After playing so much of the first Dungeon Defenders over the past couple of weeks, my partner and I decided to open up Dungeon Defenders 2 and try to remember what we disliked about it.
Turns out the gameplay is a lot more fun than the first game, but it's important to keep in mind that it's a free-to-play game with ghastly free-to-play mechanics, and that's probably what turned us away from it all of those years ago.
Dungeon Defenders 2 is a glorified mobile game but on PC, with all the things I hate about mobile games — two types of premium currency, one that you slowwwllllyyyyyyyyyyyy earn and one that you buy; gated progress; loot boxes; having to buy the best "shards" with premium currency because heaven help you if you want them to randomly drop; having to upgrade things with premium currency; PREMIUM CURRENCY.
I'm getting ahead of myself though. Yes, I just ranted about premium currency, but I also said that the gameplay is a lot of fun... and if you're able to look past the premium currency and insanely slow gated progress linked to grinding premium currency if you're too poor or stingy to simply buy it, then you might just have fun.
At the moment, we are having fun.
Because we haven't played this for so many years, but we had played previously, we already had pre-existing characters that we didn't understand. Sooo. They got deleted. xD And we started anew with brand new characters.
I made a Huntress, named the same as my Huntress in the first Dungeon Defenders. ShootyMcGee! And created her at level 1. If you've already reached level 50, you have the option to just create a new character at 50... but we wanted to learn the characters from the start.
At the War Table, you can select your missions and set up their difficulty. We decided to do the campaign from the start, on Hard mode, and very importantly, we set the match to Private so no randoms would join us. 😝
Unlike the first Dungeon Defenders, this one is always online and if you don't set things to private, people can just drop in and out of your matches. I do not approve.
I'm apparently antisocial. GTFO of my game. IT'S PRIVATE.
Just as in the first Dungeon Defenders, you have a build phase and a combat phase.
The process is a bit more streamlined now. Instead of running around collecting treasure chests to get mana, you're just given the mana at the start of the game. If you're in a party, the mana is split evenly between all partymembers.
There's also an autoloot function that sucks everything into your inventory, which is very handy and I wish it was in the first game.
You still set up your defences as per normal. There are towers, auras, beams, traps, etc, just like in the first game. BUT. It seems as though in this, the hero you're using is actually a little more useful.
In the first one, you basically just set up your defences and left them to do their thing, and repaired them as needed whilst in combat so they wouldn't get destroyed.
In this, you still do that, but your hero is actually important and has useful abilities and is more fun. Running and jumping all over the place and actually contributing to the defence. I mean, yeah, "tower defence", but also, YEAH I'M USEFUL TOO.
(Yes, you could do hero damage builds in the first one too... it's just more satisfying in this.)
At the end of the map, after you achieve victory in your defence, you get a treasure chest! It's randomly a different quality — green, blue, purple, yellow — and the gear inside matches the colour of the chest.
Legendary (yellow) treasure chests actually seem quite common, which is nice. Love me some legendary loot.
After we completed the campaign, we discovered that there were different types of maps. For example this one where the goal was to give some guy golden crystals before the timer ran out. There were also infinite enemies spawning and the waves didn't end until you delivered the crystals.
That one was fun! I liked that game-mode.
When you reach level 50, you also keep on levelling with Ascension Levels, which I like. I've always liked that type of system where you keep getting stronger after you're max level.
You know? The Paragon Points in Diablo 3. The Champion system in Elder Scrolls Online. I love it.
You can also find plenty of pet eggs in maps, and hatch them in your Tavern. Each egg has a chance to become a common to legendary version of multiple things. There are dragon eggs, cat eggs, all sorts of eggs!
I found this cat egg and it turned into the best thing I've ever seen.
It's a Super Saiyan cat.
It's name is Katkarot.
That's FANTASTIC.
It's no good compared to my current dragon pet, its stats are wrong for my hero damage character, but a Super Saiyan cat named Katkarot is just amazing.
When you have a pet equipped, it gains affection with you over time and you feed it to become stronger, and when both its strength and affection are maxed, you can evolve it! Which of course, makes it stronger.
You also need to find certain things to evolve it. In maps, as random drops, are vials, and each pet has a vial of essence it requires to be evolved.
It's not a bad system and I like it.
Now that I've babbled about what I like, allow me to show you all the things you have NO CHOICE but to use premium currency for.
First up is crafting materials. Once you hit the Chaos difficulty, you need extra materials in order to upgrade and customise your gear. Your gear is super customisable! And I really like it! But, the droprate for various materials is a bit poor, so unless you want to grind away for days... you'll need to buy that one last material you need at the shop for premium currency.
Different pets have different abilities and perks for your hero or your towers.
The best ones?
Oh look, in a premium currency shop.
As I said just above, your gear is super customisable. There are so many different mods you can put into your gear, extracted from other gear, and it's really cool!
Guess what? It costs premium currency to perform this action.
And of course, the shards... you can put a few shards on each item of gear that you have to make yourself stronger or to contribute towards quality of life, such as movement speed and repair-during-combat speed.
You can find these... of course... but you could be hunting for days before you get ones that you want. RNG strikes again! So... why not just... buy it? With premium currency?
I know, I know; this is all standard in free to play games. But it still bugs me.
At least it's not pay to win. And at least you can earn, albeit incredibly slowly, one of the premium currencies as you play.
And at least you randomly get given lootboxes and things as you play to potentially unlock shiny things that you would otherwise have to buy from the real-money shop. Like costumes and things for your characters. I even found 5 million gold in one of these boxes! Which was a nice surprise.
For while premium currency is all the rage, gold is still useful too... thankfully.
Dungeon Defenders 2 is a very fun game with a lot of nifty mechanics, but I'm just reeeeally not much of a free-to-play type of person.
MMORPGs? I like a subscription, thanks.
Normal Games? I like to buy them and be able to access all the things, thanks.
Mobile Games? I have one on my phone that I actually play. Pixel Dungeon. One of the very few free games on mobile that doesn't have ANY f2p bullshit in it.
In saying that though, we are having fun in Dungeon Defenders 2 and we will probably play it for a little bit. 🙂 Despite its intense f2p, it is still an enjoyable game.
All screenshots in this post are courtesy of me, 
