Dragon's Dogma

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Scrustle
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Re: Dragon's Dogma and Dark Arisen

Post by Scrustle »

Yeah, Bitterblack is insane. I tried to have another bash at that recently, and while I did make a little bit of progress, it was quickly stopped once I reached the first real boss of the place. At level 75, I was doing pretty much nothing to even the first of its 8 health bars or so. So I had to quit. So it seems Bitterblack is suited to levels even way higher than I am. I wouldn't even know how much exactly, but I'm guessing something quite far north of level 100. Maybe even around 150.
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JaySevenZero
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Re: Dragon's Dogma and Dark Arisen

Post by JaySevenZero »

I agree, there have certainly been times with Bitterblack that it felt decidedly unbalanced with what it throws at you. I went into the section where there was a Gorecyclops to take down which in itself will keep you occupied for a fair while, when suddenly the screen darkens and they've gone and added a Cursed Dragon into the mix - at which point I figured discretion was the better part of of valour and legged it! In truth, there have been several occasions that this kind of situation has arisen and as you wrote I wouldn't know just how powerful you would have to be to even contemplate taking on two enemies of such power?
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JaySevenZero
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Re: Dragon's Dogma and Dark Arisen

Post by JaySevenZero »

Took this from the What have you been playing thread:
Scrustle wrote:I've been back on Dragon's Dogma again. Whenever someone mentions that game, I can't help but be pulled back in again. Made a little bit of progress in to Bitterblack, and tried to clean up some more side-quests. For some reason it seems near impossible to take down a griffin! If you ever even spot one, they're already in the air and nine times out of ten it'll just instantly fly off. I've got two quests on taking just one of those down, but I can never get one! I also tried to have another go at the Ur-Dragon, since I heard that it's apparently back up to fight. The arena where you find it was empty again though. Not sure what that's all about.
I've found that with the Griffins as soon as one appears I add flame to my sword, then when it lands sprint straight at it and try to grab its mid-section near the wings (whilst using Liquid Vim to prevent my stamina from draining) then just repeatedly slash away until it's permanently grounded. Having someone use shield drum as it flies overhead usually results in getting its attention (if you don't have this I'd recommend using @CoffeeJesus's level 83 pawn Optimus Prime as he was quite adept at enticing creatures to attack.
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Scrustle
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Re: Dragon's Dogma and Dark Arisen

Post by Scrustle »

Actually I did manage to take down the griffin not long ago. But the problem I had with them is that they never even pay attention to me. As soon as they spawn they're already flying off. Don't get a chance to get near them. Maybe if I was using a character with a bow I might have a better chance, but it just seems so odd that they behave the way they do. I do have a magical projectile skill (Great Canon), but usually by the time I've casted it the thing has already buggered off, or if it hasn't, it's simply out of range anyway. If I can actually get the thing on the ground it's a piece of cake, but getting it to that point is the hard part.

Do you know what platform CoffeeJesus is on? As we mentioned not long ago on this thread, I'm on 360, and I'm expecting most other people here aren't.
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JaySevenZero
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Re: Dragon's Dogma and Dark Arisen

Post by JaySevenZero »

Ah, sorry, memory like a sieve - he's on the PS3.

For the record, Great Cannon is awesome!
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RoboticMonk3y
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Dragon's Dogma

Post by RoboticMonk3y »

I picked this up when the dark arisen version was released. After several podcast recommendations, and a bargain price, I picked it up.
I was advised that the dark arisen part was end game content and no doubt you'll cover the vertical difficulty spike of the DLC, I had a couple of attempts at the DLC the first time I was dead before the end of the first corridor, the second death came for me... Literally... One woosh of his scythe and my whole party was toast!
No doubt people will cover the main game far more eloquently than I'm able to, so I'll just chatter about some of my time with the game.

A lovely addition to the DLC was extra language options. No longer did I have to endure being told that we weren't walking on the road or that a tree was particularly interesting, I flipped the language to Japanese and imagined my pawns were telling me interesting things.

The game was fun for me to play in little chunks and I had a jolly good time chasing down dragons.
I did cause a spot bother when I forged a book and it turns out that a forged copy of a book isn't quite as helpful :s
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Dragon's Dogma

Post by RoboticMonk3y »

Also this times a million
Dragon's Dogma - Theme Song - Into Free (LEGENDADO PT,BR): https://youtu.be/_bovk2jPuOU
Sadly missing from the dark arisen release and replaced with some nimbly bimbly thing instead.
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Scrustle
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Dragon's Dogma

Post by Scrustle »

(Some thoughts for the podcast, but if I've said something else earlier in this thread that sounds better, that's cool too.)

Dragon’s Dogma is one of my favourite RPGs of the 7th generation. It’s one of those games that makes you wish other games were more like it.

The main thing that Dragon’s Dogma does so well is the combat. Combat in RPGs can often be somewhat lacking, but not so here, thanks to the game being developed by the studio behind most of the Devil May Cry games. Combat is fast and slick. Well-polished and very satisfying. While the tone of the gameplay isn’t anywhere near as over-the-top as in the DMC games, they still do a great job of nailing the kinaesthetics. The feeling of your weapon coming in to contact with an enemy is great. It definitely has the feel of coming from a studio that knows their combat mechanics.

The class system is also a big highlight. There are so many different and distinct skills to choose from, and the ability to change classes and carry over specific skills made for a really interesting way to mix things up and experiment with unusual combinations.

And on top of that there’s also the larger enemies and the climbing mechanics. Jumping on top of bosses and desperately wailing away at them as they flail and try to buck you off adds a sense of tactility to these creatures, and emphasises the “David and Goliath”-esque nature of going up against these impressive foes.

The Pawn system is another part of the game that makes the game stand out. Having them able to access the same level of skill customisation as the player character made for a really interesting party which was never quite the same twice. It was always fun to browse through other players’ Pawns too, just to see what kind of character other people created, not for themselves, but their companion.

I quite like the Pawns’ personality too. I suppose I can understand why the way they act and talk could wind someone up, but I always found it to be somewhat adorable. The lore of the game explains that they’re not human, so I always saw them as being like pets who were just eager to please. Their repeated lines ended up feeling like amusing catchphrases (“Wolves hunt in packs!”, “It hates fire!”, etc.), and a kind of reassurance that they always wanted to help. They were always so enthusiastic.

The soundtrack, too, is something which really stood out to me. While it may have been cheesy and ridiculous, I always liked the J-rock intro song that was sadly missing from the Dark Arisen version of the game. But the in-game orchestral soundtrack has so many great pieces to it as well. Really impressive, driving music for battles, and characterful, calmer tracks for the less action-packed sections of the game. I particularly like “End of the Struggle”, which plays when you start to get some of the larger enemies on the back foot.

Some aspects of the game aren't so great though, but still have positive elements about them. They tend to be examples of how the developers made the most out of what was probably quite limited resources.

For one thing, although the combat is quite polished, the game in general is not. Particularly the graphics. The models of most things in the game are fairly low-detail, and the texture resolution is pretty poor in most places. One place where this isn't the case though, is with the larger boss monsters. These fights are some of the biggest highlights of the game, so it was a good choice to focus on them, especially since you climb all over them and get so close. The scales of the dragons and hydras, the skin and muscles of the chimeras, and the plumage of the griffins, all have an impressive and believable look to them. Another part of the graphics that often get focused on a lot though, is the human characters. They don't fare so well. Faces look basic and are barely animated, and the texturing on armour patterns is sometimes quite poor.

The wider environments too suffer from a lack of detail, but here I think the game gets away with it. As the game is set in a costal location, it makes sense for the land to be windswept and barren. This is even shown in the game too, with the way trees and foliage are often dramatically blustered by winds coming in from the sea. It actually comes together to create a sense of windiness that I've not seen another game achieve.

Talking of the environments, the overall world size is fairly small. There are only two towns, and only around fifteen or so major locations in the entirety of the game world. Elder Scrolls, this isn’t. Yet, despite its size, it doesn’t feel cramped or too small. It also means that every location is unique. You don’t ever get the sense that you’re going in to an area that’s exactly like a dozen others. Each place usually also has a unique purpose. Often there’s an important quest focused around the place, or it can be a useful shortcut to somewhere else. It gives the land of Gransys a sense that it’s an actual location that exists naturally, instead of somewhere to put game content.

So even though Dragon’s Dogma is far from a juggernaut of high production values and an enormous budget, it ends up being a very well accomplished game that has a distinct personality, and does what it does right, very right. It even manages to make up for its shortcomings in clever ways too. It’s a game I jump at the chance to recommend to anyone looking for an action RPG with great combat, and that does things a bit differently.
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RoboticMonk3y
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Dragon's Dogma

Post by RoboticMonk3y »

Scrustle wrote: The Pawn system is another part of the game that makes the game stand out. Having them able to access the same level of skill customisation as the player character made for a really interesting party which was never quite the same twice. It was always fun to browse through other players’ Pawns too, just to see what kind of character other people created, not for themselves, but their companion.

I quite like the Pawns’ personality too. I suppose I can understand why the way they act and talk could wind someone up, but I always found it to be somewhat adorable. The lore of the game explains that they’re not human, so I always saw that as being like pets who were just eager to please. Their repeated lines ended up feeling like amusing catchphrases (“Wolves hunt in packs!”, “It hates fire!”, etc.), and a kind of reassurance that they always wanted to help. They were always so enthusiastic.
It was really good that you could gear up your pawn to fill in the gaps that you can't.
You didn't have to worry about being able to rain down fireballs for crowd control when you pawn will do that for you, and once you learn how to control how and when your pawn acts (something that's really clumsily explained in the game, I found out from a gaming guide) then it's really like having an extra player helping you out.

but their non-stop chatter is what made me flip my language options.
<pawn picks up rock> "what is this object"
"the path splits here" - yup, that's a split alright
"this path surely leads to gran soren" - yes, I can see it, over there...
and every time you went anywhere near water
"I'm drenched" "I'm drenched" "I'm drenched" - then why did you jump in the river!?! :lol:
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Flabyo
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Dragon's Dogma

Post by Flabyo »

There's a whole lot of things from other games jammed together in Dragon's Dogma. Part Skyrim, part Shadow of the Colossus, part Final Fantasy, part Monster Hunter. It shouldn't work, but it does. The plot is pretty confused, and suffers a little from some ropey translation, but it's really just there as an excuse to go monster hunting.

It's very rough around the edges for sure. But that's part of it's charm. There aren't too many games where you and a bunch of AI helpers are all hanging onto a giant wyvern trying to stab it's eyes out whilst it's flying across the map...

I can see where the Souls comparisons come from, but I don't think it has anywhere near the challenge of those games. Generally, if you're dying a lot in Dragon's Dogma you've gone the wrong way. It isn't quite as open world as it wants you to think it is, at least up until the credits anyway.

The system where you can lend your AI companion out to other players is something I'm surprised hasn't been copied by other developers. The implementation here is surely just the tip of the iceberg for where such a system can go. Imagine something like this games pawn's paired with the Nemesis system of Shadows of Mordor...

Training your AI pawn is perhaps a little too opaque, but I know from experience it's very hard to find the right balance between 'I don't know what my actions are doing to the pawns behaviour' and 'it's just a bunch of sliders that I can set to make it do exactly what I want' when writing this kind of AI.

So yeah, I enjoyed it a lot. Still think it's a shame there's no sign of any sequel.
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Re: Dragon's Dogma

Post by arry_g »

Reading some of the things you guys have wrote about the game makes me very intrigued about the podcast episode. Hopefully I'll get around to listening this week (time willing). Dragon's Dogma isn't a game I've managed to get absorbed in yet, I played it last year at the recommendation of some forum members and it didn't manage to grab me in the first few of hours with it.
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Re: Dragon's Dogma

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brutaldeluxe09
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Re: Dragon's Dogma

Post by brutaldeluxe09 »

I've not played this yet I really must pick it up sometime.
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macstat
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Re: Dragon's Dogma

Post by macstat »

Quick question. Can anyone tell me how fast travel works in this game ? I havent found anything like that (maybe from lack of trying). If I remember correctly, you guys talked about how limited it was. Could it be that its not unlocked yet, or am i missing something obvious ?

At the same time that lack of fast travel created new layer of immersion ;). Yesterday i was running around, pretty far from castle. Night was very close and i was weighted by a lot of loot. But while scouting nearby area i found entrance to ancient quarry. I recalled i saw something similar pretty close to castle, so i assumed that its a shortcut through the mountain. I had to fight through packs of goblins, found a bandit hideout and had epic battles with two ogres. Overall pretty tense moments but in a good way.

This adventure sounds familiar right? It just occurred to me today ... i basically had my "Mines of Moria" experience. A band of adventurers try to find a shortcut through dark ancient mines filled with nasty things ;).
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Flabyo
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Re: Dragon's Dogma

Post by Flabyo »

It doesn't unlock until later in the game, and it's not really fast travel in the traditional sense.

You get an item that you can put down where you are, and then you can teleport to that item using a menu option. Doing so consumes it.

It's more like the recall portals in Diablo, only the other way around.
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Re: Dragon's Dogma

Post by macstat »

Hmmm ok, i guess its for the better :) Thanks Flabyo
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Re: Dragon's Dogma

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If anyone's playing this on the PS4, search for JaySevenZero in the rift. The character is a Ranger and should prove useful.
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Re: Dragon's Dogma

Post by ratsoalbion »

:twisted:
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ThirdDrawing
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Re: Dragon's Dogma

Post by ThirdDrawing »

I'd forgotten how hard this game is. Hit a brick wall and wasn't able to make any progress for a while.

Got some new equipment and I've finally made some headway, but I've got Reynard following me around and the stupid git keeps getting killed.
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Re: Dragon's Dogma

Post by James »

Far be it from me to dust off an old thread, but I've started playing Dragon's Dogma today! :o

I've heard lots of good things about the game over the 7 years since release, but just never got around to playing. Well, the time is now! I was passing my local CeX this morning and stuck my head around the door to see if they had a copy. A £12 voucher spent on the PS4 version of Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen.

I'm playing as a female, brunette strider called Carter, but with the moniker 'Chun-Li', whose main pawn is a female, blonde mage called Comma, with the moniker 'Cammy'. I'm not exactly blessed with a creative mind, sadly. Anyway, I'm an hour or two in now, with a sizeable stack of quests to attempt.

I picked a side quest at random to attempt, and started my way down the village well. Cue an absolute shambles of me sprinting about, picking up my downed pawns, doing no damage to giant lizards, running away, right into some much-less-intimidating-looking bandits, who I also was doing no damage to, running away again, to safety, only to pick a fight with a wolf, which was easy enough, until seven more arrived, and downed my pawns, so I picked them up again, and then died. :oops:
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