Yes, your Pawn doesn’t have the same capabilities as your main character, but not treating him/her like a full-fledged party member will be setting yourself up for disaster. I eventually wised up and gave her new equipment, and skills and my Pawn has been taking hits like a champ ever since. Needless to say, she died frequently and I was forced to run a lot. However, I didn’t give her any new equipment for about 20 levels and neglected to buy her any skills whatsoever. I made my character a Mage, so I made my Pawn a Fighter to soak up hits. But to do so is to put yourself at significant disadvantage - something that I learned the hard way. It’s easy to just ignore your Pawn and treat them like a Phantom from Dark Souls, especially since they generally fulfill the same function. For example, a Pawn with a Utilitarian Inclination will use all their skills equally, while one with Medicant will prioritize healing above all else. Pawns are essentially A.I.-controlled characters that act depending on the behavior, known as Inclination, that you assign them. But what they lack in depth, they make up for in their ability to drastically alter the way battles pan out. Pawns follow the same growth system as your controlled character except they don’t have access to hybrid classes, so they lack the same level of depth. Of course, your character will be strong enough to handle essentially anything at that point and you don’t need to actually do that, but it’s a little odd when the “best” way to build a certain vocation is to not actually use it for much of the game. If you’re serious about maximizing your Magick Archer’s offense then you might find yourself not using that vocation at all past level 100 until you actually hit level 200. The issue is when you’re dealing with vocations like Magick Archer which rely on the Magic stat to deal damage but severely reduced Magic gains past level 100 (all vocations suffer from reduced gains past this point).
It’s a ton of fun to be able to plan out the vocations your character will have at any given level from 1 to 200 and ensure they have the best possible stats for what you want said character to do. Unfortunately, having character progression work in this manner can be both heaven and hell for those who want to min-max. For example, while a Sorcerer is technically a Mage’s advanced class, it gains less physical stats (HP and Stamina) upon leveling up and can’t use any healing spells. What’s neat about this is that while these jobs might be labelled as “advanced” they aren’t strictly better, especially when you consider that each vocation has a specialty that can’t be replicated by another and have the stat growths to match. At first, you only have access to three vocations - Fighter, Strider and Mage - but you gain access to three advanced and hybrid vocations apiece once you hit Level 10. Vocations are essentially the same as the Classes you could find in any other RPG, but the way they have an impact on your character’s growth and effectiveness in battle is what helps make them so memorable. The result is a unique title that is in a league of its own.ĭragon’s Dogma accomplishes this through two of its most unique mechanics: Vocations and Pawns. While that alone could make this game a worthy tribute, what truly makes Dragon’s Dogma: Dark Arisen so great is that it seeks to build off of DS’ formula, rather than merely mimic it as so many titles have done in the past.
As much as I hate to make any reference to Dark Souls, it’s clear the overall aesthetic and combat are inspired by it. As such, while it would be easy to just end the review here, it would be irresponsible of me to not at least offer my take as someone who loves RPGs and has heard this game being hyped up for years.įirst things first: I finally understand the hype. Capcom actually released a trailer last month that detailed these changes, so it’s nice to see that the game as a whole delivers on what was advertised.Īmusingly enough, this was actually my first time playing Dragon’s Dogma in any capacity. Everything in the PS4/Xbox One version of Dark Arisen looks cleaner, sharper and more-detailed in general.
In fact, you could easily read our review for the PC version of Dark Arisen and there wouldn’t be anything that differentiates these two other than the enhanced graphics and frame rates.Īnd while on the subject of enhanced graphics, Capcom really stepped up in this department. If you’ve played Dragon’s Dogma: Dark Arisen before, then don’t expect to see anything new here.