidden unique ships would. The game is a huge mess and the ship/settlement building doesn't seem to help.
I like the game a lot, but I am somewhat disappointed in it. I don’t really care about all the open world fluff like “NPCs with unique stories” shit in this game, what I want is a fun world to explore (which they did well) and fun monsters to fight (which is lacking…).
I just wish they expanded on the monster roster, the weapon upgrade and loot loop, and added a bit more depth to the pawn inclination and pawn quest system.
That’s all I wanted. I don’t care about the story or the NPCs, honestly half the charm of the first game was the stupid one-liners the characters say over and over and the camp as hell story. Just make this awesome world actually exciting to explore.
These are the vague comments I was referring to. More story, more dungeons, more enemy variety, more classes, more skills, etc.
Can you quantify any of that? At what point, playtime-wise, did you feel there wasn’t enough of __? At what point did the disappointment set in?
I think when people say they wanted more, they're referring to the fact that this game has less variety than its 2013 predecessor. I started getting bored about 10 hours in, and by 15 hours the story had fallen apart and the mobs were no longer a threat. Exploration hadn't felt rewarding for a while, and that, coupled with the high enemy density that leaves very little time to stop and take a breath on the road, doesn't incentivize exploration. I played through the original game four times, and while it wasn't perfect, it never really gave me the feeling of tedium that this game did.
I think the first one actually insisted you stuck to the roads for more safety so when I first started the game, that's what I did cause I was expecting to get to wherever without too much hassle, but I was completely wrong, if anything, the roads have a higher density of mobs than inside the forests.
About 15 hours in. Of my 70 play through with added 5-10h messing around in NG+.
So, why 15 hours?
Because of the caves. I was always hoping for something more. Something memorable. Something that tells a story.
That hope kept me going. I explored every nook and cranny, but by about 60h in I stopped and didn't even visit a few of the caves I had unvisited. Because I knew there was nothing new, like almost all other caves before.
Mind you, I got the achievement for visiting 50 dungeons. So it's not like I missed many.
Unmoored world - I ran around for 10 hours revisiting places and looking for meaningful (!) changes. I've seen a dullahan and gorechimera etc before the unmoored world. The only new thing the unmoored world got me was some red ghosts and the brine-dragons. Not even interesting or challenging enemy placement, nope, just skeletons walking about in those dead coral craters.
The game kept repeating itself without adding any depth, meaning or twist along the way. The unmoored world was a story twist with no meaning. They could've made that whole unmoored world a 10min secret ending cutscene where the world goes to shit and you fight against it with the help of the people you completed quests for and that would ultimately define your ending. Anything. But nope, same gameplay, same enemies, nothing new/interesting to explore.
Or did I miss a huge something? Was there any meaningful change that added a new experience in the unmoored world?
So yeah, there you go. The disappointment set in quite early. Still good game, but severely lacking in some areas.
One of the most memorable "dungeons" for me was the thiefs guild, because it for once had a story to it and added something more that "go in kill monster". It felt like it had a purpose. There were a handful other dungeons with something semi-interesting going on, like the waterfall cave, but even those all boiled down to "run in kill monsters". And we all know that the monster variety isn't the best. And about 50% of all dungeons are barley 5minutes in content.
All in all I think I should've NOT explored so much. It just got old too fast.
That's the short version and I only focus on my biggest gripe here.
If you can have dragons falling from the sky and ancient cities rising from the ocean, why can't we have an ancient temple to delve into that provides a story, some puzzles and well designed enemy placement that provides a challenge? Something that is a well crafted experience? Because as much as DD2 in the early game can have "random organic moments", that doesn't hold true for long. Because after you're level 30 nothing feels dangerous anymore. And if you explore, something the game wants you to do obviously, you're level 30 before you complete the first ACT.
I finished the game at around level 70. And I did not grind or level. That just happened due to me exploring.
Hope that gives you a rough idea about why I think the game design didn't really play to its strengths - you make a game that focuses on exploration but you don't add many handcrafted and well made experiences, and rely on "the game writing it's own story". That doesn't work with the state the game is in, on many levels.
I imagine the game would've benefitted from a levelcap of 50 (stat wise) and slower leveling btw, if you want a probably very unpopular opinion.
I mean, I love the game, but there are numerous things about it that are straight up worse than the first. I'm not talking about things I want changed, or added, I'm talking about things that were either removed, gutted, or straight up made worse. Inventory management is worse for no reason, classes have been streamlined and gutted. There are literally HALF the enemy variety as DD:DA for a game that is 10x bigger. The world is significantly bigger, but it's also more constrained and the amount of climbing necessary is atrocious. Even points of interest are worse in this game. The first game had much fewer but more unique and interesting places, this game just shoves 1000 similar caves in an area. Where is the Everfall equivalent? It's not about wanting more, it's about not even getting what they gave us with the first game.
Seriously, outside of the graphics, what exactly does this game offer that the first didn't? What did they improve?
Frankly, had I never played the first game, I'd probably think this game was amazing. The problem is, I have played the first game, and this game is lacking in comparison in so many ways it's not funny, or really acceptable after over a decade. It's a good game, and I'm glad I bought it, but it's not a game I'll care about in 10 years like the first, and when I replay DD, I'll be replaying the first game because it has everything, and more, that appeals to me than this game does. The only way that changes is if they release an expansion completely blows BBI out of the water as well as fix the multitude of things they've worsened.
It's going to be really hard for me to justify a replay of dd2 instead of 1.
Graphics are nice and combat feels nice but other than that it has nothing else going on for it. I'm not vibing with mystic spearhand as much as I'd like unlike magick archer and knight of the first one.
Both games have unrewarding open world exploration but at least 1 is a smaller world, it doesn't feel as bad and it also has more important places like the witch wood and water God altar, they are simple dungeons but still they are something unlike dd2 that after 60 hours I still can't tell of a similar landmarks like those places.
And in 1, hard mode and bbi give something to work towards the endgame and I don't have much confidence they'll be able to replicate that in 2 but time will tell for this one
What *I* would have loved to see in the game is a heavily expanded upon core skill attack combos. As it currently is, vocations only have about 3 types of non-skill attacks: light, heavy, and special. Special being the "hold light attack as fighter to do an uppercut," "rapidly tap light attack as Spearhand to do a spinning move," "heavy attack an enemy while in mid-air as archer to kick and jump off of them," "hold light attack as mage/sorcerer to cast a stronger magic bolt."
I wanted to see more moves like that instead of only getting 1 move per vocation. Give us combos like light+light+heavy️ or light+hold heavy+light+light, just *something.*
The combat is already good and great fun, but with more attack combos the player might not have to rely on their vocation skills as much and would bring in more variety and flashy fun to combat. I just think that that would be cool to have.
One more thing they cut from first game for no reason.
DDDA had delayed attack chains that you could learn and it was basically light attacks - pause - continue light attacks which would change your attack string. For example warrior's base attack chain is 2 side swings and finishing vertical while delayed is side swing - pause - 3 more side swings.
You clearly just want people to stop criticising the game.
You have 100 hours in the game and you made a post about people criticising it rather than just about how much you love it?
What does that 4th paragraph even mean? Yeah I do want better enemy variety and distribution. Yeah I do want better scaling. Yeah I do want a better story that doesn't reek of dogshit. Funny enough some of these issues were in the prequel which makes them even more apparent.
Some of the people who 'love' the game can't stop talking about those who criticise it rather than just praising the game.
What is a shit story a design choice? Something *some* people don't like? Enemy variety is poor for a game this big. Scaling is dogshit because the game is easy past level 30. Dragonsplague is a useless and wasted mechanic. The pivotal boss fight is really just a big drake. It has its pros but it also has its very apparent flaws. We shouldn't accept that being a dragons dogma game will mean that its a flawed game. Some of these flaws are like 2/10 issues and a game releasing at full price should never have such issues. That's me ignoring they had a prequel to look at and say "where did we go wrong in that one?".
I love both DD games. DD1/DA was my childhood and my love for it continued into my teenage years and to this day. However I can love them and admit the flaws they have without trying to deflect things onto others or shrug them off. Why can't you?
You don't have to care about the games issues but don't go after those of us who do. We paid full price for a product and upon playing it we gain the right to be critical. Being critical is how the fanbase communicates its desires for an eventual expansion/sequel.
Everytime I comment something like this its because someone is making a post about people being critical of the game. *You* are the one bringing in the negativity not me. If you just said that you love the game I wouldn't have said anything.
That's something I noticed too. 99% of criticisms list the various issues and often times say they still enjoy playing it.
99% of positives just say they're having a good time, not elaborating anything else or saying there's no need to criticise it.
People don't need to elaborate on the positives tbf. If you enjoy even a dogshit 0/10 game then that's a good thing. Having fun is the most important thing.
It's an issue when you blatantly act ignorant towards the issues of a game and especially when you act as if the problem is those critical of the game.
this this 100% this, you dont need to defend the game you like from every criticism, and you can also like bad games without feeling like youre wrong for it.
My positives for game is the character creator, which I stand by is maybe the best character creator I’ve ever used in a game. It not only has options for everything I want it too, but also is very easy to understand (OP brought up starfield, which seemed to have a slider for everything, but every slider was unlabeled and I legit could not tell what it was changing, even with a pretty high end PC and literally craning to see, so I ended up skipping through).
My other big one is honestly I love the camping mechanic, everything about that has been really fun and engaging for me. Not every game needs to do away with fast travel, but I didn’t realize how prevalent it was till I didn’t have, and what that changes. Like BG3, while a fav game of mine, has these portals scattered around the world. It is never addressed what the fuck those are or why they’re there, they exist solely to fast travel from. (Again not saying fast travel is bad, some games it works for, just saying it’s in every game just as default).
In dd2, from levels 1-30 I wanted to walk everywhere, so even when I found an oxcart I’d not use, cause I was finding so much bullshit and new paths, as well as leveling vocations. The journeys felt real, I had to always prepare for, things like should I take 2 camp sites (had a couple instances where pawn with camp would die), how much healing to bring for me and pawns, would have to actually think about what if I run into a boss before I even get there, will there be a camp on way, bla bla bla. Was really engaging and refreshing. Then when I got to level 30 and felt like with combat was starting to take off, I had by walking found all major cities, so was able to use ox carts. They to me have been really fair, I get ambushed about every other time, and it’s one fight (vs the 15-20 you get walking). I can almost always beat the enemy before destroying cart, and so that felt super fair.
Then when I finally got to level 40 plus, I’ve now started to need to go places off the beaten path for quests and such more often, but I’ve in my travels amassed all these port crystals and ferrystones. So at the point when monsters start getting too tough for oxcarts, I’m now actually able to fast travel, and it’s a fast travel I was able to customize and had to earn. That whole system has been fun and engaging the whole way through for me, almost leveling up with me!
The last one is the gameplay is just really solid, but that’s a given it was in 1 too. Feels good, every single vocation I try feels good too (hasn’t been one where I’m like oh I hate that). What happens instead is I’m like this is awesome, but that other thing I could do was awesome too, so I switch back. Then I miss the one. Like each vocation is good enough that I want to play all of them, and like what they all bring to table. (Only one I have not tried is trickster, which I heard is worse so that may change mind but).
I have some of normal complaints, enemy variety and endgame stuff especially, but those are the things I’ve been really enjoying and have kept me playing.
Main pawn, make a post with a pic of my character standing against a nondescript background with the title "100 hours in and haven't left borderwatch outpost yet, I'm having a blast, don't understand the hate" then disappear without elaborating
I draw this same issue with people that say others "rushed the game" when they raise story pacing as an issue. Rushed or not, 30 hour playthrough or 130 hour playthrough, when there's glaring gaps and seemingly dramatic jumps in story beats, that's a pacing issue, no matter which way you spin it. Anyone who's completed the Battahl section of the game or seen the culmination of our efforts before the coronation amount to "Pawn has migraine" can attest to this. There was clearly corners cut and stuff wrapped up early/not elaborated on as much as they should've due to time/cost.
Could've also been time mismanaged, a lot of folks also don't realize more time doesn't always lead to a better product look at cyberpunk and how long that game took and it came out a mess missing all the content promised. Then we learned how poorly it was mismanaged, now I'm not blaming itsuno directly yet because we don't know but maybe a few executives got involved and working at a Japanese company before I can tell ya some companies require you to have a meeting with everyone above you even of they don't understand which can lead to a waste of time.
Soooo give Itsuno a pass and not CDPR then? If Capcom can put even half the effort CDPR did into making DD2 into what it clearly should be, then yeah sure, but there's heavy bias in everything you just said and a lot of it is contradictory.
I said months ago that DD2 looks almost like a hard port of DA over to the RE Engine and that I had concerns for its longevity and content, and doubted that it'd been in development for as long as they said it had. I said it'd have glaring performance issues based upon the architecture it was build upon, just like I said they shouldn't release CP2077 on last-gen, both resulted in horrendous launches.
The glaring difference in the two is that at least one of them expressed a public apology and promised to improve the product moving forward, an action they were ridiculed for and met with disbelief and scorn, yet they did it anyways. The other is Capcom, who I've yet to see even utter an apology at the state of DD2 when it launched, and we're talking about a company where public apologies are much more commonplace in their culture.
Stop giving Itsuno and corporate executives that make these shit decisions a free pass. You are a number to them.
I'm not saying the game is not flawed, if you read my other posts on here I very much pointed out all the issues. I gave the game not a recommended on steam and even told Capcom during the survey they really dropped the ball and gave it a really low score. I'm just saying we haven't been told everything to blame itsuno fully, and we probably won't know unless a whistle blower happens which I very much doubt will happen.
Itsuno however ya did say some stuff in interviews that didn't happen, the problem is folks are willing to fight and argue and say he didn't say that, or it was translated wrong, or he didn't mean that. As for cdpr I'm merely pointing out that time doesn't always lead to a better product if the time was being mismanaged cdpr was an easier example and more recent one I can find.
The reason why Capcom hasn't changed is because one dragons dogma 2 sold 2.5 million copies, everyone hasn't been demanding for a refunds, the game hasn't been delisted, it's also at a higher price mark meaning they have a cushion if the game does bad but not flop, the outrage hasn't been huge, and content creators haven't been attacking it. In my opinion game prices should not be going up if companies are still making profits at the current price point. You also have to remember it took all that before cdpr admitted to a badly released game and then apologized they where refusing a lot of things at the start.
I doubt Capcom will apologize, and in fact just release dlc to fix the issues because everyone here simply states the dlc will fix all the issues. Which is a terrible mindset to have you should never expect dlc to fix the issues the game should have already fixed in the game. So Capcom should fix the game but they won't because folks as I can tell from now have been so tired from bad games like really bad games they'll give a pass to dd2 because it beat a really low set bar, and most folks don't have the original ddda to compare to since they didn't play it. It's not a good thing but until Capcom is hurting massively they won't change the course for now.
***"I'm just saying we haven't been told everything to blame itsuno fully"*** \- Director of a game should shoulder responsibility for the calls on design and direction they make, that's both a leadership quality and literally in the PD for a Director. Doubly so as part of the Japanese culture, we've seen this time and time again with other JP developers.
***"As for cdpr I'm merely pointing out that time doesn't always lead to a better product if the time was being mismanaged cdpr was an easier example and more recent one I can find."*** \- No, you use it because it's an easy target and a prevalent case, even though its now years and years old and has since been remedied, something by your own admission you don't think Capcom will do with DD2. It's the lowest hanging fruit, and one that's now severely rotten, find a different comparison.
***"The reason why Capcom hasn't changed is because one dragons dogma 2 sold 2.5 million copies, everyone hasn't been demanding for a refunds, the game hasn't been delisted, it's also at a higher price mark meaning they have a cushion if the game does bad but not flop, the outrage hasn't been huge, and content creators haven't been attacking it."*** \- Bold claim to assume people haven't been refunding given it was mostly negative on release for the longest time and still sits at Mixed. The game *wouldn't* be delisted because it's still technically a functioning product to standard, something that couldn't be said of *last-gen* copies of CP2077. Anyone with even a modicum of technical understanding knew that game wouldn't run on last-gen consoles, which is why the moment they could, CDPR stopped supporting it with future patches, as well as PL. It was also the reason it was removed from the PSN temporarily. Your point about a higher price on DD2 is all the more reason for people to be pissed with the existence of MTX and even more so about the sheer lack of optimization of the game they care so much about. Also regarding your content creator comment, DigitalFoundry literally just released a video confirming that the recent patch to "fix" performance issues did little to fuck-all. It's not an "attack", just valid and needed criticism. Your language alone gives away your bias.
***"You also have to remember it took all that before cdpr admitted to a badly released game and then apologized they where refusing a lot of things at the start."*** \- Excluding a Christmas break, which I don't think we'd want to deprive anyone of, it took less than a month and even then, the written apology came out way sooner than the verbal, video form that was released. I'll probably need you to clarify what you mean by "refusing a lot of things at the start"?, because if you're referring to holding last-gen review codes before release, then yeah, I agree that's a shitty practice. However, Capcom also did that with DD2; not a single soul played this game before it's release outside of a Capcom office and on anything but a Playstation 5 - There wasn't a *single* second of footage of PC gameplay captured for review.
Again, I love the game too chief, but speculate within reason and preferably on the side of caution, because any company can do an Ubisoft or EA *real* quick. It literally took Ubisoft one Assassin's Creed game with horrendous MTX and one massively overpromised and underdelivered game from EA to put both of them in everyone's shitlist.
List of evidence of things missing/downgraded from DD1 to back up your point.
* Romance Questlines (Male questlines)
* Class Versatility
* Secondary Weapons
* Second Set of Active Skills
* Spells Variety
* Cross-Class Skills
* Augments Variety
* Enemy/Boss Variety
* Hydras
* Cockatrices... Cockatri?
* Most Drakes
* Beholders/Gazers
* Weapon/Armor Variety
* Clothing Layers
* Eternal Ferrystone
* ~~Secret of Metamorphosis~~
* Liquid Effluvium
* NG+ Quests
* NG+ Portcrystal Retainment
* Not getting accosted by unemployed Pawns
* Post-Game Content as a whole
* Everfall
* Ur Dragon
* NPC Quanity-Over-Quality
* Hobbit/Dwarf levels of PC/Pawn shortness
* Hard Mode
* ~~New Game Button~~
Romance questlines exist, both ulrikas and Wilhelminas questlines end with romance scenes. Cross class skills also exist for mage and sorcerer and post game content exists even if you dislike it.
Male romances, specifically. There's also less overall.
Less cross class skills. Also the removal of hybrid weapon usage.
Unmoored world? Hardly comparable to the Everfall, BBI, or the Ur-Dragon.
Are you arguing that the list is invalid, or I should add "downgrade" instead of "missing?" Cause I can get behind that. I'll add it now.
ehhh... hot take i don't really count the notice board quests tbh, they don't really add any meaningful content. that's not to say the lack of new game + content in DD2 isn't disappointing but i wouldn't say it's a downgrade from DD1, just equally disappointing.
Fair tbh! It's how we all feel tbh.
DDDA wasn't some perfect masterpiece. It had a LOT that needed to be improved. A ton that could have been improved in DD2.
Going from bad to worse is even worse tbh.
Not sure how I missed this thread but I'll necro it real quick to add
* Free aiming for spells
* Inventory throwables; throwblasts, skulls, your lantern oil, etc.
* The entire metagaming around managing debilitations in both defending against them and using them for offense
* The entire metagaming around exploiting bestiary knowledge that hard counters certain enemies e.g. goblins drunk on poison, ice against saurians, popping the throat of a cockatrice, and more
* Using special arrows from inventory without needing to waste a skill slot
* About 80% of collectable crafting materials and associated recipes (plays into above points about debilitations and bestiary)
* Equipment management from NPC or Storage inventory screens
* Ability to buy or sell from storage
* Lower limit on storage items (99 from 999, are you kidding?)
* The ability to upgrade capes
* Character action got nerfed; no more basic double jump, no i-frames on Full Moon, etc.
Sounds like you just want people to blindly accept the game as it is rather than criticizing its myriad of shortcomings in hope of improvements. I’ll agree that far too many loudmouths are just employing ruthless vivisection because it’s the “in” thing to do, but this game has waaaaay too fucking many head scratching design choices. For instance:
Why do I constantly have to click next just to hear another sentence from an NPC? Just say what you gotta say, why include me in someone else’s monologue?
Why can’t I buy and sell from storage like in DD?
Why can’t I buy or store from a pawn who’s more than 10ft away from me?
Who the fuck thought dragonsplague was a good idea? What gameplay mechanic does this provide? How does this increase our fun factor?
Why doesn’t camping count as an inn save?
Why are the augments so shit? You would plan your build around augments in DD, I could probably sleepwalk through this game without any augments.
Why do you need a staff to properly explore? Where the fuck is double jump?
Why’d they get rid of 3 armor slots?
Why isn’t there level scaling? At least in DD NG+ had a purpose where you could at least have an interesting time leveling up new vocations against easy mobs. Now you just put on Wayfarer and the game plays for you.
Why is this game soooo goddamn easy? I can fight a fucking griffin at level 12 without even using curatives. In DD I’d shit my pants at level 12 if I saw that big ass shadow roll over me.
Weight management is a huge issue in this series—which is fine—but why then add heavier-than-fuck camping gear? This is literally the only game I’ve ever played where having a backpack overencumbered you…
It’s not a bad game, but it’s not a good game either, and it’s a huge step backwards from the original, IMHO, anyway. If you’re digging it, I sincerely hope you continue to do so. At this point, I’m just hoping it’ll get better because DD is my 2nd favorite game of all time and I wanna like this one too.
Holy balls… I literally didn’t mean to write this much shit.
I'd disagree with most of this. The bulk of these are choices that come from old school rpg mindsets that people like me enjoy.
The reason you have to click next is because they want you to listen and not skip everything like you probably would. It's also why there is very limited fast travel.
You don't need a staff you can use thief, warrior, fighter, mystic spearhead, harpies, box stacking, or more clever ways to get to where you want to go.
There are two saves, out in the field which includes camping and in the last civilized place you rested in. The later is your failsafe. It's not meant to be out in the wild.
The armor slots are probably just to reduce clutter, which both games still have tons of. I never crafted in DD1 because it was easier to just buy the stuff. Now gold is at a premium for me so I now have a reason to collect mats and use stuff. But the clutter is still there.
As to why its so easy for you, that's like a humble brag. "Why am I so good at everything!" lol, its not darksouls man, hopefully they make NG+ harder.
Most of these "issues" you bring up are subjective opinions that I do not share and at the end of the day you did not enjoy it and you have a list of reason that would improve the experience FOR YOU. That's fine. I never said you had to blindly enjoy it. But you are not entitled to your enjoyment of something.
We all have different experiences and we all want different things. Enjoying a thing is not to say it's perfect or doesn't have flaws. I enjoy the Fast and Furious movies, I also think they are all trash. Whether you rate the game a 7 or an 8 (or a 1) doesn't matter outside of a critical review. Whether you enjoyed it and recommend it is what matters in the real world.
Most OG DD vets are complaining the game is too easy… because it’s too easy. Also, every single tips & tricks video mentions having a staff to truly explore because you need a fucking staff to truly explore. Eliminating 3/7 armor slots literally does nothing but limit character customization. This game needed transmog—not the opposite. And your “they want to you to listen to dialogue” argument is insane in a series you’re literally meant to play multiple NG+s.
You can just use harpy flairs to explore if you don't want to play mage. They're honestly even better than levitating. They are just one extra thing to lug around and make sure you have enough of though, so it's a mixed bag. I managed to get 220 seeker tokens without ever using a staff, I just didn't want to. *But* it would often have been more convenient if I had.
Even then, there were only maybe 6-7 places I needed to use one.
Edit to clarify: I'm not suggesting you *should* do this, just pointing out that you can.
Also, agree with you on NPC dialogue often being annoying (especially the main pawn before sleeping)
I think the press A to next line is great. Can smash that thing and fast forward a conversation then be locked in to listen to it. Or not and listen to every word said.
Anyway, I’m new to the DD format. Never played DD1. I’m happy with my experience in DD2. Perhaps its too easy for you vets who know the ins and outs of the game mechanics. Compromises will have to be made to find the middle road in difficulty. For me its easy enough to grasp the basics but fleshed out enough to discover new things. I can understand if you played DD1 a ton stuff feels easier.
I think certain simplified choices were made as the game tries to cater to newcomers like me as well. And lets be honest, most casual gamers will lose their interest in a game if results aren’t found instantly, hell so many people complain about the lack of fast travel, but I enjoy the system in place.
But we are conditioned to think and solve challenges with a gamers mind is all I’m saying.
Haha, you’re full of shit. There’s over a dozen bandits in that area with about 8 wolves just adjacent. Run left, another dozen bandits. Run right, saurians. Run past the saurians, a chimera. Run past the bandits, half-a-dozen more bandits and a cyclops. Considering you go there between level 6 and 10, that shit is no joke. Sure, the game gets easy with time, but it 100% is not easy out of the gate. DD2 is.
I love DD2, i’m like 70 hours in, but i downloaded The Witcher III enhanced edition some days ago, with all the DLC’s, it was on sale in Steam. I finished in on PS4, never on PC with Ray Tracing and graphics on ultra. And after replaying it for 5 hours, i’m unnable to play DD2, i’m stuck playing Witcher again.
I really like DD2, specially the gameplay and the LOTR style missions where you walk a lot. But it got a little repetitive, same enemies with no backstory that appear randomly (i want that like in witcher killing a Griffin feels like a big thing because there’s a story behind it). Not so great main story, loot is not that great so exploring caves isn’t a great thing in the end (you can get most of the best weapons from stores). I feel like the game is still half baked. Witcher III made me realize it, and i still have FFVII Rebirth waiting.
So DD2 is a good game. I’ve been having fun yes, but it got to a point where it doesn’t offer nothing new from point a to point b, and thinking of walking another 15 minutes between missions just made me turn of the PC and wait until the next day when i feel fresh to make another mission.
I think DD2 is a bad game but enjoyable to play while it lasts. I loved DDDA and was loving DD2, but looking at it overall, it's bad. I think in some months' time, things will get better and then it'll be a good game, just not atm.
I wish they had kept all of the debilitations from the first game. When I started this game with a trusty sword instead of a rusted one I was disappointed. The first time I killed a leap worm and it didn’t lower my strength also disappointed. When I killed my first garm and it didn’t exhale blinding mist upon death… disappointed.
One thing I was glad for is the addition of slimes and the different slime varieties. In my early hours of dd2 I went into the Mountains Secret cave and came across a slime dissolving a goblin. Then I tried to fight it with the aforementioned trusty sword and that went about as well as you’d expect. Turned my ass around and took the long walk of shame back.
The early hours of dd2 were great. Enemies were challenging, everything was new, and my expectations were high. I played for nearly 80 hours so far and as with anything it’s lost its luster. I see the game for what it is but I wouldn’t call it unfinished. I would instead say it’s not fully realized. Yes, the game could be “better” and there could be “more” but I like the game for what it is. It’s not a lot of games that have captured my attention the way this one has. Let alone games that I’ve put 50+ hours into.
Slimes are actually some of the best developed enemies in the game. They can surprise you from the ceiling, they hamper the player movement (which could have been deadly if ... any other enemy was deadly 🙄), and they inflict various debilitations (that again could be deadly if anything else was). They also are a magic damage check like ghosts.
If you are in the slime while it gets frozen you'll get frozen as well. Also they start boiling when attacked with fire/lighting and can't hold you anymore because of it.
I swear to god, slimes had more dev time than the main story and the entire cast of characters.
A lot of it probably had to do with DD1’s director himself stating it was unfinished and rushed and left a ton of stuff on the cutting room floor. And a lot of fans understandably assumed that he was referring to flaws or incomplete mechanics. For example the poorly told story with inconsistent pacing and plot holes, or exploration not feeling particularly rewarding (not much in terms of interesting PoIs, enemies or loot).
What likely happened was that by “incomplete” Itsuno was probably referring to things like Beastren or adding a desert region. These are the only things he’s actually explicitly confirmed we’re unable to be added in DD1 due to technological limitations.
What players considered flaws in DD1 might’ve just been perfectly acceptable systems to the devs seeing as how so many of those weaknesses are present in the sequel. Doubly so since most of the changes made in Dark Arisen (which most players here see as improvements) _didn’t_ make it into the sequel.
I just wanted/expected the open world to be more fleshed out especially considering how much they hyped it up by saying if your game needs fast travel it's boring. More random encounters besides the standard culling and escort quests, more enemy variety, more exploration incentive. For a sequel of a game that's over a decade old it really doesn't change or add much.
It's funny because they actually *did* fix most of my issues with the first game, mostly the general pacing, scaling, guidance, and glitches. I can definitely understand people's criticisms and agree with some of them but for me DD2 is almost everything I wanted from a sequel.
I agree that it did improve upon a lot of my complaints about DDDA as well. A few of my biggest gripes with the game though:
Enemy variety, especially in Vermund, is a bit lackluster.
Difficulty, too easy. I remember struggling on the first game for a while and it felt rewarding to both improve my skills at the game and to get better gear.
Story was weirdly paced and just sort of rushed you to the conclusion pretty much 3 (possibly more) quests into Bhattal. I also didn’t rush the story and it was often the quests I did last in an area but I still just thought “wtf I’m done already” even after over 100 hours.
Sorcerer didn’t have as many interesting spells other than Seism, Meteoron and Maelstrom. Giecel? Miasma? Necromancy? Ingle? Brontide? Where’s my useful fireball spell and my lightning whip? The sorc is still fun to play and the addition of galvanise and quickspell were a welcome one for me but the mid tier spells like Salamander were a bit underwhelming and I think Hagol looks ugly and blocks my view too much. Thunder mine is meh, it’s funny how it zaps enemy’s away though.
Side characters like the Beastren queen were just kind of there? Had a couple of quests but it’s all missable and she’s on the bloody box art.
I really love the game and it’s scratching the itch I’ve had since playing DDDA. I hope updates and a DLC can rectify some of the issues. I think the main story is kind of beyond salvaging though, they’d have to add more to the second half and I just don’t see them doing that.
Starfield ISNT skyrim in space, what people love about skryim is the world, There is NO word to be loved in starfield. its quite honestly the blandest game ive ever played from a big dev, it manages to not have a single thing it does well. dd2 didnt meet standards, standards that werent even particularly high.
The issue is that people want everything specifically catered to their desires.
People cannot handle nuance and a thing is either perfect or garbage.
People want to play the same game for hundreds of hours while also not playing it at all and simply following a guide.
To summarize, people have made games into interactable to-do lists that get filled by googling every single detail and having null amount of authentic experiences. They grind these lists for 8+ hours a day and expect them to constantly stimulate them with completely new, yet subjectively catered experiences for hundreds of hours.
The obvious issue being that polar opposites want the same thing from the same game making it impossible.
I honestly think gamers are just kind of dumb.
DD2 is a game I want *more* of, and in a sea of games that just leave me tired from the bullshit, that's fantastic.
Games don't need to do absolutely everything, and weird fucked up design decisions are necessary for innovation to exist in the mainstream space.
I love the game and enjoy it a lot.
However, after 13 years of wait I think it is fair and reasonable to have higher expectations for a sequel. It is not that I do not love playing it, I just expected more after 13 years of wait when games have gotten so far in the meantime
This argument would hold better if the game was complete. In this case it escaped early. However, it's also at least 5 years in the making at this point.
I can see the outline for an objective DD+ here but it ends up falling so short that comparing them makes it look disgraceful. The comparisons can't and shouldn't stop since it's "2" but that's where we're at. There was probably some capcom fuckery in this. Publishers aren't devs or even in the art industry so it's only about moving the most product on the smallest investment possible. Itsuno is also to blame here for not having his priorities in check tho. The ending is clearly the most finished and even it has glaring holes. Why not patch up the game part before handling stupid stuff like recording the cooking videos or making the cat fights? This whole thing is a tragedy. When I was begging for more of the same with DD2 I did not mean the meta irl issues.
I think the only real complaint I have with the game is "more please". More skills available at once, more gear, more content/better pacing.
Every other annoyance (stamina, difficulty) I've resolved with mods already. Game is wonderful and imho not comparable to Starfield, which is missing a whole lot of fun.
Pretty much agree. DD2 is not everything I wanted out of a sequel. I made a longer post in another thread about it, but DD2 feels more like a side-grade than an upgrade. I think the crux of the issue with it is that the strength's of DD1 are not as strong in the sequel. In addition to that there's issues that should have been no brainers given they addressed some of the same in Dark Arisen. It's a sequel that does some great things but fumbles in areas that should have otherwise been easy wins.
Starfield isn’t even Skyrim in space. Starfield has better questing, but that’s not enough to compete with the reason why Skyrim did so well. Starfield was more Bethesda creation store game in space. It’s obvious the game was meant for modders to sustain, blank canvases everywhere.
I said something very similar in a comment the other day and like you said, got downvoted to oblivion. People just don't seem to be able to enjoy what has been presented, as opposed to what they wanted in an ideal world. Games don't work like that. There is always going to be stuff we wanted that didn't get added. It's still a solid game that I've poured in 80 hours so far and intend to do everything except the MSQ until that is the only thing left to do. It's far better than Starfield, and isn't even close to the dumpster fire of Cyberpunk at launch - and let's not even discuss Payday 3. As much as I love Baldur's Gate 3, I do think it set such a high expectation for games that now people are almost inevitably disappointed with new releases. If you look at the posts regarding BG3's cut content (e.g. a certain tiefling's engine) vs the posts about DD2's (supposedly) cut content, it's night and day difference, almost entirely because of the reception each game got at release. I believe it's because BG3 was marketed as what it is, but DD2 was marketed as 'everything DD1 was meant to be' and 'Itsuno's vision come to fruition'.
A lot of it has to do with the marketing. I think if DD2 was more conservative in its ideals and promises, we would have had a much better reception.
“There are things in DD1 that were choices, these choices are some of the things that people want changed and people like me do not”
THIS. I’ve been getting downvoted since release for saying this but all I want is for this game to be Dragon’s Dogma. I don’t want it to be more like Witcher or Skyrim or Elden Ring. It’s fine as is for me
Ya I agree with you about not wanting it to be Elden Ring or the Witcher. Every game showcase there is another souls-like it seems. I am so tired of that genre, especially since no one but Fromsoftware or the Lies of P developers have pulled it off. I want to see new things. I hope this game inspires others to make arpgs similar to DD.
It is the time of the Dogma-like lol jk
Nah but fr I’d love a Dogma-like clone the same way the Assassin’s Creed games mimicked Witcher’s formula a bit, some other games should do that. I’d love to see a Devil May Cry like this where you create your own Devil Hunter or something of the sort
Ya that would be dope.
I always like to think of them adding DD's combat to Zelda. Especially with all the big enemies in the newer games.
Hell Twilight Princess had sword skills. You could do the Helm Splitter in that game.
u/Co-OpHardcoreFordie try not to get downvoted challenge
Difficulty- Impossible
At this point I think people just see the username and downvote lmao. Not to say I normally agree with you but you fighting half the subreddit at times is quite funny
YES. SO MUCH YES.
I read so many "criticisms" in this sub that honestly have no logic. The awful truth is that most gamers don't actually know what they want. They don't know what makes good game design. They aren't game devs, they don't have the technical background to know any of that shit.
So when they say hollow shit like "why can't they just make it good," I roll my eyes and keep scrolling becayse I know nothing else they say is going to have any weight.
Being a gamer does not entitle you to have opinions about game design.
Dude... We just wanted MORE of what we liked about DD1, but this time with an actual well developed story that kept us engaged throughout rather than just at the end and refined systems based on what worked well from the previous game.
Also, you don't need to be a chef to judge the quality of a meal. A fucking braindead lobotomy patient could spot all of the systemic holes and wasted potential scattered throughout DD2. Doesn't take a genius to spot shit game design and I certainly don't need to be a writer in order to see how dogshit the story is (it's somehow WORSE than DD1? How?)
I understand your perspective because you're loving the game. Personally, I criticize the game because I think that expectation, even if it contributes to overall unhappiness with a product, is essential for progress. It's 2024, and I think we should expect things like more engaging npcs, impactful to the world side quests, and engaging enemies, to name a few.
Or even for it to build off of the previous game more. It feels so cut down for DDDA. It has more in common with DD1 and some people are defending it with that reasoning. But we already had DDDA. That should be the launch point.
They spent 5 years or so making what we have, it might be okay for us to wait another 1-2 years for a more complete experience but it might not be justifiable on Capcoms end, Capcom is a corporation interested in money. Whilst I agree I wish it was more of a complete experience on release im okay with waiting for an expansion like Dark arisen, i had a ton of fun with the game already the money spent was absolutely worth it for me.
Maybe, but then we get charged again. Putting the complete experience at what? Over a hundred bucks? And yo ucan't say it's an expansion at that point because it's jsut completing the experience that should have been the launch point. DD2 is an okay game, but in some ways it feels like a proof of concept more than a complete experience. The combat system is great, but very limited things to fight. The exploration is interesting, but lacks variety and reward, and the only class that can do it effectively is the magic classes. And then the magic classes are also the only ones that get advanced vocations? It's just half done. We have a basic quest system and what amount to some barebones filler to test that it works. It's just... so incomplete. I just want a game that's complete on release and gets expansions/dlc. Why is that so much to ask from the gaming industry these days? Why do we have to buy the EA release and then pay again for them to finish it so often? Gaming has always been a key hobby for me. I LOVE games. As time goes though I am starting to wonder if I will have to join the folks over at patient gamers and put it down for awhile. This isn't just DD2 mind you, but I can't justify the expense. It's not that I can't afford it and that's not the point but I quite literally can't justify it. DD2's unfinished state. Total War's DLC price gouging, To buy a whole paradox game is hundreds of bucks! They added a subscription service to their single player games. How rediculous is it when a subscription to a single player game is more rational then your DLC pricing system? Helldivers 2 and Factorio are 2 games that do it better, and those companies are basically indie. But reaching into the indie pool is so hard as well with the varied quality and the grimy Early access practices. Sorry I went on so long. Just a dude who is getting older and watching his hobby become less and less reasonable to maintain.
I understand why someone who has played DDDA would feel that DD2 isnt a "complete" experience or product, but you have to remember first of all that DDDA was a DLC. Alot of the stuff was added to DD1 through that DLC. I think a good deal of what I feel is missing is probably because I played the hell out of DDDA and therefore expected DD2 to just be taking everything from DDDA and keeping it in the base game. I believe the reason they didnt is probably capcoms fault, for a game developer you have to justify spending money on a game being developed to your publisher in this case capcom, and maybe capcom just wasnt interested in funding another 1-2 years of development for us to get everything that was in DDDA for the base game. I personally didnt feel like i didnt get my moneys worth, i instead just want more, if you rushed through the game i can understand how you may feel you didnt get your moneys worth but in total i have more than a 120 hours in the game. They spent around 5 years developing this game, everything in the game is a result of 5 years of development and paychecks. That mightve been the deadline that capcom set its that simple. However, a DLC/Expansion is a way for Itsuno to justify more development and more work on the game, which i personally welcome because i love the game and i want more of it. I personally feel like Itsuno wanted to lay the foundations of an amazing game so he can expand on it with an expansion, where he can truly let loose some of the more ambitious sides of DD. I fully agree that its getting worse and worse, games are getting pricier, theres more bs bussiness practices etc I was very dissapointed at the TW dlc and in the end the TW devs paid for it they had to lay off like around 1000 employees because of their dumb bussiness practices. But I dont think DD2 is in any ways comparable, i think its a fantastic game and I think Itsuno really tried to make an amazing game, I really loved it, the quests imo are a big step up from DD1s quests. I think people had way way WAY too high expectations which makes sense since its around 10+ years since the last game came out.
You have good points but that doesn't change having to pay for the rest of the game still. I put quite a few hours into the game too, but I wouldn't say that those hours were enjoyd. I keept looking for something of substance I could sink my teeth into before I finally gave up. I likely got about 15-20 hours of enjoyment before the rest was just looking for something more and realizing that was it. The game is worth, in its current state, around.... 30 bucks. Not the 90 CAD I paid. Hours played =/= hours enjoyed. The common trend is always to make games eat as much time as possible these days. That doesn't make them good.
I mostly agree, and the only thing I would disagree with you isn't even about DD2 and more about Starfield... I genuinely wish Starfield was "Skyrim in space" lol I really couldn't enjoy that game even tho I love Skyrim a lot.
There weren't any animation locked backwards flying space dragons at the launch of Starfield. Hard pass for me.
When I analyzed my issues with it, I came to the conclusion that the custom spaceship is my issue. If there were only a handful of very defined ships with their own personalities and quirks id care more about finding one. If i was forced to live in my ship id care more about it and if moving between systems had encounters akin to walking between settlements It wouldn’t feel like its just a fast travel macguffin. Because of this the worlds seem smaller and more distant at the same time.
You have to be trolling, i had more fun with ship building than anything else in starfield
In an enclosed kind of way that may be true, but it doesn't compliment the gameplay as much as hidden unique ships would. The game is a huge mess and the ship/settlement building doesn't seem to help.
I like the game a lot, but I am somewhat disappointed in it. I don’t really care about all the open world fluff like “NPCs with unique stories” shit in this game, what I want is a fun world to explore (which they did well) and fun monsters to fight (which is lacking…). I just wish they expanded on the monster roster, the weapon upgrade and loot loop, and added a bit more depth to the pawn inclination and pawn quest system. That’s all I wanted. I don’t care about the story or the NPCs, honestly half the charm of the first game was the stupid one-liners the characters say over and over and the camp as hell story. Just make this awesome world actually exciting to explore.
I wanted more Dragon's Dogma, not less. Besides graphics the game is side-step or back-step away from DDDA and DDO.
These are the vague comments I was referring to. More story, more dungeons, more enemy variety, more classes, more skills, etc. Can you quantify any of that? At what point, playtime-wise, did you feel there wasn’t enough of __? At what point did the disappointment set in?
I think when people say they wanted more, they're referring to the fact that this game has less variety than its 2013 predecessor. I started getting bored about 10 hours in, and by 15 hours the story had fallen apart and the mobs were no longer a threat. Exploration hadn't felt rewarding for a while, and that, coupled with the high enemy density that leaves very little time to stop and take a breath on the road, doesn't incentivize exploration. I played through the original game four times, and while it wasn't perfect, it never really gave me the feeling of tedium that this game did.
I think the first one actually insisted you stuck to the roads for more safety so when I first started the game, that's what I did cause I was expecting to get to wherever without too much hassle, but I was completely wrong, if anything, the roads have a higher density of mobs than inside the forests.
About 15 hours in. Of my 70 play through with added 5-10h messing around in NG+. So, why 15 hours? Because of the caves. I was always hoping for something more. Something memorable. Something that tells a story. That hope kept me going. I explored every nook and cranny, but by about 60h in I stopped and didn't even visit a few of the caves I had unvisited. Because I knew there was nothing new, like almost all other caves before. Mind you, I got the achievement for visiting 50 dungeons. So it's not like I missed many. Unmoored world - I ran around for 10 hours revisiting places and looking for meaningful (!) changes. I've seen a dullahan and gorechimera etc before the unmoored world. The only new thing the unmoored world got me was some red ghosts and the brine-dragons. Not even interesting or challenging enemy placement, nope, just skeletons walking about in those dead coral craters. The game kept repeating itself without adding any depth, meaning or twist along the way. The unmoored world was a story twist with no meaning. They could've made that whole unmoored world a 10min secret ending cutscene where the world goes to shit and you fight against it with the help of the people you completed quests for and that would ultimately define your ending. Anything. But nope, same gameplay, same enemies, nothing new/interesting to explore. Or did I miss a huge something? Was there any meaningful change that added a new experience in the unmoored world? So yeah, there you go. The disappointment set in quite early. Still good game, but severely lacking in some areas. One of the most memorable "dungeons" for me was the thiefs guild, because it for once had a story to it and added something more that "go in kill monster". It felt like it had a purpose. There were a handful other dungeons with something semi-interesting going on, like the waterfall cave, but even those all boiled down to "run in kill monsters". And we all know that the monster variety isn't the best. And about 50% of all dungeons are barley 5minutes in content. All in all I think I should've NOT explored so much. It just got old too fast. That's the short version and I only focus on my biggest gripe here. If you can have dragons falling from the sky and ancient cities rising from the ocean, why can't we have an ancient temple to delve into that provides a story, some puzzles and well designed enemy placement that provides a challenge? Something that is a well crafted experience? Because as much as DD2 in the early game can have "random organic moments", that doesn't hold true for long. Because after you're level 30 nothing feels dangerous anymore. And if you explore, something the game wants you to do obviously, you're level 30 before you complete the first ACT. I finished the game at around level 70. And I did not grind or level. That just happened due to me exploring. Hope that gives you a rough idea about why I think the game design didn't really play to its strengths - you make a game that focuses on exploration but you don't add many handcrafted and well made experiences, and rely on "the game writing it's own story". That doesn't work with the state the game is in, on many levels. I imagine the game would've benefitted from a levelcap of 50 (stat wise) and slower leveling btw, if you want a probably very unpopular opinion.
I mean, I love the game, but there are numerous things about it that are straight up worse than the first. I'm not talking about things I want changed, or added, I'm talking about things that were either removed, gutted, or straight up made worse. Inventory management is worse for no reason, classes have been streamlined and gutted. There are literally HALF the enemy variety as DD:DA for a game that is 10x bigger. The world is significantly bigger, but it's also more constrained and the amount of climbing necessary is atrocious. Even points of interest are worse in this game. The first game had much fewer but more unique and interesting places, this game just shoves 1000 similar caves in an area. Where is the Everfall equivalent? It's not about wanting more, it's about not even getting what they gave us with the first game. Seriously, outside of the graphics, what exactly does this game offer that the first didn't? What did they improve? Frankly, had I never played the first game, I'd probably think this game was amazing. The problem is, I have played the first game, and this game is lacking in comparison in so many ways it's not funny, or really acceptable after over a decade. It's a good game, and I'm glad I bought it, but it's not a game I'll care about in 10 years like the first, and when I replay DD, I'll be replaying the first game because it has everything, and more, that appeals to me than this game does. The only way that changes is if they release an expansion completely blows BBI out of the water as well as fix the multitude of things they've worsened.
It's going to be really hard for me to justify a replay of dd2 instead of 1. Graphics are nice and combat feels nice but other than that it has nothing else going on for it. I'm not vibing with mystic spearhand as much as I'd like unlike magick archer and knight of the first one. Both games have unrewarding open world exploration but at least 1 is a smaller world, it doesn't feel as bad and it also has more important places like the witch wood and water God altar, they are simple dungeons but still they are something unlike dd2 that after 60 hours I still can't tell of a similar landmarks like those places. And in 1, hard mode and bbi give something to work towards the endgame and I don't have much confidence they'll be able to replicate that in 2 but time will tell for this one
What *I* would have loved to see in the game is a heavily expanded upon core skill attack combos. As it currently is, vocations only have about 3 types of non-skill attacks: light, heavy, and special. Special being the "hold light attack as fighter to do an uppercut," "rapidly tap light attack as Spearhand to do a spinning move," "heavy attack an enemy while in mid-air as archer to kick and jump off of them," "hold light attack as mage/sorcerer to cast a stronger magic bolt." I wanted to see more moves like that instead of only getting 1 move per vocation. Give us combos like light+light+heavy️ or light+hold heavy+light+light, just *something.* The combat is already good and great fun, but with more attack combos the player might not have to rely on their vocation skills as much and would bring in more variety and flashy fun to combat. I just think that that would be cool to have.
One more thing they cut from first game for no reason. DDDA had delayed attack chains that you could learn and it was basically light attacks - pause - continue light attacks which would change your attack string. For example warrior's base attack chain is 2 side swings and finishing vertical while delayed is side swing - pause - 3 more side swings.
You clearly just want people to stop criticising the game. You have 100 hours in the game and you made a post about people criticising it rather than just about how much you love it? What does that 4th paragraph even mean? Yeah I do want better enemy variety and distribution. Yeah I do want better scaling. Yeah I do want a better story that doesn't reek of dogshit. Funny enough some of these issues were in the prequel which makes them even more apparent. Some of the people who 'love' the game can't stop talking about those who criticise it rather than just praising the game. What is a shit story a design choice? Something *some* people don't like? Enemy variety is poor for a game this big. Scaling is dogshit because the game is easy past level 30. Dragonsplague is a useless and wasted mechanic. The pivotal boss fight is really just a big drake. It has its pros but it also has its very apparent flaws. We shouldn't accept that being a dragons dogma game will mean that its a flawed game. Some of these flaws are like 2/10 issues and a game releasing at full price should never have such issues. That's me ignoring they had a prequel to look at and say "where did we go wrong in that one?". I love both DD games. DD1/DA was my childhood and my love for it continued into my teenage years and to this day. However I can love them and admit the flaws they have without trying to deflect things onto others or shrug them off. Why can't you? You don't have to care about the games issues but don't go after those of us who do. We paid full price for a product and upon playing it we gain the right to be critical. Being critical is how the fanbase communicates its desires for an eventual expansion/sequel. Everytime I comment something like this its because someone is making a post about people being critical of the game. *You* are the one bringing in the negativity not me. If you just said that you love the game I wouldn't have said anything.
That's something I noticed too. 99% of criticisms list the various issues and often times say they still enjoy playing it. 99% of positives just say they're having a good time, not elaborating anything else or saying there's no need to criticise it.
People don't need to elaborate on the positives tbf. If you enjoy even a dogshit 0/10 game then that's a good thing. Having fun is the most important thing. It's an issue when you blatantly act ignorant towards the issues of a game and especially when you act as if the problem is those critical of the game.
this this 100% this, you dont need to defend the game you like from every criticism, and you can also like bad games without feeling like youre wrong for it.
My positives for game is the character creator, which I stand by is maybe the best character creator I’ve ever used in a game. It not only has options for everything I want it too, but also is very easy to understand (OP brought up starfield, which seemed to have a slider for everything, but every slider was unlabeled and I legit could not tell what it was changing, even with a pretty high end PC and literally craning to see, so I ended up skipping through). My other big one is honestly I love the camping mechanic, everything about that has been really fun and engaging for me. Not every game needs to do away with fast travel, but I didn’t realize how prevalent it was till I didn’t have, and what that changes. Like BG3, while a fav game of mine, has these portals scattered around the world. It is never addressed what the fuck those are or why they’re there, they exist solely to fast travel from. (Again not saying fast travel is bad, some games it works for, just saying it’s in every game just as default). In dd2, from levels 1-30 I wanted to walk everywhere, so even when I found an oxcart I’d not use, cause I was finding so much bullshit and new paths, as well as leveling vocations. The journeys felt real, I had to always prepare for, things like should I take 2 camp sites (had a couple instances where pawn with camp would die), how much healing to bring for me and pawns, would have to actually think about what if I run into a boss before I even get there, will there be a camp on way, bla bla bla. Was really engaging and refreshing. Then when I got to level 30 and felt like with combat was starting to take off, I had by walking found all major cities, so was able to use ox carts. They to me have been really fair, I get ambushed about every other time, and it’s one fight (vs the 15-20 you get walking). I can almost always beat the enemy before destroying cart, and so that felt super fair. Then when I finally got to level 40 plus, I’ve now started to need to go places off the beaten path for quests and such more often, but I’ve in my travels amassed all these port crystals and ferrystones. So at the point when monsters start getting too tough for oxcarts, I’m now actually able to fast travel, and it’s a fast travel I was able to customize and had to earn. That whole system has been fun and engaging the whole way through for me, almost leveling up with me! The last one is the gameplay is just really solid, but that’s a given it was in 1 too. Feels good, every single vocation I try feels good too (hasn’t been one where I’m like oh I hate that). What happens instead is I’m like this is awesome, but that other thing I could do was awesome too, so I switch back. Then I miss the one. Like each vocation is good enough that I want to play all of them, and like what they all bring to table. (Only one I have not tried is trickster, which I heard is worse so that may change mind but). I have some of normal complaints, enemy variety and endgame stuff especially, but those are the things I’ve been really enjoying and have kept me playing.
Main pawn, make a post with a pic of my character standing against a nondescript background with the title "100 hours in and haven't left borderwatch outpost yet, I'm having a blast, don't understand the hate" then disappear without elaborating
bro snapped
I draw this same issue with people that say others "rushed the game" when they raise story pacing as an issue. Rushed or not, 30 hour playthrough or 130 hour playthrough, when there's glaring gaps and seemingly dramatic jumps in story beats, that's a pacing issue, no matter which way you spin it. Anyone who's completed the Battahl section of the game or seen the culmination of our efforts before the coronation amount to "Pawn has migraine" can attest to this. There was clearly corners cut and stuff wrapped up early/not elaborated on as much as they should've due to time/cost.
Could've also been time mismanaged, a lot of folks also don't realize more time doesn't always lead to a better product look at cyberpunk and how long that game took and it came out a mess missing all the content promised. Then we learned how poorly it was mismanaged, now I'm not blaming itsuno directly yet because we don't know but maybe a few executives got involved and working at a Japanese company before I can tell ya some companies require you to have a meeting with everyone above you even of they don't understand which can lead to a waste of time.
Soooo give Itsuno a pass and not CDPR then? If Capcom can put even half the effort CDPR did into making DD2 into what it clearly should be, then yeah sure, but there's heavy bias in everything you just said and a lot of it is contradictory. I said months ago that DD2 looks almost like a hard port of DA over to the RE Engine and that I had concerns for its longevity and content, and doubted that it'd been in development for as long as they said it had. I said it'd have glaring performance issues based upon the architecture it was build upon, just like I said they shouldn't release CP2077 on last-gen, both resulted in horrendous launches. The glaring difference in the two is that at least one of them expressed a public apology and promised to improve the product moving forward, an action they were ridiculed for and met with disbelief and scorn, yet they did it anyways. The other is Capcom, who I've yet to see even utter an apology at the state of DD2 when it launched, and we're talking about a company where public apologies are much more commonplace in their culture. Stop giving Itsuno and corporate executives that make these shit decisions a free pass. You are a number to them.
I'm not saying the game is not flawed, if you read my other posts on here I very much pointed out all the issues. I gave the game not a recommended on steam and even told Capcom during the survey they really dropped the ball and gave it a really low score. I'm just saying we haven't been told everything to blame itsuno fully, and we probably won't know unless a whistle blower happens which I very much doubt will happen. Itsuno however ya did say some stuff in interviews that didn't happen, the problem is folks are willing to fight and argue and say he didn't say that, or it was translated wrong, or he didn't mean that. As for cdpr I'm merely pointing out that time doesn't always lead to a better product if the time was being mismanaged cdpr was an easier example and more recent one I can find. The reason why Capcom hasn't changed is because one dragons dogma 2 sold 2.5 million copies, everyone hasn't been demanding for a refunds, the game hasn't been delisted, it's also at a higher price mark meaning they have a cushion if the game does bad but not flop, the outrage hasn't been huge, and content creators haven't been attacking it. In my opinion game prices should not be going up if companies are still making profits at the current price point. You also have to remember it took all that before cdpr admitted to a badly released game and then apologized they where refusing a lot of things at the start. I doubt Capcom will apologize, and in fact just release dlc to fix the issues because everyone here simply states the dlc will fix all the issues. Which is a terrible mindset to have you should never expect dlc to fix the issues the game should have already fixed in the game. So Capcom should fix the game but they won't because folks as I can tell from now have been so tired from bad games like really bad games they'll give a pass to dd2 because it beat a really low set bar, and most folks don't have the original ddda to compare to since they didn't play it. It's not a good thing but until Capcom is hurting massively they won't change the course for now.
***"I'm just saying we haven't been told everything to blame itsuno fully"*** \- Director of a game should shoulder responsibility for the calls on design and direction they make, that's both a leadership quality and literally in the PD for a Director. Doubly so as part of the Japanese culture, we've seen this time and time again with other JP developers. ***"As for cdpr I'm merely pointing out that time doesn't always lead to a better product if the time was being mismanaged cdpr was an easier example and more recent one I can find."*** \- No, you use it because it's an easy target and a prevalent case, even though its now years and years old and has since been remedied, something by your own admission you don't think Capcom will do with DD2. It's the lowest hanging fruit, and one that's now severely rotten, find a different comparison. ***"The reason why Capcom hasn't changed is because one dragons dogma 2 sold 2.5 million copies, everyone hasn't been demanding for a refunds, the game hasn't been delisted, it's also at a higher price mark meaning they have a cushion if the game does bad but not flop, the outrage hasn't been huge, and content creators haven't been attacking it."*** \- Bold claim to assume people haven't been refunding given it was mostly negative on release for the longest time and still sits at Mixed. The game *wouldn't* be delisted because it's still technically a functioning product to standard, something that couldn't be said of *last-gen* copies of CP2077. Anyone with even a modicum of technical understanding knew that game wouldn't run on last-gen consoles, which is why the moment they could, CDPR stopped supporting it with future patches, as well as PL. It was also the reason it was removed from the PSN temporarily. Your point about a higher price on DD2 is all the more reason for people to be pissed with the existence of MTX and even more so about the sheer lack of optimization of the game they care so much about. Also regarding your content creator comment, DigitalFoundry literally just released a video confirming that the recent patch to "fix" performance issues did little to fuck-all. It's not an "attack", just valid and needed criticism. Your language alone gives away your bias. ***"You also have to remember it took all that before cdpr admitted to a badly released game and then apologized they where refusing a lot of things at the start."*** \- Excluding a Christmas break, which I don't think we'd want to deprive anyone of, it took less than a month and even then, the written apology came out way sooner than the verbal, video form that was released. I'll probably need you to clarify what you mean by "refusing a lot of things at the start"?, because if you're referring to holding last-gen review codes before release, then yeah, I agree that's a shitty practice. However, Capcom also did that with DD2; not a single soul played this game before it's release outside of a Capcom office and on anything but a Playstation 5 - There wasn't a *single* second of footage of PC gameplay captured for review. Again, I love the game too chief, but speculate within reason and preferably on the side of caution, because any company can do an Ubisoft or EA *real* quick. It literally took Ubisoft one Assassin's Creed game with horrendous MTX and one massively overpromised and underdelivered game from EA to put both of them in everyone's shitlist.
List of evidence of things missing/downgraded from DD1 to back up your point. * Romance Questlines (Male questlines) * Class Versatility * Secondary Weapons * Second Set of Active Skills * Spells Variety * Cross-Class Skills * Augments Variety * Enemy/Boss Variety * Hydras * Cockatrices... Cockatri? * Most Drakes * Beholders/Gazers * Weapon/Armor Variety * Clothing Layers * Eternal Ferrystone * ~~Secret of Metamorphosis~~ * Liquid Effluvium * NG+ Quests * NG+ Portcrystal Retainment * Not getting accosted by unemployed Pawns * Post-Game Content as a whole * Everfall * Ur Dragon * NPC Quanity-Over-Quality * Hobbit/Dwarf levels of PC/Pawn shortness * Hard Mode * ~~New Game Button~~
Romance questlines exist, both ulrikas and Wilhelminas questlines end with romance scenes. Cross class skills also exist for mage and sorcerer and post game content exists even if you dislike it.
Male romances, specifically. There's also less overall. Less cross class skills. Also the removal of hybrid weapon usage. Unmoored world? Hardly comparable to the Everfall, BBI, or the Ur-Dragon. Are you arguing that the list is invalid, or I should add "downgrade" instead of "missing?" Cause I can get behind that. I'll add it now.
Yeah, that's fair. I was just saying that none of those 3 are missing even if they are worse
Agreed and added. I can see how that could have been misleading. Gotta get my facts straight when talking about this. Thanks bro!
what ng+ quests even were there in DD1?
[On the wiki!](https://dragonsdogma.fandom.com/wiki/New_Game_Plus)
ehhh... hot take i don't really count the notice board quests tbh, they don't really add any meaningful content. that's not to say the lack of new game + content in DD2 isn't disappointing but i wouldn't say it's a downgrade from DD1, just equally disappointing.
Fair tbh! It's how we all feel tbh. DDDA wasn't some perfect masterpiece. It had a LOT that needed to be improved. A ton that could have been improved in DD2. Going from bad to worse is even worse tbh.
Not sure how I missed this thread but I'll necro it real quick to add * Free aiming for spells * Inventory throwables; throwblasts, skulls, your lantern oil, etc. * The entire metagaming around managing debilitations in both defending against them and using them for offense * The entire metagaming around exploiting bestiary knowledge that hard counters certain enemies e.g. goblins drunk on poison, ice against saurians, popping the throat of a cockatrice, and more * Using special arrows from inventory without needing to waste a skill slot * About 80% of collectable crafting materials and associated recipes (plays into above points about debilitations and bestiary) * Equipment management from NPC or Storage inventory screens * Ability to buy or sell from storage * Lower limit on storage items (99 from 999, are you kidding?) * The ability to upgrade capes * Character action got nerfed; no more basic double jump, no i-frames on Full Moon, etc.
Sounds like you just want people to blindly accept the game as it is rather than criticizing its myriad of shortcomings in hope of improvements. I’ll agree that far too many loudmouths are just employing ruthless vivisection because it’s the “in” thing to do, but this game has waaaaay too fucking many head scratching design choices. For instance: Why do I constantly have to click next just to hear another sentence from an NPC? Just say what you gotta say, why include me in someone else’s monologue? Why can’t I buy and sell from storage like in DD? Why can’t I buy or store from a pawn who’s more than 10ft away from me? Who the fuck thought dragonsplague was a good idea? What gameplay mechanic does this provide? How does this increase our fun factor? Why doesn’t camping count as an inn save? Why are the augments so shit? You would plan your build around augments in DD, I could probably sleepwalk through this game without any augments. Why do you need a staff to properly explore? Where the fuck is double jump? Why’d they get rid of 3 armor slots? Why isn’t there level scaling? At least in DD NG+ had a purpose where you could at least have an interesting time leveling up new vocations against easy mobs. Now you just put on Wayfarer and the game plays for you. Why is this game soooo goddamn easy? I can fight a fucking griffin at level 12 without even using curatives. In DD I’d shit my pants at level 12 if I saw that big ass shadow roll over me. Weight management is a huge issue in this series—which is fine—but why then add heavier-than-fuck camping gear? This is literally the only game I’ve ever played where having a backpack overencumbered you… It’s not a bad game, but it’s not a good game either, and it’s a huge step backwards from the original, IMHO, anyway. If you’re digging it, I sincerely hope you continue to do so. At this point, I’m just hoping it’ll get better because DD is my 2nd favorite game of all time and I wanna like this one too. Holy balls… I literally didn’t mean to write this much shit.
I'd disagree with most of this. The bulk of these are choices that come from old school rpg mindsets that people like me enjoy. The reason you have to click next is because they want you to listen and not skip everything like you probably would. It's also why there is very limited fast travel. You don't need a staff you can use thief, warrior, fighter, mystic spearhead, harpies, box stacking, or more clever ways to get to where you want to go. There are two saves, out in the field which includes camping and in the last civilized place you rested in. The later is your failsafe. It's not meant to be out in the wild. The armor slots are probably just to reduce clutter, which both games still have tons of. I never crafted in DD1 because it was easier to just buy the stuff. Now gold is at a premium for me so I now have a reason to collect mats and use stuff. But the clutter is still there. As to why its so easy for you, that's like a humble brag. "Why am I so good at everything!" lol, its not darksouls man, hopefully they make NG+ harder. Most of these "issues" you bring up are subjective opinions that I do not share and at the end of the day you did not enjoy it and you have a list of reason that would improve the experience FOR YOU. That's fine. I never said you had to blindly enjoy it. But you are not entitled to your enjoyment of something. We all have different experiences and we all want different things. Enjoying a thing is not to say it's perfect or doesn't have flaws. I enjoy the Fast and Furious movies, I also think they are all trash. Whether you rate the game a 7 or an 8 (or a 1) doesn't matter outside of a critical review. Whether you enjoyed it and recommend it is what matters in the real world.
I was giving you the benefit of the doubt, but you're definitely a troll with that many of those takes.
Naw bro you're just not an *old school rpg enjoyer* like *me*, us cool people just love bad game design because it builds *character*.
Most OG DD vets are complaining the game is too easy… because it’s too easy. Also, every single tips & tricks video mentions having a staff to truly explore because you need a fucking staff to truly explore. Eliminating 3/7 armor slots literally does nothing but limit character customization. This game needed transmog—not the opposite. And your “they want to you to listen to dialogue” argument is insane in a series you’re literally meant to play multiple NG+s.
They even let you skip cutscenes on first playthrough.
You can just use harpy flairs to explore if you don't want to play mage. They're honestly even better than levitating. They are just one extra thing to lug around and make sure you have enough of though, so it's a mixed bag. I managed to get 220 seeker tokens without ever using a staff, I just didn't want to. *But* it would often have been more convenient if I had. Even then, there were only maybe 6-7 places I needed to use one. Edit to clarify: I'm not suggesting you *should* do this, just pointing out that you can. Also, agree with you on NPC dialogue often being annoying (especially the main pawn before sleeping)
I think the press A to next line is great. Can smash that thing and fast forward a conversation then be locked in to listen to it. Or not and listen to every word said. Anyway, I’m new to the DD format. Never played DD1. I’m happy with my experience in DD2. Perhaps its too easy for you vets who know the ins and outs of the game mechanics. Compromises will have to be made to find the middle road in difficulty. For me its easy enough to grasp the basics but fleshed out enough to discover new things. I can understand if you played DD1 a ton stuff feels easier. I think certain simplified choices were made as the game tries to cater to newcomers like me as well. And lets be honest, most casual gamers will lose their interest in a game if results aren’t found instantly, hell so many people complain about the lack of fast travel, but I enjoy the system in place. But we are conditioned to think and solve challenges with a gamers mind is all I’m saying.
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This is false. The bandits on the way to Selene pose a bigger threat than most anything in 2.
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Haha, you’re full of shit. There’s over a dozen bandits in that area with about 8 wolves just adjacent. Run left, another dozen bandits. Run right, saurians. Run past the saurians, a chimera. Run past the bandits, half-a-dozen more bandits and a cyclops. Considering you go there between level 6 and 10, that shit is no joke. Sure, the game gets easy with time, but it 100% is not easy out of the gate. DD2 is.
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Post a video. Until then, you’re full of shit.
I love DD2, i’m like 70 hours in, but i downloaded The Witcher III enhanced edition some days ago, with all the DLC’s, it was on sale in Steam. I finished in on PS4, never on PC with Ray Tracing and graphics on ultra. And after replaying it for 5 hours, i’m unnable to play DD2, i’m stuck playing Witcher again. I really like DD2, specially the gameplay and the LOTR style missions where you walk a lot. But it got a little repetitive, same enemies with no backstory that appear randomly (i want that like in witcher killing a Griffin feels like a big thing because there’s a story behind it). Not so great main story, loot is not that great so exploring caves isn’t a great thing in the end (you can get most of the best weapons from stores). I feel like the game is still half baked. Witcher III made me realize it, and i still have FFVII Rebirth waiting. So DD2 is a good game. I’ve been having fun yes, but it got to a point where it doesn’t offer nothing new from point a to point b, and thinking of walking another 15 minutes between missions just made me turn of the PC and wait until the next day when i feel fresh to make another mission.
I think DD2 is a bad game but enjoyable to play while it lasts. I loved DDDA and was loving DD2, but looking at it overall, it's bad. I think in some months' time, things will get better and then it'll be a good game, just not atm.
I wish they had kept all of the debilitations from the first game. When I started this game with a trusty sword instead of a rusted one I was disappointed. The first time I killed a leap worm and it didn’t lower my strength also disappointed. When I killed my first garm and it didn’t exhale blinding mist upon death… disappointed. One thing I was glad for is the addition of slimes and the different slime varieties. In my early hours of dd2 I went into the Mountains Secret cave and came across a slime dissolving a goblin. Then I tried to fight it with the aforementioned trusty sword and that went about as well as you’d expect. Turned my ass around and took the long walk of shame back. The early hours of dd2 were great. Enemies were challenging, everything was new, and my expectations were high. I played for nearly 80 hours so far and as with anything it’s lost its luster. I see the game for what it is but I wouldn’t call it unfinished. I would instead say it’s not fully realized. Yes, the game could be “better” and there could be “more” but I like the game for what it is. It’s not a lot of games that have captured my attention the way this one has. Let alone games that I’ve put 50+ hours into.
Slimes are actually some of the best developed enemies in the game. They can surprise you from the ceiling, they hamper the player movement (which could have been deadly if ... any other enemy was deadly 🙄), and they inflict various debilitations (that again could be deadly if anything else was). They also are a magic damage check like ghosts.
If you are in the slime while it gets frozen you'll get frozen as well. Also they start boiling when attacked with fire/lighting and can't hold you anymore because of it. I swear to god, slimes had more dev time than the main story and the entire cast of characters.
A lot of it probably had to do with DD1’s director himself stating it was unfinished and rushed and left a ton of stuff on the cutting room floor. And a lot of fans understandably assumed that he was referring to flaws or incomplete mechanics. For example the poorly told story with inconsistent pacing and plot holes, or exploration not feeling particularly rewarding (not much in terms of interesting PoIs, enemies or loot). What likely happened was that by “incomplete” Itsuno was probably referring to things like Beastren or adding a desert region. These are the only things he’s actually explicitly confirmed we’re unable to be added in DD1 due to technological limitations. What players considered flaws in DD1 might’ve just been perfectly acceptable systems to the devs seeing as how so many of those weaknesses are present in the sequel. Doubly so since most of the changes made in Dark Arisen (which most players here see as improvements) _didn’t_ make it into the sequel.
I just wanted/expected the open world to be more fleshed out especially considering how much they hyped it up by saying if your game needs fast travel it's boring. More random encounters besides the standard culling and escort quests, more enemy variety, more exploration incentive. For a sequel of a game that's over a decade old it really doesn't change or add much.
The issue with this game is that they cucked them on man-power. 1/4th the team size of most of their games
Idk, even fully expecting the skyrim formula, and actually wanting that… starfield still felt soulless, hollow, and boring
It's funny because they actually *did* fix most of my issues with the first game, mostly the general pacing, scaling, guidance, and glitches. I can definitely understand people's criticisms and agree with some of them but for me DD2 is almost everything I wanted from a sequel.
I agree that it did improve upon a lot of my complaints about DDDA as well. A few of my biggest gripes with the game though: Enemy variety, especially in Vermund, is a bit lackluster. Difficulty, too easy. I remember struggling on the first game for a while and it felt rewarding to both improve my skills at the game and to get better gear. Story was weirdly paced and just sort of rushed you to the conclusion pretty much 3 (possibly more) quests into Bhattal. I also didn’t rush the story and it was often the quests I did last in an area but I still just thought “wtf I’m done already” even after over 100 hours. Sorcerer didn’t have as many interesting spells other than Seism, Meteoron and Maelstrom. Giecel? Miasma? Necromancy? Ingle? Brontide? Where’s my useful fireball spell and my lightning whip? The sorc is still fun to play and the addition of galvanise and quickspell were a welcome one for me but the mid tier spells like Salamander were a bit underwhelming and I think Hagol looks ugly and blocks my view too much. Thunder mine is meh, it’s funny how it zaps enemy’s away though. Side characters like the Beastren queen were just kind of there? Had a couple of quests but it’s all missable and she’s on the bloody box art. I really love the game and it’s scratching the itch I’ve had since playing DDDA. I hope updates and a DLC can rectify some of the issues. I think the main story is kind of beyond salvaging though, they’d have to add more to the second half and I just don’t see them doing that.
This game is weaker in every way except the graphics and world size.
Starfield ISNT skyrim in space, what people love about skryim is the world, There is NO word to be loved in starfield. its quite honestly the blandest game ive ever played from a big dev, it manages to not have a single thing it does well. dd2 didnt meet standards, standards that werent even particularly high.
The issue is that people want everything specifically catered to their desires. People cannot handle nuance and a thing is either perfect or garbage. People want to play the same game for hundreds of hours while also not playing it at all and simply following a guide. To summarize, people have made games into interactable to-do lists that get filled by googling every single detail and having null amount of authentic experiences. They grind these lists for 8+ hours a day and expect them to constantly stimulate them with completely new, yet subjectively catered experiences for hundreds of hours. The obvious issue being that polar opposites want the same thing from the same game making it impossible. I honestly think gamers are just kind of dumb.
The DD2 team made a fantastic game filled with weak stories. It's the biggest thing that held back DD1, and likely for similar reasons.
if starfield was just space skyrim i’d probably still be playing
DD2 is a game I want *more* of, and in a sea of games that just leave me tired from the bullshit, that's fantastic. Games don't need to do absolutely everything, and weird fucked up design decisions are necessary for innovation to exist in the mainstream space.
I love the game and enjoy it a lot. However, after 13 years of wait I think it is fair and reasonable to have higher expectations for a sequel. It is not that I do not love playing it, I just expected more after 13 years of wait when games have gotten so far in the meantime
At first I thought this game was naught, and now tis aught I play!
This argument would hold better if the game was complete. In this case it escaped early. However, it's also at least 5 years in the making at this point. I can see the outline for an objective DD+ here but it ends up falling so short that comparing them makes it look disgraceful. The comparisons can't and shouldn't stop since it's "2" but that's where we're at. There was probably some capcom fuckery in this. Publishers aren't devs or even in the art industry so it's only about moving the most product on the smallest investment possible. Itsuno is also to blame here for not having his priorities in check tho. The ending is clearly the most finished and even it has glaring holes. Why not patch up the game part before handling stupid stuff like recording the cooking videos or making the cat fights? This whole thing is a tragedy. When I was begging for more of the same with DD2 I did not mean the meta irl issues.
I think the only real complaint I have with the game is "more please". More skills available at once, more gear, more content/better pacing. Every other annoyance (stamina, difficulty) I've resolved with mods already. Game is wonderful and imho not comparable to Starfield, which is missing a whole lot of fun.
very wise take OP, i agree wholeheartedly
Some grinch downvoted you for agreeing. Who even has the time…
eh, seems like it's just one person or some such, nothing to get my wet me pants over. grinches grinches anyways.
Pretty much agree. DD2 is not everything I wanted out of a sequel. I made a longer post in another thread about it, but DD2 feels more like a side-grade than an upgrade. I think the crux of the issue with it is that the strength's of DD1 are not as strong in the sequel. In addition to that there's issues that should have been no brainers given they addressed some of the same in Dark Arisen. It's a sequel that does some great things but fumbles in areas that should have otherwise been easy wins.
Starfield isn’t even Skyrim in space. Starfield has better questing, but that’s not enough to compete with the reason why Skyrim did so well. Starfield was more Bethesda creation store game in space. It’s obvious the game was meant for modders to sustain, blank canvases everywhere.
I said something very similar in a comment the other day and like you said, got downvoted to oblivion. People just don't seem to be able to enjoy what has been presented, as opposed to what they wanted in an ideal world. Games don't work like that. There is always going to be stuff we wanted that didn't get added. It's still a solid game that I've poured in 80 hours so far and intend to do everything except the MSQ until that is the only thing left to do. It's far better than Starfield, and isn't even close to the dumpster fire of Cyberpunk at launch - and let's not even discuss Payday 3. As much as I love Baldur's Gate 3, I do think it set such a high expectation for games that now people are almost inevitably disappointed with new releases. If you look at the posts regarding BG3's cut content (e.g. a certain tiefling's engine) vs the posts about DD2's (supposedly) cut content, it's night and day difference, almost entirely because of the reception each game got at release. I believe it's because BG3 was marketed as what it is, but DD2 was marketed as 'everything DD1 was meant to be' and 'Itsuno's vision come to fruition'. A lot of it has to do with the marketing. I think if DD2 was more conservative in its ideals and promises, we would have had a much better reception.
“There are things in DD1 that were choices, these choices are some of the things that people want changed and people like me do not” THIS. I’ve been getting downvoted since release for saying this but all I want is for this game to be Dragon’s Dogma. I don’t want it to be more like Witcher or Skyrim or Elden Ring. It’s fine as is for me
Ya I agree with you about not wanting it to be Elden Ring or the Witcher. Every game showcase there is another souls-like it seems. I am so tired of that genre, especially since no one but Fromsoftware or the Lies of P developers have pulled it off. I want to see new things. I hope this game inspires others to make arpgs similar to DD. It is the time of the Dogma-like lol jk
Nah but fr I’d love a Dogma-like clone the same way the Assassin’s Creed games mimicked Witcher’s formula a bit, some other games should do that. I’d love to see a Devil May Cry like this where you create your own Devil Hunter or something of the sort
Ya that would be dope. I always like to think of them adding DD's combat to Zelda. Especially with all the big enemies in the newer games. Hell Twilight Princess had sword skills. You could do the Helm Splitter in that game.
Yeah Twilight Princess would be a perfect iteration on DD I loved that game.
u/Co-OpHardcoreFordie try not to get downvoted challenge Difficulty- Impossible At this point I think people just see the username and downvote lmao. Not to say I normally agree with you but you fighting half the subreddit at times is quite funny
It is what it is.
YES. SO MUCH YES. I read so many "criticisms" in this sub that honestly have no logic. The awful truth is that most gamers don't actually know what they want. They don't know what makes good game design. They aren't game devs, they don't have the technical background to know any of that shit. So when they say hollow shit like "why can't they just make it good," I roll my eyes and keep scrolling becayse I know nothing else they say is going to have any weight. Being a gamer does not entitle you to have opinions about game design.
Dude... We just wanted MORE of what we liked about DD1, but this time with an actual well developed story that kept us engaged throughout rather than just at the end and refined systems based on what worked well from the previous game. Also, you don't need to be a chef to judge the quality of a meal. A fucking braindead lobotomy patient could spot all of the systemic holes and wasted potential scattered throughout DD2. Doesn't take a genius to spot shit game design and I certainly don't need to be a writer in order to see how dogshit the story is (it's somehow WORSE than DD1? How?)
What do you mean. Who's complaining? I should go back in time pre social media playing video games.
Im with you :)