I’m lost in the Man Swallowing falls ;_;
Is that the water temple quest? What part are you stuck with?
You know this game is hype when you spend 18 hours on it in one day, sleep for 6 hours, then play it again.
I think I’m waaay overleveled from doing so many sidequests. I’m at Lvl 43 and any shit that touches my sword just disintegrates into a pile of blood. I’ve only just done the griffin quest on the main storyline.
You should probably beat the main story around level 30. So, yeah…you’re definitely overleveled.
Dragon Dogma’s sidequests are kind of like the difficulty button. You can do them all and make the game easy, you can do none and make the game hard, or you can do a few and keep the difficulty fairly close to what it is at the beginning.
I took out the cyclopes in it… and now I don’t know where to advance to.
I’m trying to escort that chic you meet at the start of the game where you lead her into the big city with that giant snake head to another place, and it seems like the swallowing falls is in the way (or I think it is).
Trying to get past it, but don’t know how to advance after beating the cyclopes.
Kind of odd, because playing this game as a Knight, I felt like I was getting bored once again like I was with my mage.
But damn, I didn’t know how much shit was actually in the game.
I guess seeing all this spark more interests in my game, and now all I want to do grind. Fuckin’ played for a good 3 hours straight… haven’t done that to a non-fighting game in a long time. But I love being a mage fighter or whatever they’re called, shit is awesome!!
I was actually surprised by all the bosses I ran into in the woods at night. I saw the typical cyclops and griffin type monsters, but then I ran into that wizard… WTF???
Also, another question is, I heard there’s something called a “whore shop” where you buy slutty items for your pawns. I-I want that…!
Wow from what yall are saying game seems pretty short. I just bought mines 2 days ago. Im past the 2nd cyclops that motherfucker was hard, and I ran into those lizard thingys in the forest. Pretty fun so far but will see if it will end up a classic.
Fucking BANDITS. Vash the stampede looking ass niggas.
Whats this about ads?
How many story quests are there after the Griffin?
How do you tell which one is a story quest and which one is a side quest?
If anyones on X360, send me a friend request. Gamertag = Biggzy.
I finally figured out how the rift works and saw that Fighter “Apollo” was from FurryKing, pretty bad ass dude. I’m looking for a Mage or Sorcerer pawn.
Also, someone finally used my pawn and gave it a good review. So that was kinda cool.
Oooh question. When you hire a pawn, and it has their quest knowledge, how does that play into your quest info? Will they give you more clues about it or something?
Ran into so many mini-bosses, this song has yet to get dull on me.
[media=youtube]mp2fkcxlDgw[/media]
Okay, so my thoughts on the game since I just beat it recently. There are some spoilers so,
[details=Spoiler]Dragon’s Dogma is pretty ambitious project. It attempts to bridge a gap that many gamers have rightly perceived; lack of good combat in an RPG. True real-time, fun, and engaging third-person combat in an open world RPG has not been commonly employed. Sure, you’ve got the isometric combat a la Baldur’s Gate, but many gamers want the sheer physicality of being able to beat an enemy’s face in with a mace or slash them apart with a sword.
Dragon’s Dogma attempts to do this by drawing on design elements players will recognize from Capcom’s own Devil May Cry series and Monster Hunter, as well as marrying it to an open world experience. How does this succeed? In one aspect, it is a phenomenal success. In another perspective, it is a phenomenal failure. I will explain how below.
Before we get to what I believe are the many strengths of Dragon’s Dogma, it’s important we get the biggest problem with Dragon’s Dogma out of the way first: the story. The story is not exactly presently in an entirely sensible or coherent fashion. The player will frequently go through long stretches without an inkling as how the quests they are doing are at all related to the main quest. After getting your heart taken and traveling to Gran Soren, you are made a member of the Wyrm Hunt, where your duties include seemingly unrelated tasks such as routing a monster infestation or killing a Griffin that is terrorizing the countryside. The relation to the main storyline is tenuous at best.
Entire plotlines appear to disappear and characters enter and leave without any understanding or explanation. For example, it is never clearly explained or hinted at to whom the Mason is (an agent of the Duke? Who knows). Exposition is vague and there is no coherent strand connecting any of the quest lines. Even the Elder Scrolls series, which also had poor and uninteresting characters and storyline, had far more coherent main quest lines. The entire point of the journey is not really explained until the very end, when the player slays the red dragon and then meets Savan.
There is no real sense of permanence in the game. The character can be jailed, only to walk away, right in front of the guards in fact, with no consequence. In one quest line, you approach the Duchess’ bedroom, are caught redhanded, and sent to the dungeons. You can literally walk outside and no one seems to even remember. You can even talk to the Duke later and it’s as though the game erased the incident from the collective memory of Gransys.
It is in this aspect the game must be considered a phenomenal failure; the story is bland and largely incoherent and while the final plotline is quite interesting, it’s too little, too late.
One compliment of the story I can give however is that the end truly was quite interesting and that the moral decisions, while few and far between, always seemed rather significant.
However, I believe Dragon’s Dogma has other strengths that more than make for this deficit. By and large, in RPGs, there has existed a triad of sorts, 3 cornerstones to a successful RPG:
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Gameplay: This includes combat, interacting with the world, and what not
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Exploration: This includes trekking the game world, interacting with the world, whether from spelunking in caves or traversing vast countrysides
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Story: The plot lines, the characters, the coherence of exposition, making the story and characters matter to the player.
There is of course graphics and audio quality, but this is a given in many games, and often, excellent gameplay can make up for relatively sparse graphical quality. Most RPGs succeed in only one or two of these cornerstones.
Consider the Elder Scrolls series. They are utter paragons of succeeding at the Exploration aspect, allowing the player to trek across an entire country, interact with hundreds of NPCs, make actions that have real consequences, craft items, go anywhere they please, etc. However, everyone is painfully aware how repetitive and dull the combat is and the story is typically throwaway and the characters rarely memorable.
Or consider a game like Final Fantasy (take your pick of which). Many of them feature engaging, memorable characters and situations, but in so doing, they give up the exploration aspects that are prized by Western developers. The combat is also fairly typical standard turn-based fare and becomes repetitive before too long. How many times can you cast Ultima or summon Shiva before it becomes dull?
Or consider a game like Dark Souls. It absolutely excels in both gameplay and exploration, giving the gamer a tense experience of survival and consequence in a world that is absolutely out to get you. This particular game was very highly rated and favored. And yet, it features almost nothing in the way of story. It is exceedingly minimal in the way of exposition.
It is these latter two aspects that I feel Dragon’s Dogma is a resounding success. I quite honestly believe, alongside the combat in Dark Souls and in Mount & Blade, Dragon’s Dogma gameplay stands among the best of any RPG in gaming. They were hardly the first game to consider action-adventure elements in an RPG. The concept goes back a while, perhaps most notably in Secret of Mana, and later on with third-person action RPGs like Vagrant Story, Brave Fencer Musashi, Kingdom Hearts, Dark Messiah, etc.
But just about none of them truly captured the essence of combat and physicality to the extent I believe that Dark Souls, Mount & Blade, and now, Dragon’s Dogma has. There is nothing quite like being out in the middle of the wilderness at night, barely able to see 15 meters in front of you, when a Chimera assaults your party. And then once you scale the beast and get to work on it, and finally killing the thing - that experience never gets old. The grab command is a phenomenal addition to an RPG, arguably on a greater level of importance than say the Gravity Gun in Half-Life 2.
Combat feel powerful and visceral. The player is given a wide plethora of offensive and defensive choices presented to them. However, you can only set up to 6 different abilities at an inn. You can do anything from a massive overhead sword swing to catapulting your allies to the air with the flat of your blade or with a shield. The sheer number of options in combat is quite large, from grabbing enemies so your ally can finish them off, to creating ice pillars you can vault off of, to summoning down tornadoes, to shooting a rain of arrows, to - Look, just give it a try. The game must be played to believed.
Dragon’s Dogma features 9 different classes, each with about 20 or more (much more in the case of the hybrid vocations) unique abilities, up to which 6 can set. Moreover, there are a variety of augments available to each class. The player is able to switch at will, at the Gran Soren inn, between any of these classes. Feel like playing a mage, but started as a fighter? Then just buy the mage class and get to blasting off fireballs or raising pillars of ice. This ability to fool around with each of the different classes, and not be constrained by stereotypical class choices is a crucial part of Dragon’s Dogma’s charm.
The pawn system is also well done. You can tweak your main pawns inclination, whether it be to defend you or pick off the weaker monsters. Your pawn gains the same class choices you do, except the hybrid vocations, and can switch as easily as you do. You can pick one main pawn and up to 2 support pawns. Pawns are reasonably intelligent and have knowledge of different aspects from monsters, to areas, to quests. Uncertain of how to get to the Stone of the Southwest? Then hire a pawn who is knowledgeable of the area and they can easily guide you along the main roads. Pawns with high understanding of certain monsters will effectively fight against them, whether it be from buffing your part with holy power when against undead, to wielding lightning against a cyclops.
Just as impressive is the ability to hire support pawns online. Your own pawn, a copy of them anyway, will be hired on for another player’s quests, and then come back with items and experience when you rest. This allows them to gain valuable knowledge of quests and areas you might not have even played through yet.
The crafting system is also well done. The combinations are largely logical and in some cases, surprising in the level of thought Capcom put into the game. For instance, if you want a torch, just hold a piece of kindling and stand next to a torch. Voila, instant light source. The sheer number of combinations seems massive thus far. There is even the ability to forge and duplicate items, at a price. You can even duplicate quest items, although this may have certain consequences…
The game emphasizes proper preparation, because you cannot easily fell larger monsters until well into the later levels. Running through Cyclops country? Then better have a mage with either the ability to cast lightning or enchant your weapons with it. Running through an area above your level with just about no curatives. Expect to die a lot. At one point, during an unrelated quest, I ran across a Dragon at level 30 and only lived to tell the tale because I had bought nearly 40 potions for the road. I ended up using all of them and it took me a day (of in game time) to kill the thing.
Dragon’s Dogma is not afraid to kick your ass a bit. It doesn’t handhold and if you trek through an unfamiliar area without being properly leveled or prepared, you will die. The difficulty does even out later as you become just about unstoppably strong, but the difficulty takes a significant spike towards the end, giving even relatively high level players a challenge.
Moreover, given the plethora of items, classes, and a new game plus, this game holds a quite decent amount of replay value.
In conclusion, I think Dragon’s Dogma is a fantastic RPG. I hope it becomes another highly successful IP for Capcom. The only thing that detracts from the experience is the poor story, but even highly acclaimed RPGs like Skyrim and Dark Souls featured minimal or poor stories. I think the game deserves at least an 8 or 9 out of 10, for the sheer quality of its gameplay and exploration.[/details]
It doesn’t get old because it means something is about to DIE! yells a rallying war cry, U S A!
I think I gave your character some new crap (Juggernaut?). If not I will. The best way to search for what you want is to literally search for what you want. Search by level (go to the rift stone while you are in the rift and there’s the option for it) and then narrow it down from there. And don’t be afraid to hire someone quite a few levels ahead of you. I was running around with the same two pawns for awhile because they had 9 or 10 levels on me. Yeah it was expensive but we went on so many quests that I have quite a bit of rift crystals stored up. Now I’m only doing 5 levels ahead because after seeing what I’ve seen I might need to mix it up more.
If the pawns you’ve hired have done the quest that you are currently working on they offer advice. Like for instance there was this quest to find a grimoire tome thingy from the thief castle hang out place in the south. The thief leader kept saying that he’d give me the book if I got him something but my pawns kept saying “Hey man, it’s here. Ignore him!” Not literally what they said but they kept pushing me hard by saying it’s nearby. So since I have double jump I got to the highest point in this abandoned castle (there is a broken spiral staircase) and there it was in a chest. The same goes for your pawn when it gets hired out. He or she will gain knowledge and bring it back to you. If it weren’t for that system or being able to sort of guide the personality of your pawn I would find their banter really irritating but my crew is smart and not too annoying.
Arty and Apollo Cont’d
So I’ve been out there doing my thing with these two pawns (a mage and a warrior) who were 9/10 levels ahead of me. We felled many a cyclops, chimera, harpy, wolf, bandit, saurian, etc. Just having a great time with these guys. I’ve just finished The Cypher quest. Game is so strange lol. So dumbass story time.
It’s like 4am last night right and I’m at the Northwest side of the map, passed the very windy valley which was absolute murder on Artemis. Anyway once you get passed that there is this rocky landscape with a deep gorge running through it. My dumbass at lv 34 decided to try to keep pushing deeper and deeper into the game. Man the fucking bandits in there are crazy. It was nighttime too so I couldn’t see shit beyond 50 feet and archers are owning me from afar. We barely survived the first attack but again, my dumbass was hungry for battle. Battle is what I got alright and right when I was about to die I hit Back to go use my ferry stone but like I said, it was late and my mental faculties were failing me, I hit Back AGAIN and ended up getting slashed to death before I had a chance to hit Back a third time.
I did save some time before then so all was not lost. Still, it was nice for the game to kick my ass and remind me why there is a 99 level cap lol.
Nice feedback.
TL;DR version: Game is great, does things RPGs should do or haven’t done in a while. Story was bad, bad, bad.
Sounds like almost every awesome RPG has good gameplay but awful story.
WHAT IS UP WITH THAT?!?!?
Only game I know that succeeded in that was Baldur’s Gate and FFT.
Also…
I’m still lost in Man Swallowing falls ;_;
Killed cyclopes, what do now?
Being able to double jump or levitate serves you well. You’ve noticed that it’s flooded but when you are in the main flooded area (before the Cyclops) you there is a room to the right near the entrance that you can double jump too (I have a strider so I don’t know if you can sprint and jump to it. Doesn’t hurt to try). In there is a new area with a switch to hit. Doing so drains the water and opens up the bottom floor or the temple. I honestly did it myself before being told too so I don’t know what the five heavy ass blue slates have to do with anything (that’s what this little quest will get you) but that’s what you get out of it. There’s another Cyclops around so be weary.
Where the fuck is Valmiro!?
Ps3 = Tr4gicLi0n_ if anyone wants to add me
Just got this game and im loving it so far. Started out as a Strider and I got past the encampment it became dark outside and i didnt have any oil for my lantern so I for some dumb reason decide to not wait out until the sun came out. So I’m walking around in the woods and just chillin’ with no monsters at all suprisingly then my pawn’s start talking and say something to me and I dont have my glasses on so I ignore whatever they are saying. Next thing you know I’ve fallen into a ravine with no way back up and I can only go downstream. I travel downstream to see a giant ass sleeping cyclops and harpies that are singing to it (guess they put him to sleep). So I engage all of them into a constantly losing battle (my pawns are pretty retarded kept dying on me). Eventually the cyclops knocks my healer pawn off the waterfall (didnt mention the ravine turned into a waterfall) and so I have to play super lame and shoot arrows at the cyclops for like 30 minutes. But it was the funnest 30 minutes I had. Shoot the cyclops in the eye then rampages all over trying to club us to death. Died like 3 times trying to fight him.
There is a switch on the righthand side I believe. You can jump around in the main area (past the bridge, before the cyclops) to get through the narrow doors on the right side to reach the switch.
The slates are used in a main story quest so be sure to hang onto them. Just give them to your support pawns or something though since each is 10 lbs each.
I actually found out I shouldn’t be in that cave.
I’m trying to escort Mercede to some place and doing an awful job 
@Lion, send a friend request to me if you need a higher level pawn to help out a bit, I have a level 32 ranger/strider.
Dark Souls had a fascinating, deep story to it.
It simply made you dig for it.
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Bro I did the same thing only I was escorting Rowland (I think was his name). He gives you this big ass sword for taking him to the Shadow Fort. I say go ahead and rack up some experience points and finish the temple.