Dragon’s Dogma 2 has been a long time coming, but the time taken is strange when you think about the original’s success. The sequel’s arrival comes over a decade after the original. In a recent interview with GamesRadar, Dragon’s Dogma 2 producer Yoshiaki Hirabayashi shed light on the reasons behind the extended wait.
During the interview, Hirabayashi explained that scheduling conflicts for series director Hideaki Itsuno were the primary factor. Capcom, the developer behind Dragon’s Dogma, juggles multiple major franchises, and Itsuno was focused on other projects. Notably, Itsuno directed entries in the Devil May Cry series during the intervening years, including Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition and Devil May Cry 5.
Beyond scheduling, Hirabayashi emphasized the demanding nature of open-world RPG development. Games like Dragon’s Dogma 2 require significant resources, manpower, and development time. For the project to succeed, Itsuno’s availability, a large development team, and sufficient resources had to all be available simultaneously. According to Hirabayashi, there was no specific reason for the delay other than the practicalities of development at a large studio.
“It’s not just a matter of schedule – these games, especially open-world style games, they take a massive amount of resources, manpower, and development time and planning to implement. So the stars really had to align for the director and a large enough team and the resources and the time to all be available at the right timing for him to get back into it. It wasn’t so much that we waited for any particular reason, but that’s just realistically how long it took for him to tackle everything else that was on his slate before he got back into it.”
Yoshiaki Hirabayashi
The wait actually worked really well for Capcom. The Pawn system was ahead, and building on it would have been very difficult soon after Dragon’s Dogma. They can use today’s technology to make a much better Pawn system and overall game.
Itsuno’s busy schedule and the inherent demands of open-world RPG development were the key factors behind the 12-year gap between Dragon’s Dogma games. However, With those hurdles overcome, Dragon’s Dogma 2 is finally poised for release. I’m definitely excited for it all.
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