Dragon's Dogma is a Flawed Gem.

It is a game that is clearly unfinished, but every negative aspect is replaced with some fantastic positive.

Story-wise, you are a person in a seaside village, who had the misfortune of being at the center of the birth of the next dragon, an evil that comes every hundred years or so to destroy the world. The Dragon chooses you as a worthy opponent and steals your heart, turning you into an Arisen. Meaning, you are a person who remains alive and immortal without a heart, capable of commanding Pawns (soulless humans who travel between worlds), until one day you will be ready to face the dragon. The story is "theoretically" fantastic, but the way it is told is very bad. The voice acting initially seems intentionally in medieval English, while the game does not have such a style. After the beginning, you reach the big city where the Duke assigns you various missions to "prove yourself" for most of the game. The missions are not bad, and they are useful for getting to know the world, but the cutscenes are scarce, the dialogues are monotonous, and the enemies in this part are repetitive. It doesn't help that your party members are literally lifeless. The real lore is in the side quests, which greatly help with immersion and understanding the characters. If you manage to overlook/watch this part and reach the third part of the game, you are in for a fantastic story.

The battles are some of the best I have ever seen. You usually travel with 3 pawns, 1 of your own and 2 borrowed from other players. You have at your disposal all the skills you expect from the best fantasy epics, and you will see yourself participating in fantastic action scenes without any quick time events. Even mages, who are typically the most boring classes in these games, are extremely enjoyable thanks to the fantastic destructive skills they can unleash.

Graphically, the game shows that it is a PS3 game. However, given the chaos that is happening, it seems that it was impossible to run on consoles of that time, and this PS4 version finally has full-screen and stable framerate. The character creation was one of the best when it came out, and that hasn't changed until today.

The world is very big, but it is evident that it had ambitions to be even bigger. There are only two real cities, and the rest are camps at best. However, the world is full of life and detail, and it is recommended to explore it as many dangerous creatures guard certain areas, and all loot chests respawn every few days. The game in its initial version had a problem with movement, as the possibilities for fast travel were limited and expensive, but this version has fixed that.

One of the best innovations of the game is the online system. You cannot play directly with other players, but the pawns learn by watching you and other players complete quests and explore areas, and then they can give advice. The pawn you create can be borrowed by other players in their party, and in turn, you can borrow theirs, so you share knowledge and combat abilities.

Despite its flaws, the game is an epic if you engage with it. It had the misfortune to be released alongside Skyrim, but in many aspects it outperforms it. This version includes the DLC and the Expansion.

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Hints for beginners:
* The gender and shape of your character matter. Big characters have a lot of Stamina, small characters climb better and have better stamina regeneration, tall characters can hang from higher points, short characters can fit through holes, and women can wear unique costumes.
* The Expansion area (Bitter Black Isle) is an endgame area and although it is available from the beginning, it is not recommended to do it before reaching level 50.
* Fear the night. The world becomes much more dangerous, and unique enemies make their appearance. As if that wasn't enough, it is realistically dark.
* As you progress through the Main Quest, many side quests fail or disappear. Make sure to do the side quest "Lost and Found" before reaching the big city, as it has a big chain afterwards.
* The game has an Affection mechanism, where the character you love the most will appear in the final cutscenes. The game pushes you towards specific well-written characters who have specific side quests that greatly increase affinity with them, but in reality, you can make any NPC your "favorite" by showering them with gifts, from minors to any random guard.
* After defeating the dragon, the game does not end despite having credits. You simply entered the endgame, with the real ending waiting a little further down.

Very beautiful RPG that stands quite well among current titles despite being a remaster. It has a large map with several areas to discover and monsters with various loot that you can find here and there. The sound is at good levels with nice music accompanying you on your adventures, the complaint is unfortunately about the lip synchronization which doesn't match so well and the texture models of the characters are not the best, but always judging by the age of the title, the graphics overall left me satisfied. The story doesn't say much, I would say it's quite indifferent, but a RPG like this never attracted me for its story but for its gameplay, which is its strongest aspect, with a great combat system and pawns, meaning characters that follow you in battles and in the game's story, which you can change and choose, for example, someone of a higher level. Another negative aspect is that you don't have a horse or any means of transportation to make the journeys easier from one point of the map to another, especially when you have already discovered them, later on, of course, you can get some stones that with the help of certain crystals you can create a kind of teleportation. In conclusion, I highly recommend it, you won't regret it and its price is very low, I enjoyed it and then some!