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What’s better: Gliding powers or Dragon’s Dogma 2’s Unmaking Arrow?Vote now as we continue deciding the single best thing in games
Vote now as we continue deciding the single best thing in games
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Capcom
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Capcom
Last time, you decided thatshopkeepers annoyed when you don’t buy anything is better than security cameras following your every move. So rather than an implied surveillance which doesn’t actually have consequences, you wish to be actively scolded for things you’ve not done. Alright reader dear, I’m noting that in your psychological profile. Onwards! This week I ask you to choose between soaring through the sky or making something else soar. What’s better: gliding powers orDragon’s Dogma 2’s Unmaking Arrow?
Gliding powers
It’s a common icebreaker: would you rather have the superpower of invisibility or flight? And it’s flight, obviously it’s flight, and if someone says invisibility you should immediately turn and walk away from them at whichever industry networking event has pushed this question into your mouths, but inside video games? Stuff flying; the power I crave is gliding.
I’ve recently returned to Ghostwire: Tokyo and revel in leaping and gliding over Tokyo as a superpowered parkourist. The speed and convenience. The constant little challenges of picking the right rooftop and angle to launch yourself from to reach a distant point before your glide gives out. The feeling of terrible power as you get the drop on ghosts. I’ve gone back and collected all the collectibles because it’s just a joy to glide about. The same goes for the Batman: Arkham games and their escalation of scale making gliding even wackier across the series as you come to swoop across Gotham. Or at the extreme end of the scale, I am glad thatSaints Row 4’s ridiculous superglide is still a glide, still sending you drifting downwards, not outright flying.
Beyond the fact that it’s just great to swoop through the air, a glide is limited, which creates space for interesting challenge and satisfying solutions. Even in games where you don’t have a time limit on your gliding power, you’re still slowly falling, still destined to return to ground. But can you find a way to reach this point in time? Can you dodge obstacles to preserve your momentum and go farther? Just how far can you manage to go? It’s playful, and success feels even richer when you might fail.
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Bethesda Softworks
Dragon’s Dogma 2’s Unmaking Arrow
While we have previouslyjudged resources too good to use(you decided it wasn’t better than a pre-boss supply cache), this one is extra special: a resource not just too good to use, it’s so good that the game outright calls no take-backies. The Unmaking Arrow in Capcom’s open-world fantasy RPG is so much more than a rare potion or limited crafting material.
But if you do hit? I’ll kindly spoiler tag for people still exploring this big game butgod yes, it is everything you dreamed of. You can even one-shot the final boss.
But which is better?
I’m going to abstain because I know my love of gliding is such that I’ll struggle to consider the Unmaking Arrow objectively in abstract. But which do you think is better, reader dear?
