Difficulty:

Just Right

Time Spent:

40 to 100 Hours

The Bottom Line:

"Rocks"

First of all, i have to say i had high hopes for Dragon Dogma after seeing many gameplay videos and developer interviews, but Capcom really surprised me when i got the game and started playing .. it really exceeded my high expectations and blew me away, it's hard to describe what's so great about this game, one has to experience it hands-on to fully appreciate it, but i will try my best to share my experience and review the game avoiding spoilers as much as i can.

It all starts out with the unusual song in the start menu, it starts slow but as soon as the vocals kick in it really surprised me, it irked me the first few times, but once you get to read the lyrics and listen to the song it really grows on you and you understand why it fits perfectly with the game, after that you get to play some tutorial level with some pre-made character called Savan in which you will be introduced to all the basic game mechanics and concepts (will get to those later) .. i didn't understand why they made you play with a per-made character for the tutorial but it all made sense later .. it is a very impressive way of making a tutorial level that also will factor in the story later on.

After that you get to select how you want to make your character and shortly after an introductory cut-scene that sets the stage for your epic journey you get to select your first vocation (job) and don't think too much about it, you can easily change later .. and i have to admit the customization options are quite extensive and in-depth customization is possible (and can be extended even further later in the game, will come to that later) .. not only that .. but if you read the manual it will tell you that your body size and weight actually factor in combat and movement for real .. well done Capcom .. i didn't see this one coming .. the only down side here is that i think a slider based editor would have been more intuitive than selecting from 40 different possible variations of a certain body-part, the end result will be the same but the process will be more refined ... one last thing to note .. you can only have one character per PS3/Xbox360 account and only one save file per character, i was shocked first, but i got over it quickly and partially understand why they made that choice, you can still copy your save file to a flash drive and make another one .. or simply make multiple accounts aside from your main one .. problem solved XD

You then start the game, it starts slowly but ramps up once you reach the main capital of the game world .. it also does a great job of introducing the game systems bit by bit so they don't overwhelm the player and without too much hand-holding, the pawn system specifically is just brilliant, imagine the message system from Demon's Souls/Dark Souls but instead those massages are now living breathing (and talkative) in-game characters you can create, hire and lend to other players, characters who not only fight by your side as your adventuring party/buddies put also give you useful tips regarding the game world, combat and quests .. all depending on what experiences they had in their original worlds .... just after you reach some camp in the early part of the game you get to create you own main pawn (you can have only one personal pawn) like you created your character and give them a job and a voice (pick well as you will be hearing it a lot, surprisingly despite selecting a voice for your main character too they don't speak at all, your pawn does all the talking here XD), not only can you lend and borrow pawns to/from other players, but when you switch pawns or send them back you can rate them and send them off with gifts to their original owners if you liked their look and/or performance, and a greetings message too if you feel like it, you can also fav your most liked pawns and re-hire them later or search for specific traits or combinations of skills through the pawns homeworld called "The Rift" .. the only downside despite how brilliant the system is that the pawns can sometimes not do what you want them to do exactly .. an AI tweaking option would have been a welcome addition (like FF12 gambits) .. still .. the AI in the game is pretty damn good as it is and you can alter the AI of your main pawn through talking sessions in any inn or with magical potions XD

Then we come to the meat of the game, the big monsters that fill the world of Gransys, and damn it, those are the most impressive thing about the game, Capcom outdid themselves with some of the most fearsome and amazing looking beasts, yeah they are all based on Greek mythology and not original monsters (with few exceptions) but never have they been this amazing looking nor amazingly animated (the Hydra heads just feel so amazing and surreal when they twitch, move and attack independently from each other in a dance of beautiful madness), the real catch here is that you can interact with those beats in very interesting ways, you can climb their bodies, cling to them and stab or pummel them in their weak-points while they try to catch you or shake you off, and each of the monsters has multiple body parts, multiple weak points and health-bars, and they don't go down easily .. you will just feel amazing taking them down .. and await to repeat those encounters over and over .. even small monsters are so much fun to fight (and dangerous in large numbers, bandits can be a pain in the ass early on), also the game gives you a very wide repertoire of moves, attacks and support skills to play around with .. and each job feels and plays very differently from the other ones .. there are shared skills and gear between jobs but each one still has its own unique perks and play style and they all feel great.

Then there is the story, while the presentation is kinda dry bones and the cut-scenes with dialog are too simple, the story has its share of interesting twists and interactive moments that feel fantastic and cinematic near the end of the game when things really spin out of control and in unexpected ways, besides .. who needs cinematic cut-scenes when the action in the game itself rivals the cinematics in many games that you watch and say (i wish i can do that in the game) .. in DD you can do some crazy cinematic things in game that rarely other games allow you too XD

As for difficulty, at first the game is quite challenging and the wilderness outside cities is really very dangerous specially at night (there is a fantastic day/night cycle), but later on midway through the game you get strong enough to best the strongest monsters without too much fear of dying specially if you have been doing all sorts of side-quests that give lots of money and exp (but still the big monsters battle feel fantastic) .. that until a certain twist in the game that surprisingly amps up the difficulty considerably and opens up many new locations you thought were blocked before.

Then there is the community, Capcom provided a community site for people to share their adventures, and provided an in-menu camera that allows you to capture your most cinematic moments (or your most hilarious ones), just look online for the virtual magazine called "Gran Soren Times" that is posted daily by Capcom and features a verity of hand-picked interesting snippets of players adventures and exploits.

Finally i have to say Dragon's Dogma is a game that takes some of the most interesting concepts from a variety of games like (Dark Souls, Monster Hunter, Shadow of the Colossus, .. etc etc) mixes them together and adds to them their own ideas and in the end creates a fantastic experience that feels so immersing and thrilling ... it isn't without its flaws (which makes it short from residing in the best games of all time list) but you will forget about those flaws once you start getting into the world of Gransys and realize how hard it is to put down the controller once you start playing this fantastic game.