Topic: Bravely Default II (Nintendo Switch)

@VoidofLight I really enjoyed them, so I hope they return.

I certainly hope Ba'als return. Not only for the challenge - though in Bravely Second they certainly made random encounters at the "halfway" point an absolute pain - but also for some of the wordplay.

@Tyranexx My favorite part about the ba'als is the design aspect. I love how jarring they are compared to everything else in the games, and how they look like children actually crafted them. I love the music that plays as well when you fight them. They kind of remind me of Madoka's witches in a design sense honestly.

@VoidofLight Agreed! They're so otherworldly, kind of like they're a random mashup of an artist's ideas that never formed a cohesive whole. And the music is certainly a strong aspect of the Bravely series.

Getting close!

Mario 3D World is the perfect length game to last until Bravely Default 2.

We’ve basically got all of next week, Mon - Sun, then the following Tue is Persona and that Friday is Bravely Default 2. So... like a week to finish Mario then, and 3 days getting a taste of Persona. No way I finish Bravely Default 2 by March 26th though. I take my time with JRPGs. Ya, I finished Final Fantasy X, and XII, and Xenoblade 1 and 2, but everything else has been slow burn over long periods of time. Ys VIII, Trails III, Dragon Quest XI S, and for sure Bravely Default 2.

I’ll be playing on casual mode though. I hear the game is kind of hard.

I have one week left to try and beat Persona 5 Royal. I'm so close to being done with the game honestly. Then I'll probably play Bravely Default II, or if I have time, finish Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity. I probably won't play Persona 5 Strikers for a while, since I'll just have finished Royal.

So I just watched a preview for the game, and it kind of looked a bit rough. Maybe it was just the recording messing up, since the other footage I've seen, and the trailers look good. However, on the one video I watched, the textures for the towns in the overworld kind of look a bit rough, and the game has aliasing issues around the character models and such. It's weird though, since I don't remember the demo looking that way. However, the graphics don't really matter much if the rest of the game is good I guess.

I don't know if I should link the video, since it's from a different news outlet for video games.

So the game got it's final trailer yesterday. Honestly, I don't know if I want to watch it or not, since I'm scared that it'll end up spoiling a lot of the story itself. Mainly because final trailers.. usually do that.

People think that they put the final boss in the newest TV spot. I didn't watch it, so I don't know, and I don't really want to know.. but why would they do that?

I don't think most people are highly neurotic about seeing an in-game boss for a couple of seconds out of fear of spoiling the sanctity of their first playthrough or whatever.

In general, if you're that sensitive to spoilers, it's probably best to just avoid trailers outright.

@Ralizah I mean, if it's the final boss, then that could spoil a lot about it in a story based game.

@VoidofLight If it's a character, then yeah, but oftentimes it's a generic looking monster. For example, seeing Ouroboros from the first game wouldn't spoil a damn thing. Just looks like a final boss.

Showing footage of the Airy boss fight from the first game would be downright criminal, though, given how central that twist is to the story.

True.. but eh, I'm just mostly warning those who weren't aware. I personally am trying to avoid spoilers for stuff.

77 on Metacritic, and it'll probably go down further.

https://www.metacritic.com/game/switch/bravely-default-ii

It appears the only "negative" review so far is from The Telegraph (2/5 stars). I'd like to see what all the reviewer disagreed with, but there's unfortunately a paywall. Gotta stick with the flavor text on MC.

@Ralizah
Why do you think it'll go down further?

I mean, it might, but why?

Not that I think it matters. It got a smattering of great reviews. Just getting pulled down by a few unreasonably low ones.

In statistics, we categorize those as outliers and remove them from the data set. Or, an alternative approach would be to calculate a median score rather than a weighted mean score, since median is robust against outliers.

In any case, having played the recent demo I'm convinced the game is as good as I'd hoped (and no "play through the game a second time" shenanigans either). Reviews are more of a formality at this point.

@JaxonH Just an observation. Games almost always creep a few points lower before the final score stabilizes a week or two after release, once the slower outlets get their reviews in.

Anyway, the demo should be sufficient for people to judge whether they want the game or not. It makes a few controversial changes from the original, but otherwise sticks to its card and doesn't go for a blowout experience. Mario games do that all the time and score way higher, but difficult, grindy, highly technical, and/or niche experiences are just less likely to appeal to critics. There's a reason the GOTY is an action-adventure title almost every time, and it's not because action-adventure games are an inherently superior genre. They're easy to consume and provide more easy stimulation than a game like this would.

Critic reviews are largely pointless in a world filled with gameplay footage and universal user impressions. And especially with a game like this where the final demo broadly reflects the sort of experience you're going to get with the full game.

@Ralizah
I usually read one review just to get a feel for any glaring flaws I'm unaware of, but aside from that, gameplay vids are how I judge a game. Or a demo if a game has one.

I'm 30 minutes in, and so far the voice acting isn't that bad. Some of the character models look a bit odd, but they'll grow on me eventually. The one thing that really stands out to me however is the game's music. It's really really good, despite being the starting area.