Those messed up creatures above are some of the new antagonists you’ll be fighting in Dragon’s Dogma‘s first major expansion, Dark Arisen. It’ll be coming next year, and we can’t wait.
For those unfamiliar, Dragon’s Dogma is an action RPG from Capcom with repetitive dialogue (“‘TIS WEAK TO FIRE!”), huge amounts of backtracking, and a kind of goofy and ridiculous ending. None of this matters because it’s also a game where you can be thrown at a dragon and hack at its underbelly while your party members freeze its wings and stab it in the face. Imagine Skyrim’s design with Dungeons and Dragons 2nd Edition rules. It’s that kind of game.
It was also a completely unexpected hit for Capcom. It was intended to compete with Skyrim in the West: That failed miserably. But it was a huge hit in Japan, where it was basically seen as another Monster Hunter game, which means DLC and sequels.
What we don’t know yet is exactly what happens, since all we really have about the game is a title and a few screenshots. Well, aside from the fact that you’re getting chased by Death himself:
The game has also debuted two new modes, for the five of us that already own it: A “Speedrun” mode and a “Hard” mode. Considering this is a game where random encounters can be massive boss fights and that enjoys killing you at the drop of a hat, both are kind of ridiculous.
And that’s just the way we like it.