A couple years ago, I was looking for an RPG where I could be part of an MMO group — but without actually having to be playing an MMO. See, what I wanted was EverQuest — but without the other players. I could just go to the tavern or a guild and strike up a conversation and recruit my party members that way. If I found someone along the way I thought would be a good fit, then they might join, too. And if I decided to get alt-itis and change my class, everyone would be okay with it and someone else could tank or heal while I had all the fun.
Turned out this game existed, it was called Dragon’s Dogma, and I could do all those things. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Dragon’s Dogma II is more of the same.
In both Dragon’s Dogma I and II, you play an Arisen — someone who has had their heart torn out and eaten by a dragon, meaning your life is now bound to the dragon’s life, and you have gained certain powers. Chief among those powers is the power to summon pawns. Pawns are helpful beings who come from another world and are sent here to, well, help people. Pawns are used as slaves by cruel people, but are willing to join you on your adventures.
At game start, you design your own character, but you also design your main pawn. You and your pawn will be together through the entire game. When you aren’t actively playing the game, if you allow it, your pawn can be hired by another actual player. While in their game, they may learn the locations of dungeons, treasures, notable monsters and quest steps that they can bring back to you. And when you hire new pawns for your group, they might also be other player’s main pawns, and they can bring you to locations they have seen in their player’s game.
These pawns are incurable gossips, and will chattily set loose on the things their other players have done or how long they’ve been kept in the team and so on, making me feel a little curious what they will tell their next adventurer partner about me. So I try to treat them well.
Dragon’s Dogma II, like I, doesn’t have a strong plot. There is a plot, but it doesn’t get in the way of the adventuring unless you want it to. That was how I played the first game, as well. I spent a good amount of time adventuring and exploring and finding out what class I wanted to play (you and your main pawn can change classes freely) before I decided I was ready to embark on the main plot and finish the game.
DD1 was a game of massive monsters, fights against overwhelming odds, and startlingly memorable locations. I have barely started DD2 and already stumbled into a dragon. (No, it did not go well). We run when we see a griffon in the sky. We track and clear goblin camps. And I hired, for awhile, a thief — Arcanto — who demanded I follow her all over the map so she could show me things. Which usually turned out to be ambushes. When, scratched, scarred, bleeding and battled, we staggered out of the other side, she’d turn and point to a chest against a broken stone wall and demand praise for bringing us to such staggering wealth.
An apple.
My current pawns are a little less excitable, but I can go into the Riftstone portal, if I want, and look her up and see how she’s doing — maybe invite her back. She sure did seem to know where things were.
