Dragon's Dogma

The cult fantasy RPG that found its own weird path to adventure

- Robin Valentine

Like its cyclical fantasy world, Dragon’s Dogma has lived many lives. First released for PS3 and Xbox 360 in 2012, it was then re-released on those same consoles, updated and expanded, as Dark Arisen in 2013. In 2016 it returned with a PC port, then again for PS4 and Xbox One in 2017, and, most recently, it came to Switch in April of this year. That its cult success endures to this day is testament to its wonderful, singular strangeness.

On the surface, it appears a rote open-world action RPG, Japanese developer Capcom aping Western ideas and Tolkienesque fantasy. Dig deeper, however, and you discover something far more distinct and alluring. Capcom had its own vision for what a game like this could be: something built on turning left wherever its contemporaries turn right.

At its core, it’s about journeys – long, hard treks across its sprawling kingdom. It’s about learning the landscape around you, managing dwindling supplies and the moment of relief when, after days on the road, you finally spot civilisation on the horizon. It’s not afraid to inconvenience players in favour of giving its world and its quests a greater sense of scale. And it’s not afraid to be scary – not simply hostile or difficult, but dangerous. Thanks to a brilliantly unfriendly lighting system, nights are pitch-black. Even with a light source, navigation after sundown is terrifying, as you stumble through trees and scrub pursued by predators who only wake in the darkness. Its caves and dungeons aren’t simply handfuls of fights and stashes of treasure; they’re lairs. Exploring their cramped, lightless tunnels is an exercise in tension and release as you creep forward, pushing your luck ever further, before a great beast erupts from the shadows and smears you across the walls.