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Forum - View topicGAME: Bravely Default Flying Fairy HD Remaster Game Review
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Juno016
 Posts: 2584 |
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I'm on the fence. On the one hand, I played the game on the 3DS already and the 3D gimmicks felt integral to the experience of the game. On the other hand, I've been dying for an HD update to the low-audio-quality Revo masterpieces that sounded just as bad on disc as they did on the 3DS itself (which was good for the 3DS, but bad for a raw soundtrack disc). I also never got to play either sequel, and I feel like I really want to play them on the 3DS as well... I don't know what I want!
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b-dragon
Posts: 631 |
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I loved this game until I hated it. It's now my- by far- least favorite of the three Bravely Default games. And its all due to the repetition towards the end of the game (if you've played, you know.) It was boring, it was frustrating, and it wasn't fun after the first recycle.
That aside, the series as a whole is one I would highly recommend for "JRPG sickos" even if only for the gameplay systems. Taking the job mechanics from FFV (and others, absolutely) to the next level, and then adding the Brave/Default mechanic on top? Its really good stuff. |
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Vanadise
 Posts: 599 |
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Bravely Default is also my favorite Final Fantasy game of all time, and this is definitely one of the best reasons to have a Switch 2 right now. I assume it'll eventually get a PC port, but I wonder when...
I do know, and honestly I've never really understood the extreme hate I've seen for this or the reputation the game has somehow gained because of it. It takes maybe two hours to rush through that part of the game if you just want to get through it as quickly as possible, and there's a fair amount of optional content you can do to break up the monotony, like spoiler[the Sage and Vampire sidequests, and remixed challenge battles against all of the asterisk holders]. It's the low point of the game, but I don't think it really significantly hurts a game that otherwise has >50 hours of fantastic content. It always felt to me like people heard spoiler["you have to re-fight a set of four bosses three times" and through a game of telephone, that somehow got turned into "you have to play through the whole game four times!!" by people on the internet who had never played the game at all.] |
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ThatGuyWhoLikesThings
Posts: 1075 |
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Yeah i've never gotten the beef with the 2nd half of the game. There's so much fun and challenging optional content to engage with. If you missed all that, then it's really your own fault that you didn't like it
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b-dragon
Posts: 631 |
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Oh man, I wish I had that view. But the remixed "challenge bosses"...weren't much of the former, even if the latter applied. The sidequest, if I recall correctly, was a giant loredump from mostly nowhere- vaguely hinted at once or twice before. And this is between the repetitive button mashing on crystals, as the party decides to demonstrate that popular definition of insanity.
A lot of it is the contrast. The game is picking up. Momentum is building and it feel like the narrative is reaching a crescendo. I have nitpicks (I don't like the punny names, and some plot points still strike me as actually stupid,) but its overall been excellent. And then we run in circles for about two hours at best. The momentum crash killed me- I expected so much better because that's what it had been. And what it was again at the very end! Its like having a nice burger- nice restaurant, premium stuff, its been great- but the second to last bite is moldy. How does that impact the last bite? Do you take it? Does the taste of mold still linger? |
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Flash33
 Posts: 148 Location: Florida |
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While I can understand people not liking the back half of the game as much as the front half, having played through the game twice I never really had an issue with it honestly. For the bosses sure most can be cheesed with the proper jobs (i.e. Ninja and Valkyrie) and gear but outside of that they can be a good challenge, and some of the fights vs. multiple bosses at once actually reward you with unique dialogue depending on the order you take them out in (and in Victor & Victoria's case at the same time). The cheese strategy also doesn't work in one specific optional fight near the end, requiring a change up to beat it.
That aside I really enjoyed playing the game this year on 3DS and seeing its two endings. The characters all stand out in their own unique ways, especially later in the game when more is revealed, and I also like how certain actions taken affect the world later on (not much mind you but still). Story wise one criticism I've seen is that the cast as a whole suffers from spoiler[Poor Communication Kills], which is fair, but that didn't detract from my enjoyment of it overall. The English voice cast also deserves praise for putting on solid performances, such as Bryce Papenbrook as Tiz, Cassandra Lee Morris as Edea and Michael Sinterniklaas as Jackal. Honestly what pleasantly surprised me is how many VAs I recognized in this game from other games and shows, such as these three (Bryce from SAO/SDS/DR2, Cassandra from SAO/Toradora/P5, Michael from Naruto Shippuden (Sora), etc.). The combat system was also fun and unique with its risk/reward nature, and I'm glad it was kept for future entries. The job grinding I wasn't a big fan of, but at least there's a good place near Florem that makes it go relatively quickly so that helps. As for Norende Village Reconstruction, unless you have another 3DS nearby or can use NetPass I'm fine with having it changed to random NPCs in towns you visit helping out with it. Overall a solid game with a solid story and gameplay that I would recommend people play. As for Bravely Second I was playing it and was enjoying it but unfortunately I had to stop because the right hinge on my 3DSXL broke off and I don't want to risk damaging it more and would hopefully like to get it fixed in the future somehow. P.S. The version the US and EU got is actually based on the updated version called Bravely Default: For the Sequel that was released in JP in 2013. Last edited by Flash33 on Tue Sep 23, 2025 7:48 am; edited 4 times in total |
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BrazillianCara
Posts: 88 |
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I feel that Bravely Second is the only game in the series not to have some detail that dominates all discussion for the worst (at most, just disappointment that REVO didn't do the soundtrack). Aside from the already mentioned plot development in 1, it seems that bosses overusing counters is all people ever talk about regarding 2.
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Probablytomorrow
Posts: 174 |
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I played this game on my 3DS way back in 2014 and I still recall the thrill of all those endgame optional fights, spoiler[with each remix better than the last, culminating in a full-on boss rush]. I got my money’s worth of the game’s battle mechanics for sure.
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Kicksville
 Posts: 1415 |
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This review gets a little over the top in boasting over nearly every related thing (the largely forgotten Dungeon Encounters from 2021 is genre defining...!?)...but this is a good game, to the extent that I was surprised how little the controversial last segment bothered me. I'm not sure I'd tolerate it happening again, but for a game where screwing around with the jobs is a large part of the fun, an excuse to engage with it even more worked out for me.
That Part is not so insurmountable as to turn off the game's many other positives, so although people's choices on how to deal with it will vary, I'd say it's worth trying the game even if it seems off-putting. |
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Terry Lang
 SubscriberPosts: 91 |
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In my opinion, Bravely Second had vastly superior writing. I ended up liking almost any character in Second more then any in Default. (including those that were in both games)
I tend to be afraid of missing dialogue so I ended up re-visiting a lot of locations during the late-game loops since sometimes they say something different. That part was unpleasant and I barely managed to finish the game. I sound negative, but most of the game was very enjoyable. The combat mechanics are still top-tier.
Yeah me too. You have all these broken combo's ready but then the boss combos still counter those. |
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meiam
Posts: 3674 |
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Its a decent game, but for anyone who hasn't played it, don't go in thinking its ''a game that would forever change the JRPG genre'', its impact on the JRPG genre is largely non existent, its biggest impact being that it brought back older style job system that had largely fallen out of fashion. Not much of a revolution so much as just realizing that JRPG had wandered in a pretty bad direction and just doing a course correction, back to what worked. (For those who weren't around back then, JRPG was in a very bad place in the 2010's, borderline a dying genre).
But its a solid B, every aspect work but it isn't particularly outstanding at anything, its very much a ''cut-and-dry power fantasy like a lot of games of this ilk'' (hint: if there's a prominent religion in a JRPG, its almost always bad). If you've played more than 3 JRPG before you've seen almost everything the game has too offer already, but if you haven't its as good as any place to start. |
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Silver Kirin
Posts: 1772 |
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Haven't played Bravely Default, but from what I've seen and what it's said in this review, the game is basically a throwback to the classic Squaresoft RPGs from the Super NES/Famicom era, just like other games like Octopath Traveller, a way of making a lower budgeted title for fans of the old-school FF games, which don't necessarily like titles like Dragon Quest. |
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harminia
 Posts: 2221 Location: australia |
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I enjoyed Bravely Default but I also kinda hated it. It took me a decade to get around to finishing it because of spoiler[the world loop plot]. The thought of having to do all that again is a bit much... (I don't think the second half isn't as good per se but it was annoying).
I remember reading about a certain party combination that makes defeating the vampire insanely easy, since I was having a lot of issues with him and was tired of grinding. It felt like cheating but it really helped. spoiler[I think I ended up using it for the rest of the loops (and I did every single asterisk battle in every loop, partially for completionist sake but also because the different dialogues) so that I could get through it quicker...] I know I had a good time with BD, and I enjoyed the characters a lot and drew a lot of fanart. But when I think of replaying the game I just feel dread. I want to play the rhythm game but I don't want to buy the whole game again... I never played the sequels. I played the demo of 2 and found myself getting a little bored. I'm usually pretty fine with grinding in games and stuff but maybe I just wasn't in the mood for it when I played. I love the designs of the game. The class outfits are so good. As a Sound Horizon fan, I adore the soundtrack (especially the vocalised versions. Actually, part of why I wasn't interested in the BD sequel was that the music wasn't be Revo, and for BD2 there was no vocalised versions). I still say mrgrgr. But I still don't know if I can say I like the game, and I definitely don't know that I could recommend it to anyone other than hardcore JRPG people who, like the review says, enjoys the battle loops and devising strategies. (Also props to the reviewer for mentioning Sound Horizon instead of just Linked Horizon, though strictly speaking BD was more LH aligned since the vocalised versions were released as a LH album). anyway stan Praline à la Mode |
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RDespair
 Posts: 263 Location: California |
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Bravely Default is great, Bravely Second is one of my all-time favorites, and Bravely Default 2 was a big disappointment.
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