They had me at open-world where you'll travel to kingdoms as the fated one to slay the dragon and save the world. I love that sh*t, even if I've just played a few games that sounded much like that recently. But it makes sense that another Western-style RPG is being attempted, especially after the wild success of games like The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Kingdoms of Amalur, and The Witcher 2. There's still a bit of room left for more in this genre space, especially when new, standout ideas are involved.
These Western-style RPGs are really hot these days, so much so that Eastern developers are now trying their hand at the genre. Most recently, From Software's Souls franchise made a bloody splash, with the punishment of Dark Souls still fresh in gamers' minds. Now Capcom takes up sword and shield, suiting up members of the Devil May Cry and Resident Evil development teams to go into battle with their own open-world quest fest, called Dragon's Dogma. And it's gooooood.
Dragon's Dogma (PS3, Xbox 360)
Developer: Capcom
Publisher: Capcom
Release: May 22, 2012
While Capcom has Japanese'd the WRPG forumla in Dragon's Dogma, you wouldn't know it from the game's big budget story-establishing cutscene, as it's about as Western as it gets. After a dragon swoops in to attack your seaside town, you decide to get ballsy and defend your home, taking up a fallen soldier's sword to go face to face claw with the beast. Unfortunately, your weak sword jab is nothing to the dragon's scaly hand, but it's still enough to piss him off, so he plucks your heart out with a single clawnail, leaving you to die on the beach. But you don't die. It turns out that you're the Arisen, a destined hero that actually has the power to take down the dragon. Go figure.
After creating your character, customizing its look, and choosing its class (picking from a warrior, mage or strider), you'll set off on a seemingly endless fantasy adventure, where you'll explore a vast open world, taking on countless quests, lengthy treks and huge monsters, working to finally make your way back to the dragon, hoping to get your heart back. Dogma's world can be freely explored in that Elder Scrolls kind of way where it seems like you could walk for days, constantly finding something interesting in the distance to make your way towards. It also shares another trait with that franchise: managing to suck you in to its world and take over your imagination.
You'll never explore alone, as Dragon's Dogma Pawn system has party members always at the ready for you. Pawns mystically appear from a void called the Rift, ready to serve the Arisen. They have no soul or will of their own, and are totally open to your commands and wishes, following you around loyally, calling you "master." You'll get one main Pawn that you can mould as you see fit, establishing their class, look, weapons, abilities and even behavior. Beyond this buddy you'll have access to two more Pawns from the Rift to make a party of four, though you aren't able to customize the other two.
In an interesting online connectivity twist, your main Pawn is shared online, uploaded to the rift for others to hire and use in their own party. The higher you level your Pawn, the more it's worth, and the more it will cost other players to use. Similarly, you can spend earned RC (Rift credits) to hire someone else's Pawn, adding them to your own party. These pawns can be freely dumped and hired as you see fit, enabling you to custom tailor your party for any battle or quest situation. My pawn is only worth a few hundred RC, but she has already gone out on adventures without me, always coming back with experience, money, item loot and even advice for quests I might go on later.
Through this system, Capcom has figured out a way for all Dragon's Dogma players to enjoy their own single-player experiences while maintaining some online interactivity with each other. You're able to reap the benefits of other player's journeys through their Pawns, and you'll pass on your experiences (uploaded every time you stay at an inn) to them in the same way. This always-connected backbone is the unique twist that makes Dragon's Dogma stand out from the other recent open-world games.
Thankfully, these Pawns aren't just mindless bots. They're actually quite talkative, offering up guidance or advice frequently during your travels. They're also pretty handy in battle, with the AI balance keeping them busy working within the confines of their class, though sometimes smartly breaking out to assist you with buffs, or offer up a heal spell in a pinch. In key battles they'll yell at you to point out weak spots or key strategies, and after successful battles will shower you with praise, or sigh in relief after closer ones. Even during adventuring they'll serve as a sort of working tour guide through the game's world, quick to point out landmarks or enjoy the scenery while picking up loot and picking off baddies along the way. So, while you're technically playing alone in a single-player story, through Pawns you'll never feel alone, and with party members pulled from the Rift, you'll feel like you're playing with others. Neat stuff.
While Dogma's world is freely explorable, you'll want to take on quests to get started, with the hopes of eventually building up your abilities to take on the big guy. Quests can be found everywhere, from job posting boards to NPCs, and their type varies greatly, ranging from item delivery and escort work to full-on beast slaying duties. You'll literally trip over things to do, though it's ultimately up to you to decide what you'd like to take on. For my first few hours I took on whatever looked fun, slowly working my way up to more serious work. Even though I've only played for about a week, I'm already hooked on the pleasant pace this game sets.
Beyond the standard training quests, it's easy to bite off more than you can chew, even early on. I made the mistake of taking on a quest where I was tasked with exploring a well to kick out some baddies that managed to sneak in after the dragon attack. It sounded easy enough, and started out with killing mere critters, but it quickly escalated, putting me in a sub-boss battle with four reptile-like creatures that quickly devoured my party. Coming back a bit later had me barely taking them down, but later encountering some rogue bandits that destroyed my party once again in the same area. Defeated, I set about getting stronger, venturing out of the city to gain experience and learn more about the world. After many more quests, customizations, spell upgrades, armor purchases, and a better knowledge of battle techniques, I boldly marched back into the well, ripped through the reptiles with lightning spells from above, breezed past the bandits with melee attacks, and came out of a well passage on the other side, chest held high. I probably put 30 minutes into party prep and weapon selection before this quest on the third time, but it was easily worth the time.
Battling goes down in third-person, through a combat system system that manages to be both fast and meaty -- the best of both worlds. It's fast but not floaty, and there's plenty of strategy required, so it's not like you're doing mindless Devil May Cry-style slashing. Basic attacks come off quickly, whether it be sword slashes or spell casts, but the harder, meaner ones take time, effort and planning, and careless misuse will find you staring at the retry screen. When the big hits connect, it feels good, but it's never an easy thing, though you'll get better at it as you learn your character's intricacies. Main attacks are mapped to face buttons, and assignable skills can be mapped to a button combination that uses the bumpers as shift buttons. This allows free swapping of any of your skill sets, letting you get creative in your attacking strategies.
From what I've seen of the game, you'll need to take full advantage of the dynamic combat system to survive. You'll blast through basic rats and bats without effort, but anything beyond that is a solid challenge. You're not up against Dark Souls-style ball busting here, but you also shouldn't expect to mash your way through anything less than a simple goblin. If you're outnumbered, you're probably going to die, at least early on. If you're ill-equipped? Dead. Out-ranked? Dead. And if your exploration sense overrides your common sense and has you venturing out a bit too far from home base? Super dead. This was a tough but enjoyable lesson.
Excuse the story-based pun, but Dragon's Dogma has already stole my heart in the week or so I've spent with it. Its mix of Western foundations and Eastern design make for a really unique experience, and the online connectivity concepts are promising. Beyond this, there's so much to explore, and even with a week under my belt, I've only unfurled a small section of what looks to be a huge world map. I can't wait to see what's out there.
If you like Western open-world RPGs, please put this on your list of games to check out. A demo is coming on April 24, and that's certainly something to look forward to, I'm worried that even a lengthy demo is going to be too limited to show the full scope of the journey. I definitely recommend that players check out this upcoming demo, but I still think that only after you've spent some real time exploring will you get a real feeling of what Dragon's Dogma has to offer.
Get ready, though. I think you're going to like this.
Contest:
11:45 AM on 04.22.2012 | 
For Dragon's Dogma... does anyone know if the enemies are auto-leveled or is it possible to grind and over-level to make the boss fights easier?
great preview, and for better or worse I'm definitely hyped now.
OK, I'm in.
Hell yeahhhh!
This is a day one purchase for me!
The combat DOES look like fun though, and Im a sucker for open-world RPGs. The online stuff I couldnt really care less about personally, Id likely even play offline, but its definitely interesting.
Just wondering though, why do you censor words like 'shit' in your articles? You only put the asterisk on the 'i', and I don't think there's anyone reading this who won't fill in the blanks. You don't have any companies or advertisers breathing down your neck, so why even do it?
"But it makes sense that another Western-style RPG"
The game is not an rpg as capcom has said
"These Western-style RPGs are really hot these days, so much so that Eastern developers are now trying their hand at the genre. Most recently, From Software's Souls franchise made a bloody splash, with the punishment of Dark Souls still fresh in gamers' minds."
From software has been making the same rpgs for over 10 yearss...........they didnt just jump into it
Ok so that makes what? Less than 5 western inspired rpgs compared to over 300 not?
Really its just sad that capcom sold out to make not only a western action adventure. But one that doesnt even seem to play as well or be as deep as monster hunter.........
Wow, I suprised myself, I havent let a destructoid article get to me like this in some time
I think Dtoid prefers to censor anything that can be seen on the main page (before the jump), just in case someone is browsing the site at work or something.
I've always considered Destructoid to be the mullet of video games.
Also, I'm still burning that this doesn't have online co-op.
you should call them rpgs, and then action rpgs
But this isnt one.
IS IT COMING?
http://beefjack.com/features/dragons-dogma-preview-xbox-360-ps3/
http://www.oxm.co.uk/40774/features/dragons-dogma-review-what-do-you-want-to-know/ (second page)
There's more I'm sure, it's kind of sad.
It's an RPG, when Capcom said it's not a rpg it was a year ago by that 1 guy from Capcom USA who didn't know what it was, and he doesn't even work there anymore. It's been an RPG with customizeable skills, job system, stats, dialogue choices, exploration, with a heavy emphasizes on combat, it's an action RPG.
The demo was close ended without RPG elements because they didn't know how to make an open world demo.
Stop being disrespectful when you haven't even played the preview version of the game.
it's just one of those typical "if there's any demand" stuff you get from developers, their official excuse was "We wanted to focus on console because it's our first time making an open world game".
play the demo and see for yourself
You realize theres users with the same name right? I took the name after being on beyond so long from someelse who used it
Its been constant, its not an rpg from capcom, and even other writers are starting to pick up
"customizeable skills, job system, stats, dialogue choices, exploration, with a heavy emphasizes on combat"
all things that arent required for an rpg
"Stop being disrespectful when you haven't even played the preview version of the game."
Did you even read 1 word I wrote? I could care less about the game, its how the preview was written. READ
Like take Mass Effect 1, Action RPG. But then they make ME2 and ME3 Action games with only the dialog for a Role Playing element and still call it an RPG, even the devs dont really know what an RPG is. But Bioware is failing as an RPG developer IMO, so maybe theyre not the best example.
But then you look at an RPG like Dark Souls. Its got all the "RPG" stuff like stats and items and exp... except it has absolutely no actual "Role Play" stuff in it, but people still praise it as an RPG. You can roleplay in terms of combat style, but you cant roleplay any kind of actual character with a back story(well you can, but you have no choices on what you can or cant do). Which is a lot like Skyrim, though because its scaled and more open you can pick and choose what to do and when to do it(no, my warrior wont join the College, fuck off NPCs).
Honestly I see "Action" as the combat style definition, not the genre definition. Same with "Japanese" or "Western", theyre just describing the style, not the genre. Even "Euro" RPGs mean more mature(actually mature, not just throwing tits and more blood on the screen), like Witcher or Age of Conan - both of which have tons of tits and blood, but thats not what makes them more mature games.
Momma always told me not to feed the trolls, but sometimes theyre just so cute and adorable that I cant help myself!
Oh i see its coming to PC...well....lets hope that PC demo gets released on Steam!
fyi the combat/gameplay style IS the genre. Action rpg, turn based rpg, strategy rpg, platforming rpg, vn rpg ect.......
Here's another article, hey he seems to enjoy Monster Hunter too:
http://www.computerandvideogames.com/344053/previews/dragons-dogma-is-it-really-the-japanese-skyrim-not-exactly/
I would disagree with this especially taking into aocount mobile and indie western made rpgs
And like Lawrens said, its an Action RPG. Even if Capcom says its not, and its got stats/skill trees/dialog choices/questing, then that just means Capcom doesnt know what RPGs are either and made one by accident. Lol.
I never said any of this
And like I said you dont need any of that for it to be called or not an rpg........
God I wish people would stop making things up
@Takeshi
you should call them rpgs, and then action rpgs
But this isnt one."
Pretty sure thats you saying WPRGs are Action RPGs. If I misunderstood then, well, that makes most of what I said irrelevant.
Even so you keep saying this game isnt an RPG, and saying stuff doesnt make something an RPG, but youve yet to state what you think does make an RPG.
What I was saying is that rpg is the main genre, and then its sub genre would be action rpg, which I didnt think it was.
I was not saying wrpgs are action rpgs, nor was that bashing.
So yeah your post is irrelevant
Apology please
I'm not even in it for the argument on what makes an RPG, but I'm only addressing this point:
"The game is not an rpg as capcom has said"
As I said, it was someone from Capcom USA who claimed this, not the developer themselves, as far as I know the director has stated he wanted to make an RPG, regardless of what people like to call it, the article of the interview could be found here:
http://tech2.in.com/features/gaming/dragons-dogma-interview/298822/0#story
And second of all, journalists and writers never got their hands on the preview copy before this month, and this month was when the media embargo lifted, and where journalists receive a new build of their preview copy, hence all the articles prior to this in the past many months were based around a closed demo or developer demonstration of a preview.
For the features the game has, anyone could just read about them and could judge for themselves. And Journalists could call it whatever they want, regardless of what 1 user thinks on the interweb.