Hey all. So, I've got some issues with this game, and I'm going to list a few of them out for the sake of catharsis. Consider this a thread for anyone else to do the same. Or, if there's a nitpick that has a fix or workaround, post that, instead! (To be clear, I really enjoy Dragon's Dogma!)

1. Escort quests. These wouldn't be so bad, they give you an excuse to travel, at least, except that the NPCs seem to have no AI of any kind! All they do is follow you, and extremely closely at that. If I get into a fight with a large enemy, the NPC is dying, end of story. I have to run away and hope my pawns can handle it on their own. Why cant the follower know to back off, or at the very least carry a weapon? I'm sick of reloading because of this, which brings me to

2. No way to load a game quickly. The time from starting the game to getting in game is about five times longer than it ought to be. Why on earth is it asking me if I want to connect to Live when I'm already connected to Live? Why are there so many steps? And why is there an option to go to my last inn-save in game, but not my last actual save? Why do I have to bounce back to the main menu and wait five minutes for everything to load up because that NPC follower followed too close again?

3. Why can't I switch weapons? If I'm playing, say, a Mystic Knight, I get to use either a staff or a mace/sword. Awesome. Please let me hit a button to switch them! It's not like there aren't enough buttons on the controller. You've got two set to "Help!" for crying out loud! Make one of them "Switch Primary". If I'm in the middle of a fight (you know, the time I might actually want to pull out my staff to cast a spell real quick), I really don't want to pause and fiddle through my inventory or equipmnet sheet to change weapons, then do it again to switch back. You can add an animation during which I'm vulnerable for switching, if you like. Hell, that'd fit the game and make it an interesting tactical choice, rather than a hassle. I virtually never switch thanks to this.

4.The story. 'Nuff said. (I've not got to the supposedly crazy ending, so please don't spoil it! That doesn't excuse the lack of characterization, lore, and sense of place in the rest.)

5. Why isn't there a lock-on for all classes at all times? Something identical to that of Dark Souls would be perfect. I can click the stick to turn it off when I'm running around trying to get to the other side of that monster or whatever, and turn it on when I'm trying to fight one guy out of several. I know the game has the ability, since it randomly decides to lock onto things, with very little rhyme or reason, in certain situations. Let me do it, it's my character your turning to face the wrong bandit!

There's more where that came from, but I'll leave some for you guys. Great game, so many little things pulling it away from perfection.

@thebigJ_A:

Well we kinda already have a thread on this that serves dual purpose for both praise and criticism: http://www.giantbomb.com/dragons-dogma/61-34776/so-what-do-you-guys-think-of-it/35-547822/#161

As far as your points go i'll give some tips/tricks:

1. when doing escorts there are 2 main things you can do, have a healer in your party that can heal the escort and then you only really need to avoid the big monster fights, or avoid fights completely when on an escort, if you just run past everything then the NPC will keep following you and the enemy will leash after a while not doing any damage
2. yep save/load system kinda sucks, too many steps, there is a workaround later on in the game that will allow you to load your last save (instead of the checkpoint) directly, but it involves pretty much suiciding yourself each time in order to bring up the load menu, the system is especially a bummer in the escort scenario you described, i've been there many times, after a while I either stopped doing escorts or if they are on the way I simply run past every enemy encounter to not risk the NPC dying
3. archaic inventory/character management menus, nothing to help you there sorry :(
4. yep
5. I played through the game as a melee class and lack of lock-on didn't really bother me much to be honest. I used the fighter/MK dash move pretty much as my main lock-on and distance closing ability the entire game it works wonders

The charging weapon skills seem to have a very generous amount of auto-aim when it comes to making a connection. The combat is just touchy enough that spamming is not truly effective.