{"id":15117,"date":"2026-10-08T01:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-10-07T22:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/?p=15117"},"modified":"2026-10-08T02:44:50","modified_gmt":"2026-10-07T23:14:50","slug":"dragons-dogma-2-dark-arisen-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/index.php\/2026\/10\/08\/dragons-dogma-2-dark-arisen-review\/","title":{"rendered":"Dragon’s Dogma 2: Dark Arisen Review"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The first Dark Arisen expansion for the original Dragon\u2019s Dogma has a well-lauded place in video game history as the expansion that \u201cfixed\u201d the base game, sanding down the rough technical edges and tweaking things to make the notoriously obtuse RPG more approachable. It also added hours of new content, spiraling an already heady story directly into the heavens on the back of dragon wings. Dark Arisen 2 isn\u2019t as transformational as the first one was, primarily because many of Dragon\u2019s Dogma 2\u2019s biggest issues have been fixed through incremental patching since it came out in 2024. But the new content here definitely flies in the same ambitious skies as its predecessor, pushing the story and world design to new heights, even if some of the new progression options get left behind.<\/p>\n

As with Dragon\u2019s Dogma 2\u2019s base campaign, Dark Arisen 2\u2019s story remixes themes from the first game without being a simple retelling. Like in the first, another Arisen has been rumored to exist, something that shouldn\u2019t be possible and demands your immediate attention. This takes you north to the frozen mountains of Norgan, a place that is largely abandoned save for the single settlement at its border (and the steady stream of visitors coming from other lands to investigate what\u2019s been lost under all that ice besides you).<\/p>\n

Dragon’s Dogma 2 review.<\/section>\n

The expansion\u2019s story also meanders in similar ways to the base game, with plot points getting sidetracked by little tasks or other happenings, but it didn\u2019t feel as distracting since a lot of the \u201chelp me and I\u2019ll help you\u201d quests are relegated to side stories. As a whole, this roughly 20-hour main quest is solid, lacking in nuanced writing or ground breaking storytelling but bursting with a tangibly broody mood, big moments, and some genuinely interesting lore. It\u2019s meditation on how a hero of destiny chooses their fate (if they get a choice at all) is unsubtle, and spends far too long at the end really sending the message home, but it sticks it.<\/p>\n

For those who don\u2019t mind a lot of filler with their killer, there are plenty of people with tasks thoroughly less vital to the survival of reality that need doing. A couple of those quest lines stand out \u2013 one where you help the son of the village\u2019s leader become brave and tough enough to follow in his footsteps, for example \u2013 but most are just a flimsy excuse to run around the world and beat up enemies.<\/p>\n

The frigid Norgan region is delightfully dense with things to find and see even if its smaller than most other regions in Dragon\u2019s Dogma 2. What it lacks in square footage on a map, it gains in a sprawling sense of height that stretches from it\u2019s jagged icy peaks down to winding underground caverns that spread wide and interconnect. Navigating up and down the rocks is a treacherous and daunting road at first, but climbing hooks can be used on specific poles scattered throughout to bridge elevations without the fuss. <\/p>\n

It feels almost like a Zelda or Metroid game in ways this series never has before.\u201c<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n

Combined with how dungeons and caves tended to loop back on themselves, revealing exits or opening doors that served as their own shortcuts into and out of zones, and Dark Arisen 2 felt almost like a Zelda or Metroid game in ways this series never has before. The abundance of portcrystals scattered around the map is another navigational relief. There are more in Norgan than there are in Vermund and Bathall combined, making travelling to different zones far more reasonable than it was in the base game.<\/p>\n

Note that reasonable doesn\u2019t necessarily mean easier. The portcrystal\u2019s abundance is a practical matter, as ox carts wouldn\u2019t last long in the harsh environments. Norgan\u2019s wintry winds often pick up, turning snowfall into blinding whiteouts that threaten to freeze you to death if you aren\u2019t protected by special winterized gear or new consumables designed to stave off these frost effects for a limited time. These came in abundance pretty regularly so I never felt like my life was in danger out there, but the scrambling effect it has on the minimap and how generally hard it is to see or navigate in real time made them a threat worth waiting out at camp.<\/p>\n

Norgan\u2019s crumbling castles and snowcapped cliffs are a welcome change of pace from the rolling hills and dense hinterlands of Vermund and he craggy deserts of Bathall. It\u2019s also not all snowy wastes. I was surprised to see a break in the snow drifts when I came across a festering poisonous swamp. It matches thematically in that everything in it is dead (or maybe wishes it was), but areas like that and the crystal caves deep below the mountains subverted my expectations for the region in a welcome way.<\/p>\n

The bulk of what you\u2019ll find hidden in the snow are Spoils, a new gear type that appears in generic shapes (long weapon, aegis, etc.) at first, but is revealed to be a usable piece of equipment when appraised by one of the new NPCs. Rolling the dice for new gear was not particularly exciting, and it further isolated me from having any real attachment to my equipment in a game that already had an abundance of junk to constantly ignore. There are at least things outside of raw stats to consider, as each piece of gear can potentially have special attributes that grant passive abilities or enhance specific weapon skills \u2013 but no single piece of gear stayed in rotation long enough to be something I relied on much, with the deluge of experience points I received strapping a rocket to my leveling almost immediately. I can see how these could fit into an endgame grind, but participating in a lottery in hopes to get incrementally stronger as my levels reaches the mid 100s is the sort of loop that I, like The Arisen, simply don\u2019t have the heart for. <\/p>\n

New skills and abilities for every vocation can be learned from obelisks that dot the ridges and tundra in Norgan. Each have multiple tiers of offerings, and while the first are available for purchase with rift points immediately, the rest need to be unlocked with offering flames, earned in Dark Arisen 2\u2019s second big campaign: the repeatable 12 Lost Rites dungeons scattered across Vermund and Bathall. Each skill is welcome, though outside some of the powerful new spells available to casters, I don\u2019t think many of them change the balance of vocations in any significant way. Trickster is more active now that you can do additional things with your incense clone, like possess enemies and have them attack their kin. But if you have a favorite class, I\u2019m not sure these new offerings will change the tier list already in your mind. <\/p>\n

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Jarrett Green’s Action RPG Atrium<\/h3>\n

A very good list of very good action RPGS<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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