History YMMV / DragonsDogmaII

* AwesomeBosses: [[spoiler:Both of the Purgeners that can be fought by interacting with the red beams of light near Vernsworth and Sacred Arbour are unique bosses whose fights almost serve as a SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute to the Ur-Dragon from the first game, up to having glowing weak points around their bodies. The former is a Griffin-like monster that can shoot lasers from its mouth and spam lots of lightning bolts in the arena, while the latter is a giant serpent that slithers around and shoots lasers everywhere.]]

** The Thief class seems made for almost any situation to make up for a lack of ranged options (split from the Strider class in the original), but one augment in particularly can trivialize the combat for you: Formless Feint. Though it's supposed to be an auto-dodge that activates before you're hit and slowly drains your stamina, it does have a few notable quirks. It will always teleport you horizontally, it is automatically active once you turn it on and ''it will still activate while you are attacking.'' The teleport itself doesn't drain your stamina any more than the augment already does. Having it on essentially turns a majority of the combat into a button masher as no attacks can actually hit you, and the only thing you need to do to keep it going is either turn it off and let it recharge once in a while or just consume stamina recovery items. It's not just combat either; Because it essentially keeps you from ever having to worry about losing your max health, you can intermittently throw it on while exploring to travel far further in a single sitting than the game expects, allowing you to theoretically encounter and kill threats you normally should be one-shot by.

** Freezing is a particularly powerful debilitation that can be inflicted on ''everything,'' up to and including bosses. Using ice enchantments or magic will cause the afflicted to become frozen solid and incapable of moving, and because of how it works, it can be rapidly re-applied over and over to essentially stunlock enemies to death. It is somewhat offset by requiring the enemy to be drenched in order to be inflicted, and that debilitation comes from either standing in deep-enough water [[spoiler:(which dries up in the Unmoored World)]], rain or an Archer with Drenching Shot skill equipped.
** Magick Archer's Martyr's Bolt is a supreme boss nuke. What it does is [[CastFromHitPoints sacrifice your HP to deal a massive amount of damage in an AoE around a target.]] This would normally be very dangerous, if not for the simple fact that Allheal Elixir's exist and you can buy and forge them to make more if the need arises. You can charge it from a safe distance and kill bosses before they even notice your presence.
* GoddamnedBats: The Rattlers are a rocky variant of [[LizardFolk Saurians]] who trade away spears in exchange for a RollingAttack that they will use when on high grounds. They are not too threatening by themselves, but if their tough skins do not make them annoying to fight against, their tendency to blend into the mountainous landscapes of West Vermund and Agumen Volcanic Island means the player will often find themselves knocked down by a rolling Rattler before they can see them approaching.

* TheyChangedItNowItSucks: While a fairly minor change, the fact that the [[MagicKnight Mystic Knight]] vocation splitting the Strider vocation into Thief and Archer classes, makes it fairly annoying for those who liked the older classes. Especially since some people enjoyed the JackOfAllTrades style of Mystic Knight compared to Mystic Spearhand, especially in terms of variety.

** Need to get down from the high ground but need to save your Wakestones? Just put your Pawn right next to the ledge, then run up and [[TheGlomp tackle them to the ground]]. The pinned-down animation pushes you forward over the ledge, remains unchanged as you two fall, and negates the FallingDamage upon landing.

* GoodBadBugs: Sometimes when you get struck by an attack from a large monster, it sends your Arisen [[RagdollPhysics ragdolling]] across the place you were fighting it in. However, there are few clips such as [[https://www.reddit.com/r/DragonsDogma/comments/1bp0ozk/wtf/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button this Reddit post]] where the Arisen's body ends up flying upwards into the sky and across both Battahl and Vermund at high speed. Jokes have spawned from this glitch about it being another form of fast travel, how the Arisen is flying all the way back to Gran Soren from the first game, and the comparisons with the [[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim Nordic Space Program]].

* CantUnHearIt: While Graham Fox's take on the Dragon is extremely well done, some fans miss [[Creator/DavidLodgeAmericanActor David Lodge's]] voice of Grigori, especially with how poetically eloquent and how much of a NobleDemon he was. Of course, given the fact that the Dragon is a different one from Grigori, it's no surprise he has a different voice.

** Freezing is a particularly powerful debilitation that can be inflicted on ''everything,'' up to and including bosses. Using ice enchantments or magic will cause the afflicted to become frozen solid and incapable of moving, and because of how it works, it can be rapidly re-applied over and over to essentially stunlock enemies to death.

* SugarWiki/FunnyMoments:
** Just like the World Tour mode of ''VideoGame/StreetFighter6'', there can be a tonal conflict and hilarity that won't match the game's setting and cutscenes depending on how you [[CharacterCustomization customize]] your playable Arisen and/or main Pawn.
*** ''Dragon's Dogma II'' features hairstyles and traits that make them resemble other Creator/{{Capcom}} characters with little tweaking, most notably Leon S. Kennedy from ''Franchise/ResidentEvil'' or Nero's appearance in ''VideoGame/DevilMayCry5'' due to their hairstyles being some of the obvious CompanyCrossReferences. These just add creativity for [[SelfImposedChallenge "cosplay runs"]] and there's likewise the greater freedom of making your characters resemble other third-party characters such as [[VideoGame/GodOfWar Kratos]] or even [[NoCelebritiesWereHarmed real-life celebrities]]. On the extreme end, you can make your Arisen and/or Pawn look like hilarious abominations.
*** Aside from appearances, you can also customize aspects of your character's animations (specifically their standing posture or how they walk) to the point where they can be hard to take seriously while exploring.
** Just like in the first game, you can grab and throw virtually any non-giant creature as you wish. Furthermore, throwing it at a Pawn who looks at you, especially one with a [[{{Cloudcuckoolander}} Simple]] inclination, causes them to catch it and throw it back at you, potentially turning it into an amusing game of catch that causes the more serious Pawns to [[WhatTheHellPlayer call you out]].
** The game begins with Rook, the first pawn to join the Arisen, being nonchalantly consumed by the Brine. One would have to wonder if Capcom knew how many people threw Rook off cliffs and into the sea in the first game.
** While somewhat hard to do, you can get a brawl started in your ''own house'' if two characters you maxed affinity for are there. Its funny to see two characters have a duel to the death over your love and affection. [[VideoGameCrueltyPotential There's even an achievement tied to it!]]
** The way the player [[FacePlant faceplants]] the ground when taking fall damage looks surprisingly comical. The waiting until the character gets back up even looks like a {{Beat}}.
** While terrifying in its own way, the Brine can lead to many hilariously anticlimatic moments when a large boss monster steps into even just ankle-deep water and is instantly consumed. Especially prone to this are Griffins, which tend to divebomb the player from above and, if they are next to water, essentially crash-land into the water and die instantly.
** On a similar note, the ability to petrify any enemy with the Medusa Head is equally funny as well, with the sheer sudden anticlimax of it. You can petrify Grigori and end the final battle instantly, or petrify the Sphinx before she can even give out her riddles. The latter especially comes off as especially hilariously spiteful with how the Sphinx is a NonMaliciousMonster who only wants to match wits with the player and stoning her comes off as a massive "I have no time for you" attitude.
** The player can grab onto the Sphinx's breasts. She is clearly ''not'' pleased with this.
** If you hire a party of all-male pawns while also playing a male Arisen, the pawns will sometimes quip "It appears all of us pawns are men! I wonder if it speaks of the Arisen's preferences?"
*** Spend too much at the shops and the pawns will complain that you spend too much. "Have we any gold left after that extravagance?" Conversely, if you window-shop without actually buying anything, the pawns say "The Arisen is ever prudent in his application of coin", which just comes off as them making fun of you for being broke.

** Upon meeting the Sphinx, you can choose to take part in her riddles for a chance at the sealed chests behind her. When you return with your answer(s), she'll get right in your Arison's face with an ''extremely'' unnerving, almost SlasherSmile grin, and during this close-up can [[BodyHorror twist her head nearly 90 degrees without moving her body]]. Combined with other subtler details, such as her face taking on more scales during this close-up (yet returning to normal afterward) and her pupils expanding into almost BlackEyesOfEvil before shrinking again, people are lucky this being ''chooses'' to be peaceful.

--> [[spoiler:''Dragonsplague has struck, leaving a trail of innocent lives in its wake.''\

** The Gorechimera returns from the previous game, but appearing far more unsettling and even appearing to be ''undead''. The goat has a disturbingly ghostly appearance with white wispy fur, glowing red eyes and a "crown" of small tumorous growths instead of horns, and most tellingly, the Gorechimera starts the battle with the lion and snake heads ''literally dead'' and trailing limply requiring the goat head to cast necromancy spells to ''reanimate'' them individually. They also reappear postgame replacing standard Chimeras that are previously killed, implying that these are the ''same'' Chimeras your party has previously slain, now returned from the dead.

** ''Riddle of Futility'': Bring an incredibly fragile vase to a specific NPC in Bakbattahl. The intended solution is to use a Ferrystone while carrying the vase to skip walking across Battahl[[labelnote:Note]]Which is a ''bad'' idea, considering the region is [[MonstersEverywhere filled with a myriad of monsters that can break the vase]][[/labelnote]], or bring the ''NPC'' to the vase, but if for some reason you don't have a Portcrystal at either the Frontier Shrine or Bakbattahl, you're out of luck.

* LowTierLetdown: Out of all the vocations, many have found themselves disliking the Trickster vocation. A pure SupportPartyMember vocation focused on support and tanking, it relies heavily on the inconsistent pawn AI to get anything done. The illusions the Trickster can create can be dispelled in a few hits if you aren't careful, and while watching enemies throw themselves off cliffs or kill each other can be funny at first, it can quickly lose its luster after a while when there's nothing else you can do. As a result, Trickster feels out of place in an action RPG, or would have been better as a pawn exclusive vocation instead of being locked to the player. The one benefit it ''does'' have, however, is tied to a weapon from the Sphinx sidequest that makes enemies drop gold ''on hit'', and enemies have been reported to drop as much as 50k gold, but that is only a band aid to the ill-fitting nature of the vocation.

** Rest in an inn or your house while your Pawn is at the last stage of Dragonsplague, and you'll be treated to a special cutscene where [[spoiler:said Pawn grunts in pain as pitch-black darkness envelops their body except their [[RedEyesTakeWarning red, glowing eyes]], and turns them into an ink-like dragon that lets out a high-pitched roar as it takes flight, ending with a fade to black along with [[HellsThatNoise screams of people that can be faintly heard]]. What it does is [[NothingIsScarier not shown]], but upon waking up, you will see a ''lot'' of [=NPCs=] lying dead on the streets of the city or town you slept in, but not before a message shows, telling you what happened while you were asleep:]]

** Rest in an inn or your house while your Pawn is at the last stage of Dragonsplague, and you'll be treated to a special cutscene where [[spoiler:said Pawn grunts in pain as pitch-black darkness envelops their body except their [[RedEyesTakeWarning red, glowing eyes]], and turns them into an ink-like dragon that lets out a high-pitched roar as it takes flight, ending with a fade to black along with [[HellsThatNoise screams of people that can be faintly heard]]. What it does is [[NothingIsScarier not shown]], but upon waking up, you will see a ''lot'' of [[=NPCs=]] lying dead on the streets of the city or town you slept in, but not before a message shows, telling you what happened while you were asleep:]]

** Rest in an inn or your house while your Pawn is at the last stage of Dragonsplague, and you'll be treated to a special cutscene where [[spoiler:said Pawn grunts in pain as pitch-black darkness envelops their body except their [[RedEyesTakeWarning red, glowing eyes]], and turns them into an ink-like dragon that lets out a high-pitched roar as it takes flight, ending with a fade to black along with [[HellsThatNoise screams of people can be faintly heard]]. Upon waking up, a message shows, telling you what happened while you were asleep:]]