Capcom’s Dragon’s Dogma could be describes as a Japanese Elder Scrolls. The development team behind it are comprised of some of the best game makers Japan currently has, and the scope of the game is quite ambitious. It has elements of Monster Hunter, Shadows of the Colossus, and of course the Elder Scrolls series, and if you like those games you’ll really enjoy Dragon’s Dogma.

Unfortunately I don’t any longer. Mostly because I don’t have the time to play huge, open ended games any more. Sure, I can make time for them, and tried with DD, but they’ve got to grab me immediately, and DD fails to do this. On top of that, there are a few things which let the game down, including the graphics, the constant chatter of the NPCs, to the tedious grind.

The story of Dragon’s Dogma is fairly interesting. It starts off with a dragon appearing, set on tormenting the province of Gransys, and after creating your character through the incredibly robust character generator, you stand up to the dragon, only to have your heart devoured and then come back as the Arisen. From here on in though, the story gets a little lost, and like other massive RPGs you’ll get bogged down in so many quests and side activities, it’s hard to focus on what you’re meant to be doing. The world you’re in isn’t radically different to any other world you’ve visited in RPGs, and I found it rather boring, to be honest.

During character creation you can choose from three classes, as such – Magic User, Bow User, or Melee user. Whilst the tutorial tells you the basics of how to play the game, it doesn’t give you a feel for the game overall. I don’t particularly like handholding in games, but here it’s unfocussed and only tells you the very basics of how to play. It doesn’t, for example, tell you that you can branch out and change your class relatively early in the game, and gives no hints to where to do this. I stumbled upon it by accident.

Something which really put me off was the graphics. I’m a rare person who thinks realism in games should be secondary to the gameplay, but even I balked at the seriously ugly graphics. I realise no sprawling, open world, go anywhere game can match the graphical fidelity of tightly polished arena shooters for example, but here feels positively last gen. Textures are very basic, the poly counts on models are quite low, framerate is really low, draw distance isn’t great, and everything seems to blend into everything else because of the poor lighting. The animations on the models are also really bad, especially when they’re talking to others.

The game features an upgrading system for weapons and equipment. Like the Elder Scrolls, the land you explore is full of stuff you can pick up. Some of it is lying in the world, others can be found by killing monsters. You can combine these to make better items such as better health potions, better weapons, and unique buffs. Many of the items can be gifted to NPCs to make them think better of you so they give you discounts and better information about quests.

One really cool thing about DD is the NPC system. These Pawns as they refer to themselves follow you around, fight for you, pick up items you may have missed, and tell you tactics on how to fight monsters and hints on where to go in missions. You get to create your first pawn much in the same way you make your character, and you can equip them in the same manner you equip yourself. Where it becomes really cool is when you aren’t playing the game. The game connects to other people, and when you’re offline your pawn can go travelling in other people’s games, earning equipment and experience to guide you in your game. It encourages you to equip your pawn with the best equipment so people choose to go with your pawn.

When fighting huge monsters, there’s a great ‘Shadow of the Colossus’ feature where you can grab them and climb up to a weak spot. Your Pawns will helpfully and constantly tell you when you can do this in a fight. This gives some epic battles as your pawns scramble around whilst you’re clinging onto the back of a giant hydra.

One of the bad things about Pawns is they’re not very smart. They will steal things you’re trying to pick. They tend to run off and attack things you can’t see. Part of that is the bad graphics. As mentioned, everything tends to blend together, so seeing enemies can be arduous. But to have them scream “goblins” and run off is highly annoying. Also, they constantly chatter, obscuring often important dialogue. They’ll constantly tell you how the tactics of how to kill the most frequent creatures “wolves hate fire!” and often tell you they know something of important, and when you click them to ask they say “we need to find the book”, which is the objective of the quest anyway.

To progress through the game you’ve really got to grind. I hate grinding in games, and it’s why I don’t often enjoy Japanese games. I prefer to be able to play the game from point to point. It doesn’t necessarily mean I enjoy a linear experience, I just prefer that if I get tasked with doing something then I’m at a level to do it. If I get tasked with killing X creatures (a type of quest I hate in games anyway as I think it’s really lazy quest design) then I should be at a level to kill those creatures when asked to do the quest. If I get tasked with escorting a NPC to a place, I should be able to defend that NPC with my skills. DD tends to simply throw every quest at you and make you attempt it before realising your too weak a level to complete it.

This is compounded by the fact you’ve got to walk everywhere. There are no mounts, no quick travel. So, if you walk into an area you’re not equipped for following a quest, not only do you frequently die, you have to turn around and run away, often for great distances between the different quests. You’re simply stumbling blindly for a great portion of the game doing nothing except dying. I found it frustrating and tedious.

Conclusion
I know there are people out there who love games like Dragons Dogma, who love being able to forge their own path at their own pace. People who don’t mind grinding, killing the same types of enemies over and over again to get enough experience or equipment to continue quests.
Although I did know what kind of game Dragon’s Dogma was when I picked it up, I was hoping that it would be different, have something I found compelling, something I could get addicted to and want to spend my time with.

But for me, this kind of ‘old school’ gaming found in Dragon’s Dogma is simply tedious and not enjoyable. I no longer have the time nor the patience to grind through games, especially if the story or the world it’s set in isn’t compelling. There are other games out there to be played, games that don’t demand I put in hundreds of hours just because the designers want you to, but rather encourage it by being more interesting and better looking.

Pros:
Very large world with lots to explore
Pawn System is a unique and interesting system

Cons:
Demands too much of your time for too little reward
Looks very ugly
NPCs can be really dumb

70/100