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In recent years, owners of Nintendo systems have been given numerous opportunities to fall in love with Japanese RPGs of the highest calibre, with Xenoblade Chronicles in particular proving that the genre is still going strong. It's probably fair to say that most of the bigger titles have been afforded to consoles over handhelds, however; despite the diverse library the Nintendo 3DS currently boasts, it's been waiting quite some time for its Xenoblade moment. Now, with the launch of Bravely Default, we can safely say that moment has arrived.
Bravely Default is the creation of Square Enix and the Japanese developer Silicon Studio, with Nintendo taking over publishing, marketing and distribution duties in Europe, North America, and Australia. A spiritual successor to Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light, Bravely Default was first released in Japan in October 2012 as Bravely Default: Flying Fairy before being revamped and released as Bravely Default: For The Sequel in December 2013. It's this version - with its tweaked difficulty options, enhanced visuals, and dual English and Japanese audio tracks - that has been released worldwide as Bravely Default.
The game's story focuses on a band of four characters, two of whom are the key players early on. A young boy named Tiz Arrior - the first character to be officially introduced - is the only survivor of a dreadful disaster in which a giant chasm opened in the ground and destroyed his home village of Norende, along with its entire population and his younger brother. His first companion is Agnes Oblige, known to some as the Vestal of the Wind Crystal; the Wind Crystal is one of four crystals worshipped by the longstanding religious order called the Crystal Orthodoxy. Together, the pair share entwined goals: as Tiz works to rebuild his lost village, Agnes must travel the world to awaken the crystals worshipped by the Orthodoxy, and Tiz intends to help her do that.
Before their journey has even begun, they are joined by two other characters, creating your party of four. The mysterious Ringabel makes three; he calls himself Ringabel because, as an amnesiac, he has forgotten his own name. The only knowledge he carries comes in the form of a book named D's Journal, which includes details of his future and his encounters with the rest of the party, and so he intends to find his true self on this quest. The final addition to the group is Edea Lee, the only child of the Grand Marshal of the Duchy of Eterna, a royal force which has recently taken to fighting against the Crystal Orthodoxy; Lee soon rebels against the violent, hateful force of the Duchy and purposefully ignores her orders to have the Vestals - including Agnes - overpowered.
Bravely Default's biggest gameplay pull lies in its battle system, which features the brand new Brave and Default mechanic. This is one of the most interesting new additions to any RPG's battle system for quite some time and ensures that Bravely Default stands out from the crowd. Essentially, your usual battle options are still there - attack an enemy, use an item, use magic, and so on - but are joined by two new options called Brave and Default. The mechanic is likely to sound complicated, but it's actually very easy to grasp when you play the game, and fortunately a free demo of the game is available to download from Nintendo eShop.
Each character has something called Brave Points, and these decide when you can next take a turn. Assuming you don't use Brave or Default, every turn you take uses one Brave Point, and you'll receive one Brave Point at the end of the turn, effectively resetting your total. This is where the mechanic comes in: Brave allows you to use one additional turn, up to four turns in one go; Default allows you to forfeit one turn in order to defend against enemy attacks until your next turn. You'll receive one Brave Point if you use Default, while you'll lose one Brave Point every time you use Brave. You need a total of zero Brave Points in order to take a turn, so if you have zero Brave Points and you use Brave four times in one go, you'll end the turn with -3 Brave Points, meaning you won't be able to do anything for three turns.
As we said, it does sound complicated in theory, but it's much easier to grasp in practice. It brings an incredibly interesting strategic element to the game's battles, because you don't have to take things turn by turn; in reality, the concept of a "turn" is (if you'll pardon the pun) turned on its head in Bravely Default, because defending using Default allows you to stack turns up, while going on the offensive with Brave can leave you vulnerable for a number of turns if you feel it's worth the risk.
In random encounters on the world map, this isn't an issue; if all four characters max out on Brave for a total of sixteen attacks, then you'll be done fairly quickly. In boss battles, however, you need to decide whether you want to Default for multiple turns in order to max out on Braves with no compromise, or if you're feeling brave enough to strike while the iron's hot. It's also worth noting that each character's equips play a large part in this, as characters aren't limited to one attacking item and one defensive item; if you want to give a character two attacking items, they'll attack once with each item when you tell them to attack.
Another great twist Bravely Default provides on the classic formula is the overhaul of character classes, or the job system as it's known in the game. As per usual, each character gains experience points for defeating enemies, and these allow them to level up and increase their stats. However, instead of being assigned a job permanently - or even long-term - each character can swap their jobs very easily with the use of asterisks, as there is one asterisk for each job. For example, after collecting the white mage asterisk, this can be attached to a character to turn them into a White Mage, thus altering their stats and battle options.
Along with experience points, characters will also gain job points, as each job can also level up to allow characters to learn new abilities within that job. For example, if Ringabel is LV.7 and takes the monk asterisk for the first time, he'll still be LV.7, but he'll be a LV.1 Monk, and he'll need to remain a Monk in order to gain job points to level up. It's almost like Pokémon, in a way, as each Pokémon levels up separately and has its own stats, but it can't level up if it's not in your party. In the case of Bravely Default, any job points a character earns will only count towards the job they currently hold, and there's even more strategy to be had when you consider the fact that you'll continue to find new asterisks throughout the game.
The game also features a huge quest involving the rebuilding of Norende village. The quest is easily accessible from the game's main menu and, as a time-based quest, will continue to develop even when you're not actively involving yourself in it. You'll begin with one person working in an empty area and you're able to designate specific tasks for people to work on, such as clearing a roadblock or building a shop. Clearing a roadblock will allow you to access a larger area, while building a shop will give you the chance to buy items at any time. Each task has a set completion time: for example, if a task would take one hour to complete, that means it would take one person one hour, but if you set two people on the task, it'd only take 30 minutes. You'll meet more people through StreetPass and SpotPass, and you'll also find enemies to fight in Norende as well.
As you progress through the game, you'll find every aspect of it wonderfully presented. The game's visuals are vibrant and benefit from a unique art style with stunning backgrounds and locations, while its orchestrated soundtrack features truly wonderful pieces, with the music used on the world map and in battles standing out particularly. A great amount of care and detail has been poured into the game, which also features excellent voice acting and an overall impressive quality of sound and visuals. You have to assume that Square Enix and Silicon Studio have pushed the Nintendo 3DS hardware to its limit, because this is one of the best examples of quality presentation you'll find on the system.
One of the best things about Bravely Default outside of its fascinating gameplay is the fact that its underlying mechanics are so easy to manipulate within reason. You're free to change the game's difficulty level as much as you like, while you can also set the frequency of random encounters in the open world or turn them off completely; while this is good practice if you're in bad shape or need to get to a town urgently for whatever reason, the game makes a point of warning you that, with no random encounters, you won't be able to gain experience points or job points, severely hindering your progress in the game.
Regarding the game's difficulty level, it's worth pointing out that the game will seem quite difficult until you get your fourth and final party member, even on the easiest difficulty setting. Bravely Default does start out quite tough and it's difficult to get a rhythm going with only three party members, but once you get your final party member after a couple of hours, the game opens up hugely and becomes infinitely more enjoyable. At the same time, you'll continue to learn about the battle system and the game does a very good job of explaining this; there is some trial and error to be had, and you're likely to spend some time early on working out which setups best suit which characters, but that's part and parcel of RPGs and it can result in very interesting combat.
You'll also find that D's Journal - which is an encyclopaedia of sorts - will come in very handy throughout the game, as it will contain information on every character, enemy, boss, item, asterisk, weapon, event... the list goes on. Once you meet an enemy or collect an item for the first time, it'll be added to D's Journal where you can look it up properly, making it a journal of your entire adventure so far. It's not necessarily a vital part of your adventure, but learn to use it well and you'll find it becomes an incredibly useful guide.
Bravely Default could have very easily fallen by the wayside on Nintendo 3DS. It's not the sort of system one might buy for its RPGs, though its library is as diverse in other genres as the system is in its userbase. However, we don't expect that it could ever have fallen by the wayside given the involvement of Square Enix in its development and Nintendo in its international release; anything the former does on traditional video game systems, and anything the latter does at all, is often quite highly anticipated by the many. The question, then, is this: taken on face value, does Bravely Default deserve the hype, the attention, and the praise?
The answer is one of the easiest we've come across: it absolutely does. Bravely Default deserves to be held in high regard because, despite potentially being a game changer in the genre, it does what it does astoundingly well and with very little fuss. Its gameplay is some of the finest on the system, and the same can be said of its visuals, its soundtrack, and its writing. In allowing leniency in its difficulty and random encounters, it doesn't put itself in a specific category with any other games; it isn't just to be enjoyed by the most experienced of gamers, and it isn't patronisingly easy. In fact, once your party has all four members, the game becomes as close to perfectly balanced as you're likely to find in an RPG. This is definitely one for the collection, and we can't wait to see what comes of it in the future.
