Dragon’s Dogma 2 changed how I look at fast travel in video games

I never had reason to give much thought to fast travel in games before starting Dragon’s Dogma 2. In most open-world games that include the feature, the only requirement for accessing it is reaching points of interest. Once players do so, they are generally free to zip from point to point around the map with little to no inconvenience. That isn’t how Dragon’s Dogma 2 operates — fast travel is based around a limited currency called Ferrystones — and it has completely changed my mindset on the mechanic as a whole.

There was a bit of buzz about how fast travel would be implemented prior to the game’s release. “Just give it a try. Travel is boring? That’s not true. It’s only an issue because your game is boring. All you have to do is make travel fun,” game director Hideaki Itsuno stated when speaking to IGN about Capcom’s limited approach to fast travel in Dragon’s Dogma 2. While I don’t fully agree with that statement, I’ll admit that Capcom didn’t just make travel fun in Dragon’s Dogma 2 — it made it terrifying.

Slow and steady

I didn’t even find the requisite item to fast travel until several hours into my playthrough, but by then, my mindset around navigating the world had been established. My first few adventures in Dragon’s Dogma 2 felt somewhat similar to my first Souls game in the sense that I fell into the trap of approaching it like a more traditional open-world RPG to disastrous results. My initial big mistake was underestimating nighttime.

I had ample opportunities during an early long journey to stop and make camp for the night, but I felt no need. My health was fine, no enemy had posed much of a threat thus far, and I had my lantern to guide my way. My tune quickly changed when a hulking monster stumbled from the shadows that had obscured it until it was mere feet away. While my pawns and I put up a valiant fight, one bad move cost me my life, and I was shoved back to my last autosave. It took four more deaths in a similar fashion before I learned my