I love the first Dragon’s Dogma. Its ongoing cult popularity-turned-decade-late success is a testament to its plucky spirit, energetic combat, and captivating oddness. The game blends classic Capcom combat with a sprawling fantasy world, and a bunch of goofy decisions that other games just don’t make.

Dragon’s Dogma 2 picks up those decisions and runs with them right off the cliff of madness. The game boldly starts out with the title “Dragon’s Dogma,” implying that it’s the real Dragon’s Dogma experience, and that the earlier game was just a prototype. The first friendly pawn you meet is the same guy with a bowl cut and beard as in the 2012 original, Rook — but then a few moments later he’s unceremoniously dumped into the death water that’s filled with evil red tentacles.

This is a sign of things to come. Everything in this new Dogma is pulled off to greater effect than in the original, but with a tiny hint of evil attached. The combat is now fully physics-entwined, allowing for remarkable-looking sword combos and wonderfully realistic dynamically animated reactions…but cliffs and bumps in the ground can now spell disaster for your balance.

The vast world of the game is open to you right from the start, offering quests to find and dungeons to explore…but time is even more of a factor than in the first game, with stark consequences for taking too long on important missions. The game prominently features a morgue where dead NPCs can be revived. You might be visiting it more often than you think.

Pawns are still super helpful and chatty, even if they aren’t quite as funny as they were in the original. However, they can now carry a terrifying disease known as the “Dragonsplague.” If left unchecked, or if you happen not to notice it among the bedlam of all the other mechanics, it has devastating consequences that once again might prompt a trip to that morgue and the spending of precious resources.

The first game encouraged you to travel the roads rather than teleport, making fast travel stones a limited resource. That was okay though…