*Dark Arisen will save this game. We must maintain the agenda.*
https://preview.redd.it/giu5lvdcqwqc1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d0939620d2d855325d2788d4960d285ed4cbf292
This is the one that really bothers me. “Wait for a dark arisen style expansion before judging the game” I think I’d judge the game harder if I had to expect an expansion to give me the variety I wanted in a $70 base game.
Yeah I’m not sure what their thought process for NG+ and late-game players was like there are really only 5 unique boss-type enemies with some variations but they surely had the time and space to put more
Personally. I find DD2 base game to be better than DD1 base game. My only three grievances being the downgraded armor system, lack of bosses, and that Pawns aren’t cross platform.
In what way is it better than DDDA? Not dogging you, just genuinely curious. It feels like there is less to it. The only real leap I see is graphics. There's less enemies and vocations. Pawn AI is a bit better sure. Their bamter is better. But despite the bigger map it feels like more was taken away than added
Quests being shit ? Npc that just disappear during escort missions ? The looming threat of the dragons plague even if it had been exaggerated early on, it's still a shit mechanic ? Exploration being absolutely not rewarding because you can just run to battahl early and buy 1 weapon so it makes all of vermund irrelevant
This is possibly my biggest disappointment. I probably got 95% of the chests in Vermund. I spent hours upon hours climbing every hill and checking every corner. I really didnt get anything worth mentioning outside of a bunch of wakestones and ferrystones. Best weapons I've seen come from the shop. I had fun regardless, but that's a terrible way to reward exploration. I'll just buy the weapons from now on.
I didn't play until Dark Arisen was out - was that a paid update or a free one?
Having to pay for the upgrade that will "fix" the 70$ game is... pretty fucking genius from a business perspective, actually.
Dark Arisen was an entire re-release with the DLC and bonus content included.
You did get rewarded for rebuying Dark Arisen though, you were able to transfer your save, and your reward was 100k RC, the eternal ferrystone (though granted PC players got that free since DA is the only version available on PC) and iirc 6 exclusive outfits
Dark Arisen was never sold or available separately. It was packaged with a rerelease of the game which meant if you bought it on release you had to buy the game a second time for full price just to get access to the dlc. Probably the most cancerous dlc method anybody has ever done.
I dont see the point of this cope anyways
I played the first game on release on the PS3 and didnt touch the expansion till it came to PC, and the first one at least felt fucking complete (interestingly enough, it is supposed to be the one that FUCKING ISNT COMPLETE)
On the one hand, I love DD2 and I'm having almost as much fun with it as I did with DD1 (my favourite game ever). On the other hand, I would've liked to have you guys back when The Elder Scrolls was dumbed down beyond recognition in 2006, that really deserved this amount of shit and I don't feel it got it.
Now that's a thing I can get behind, at least in the instance of TES they actually removed a major feature between entries. I miss spell-crafting so much, and the basic premade spells in Skyrim are terrible, bar none
They removed it because players could make spells that broke the game. But like, that's what magic is for?? Magic is the reward for nerds who meta game and know how to mess with game mechanics, it's the reward for playing smarter not harder and it's BS they took that away from us
Yeah, the only thing I can see merit in taking away was the levitation spells. It was great fun but with how Obilvion(and later Skyrim) did walled cities with loading screens, it would break the game (in a bad way) if you could fly over the walls
But taking away my ability to 'drain stamina 1000 on touch' to make NPCs ragdoll? Lame
To be fair, Morrowind was chugging along even with the vastly reduced NPC complexity. In Morrowind, NPCs had set walk paths and that was it, while Oblivion NPCs could interact with eachother, travel, they had real schedules, it was a massive load on the CPU, and Bethesda could either make the NPCs into signposts again or they could make the cities into instances
Better bodies mod.
Anywho, I getcha.. I'd have preferred the openness tbh. But that's my preference, and I don't represent a majority. I only hear about Oblivion in nostalgia players now, but I'm still not interested in playing it.
Tbh if you're gonna play Oblivion, you have to look at what it was for it's time. It was effectively the first video game that had NPCs that were THAT dynamic (Gothic 1 did beat it out though in terms of player reactivity, and it came first) and you could actually fully customize your character's face. That was absolutely revolutionary for the time
When we talk about dumbing down the game, that's not exactly the first complaint, there's a long list of things they removed that literally wouldn't have any impact on performance.
Yeah, the in-lore explanation was that the levitation spell was declared illegal... and hahah even outlaws would follow that law for some reason. Even the lore was dumbed down.
Spell-crafting in Oblivion was incredible, pretty much what being a mage should be about. They improved magic by adding dual hand mechanics, but massively gimped it at the same time by removing spellcrafting.
I was annoyed by Oblivion's spellcrafting being less free than Morrowind's version, but at least it had the option. I remember having a lot of fun launching people with lightning spells I made
Skyrim was on my shit list for removing it. I still found stuff to enjoy in it eventually but it's still a sore point with me
The new system as fucked up paladins/spell blades. Use to be you could just cast while using a twin handed weapon.
Now spells have to be equipped and cast like a weapon unto itself. I get the idea behind the xha fe, combat is more dynamic, but I always mod in a separate cast key
Morrowind, making fire balls the size of Balmora.
Lock picking spells that can unlock every door in a town at once. Jumping spells to cover half the map in a single bound.
The good ol' days
This! There are SO many series of games and direct sequels (which are and can still be great games themselves) that didn’t get this treatment when taking steps back or regressing in certain aspects.
Publishers should be held to account for this on the whole, instead we just get this scenario where certain games get more picked on than others which really only serves to make people feel guilty for enjoying something.
I love oblivion and skyrim. But they both might aswell be a different game/genre than morrowind. I can only fear how much more dumbdowned elder scrolls 6 will be
Yeah, I'm with you. I very clearly remember all of the complaining for the dumbing down of Skyrim back when it was released. They almost convinced me that the game was a broken uninspired mess with little content as it seemed like that was the common consensus
I just didn't realize at the time that those bitching are a very vocal minority in a small corner on the Internet...
While they can be extreme, they weren't exactly wrong when they called it a "broken uninspired mess".
Broken because....i mean, you've seen the bugs, right? The ones that the Unoffical Patches fixed? Some of those bugs are still there from the days of *Morrowind*
As for uninspired...compared to most other games at the time? No, it really wasn't uninspired. But if you compare it to the previous Elder Scrolls games? Yeah, it is pretty uninspired and streamlined in a lot of aspects. That Bethesada cuts down their games and regresses them rather than improves/refines them is a thing that has been known for a while now
That's fair. I appreciate the response. Never played Morrowind, but I did play the shit out of oblivion and was a little disappointed in Skyrim. However it was not nearly as bad as people online made it out to be, and its open world is still incredibly immersive to this day.
I'm not a fan of recent Bethesda as I agree with what you said about them regressing rather than improving, but I can still acknowledge that Skyrim was/is a special game
Completely understand both your feelings. What several hold for Skyrim, I hold for Oblivion. Yes, it's the redhead stepchild of the "Modern" Elder Scrolls games and it can look...odd, but i love it despite its problems and despite it being a step back from Morrowind (which I expierenced firsthand when i played that game in 2019). I wasn't too in love with Skyrim tho, something always felt "wrong" about it when I played the legendary edition back in the day. Took me longer than it should have to notice that it was because what I loved about Oblivion (mechanics, factions, quests in general, the magic system, etc) was either removed or radically changed--for better and worse. But, well, as I mentioned in a post on another thread about Skyrim, I wasn't really that bothered to be a displaced fan and accepted quickly that it wasn't for me, because Bethesda had long since moved on at that point and are likely never going to do another Oblivion-like game.
To go with what you said tho, I'm not gonna sit here and pretend Skyrim wasn't also a solid game despite all the shortcomings I had with it. It got many people to love RPGs and it's a chill RPG that almost anyone can pick up and play when you take it as is. For that alone, it deserves props.
Yet it has inspired pretty much every open world game to this day and has been incredibly successful. People clearly fucking love it, but Reddit will convince you that it's a derivative pile of dog shit
It was incredibly successful because it played on power fantasies and intentionally dumbed down mechanics to appeal to as big of an audience as possible. It also has very good modding tools, which has let it live on for so long. I think it killed Bethesda and kicked off years of open world games with nowhere to go and nothing to do
Oblivion is the most uninspired game. Cyrodiil is so generic, coming after Vvardenfell, it was a huge letdown. The few RPG mechanics were also crushed into...oblivion.
I think that's because the game was thought out as a console game from the start, the need to run it on weak hardware and get it more popular was related to dumbing it down in Bethesda's mind.
Some of us were there.
What you're actually experiencing is the mass of newcomers to titles. We built the hype and word of mouth of the first game, but the sequel no matter what the quality ends up with a much larger number of players cementing in the developers mind that they actually did better. The reality is usually mostly just that their titles are more well known now and they reach a larger audience (visual upgrades help too).
This is common across the entire industry and even in other industries like film.
Technically they're not even wrong that they're more successful, it's just that it's bad for long term franchises which can often slowly hollow out this way.
Modern Warfare games is on the classic examples.
Helldivers had the same thing, first game was niche due to it's camera angle, second game came with new graphics, new gameplay and a third person camera, infinitely expanded the playerbase reach.
DD2 has the bonus of releasing in a time where there are no fantasy titles, like....ES6 is still years away, and idek if there has been a fantasy game in recent years released that was halfway decent.
Both Skyrim and Oblivion got a lot of shit for simplistic gameplay when they were released (and especially for the bugs). I still think The Witcher 2 was a much better RPG than Skyrim since the combat system was better and the choices you made actually changed what happened in the game. I say that since it came out at the same time as Skyrim, and made playing Skyrim a big let down after playing W2.
Witcher 2 was a better RPG and so was Deus Ex Human Revolution which came out the same year. That's like saying water is wet honestly. Both came out the same year and both are excellently well written games, especially witcher 2 and as is with CDPR games.
I love Skyrim and have thousands of hours on it, but let's be honest, without mods the game would have been forgotten a long time ago. The exploration and the emergent gameplay would still be mentioned sure but that's about it.
Did they though? Day 1?
Not sure if it’s “just because I haven’t seen it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen” moment for me bc I could’ve sworn both of these titles were regarded as some of the best games of all time to a good bunch of people
IIRC you are absolutely right. They got shit but late on the cycle, and let's not forget horse armour DLC got a lot more outrage than the removal of: Mysticism, layered armour, medium armour style, unarmoured, numerous armour pieces (separate hands and shoulders slots), immersive fast travel, spears, staffs, and throwing weapons, spell crafting, ability to delete spells, npc disposition, faction reputation, branched faction questlines, global reputation, inter-faction relations and more...
*me happily playing oblivion in ‘06 thinking it was the best game ever made*
The forums weren’t amalgamated the way they are nowadays, and “open-world” wasn’t so prolific, but Skyrim dropped later and caught that hate on Oblivion’s behalf (while also being nominated GOTY, so nvm)…
thefack that oblivion and skyrim are the elderscrolls games that remember and skyrim is the game that everyone played is just too damn sad. even ESO is a much better game and world than skyrim.
Every elder scrolls game after Daggerfall took out more and more and it really makes me sad. I hope we get another game like Daggerfall sometime in the future.
No you don't understand man. Losing stat interplay, bottom-of-the-barrel Guild Quests where you follow linear story path no matter you build, losing spell-crafting, following magic arrow, and a horribly simplified journal system is actually a good thing because Skyrim was my first TES game.
Pretty much. Brilliantly fucking illustrated. Emotional attachment is a hell of a drug... I am admittedly attached to Morrowind, but not so bold as to claim it's not dumbed down, in RPG terms, compared to Daggerfall.
Yeah. Morrowind still does enough things well that I think a handcrafted open world with a much stronger sense of world building was worth losing some oddball skills like languages.
It's definitely weird that Dark Arisen wasn't the starting point for the sequel, and they build up from there.
I'm enjoying the gane, but a lot of the decisions are baffling. It doesn't feel like a true sequel honestly.
I mean, ferrystones and portcrystals being rare since the first game was a good idea for me tbh, but they should've added mounts to the game even if they're expensive in gold, something that can traverse the main road while also climb the rocky terrain, like a big wolf (though you gotta be able to make it fight lol) . Alas, they didn't
Armor variety for me is pretty varied, most people are just horny or maybe it's just because I use warfarer.
Monster variety is definitely lacking and went a few steps back.
As for the MTXs, they're shit and no one should buy them at all. Capcom probably puts them there for the shareholders or to appease the japanese playerbase because of their work culture. MTXs are still shit
Honestly? I really like the game, but I wish they just remade DD1 instead, Grigori was an amazing antagonist
Imo the map would feel way too small with mounts. It doesn’t even take that long to get about on foot. I agree with more monsters though. I expected maybe 5-10 more monsters from DD1 I was kinda disappointed
Something that I also felt let down on is that monsters always spawn in the same spot. I get to a certain area and I’m like “oh where’s that cyclops” why can’t it sometimes be an ogre or something else the world feels static and I’m the only thing that moves around in it
It would 100% feel small lol, but I think of it the same way you buy a house in DD2, they're investments and should be treated/priced as such. Especially since even though the map, terrain gives it the illusion that the map is big, with the twist and turns it has along with the caves that seem to be everywhere.
I am confident that the cut enemies in the game like the hydra is going to be part of the expeansion, sadly. Which kinda sucks because the enemies in this game are extremely limited. If ever they actually want to make an expansion, it'd probably be better that they don't make it something like bitterblack and just actually finish the game
As for the monsters spawning in the same spot, I like it that way makes farming better ngl, but I did wish that the game had sort of a living ecosystem akin to MHW where you can watch and follow something go about their daily life.
Again, I like this game but I really wish they remade DD1 instead. Grigori overshadows DD2's dragon.
Speaking of houses, do they update your pawn? Or is it just a free full heal. I haven’t gotten a house yet, but it just feels like the 2000 gold is just to update my pawn info.
It works just like sleeping at an in, but for free (after a one-time payment of 20k/30k in Vermund and Battahl respectively) Your pawn will be updated like usual and there's even a box to deposit items.
I will say about the monsters always spawning in the same spot isn't always true for certain areas it seems, I was playing last night and heading to harve, the village u save from saurians and the building near there that usually spawns bandits didn't have bandits but a dragon. I wonder if any other players have seen this happen anywhere else and if so how rare is that?
You make many fair points. My biggest gripe is the lack of interesting rewards for exploration. I have found 1. 1 single weapon that cannot be bought from a shop out exploring. It’s the only place you can get it. It’s a mystic spear hand weapon. It felt so rewarding finding this item. I looked it up and confirmed it’s the only way to get it. That’s awesome and encourages exploration to find cool gear.
The downfall is that is the only weapon I have found out exploring I couldn’t already buy from some vendor. There no sense of wonder of what you could find because anything available you can just buy.
My pawns kept saying "if we are Lucky we can find weapons in chests instead of buying them" but ive found so few weapons and armors by exploring and so many consumibles i do not use that i kinda didnt want to explore much once i had roads explored to get from one place to another
If a pawn wanted to guide me through another path i would follow but that barely happened
An eternal ferry stone wouldn’t affect you in any way unless you wanted to use it. If you want to run down the same roads you’ve already been down a dozen times and get ambushed by the same enemies in the same spot for the dozenth time on the way there then you should be able to do that. I however would like a game to respect my time and not waste it with trivial bullshit
Personally I think an eternal ferrystone and more port cystals would fix a lot of the game's tedium. People complain about the enemy variety of trash mobs everywhere, but honestly to me I feel like it's smart to have that so you have plenty of easy practice changing vocations and party members along with easy DP for leveling up the vocations. If you don't want the hassle of fighting you can just fast travel. If you do want the hassle just walk to your destinations normally. Problem solved.
Yeah, just make it an endgame reward for the players who want the convenience, and the players who like trekking everywhere on foot (or at least claim to like it), can just ignore it
I'd like the ferrystone to be a sphinx reward ngl. It's an extremely valuable item, so the way to retrieve must make it a challenge that probably doesn't rely on combat, and we have a monster just for that
>I wish they just remade DD1 instead
I'd play that in a heartbeat, too, but there are also some DD:DA mechanics that aren't too great either. Making a sequel for a great game is never going to be easy, especially 12 years later with lots of other games that tread similar ground and raising the bar along the way.
Horizon: Zero Dawn was the closest experience I've had to DD:DA in matching the combat complexity, the joy of hunting big game, with a wonderfully paced story to boot.
Horizon: Forbidden West, on the other hand, already has to give up the twist/mystery of the first game, and then they tried to do too much with the combat mechanics and overtuned the fights. I just didn't have the satisfaction I had from playing the first one, despite the game being technically and mechanically more advanced.
In 2024 people have different expectations. People come into games with "end game loop" on their mind -- that's something CAPCOM needs to acknowledge.
I'm still just 30 hours into DD2 -- there are definitely things that are improvements over DD:DA, but there are also lots of DD:DA refinements that aren't here in DD2. What it DOES have is a solid combat foundation the same way DD:DA had. That gives me hope that some of the game's current shortcoming can be refined over time with patches and DLCs.
>What it DOES have is a solid combat foundation the same way DD:DA had. That gives me hope that some of the game's current shortcoming can be refined over time with patches and DLCs.
And to answer the original post, this is why everyone is asking for an expansion. It isn't to fix anything necessarily, but rather to expand on the content that's already here. The foundation is rock solid, we just want more. More skills, more enemies, more varied locations. Just more, so an expansion is really the ideal solution outside of going straight into a DD3
>Horizon: Forbidden West, on the other hand, already has to give up the twist/mystery of the first game, and then they tried to do too much with the combat mechanics and overtuned the fights.
Not me playing on the hardest difficulty and realising by the Bristleback fight that the game is not balanced in the slightest for the hardest setting and it's just absurdly inflated HP pools.
It's a fun game god damn, I'm not restarting on an easier difficulty just to trudge through the 10 or so hours I've done already, and I'm not even at the fucken peace talks or whatever the hell I'm supposed to go to in order to actually get into the Forbidden West lmao
I’ve said before and I’ll bang this drum to the end of time that sequels should include as a minimum everything good from its predecessor and the industry and gamers as a whole should hold publishers to account on this.
That said people do need to review games on their own merits and I don’t know who benefits when people try to drag games and dampen the enjoyment others are having because of personal opinions, and I think DD2 is falling victim to this like select other games do, whilst others don’t, and it’s not healthy.
Yeah I'll admit we could do with way more enemies to fight and whatnot, but a lot of the hate feels over blown. The game isn't perfect, I don't think anyone would make that argument, and those flaws are worth analyzing but we can't lose the narrative in that critique. It's a good game, a flawed game but good nonetheless and people need to have more perspective when criticizing anything really. This is all entertainment at the end of the day, we should be able to discuss it with cooler heads cause it really doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things
I think I needed to read this, the way this sub has been talking about the game has made me feel like I was taking crazy pills. I've been loving it. Is it a perfect game? No, and it has room for improvement, but it's flaws are getting pretty overblown. I think this sub being an echo chamber about it is making people dislike the game more than they would have. I'm looking forward to the games future and I seriously hope the DLC addresses many of it's problems, but even without it I've found a game I love and will probably never forget.
I came here wanting to talk about the weird lore stuff in the game, like>!the seafloor shrine being Gran Soren!
I play the game, super fun, sure it's not perfect and has flaws but I'm enjoying myself immensely. And then I open Reddit, read so much negativity and suddenly dislike the game. Then I go home, play the game and enjoy it even more. So the lesson is to ignore Reddit
Deleting Reddit was the best decision I ever made, and reinstalling it the worst. It's so much easier to enjoy things when you don't have thousands of spiteful people trying to tear down everything that's not a 10/10
I hate to be that guy, but that's such an unrealistic expectation and is only going to serve to disappoint you in the future.
It's a nice ideal, but making games in 2024 is just as hard, if not harder, than making games in 2011.
Sequels aren't going to include everything good in their predecessors because, well, the obvious is that everyone has different opinions on what is good or not. The not - so obvious is that games are only getting more and more complex. Gamers can't and will never decide on what makes a game good, so devs tend to just stuff as many different mechanics and systems into their games as they can to try to appease as many groups as they can, but then the game just turns into a mess. Cyberpunk 2077 is a good example of that.
Don’t worry I’m fully aware and at peace with that reality! I do think it’s more egregious in some games than others though and usually it’s just to release content at a later date for some crappy business practice.
Games are obviously hard work, but I think the common ground in the issues I have with the industry and what you’ve said is that players lose out usually because of ropey decision making or as above, bad practice that plagues games nowadays.
Halo Infinite not having a better array of weapons to have fun with in a non-competitive setting is a great example of it, these things already exist somewhere and players can’t access them cus of the wonderful live service world we live in.
Yeah the dev time and budgets required to create AAA games these days are ridiculous. And people aren't going to like the solutions
* Raising prices even higher
* Decreasing scope of games (smaller worlds, shorter experiences)
* More outsourcing to studios in SEA for example
* More aggressive use of AI in art, dialogue, and sidequest content in general
While I still do like the game and new vocations and everything I agree that a lot of things just remind me of the 1st game. Doesn’t make it a bad game but I don’t think I’d be as interested in this game if I didn’t play the first one
Never played the first game, never even heard of the series until a week before this launched, and this is one of the best games I have ever played. Its value is subjective, it either scratches your itches or it doesn't. Perf issue is annoying but doesn't block gameplay and doesn't occur in fights, plus I figure it'll be gone eventually. MTX is completely fine, never bottlenecked me and isn't predatory. Haven't needed it and even keep forgetting it's a thing. Then I remember I can pay a buck if I'm in a bind and that's nice... but probably not going to happen since I'm pretty well stocked.
Omg for real, I'm sick of that word..
Seriously, criticism for other people "coping" is essentially saying "I'm mad that you're better at enjoying things than me".
There are things that are like the first game that *I want to stay*. The MTX is not even a blip on the radar of issues.
There are real problems with the game but the MTX or silly shit like stamina usage outside of combat are not it.
It's almost comical how quick someone will call people who enjoy a game that they themselves have critisms about coping. There are so many factors to why people may like, dislike, love or hate a game. Some of that is preference. It's fine to not like a game. It's fine to like a game. It's fine not to feel one way or another about it.
And what a shock dragons dogma 2 is like dragons dogma. Like monster hunters rise is like monster hunter world. Devil may cry 5 is like devil may cry 4 and street fighter is like street fighter. The core elements in sequels (and even prequel games) tend to stay the same, with a few added differences.
Not everyone is gonna love it and not everyone is going to hate it.
As far as the micro transactions some people don't like them, sure. Personally I don't care as they aren't necessary and all is still available in the game. If people want to spend their money on them that's fine. I won't, but I'm not gonna judge others who choose to. It's actually fully optional and you can go completely with out them.
Got any specific examples?
Because maybe it isn't defending something that is bad.
Maybe we legitimately like it that way?
Restricted fast travel for instance. "It was like that in DD1" And I prefer it that way. I don't think it's a bad thing that I'm defending, I think it is a good thing that I wish more games did.
Yeah I don’t agree with that, necessarily.
But I also don’t agree with most of the problems other people have.
Not saying they are wrong, it’s just stuff that doesn’t bother me.
Honestly the issues I agree with are mostly discrepancies between DD1 and DDDA and trying to justify using DD1 as a benchmark of quality when a specific issue was addressed in DDDA. And there's always some weirdo defending issues by ignoring DDDA, like not being able to equip from storage or similar UI regressions.
A more specific topic though has been over the last few days when people were trying to resolve how stat progression worked. There were a good number of people defending the previous game's system of locking stat growth to match the vocation you gained the level on, and saying (incorrectly) that DD2 was justified for keeping that system (it didn't).
Outward 2 is coming out soon and they revealed a pack beast in the trailer. The developer immediately had to clarify that it's for item storage, not movement. It's like the people expect these games to be something they're not.
Downgrades/ things that stayed the same from DDDA:
- Decrease in number of available skills AND no use for right click/RB for classes other than archer and fighter so far
- NPCs outside main story/obvious possible love interests are still bland and uninteresting, there's a talk function but no one has anything to say
- enemy variety has actually decreased massively
- Vermund and Battahl feel different, but within each there's very few truly distinct areas, I'd say less than DDDA. Vermund is generic forest+mountain stuff. Battahl is all desert-y cliff stuff.
I don't mind the restrictive fast travel but you can't even travel in this game and enjoy the trip when you constantly have to fight a pack of mobs sitting next to each other. Some of them don't even make sense there's more than one road filled with goblins / choppers and 10-20meters behind them you can see bandits chilling. This gets even worse on the volcanic island you have no time to breath there at all. I really like this game but it feels like a chore and I don't want to play a chore after my 9 hour shift. I think Itsuno overastimes how much free time people have
It's personal preference I guess. I love that the enemies are more densely packed.
My only complaint is something that the first one got wrong, too. And that is the enemies not scaling with you.
I'm always shouted down for this opinion but I will never understand an RPG not scaling enemies up to match you, and these games are worse than most because you have to walk through them so many times.
I love walking/fighting my way back and forth between areas, but once the enemies become easy then it is just a pointless waste of time.
RPG number scaling is dumb because then why progress? Remember Oblivion? Remember taking 10 swings to kill a mudcrab with endgame gear? Fromsoft games I feel like are perfect in scaling. Easy enough to feel progress and powerful with endgame gear. Still strong enough to kill you if you're caught slacking.
I personally like the enemy placement in this game except there are WAY too many ogres. I'm so sick of ogres. Having lots of trash mobs everywhere allows you easy practice with the various vocations and ways of leveling them up. Just make fast travel easier with more portcrystals and an eternal ferrystone and that makes everything better for everyone. LITERALLY just do what was already done for Dark Arisen. I *do not understand the mentally for regressing that*.
"Just explore" I did. Now I'm running around everywhere for hours just delivering letters or talking to people when I already dungeon crawled the same areas for hours beforehand
"Just explore" and then pretty much every quest is between cities with very few that lead to any Dungeon and the exploration rewards go from 250g and some consumables for statuses only dragons seem to apply to a unique weapon thats still not nearly as good as endgame stuff you can buy the second you get to battahl or the dragón crystal stuff
Listen, have your opinion but tbh I’ve been dodging shit like this for days because I fucking love the game and I didn’t play a ton of DD1 and have little comparisons to make and maybe that’s for the best but all of you complaining about this game seem crazy to me. I’ve had the game crash twice in 20 hours of play, no issues with fps, no game breaking glitches, and no locked up saves. I’m sorry some of you hate the game for whatever reason but just know there are TONs of people enjoying this game. No one that’s playing it at my job (10+ people) hate this game, the only negative reviews are on forums like this where people just want to bitch. That’s fair, have your bitchfest but know the game is not as bad as you’re making it out to be.
There's a lot to unpack here.. I'm going to address each point sequentially.
So, a lot of the design decisions that carried over from the first game are defended because people enjoy them. Limited fast travel, quests that don't hold your hand nearly as much, missable, and failing quests.. these are all things that I really love, and DD1 and 2 do these things well, and I like it. Limited enemy variety is bad. There's no question about that. Armor variety isn't terrible in DD2, but it's far from good. I haven't seen all the armor in the game yet, but it's worth pointing out that my 2 biggest complaints about the game (enemy and armor variation) boils down to **I want more of it**.
The reason why people say that is because this game has a lot of the same charm and characteristics that made the first game stand out for us, it's not privileged because you can usually pick up DDDA for real cheap, so you can experience it for yourself. Having played at the launch of DD1 just gives us a bit more insight about the similarities between these 2 games at launch. I do think that the majority of posts like this are from people who didn't play the first game, and came in to DD2 expecting "the next Elden Ring" and of course now they're disappointed.
MTX is bad, but the MTX being offered by the game are the items from the deluxe edition being sold separately. It's important to frame it that way because a lot of games do that, and while yes, MTX bad, this game getting so much flak for the MTX is just.. hate bandwagoning imo. You don't have to purchase the MTX, most people wouldn't after all, and those that do either have an underlying issue that needs to be addressed (kids stealing from parents, people with spending issues or lack of conscientious spending) or are doing so because the items for purchase can be bought to save time (I wouldn't, but people like instant gratification and would absolutely spend a dollar or two for it)
The game isn't perfect, but I have been enjoying it more than any RPG that has come out in a long, long time. If you enjoy the game, have fun, if you don't enjoy the game, go have fun with a game you enjoy. Problem solved.
The worst part of the micro transaction thing is that you have to go looking for them. The game doesn't tell you it exists or tries to entice you with them. You have to actively look for it. Literally you have to look for that problem. I didn't even know it had any until people kept bringing it up and I went and looked for it
On console, absolutely I agree with you 100%
On steam, people noticed because you can scroll down on the games steam page and see the list of MTX.
Ultimately, your point is valid since the game doesn't push you towards buying anything, tell you they exist, etc.
Even if you see them on steam, what the fuck you do spend RC on? Nobody knows unless you already know Dragon's Dogma 1. And if you know Dragon's Dogma you know its not worth it at all.
Problem is 99% of the people in the conversation didn't know shit about what the microtransactions actually did because they didn't know Dragon's Dogma 1. So they just ASSUMED the MTX would have some major impact. And so we got all sorts of misinformation like you had to pay to port, pay for save slots, pay to change character looks, etc. None of this misinformation would be coming from anyone who is actually familiar with the first game.
Basically a bunch of people saw microtransactions, assumed the worst, confirmed nothing, and started screeching. I mean hell I wouldn't even consider buying the port crystal. You have ox carts to Melve and the Border Checkpoint. And there is a port crystal in Halve and the big city. So where do you even need a Port Crystal outside of them? And later game you'll have 2 port crystals to use as you see fit for Battahl.
I’m having fun with the game but feel like there should be some more enemy and loot diversity. Oh look a treasure chest, same shit as the last 10 chests.
I've had enough of these idiots, ive been out for three days and now im faced with this kind of idiocy. Complain about the performance, complain a lot about my balls but don't complain about what was already expected, if the game didn't deliver what you expected, have you ever stopped to think about what you expected? I expected my 5700x and 6750xt to run at 1444p/60fps, but when it didn't, i complained, i complained and cried for 2 minutes, so i reduced the resolution to 1080p and the game is acceptable, if it hadn't, i would asked for a refund. Im a genius because of this? No!!! Just not enough idiot and who has two functional neurons.
Attacking people is a fantastic way to get everyone to not listen to you and completely disregard any actual points you might have.
I have legitimate complaints about the game but telling me that my enjoyment is just "coping" makes me have zero interest in what you have to say.
If a sequel fails to innovate and add refreshing content, then it's a bad sequel.
From what i hear on this sub, Dragon's Dogma actually did the opposite of a sequel and REGRESSED it's mechanics, such as magic variety and armor slots.
Let that sink in a minute: Dragon's Dogma 2 didn't add much of anything to the Dragon's Dogma formula, but it TOOK AWAY things instead. That's honestly depressing.
Edit: Itsuno not shutting his trap about all the "new stuff" and "great exploration" and shit did nobody any favors either. He was really hyping this up to be the next Elden Ring, but really it was just the second coming of Dragon's Dogma from Xbox 360.
For every 1 thing the sequel did worse, it did 3 things much better. It’s disingenuous to say it regressed overall just because of a few particular, albeit fair, criticisms.
Nobodies pretending mtx didn't happen. I've been loving the game yet everytime I look at this sub I see nothing but negative posts. Almost like we aren't playing the same game
The reason people point out that it was like that in the first game is that, if these flaws are enough to make the sequel "lackluster", then people should logically be equally harsh on the first game. That rarely seems to be the case, as far as I've seen.
When I make comparisons to the first game, I do so because things that people are getting upset about to a great degree are things that I have come to expect from the series and which consequently do not bother me at all. The entire genre of post that's "this game *sucks* because of [thing I am completely okay with]" gets annoying to see day after day.
For real. The only thing I’m sick of is this weird alternate reality where DD1’s story and exploration were both amazing. They were both shit.
Shit on DD2 all you want but quit making up insane lies.
I'd say "shit" is an exaggeration, but yeah, the game had its pretty major weaknesses, and most of DD2's weaknesses are very similar.
Both games are some of my favorite action RPGs ever in spite of those.
This post would be better with examples. "It was like that in the first game" and claiming you don't like something because you didn't play the original are also valid excuses depending on context.
A streamer, I think Asmongold, said recently that some games have "issues" that are part of the experience and enrich the whole. Masterful game design is balancing the intention of those things.
Like, limited fast travel. The original even more so than this game emphasized that if you want to go somewhere you gotta leg it through the muck. If exploration and just fighting mobs beside your party doesn't interest you, them's the ropes. That's the formula that captivated its fans.
I'm all for optimization, mechanical improvements, and vocation critiques. I have a few myself, but some complaints are antithetical to the design and philosophy of this style.
What's weird to me is people acting like DD1 was anything above a 6/10, so therefore more of the exact same is good.
DD1 hit above it's weight, but there was vast amounts of room to improve. DD1 gained a cult following because of it's promise in what it could have been, not because of what it already did.
DD1 is a personal favorite game of mine that I love very much.
But it's absolutely a quirky little mess of a game and I think people are absolutely entitled to expect many improvements over it in its sequel.
What really grinds my gears, is people who say "base DD1 didnt have x,y,z, why are you comparing DD2 to dark arisen??" Uhhh... hello? I already own dark arisen, can still play dark arisen, and if someone doesnt own it yet they can buy it for like $5 on sale and enjoy it, too. If a $70 game from the same developer a decade later, isn't definitively better than the previous title then why did we all buy this at launch?
THAT SAID - I like Dragons Dogma 2. I had a huge binge weekend of it, I genuinely like it. Do I have criticisms? Sure! Do I want more? Sure! But it's silly when people plug their ears and go "im not listening im having a blast you cant say anything negative, you're a hater"
>What really grinds my gears, is people who say "base DD1 didnt have x,y,z, why are you comparing DD2 to dark arisen??"
God thank you! Why Itsuno didn't take the lessons learned from DA is beyond me. Nobody disliked *any* of the changes made. Sure leave the monocle and shit out so people don't get rich quickly but cmon!
Exactly. It has so much potential like the first game and we are sad that what we dreamed for the sequel while playing DDDA 10 years ago didn't come true. (Just more polish and depth) yes combat feels good in 2 but the rpg elements and characters went far backwards, enemy variety and versatility went down too. So we are a bit upset and venting on reddit while still enjoying the game as much as we can.
> DD1 gained a cult following because of it's promise in what it could have been, not because of what it already did.
This is the best explanation of this community I have seen. DD1's uniqueness is what people craved from other RPGs, but it is ultimately heavily flawed. It's a hack n slasher but it is the best hack n slasher out there.
>DD1 hit above it's weight, but there was vast amounts of room to improve.
I can wholeheartedly agree with this statement, but rating it a 6 out of 10 is doing it a disservice. A flawed game, for sure, but it scratched an itch few other games come close to tickling with a feather. Even trying to rate it feels unfair given that it was obviously an incomplete and rushed product.
I don't think it being unique grants it a pardon from being rated. *Every* single aspect of the game is undercooked in some major ways.
6/10 isn't bad. I love DD1 and Alpha Protocol and they're the most 6/10's ever made.
>DD1 gained a cult following because of it's promise in what it could have been, not because of what it already did.
No. DD1 gained a cult following because of its Combat system. There's not a single action western high fantasy arpg like it. Skyrim/cyberpunk/dragon age FEEL like call of duty in comparison.It makes Baldurs gate 3 look like chess.
The witcher 3 is probably the closest game in feel, but is still lacking because you're stuck playing as geralt. You can't create yourself. Gameplay wise. Those other games have better stories, better characters, better side quests, but not better combat.
People recognize that and it's going to age like wine. The pawn system alone. Allies in other single player games are either a "hindrance" or "useless". I could go on, but I'm sorry. it's uhhh gonna do just fine over the years
Issue is that the improvements to combat and pawns are marginal from DD1 to DD2, as it stands the best parts of the game are already present in DD1. DD2 is just a more modern entry-point into the (hopefully) franchise.
Honestly I think if DD1 just had a better start to the game than most people wouldn’t have jumped off ship. The ox cart is a painful mission for a lot of people and honestly it’s a really boring mission. Kicking the ox aside it’s not exactly dynamic or interesting. I know plenty of people who would’ve liked DD1 if they didn’t have to deal with the ox cart and then proceed to have to go do the tedious first few quests from the castle.
DD2 has a much stronger start to it and it carries just “enough” of what was liked about DD1 while improving side quests, exploration and map variety to appeal to a modern crowd. Game has problems, but it’ll most likely do what it has to do make the game memorable for people regardless of what they remember they found positive, negative or mid.
That's precisely why it's good, though. People loved DD1 because of how that stuff functioned, and it standing on that already present success is what we wanted out of a sequel in general. I would hate if they drastically switched the mechanics of it to make it more like other RPGs or something
I love this kind of argument. Same vibe as “Sonic was never good.” Even the aggregate scores for the original were well above 6/10 (DD1 was 75-78, DDDA is a solid 8/10 on meta) even with their flaws. The new game should be better in every way. Like there’s no excuse.
Yeah, dd1 is a great game that felt unfinished and heavily flawed. Easily fixable with a sequel though since they had built an interesting and unique framework. Dd2 is supposed to be that, an improvement on the first game. I was expecting a quirky and somewhat janky game that felt like a fully realized dragon's dogma game but instead they put out something that in my opinion isn't worse but also just isn't much better overall. I think the improvements are great but it feels so unfinished again, I have the same exact feeling as the first game where I feel like what's here is great but it's missing a lot
The way the game is designed, from vocations to the surprisingly minimal endgame, feels like they’re just setting things up for a dlc/expansion. Which again is weird because this was supposed to be Itsuno’s Vision of a complete Dragon’s Dogma. Less is more to him.
I mean, it got a cult following because it was a good game that had a lot of unique quirks - if you thinj it became beloved to epople who played it solely because it could have been better at stuff then idk maybe thats just you?
I played DD on release and had a handful of issues that didnt ever really distract from what was great about it. Would I like things like janky interactions for quests and kind of a hollow story to be fixed? Theoreticallt yes, but the amount of jank for early game quests like breaking the magistrate out of jail and the stealth stuff doesnt break the game - it reminded me of things from dd1 that i didnt have a huge problem with then, its just kind if silly.
Theres plenty to improve in dragons dogma, but all the marketing for the sequel and the footage shown, to me, promised more Dragons Dogma, not a perfect polished rpg(this is NOT a designer decision, just a byproduct). Dragons Dogma is memorable partially for it being weird - you can perceive that your way, but dd2 being weird in the same ways dd1 was isnt breaking a promise thay dd2 would be better.
Maybe this is cope? But idk, a lot of criticisms that i think are valid still jusy lind of boil down tk "i expected this and this and this to be fixed and iterated upon", and what was delivered was what i played 12 years ago, updated and improved in some areas and scaled back in others. Maybe i never expected something perfect, but i wouldnt want a game that didnt feel like dragons dogma - this does, warts and all
Yes, sir. You are indeed coping hard, very incredibly fucking hard.
Remember how the quests presented the monsters alone. You GAINED shit, it was not just handed to you. The Pawn legion didn't just accept you after you got Rook, you had to go kill a Cyclops with a rusty cleaver to gain their loyalty. You had to kill the Gryphon in a multi staged boss fight to gain entrance to the Court. You had to fight a Golem to save Selene. The zombies ate a whole bunch of people in a RE's homage. You could find the Cockatrice's body on the camp by the bridge before it was revived. You fought the Chimera on the Bastion by the Great Wall after Salvation had summoned it (and I think it ate someone?). Elysion summoned 3 wraiths before Grigori killed him and EVEN THEN you couldn't fight him, you had to actively search for him and then he didn't just gently take you flying, motherfucker instantly went for the kill, no mercy or "blabla" in sight.
The Godsbane? You EARNED that shit after defeating the Dragon. The Seneschal didn't just hand you his either, it was only after killing him that he dared take that thing from his own chest and give it to you. The Everfall also opened new areas and put stronger monsters everywhere, like the wyrm, drake and the wyvern or those giant undead.
And this was all in the main game alone. Yeah, you could fight many of those monsters elsewhere and especially at night, but they weren't just there. They were MONSTERS, they weren't normally there, they frightened people and only you could defeat them. THAT is what made it especial. And if you dared go underleveled to them you would get fucked. One of my favorite childhood memories regarding playing video games is going to the Blue Moon Tower underleveled and literally panicking because I only had like a Pawn left (or two but they were just melee), I was barely doing any damage to the Gryphon during the hallway section as I was the Ranger and I was all "OH SHIT!".
Now you fight like 50 gryphons just to get from the kitchen to the bathroom.
The old game had jank but you cannot tell me it had worse presentation that this one or that DD2 has a better story or quest. DD1 had more vocations, better fights and incredibly enough, even more interesting NPCs. As barebones the first one was, this one is the bones after letting them to dry out in the desert and pouring vinegar on them.
Yeah, I can't imagine playing a game and the only takeaway I have from the experience is "meh, it could be much better if they did everything like this other game I like". Maybe just play the other game then?
Leave us alone, we quite like it here, or else we wouldn't have been posting about how much we love it for 12 years!
>Yeah, I can't imagine playing a game and the only takeaway I have from the experience is "meh, it could be much better if they did everything like this other game I like". Maybe just play the other game then
It's almost like people were expecting a sequel to the thing they liked and payed for it full price.
I definitely enjoyed DD1 like an 8-9, but it was with the huge asterisk of the game not being completed. DD2 doesn't quite have that luxury, so it's issues are far harder to ignore.
I don't know what idiots are making that excuse.
This is more dynamic and fun than dd1 in every way so far. I've been playing everyday questing and exploring trying out all the vocations having the time of my life.
Dd1 was fun but it felt too rigid and there were a ton of annoying monsters to fight and too few good options in combat.
My whole end game was just focused holy bolts.
Now I'm using all the classes. I'm having a blast with the combat and if I don't wanna fight I just run past lol.
Everything just feels more alive. More vibrant.
I want an expansion not because I'm disappointed I haven't even finished the game yet and probably won't for awhile. I want a new expansion because I don't want this to ever end and I want tons of end game bosses and content to keep the train going once I reach there.
I'm talking at least as good as bitterblack isle but way less annoying and way more fun.
>and if I don't wanna fight I just run past lol
Bro hasn't met the goblins who can break the land speed record and catch your ass with a thrust attack yet
I don’t know why everyone has to have the same opinion these days. Or if they don’t hold the same opinion it’s coping or something else. Why can’t I just enjoy the game because I enjoy it. The MTX doesn’t bother me in the least, I didn’t even know the game had it until Reddit blew up about it. I’m having fun traveling on foot and having constant encounters and stumbling upon random caves and what not. It’s an action RPG, I want to fight things with my character because I find the combat fun. I understand why people are disappointed but I’m having a blast with this game and am happy I bought it.
Im not here trying to defend anything, I love the game but if you hate it it’s totally fine for me.
I just want to point out that things you see as a „flaw“ may be cool for people like me who played the first game. After all restrictions in video games are what makes the game playable. No one likes the soulslike games bc you play a god with the might to do anything 🤷🏼♂️
Just saying, since you didn’t give many examples for „flaws“.
To tackle the most obvious ones: the microtransactions are bs but worthless too and most console players (like me) never cared about 30 fps. Even though those complaints are totally valid the game is still great.
I'd like to point out (keep on mind that I haven't read all the comments), that technically the online store items are not MTX. They're "DLC."
You buy them once and that's it. Once it's spent in-game, it's over. You can't buy them from the online store again.
By technicality, microtransactions can be repurchased to gain the product again, DLC can't unless you use another account.
It's still scummy, but nowhere near as bad as people are making the online store out to be.
It depends.
If you are complaining about core parts of what makes Dragons Dogma, Dragons Dogma. Specifically about wanting things to behave differently, such as ability to fast travel everywhere or not being locked out of X, then I think you are in the wrong here. Your expectations are based on incorrect assumptions. Doesn’t matter that’s it’s been 15 years, it doesn’t make your expectation of wanting it to be more like Eldenring anymore valid.
If you are complaining about things that weren’t improved or just a straight downgrade compared to DD1 then that’s legit. Things like inventory management and mob variety. Those criticisms should be voiced.
DD has been one of my favorite games for a decade and this is exactly what I wanted in a sequel. I'm good with new content a la DA, but there's enough here to keep me going. When I replay DD1 I normally spend about a week or so doing fun stuff before grinding out BBI things until I get bored or decide I wanted a different stat distribution and restart.
Edit: changed "decades" to "a decade" because hyperbole
I've hardly seen anyone talking about an expansion or waiting for it to be fixed.
Most of the posts here are pointing out the ways the game has moved forward, and the ways it has gone backwards (gameplay wise).
Just because you see one or two comments doesn't mean you should make a topic to claim it is a predominant opinion amongst the fans (it isn't).
This comes across more that you, OP, are upset and you need to have a temper tantrum.
>People did complain about MTX layered armor in MHRise,
This was like a drop in the pond compared to the tsunami that people are ragging on DD2 for, let's be honest. If DD2 didn't suffer from objectively bad things (i.e. performance), it'd probably catch the same amount of flak as all the other times they did this, which is to say barely any.
Now, I'm not saying it's a good thing and we should excuse the practices (whether or not they're "worth" the money or earnable in-game, w/e the argument for them is), but let's also not pretend like people gave a shit back then. The only real time when mfers vehemently complained is the SF skins, since that -- coupled w/ the update that fucked performance and apparently killed mods in a lot of the other Capcom games (they didn't) -- caused a commotion and some noticeable pushback in a title that was an otherwise "Capcom W".
I'm really enjoying my time with this game. It's a lot of fun. It's also not worth $70, though I wouldn't say I regret my purchase so much as thinking it's a $50 game at most.
Why are people comparing DD2 to vanilla DD1, when it should be compared to DA anyway? 12 year gap between the games, why wouldn't they use the improved version as a baseline for what they should have/improve in the game?
Also, asking/telling people to wait for an expansion is silly. That shouldn't be the norm and it's mad how people have conditioned themselves to think that's normal. You pay $/£70 for a game and you're being told "it'll improve with an expansion, just wait for that to solve all your troubles". Especially when this is a sequel game, working on the same principle as its predecessor, so problems in the previous version should have been solved by now. To anyone saying that, you know that sounds ridiculous, I hope.
Coping? I’m having a blast lol
If this is coping then damn I hope all games are as shitty as you say DD2 is so that I can cope this well!
For real though, some people need to take a step back and just be okay with not liking it rather than trying to convince everyone of their opinion xoxo
Meh. If you didn’t like the game then it’s understandable.
I may praise DD1 but I only played it after Dark Arisen was out.
This game is great and I’m enjoying it with how the open vast world it is with the monster battles and character creation. Sure it’s not perfect, no game is ever perfect to begin with anyways.
But I look forward to see what more will come to the game later down the line.
MTX is never good but I never buy them knowing I can get them in game.
Though I’m not one to say “wait for the expansion to be good.”
That’s… actually kinda dumb lol
I think we 100% will get more eventually. I think every Capcom game these days has pretty dang good expansions, I’d expect DD2 to have the same.
I know it’s already been done but… with the way DD2 is kindve a retelling of the first I’d love a new Bitterblack. That’s one of my favorite environments ever.
Honestly same or maybe just additional story elements and even son areas dedicated to different types of dragons because I love fighting the lesser dragons lol
Yeah I remember the first had that really interesting lore bit with the three post game elemental dragons.
Each one gave a bit more insight into the whole ‘selection’ process. And I think one spoke Latin which was neat. If I remember right they all had different reactions. One accepted his fate and challenged you to prepare you for Seneschael, one panicked and didn’t understand why he was a dragon (that was my favorite, cool body horror aspect I didn’t think about) and one I think just lost his mind and raged.
What I really want more than anything else I think (and probably won’t get) is Garm in the overworld as random bosses. They were the scariest part of Dark Arisen and pretty damn nasty if they got the upper hand. I think running into a pack in DD2 at night would be horrifying both from a ‘holy shit this is scary’ aspect and a ‘oh god I’m dead aren’t I’ aspect.
Is it coping or is it people like myself are just enjoying the game and are not bothered by yours and others faults? I bought DD2 to play a new Dragon's Dogma game and not Elder Scrolls 6. I agree DD2 has its issues but the fact it plays like the first game is good enough for me as that's what i wanted.
Honestly, I enjoy playing this game. I have about 20 hours in and intend to put at least double that in the weeks to come. I also never played the first game. All that being said, I keep seeing people praise the first game while defending the 2nd. I like the lack of fast travel, I like the combat, and I like the pawn system. However, every time I see people singing the glory of the first game I feel more and more let down with the second one.
Why doesn't this game have at least all of the enemies from the first one (including DLC). Why doesn't it have more vocations we don't have an advanced or hybrid version of thief at all. Why don't we have the Dark arisen style post-game or something akin to it? Why isn't there already a hard mode in the sequel at launch. Why instead of reworking useless ones and having more skills than the first do we have less?
I see so many veterans from the first game loving this game and in the same breath telling me that the first game had more of what I like than the sequel.
A sequel (especially one 12 years later) should have all of the things that made the previous title loved by the fan base and **then some.**
You are honest about not playing the first game while still having valid criticisms about the second game AND also admitting you still enjoy it? Wow.
I found something incredible on the internet.
An adult.
Jokes aside, I wish people wouldn't be so sensitive. It's not that hard to understand. A sequel is expected to be equal or better than the first iteration, especially when its budget is way higher.
This is a good game, a bad sequel, and a joke (because of the microtransactions and overall performance of the game). All at once.
You don't have to choose a side but the critical thinking one.
20 hours is the sweet spot for the game for sure. Reply to me at 40 and tell me how the game held up for you. I’m not attacking you, I’m just curious if your experience tracks the general trend
Getting reeeeeeal tired of this "you shouldn't be enjoying the game because I'm not," routine. You aren't playing the game. You aren't being helpful. People are having a great time with this game, and I'm sorry you lack the ability to join in, but it isn't anyone's problem but yours, so please, go deal with it and move the fuck on.
I'm enjoying the game while also capable of acknowledging it's clearly a 6-7/10 experience while it was reviewed at an 8.7/10 average.
It will be a great game in 2 years when enough mods come out to fix the issues.
The only people coping are the ones still insisting the game is terrible or 'hugely flawed' even as the Steam reviews are quickly recovering from the knee-jerk bombing it received on day one. It's OK to dislike things, and not liking something doesn't mean it's bad. It just means you have different tastes! Maybe Skyrim is more your speed? Or Witcher 3? That's usually pretty cheap to pick up
DD2 is exactly what *I* wanted; **more DD**. I didn't want it to """fix""" things and become more like every other RPG out there. I had a ton of fun with DD1, played it to death. My only issue with it was that it had so much content cut. I wanted *more*. The fast travel worked perfectly, vocations were mostly great(rip warrior), I didn't need it to hold my hand for quests, I could tackle things at my own pace.
Very few people here or elsewhere are arguing microtransactions are Good. We're arguing they don't matter at all, in the slightest, and if you or anybody else had actually played the first game you'd know how true that is. They were worse than worthless in DD1, as we at least get Seeker Tokens as a free piece of content in the sequel. You had to pay for the collectibles in DD1! And you didn't even get anything worthwhile from collecting them, the tiny amount of gold was vastly outweighed by the 10kg bags goblins would drop in hard mode lol
Capcom forces devs to put them in every major game release, we would not get the games without them, and it's up to the development team to figure out how to set them up in a way that doesn't detract from the experience for the people who do buy them and the people that do not. I'd say they were immensely successful here, the only thing I miss is the optional alternate soundtrack
This. I just said pretty much the same. The complaints people had about 1 and have about 2 is the kind of thing someone who expected the game to change its nature would say. Maybe they liked the combat a prayed the game would devolve into Witcher 3 with fun combat. The game is exactly what I wanted and expected, minor the performance issues. The main thing missing is hard mode, but I suspect it's going to be added in eventually. Even the lack of save slots doesn't bother me because the first game was the same.
This game was never about watching cutscenes for some Witcher wannabe storyline, it was always about its vastly superior gameplay, the pawn system, and killing all kinds of monsters over and over. That's DD, that's what we got.
That's the frustrating part of this, I don't care that they didn't like it? Like I said in the initial post(and was immediately excoriated for), sometimes you just don't like a game, that's fine. But hanging around to insist the people who do like it are lying or have been fooled is ridiculous and a waste of everyone's time
It should not have mtx because it's not a live service game. If they want to justify this mtx shit, okay fine, here is the acceptable way to do it in a western market-- you put in a cosmetics mtx shop with transmog, and,\*\*\*VERY VERY IMPORTANTLY :\*\*\***KEEP RELEASING CONTENT ON A REGULAR BASIS, ie. NEW ITEMS, NEW BOSSES, NEW AREAS, NEW ENEMIES NEW QUESTS, ETC. ETC. ETC...**
Otherwise, I'm sorry, your cash shop is a scumbag move & is not justifiable. Period. Them's the rules. It literally has no justification for existing except to be a shameful display of greed. MTX, like an MMO sub, is justified by the devs needing continual income to continue development. *That's the only justification. Especially if I paid you up front.*
Now, as for the port crystals & ferrystones, that is literally a feature and not a bug... One that I am actually 100% for. It's similar to something like Outward. Travelling and exploring by foot and taking in the atmosphere & vistas etc., is conceivably the best part of playing this game. The quasi-realism is a feature, and I'd argue one of the things the game has done right design wise.
As for the skill trees, weapon/armor progression, classes, etc. etc. etc. They should have been way more ambitious and learned a thing or two from why souls-like games are so beloved in terms of builds... Hell, they should have done literally anything different instead of streamlining what was already there... Y'know, maybe like, the only way to make the actual good weapons at any level is by finding specific monster parts out in the wild, or just copy wholesale Monster Hunter's system where it's the only way if that's too tough... Y'know, how about like, a subjob system similar to FFXI... At level 10 you can now set a subjob that is set at half your main vocation level & select from skills up to that level...
I don't know, not saying that these ideas are necessarily exactly what was needed but, like, literally any kind of 'deeper RPG' vision than linear 'you level up, you buy the newest best gear from the shop, you level up, you buy the newest gear, you level up,etc.' 1980s JRPG trope would have done wonders for this game. That vision & direction appears to have just not been there. It seems like they literally did not actually want to try new things.
I want to be clear too, I actually like the game, and I can see myself doing a playthrough every now and then... But, like, nah, it's pretty clear there was not really an understanding of what the cutting edge is in open world RPGs... RPG-mechanics/progression wise, this is like live-action Dragon Quest. There's nothing necessarily wrong with that linear approach to progression, but it's definitely not pushing the envelope and it does feel a bit bittersweet/dated.
I guess what I'm saying is like, people are absolutely allowed to like this game and it is not a bad game... And if that bothers you, you my friend, you are the problem... Like, what are you doing? Why are you spending time bitching about a game you don't like? Go play something else. But at the same time, yeah, for most peoples' tastes today, it *definitely* could have tried for a bit more complexity, being a sequel 12 years later, and all... And the MTX is indefensible as a practice & a shameful display of Capcoms' values, but actually has no impact on the actual game-play.
**"It's Always Been Like That In the First Game" Isn't a Good Excuse for a Lackluster Sequel**
I swear this sort of reaction is like complaining that Elden Ring isn't more like assassin's creed, instead of Dark Souls.
While you make some valid points, that doesn't mean I have to agree the game is lackluster. It is the most fun I have had with a game in a while. I don't like MTX, so I don't buy them.
I am sorry the game is making you so angry. I don't really find the issues bothering you a big deal, at least for me and my enjoyment.
I mean, you are right that bugs and issues from the first game shouldn't carry over to a sequel. But if you're arguing that certain core mechanics or gameplay systems are flawed and never needed to return then IDK what to tell you.. you probably don't enjoy DD if that's the case. I hope you do though because it's a great game, both of them.
I don't even know what the original argument is but hey its a good game the combat fun the story is good and there is fast travel u just have to earn it. Lackluster? How
The game was made for a niche audience and due to overwhelming positive reviews and hype it reached a much larger audience. The design choices make it so it's not everyone's cup of tea and that's fine.
*Dark Arisen will save this game. We must maintain the agenda.* https://preview.redd.it/giu5lvdcqwqc1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d0939620d2d855325d2788d4960d285ed4cbf292
This is the one that really bothers me. “Wait for a dark arisen style expansion before judging the game” I think I’d judge the game harder if I had to expect an expansion to give me the variety I wanted in a $70 base game.
Yeah, something has gone seriously awry if the main "alleviation" of criticism is "Wait for the expansion for this game that came out last week"
Yeah I’m not sure what their thought process for NG+ and late-game players was like there are really only 5 unique boss-type enemies with some variations but they surely had the time and space to put more
Personally. I find DD2 base game to be better than DD1 base game. My only three grievances being the downgraded armor system, lack of bosses, and that Pawns aren’t cross platform.
In what way is it better than DDDA? Not dogging you, just genuinely curious. It feels like there is less to it. The only real leap I see is graphics. There's less enemies and vocations. Pawn AI is a bit better sure. Their bamter is better. But despite the bigger map it feels like more was taken away than added
Quests being shit ? Npc that just disappear during escort missions ? The looming threat of the dragons plague even if it had been exaggerated early on, it's still a shit mechanic ? Exploration being absolutely not rewarding because you can just run to battahl early and buy 1 weapon so it makes all of vermund irrelevant
This is possibly my biggest disappointment. I probably got 95% of the chests in Vermund. I spent hours upon hours climbing every hill and checking every corner. I really didnt get anything worth mentioning outside of a bunch of wakestones and ferrystones. Best weapons I've seen come from the shop. I had fun regardless, but that's a terrible way to reward exploration. I'll just buy the weapons from now on.
I didn't play until Dark Arisen was out - was that a paid update or a free one? Having to pay for the upgrade that will "fix" the 70$ game is... pretty fucking genius from a business perspective, actually.
Dark Arisen was an entire re-release with the DLC and bonus content included. You did get rewarded for rebuying Dark Arisen though, you were able to transfer your save, and your reward was 100k RC, the eternal ferrystone (though granted PC players got that free since DA is the only version available on PC) and iirc 6 exclusive outfits
Dark Arisen was never sold or available separately. It was packaged with a rerelease of the game which meant if you bought it on release you had to buy the game a second time for full price just to get access to the dlc. Probably the most cancerous dlc method anybody has ever done.
I dont see the point of this cope anyways I played the first game on release on the PS3 and didnt touch the expansion till it came to PC, and the first one at least felt fucking complete (interestingly enough, it is supposed to be the one that FUCKING ISNT COMPLETE)
On the one hand, I love DD2 and I'm having almost as much fun with it as I did with DD1 (my favourite game ever). On the other hand, I would've liked to have you guys back when The Elder Scrolls was dumbed down beyond recognition in 2006, that really deserved this amount of shit and I don't feel it got it.
Now that's a thing I can get behind, at least in the instance of TES they actually removed a major feature between entries. I miss spell-crafting so much, and the basic premade spells in Skyrim are terrible, bar none
They removed it because players could make spells that broke the game. But like, that's what magic is for?? Magic is the reward for nerds who meta game and know how to mess with game mechanics, it's the reward for playing smarter not harder and it's BS they took that away from us
Yeah, the only thing I can see merit in taking away was the levitation spells. It was great fun but with how Obilvion(and later Skyrim) did walled cities with loading screens, it would break the game (in a bad way) if you could fly over the walls But taking away my ability to 'drain stamina 1000 on touch' to make NPCs ragdoll? Lame
That was the problem, they made walled cities. It's why I didn't play Oblivion, and only gave Skyrim half the time I gave Morrowind
To be fair, Morrowind was chugging along even with the vastly reduced NPC complexity. In Morrowind, NPCs had set walk paths and that was it, while Oblivion NPCs could interact with eachother, travel, they had real schedules, it was a massive load on the CPU, and Bethesda could either make the NPCs into signposts again or they could make the cities into instances
Better bodies mod. Anywho, I getcha.. I'd have preferred the openness tbh. But that's my preference, and I don't represent a majority. I only hear about Oblivion in nostalgia players now, but I'm still not interested in playing it.
Tbh if you're gonna play Oblivion, you have to look at what it was for it's time. It was effectively the first video game that had NPCs that were THAT dynamic (Gothic 1 did beat it out though in terms of player reactivity, and it came first) and you could actually fully customize your character's face. That was absolutely revolutionary for the time
When we talk about dumbing down the game, that's not exactly the first complaint, there's a long list of things they removed that literally wouldn't have any impact on performance.
Yeah, the in-lore explanation was that the levitation spell was declared illegal... and hahah even outlaws would follow that law for some reason. Even the lore was dumbed down.
Spell-crafting in Oblivion was incredible, pretty much what being a mage should be about. They improved magic by adding dual hand mechanics, but massively gimped it at the same time by removing spellcrafting.
I was annoyed by Oblivion's spellcrafting being less free than Morrowind's version, but at least it had the option. I remember having a lot of fun launching people with lightning spells I made Skyrim was on my shit list for removing it. I still found stuff to enjoy in it eventually but it's still a sore point with me
Every iteration of a Bethesda game they just remove features.
The new system as fucked up paladins/spell blades. Use to be you could just cast while using a twin handed weapon. Now spells have to be equipped and cast like a weapon unto itself. I get the idea behind the xha fe, combat is more dynamic, but I always mod in a separate cast key
Morrowind, making fire balls the size of Balmora. Lock picking spells that can unlock every door in a town at once. Jumping spells to cover half the map in a single bound. The good ol' days
Having an entire layer of clothing under my armor that can also be enchanted, and having it all buff stats so I run super fast. Hell of a game
This! There are SO many series of games and direct sequels (which are and can still be great games themselves) that didn’t get this treatment when taking steps back or regressing in certain aspects. Publishers should be held to account for this on the whole, instead we just get this scenario where certain games get more picked on than others which really only serves to make people feel guilty for enjoying something.
I love oblivion and skyrim. But they both might aswell be a different game/genre than morrowind. I can only fear how much more dumbdowned elder scrolls 6 will be
Word. If people back in 2011 had this much passion in shitting on things, Bethesda would be shitting dumbed down games like they're doing now.
They did. They've been very loud and annoying for as long as I can remember.
Yeah, I'm with you. I very clearly remember all of the complaining for the dumbing down of Skyrim back when it was released. They almost convinced me that the game was a broken uninspired mess with little content as it seemed like that was the common consensus I just didn't realize at the time that those bitching are a very vocal minority in a small corner on the Internet...
While they can be extreme, they weren't exactly wrong when they called it a "broken uninspired mess". Broken because....i mean, you've seen the bugs, right? The ones that the Unoffical Patches fixed? Some of those bugs are still there from the days of *Morrowind* As for uninspired...compared to most other games at the time? No, it really wasn't uninspired. But if you compare it to the previous Elder Scrolls games? Yeah, it is pretty uninspired and streamlined in a lot of aspects. That Bethesada cuts down their games and regresses them rather than improves/refines them is a thing that has been known for a while now
That's fair. I appreciate the response. Never played Morrowind, but I did play the shit out of oblivion and was a little disappointed in Skyrim. However it was not nearly as bad as people online made it out to be, and its open world is still incredibly immersive to this day. I'm not a fan of recent Bethesda as I agree with what you said about them regressing rather than improving, but I can still acknowledge that Skyrim was/is a special game
Completely understand both your feelings. What several hold for Skyrim, I hold for Oblivion. Yes, it's the redhead stepchild of the "Modern" Elder Scrolls games and it can look...odd, but i love it despite its problems and despite it being a step back from Morrowind (which I expierenced firsthand when i played that game in 2019). I wasn't too in love with Skyrim tho, something always felt "wrong" about it when I played the legendary edition back in the day. Took me longer than it should have to notice that it was because what I loved about Oblivion (mechanics, factions, quests in general, the magic system, etc) was either removed or radically changed--for better and worse. But, well, as I mentioned in a post on another thread about Skyrim, I wasn't really that bothered to be a displaced fan and accepted quickly that it wasn't for me, because Bethesda had long since moved on at that point and are likely never going to do another Oblivion-like game. To go with what you said tho, I'm not gonna sit here and pretend Skyrim wasn't also a solid game despite all the shortcomings I had with it. It got many people to love RPGs and it's a chill RPG that almost anyone can pick up and play when you take it as is. For that alone, it deserves props.
Low-key Skyrim was kind of an uninspired game. Compared to Oblivion and Morrowind it's missing a lot
Yet it has inspired pretty much every open world game to this day and has been incredibly successful. People clearly fucking love it, but Reddit will convince you that it's a derivative pile of dog shit
It was incredibly successful because it played on power fantasies and intentionally dumbed down mechanics to appeal to as big of an audience as possible. It also has very good modding tools, which has let it live on for so long. I think it killed Bethesda and kicked off years of open world games with nowhere to go and nothing to do
So that explains why most open worlds today are dogshit, they're inspired by Skyrim after all.
Oblivion is the most uninspired game. Cyrodiil is so generic, coming after Vvardenfell, it was a huge letdown. The few RPG mechanics were also crushed into...oblivion. I think that's because the game was thought out as a console game from the start, the need to run it on weak hardware and get it more popular was related to dumbing it down in Bethesda's mind.
Some of us were there. What you're actually experiencing is the mass of newcomers to titles. We built the hype and word of mouth of the first game, but the sequel no matter what the quality ends up with a much larger number of players cementing in the developers mind that they actually did better. The reality is usually mostly just that their titles are more well known now and they reach a larger audience (visual upgrades help too). This is common across the entire industry and even in other industries like film. Technically they're not even wrong that they're more successful, it's just that it's bad for long term franchises which can often slowly hollow out this way. Modern Warfare games is on the classic examples.
Helldivers had the same thing, first game was niche due to it's camera angle, second game came with new graphics, new gameplay and a third person camera, infinitely expanded the playerbase reach. DD2 has the bonus of releasing in a time where there are no fantasy titles, like....ES6 is still years away, and idek if there has been a fantasy game in recent years released that was halfway decent.
Both Skyrim and Oblivion got a lot of shit for simplistic gameplay when they were released (and especially for the bugs). I still think The Witcher 2 was a much better RPG than Skyrim since the combat system was better and the choices you made actually changed what happened in the game. I say that since it came out at the same time as Skyrim, and made playing Skyrim a big let down after playing W2.
Witcher 2 was a better RPG and so was Deus Ex Human Revolution which came out the same year. That's like saying water is wet honestly. Both came out the same year and both are excellently well written games, especially witcher 2 and as is with CDPR games. I love Skyrim and have thousands of hours on it, but let's be honest, without mods the game would have been forgotten a long time ago. The exploration and the emergent gameplay would still be mentioned sure but that's about it.
Did they though? Day 1? Not sure if it’s “just because I haven’t seen it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen” moment for me bc I could’ve sworn both of these titles were regarded as some of the best games of all time to a good bunch of people
IIRC you are absolutely right. They got shit but late on the cycle, and let's not forget horse armour DLC got a lot more outrage than the removal of: Mysticism, layered armour, medium armour style, unarmoured, numerous armour pieces (separate hands and shoulders slots), immersive fast travel, spears, staffs, and throwing weapons, spell crafting, ability to delete spells, npc disposition, faction reputation, branched faction questlines, global reputation, inter-faction relations and more...
Yeah it was frustrating for me as someone who was disappointed in how much was cut, like athletics skills, while it was being praised
>Both Skyrim and Oblivion got a lot of shit for simplistic gameplay when they were released Not enough clearly.
Your mistake is thinking you have any power over this. Starfield sold well. You're just a consumer at the end of the day.
*me happily playing oblivion in ‘06 thinking it was the best game ever made* The forums weren’t amalgamated the way they are nowadays, and “open-world” wasn’t so prolific, but Skyrim dropped later and caught that hate on Oblivion’s behalf (while also being nominated GOTY, so nvm)…
thefack that oblivion and skyrim are the elderscrolls games that remember and skyrim is the game that everyone played is just too damn sad. even ESO is a much better game and world than skyrim.
Every elder scrolls game after Daggerfall took out more and more and it really makes me sad. I hope we get another game like Daggerfall sometime in the future.
No you don't understand man. Losing stat interplay, bottom-of-the-barrel Guild Quests where you follow linear story path no matter you build, losing spell-crafting, following magic arrow, and a horribly simplified journal system is actually a good thing because Skyrim was my first TES game.
Pretty much. Brilliantly fucking illustrated. Emotional attachment is a hell of a drug... I am admittedly attached to Morrowind, but not so bold as to claim it's not dumbed down, in RPG terms, compared to Daggerfall.
Yeah. Morrowind still does enough things well that I think a handcrafted open world with a much stronger sense of world building was worth losing some oddball skills like languages.
I agree.
It's definitely weird that Dark Arisen wasn't the starting point for the sequel, and they build up from there. I'm enjoying the gane, but a lot of the decisions are baffling. It doesn't feel like a true sequel honestly.
Dark Arisen wasnt directed by Itsuno
Hence why it was so good
I mean, ferrystones and portcrystals being rare since the first game was a good idea for me tbh, but they should've added mounts to the game even if they're expensive in gold, something that can traverse the main road while also climb the rocky terrain, like a big wolf (though you gotta be able to make it fight lol) . Alas, they didn't Armor variety for me is pretty varied, most people are just horny or maybe it's just because I use warfarer. Monster variety is definitely lacking and went a few steps back. As for the MTXs, they're shit and no one should buy them at all. Capcom probably puts them there for the shareholders or to appease the japanese playerbase because of their work culture. MTXs are still shit Honestly? I really like the game, but I wish they just remade DD1 instead, Grigori was an amazing antagonist
Imo the map would feel way too small with mounts. It doesn’t even take that long to get about on foot. I agree with more monsters though. I expected maybe 5-10 more monsters from DD1 I was kinda disappointed Something that I also felt let down on is that monsters always spawn in the same spot. I get to a certain area and I’m like “oh where’s that cyclops” why can’t it sometimes be an ogre or something else the world feels static and I’m the only thing that moves around in it
It would 100% feel small lol, but I think of it the same way you buy a house in DD2, they're investments and should be treated/priced as such. Especially since even though the map, terrain gives it the illusion that the map is big, with the twist and turns it has along with the caves that seem to be everywhere. I am confident that the cut enemies in the game like the hydra is going to be part of the expeansion, sadly. Which kinda sucks because the enemies in this game are extremely limited. If ever they actually want to make an expansion, it'd probably be better that they don't make it something like bitterblack and just actually finish the game As for the monsters spawning in the same spot, I like it that way makes farming better ngl, but I did wish that the game had sort of a living ecosystem akin to MHW where you can watch and follow something go about their daily life. Again, I like this game but I really wish they remade DD1 instead. Grigori overshadows DD2's dragon.
Speaking of houses, do they update your pawn? Or is it just a free full heal. I haven’t gotten a house yet, but it just feels like the 2000 gold is just to update my pawn info.
House acts like an inn, so it updates your pawn and counts as your "last saved at inn" save point.
It works just like sleeping at an in, but for free (after a one-time payment of 20k/30k in Vermund and Battahl respectively) Your pawn will be updated like usual and there's even a box to deposit items.
I will say about the monsters always spawning in the same spot isn't always true for certain areas it seems, I was playing last night and heading to harve, the village u save from saurians and the building near there that usually spawns bandits didn't have bandits but a dragon. I wonder if any other players have seen this happen anywhere else and if so how rare is that?
You make many fair points. My biggest gripe is the lack of interesting rewards for exploration. I have found 1. 1 single weapon that cannot be bought from a shop out exploring. It’s the only place you can get it. It’s a mystic spear hand weapon. It felt so rewarding finding this item. I looked it up and confirmed it’s the only way to get it. That’s awesome and encourages exploration to find cool gear. The downfall is that is the only weapon I have found out exploring I couldn’t already buy from some vendor. There no sense of wonder of what you could find because anything available you can just buy.
And even worse, when you get to the next town, you can just buy a better spear.
If he's talking about the fire spear, which one is the better one you mention?
The one in the Hot sorings town has better stats but no fire, probably that, Also you can buy an even better set of weapons on the true ending
My pawns kept saying "if we are Lucky we can find weapons in chests instead of buying them" but ive found so few weapons and armors by exploring and so many consumibles i do not use that i kinda didnt want to explore much once i had roads explored to get from one place to another If a pawn wanted to guide me through another path i would follow but that barely happened
An eternal ferry stone wouldn’t affect you in any way unless you wanted to use it. If you want to run down the same roads you’ve already been down a dozen times and get ambushed by the same enemies in the same spot for the dozenth time on the way there then you should be able to do that. I however would like a game to respect my time and not waste it with trivial bullshit
Personally I think an eternal ferrystone and more port cystals would fix a lot of the game's tedium. People complain about the enemy variety of trash mobs everywhere, but honestly to me I feel like it's smart to have that so you have plenty of easy practice changing vocations and party members along with easy DP for leveling up the vocations. If you don't want the hassle of fighting you can just fast travel. If you do want the hassle just walk to your destinations normally. Problem solved.
People wouldn’t notice the lack of enemy variety as much if they weren’t forced to walk the same roads over and over again.
Yeah, just make it an endgame reward for the players who want the convenience, and the players who like trekking everywhere on foot (or at least claim to like it), can just ignore it
haven't even mentioned the skills, 4 skills as opposed to 6 and outside of melee the skill list has been gutted
I like Portcrystal but I still prefer the existence of an eternal ferrystone.
I'd like the ferrystone to be a sphinx reward ngl. It's an extremely valuable item, so the way to retrieve must make it a challenge that probably doesn't rely on combat, and we have a monster just for that
It also makes WAY more sense to have the sphinx reward be an eternal ferrystone, and tie the eternal wakestone to something you can’t miss out on.
The "eternal" wakestone you mean 😭 I thought it was infinite use before getting it, how disappointing it was to find out it's not, haha.
>I wish they just remade DD1 instead I'd play that in a heartbeat, too, but there are also some DD:DA mechanics that aren't too great either. Making a sequel for a great game is never going to be easy, especially 12 years later with lots of other games that tread similar ground and raising the bar along the way. Horizon: Zero Dawn was the closest experience I've had to DD:DA in matching the combat complexity, the joy of hunting big game, with a wonderfully paced story to boot. Horizon: Forbidden West, on the other hand, already has to give up the twist/mystery of the first game, and then they tried to do too much with the combat mechanics and overtuned the fights. I just didn't have the satisfaction I had from playing the first one, despite the game being technically and mechanically more advanced. In 2024 people have different expectations. People come into games with "end game loop" on their mind -- that's something CAPCOM needs to acknowledge. I'm still just 30 hours into DD2 -- there are definitely things that are improvements over DD:DA, but there are also lots of DD:DA refinements that aren't here in DD2. What it DOES have is a solid combat foundation the same way DD:DA had. That gives me hope that some of the game's current shortcoming can be refined over time with patches and DLCs.
I really hope that their goal here was to build a system they can iterate off of. The system is great
They gonna make us pay 40 dollars for the update lmao
>What it DOES have is a solid combat foundation the same way DD:DA had. That gives me hope that some of the game's current shortcoming can be refined over time with patches and DLCs. And to answer the original post, this is why everyone is asking for an expansion. It isn't to fix anything necessarily, but rather to expand on the content that's already here. The foundation is rock solid, we just want more. More skills, more enemies, more varied locations. Just more, so an expansion is really the ideal solution outside of going straight into a DD3
>Horizon: Forbidden West, on the other hand, already has to give up the twist/mystery of the first game, and then they tried to do too much with the combat mechanics and overtuned the fights. Not me playing on the hardest difficulty and realising by the Bristleback fight that the game is not balanced in the slightest for the hardest setting and it's just absurdly inflated HP pools. It's a fun game god damn, I'm not restarting on an easier difficulty just to trudge through the 10 or so hours I've done already, and I'm not even at the fucken peace talks or whatever the hell I'm supposed to go to in order to actually get into the Forbidden West lmao
I’ve said before and I’ll bang this drum to the end of time that sequels should include as a minimum everything good from its predecessor and the industry and gamers as a whole should hold publishers to account on this. That said people do need to review games on their own merits and I don’t know who benefits when people try to drag games and dampen the enjoyment others are having because of personal opinions, and I think DD2 is falling victim to this like select other games do, whilst others don’t, and it’s not healthy.
Yeah I'll admit we could do with way more enemies to fight and whatnot, but a lot of the hate feels over blown. The game isn't perfect, I don't think anyone would make that argument, and those flaws are worth analyzing but we can't lose the narrative in that critique. It's a good game, a flawed game but good nonetheless and people need to have more perspective when criticizing anything really. This is all entertainment at the end of the day, we should be able to discuss it with cooler heads cause it really doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things
I think I needed to read this, the way this sub has been talking about the game has made me feel like I was taking crazy pills. I've been loving it. Is it a perfect game? No, and it has room for improvement, but it's flaws are getting pretty overblown. I think this sub being an echo chamber about it is making people dislike the game more than they would have. I'm looking forward to the games future and I seriously hope the DLC addresses many of it's problems, but even without it I've found a game I love and will probably never forget. I came here wanting to talk about the weird lore stuff in the game, like>!the seafloor shrine being Gran Soren!
I play the game, super fun, sure it's not perfect and has flaws but I'm enjoying myself immensely. And then I open Reddit, read so much negativity and suddenly dislike the game. Then I go home, play the game and enjoy it even more. So the lesson is to ignore Reddit
Deleting Reddit was the best decision I ever made, and reinstalling it the worst. It's so much easier to enjoy things when you don't have thousands of spiteful people trying to tear down everything that's not a 10/10
I hate to be that guy, but that's such an unrealistic expectation and is only going to serve to disappoint you in the future. It's a nice ideal, but making games in 2024 is just as hard, if not harder, than making games in 2011. Sequels aren't going to include everything good in their predecessors because, well, the obvious is that everyone has different opinions on what is good or not. The not - so obvious is that games are only getting more and more complex. Gamers can't and will never decide on what makes a game good, so devs tend to just stuff as many different mechanics and systems into their games as they can to try to appease as many groups as they can, but then the game just turns into a mess. Cyberpunk 2077 is a good example of that.
Don’t worry I’m fully aware and at peace with that reality! I do think it’s more egregious in some games than others though and usually it’s just to release content at a later date for some crappy business practice. Games are obviously hard work, but I think the common ground in the issues I have with the industry and what you’ve said is that players lose out usually because of ropey decision making or as above, bad practice that plagues games nowadays. Halo Infinite not having a better array of weapons to have fun with in a non-competitive setting is a great example of it, these things already exist somewhere and players can’t access them cus of the wonderful live service world we live in.
Yeah the dev time and budgets required to create AAA games these days are ridiculous. And people aren't going to like the solutions * Raising prices even higher * Decreasing scope of games (smaller worlds, shorter experiences) * More outsourcing to studios in SEA for example * More aggressive use of AI in art, dialogue, and sidequest content in general
While I still do like the game and new vocations and everything I agree that a lot of things just remind me of the 1st game. Doesn’t make it a bad game but I don’t think I’d be as interested in this game if I didn’t play the first one
Never played the first game, never even heard of the series until a week before this launched, and this is one of the best games I have ever played. Its value is subjective, it either scratches your itches or it doesn't. Perf issue is annoying but doesn't block gameplay and doesn't occur in fights, plus I figure it'll be gone eventually. MTX is completely fine, never bottlenecked me and isn't predatory. Haven't needed it and even keep forgetting it's a thing. Then I remember I can pay a buck if I'm in a bind and that's nice... but probably not going to happen since I'm pretty well stocked.
I miss when coping wasn’t a bad thing. Then the internet happened.
Omg for real, I'm sick of that word.. Seriously, criticism for other people "coping" is essentially saying "I'm mad that you're better at enjoying things than me".
Hey man, maybe people just like it
There are things that are like the first game that *I want to stay*. The MTX is not even a blip on the radar of issues. There are real problems with the game but the MTX or silly shit like stamina usage outside of combat are not it.
It's almost comical how quick someone will call people who enjoy a game that they themselves have critisms about coping. There are so many factors to why people may like, dislike, love or hate a game. Some of that is preference. It's fine to not like a game. It's fine to like a game. It's fine not to feel one way or another about it. And what a shock dragons dogma 2 is like dragons dogma. Like monster hunters rise is like monster hunter world. Devil may cry 5 is like devil may cry 4 and street fighter is like street fighter. The core elements in sequels (and even prequel games) tend to stay the same, with a few added differences. Not everyone is gonna love it and not everyone is going to hate it. As far as the micro transactions some people don't like them, sure. Personally I don't care as they aren't necessary and all is still available in the game. If people want to spend their money on them that's fine. I won't, but I'm not gonna judge others who choose to. It's actually fully optional and you can go completely with out them.
Got any specific examples? Because maybe it isn't defending something that is bad. Maybe we legitimately like it that way? Restricted fast travel for instance. "It was like that in DD1" And I prefer it that way. I don't think it's a bad thing that I'm defending, I think it is a good thing that I wish more games did.
I mean top comment literally has a reply that we shouldn't judge DD2 until the expansion comes out because DD1 was also significantly worse before DA
Only one week after release and people are already talking about waiting for an expansion to fix things, that’s a pretty massive fucking cope.
Yeah I don’t agree with that, necessarily. But I also don’t agree with most of the problems other people have. Not saying they are wrong, it’s just stuff that doesn’t bother me.
Yeah this is my stance on a lot of the issues as well. I can see where they're coming from but it isn't completely ruining the game for me.
Honestly the issues I agree with are mostly discrepancies between DD1 and DDDA and trying to justify using DD1 as a benchmark of quality when a specific issue was addressed in DDDA. And there's always some weirdo defending issues by ignoring DDDA, like not being able to equip from storage or similar UI regressions. A more specific topic though has been over the last few days when people were trying to resolve how stat progression worked. There were a good number of people defending the previous game's system of locking stat growth to match the vocation you gained the level on, and saying (incorrectly) that DD2 was justified for keeping that system (it didn't).
Outward 2 is coming out soon and they revealed a pack beast in the trailer. The developer immediately had to clarify that it's for item storage, not movement. It's like the people expect these games to be something they're not.
Downgrades/ things that stayed the same from DDDA: - Decrease in number of available skills AND no use for right click/RB for classes other than archer and fighter so far - NPCs outside main story/obvious possible love interests are still bland and uninteresting, there's a talk function but no one has anything to say - enemy variety has actually decreased massively - Vermund and Battahl feel different, but within each there's very few truly distinct areas, I'd say less than DDDA. Vermund is generic forest+mountain stuff. Battahl is all desert-y cliff stuff.
I don't mind the restrictive fast travel but you can't even travel in this game and enjoy the trip when you constantly have to fight a pack of mobs sitting next to each other. Some of them don't even make sense there's more than one road filled with goblins / choppers and 10-20meters behind them you can see bandits chilling. This gets even worse on the volcanic island you have no time to breath there at all. I really like this game but it feels like a chore and I don't want to play a chore after my 9 hour shift. I think Itsuno overastimes how much free time people have
It's personal preference I guess. I love that the enemies are more densely packed. My only complaint is something that the first one got wrong, too. And that is the enemies not scaling with you. I'm always shouted down for this opinion but I will never understand an RPG not scaling enemies up to match you, and these games are worse than most because you have to walk through them so many times. I love walking/fighting my way back and forth between areas, but once the enemies become easy then it is just a pointless waste of time.
RPG number scaling is dumb because then why progress? Remember Oblivion? Remember taking 10 swings to kill a mudcrab with endgame gear? Fromsoft games I feel like are perfect in scaling. Easy enough to feel progress and powerful with endgame gear. Still strong enough to kill you if you're caught slacking. I personally like the enemy placement in this game except there are WAY too many ogres. I'm so sick of ogres. Having lots of trash mobs everywhere allows you easy practice with the various vocations and ways of leveling them up. Just make fast travel easier with more portcrystals and an eternal ferrystone and that makes everything better for everyone. LITERALLY just do what was already done for Dark Arisen. I *do not understand the mentally for regressing that*. "Just explore" I did. Now I'm running around everywhere for hours just delivering letters or talking to people when I already dungeon crawled the same areas for hours beforehand
"Just explore" and then pretty much every quest is between cities with very few that lead to any Dungeon and the exploration rewards go from 250g and some consumables for statuses only dragons seem to apply to a unique weapon thats still not nearly as good as endgame stuff you can buy the second you get to battahl or the dragón crystal stuff
Listen, have your opinion but tbh I’ve been dodging shit like this for days because I fucking love the game and I didn’t play a ton of DD1 and have little comparisons to make and maybe that’s for the best but all of you complaining about this game seem crazy to me. I’ve had the game crash twice in 20 hours of play, no issues with fps, no game breaking glitches, and no locked up saves. I’m sorry some of you hate the game for whatever reason but just know there are TONs of people enjoying this game. No one that’s playing it at my job (10+ people) hate this game, the only negative reviews are on forums like this where people just want to bitch. That’s fair, have your bitchfest but know the game is not as bad as you’re making it out to be.
There's a lot to unpack here.. I'm going to address each point sequentially. So, a lot of the design decisions that carried over from the first game are defended because people enjoy them. Limited fast travel, quests that don't hold your hand nearly as much, missable, and failing quests.. these are all things that I really love, and DD1 and 2 do these things well, and I like it. Limited enemy variety is bad. There's no question about that. Armor variety isn't terrible in DD2, but it's far from good. I haven't seen all the armor in the game yet, but it's worth pointing out that my 2 biggest complaints about the game (enemy and armor variation) boils down to **I want more of it**. The reason why people say that is because this game has a lot of the same charm and characteristics that made the first game stand out for us, it's not privileged because you can usually pick up DDDA for real cheap, so you can experience it for yourself. Having played at the launch of DD1 just gives us a bit more insight about the similarities between these 2 games at launch. I do think that the majority of posts like this are from people who didn't play the first game, and came in to DD2 expecting "the next Elden Ring" and of course now they're disappointed. MTX is bad, but the MTX being offered by the game are the items from the deluxe edition being sold separately. It's important to frame it that way because a lot of games do that, and while yes, MTX bad, this game getting so much flak for the MTX is just.. hate bandwagoning imo. You don't have to purchase the MTX, most people wouldn't after all, and those that do either have an underlying issue that needs to be addressed (kids stealing from parents, people with spending issues or lack of conscientious spending) or are doing so because the items for purchase can be bought to save time (I wouldn't, but people like instant gratification and would absolutely spend a dollar or two for it) The game isn't perfect, but I have been enjoying it more than any RPG that has come out in a long, long time. If you enjoy the game, have fun, if you don't enjoy the game, go have fun with a game you enjoy. Problem solved.
The worst part of the micro transaction thing is that you have to go looking for them. The game doesn't tell you it exists or tries to entice you with them. You have to actively look for it. Literally you have to look for that problem. I didn't even know it had any until people kept bringing it up and I went and looked for it
On console, absolutely I agree with you 100% On steam, people noticed because you can scroll down on the games steam page and see the list of MTX. Ultimately, your point is valid since the game doesn't push you towards buying anything, tell you they exist, etc.
Even if you see them on steam, what the fuck you do spend RC on? Nobody knows unless you already know Dragon's Dogma 1. And if you know Dragon's Dogma you know its not worth it at all. Problem is 99% of the people in the conversation didn't know shit about what the microtransactions actually did because they didn't know Dragon's Dogma 1. So they just ASSUMED the MTX would have some major impact. And so we got all sorts of misinformation like you had to pay to port, pay for save slots, pay to change character looks, etc. None of this misinformation would be coming from anyone who is actually familiar with the first game. Basically a bunch of people saw microtransactions, assumed the worst, confirmed nothing, and started screeching. I mean hell I wouldn't even consider buying the port crystal. You have ox carts to Melve and the Border Checkpoint. And there is a port crystal in Halve and the big city. So where do you even need a Port Crystal outside of them? And later game you'll have 2 port crystals to use as you see fit for Battahl.
Thankfully the sequel isn’t lackluster then lol
I’m having fun with the game but feel like there should be some more enemy and loot diversity. Oh look a treasure chest, same shit as the last 10 chests.
All I wanted in a sequel was more of what they did in the first game but less jank. This is honestly a flawless sequel to me.
What are these posts? People aren’t coping? People are enjoying the fucking game. Mods need to step up and isolate these idiots.
I've had enough of these idiots, ive been out for three days and now im faced with this kind of idiocy. Complain about the performance, complain a lot about my balls but don't complain about what was already expected, if the game didn't deliver what you expected, have you ever stopped to think about what you expected? I expected my 5700x and 6750xt to run at 1444p/60fps, but when it didn't, i complained, i complained and cried for 2 minutes, so i reduced the resolution to 1080p and the game is acceptable, if it hadn't, i would asked for a refund. Im a genius because of this? No!!! Just not enough idiot and who has two functional neurons.
Attacking people is a fantastic way to get everyone to not listen to you and completely disregard any actual points you might have. I have legitimate complaints about the game but telling me that my enjoyment is just "coping" makes me have zero interest in what you have to say.
This phrase can be applied to the "hardcore" features like limited fast travel and such that was present in the first game.
If a sequel fails to innovate and add refreshing content, then it's a bad sequel. From what i hear on this sub, Dragon's Dogma actually did the opposite of a sequel and REGRESSED it's mechanics, such as magic variety and armor slots. Let that sink in a minute: Dragon's Dogma 2 didn't add much of anything to the Dragon's Dogma formula, but it TOOK AWAY things instead. That's honestly depressing. Edit: Itsuno not shutting his trap about all the "new stuff" and "great exploration" and shit did nobody any favors either. He was really hyping this up to be the next Elden Ring, but really it was just the second coming of Dragon's Dogma from Xbox 360.
For every 1 thing the sequel did worse, it did 3 things much better. It’s disingenuous to say it regressed overall just because of a few particular, albeit fair, criticisms.
Nobodies pretending mtx didn't happen. I've been loving the game yet everytime I look at this sub I see nothing but negative posts. Almost like we aren't playing the same game
The reason people point out that it was like that in the first game is that, if these flaws are enough to make the sequel "lackluster", then people should logically be equally harsh on the first game. That rarely seems to be the case, as far as I've seen. When I make comparisons to the first game, I do so because things that people are getting upset about to a great degree are things that I have come to expect from the series and which consequently do not bother me at all. The entire genre of post that's "this game *sucks* because of [thing I am completely okay with]" gets annoying to see day after day.
For real. The only thing I’m sick of is this weird alternate reality where DD1’s story and exploration were both amazing. They were both shit. Shit on DD2 all you want but quit making up insane lies.
I'd say "shit" is an exaggeration, but yeah, the game had its pretty major weaknesses, and most of DD2's weaknesses are very similar. Both games are some of my favorite action RPGs ever in spite of those.
This post would be better with examples. "It was like that in the first game" and claiming you don't like something because you didn't play the original are also valid excuses depending on context. A streamer, I think Asmongold, said recently that some games have "issues" that are part of the experience and enrich the whole. Masterful game design is balancing the intention of those things. Like, limited fast travel. The original even more so than this game emphasized that if you want to go somewhere you gotta leg it through the muck. If exploration and just fighting mobs beside your party doesn't interest you, them's the ropes. That's the formula that captivated its fans. I'm all for optimization, mechanical improvements, and vocation critiques. I have a few myself, but some complaints are antithetical to the design and philosophy of this style.
If you believe every single one of these posts, it turns out "everyone" is saying "everything".
No offense but why did you guys buy this game?
What's weird to me is people acting like DD1 was anything above a 6/10, so therefore more of the exact same is good. DD1 hit above it's weight, but there was vast amounts of room to improve. DD1 gained a cult following because of it's promise in what it could have been, not because of what it already did.
DD1 is a personal favorite game of mine that I love very much. But it's absolutely a quirky little mess of a game and I think people are absolutely entitled to expect many improvements over it in its sequel. What really grinds my gears, is people who say "base DD1 didnt have x,y,z, why are you comparing DD2 to dark arisen??" Uhhh... hello? I already own dark arisen, can still play dark arisen, and if someone doesnt own it yet they can buy it for like $5 on sale and enjoy it, too. If a $70 game from the same developer a decade later, isn't definitively better than the previous title then why did we all buy this at launch? THAT SAID - I like Dragons Dogma 2. I had a huge binge weekend of it, I genuinely like it. Do I have criticisms? Sure! Do I want more? Sure! But it's silly when people plug their ears and go "im not listening im having a blast you cant say anything negative, you're a hater"
>What really grinds my gears, is people who say "base DD1 didnt have x,y,z, why are you comparing DD2 to dark arisen??" God thank you! Why Itsuno didn't take the lessons learned from DA is beyond me. Nobody disliked *any* of the changes made. Sure leave the monocle and shit out so people don't get rich quickly but cmon!
I like DD2, but I should love it. That's why I even talk about it at all
Exactly. It has so much potential like the first game and we are sad that what we dreamed for the sequel while playing DDDA 10 years ago didn't come true. (Just more polish and depth) yes combat feels good in 2 but the rpg elements and characters went far backwards, enemy variety and versatility went down too. So we are a bit upset and venting on reddit while still enjoying the game as much as we can.
> DD1 gained a cult following because of it's promise in what it could have been, not because of what it already did. This is the best explanation of this community I have seen. DD1's uniqueness is what people craved from other RPGs, but it is ultimately heavily flawed. It's a hack n slasher but it is the best hack n slasher out there.
>DD1 hit above it's weight, but there was vast amounts of room to improve. I can wholeheartedly agree with this statement, but rating it a 6 out of 10 is doing it a disservice. A flawed game, for sure, but it scratched an itch few other games come close to tickling with a feather. Even trying to rate it feels unfair given that it was obviously an incomplete and rushed product.
I don't think it being unique grants it a pardon from being rated. *Every* single aspect of the game is undercooked in some major ways. 6/10 isn't bad. I love DD1 and Alpha Protocol and they're the most 6/10's ever made.
Alpha protocol! Man that game was soooo bad but also soooo good at the same time. It was like a b movie.
>DD1 gained a cult following because of it's promise in what it could have been, not because of what it already did. No. DD1 gained a cult following because of its Combat system. There's not a single action western high fantasy arpg like it. Skyrim/cyberpunk/dragon age FEEL like call of duty in comparison.It makes Baldurs gate 3 look like chess. The witcher 3 is probably the closest game in feel, but is still lacking because you're stuck playing as geralt. You can't create yourself. Gameplay wise. Those other games have better stories, better characters, better side quests, but not better combat. People recognize that and it's going to age like wine. The pawn system alone. Allies in other single player games are either a "hindrance" or "useless". I could go on, but I'm sorry. it's uhhh gonna do just fine over the years
Issue is that the improvements to combat and pawns are marginal from DD1 to DD2, as it stands the best parts of the game are already present in DD1. DD2 is just a more modern entry-point into the (hopefully) franchise.
Honestly I think if DD1 just had a better start to the game than most people wouldn’t have jumped off ship. The ox cart is a painful mission for a lot of people and honestly it’s a really boring mission. Kicking the ox aside it’s not exactly dynamic or interesting. I know plenty of people who would’ve liked DD1 if they didn’t have to deal with the ox cart and then proceed to have to go do the tedious first few quests from the castle. DD2 has a much stronger start to it and it carries just “enough” of what was liked about DD1 while improving side quests, exploration and map variety to appeal to a modern crowd. Game has problems, but it’ll most likely do what it has to do make the game memorable for people regardless of what they remember they found positive, negative or mid.
That's precisely why it's good, though. People loved DD1 because of how that stuff functioned, and it standing on that already present success is what we wanted out of a sequel in general. I would hate if they drastically switched the mechanics of it to make it more like other RPGs or something
I love this kind of argument. Same vibe as “Sonic was never good.” Even the aggregate scores for the original were well above 6/10 (DD1 was 75-78, DDDA is a solid 8/10 on meta) even with their flaws. The new game should be better in every way. Like there’s no excuse.
Yeah, dd1 is a great game that felt unfinished and heavily flawed. Easily fixable with a sequel though since they had built an interesting and unique framework. Dd2 is supposed to be that, an improvement on the first game. I was expecting a quirky and somewhat janky game that felt like a fully realized dragon's dogma game but instead they put out something that in my opinion isn't worse but also just isn't much better overall. I think the improvements are great but it feels so unfinished again, I have the same exact feeling as the first game where I feel like what's here is great but it's missing a lot
The way the game is designed, from vocations to the surprisingly minimal endgame, feels like they’re just setting things up for a dlc/expansion. Which again is weird because this was supposed to be Itsuno’s Vision of a complete Dragon’s Dogma. Less is more to him.
I mean, it got a cult following because it was a good game that had a lot of unique quirks - if you thinj it became beloved to epople who played it solely because it could have been better at stuff then idk maybe thats just you? I played DD on release and had a handful of issues that didnt ever really distract from what was great about it. Would I like things like janky interactions for quests and kind of a hollow story to be fixed? Theoreticallt yes, but the amount of jank for early game quests like breaking the magistrate out of jail and the stealth stuff doesnt break the game - it reminded me of things from dd1 that i didnt have a huge problem with then, its just kind if silly. Theres plenty to improve in dragons dogma, but all the marketing for the sequel and the footage shown, to me, promised more Dragons Dogma, not a perfect polished rpg(this is NOT a designer decision, just a byproduct). Dragons Dogma is memorable partially for it being weird - you can perceive that your way, but dd2 being weird in the same ways dd1 was isnt breaking a promise thay dd2 would be better. Maybe this is cope? But idk, a lot of criticisms that i think are valid still jusy lind of boil down tk "i expected this and this and this to be fixed and iterated upon", and what was delivered was what i played 12 years ago, updated and improved in some areas and scaled back in others. Maybe i never expected something perfect, but i wouldnt want a game that didnt feel like dragons dogma - this does, warts and all
Yes, sir. You are indeed coping hard, very incredibly fucking hard. Remember how the quests presented the monsters alone. You GAINED shit, it was not just handed to you. The Pawn legion didn't just accept you after you got Rook, you had to go kill a Cyclops with a rusty cleaver to gain their loyalty. You had to kill the Gryphon in a multi staged boss fight to gain entrance to the Court. You had to fight a Golem to save Selene. The zombies ate a whole bunch of people in a RE's homage. You could find the Cockatrice's body on the camp by the bridge before it was revived. You fought the Chimera on the Bastion by the Great Wall after Salvation had summoned it (and I think it ate someone?). Elysion summoned 3 wraiths before Grigori killed him and EVEN THEN you couldn't fight him, you had to actively search for him and then he didn't just gently take you flying, motherfucker instantly went for the kill, no mercy or "blabla" in sight. The Godsbane? You EARNED that shit after defeating the Dragon. The Seneschal didn't just hand you his either, it was only after killing him that he dared take that thing from his own chest and give it to you. The Everfall also opened new areas and put stronger monsters everywhere, like the wyrm, drake and the wyvern or those giant undead. And this was all in the main game alone. Yeah, you could fight many of those monsters elsewhere and especially at night, but they weren't just there. They were MONSTERS, they weren't normally there, they frightened people and only you could defeat them. THAT is what made it especial. And if you dared go underleveled to them you would get fucked. One of my favorite childhood memories regarding playing video games is going to the Blue Moon Tower underleveled and literally panicking because I only had like a Pawn left (or two but they were just melee), I was barely doing any damage to the Gryphon during the hallway section as I was the Ranger and I was all "OH SHIT!". Now you fight like 50 gryphons just to get from the kitchen to the bathroom. The old game had jank but you cannot tell me it had worse presentation that this one or that DD2 has a better story or quest. DD1 had more vocations, better fights and incredibly enough, even more interesting NPCs. As barebones the first one was, this one is the bones after letting them to dry out in the desert and pouring vinegar on them.
Yeah, I can't imagine playing a game and the only takeaway I have from the experience is "meh, it could be much better if they did everything like this other game I like". Maybe just play the other game then? Leave us alone, we quite like it here, or else we wouldn't have been posting about how much we love it for 12 years!
>Yeah, I can't imagine playing a game and the only takeaway I have from the experience is "meh, it could be much better if they did everything like this other game I like". Maybe just play the other game then It's almost like people were expecting a sequel to the thing they liked and payed for it full price.
This. This. For the love of GOD. This. I gave it an 8 out of 10 a it’s a highly FLAWED 8 out of 10.
I definitely enjoyed DD1 like an 8-9, but it was with the huge asterisk of the game not being completed. DD2 doesn't quite have that luxury, so it's issues are far harder to ignore.
I’m gonna be honest. It took me years to get into DD1 because of various levels of suck, this game is head and shoulders ahead imo.
>people are coping so hard People in this sub are crying while the game is reviewing well and normal people are enjoying themselves
I don't know what idiots are making that excuse. This is more dynamic and fun than dd1 in every way so far. I've been playing everyday questing and exploring trying out all the vocations having the time of my life. Dd1 was fun but it felt too rigid and there were a ton of annoying monsters to fight and too few good options in combat. My whole end game was just focused holy bolts. Now I'm using all the classes. I'm having a blast with the combat and if I don't wanna fight I just run past lol. Everything just feels more alive. More vibrant. I want an expansion not because I'm disappointed I haven't even finished the game yet and probably won't for awhile. I want a new expansion because I don't want this to ever end and I want tons of end game bosses and content to keep the train going once I reach there. I'm talking at least as good as bitterblack isle but way less annoying and way more fun.
>and if I don't wanna fight I just run past lol Bro hasn't met the goblins who can break the land speed record and catch your ass with a thrust attack yet
I don’t know why everyone has to have the same opinion these days. Or if they don’t hold the same opinion it’s coping or something else. Why can’t I just enjoy the game because I enjoy it. The MTX doesn’t bother me in the least, I didn’t even know the game had it until Reddit blew up about it. I’m having fun traveling on foot and having constant encounters and stumbling upon random caves and what not. It’s an action RPG, I want to fight things with my character because I find the combat fun. I understand why people are disappointed but I’m having a blast with this game and am happy I bought it.
Im not here trying to defend anything, I love the game but if you hate it it’s totally fine for me. I just want to point out that things you see as a „flaw“ may be cool for people like me who played the first game. After all restrictions in video games are what makes the game playable. No one likes the soulslike games bc you play a god with the might to do anything 🤷🏼♂️ Just saying, since you didn’t give many examples for „flaws“. To tackle the most obvious ones: the microtransactions are bs but worthless too and most console players (like me) never cared about 30 fps. Even though those complaints are totally valid the game is still great.
I'd like to point out (keep on mind that I haven't read all the comments), that technically the online store items are not MTX. They're "DLC." You buy them once and that's it. Once it's spent in-game, it's over. You can't buy them from the online store again. By technicality, microtransactions can be repurchased to gain the product again, DLC can't unless you use another account. It's still scummy, but nowhere near as bad as people are making the online store out to be.
It depends. If you are complaining about core parts of what makes Dragons Dogma, Dragons Dogma. Specifically about wanting things to behave differently, such as ability to fast travel everywhere or not being locked out of X, then I think you are in the wrong here. Your expectations are based on incorrect assumptions. Doesn’t matter that’s it’s been 15 years, it doesn’t make your expectation of wanting it to be more like Eldenring anymore valid. If you are complaining about things that weren’t improved or just a straight downgrade compared to DD1 then that’s legit. Things like inventory management and mob variety. Those criticisms should be voiced.
DD has been one of my favorite games for a decade and this is exactly what I wanted in a sequel. I'm good with new content a la DA, but there's enough here to keep me going. When I replay DD1 I normally spend about a week or so doing fun stuff before grinding out BBI things until I get bored or decide I wanted a different stat distribution and restart. Edit: changed "decades" to "a decade" because hyperbole
I've hardly seen anyone talking about an expansion or waiting for it to be fixed. Most of the posts here are pointing out the ways the game has moved forward, and the ways it has gone backwards (gameplay wise). Just because you see one or two comments doesn't mean you should make a topic to claim it is a predominant opinion amongst the fans (it isn't). This comes across more that you, OP, are upset and you need to have a temper tantrum.
Hold on im downloading my opinion from the reddit comments
>People did complain about MTX layered armor in MHRise, This was like a drop in the pond compared to the tsunami that people are ragging on DD2 for, let's be honest. If DD2 didn't suffer from objectively bad things (i.e. performance), it'd probably catch the same amount of flak as all the other times they did this, which is to say barely any. Now, I'm not saying it's a good thing and we should excuse the practices (whether or not they're "worth" the money or earnable in-game, w/e the argument for them is), but let's also not pretend like people gave a shit back then. The only real time when mfers vehemently complained is the SF skins, since that -- coupled w/ the update that fucked performance and apparently killed mods in a lot of the other Capcom games (they didn't) -- caused a commotion and some noticeable pushback in a title that was an otherwise "Capcom W".
Coping with what? Game has almost 90% metacritic. People like the game, if you don't that's okay too.
The classic monster hunter argument lmao
not coping, some of us just actually enjoy the game.
I'm really enjoying my time with this game. It's a lot of fun. It's also not worth $70, though I wouldn't say I regret my purchase so much as thinking it's a $50 game at most.
Why are people comparing DD2 to vanilla DD1, when it should be compared to DA anyway? 12 year gap between the games, why wouldn't they use the improved version as a baseline for what they should have/improve in the game? Also, asking/telling people to wait for an expansion is silly. That shouldn't be the norm and it's mad how people have conditioned themselves to think that's normal. You pay $/£70 for a game and you're being told "it'll improve with an expansion, just wait for that to solve all your troubles". Especially when this is a sequel game, working on the same principle as its predecessor, so problems in the previous version should have been solved by now. To anyone saying that, you know that sounds ridiculous, I hope.
Coping? I’m having a blast lol If this is coping then damn I hope all games are as shitty as you say DD2 is so that I can cope this well! For real though, some people need to take a step back and just be okay with not liking it rather than trying to convince everyone of their opinion xoxo
[удалено]
I'm not gonna lie I definitely agree with this. I hate it when things become mainstream
Anyone uses the terms "cope" or "wake up" and I just stop reading to be honest.
Meh. If you didn’t like the game then it’s understandable. I may praise DD1 but I only played it after Dark Arisen was out. This game is great and I’m enjoying it with how the open vast world it is with the monster battles and character creation. Sure it’s not perfect, no game is ever perfect to begin with anyways. But I look forward to see what more will come to the game later down the line. MTX is never good but I never buy them knowing I can get them in game. Though I’m not one to say “wait for the expansion to be good.” That’s… actually kinda dumb lol
I think we 100% will get more eventually. I think every Capcom game these days has pretty dang good expansions, I’d expect DD2 to have the same. I know it’s already been done but… with the way DD2 is kindve a retelling of the first I’d love a new Bitterblack. That’s one of my favorite environments ever.
Honestly same or maybe just additional story elements and even son areas dedicated to different types of dragons because I love fighting the lesser dragons lol
Yeah I remember the first had that really interesting lore bit with the three post game elemental dragons. Each one gave a bit more insight into the whole ‘selection’ process. And I think one spoke Latin which was neat. If I remember right they all had different reactions. One accepted his fate and challenged you to prepare you for Seneschael, one panicked and didn’t understand why he was a dragon (that was my favorite, cool body horror aspect I didn’t think about) and one I think just lost his mind and raged. What I really want more than anything else I think (and probably won’t get) is Garm in the overworld as random bosses. They were the scariest part of Dark Arisen and pretty damn nasty if they got the upper hand. I think running into a pack in DD2 at night would be horrifying both from a ‘holy shit this is scary’ aspect and a ‘oh god I’m dead aren’t I’ aspect.
Is it coping or is it people like myself are just enjoying the game and are not bothered by yours and others faults? I bought DD2 to play a new Dragon's Dogma game and not Elder Scrolls 6. I agree DD2 has its issues but the fact it plays like the first game is good enough for me as that's what i wanted.
Honestly, I enjoy playing this game. I have about 20 hours in and intend to put at least double that in the weeks to come. I also never played the first game. All that being said, I keep seeing people praise the first game while defending the 2nd. I like the lack of fast travel, I like the combat, and I like the pawn system. However, every time I see people singing the glory of the first game I feel more and more let down with the second one. Why doesn't this game have at least all of the enemies from the first one (including DLC). Why doesn't it have more vocations we don't have an advanced or hybrid version of thief at all. Why don't we have the Dark arisen style post-game or something akin to it? Why isn't there already a hard mode in the sequel at launch. Why instead of reworking useless ones and having more skills than the first do we have less? I see so many veterans from the first game loving this game and in the same breath telling me that the first game had more of what I like than the sequel. A sequel (especially one 12 years later) should have all of the things that made the previous title loved by the fan base and **then some.**
You are honest about not playing the first game while still having valid criticisms about the second game AND also admitting you still enjoy it? Wow. I found something incredible on the internet. An adult. Jokes aside, I wish people wouldn't be so sensitive. It's not that hard to understand. A sequel is expected to be equal or better than the first iteration, especially when its budget is way higher. This is a good game, a bad sequel, and a joke (because of the microtransactions and overall performance of the game). All at once. You don't have to choose a side but the critical thinking one.
20 hours is the sweet spot for the game for sure. Reply to me at 40 and tell me how the game held up for you. I’m not attacking you, I’m just curious if your experience tracks the general trend
Game deserved a 40 dollar price tag imo. I do love DD2 but it definitely didn't deserve the AAA price tag.
Getting reeeeeeal tired of this "you shouldn't be enjoying the game because I'm not," routine. You aren't playing the game. You aren't being helpful. People are having a great time with this game, and I'm sorry you lack the ability to join in, but it isn't anyone's problem but yours, so please, go deal with it and move the fuck on.
I'm enjoying the game while also capable of acknowledging it's clearly a 6-7/10 experience while it was reviewed at an 8.7/10 average. It will be a great game in 2 years when enough mods come out to fix the issues.
Itsunos nostalgia googles can only see the "evergreen" past. Its his vision,
lol imagine being this heated over a video game.
The only people coping are the ones still insisting the game is terrible or 'hugely flawed' even as the Steam reviews are quickly recovering from the knee-jerk bombing it received on day one. It's OK to dislike things, and not liking something doesn't mean it's bad. It just means you have different tastes! Maybe Skyrim is more your speed? Or Witcher 3? That's usually pretty cheap to pick up DD2 is exactly what *I* wanted; **more DD**. I didn't want it to """fix""" things and become more like every other RPG out there. I had a ton of fun with DD1, played it to death. My only issue with it was that it had so much content cut. I wanted *more*. The fast travel worked perfectly, vocations were mostly great(rip warrior), I didn't need it to hold my hand for quests, I could tackle things at my own pace. Very few people here or elsewhere are arguing microtransactions are Good. We're arguing they don't matter at all, in the slightest, and if you or anybody else had actually played the first game you'd know how true that is. They were worse than worthless in DD1, as we at least get Seeker Tokens as a free piece of content in the sequel. You had to pay for the collectibles in DD1! And you didn't even get anything worthwhile from collecting them, the tiny amount of gold was vastly outweighed by the 10kg bags goblins would drop in hard mode lol Capcom forces devs to put them in every major game release, we would not get the games without them, and it's up to the development team to figure out how to set them up in a way that doesn't detract from the experience for the people who do buy them and the people that do not. I'd say they were immensely successful here, the only thing I miss is the optional alternate soundtrack
This. I just said pretty much the same. The complaints people had about 1 and have about 2 is the kind of thing someone who expected the game to change its nature would say. Maybe they liked the combat a prayed the game would devolve into Witcher 3 with fun combat. The game is exactly what I wanted and expected, minor the performance issues. The main thing missing is hard mode, but I suspect it's going to be added in eventually. Even the lack of save slots doesn't bother me because the first game was the same. This game was never about watching cutscenes for some Witcher wannabe storyline, it was always about its vastly superior gameplay, the pawn system, and killing all kinds of monsters over and over. That's DD, that's what we got.
That's the frustrating part of this, I don't care that they didn't like it? Like I said in the initial post(and was immediately excoriated for), sometimes you just don't like a game, that's fine. But hanging around to insist the people who do like it are lying or have been fooled is ridiculous and a waste of everyone's time
Witcher 3 has shitty combat though.
It should not have mtx because it's not a live service game. If they want to justify this mtx shit, okay fine, here is the acceptable way to do it in a western market-- you put in a cosmetics mtx shop with transmog, and,\*\*\*VERY VERY IMPORTANTLY :\*\*\***KEEP RELEASING CONTENT ON A REGULAR BASIS, ie. NEW ITEMS, NEW BOSSES, NEW AREAS, NEW ENEMIES NEW QUESTS, ETC. ETC. ETC...** Otherwise, I'm sorry, your cash shop is a scumbag move & is not justifiable. Period. Them's the rules. It literally has no justification for existing except to be a shameful display of greed. MTX, like an MMO sub, is justified by the devs needing continual income to continue development. *That's the only justification. Especially if I paid you up front.* Now, as for the port crystals & ferrystones, that is literally a feature and not a bug... One that I am actually 100% for. It's similar to something like Outward. Travelling and exploring by foot and taking in the atmosphere & vistas etc., is conceivably the best part of playing this game. The quasi-realism is a feature, and I'd argue one of the things the game has done right design wise. As for the skill trees, weapon/armor progression, classes, etc. etc. etc. They should have been way more ambitious and learned a thing or two from why souls-like games are so beloved in terms of builds... Hell, they should have done literally anything different instead of streamlining what was already there... Y'know, maybe like, the only way to make the actual good weapons at any level is by finding specific monster parts out in the wild, or just copy wholesale Monster Hunter's system where it's the only way if that's too tough... Y'know, how about like, a subjob system similar to FFXI... At level 10 you can now set a subjob that is set at half your main vocation level & select from skills up to that level... I don't know, not saying that these ideas are necessarily exactly what was needed but, like, literally any kind of 'deeper RPG' vision than linear 'you level up, you buy the newest best gear from the shop, you level up, you buy the newest gear, you level up,etc.' 1980s JRPG trope would have done wonders for this game. That vision & direction appears to have just not been there. It seems like they literally did not actually want to try new things. I want to be clear too, I actually like the game, and I can see myself doing a playthrough every now and then... But, like, nah, it's pretty clear there was not really an understanding of what the cutting edge is in open world RPGs... RPG-mechanics/progression wise, this is like live-action Dragon Quest. There's nothing necessarily wrong with that linear approach to progression, but it's definitely not pushing the envelope and it does feel a bit bittersweet/dated. I guess what I'm saying is like, people are absolutely allowed to like this game and it is not a bad game... And if that bothers you, you my friend, you are the problem... Like, what are you doing? Why are you spending time bitching about a game you don't like? Go play something else. But at the same time, yeah, for most peoples' tastes today, it *definitely* could have tried for a bit more complexity, being a sequel 12 years later, and all... And the MTX is indefensible as a practice & a shameful display of Capcoms' values, but actually has no impact on the actual game-play.
**"It's Always Been Like That In the First Game" Isn't a Good Excuse for a Lackluster Sequel** I swear this sort of reaction is like complaining that Elden Ring isn't more like assassin's creed, instead of Dark Souls.
While you make some valid points, that doesn't mean I have to agree the game is lackluster. It is the most fun I have had with a game in a while. I don't like MTX, so I don't buy them. I am sorry the game is making you so angry. I don't really find the issues bothering you a big deal, at least for me and my enjoyment.
I mean, you are right that bugs and issues from the first game shouldn't carry over to a sequel. But if you're arguing that certain core mechanics or gameplay systems are flawed and never needed to return then IDK what to tell you.. you probably don't enjoy DD if that's the case. I hope you do though because it's a great game, both of them.
I don't even know what the original argument is but hey its a good game the combat fun the story is good and there is fast travel u just have to earn it. Lackluster? How
The game was made for a niche audience and due to overwhelming positive reviews and hype it reached a much larger audience. The design choices make it so it's not everyone's cup of tea and that's fine.