After 3 hours with Dragon’s Dogma 2, it already feels like another Capcom hit

It’s so rare during a preview event for a game to have us giggling with childlike enjoyment.

Typically these events are hyper-controlled corporate walkthroughs, showing off exactly what the publisher wants you to see. This is why it was such a pleasure when we recently got a chance to play 3 hours of Dragon’s Dogma 2, off the leash.

Not only was this an excellent way to experience a chunk of the upcoming mammoth Capcom RPG, but also led to the three of us in the demo room laughing uproariously as we discovered just how overpowered some of Dragon’s Dogma’s new toys really are.

The long-awaited sequel is almost here, and after our time with the game, we’re not only confident that long-time fans of the series will be happy, but we also think that millions of new converts will finally understand the hype of the little-played, but much loved 360 RPG.

We played as both the Magick Archer and the Mystic Spearhand; two of the game’s classes. This dictates what weapon style you’ll be most adept with, but with these classes specifically (known as Hybrid Vocations in-game) we were also able to cast magic.

The Spearhand saw us get up close and personal with our enemies. At one point, a huge Griffin plunged into the road in front of us, engaging our character and his three pawns in a fight for their lives. Like in the first game, there’s an ever-present climbing system in Dragon’s Dogma 2, so instead of wailing away at it from a safe distance, we climbed onto its neck and began digging it.

When the Griffin then took off and sent us rolling down a hill, it was thrilling and hilarious. The game is built for emergent moments like that and handles the pressure of dealing with the full party and the main character’s abilities very well.

It turns out this Griffin was treating us more as light entertainment, as it flew away before we could do significant damage. According to Capcom, that Griffin will reappear later to settle our score, but that happens unexpectedly as players explore the open world, striking when a player least expects it.

We then headed deeper into the valley with our Pawns (the game’s in-game AI helpers that form your party of four). As we reached a creek, some enemies that we were clearly very under-leveled for pinned us against a wall. Once we evaded their seemingly endless attacks, we legged it up the path, a task made harder by the Pawns being routinely knocked unconscious.

This resulted in a relay race of reviving a Pawn, running 20 yards, one of them dying, running back reviving them, all the while a huge monster was barrelling toward us, one attack from which would wipe the whole party.

This moment had the vibe of a D&D session wherein the party gets in over their heads, and has to scramble to find their way out while managing to keep everyone alive. We did all live, for what it’s worth, before slowly creeping back to a campsite to heal.

But the moment that really had us ticked was when we started playing as the Magick Archer. The Archer had a few different spell arrows at their disposal. A flame spell arrow, a homing spell arrow, and a spell arrow that healed our Pawns when we shot them with it. The final arrow in the quiver was the ricochet arrow.

We were warned before playing as the Archer that the ricochet arrow was somewhat powerful when used inside caves, since once it hits an enemy, or a solid surface, it would bounce back and forth, further damaging the enemy.

What we didn’t expect was to enter a cave, face a 40ft demon and then turn said cave into an illegal rave, sending showers of neon pink ricochet arrows around the demon’s lair. Their health bar melted.

Breaking things in games is incredibly fun, and from what we’ve played, Capcom wants you to feel extremely powerful. Dragon’s Dogma 2 is just as good about humbling you as it is about empowering you, which is a balance that a really excellent RPG has to strike.

Not only were we skipping through the fields of Dragon’s Dogma 2 pushing the game to its limits, but we also got a brief look at how missions are presented to the player and an example of how they may be resolved.

To pass a gate, we had to present a specific permit to the guard. This item would allow us through, as long as we were part of the in-game race that looked like humanoid cats.

“Dragon’s Dogma 2 is just as good about humbling you as it is about empowering you, which is a balance that a really excellent RPG has to strike.”

So, you present the pass and they rudely tell you that you’re missing the prerequisite features to pass as a furry’s dream. We then went off to the local shop, which had a cat mask waiting for us. The same shopkeeper could forge the permit that we held, had we not acquired it traditionally (this happened before our demo).

We left our time with Dragon’s Dogma 2 absolutely desperate to play the full game. The world is full of life. It’s both an intentionally, and emergently hilarious game, and the range of combat abilities feels vast. We didn’t get a great sense of the state of the world and the overarching story, but when it’s this fun to play we’re ready to jump straight back in when the game releases later this month.