➤ Dawnguard review, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim DLC 🎮

Let's unleash Vampires and Werewolves all over Skyrim!

Xbox 360 tested version.

In the narrative and cinematographic genre dedicated to horror two are the creatures of the night that are the masters: Vampires and Werewolves. These two races of monsters have always titillated the collective imagination by creating a large crowd of fans captured by the charm of these hunters of human beings.

Could perhaps a title of the caliber of Skyrim exempt yourself from the burden of introducing the eternal struggle between vampires and werewolves into your world? The answer is obviously obvious.

In the first DLC produced by Bethesda Softworks entitled Dawnguard two new main missions will be introduced; one dedicated exclusively to vampires. The other is dedicated to a group of vampire hunters, which optionally includes becoming werewolves.

Choose your destiny

To be able to kick off the new quest introduced in the dlc, it is sufficient to have a character who has reached at least an experience level of 10 or higher, talk to any city guard, or during the explorations of the surrounding area, meet a messenger bearing the related message. We will discover that the vampire activity on Skyrim has undergone an unstoppable surge and, to put a stop to it, the legendary vampire hunter Isram, is recruiting new recruits at Fort Dawnguard to strengthen his guild of vampire slayers.

The first mission we will take part in is very simple: we will be ordered to investigate the crypt of Dimhollow in search of tangible evidence of the activities of the undead. Once we reach this dungeon we will find ourselves faced with new enemies, new vampires with their minions and hellhounds. By stealthily listening to the speeches of the enemies we will discover that the attack by the vigilante Dawnguard is due precisely to the fault of the vampires. If during the exploration we thought we would find some vampire artifacts, well, we will soon be proved wrong.

Evidence of the existence of the dangerous undead is personified by Serana, the handsome daughter of Lord Harkon, the undisputed leader of the vampires. Escorting her to Volkhar Castle her father to thank us for saving her life will offer us a choice: accept the gift and become lord. vampires, or be banished from the castle but save your life, just this time. Here we will be placed in front of the first, fundamental crossroads of Dawnguard; join the mighty vampires or become a full member of the guild of blood-sucking hunters? Whatever our choice, the missions that we will face from now on will cross paths, visiting the same places, but with different purposes.

Power of the races

The most striking innovations introduced in this expansion are mainly two, namely the skill trees dedicated to both vampires and werewolves, thus deepening the characterization and use of the two races. To improve the respective skills it will not be necessary to make continuous use of them as we were used to with our human character, but rather by feeding on our enemies, sucking their blood in vampire form, or eating their hearts if we impersonate a werewolf. The bonuses from impersonating the creatures of the night are substantial and range from increased physical characteristics, new powers, and new magic.

The vampire will be able to turn into fog to heal himself and not be attacked by the enemy, he can poison with physical attacks, summon dead and even gargoyles at his side, absorb the health of opponents from a distance and enjoy the bonuses related to his race, such as vampire seduction, improved night vision, moving quickly by changing into a flock of baby bats and much more. The werewolf will enjoy more than anything else bonuses purely dedicated to physical combat, the ability to recruit another werewolf ally and increase their characteristics by 100%.

Obviously there is the downside, if at night using the vampire or werewolf will mean beating like blacksmiths, during the day we would have to deal with all the disadvantages of sunlight, vigor and reduced health, the possibility of being discovered and attacked by angry crowds and so on. As you play, you will find that using the vampire will be much more satisfying than the werewolf. In fact, if they spend 72 hours in the world of Skyrim without having sucked the neck of some sick person, we will move on to the second phase of the transformation. There are 4 distinct phases, with attached bonuses and malus. That is resistance to frost but weakness to flames and increased magicka and health.

We advise you to stop at the third phase and feed yourself regularly, because the fourth phase will no longer be reversible and everyone will attack you on sight, even if you are in human form, making it impossible for you to complete certain quests separate from Dawnguard. Other innovations introduced in this dlc are the new silver weapons, crossbows that will prove to be much more powerful than bows, the ability to attack while riding horses, new words of power (screams) and legendary dragons. The triptych is very interesting, but unfortunately there are pros and cons to keep in mind.

Cross and delight

If the additional bestiary, combined with the new equipment and the new powers that are provided to us by being vampires or werewolves will attract the most users, it must be said that there are annoying bugs and rather obvious programming flaws. Starting from the fact that to transform into a vampire it takes on average about fifteen seconds, during which we will be defenseless to enemy attacks, the form of Lord of the Vampires will force the player to use the third person view, making it difficult many times the fight to pass through doors and the exploration of the dungeons present in the game.

As if that were not enough, in order to open a chest, read books and interact with the surrounding environment, you need to return to human form, so you understand how annoying it is to have to alternate the two forms cyclically in order to only reach the end of a labyrinth. Fortunately, the version arrived in the editorial office was fixed by the heaviest bugs that plagued the first versions, that is invisible enemies, vampires in underwear and followers who got stuck in the polygons of the new locations.

Taking a quick math, Dawnguad offers a well-orchestrated new story with a great storyline, with a lot of backstory that goes far beyond just killing an undead for your survival, lots of brand new NPCs, a good 37 hours to gut all that that the expansion has to offer, 22 new sub quests and 1600 new locations added on the map to discover are not bad. Sore point? The price. XNUMX microsoft points to download this additional content is perhaps a bit too much.

Final comment

In conclusion we can say that Dawnguard is a must buy for all fans of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, given the amount of extra content we will get from this DLC. Too bad for the defects mentioned above, and a not exactly crystal clear bugfix session, added to a decidedly not very popular price that could leave a large slice of users astonished. In any case, the additional content provided by Dawnguard feeds the fantastic adventure of the game of the year 2011.