What you need to know
- Update: Capcom has announced that it will soon increase the number of Art of Metamorphosis tomes available through gameplay to 99, addressing one of the main reasons you'd want to use this mod. Each one will still cost 500 Rift Crystals instead of a measly 10 Gold, however.
- Capcom is selling Dragon's Dogma 2 Art of Metamorphosis items for $2 apiece in the game's online store. These are needed for changing your character appearance and are only available through gameplay in limited quantities, so their sale in microtransactions has sparked controversy.
- Less than 24 hours after the game's launch, a modder has already created a mod for the PC version of Dragon's Dogma 2 that makes a vendor sell 99 of these items for just 10 Gold each. You'll find additional details in the text below.
- As far as I can tell, the mod is safe to use while connected to the game's servers, though if you want to be as safe as possible, switch Steam to Offline Mode before starting the game with it installed.
- There are already plenty of other mods for Dragon's Dogma 2 as well, such as carry weight increases, a save manager, and even a DLSS 3 enabler. I've linked several of these towards the end of this article.
Update (March 25, 2024): Capcom has confirmed that future updates to Dragon's Dogma 2 will increase the number of Art of Metamorphosis tomes that are earnable in-game to 99, which addresses one of the primary reasons you'd want to use this mod. They'll still each cost 500 Rift Crystals to buy, however, though it's not terribly difficult to get Rift Crystals as long as you explore the game's world thoroughly and your Pawn gets hired by other players.
Other gameplay additions and improvements coming in these updates include the ability to start a new game even if you already have an existing playthrough, as well as earlier availability for the quest that allows players to obtain a home where they can rest and save. Fixes for bugs and options to toggle motion blur, ray tracing, and locked 30 FPS are on the way too, as are framerate and performance improvements.
Original article: While lots of Dragon's Dogma 2 players are annoyed with all of the game's controversial microtransactions, one that's drawn lots of ire in particular is its Art of Metamorphosis DLC. You need these tomes to change your character appearance (or your Main Pawn's) in-game, but there are only two obtainable for 500 earnable Rift Crystals through gameplay. If you want more, you'll need to fork over $2 per tome on the game's online store. But what if I told you there was now a way to get nearly 100 of these items for nothing more than a trifling sum of Gold?
Thanks to the new "Early n' Cheap Art of Metamorphosis" mod on Nexus Mods from user SilverEzredes, there is — for PC players, at least. When installed, it edits the inventory of a vendor in Melve (one of the first major settlements you'll visit) and makes him sell 99 Arts of Metamorphosis for 10 Gold apiece. Essentially, for the price of a starter weapon, you can get all the makeover fuel you'll ever need.
Installing it is pretty simple thanks to the Fluffy Mod Manager that modders have been using for other Capcom games like Resident Evil 4 Remake and Devil May Cry 5, and YouTuber WitherFox was even kind enough to put together an installation guide you can watch via the embed below.
The one catch of the mod is that the vendor it edits seems to start wandering the map once you visit Melve for the first time, so if you've done that, you'll likely struggle to actually find him. It's unclear at the moment if he ever returns or if he even remains in the game once he leaves town, so you might have to start a new game to buy the goods. Hopefully the mod gets an update that adds the Arts of Metamorphosis to the static trader there, or to one in Vermund's capital Vernworth.
Naturally, there are also concerns about the mod being safe to use; even though Dragon's Dogma 2 is a single player game you can enjoy offline, many want to play it while connected to the internet so they can use other players' Pawns. The fact there aren't any warnings about online use on the mod's description page is a good sign, but to be as safe as possible, switch Steam to Offline Mode before playing. Do this by clicking the Steam button in the top-left corner of the client and then selecting "Go Offline..." from the dropdown.
Something I find rather amusing is that this mod was made in less than 24 hours since the game launched on PC Thursday evening, meaning that it hasn't even taken a day for the modding community to completely undercut Capcom's microtransactions. It exposes just how silly the microtransactions ultimately are, and also makes me appreciate the openness of PC gaming that makes modding possible in the first place. I feel for my Arisen comrades on console that don't have the option to use this mod and never will.
Curious about the other mods that are already available for Dragon's Dogma 2? There's quite a few good ones, including a save manager, item-related cheats, a carry weight increase, and even a DLSS 3 enabler for folks with NVIDIA's 40 series GPUs. Make sure to browse the game's Nexus Mods homepage for a full overview of everything the community's cooked up so far, though be mindful of the NSFW stuff — it's far more explicit than anything you'll find in the Rose Chateau.
Dragon's Dogma 2 is available now, and it's one of the best Xbox games and best PC games you can play in 2024 if you love action RPGs with deep, varied combat and rich fantasy worlds. Capcom's new title is playable on Xbox Series X|S, Windows PC, and PS5 for $69.99.
