Capcom’s Dragon’s Dogma 2 did not launch in a great state, and almost two years of silence led many to assume that the game had been abandoned. Of course, we now know that’s not the case with the game’s upcoming Dark Arisen expansion launching on October 9th alongside a Nintendo Switch 2 port.
The upcoming release of Dark Arisen comes alongside come massive title updates for the game. These updates rip ripped out the game’s useless microtransactions, improve fast travel and other gameplay mechanics, and more.
Capcom has explained that the new fixes and expansion serve to win back the trust of fans. For the most part, the studio has been on a roll this generation, but the botched releases of Dragon’s Dogma 2 and Monster Hunter Wilds have served as underwhelming launches for many fans.
In a new interview with Automaton, producer Naoto Oyama confirmed that the ongoing development of Dragon’s Dogma 2 and Dark Arisen has taken “just under two years” and brings 25 hours of content to fans. After the initial months of patches, the team immediately set to work on massive under-the-hood changes as well as new content.
“After Dragon’s Dogma 2 launched, we received all sorts of feedback from players, and we felt that addressing those concerns needed to come first,” added Dark Arisen director Kento Kinoshita. “So, for the first six months after release, we continued making improvements, using players’ voices as both motivation and a means to reflect, while also thinking about what should come next for the game. As a result, our efforts were primarily focused on title updates during that period.”
As for Dark Arisen itself, Kinoshita explained that the process of making this new expansion was “similar” to the process of making the first game’s expansion, also titled Dark Arisen. While the original game’s shortcomings were more easily forgiven as it was the first entry in the series, Dragon’s Dogma 2 needed to be expanded in very similar ways.
“Looking back on this new project, we felt the same level of enthusiasm from players once again, which made us think we should create content that would allow them to enjoy the game even more, particularly through combat,” Kinoshita said.
The game’s upcoming optimisations, which will be introduced first in a major August update, were also planned to come to the game. However, with the prospect of making a port for the CPU-light Nintendo Switch 2, further optimisations had to be made “step by step”, which should benefit every platform.
While Dark Arisen is likely the end of major expansions for Dragon’s Dogma 2, there might be some minor additional support in the future. Of course, the new expansion will likely have its own suite of patches after launch as players discover issues the team have missed. However, new features may also be on the table.
“We are currently considering adding a “Hard Mode” for veteran adventurers who want a more intense challenge,” Kinoshita said. “ We’ve been aware since Dragon’s Dogma 2’s launch that players have been asking for something along those lines, so we’re carefully considering how best to approach the matter within the context of Dark Arisen.”
