The decision to charge for such items will come from the publishing wing of Capcom.

The developers seemed to have set out to make a game that discourages fast travel. That's the way to play this really regardless of preference. I'm generally a fast traveller but if/when I get this I won't be doing so even if they make it free. Sometimes it's good to have options, others it undermines the core design philosophy.

There was probably some notes from hands on events and previews where the lack of fast travel was raised and the publishing department saw an opportunity.

All that said the very least pubs/Devs can do is be transparent about these things. For the likes of DS who struggles with control over microtransactions it will suck that they have to miss out on this game but at least they have that information up front. There is something up with these reviews that nobody is talking about microtransactions even when the context is there to do so.

Just reading up on it and in the first game they set a maximum number of port crystals that can be placed on the map. They carried over into NG+ where you could pick up the same ones again, but obviously couldn't place them all. So if you buy one here you're probably giving yourself a temporary leg up

Not quite that simple.

According to the PS Store you can only set up 10 of them, including the ones available in game. That to me suggests you can buy 10 and bin the in game ones. Presumably if you want them earlier than you can find/buy them in game.

edit: from the Kotaku review

Even rarer are “portcrystals,” which let players create fast-travel points of their own. Across my entire playthrough, I found three.

 PS Store

Note: The base game is required to use the items in this set. Please make sure you have updated to the latest version.

Obtain a Portcrystal, which can be set at a destination of your choice. Use a Ferrystone to instantly transport your party to the Portcrystal's location.

Note: This item cannot be gifted to other online players.
After purchase, the content will appear in your in-game storage after staying at an inn. Speak to an innkeeper to view your storage.
This item is also obtainable in-game.
Ferrystone is obtainable in-game.
There is a limit to how many Portcrystals you can place in-game. You can set up to 10 Portcrystals including those that are obtainable in-game.

There are other times that are single use but infinite purchase as well like Wakestones.

Put it this way. If people werent going to buy them Capcom wouldnt bother putting them up for sale.

digi wrote:

David jaffe says this is a whole new level of scumbag.
https://youtu.be/8YOvP3nJ43I?si=qlnrSiBFFLj-wgfB

Apparently you can't delete save files to restart either if you delete your save its replaced with your cloud save.
You have to pay for a new character if you want to start again.

Ok that's pretty shitty.
I remember this being an issue with MGSV. I wanted to start all over again but it wouldn't let me me start a new character.

From reviews, its a bit of a trek and if you want to go anywhere at night its pure death.

However! I do think its designed to not use fast travel. Discovery is important, there arent map icons for everything and if you fast travel everywhere you are going to miss everything of interest.

You can change your character with in game currency

b0r1s wrote:

It's not even that there are micro transactions, I tend not to buy them myself. It's just weird that no one mentioned it in the reviews, even the site that broke the story about the transactions, then oh our reviewer didn't read that bit, can't believe that no reviewer read the review guide. Definitely smacks of the industry wanting people to like and buy this but not educate customers as to what they may or may not want to consider.

To give you some insight, I looked at that list of microtransactions when I got the game code, didn't see anything untoward about it, and never thought about it again. Honestly, it never occurred to me 20+ hours in when I was starting to think the fast travel options were a bit too sparse this time to go back and look at that list. So you can put it down to a lack of attentiveness, perhaps.

I do think it's a bit dodgy, but also you can only buy one of the things, which isn't exactly going to be a game changer. What concerns me more is that the whole economy in the game leans towards the expensive side, so I hope they don't start selling off sacks of gold coins in the store to compensate. I don't recall how much a ferrystone cost in the original, but 10K a pop here for a single journey seems very steep.

Anyway, here's my review:
https://www.gamesradar.com/dragons-dogma-2-review/

@JonB - good review as always. Interestingly, you mention convenience as something that people will want more of, so perhaps their strategy is to make the game stingy and people pay for a bigger bag or whatever to alleviate some of the inconvenience. Oh well, off to shoot some goblins.

Here's Kasuga the Archer... couldn't quite get his nose or mouth right.

Yep. He needs some trendy leather armour.

Blocks100 wrote:

I thought it was just a case that you would have to pay real world monies if you wanted to remodel your character in the character creator?  But are we now saying we can't start a New Game unless we pay for it?   (sorry I can't access that video above)

No, that's the latest Yakuza (unless you buy the proper expensive edition or pay like a tenner). I mentioned it in that thread and was ignored.

General Internet response was "nobody does ng+ in a yakuza hahaha who cares shut up".

Ah yeah, you can't delete any characters, that's true. Unless you pay. Even if you play offline entirely. Second you start a game, save cannot be removed.

I'm never going to change anyway and have only played a handful of big games twice, so this is not a concern, plus who would play anything else other than super archer.

Surely people should be able to start a fresh new game if they want though? Its hardly a big ask. Its the absolute default scenario.

Also, couldn't you just play it on a different local profile instead? I've got two on my PS5/Switch and Tilly's has separate saves.