dbarry_22's Game Review of Bravely Second: End Layer

A Direct Sequel Which Is Good and Bad
dbarry_22 - wrote on 02/17/17

Bravely Second is a direct sequel to the previous game in the series, Bravely Default, which was also on the 3DS. This sequel uses the same mechanics and several of the same characters along with the same world. This provides good and bad things for players and it was tough for me decide if this was a good thing or not.

This game's main character is Yew, the leader of the Crystalguard. He serves Agnes, a character from the previous game. After she is kidnapped, he must go on a journey to save her. Along the way he finds other characters from the previous game while also visiting all the same towns and dungeons. I won't go into further details as to not spoil it for you.

The game uses the same fighting mechanic used in the first game too. You have the ability to "Brave" or "Default". When you "Default", you basically put your character in a defensive state, building up turns to use later on. This is referred in the game as your "BP". You can also "Brave" raising your character to up to 4 attacks in one turn. The idea behind this is to time your attacks. If you "Brave" a ton at the start of the battle, your BP will go into the negative, and you can't do anything with your character until you get back to zero. It actually works really well. If you've played the previous game you'll know it well and it will provide you more chances to take risks with new job classes as you acquire them later in the game.

There's almost an endless number of job classes you can use in this game. Fortunately, there are new ones and not just the same ones from the first game. And while some are the same, most are not which helps keep the game feel a little new. For example, one of the classes gives you the ability to reverse turns on enemies or your own party members. If used right you can gain back HP or perhaps reverse a death. Or maybe you reverse a heal your enemy performed.

So here's the problem I have with this game. The towns and dungeons are almost all the same from the first game. Since I played the crap out of that first game, I knew the dungeons and towns well so there wasn't a whole lot of new exploration in this game. That brings me to my point of this being a sequel being good and bad. I felt like in order to gain the full experience of the game you need to have played the first one, but the game would have been harder/more fun if you hadn't. If you hadn't played the game you would have had a hard time following a lot of the story (even though they did try and fill the gaps for new players) but if you did play the first game like I had it made it much easier and less fun since you knew where most of the stuff was. It was odd.

Don't get me wrong, this was still a fun RPG to play. I put in a little over 60 hours in this game compared to over 100 in Bravely Default. This game is shorter. I also have an issue with the game breaking the 4th wall in the game (addressing you as the gamer). This caused some confusion pretty early in the game where it appears you're starting the game over. If you have to look up what the heck to do I'd understand. It's confusing. But, all in all it's a fun game. I'd say you should play the first game before trying this one out but honestly I'm not so sure.

4/5