No Griffins were harmed in the writing of this feature.
it’s not all name dropping and game engines, there’s also head chopping and siege engines
It seems Capcom has an interesting equation for us.
Oblivion(Monster Hunter X Demon’s Souls) + Shadow of the Colossus = Dragon’s Dogma.
Admittedly, that’s a lot to take in. However, rumor has it a picture is worth a thousand words. If that’s the case, these ‘moving pictures’ should clue you in comprehensibly…
Funnily enough, one word in particular stands out… wow.
Debuted at Capcom’s annual Captivate event last month, this Action RPG monster mash-up has been causing something of a stir. Even ignoring the mastadonic foes, visceral gameplay, tense atmosphere and electric guitar (?), when your project is helmed by producer Hiroyuki Kobayashi (Resident Evil 4) and director Hideaki Itsuno (Devil May Cry 3 and 4) the gaming community tends to take notice.
Couple this lineage with the implementation of the MT Framework Engine, responsible for rendering impressive titles such as Lost Planet 2 and Resident Evil 5, and Dragon’s Dogma quickly becomes Capcom’s go to title of early 2012.
But it’s not all name dropping and game engines, there’s also head chopping and siege engines. Not to mention the occasional giant multi-skulled hydra’s to scale/get eaten by…
Billed as a party based RPG, there’s plenty of mix and matching to be done regarding gender, class, weaponry and headwear. ‘Which better compliments my flaming broadsword; a morning star or this jaunty hat?’
As a four man team (3 NPCs and one YOU) of stalwart fighters, mages or striders, you’re tasked with bombing around a fully voiced, lush open world, occasionally stopping to stock up in large cities featuring in excess of 200 NPCs, and generally whack assorted European mythological beasties, of both the normal and gargantuan variety, into submission.
Though inspiration from the widely lauded Resident Evil 4 and the critically worshipped Shadow of the Colossus is evident; the development team maintains Dragon’s Dogma has been nurtured on decades of childhood fantasies, citing it as the game they always wanted to make. And by extension, play.
In an interview with Eurogamer, director Itsuno stated,
"In a lot of action games, with big enemies the tendency is just to have you hacking away at the shins. You don't get the full effect of fighting a giant boss… With this game you can climb all over it. If it has a body part, you can attack it.”
Indeed, with a supposed game length of anywhere between 30 and 100 hours, the sharing of online party members and a thrilling seize mechanic which grabs both monsters and players by the throat, Capcom’s latest RPG enterprise, with another half year’s polish, could see itself one of the major new IPs of 2012.
Dragon’s Dogma will be setting fire to your PS3 and Xbox 360 in Q1 2012. Let’s just hope that with the Witcher 2, Dark Souls, and Skyrim under our belts by then, we won’t have had our fill of spilling dragon guts.