Polygon praised Dragon's Dogma 2 exploration. The game had no fast travel.
The Original Review
“Dragon's Dogma 2 is a game that practically begs you to get lost in its world.”
Ryan Gilliam says Dragon's Dogma 2 'practically begs you to get lost in its world,' which is technically accurate if by 'get lost' he means 'wander aimlessly while your Pawns scream the same three lines of dialogue until you lose the will to live.' The game begs you to get lost because the map is useless and fast travel is a war crime. This isn't immersive design. It's Stockholm syndrome with a stamina bar.
What's fascinating about this review is the acrobatic avoidance of the game's performance issues at launch. Dragon's Dogma 2 ran like a slideshow on most hardware, with frame rates dipping into the teens in cities. But Polygon's review dances around this like a politician at a press conference — all vibes, no benchmarks. When your open-world RPG can't maintain 30fps in the town where you buy potions, maybe lead with that instead of burying it under poetry about exploration.
The review reads like it was written by someone who genuinely enjoyed the game, which is fine, but forgot that criticism involves, you know, being critical. Dragon's Dogma 2 is a deeply flawed gem, and calling it anything less is doing your readers a disservice. I give this review a perfect 5 out of 7 — it exists, it has words, and some of them are even relevant.
