Still going hard on Dragon's Dogma 2. Have some updated thoughts on it after having beat the game a couple times.
I initially played through as melee classes, as those were my favorites in the first game. Aside from a few steps back from the first game, overall the new balancing is better on DD2, and makes all of the melee classes very satisfying to play. This recent playthrough, however, I've been playing caster classes, and oh boy is it rough. First off, the Trickster class is absolute trash, and the worst thing about the game by a mile. It makes no sense, whatsoever. It's slightly support-ish, but it's really meant to be a tank class, with the harebrained idea that it can't deal any damage. None. So it's not only not fun because you literally just stand around casting your little smoke skills that just draw attention, it's also not fun because the pawn AI is a huge step back from the first game.
I didn't really notice how bad the pawn AI is when playing as a melee class, as it's fairly competent when it comes to being caster and ranged classes, but the moment you need them to be melee DPS they completely fall apart. They don't proactively attack enemies, and the pawn commands won't force them to. They don't start fighting until your arisen has been hit, so as a caster enemies will rush you as you're casting your spell, canceling your spell and knocking you to the ground. They also prioritize enemies in weird ways, with no real rhyme or reason. And on top of all that, their pathfinding is hot garbage, so if you get too far ahead of your pawns they simply won't know how to get to you when you're attacked by mobs.
Thankfully I finished leveling my caster classes, so I won't need to bring melee pawns with my anymore. As mentioned earlier the pawn system works just fine when you're playing a melee class, so it should be smooth sailing from here. I really do feel for people who generally prefer caster classes, though. The game is so much more frustrating, with what seems like very little thought put into it. I think I'd have to steer people away from playing mage, sorc, and especially trickster if they want to get any enjoyment out of the game. On the upside, magick archer and mystic spearhand are fantastic, and let you do some magical combat without falling too deep into the pitfalls of actual caster classes.
I also feel like I have to mention how fantastic the game looks in HDR on an OLED TV. It legitimately might be the best use of HDR I've seen in a game. At night, in particular, it's spectacular looking. It's almost pitch black, but you can see some faint detail in the distance, but then things like spells and lanterns light up the scene and almost blind you. And on that note, a small detail I love is when you walk up to NPCs at night with your lantern drawn they wince and shield their eyes. Even during the daytime it looks great, since the direct sunlight creates extremely dark shadows. Really makes the whole world pop. If the HDR weren't so good I'd probably prefer playing on my ultrawide monitor, since the FOV is pretty narrow, but I've started to get used to it.
