Recent reviews by Erena

Gameplaywise, its monster hunter. 10/10
mp wise, its a bit of a pain to figure out how to properly party up between lobbies and link parties, but once u get it down its a lot better than world for the story experience.
Performance wise, i might be biased since i've seen nothing but ppl trashing the optimization since the first beta, but it runs really well for me. If you're running the same pc you did as when world released, maybe dont get it, otherwise the drama feels overblown

I played through the first game a few times, and as expected, have been enjoying the gameplay of Dragons Dogma 2 quite a lot. But after a few hours I've realized I've not actually done very much gameplay.
The vast majority of my time has been running the insane distance between places, with "fights" against 2-3 smaller enemies that die to my (same level) pawns before i can finish an incantation as a mage. I do not disagree with the developers that fast travel can inhibit the fun of travel, but at least on lower levels, i do not think they managed with this game. The 4x map size compared to the original has added very little exploration in my experience, at the expense of a ton of stamina breaks and running.
Once mods come out to make travel a bit less of a drag, i'll try it again and amend the review.
TL;DR Much running. Little play