Some DD2 Thoughts (Warning: POSITIVE Thoughts! Can you believe this?!)

Please, in case you want to discuss something, be respectful, okay? Okay.

I have been quite obsessed with DD2 these past few days. I been replaying and exploring every nook and crane of the map, avoiding as much as I can to rely on guides or external help, just using what the game communicates to me. My first playthrough was quite incomplete and rushed (also pretty negative for some personal reasons), so it's like I'm experiencing this for the first time again. I also replayed a fair bit of Dark Arisen some weeks ago to best paralel my thoughts

As much as I understand the frustration from so many people regardings the game, to me - this is one of if not the most feverish and passionate mainstream effort in the last decade and by far the most important game CAPCOM have released in so many years. It's so beautifully flawed, exhausting, time consuming, livable and alive that I can help but to feel impressed.

Traversing those big landscapes is such an endearing experience. Keeping track of those bizarre and obtuses map markers, studying your surroundings for directions and hearing your pawns tell you hints. The game communicates to you in such an organic way! A lot is said about the enemy variety and yeah, I quite agree, it's exhausting. But I also love how they feel more like creatures part of an ecosystem than... enemies? Like man, you can see griffins hunting, goblins and humans camping, saurians resting close to the sea and hidden in caves and even monsters fighting! I think my biggest gripe is density, like, the world is so well crafted, begging to be explored like you were a pilgrimage in that world, just to be interrupted by a enemie over and over again... I really would love it if the game just shut up a bit and just let me explore them without having to constantly stop  and make me fight something. Still though, I really love how exploration works here and I also think it's really cool how every area has its own diegetic traversal gimmick - from the oxcarts to the teleferics - both with its risk/reward proportion.

I also really like a lot of the NPCs systems, though it reaaaaaaaaaaaaly would be great if received more polish. It's so unpredictable to see those random NPCs that you sometimes help in the roads just popping out in Vernworth inviting you to grab a bite or leaving a gift with a cute letter on your house. A lot of this can also be said about the quests, i think it's beautiful that the game is so opaque about them, it really expects you to interact more like you were a character in that world than someone seeing by the lens of a interactable simulacrum. That being said... I really wish they expanded more on the social RPG side of things. It doesn't need to be CRPG levels of depth but there are so many times were the game kinda just... brokens if you try to be a bit out of curve. Also, i haven't tested much of the death mechanics, but they also seem mostly unpolished, and doesn't help that dragonsplague was so nerfed (i'm still really sad about this, is such a incredible mechanic...).

Anyway, enough about crap, who cares for exploration and world, right? Let's talk about combat! Now, let me ask something: Do you known other game you can pull a individual geometric leg of a cyclop, making him ragdolling into a wall, banging his head and falling in the exactly adjacent way to the terrain topography? No? What about one where the fucking God Hand's Home Run God it's a skill? Not too? What about one where you can make those mystic creatures fall of a cliff like dumbasses because they step on a fake ground? No, right? Yeah, you get the idea. A lot is said about DD2 "downgrading" the vocations and I strongly disagree. It's more specialized vocations completely changes how you Interact not only with the combat, but also with the more vertical world design. Archers have less options in close range now, so spatial control is more important. Warrior have those amazing time-sensivite skills that tests yours reflexes on the fly (and we even have the DMC5 parry!), Thief feels like a fucking platformmer letting you not only explore in a more vertical way but also fly trough the danger, they feel so distinct and interesting on they own, and make the warfarer vocation feels even more substantial since you can create the ultimate hybrid vocation with this. A lot of people shit on Trickster and yeah, while I agree that it should have more skills, it's experimenting with new ideas, testing new things, contextualizing it's combat strengths focused on so much emergents elements like position and environmental hazards into something new. And that's exactly what DD2 is, bold and new.

A lot is questioned about the mystic "Itsuno's vision" of what DD2 is about (or should be?), and the frustration from the fandom seems to come from the fact that, Drago’s Dogma 2, in fact, could not be perfect, even after 12 years of waiting. But that's the gamble that you play to create something so remarkable and unique. You will commit mistakes, not everyone will like, some even will hate and despise, but it's undeniable that what Itsuno creates here is something that justifies itself on being a videogame, an experience that can only exists inside of this medium.

And to me, that's the true Itsuno's dream. A game that finds itself a reason to exist inside of this medium.