I think its fascinating that theres three dragon's dogma games and being unfinished is their defining trait. Crazy good time but disappointed by the lack of spell variety like the first game, the trickster feels undercooked, and warfarer feels like a band aid last minute fix for a lack of classes they could not ship on time.

I lost 50 hours heavily immersed and the game has had some of my fondest memories playing a game in recent memory, but it is about the same amount of undercooked as the first one. Its a recurring thing I have to say about this game: "This is all pretty good but x problem" or "This feels lacking but it has a lot of potential for expansion later".

The true ending route is truly crazy though, I cannot believe they went somewhere more cowardly devs would defer to a cutscene for a bad end.

The plot sort of stops existing after the first ten hours and it really was funny to see characters i barely interacted with brought in to up the stakes or be part of a readout of "Your best friends 4ever :)"

Everything wrong (or right) with Dragon's Dogma 2:

Fashion's Dogma is dead: Under-armor is completely gone (both the chest and legs slot) and so are the gloves. Instead, all you get are a slim number of accessories that you can wear in tandem with your helmet. The cloaks are also unusually large, but their ineffectiveness makes them the most interchangeable slot. The excuse we got was that there would be more armors to choose from, so did we? Hardly, the original game had 68 chest pieces for instance, while this one has 90. But when you include the under-armor, you have 124 pieces to choose from. Now let's include the 70 glove pieces, that's 194 chest options. See what I mean? This game has 68 pieces of the leg armor and the original had 79, when you include under-armor, you have 111. Helmets are comparable in quantity, there's 88 in the original and and 82 here, 97 if you include accessories. Clearly, armor choice is a massive downgrade this time around and it's unjustifiable.

Vocations are disappointing: They just had to restrict this system as well. Is it really okay to only have ten unlockable skills, (plus one mastery skill), when we can't even use two weapons anymore? Especially with so many skills returning, it's a real shame they couldn't come up with more. You only get to unlock 5 augments per class as well; down from six, most of which are useless. Like dealing 5% more damage when hitting a target's vitals or reducing the time it takes to revive a Pawn by 1 second. Not to mention, the game won't even tell you what the values are (that applies to rings as well). The archer is especially affected, since four of the skills require their respective arrow types when they used to require none. You can no longer equip arrows to use on any skill anymore, nor are there status inflicting skills like Invasive Arrow. Mages used to be able to aim their spells and pinpoint a location on the ground, now it's forcibly automatic. When it comes to new classes, trickster makes a jarring addition to the roster because they can't deal any damage. Why isn't this a pawn class? You're going to be much more effective at dealing damage than any pawn. Wayfarer is much worse than the comparable assassin and should have been an opportunity to combine weapons. Instead, you have the ability to switch between two or three vocations, but you only get three ability slots and worse stats. At least the Mystic Spearhand was incredibly unique and fun to play, it's really the only worthwhile addition. I've also got to point out that all the hybrid vocations involve magic, the thief got nothing to mix with.

The gameplay is excellent: Existing skills have been given additional flair and the physics engine will ensure that you can launch your foes straight into the stratosphere. It's very satisfying and fun, especially thanks to the improved AI. Enemies are much more aggressive, have better tracking, quickly gap close, can stunlock you to death, and will chase you to the ends of the earth. They can be genuinely terrifying and you will need your pawns to survive. Going solo is no longer a viable option, especially when most of the classes don't have a basic dodge. Maybe every single hit shouldn't stagger you though, you can only mitigate knockdowns. Most important of all, they fixed leveling stats. They're tied exclusively to your vocation, so there's no overlap. The max level is no longer 200 as well, now it's 999; which would have been cool if there were high level monsters.

The world is epic! Exploration is hollow: It's massive and sprawling, you'll really feel like you're on some sort of grand adventure; but it's landscapes are realistic to a fault; detrimental to the real meat of the game. For instance, every single dungeon is cave and only a handful of them are going to take you a significant amount of time to explore. You're not going to find anything like Bluemoon Tower, the Catacombs, or Watergod's Altar. Puzzles are gone, levers are gone, anything that could have made the locations district is largely missing. You can even see it in their names: "Strange Corridor", "Hidden Cavern", "Forgotten Tunnel" to name a few. Once more, they're not so rewarding either. There are chests absolutely everywhere, but more often than not, you're going to find a wakestone shard or an item you can already buy at the region's blacksmith. There are duplicates of several weapons and armors as well, why? Notable exceptions exist, but they're few and far between. If there were more armor slots to play with, this wouldn't have been a problem. Maybe focus on filling the world with quality content instead of simply making it large, Skyrim was 12 years ago. To make matters worse, enemy variety is about the same as the first game, just spread across a greater distance. If you were hoping for new additions, all you really get are variants of existing ones, slimes, and one-off bosses. Considering an encounter happens about every 15 seconds, it can get pretty exhausting.

Travelling could have been great: The addition of oxcarts is a welcome one, it's so nice to have more options beyond walking and ferrystones. However, the cart moves so slowly that I'm always opting to "doze off", which usually involves an enemy encounter along the way. Problem is, oxcarts are very destructible; I don't even think it's viable to take them without the time skip, because there are so many enemy encounters along the way. The addition of camping is great because you don't have to walk back to an inn whenever night arises. I do think their spread is too generous though, you'll have an easy time finding one when the need arises. Riftstones are everywhere too, so losing a pawn is hardly detrimental. What really bothers me are the portcrystals. Why are there only two naturally occurring ones in the entire game? Here are the places that should have one but don't: Melve, Bakbattahl, Rest Town, Sacred Arbor, Volcanic Island Camp. It's ridiculous, not to mention the non-existence of an eternal ferrystone, which was probably an excuse to fill up chests. Oh, and there's a portcrystal DLC, maybe that's why Bakbattahl doesn't have one.

Questing is better, but the quests aren't good: Quests are no longer tied to stages in the story, so you don't have to worry about automatically failing them. Timed quests will explicitly tell you in the UI, but I'd appreciate having a day counter. Failure was touted as a possibility, but it's not really something to worry about. They're usually started by encounters (you'll run into an NPC or they'll walk up to you) making them feel like a natural occurrence in the world. I appreciate how cryptic they can be, but sometimes the descriptors are unhelpful and you'll have to rely on a pawn's knowledge. Where they falter is in interest, because there aren't any exciting locations to unlock or exclusive rewards. I couldn't tell you a single memorable one, they all felt like a chore.

The plot is dreadful: The main story might just be the laziest I've ever seen in an RPG. It's even more of an afterthought than the first game. All that intrigue and buildup about the false sovran (which is really just a bunch of half-baked stealth missions) is squandered because of some Godsway MacGuffin. Which I thought was just the beginning of the story, turns out it's actually the half-way point. Your search for answers leads you to Bakbattahl, but the actual region is irrelevant to the plot. You'll head to an alter that raises from the sea, but it isn't a dungeon, just a cave with an elevator... Once you reach Moonglint Tower, it's just an elevator again. They seriously couldn't put a single fucking dungeon in this game to save their lives. Once you reach the top, bootleg Jafar accidentally summons the wrong dragon and it ends about the same way as the first game. Only this time, the post-game sucks bigtime. We're talking time limits, zero saves, three main quests, an obsession with the color red, and no dungeons. But don't worry, it's all doable in under 4 hours and the ending is just a hint at future DLC.

I have a very hard time accepting that this was Itsuno's true vision for Dragon's Dogma because it's worse than Dark Arisen. Not only does it fail to adequately improve on the original's shortcomings, in many ways it has doubled down on them. Meanwhile, its best aspects have been stripped away. Yet again, there's a great system buried beneath a pile of trash, only this time they took more pages from Ubisoft instead of lighting the book on fire. It's emblematic of everything wrong with modern gaming and this massive open world trend needs to stop already.

"Finally made it to the big leagues!"
Is the quote I think of when it comes to this game. Now I won't be one of those people that may exist that are like "well I actually loved cyberpunk since day 1 blah blah" but I truly did. When this game first cameout I fucking adored it, I adored the world, the story and how it was presented, the amazing and memorable dialogue. Despite all of that though I would say I loved this game but I never recommended it in good faith. The game was in nowhere near of a consistently playable state and had arguably the worst version of a triple A to release on PS4/Xbox one. Plus the matter of the fact that the game was built up by so many expectations just to seemingly under deliver on a lot of promises made. Now after 3 years of update and cleaning up the product and adding to it and making the game they wanted to release 3 years ago, with the inclusion of Phantom Liberty. I can say this is a top 5 game of all time for me.

I wanna start with the gameplay which has only been refined overtime. For my recent replay in the buildup to Phantom Liberty I decided to try out a throw build which is a new weapon archetype that was added post launch and man. This is the the most fun I've ever had with the gameplay of an RPG game ever (despite the fact its more of an action game). The combination of being a netrunner and pulling off covert quickhacks just to pop out of cover and nail everybody you saw with a knife from across the room without being spotted. No higher dopamine rush in a RPG game. Then going loud and pulling out the massive "well fuck it" revolver when the plan goes south and I have to break stealth. Engaging with all the systems in this game creates a flow state that is so rarely achieved by other games. Another spot of gameplay that I need to talk about is skill trees. What a fucking massive overhaul from launch. The original cyberpunk skill trees for the most part where unfortunately just percentage boosts with not a lot of uniqueness to a given tree. Just you do something better in this tree compared to the others. With the 2.0 update they finally made them PROPER skill trees. With each category of your character getting a proper ability addition when you reach the top and even at the mid section of skill trees. The skill tree is only just another great part of the gameplay flow of the whole package. Also I found the added vehicle combat to be actually fun! While can be a little weird to control sometimes (especially on a controller) it was fun to get in car chase shootouts.

Another important part of this package as a whole that is arguably my favorite part is the story of the game as a whole. Not just the main quest. The way you interact with the world isn't the most genre defying (especially with Baldur's Gate 3 coming out recently and being a monumental CRPG that has so many ways you can change the world). The interactions with each character is such a joy to go through when you learn about each character's ins and outs. Night City as a whole is such an oppressive depressing shithole of a city. But the story is about how V (your character) tries to make themselves a legend to remember no matter how they cameup. The set pieces are so amazing and fill you with such awe when you experience them. The side quests that show you so many different parts of the city and how the cast of characters lives change around V and how your actions change the trajectory of theirs. Obviously a high point of dialogue and character interactions is with Johnny Silverhand himself. What may come off as a typical super macho rockerboy that convinced himself that his actions were one of a revolutionary, actually has more emotion past that facade he constantly puts up around everybody but V the deeper you go into the game. I think a big part of the story aswell is the city and how it interacts with you and how you interact with it. With the constant police shootouts happening and the random instances of gangs you can run into that try to goad you into trying something. This game is truly one of the most immersive worlds I have ever had the pleasure to engage in.

A thing of importance I have to state separately is the art design of the game as a whole. Despite how the game is designed and the dialogue being topnotch it would be hampered if the art design of the world wasn't as top of the line as it is. Walking through the streets and exploring the dark dank alleys filled with sketchy figures juxtaposed by seeing the highs of opulence with extremely clean and gaudy environments of the 1% of Night City. The music also elevating all the parts of this game as a whole. Plus the fact that this game is the best looking game out there currently. The technological marvel that is this game just existing is an achievement in itself.

I'll add a note here about the dlc but won't say anything spoiler specific. I really loved the dlc! It was a really good story and I loved the setting of Dogtown and thought Dogtown is just another amazing addition to Night City as a whole. While I think the dlc was amazing and just gave me more Cyberpunk which is what I wanted, it's a bit held back by the general length of it's story so you don't get enough time to properly connect to these characters as you do those in the base game. I love Phantom Liberty but I just love the base game more then fucking anything.

With all that said I just want to say I'm so happy to be able to confidently say that yes I fucking love that after three years of defending this game I can say that I can recommend it to people! It is one of my favorite video games of all time easily. A master-class in multiple categories (but not all). This is the game I am proud to proclaim is a game I love dearly and hold to my heart, and I am so fucking excited for what comes next. I am extremely excited with the fact that the director for Phantom Liberty and who's been leading the development to make Cyberpunk a better overall experience (Gabe Amantangelo) cleary has a vision for the future of Cyberpunk with the sequel. The dev team finally got a director who knows what they want to do with this game. I can't be even more fucking excited for what is in store for this world in the sequel!!! Buy this game!!! I love it so much! This is literally my longest review on backloggd I just want everybody to experience the thing I adore!!!
"Will never fade away!"

funny to say this since it's just a story expansion, but this might one of, if not the best game i've played all year

the story's great and some of the gameplay sequences are amazing and unexpected

really wish this game had the love it deserved

Thought I'd give this a quick replay before the Phantom Liberty update and goddamn.

Even on a third play through I still love it to pieces.

I still discover new things, I still find it hard to do things that'll hurt the characters I like because I just fall in love with them all over again. I still lose track of time and end up playing till 4 in the morning.

Even after a 3rd play through I am excited for a 4th.


It definitely has its problems but I am more than happy to look past them for everything else. So fucking excited for Phantom Liberty, give me more cyberpunk forever and ever please and thank you <3