Hands-on: Dragon’s Dogma 2 doesn’t fix what isn’t broken

destructoid.com:

The very first thing I did in Dragon’s Dogma 2 was fight a griffin. Having selected the Fighter vocation, I spawned in with a party of Pawns and three quest objectives to reach. However, that big ol’bird was right there. And if you think I’m not going to stab it at least once, then clearly we have different gaming priorities. What ensued was a dramatic tussle of climbing on the monster, taking shots when I could, all while my army of Pawns fought by my side and shouted canned, unnecessary phrases.

After depleting one of its four health bars, the griffin flew high into the sky, putting an abrupt end to our battle. However, once I looked at my party, I noticed I was down a pawn. “Where’s Sara?” I asked aloud, only to look up and realize she was still on the griffin, who was now a mile up in the air. I couldn’t help but laugh as I shouted incredulously, “Did that bastard run away with my party member!?”

Fortunately, the Capcom representative with me informed me that Sara would soon reappear in my party once enough time passed. And after I returned from the event that night, my girlfriend who is more versed in Dragon’s Dogma than I told me that what I experienced is pretty similar to the first game. Hearing that, I couldn’t help but feel kind of amazed. Even if Dragon’s Dogma 2 is just refining what worked the first time around, the result still felt as exhilarating as anything I’ve played this year.

To be fair, I’m not totally green on Dragon’s Dogma 2. I knew I’d demo it at a small event hosted by Capcom, so I did play its predecessor a bit. I had an hour with the sequel, and I knew I had a lot to cover. More than even digging deep into the game itself, I really wanted to get a feel for all the game’s vocations (i.e.