When I started Dragon’s Dogma 2 once again to play a little New Game+ in preparation for the Dark arose DLC, I initially felt a bit mundane about the whole thing. My Arisen was at a very high level, I had seen everything I wanted to see in the base game, and although I had loved this adventure, I was not very happy to be back. The clips I’d seen of Norgan, the new region introduced in the DLC, hadn’t convinced me that there was anything new or exciting enough to hook me. The same monsters again, just in the snow this time. Of course.
But then I went to Norgan, where Dark arose reminded me that I love Dragon’s Dogma 2. I like that it’s weird, harsh and sometimes even silly. I love being a little guy running around a big guy’s big feet and trying to knock him down. I like to come to a dialogue choice that seems extremely simple and freak out for several minutes because I think maybe the game is trying to trick me. I love (hate) every time my pawn invites me to take things out of his pack whenever I want (I don’t want your crappy harp, November).
With Dark arose come 12 new dungeons added to the existing world. Personally, playing New Game+ with a character starting around level 70 and climbing by the hundreds throughout the expansion, I found these dungeons relatively nothing. I even forgot they were in the DLC for a while after I was introduced to them, because everything else is so much more interesting. These dungeons are largely just a series of combat trials at a level that makes sense for a character finding them out of place in the original world for the first time, which means I’ve gone through them and anyone who’s ever completed the game once probably will too. There are some interesting new monster variants, and the weapon rewards look pretty cool; I just didn’t have any use for it. However, if you’re playing for the first time, it looks like these will fit in pretty seamlessly with the rest of the adventure, so it’s nice to have them.
The new region, Norgan, is the star here, and where I spent almost all my time. Norgan is the snowy tundra of a region to the north of the existing map, and you are sent there both to track down rumors of a second Arisen and to find resolution to your own terrifying and seemingly prophetic dream. Norgan is harsh, with few signs of civilization, many ruins buried in the snow, and a single colony of friendly people trying to carve out an existence here against the onslaught of threats from monsters, raiders, wolves, griffins, giant troll-like creatures, and now suddenly also an outbreak of strangely fast zombies.
I’m willing to eat crow on some (not all!) of my past complaints that updates and DLC would bring. Dragon’s Dogma 2 much too easy. I always think these dragon plague remedies are way too easy to make. and a terrible conceptual idea: when my pawn got that flu at the start of my DLC game, I recognized it right away (instead of spending several agonizing days wondering if I was imagining things), then I pushed him off a bridge like the good Lord intended. But it’s the quick trips that don’t bother me anymore. In the main game of Dragon’s Dogma 2a major update giving players an infinite number of fast travels and a stack of port crystals to place wherever they want trivializes the pace of the adventure. Without these items, you need to think about where and when you camp, as well as the routes you take to get there and back. You can’t just go through dungeons, come back to town, heal up, and then jump back into the action. It takes a while to get around, and you might get attacked by monsters that will completely destroy your shit, even if you’re traveling by oxcart. I love this aspect of The Dogma of the Dragonthe fear growing as my health deteriorates and the skies darken and I have no idea where the nearest campsite is and no way of getting back to Vermund. Adding free fast travel pretty much negates all of that…
…in the main game, anyway. In Dark aroseIt’s the Norgan region, I understand a little. There is only one town in Norgan, in the far south, and very, very a few campsites, many of which are difficult to find without a pawn who knows where they are going. The points of interest where the plot takes place are very far apart, as are most dungeons. However, there are Harbor Crystals are found outside of most landmarks, and most objectives are farther and farther north as you progress through the DLC. The pace of the game, in this case, is to fight long and hard to reach a rare resting point with a portcrystal, return to town, rest, assess all of your artifacts (basically the Norgan system for obtaining weapon upgrades which is suspiciously gacha-like for a non-gacha game), and prepare, then return to where you just were and begin another long journey even further north. Annoyed as I am with the change to the main game, I think this system fits perfectly here. It’s more like climbing a dangerous mountain bit by bit, and less like planning a road trip through Death Valley.
Dragon’s Dogma 2: Darkness Rises
Quote on the back of the box
“I just thought: If we roll a rock in the snow, couldn’t it accumulate snow and get bigger?”
Promoter
Capcom
Type of game
Action RPG
I liked
The new region is big and full of interesting things to do, several cool new bosses, an intriguing story, the same tough gameplay from Dragon’s Dogma 2.
I didn’t like
Not a ton of monster variety, 12 new dungeons in the old world are aimed at experienced players.
Platforms
Xbox Series X/S (playable on S), PlayStation 5, PC via Steam, Nintendo Switch 2.
Release date
October 9, 2026
Plays
About 20 hours before the end (maybe several?), there are still a few side quests to complete.
Norgan has a long way to go, path more than I expected. Watching it in the trailers, or even the first few hours of the DLC, it’s easy to be fooled into thinking it’s just a big snowy wasteland with a few mountains and caves and a quick escape to a castle to fight a zombie dragon. This is not the case! The main story quest continues going– sometimes in tedious ways, like when I have to go somewhere but have to do, like, my fifth stupid errand for the soldiers to open a cave for me. But other times it’s pretty exciting: I really like the new character, Eir, and some of my favorite moments in this DLC were when I thought I’d finally solved a problem, but Eir presented a strange new wrinkle that would take several more hours of exploration to resolve.
There are also a surprising number of side quests offered by the small group of characters hanging out in the mountains. Most of them aren’t very interesting on their own, but they’ll make sure you explore every corner of Norgan, not just the landmarks on the main roads. Of course, a lot of my time goes through Norgan was spent just looking at a fairly mundane snowy terrain dotted with evergreens and tundra brush while listening to my Pawns chatter (they have a lot of nice, new, and hilarious dialogue). But often enough, I would turn a corner or emerge from a cave to discover that a clever designer had placed a dazzling surprise in my path: a magnificent frozen lake, a chimera silhouette looming in the fog, or sunlight filtering over buried ruins. This DLC remains with a good The Dogma of the Dragon tradition of making risky curiosity rewarding, whether that reward is treasure, a hidden dungeon, a monster that will completely decimate your unprepared party, or just a cool view. I had to continue using this game’s (still clunky) photo mode to capture everything.
When it comes to variety, however, some fear that Dragon’s Dogma 2: Darkness Rises it will mainly involve recycling the same monsters from the base game. And yeah. This is usually the case. These are all variations, of course: you will fight SO lots of saurians throwing ice at you, and lots of big yetis that are basically Ogres and Cyclops 2. I thought this would bother me more than me. As familiar as most of these encounters were, there were enough small touches of change to keep me on my toes: icicles can be knocked down from above onto enemies and allies alike. You can, with some precision, roll snowballs down hills and watch them grow until they hit your enemy. Frozen lakes can crack under your feet if you’re too rough with them. Blizzards and whiteouts come and go, obscuring visibility and sapping your stamina if you’re not careful and stop every now and then to warm up. Plus, some of the variants are actually pretty cool: I’m a big fan of the griffin using lightning attacks and struggling way more than I remember a griffin in the base game.
And of course there are some new monsters that are really, really sick. Most of them are boss encounters necessary to complete the story. I won’t spoil them here, but one of my favorites did some pretty cool things with fire attacks that I haven’t seen in a while. The Dogma of the Dragon before, and my partner kept looking at my screen and pointing out how Capcom had clearly infused Dark arose with a little Monster Hunter juice.
Dark arose does not radically change anything Dragon’s Dogma 2but it’s not exactly the same thing either Dragon’s Dogma 2 clip. It just seems… natural, in the same way that it seems natural to cheer up and finally cross the border to Bakbattahl. Except for the absurd way you get to Norgan at the very beginning, if you told me this entire campaign was just a part of the original game, I’d fully believe you. It’s challenging in different ways, but spiritually in line with the delicious friction of Dragon’s Dogma 2and its story even introduces new twists and turns with interesting implications for the larger history of the world. The Dogma of the Dragon universe. Having beaten Dragon’s Dogma 2 two years ago, I didn’t expect such a late DLC to reabsorb me as completely as it did Dark arose has. But Capcom cooked it right (and not just raw meat over an open fire) with this one, and it broke the clouds of my long-held cynicism and fear. The Dogma of the Dragon the shepherd Hideaki Itsuno leaves in 2024. The dragons and their dogma seem to be in good hands.
Gn tech
