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Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen |OT| deep down darkness

truly101

I got grudge sucked!
I can't see myself disliking it, but that's probably a good idea to give the demo a shot, since no one can seem to agree on what other games it has similarties to. I've heard the game being compared to Dark Souls, Monster Hunter, Dragon Age and PSO, but each time someone would disagree, it's kind of amusing actually.

Best comparison I heard was its like a modern adaptation of the Capcom D&D games from years ago. I think thats fair. There are minor similarities to Dark Souls but its really its own thing.
 

GorillaJu

Member
Just loaded back in after a while of not playin and got 4 million RC from people using my pawn. Lol looks like that 100k won't make much of a difference...
 
It's Super Dragon's Dogma, plus you get bonuses for owning the original.

If you need to, sell your original to offset the cost. You'll lose the rad Dangan intro music forever, though.

The bonuses make me want to keep the original. I'll probably get it down the road... I promised myself Revengeance first.
 
12123c7sp2.png

this image right here might be enough to make me buy this.

I have most the vocations maxed out. I might throw my black swordsman armor on, switch to warrior and just start slaughtering solo
 

ixix

Exists in a perpetual state of Quantum Crotch Uncertainty.
Kinda torn on whether to start a fresh character when I get Dark Arisen for the full experience of all the changes they've made or go ahead and start a new vanilla character right now for immediate Bitterblackin' as soon as I get it.

Current duo is sitting at level 130 or something so they'd probably trivialize the new stuff a bit too much. Think I'd rather go in under-leveled rather than over-leveled.
 
You can also get it for AUD$28 (with free shipping) from Ozgameshop if you're willing to wait a week or two for delivery.

Is the release date in AU confirmed to be the 23rd?
That's what JB have on their web site, and it's also what the EB guys have told me in store.
 
I missed DD and after recently getting hooked into Dark Souls and Monster Hunter and hearing comparisons I'm interested in trying this release.

For those who played DD, what do you think of Patrick Klepek's review?

Ignore the score (I don't care about that). Is it a fair review? Any points you disagree with? Anything he missed?

There's some stuff in that review that REALLY makes me interested, like:

Dragon’s Dogma feels like Capcom taking the most outwardly appealing part of Monster Hunter--big, meaty fights against monstrous beasts with a team of friends--and putting that into a sprawling world that goes on and on for miles.
The real core of Dragon’s Dogma is combat. Thirty-seven hours later, a pile of bodies the size of a mountain in my wake, I was still having fun slicing up goblins and direwolves. The game has a terrifically fun and dynamic combat system that constantly encourages players to experiment.
There’s nothing quite like hitting a griffin mid-air with fire-infused arrows, watching it crash to the ground, straddling its neck just before it manages to take off, being lifted thousands of feet into the air and stabbing the hell out of it, as it maniacally tries to shake you off. It’s these moments, with you and your Pawns working in tandem to take down these towering enemies, that Dragon’s Dogma shines. It never gets old, and the ability to perpetually switch around your set of combat skills means fighting the same enemies manages to feel fresh, since your approach to it changes.

His biggest gripe seems to be the lack of anything interesting OTHER than combat until the end of the game (which sounds like it must be pretty awesome?).

I understand the story is not great - I don't really care about that. But are the environments interesting? He mentions you end up seeing the same places over and over again. Is that fair?

Is the leveling/character progression done well? Lots of customization? Loot?
 
You can also get it for AUD$28 (with free shipping) from Ozgameshop if you're willing to wait a week or two for delivery.


That's what JB have on their web site, and it's also what the EB guys have told me in store.

Question: Is this game the US version or AU version?

EDIT:
I'd rather spend the $10 extra for a local copy. I have banned Ozgameshop after they sent me a Asian copy of Red Dead Redemption and i couldn't buy the DLC for it.
D=
If this is the case, then I'll pass
 

Card Boy

Banned
D=
If this is the case, then I'll pass

8 times out of 10 they send PAL UK copies of games, sometimes for some reason they send NTSC US/Asian games.

At least with a local copy I'm getting it instantly instead of waiting 1-3 weeks, I 100% know it's Australian, i can easily return it plus it has trade value and EB/JB accept it.
 

Sanctuary

Member
Best comparison I heard was its like a modern adaptation of the Capcom D&D games from years ago. I think thats fair. There are minor similarities to Dark Souls but its really its own thing.

So minor that the comparisons really need to stop, because it's pretty much on every gaming forum. The only real way the two compare is aesthetically somewhat in the darker areas, and somewhat post game. But post game just feels more like how it was in the very early levels going up against the seemingly unkillable bandits of doom.

And as much as people complained about framerate issues (PS3 version?), and "awful tearing" (it was only awful on the 360 if you constantly and spastically panned the screen around and were looking for it), the worst thing in this game for me was the idiodic and chatty pawns. Especially because they would repeat the same lines over and over again as though they all gained amnesia every five minutes. Really loved most of the other parts of the game, and the fast travel has been "fixed" in this expansion for those who already owned the first, but I'm seriously not looking forward to hearing "MASTER, A GOBLIN!" another thousand times.

His biggest gripe seems to be the lack of anything interesting OTHER than combat until the end of the game (which sounds like it must be pretty awesome?).

I understand the story is not great - I don't really care about that. But are the environments interesting? He mentions you end up seeing the same places over and over again. Is that fair?

Is the leveling/character progression done well? Lots of customization? Loot?

The leveling system is not bad. It's also customizable, although by how much you think would depend on the person. I felt it was pretty bare-boned and obvious, but it was still fun. Other than that, there really is nothing worth mentioning about the game other than the monster fights and combat. The combat was the funnest part about the game and you may as well just think of it more like those closed off segments in the God of War games, where you have to kill a bunch of enemies to progress (or Devil May Cry). It's obviously not closed-off and it's in larger "arenas", but that's pretty much how the game plays for the most part. It's not Skyrim, it's not Dark Souls, but more of a mashup of the D&D games of old and Monster Hunter, with an attempt at an open-world feel. Although honestly, I started making Monster Hunter comparisons prior to actually playing any Monster Hunter games. After playing MH3U, I'd say the enemies in Dragon's Dogma aren't quite up to par with the Monster Hunter bosses, but they animate similarly well, and are still probably better than anything else that's not exclusively Monster Hunter. The pawn system gives you kind of an MH online experience.
 
Love the hell out of this shot.

Dragons-Dogma-Dark-Arisen-Wallpapers.jpg

They nailed the atmosphere so well in this game, and Bitterblack Isle seems to just continue with that.

I'm elated we even got a good expansion. The initial quest DLC was meh indeed, I just love everything I've been seeing so far.
 
8 times out of 10 they send PAL UK copies of games, sometimes for some reason they send NTSC US/Asian games.

At least with a local copy I'm getting it instantly instead of waiting 1-3 weeks, I 100% know it's Australian plus it has trade value and EB/JB accept it.
I've never ordered an Xbox 360 game from them, but for the PS3 games it's always a UK copy that works fine with Australian DLC (i.e. BLES coded games). I have ordered about 20 games from them now over the course of about 4 or 5 years (from before they had the ozgameshop shopfront and only had 365games.co.uk).

The only downside is shipping time (usually 7-10 days), but that's the price you pay for getting the games much cheaper. I don't know what the implications are for trading games in locally as I don't actually do that, I keep all of my games.
 

GorillaJu

Member
It has aesthetic similarities to Demons Souls and gameplay similarities to Monster Hunter. Don't think the comparisons are that wild, but it's not firmly in the mold of either game. It's an open world adventure game first and foremost.
 

Eusis

Member
Yeah, it's kind of like comparing Bioshock and Deus Ex, they're LOOSELY similar but it's not really THAT close.
 
Just picked this up today in Australia.

Jumping in for the first time, so some questions for GAF (it is your fault I'm playing this after all):

* Best class/setup that is fun to play and gets really strong later on?
* Anything really important that I can miss/do that I'll regret later? (only really have the time to do it once).
* Anything that I 100% must do that isn't on the regular path?

Thanks.
 
8 times out of 10 they send PAL UK copies of games, sometimes for some reason they send NTSC US/Asian games.

At least with a local copy I'm getting it instantly instead of waiting 1-3 weeks, I 100% know it's Australian, i can easily return it plus it has trade value and EB/JB accept it.

Ic. I think I'll probably wait. It's a good price though. But I still got some backlogs to get through, so I wouldn't be able to play this day 1 anyway.
 

GorillaJu

Member
Just picked this up today in Australia.

Jumping in for the first time, so some questions for GAF (it is your fault I'm playing this after all):

* Best class/setup that is fun to play and gets really strong later on?
* Anything really important that I can miss/do that I'll regret later? (only really have the time to do it once).
* Anything that I 100% must do that isn't on the regular path?

Thanks.

You can change your class at any time, but the class you level up as determines what stats you increase as you level. Warrior gives a good balance between attack and HP. Sorc gives the highest Magic attack and Assassin gives the highest attack. Just keeping that in mind, you can do whatever you want and all the classes are pretty fun. It doesn't make that big a difference end-game anyway.

I think Assassin is really fun personally.
 

Eusis

Member
40$ for an expansion pack is regular price. That is how much pc expansion packs usually were and some still are, see SC2:HOTS.
Blizzard was on the "let's make our disc based games $60 and $40 without making some sort of LE to justify it!" bandwagon long before anyone else was after the Saturn died, traditionally expansion packs had been $30. Though admittedly that $10 raise WOULD match with console prices (these $30 expansions were generally for $50 games), and this is standalone so that's some compensation, especially as you can trade in the regular for $10 and make it $30. You'll lose Into Free, but as I noted you can just buy that off iTunes for 69 cents (though I don't think the PS3 supports custom soundtracks, so on that front you couldn't just play it at the title screen instead if not through the whole game.)
 
You can change your class at any time, but the class you level up as determines what stats you increase as you level. Warrior gives a good balance between attack and HP. Sorc gives the highest Magic attack and Assassin gives the highest attack. Just keeping that in mind, you can do whatever you want and all the classes are pretty fun. It doesn't make that big a difference end-game anyway.

I think Assassin is really fun personally.

Assassin is pretty great, definitely.

Though I personally have a big love for Ranger, and slowly getting one for Mystic Knight, but I'd say there's really no wrong decisions in choosing a vocation, all of them are fantastic. (Well, I technically can't vouch for Mage or Sorcerer, but still, all are pretty great).
 

Eusis

Member
Looks to have a hole in his chest, I'm gonna guess that he was a former Arisen who turned evil and stuff and thangs.
Other pictures made it look more like a face actually.
The twist is that Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen is a Ghosts & Goblins sequel.
(Fake spoilers... I hope.)
 
Just picked this up today in Australia.

Jumping in for the first time, so some questions for GAF (it is your fault I'm playing this after all):

* Best class/setup that is fun to play and gets really strong later on?
* Anything really important that I can miss/do that I'll regret later? (only really have the time to do it once).
* Anything that I 100% must do that isn't on the regular path?

Thanks.
All of the classes are good and fun to play, and with the way the augments work you are encouraged to try more than one. Apart from right at the very beginning the game is fairly easy so you don't need to worry about ending up with a character set up that isn't strong enough.

In terms of quest progression and snookering yourself:
  • You'll be warned at certain points in the story that continuing on will wipe your current quests, and it will ask if you're sure if you want to continue. What they don't explain is that it's not just the side quests that you've currently accepted that will get wiped, but all untaken noticeboard side quests will be wiped as well and you'll never get a chance to do them. This doesn't apply to the "Kill X number of enemy Y" quests, they keep going, but the other ones with slight story elements do get wiped.
  • When Caxton (you'll meet him later) asks you for an idol, do not give him anything other than a Gold Idol; once you give him a certain type of idol there is no way to change it later.
  • When you are asked to do a mission for Fournival that involves Symone, rest at an inn before you accept that quest and make sure you get a gold idol out of her afterwards (otherwise, try again using the "retry from last checkpoint" [at least I think that's the option] that takes you back to the Inn so you can start again).
  • Make sure you do Fournival's personal quests as soon as possible, because one of the mainline quests can remove them.
  • After you meet the Duke for the first time, do not leave by a side door; make absolutely sure you leave the building via the main front doors or you'll miss out on an entire quest line.
  • When you talk to people, do quests with them, or give them presents, they gain affinity for you. The person with the highest affinity for you later on will become your lover, regardless of sex or age. Be mindful of that or you'll be in for a rude surprise :)
There may be more but those are the ones that come to mind.
 

Sanctuary

Member
Just picked this up today in Australia.

Jumping in for the first time, so some questions for GAF (it is your fault I'm playing this after all):

* Best class/setup that is fun to play and gets really strong later on?
* Anything really important that I can miss/do that I'll regret later? (only really have the time to do it once).
* Anything that I 100% must do that isn't on the regular path?

Thanks.

Well, if you're a min/maxer you'd want to take X levels for both Fighter and Warrior to gain their augments for an Assassin and then just stick with Assasin for the rest of the levels since they gain the most stats per level out of all of the classes.

The shitty thing is that if you want to be the "optimal" Mystic Knight (or Magick Archer), you're better off spending the majority of your levels as a Sorcerer and then pretty much switching near the end of the game. It's not necessary, but it gives you the most powerful version of the Mystic Knight. Can't speak too much for the Ranger or Strider since the Assassin is close enough to them already, but stronger as a whole.

Personally I found the Sorcerer class to be really fun, and it gets really powerful later. But then I also found the Assassin fun simply because it's a class that gets into the middle of everything and has more than one way to play. The Warrior is way too sluggish (almost felt like a Great Sword user from Monster Hunter) and the Fighter and it's "tanking" is kind of pointless.
 

nikos

Member
Playing the demo now and it's a lot of fun. I like a lot of the game's mechanics, especially being able to climb onto beasts. Think I'm going to pick it up.

How hard is the game? I don't like playing games that are too difficult anymore.
 
Playing the demo now and it's a lot of fun. I like a lot of the game's mechanics, especially being able to climb onto beasts. Think I'm going to pick it up.

How hard is the game? I don't like playing games that are too difficult anymore.

Not that hard and there is an Easy Mode.
 

Sanctuary

Member
Playing the demo now and it's a lot of fun. I like a lot of the game's mechanics, especially being able to climb onto beasts. Think I'm going to pick it up.

How hard is the game? I don't like playing games that are too difficult anymore.

It's not really hard, except possibly if you're a Mage/Sorcerer until you get Miasma and that's only a few levels. The difficulty spikes up again post-game, but it's not "terribly hard" as some might make it out to be. No idea how difficult Dark Arisen will be compared to post-game, nor what level you should be before tackling it.
 
Yeah, you can compare Dragon's Dogma to a few games. But I like to think that once a game can be compared to 3 or more games, it's its own thing.
 

nikos

Member
Not that hard and there is an Easy Mode.

It's not really hard, except possibly if you're a Mage/Sorcerer until you get Miasma and that's only a few levels. The difficulty spikes up again post-game, but it's not "terribly hard" as some might make it out to be. No idea how difficult Dark Arisen will be compared to post-game, nor what level you should be before tackling it.

Sounds good, thanks guys!
 

klee123

Member
Just picked this up today in Australia.

Jumping in for the first time, so some questions for GAF (it is your fault I'm playing this after all):

* Best class/setup that is fun to play and gets really strong later on?
* Anything really important that I can miss/do that I'll regret later? (only really have the time to do it once).
* Anything that I 100% must do that isn't on the regular path?

Thanks.

Where did you get it from? I went to JB and EB and don't seem to be willing to sell it early.
 
Kinda torn on whether to start a fresh character when I get Dark Arisen for the full experience of all the changes they've made or go ahead and start a new vanilla character right now for immediate Bitterblackin' as soon as I get it.

Current duo is sitting at level 130 or something so they'd probably trivialize the new stuff a bit too much. Think I'd rather go in under-leveled rather than over-leveled.
Definitely. I'm going in fresh to check out all the new enemy spawns. 130 sounds way overleveled for DA.
 

Eusis

Member
Yeah, you can compare Dragon's Dogma to a few games. But I like to think that once a game can be compared to 3 or more games, it's its own thing.
Yeah, this is true, most accurately would probably be Elder Scrolls open world crossed with Devil May Cry, and even that simple it's not something you see very often and is distinctive enough, nevermind that with how awful most Elder Scrolls combat IS having a good combat system is a godsend.

And as I'm high 30s I figure I'd probably see a good chunk of the game through DA, then touch DA content.
 

Sanctuary

Member
Yeah, this is true, most accurately would probably be Elder Scrolls open world crossed with Devil May Cry, and even that simple it's not something you see very often and is distinctive enough, nevermind that with how awful most Elder Scrolls combat IS having a good combat system is a godsend.

And as I'm high 30s I figure I'd probably see a good chunk of the game through DA, then touch DA content.

The irony here is that TES games suck horribly bad with combat, but feel like awesome terrain exploration simulators (since the dungeons kind of suck too). On the other hand, Dragon's Dogma excels at the combat, but is rather "meh" when it comes to exploring (mostly due to the repetitive nature of the terrain and the backtracking in vanilla), while the dungeons were "okay".

Also, am I just reading some of the posts here too deeply, or are some of you suggesting that new enemies will appear in the vanilla game as well, and not just when you enter the new dungeon?
 
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