Last week, Square Enix revealed its Switch release Bravely Default II had sold around 950,000 units worldwide. It's on track to surpass the sales of the original 3DS release - which sold just over a million units in its lifetime. Naturally, it's raised questions about the future of the series.
The good news is Team Asano hopes to continue to the series and is already in the planning phases for the next entry. Here's what the producer Tomoyo Asano had to say in the latest issue of Famitsu (translation courtesy of Nintendo Everything):
“Bravely Default II was well-received by fans and as a result, we’re hoping to continue the series as we feel we can pull it off once again. With that said, we’re still in the planning phase, and I suspect development will take another 3-4 years, so we’d appreciate if fans could bear with us.”
Asano was previously asked about the future of the series in April last year. At the time, he said he had a concept in mind and mentioned how it could even be a smartphone release:
"I do have a concept for it. I haven’t nailed down the particulars intentionally, so it could even be a smartphone game. Maybe I’ll have the opportunity to make it in the future if fans support the series."
Are you eager to see more entries in the Bravely Default series? Did you play BDII? Leave a comment down below.
[source famitsu.com, via nintendoeverything.com]
Comments 30
waiting for Bravely Second II 🤩
Glad to see they're still interested in making these, and that soft confirmation of a new one is reassuring. I know there are some valid critiques of these, but I just see them as what modern Final Fantasy would look like if Square didn't focus so much on mixing that series up with each entry. Sometimes, it's just nice to have a relatively simple plot and an in-depth job system to fool around with, even if it's not really pushing the envelope much.
Playing BDII, and its my first entry into the series. Haven't played all that much but the little I have played, I'm loving. As long as the rest of the game is a good time, I could see myself digging into the other two games.
"so it could even be a smartphone game"
Please, no. If they make a sequel or successor, it desperately needs to be a full title on an actual console, not a mobile game. JRPG's aren't great on mobile, and I'd rather not have my phone overheat while trying to enjoy a video game.. as well as have to deal with touch controls.
Other than that, it's nice to know that they're planning to continue making these games.. I just hope they don't release them on cellphones only.
Yep definitely don't pick up a smartphone game.
He needs to be brave and default his idea of yet another license becoming a smartphone game.
Can't wait for Bravely Second II, only after the release of Project Triangle Strategy and Nonapath Adventurer.
It was off putting when pretty much it was lead to believe 'if you support BD2 enough we will push the franchise to mobile' back then. It's normally the other way round.
It would probably be nice to see the first and bravely second get an upres remaster or something. Especially if they aren't keen on funding a full on new title just yet.
Can't wait for these confusing titles:
Bravely Default 3
Bravely Third
Bravely Second 2
Bravely Third 2
Bravely Second 3
Bravely Third 3
Bravely Final
Bravely Ultimate
Bravely Hyper
Bravely Default 3 needs a better story (not so well known generic crystal stuff again) and much more memorable characters (like in FF7-F10), lesser focus on grinding and some tweaks to the job and battle system (only to keep the things fresh and not the same again for the 4th time) and much better written sidequests.....yeah and bring us some minigames, but make it more interesting, as BnD was not fun at all....
@VoidofLight I'll take a portable console release over a mobile one any day myself, but JRPGs, while "not great on mobile" (given the control scheme limitations/compromises, few games ultimately are), may well be the most adaptable genre for the platform - and arguably strongest inspiration among F2P games - by far. And the results can be massive at times, like Tales of Crestoria with what certainly feels like some of the best casts, stories and themes in the franchise that is generally no slouch in these regards as it is. And a part of me does wonder if the lure of freemium MTX and gacha profits could be one heck of a potent argument in securing publishers and budgets for quirkier projects like SinoAlice these days - especially as the market is even more lucrative in Japan than we have ever seen it be here. Atelier Online I tried the other day looks pretty damn promising as well.
That said, again, I do decidedly prefer retail and console at the end of the day - all the moreso after experiencing a string of literally short-lived English localisations some of which barely even release "worldwide" outside a handful of western countries and sometimes diligently resist sideloading attempts on top of that. Despite its own limitations (like needing native pre-paid eShop cards for purchases or facing native servers which ensure constant connection breaks from here across the continent), I never thought I'd live to see a Nintendo console granting me relatively easier multi-region access than my smartphone.😅
But thanks to Switch, Vita and 3DS in general, Japanese developers remain pretty committed to portable consoles anyway. It's more of a bummer how adaptations of **western** animation franchises seem to have migrated to mobile in their borderline entirety. To think that MLP's G3 had several console games and the most successful generation by a mile would come to have none (in more than a decade it lasted!)... props to ones like Hotel Transylvania, Addams Family and CN/Nickelodeon families that still try, but the niche still feels rather barren compared to what once was. And particularly, RIP Disney Infinity... too bad you never survived until Switch era.
@nhSnork I heard Berseria was the best tales game, at least story-wise. I probably won’t check out the mobile one, given that I’m not a fan of gacha games at all, and I’m not really convinced that the battle formula would work well with a phone.
@VoidofLight Berseria is the best Tales of game since Xillia... but that game's story is not even close to Symphonia, Vesperia, and Xillia. I'd say if the series catches your eyes at all and you don't have a PC that can run Symphonia (which you should its a GameCube game and the min-specs reflect that) then check out Vesperia on Switch it is an excellent game! As for mobile gotcha games like Tales of Crestoria, Brave Exvius and Fire Emblem Heroes they are great if you can look past the gatcha mechanics and enjoy the complete fanservice that is those titles... but they are not the same as a full-blown adventure on consoles. So... yeah I rather see the Bravely series remain on consoles... gotcha Bravely sounds like a good way for me to hate this series rather than love it.
As for Bravely... really happy to see this series do well! Considering it is a sendup of classic JRPG games it does show there is an audience for these types of games still.
@VoidofLight it's one of the most potent entries indeed and an evident candidate for my top tier in the franchise, although so is Zestiria which the fandom likes to bark at. As for the mobile ones, I haven't played the ones that reportedly tried action battles (Rays etc); Link (long shut down, alas) and Crestoria both utilize turn-based systems - heretical for the franchise as that might seem, both have been enjoyable in their own right. But the arguable juice of Crestoria is its plot, cast and themes, the latter offering particularly topical for our own world even by Tales standards.
@BlackenedHalo and PLEASE, no puppet graphics. That ruined the game for me, but loved the 1st 2 games.
Maybe bring over the two 3DS titles to Switch and PC (and maybe Xbox)? That could help to prolong the need for a new entry for a few years.
Need to get back to this one the Boss fight are a pain in the butte....
Ugh, I hate it when they say the sequel "could even be a smartphone release". They the same thing about Bravely Second and we never got that either. What we have gotten is are more mobile games, including one a few months after BDII came out.
Surely they've made enough of those and we can hope for another console release thanks to BDII being so well received?
I bought BDII at release and even after over 200 hours of that, I'm eagerly awaiting more!
The character models in BD 2 were just awful. Hopefully they change the design going forward. Mobile game is a no go for me. Always ends up being pay to win.
@Specter_of-the_OLED
2 Brave 2 Default
Telling fans that another game in the series is in concept stage and could be four years away is not really a good idea.
Nintendo do this, Metro 5 and BotW 2 come to mind. Life is more than looking four years ahead for the release of a non existent game and becoming four years older.
I am now and have been for the last two years quite indifferent to when BotW gets a release. Life has more important things to concern myself about, that Nintendo playing games. 🙃
@zool What is Metro 5? If you mean Metroid 5 that is Dread and coming out next month and was only announced a few months ago (Nintendo never officially announced it outside of a vague statement of working on a DS Metoird and Retro subtly referenced it's existence in Metroid Prime 3. Those can be easily handwaved away. Dread was always rumoured and was never officially announced by Nintendo themselves). As for BoTW 2 that was a rather requested game to get announced and is still targeting a three-year turn-around from announcement to release and if it were not for COVID we would have probably got it this year so understandable situation for it taking longer to cook than expected. The only two games I can think of with excessively long wait times from the Big N is Metroid Prime 4 and Bayonetta 3, but in their defence, Metroid Prime 4 started from scratch because Nintendo did not want to release a substandard product after fans have waited over a decade since Prime 3 and Bayonetta 3 is being developed by Platinum Games who have been rather clear that progress is going smoothly.
If we are talking companies with notorious records of announcing a game years before even a sniff of release is Square Enix... Final Fantasy Verus XIII/XV, Kingdom Hearts 3, Final Fantasy VII Remake (and we only have the first part of that remake), Babylon’s Fall and I can name even more games if I felt like digging through their record further outside of what I can remember from the top of my head. So Bravely Default 3 being announced YEARS before a release just sounds like Square's MO and NOT even related to Nintendo outside of the games traditionally being Nintendo console exclusives. That's like being mad at Sony because we have not gotten Persona 6 yet considering that is an Atlus property.
@Wexter yes you are correct saying Metroid 4. Which everyone knows, 4 comes after 5. Well in Nintendo's world it does.
My point still stands, 4 years is to long wait and if it wasn't covid it would be some other reason for the delay.
What Nintendo AAA games are in the pipeline for an early 2022 release? There must be something. Why are we not told about finished game release dates, which are of more interest than games without a release date?
@zool Because fans care about hype titles and knowing a game is on the way even if it is a few years out can entice people to purchase the system. Nintendo tries to give quick turn-a-rounds from announcement to release. But, they're not perfect and sometimes despite this situations within the development can delay a game and they don't make a habit of using crunch or other practices to punish their devs to force a game out the door... which while respectable also means they are less likely to announce something unless they are sure they can get it out the same or following year which makes them very secretive on what they are working on so people by nature are more interested in what they've not announced then what they have.
As for why fans care more about what is coming out in 2022 than the fact in a month they will have Metroid Dread is simple... they might just not be interested in the games coming out in the 2nd half of the year or they just want to know what they could be playing next year.
@Wexter A quick turn around of games can result in games like Mario Golf being released with content held back to be released as dlc at a later date.
Other games get release dates put back under the umbrella of wanting to improve issues with a game, but really it's just a marketing ploy.
BotW is finished but is being held back for reasons only Nintendo know, maybe it's for a launch together with an improved and more powerful Switch version.
And it's funny how Metroid 5 can be put into production after Metroid 4 and finished and released long before it.
Nintendo game announcements and release dates were at one time much more reliable.
I'd like a new Bravely game, but NO WAY do I want it to be a phone game. Also, it would desperately need to fix all the problems that Bravely Default 2 had, most of which were either new additions that were nothing but irritating or removal of old useful features for no apparent reason. It's bad enough that I actually wish they'd remake BD2 in the immediate future, even though I normally don't condone remakes on the same system as the original. I discussed the finer details in the reviews I did of the three games.
@zool WE NEED TO CLARIFY SOMETHING are you referring to Metroid Prime 4 or Metroid 4? Because Metroid 4 is called Metroid Fusion and was released in 2001. As for why Dread was released before Prime 4? That is simply because it did not have its development restarted and has been in development by Mercury Steam since they finished Samus Returns in 2017. In all essence, Prime 4 was just starting development when they announced it and they needed to get hype for the Switch going. That is why they announced it so early and even Nintendo said it was a mistake. As Prime 4 had it's development restarted, the development duties were stripped from the unknown studio (from reports it was a group in Namco Bandai) and handed to Retro Studios who have been doing massive highers from developers who worked at Bioware, 343, EA and a ton of other studios who specialize in FPS games. So Prime 4 was sent back to square-one in 2019 and Dread has been on smooth sailing since basically roughly 2017/2018. That is why Dread is being released first there is no conspiracy here.
Dread was kept under wraps till Nintendo had it in their back pocket to release. No leaks, no-nonsense and BAM Metroid Dread. We can agree to disagree on things, but you really need to be accurate with what you are talking about when it comes to known timelines of release...
To clarify, I am responding to this topics question, 'Are you eager to see more entries in the Bravely Default series?'
My response is/was not if it's going to be a four year wait. I am not eager to wish my life away for a game.
Metroid and BotW 2 were examples of this kind of wait. A little clip of BotW at E3 or a couple of stills in a Nintendo Direct and we should be grateful, then another long delay. Clever marketing or frustrating for gamers?
It's not about Metroid 4 or 5.
@zool I'm just asking you to use the correct terms when referring to games because it is super confusing when you are talking about "Metroid 4" or "Metroid 5" because in both cases they don't apply here. And in any case, Nintendo agrees with you that the wait for Prime 4 was too long and they announced it too early. This is fair for them to say considering they don't like announcing games unless there is a clear 1-2 year wait for a game which I think is a fair amount of time to notify your user base of a game coming out.
As for my issues with hype culture actually has less to do with Nintendo themselves. Their track record of announcement to release tends to be rather consistent with a few outliers (Bayonetta 3 and Prime 4 and in Prime 4 they have been very clear as to why it's taking longer than ususal). My issue has to do with YouTube influencers talking about a game at nausia when Nintendo has not said anything about the game outside of "we're working on it. It is going well and we'll let you know more about it when we have more to share." And we get videos for weeks about "Is Zelda having development issues" or "Zelda's development is going well nothing to worry about" when in all honesty the game was hardly announced two years ago and is coming out early 2022. This falls directly into a nice release window that almost all AAA games fall into of a two-year announcement followed up by release. As for Dread it really does not apply to this discussion as outside of Sakamoto talking about a project called "Dread" back in 2010 saying the game was shelved and they had no plans to pick back up development on 3DS and that was to squash rumours, Dread had an insanely quick turn-a-round from announcement to release. So all I'm asking is if you're going to discuss a topic like this you keep to the facts of what we know rather than inflating things with BoTW 2 and Dread when they both don't apply to insanely long wait times when one is nice and comfy in a release window and Dread was basically shadow-dropped into our laps within a few months of the announcement and getting consistent information since the announcement from Nintendo themselves.
That and I don't know why we're even discussing Nintendo's track record in this article when it is about a Square Enix game which sounds about right as Square Enix is beyond notorious for this even a decade ago... https://youtu.be/i5GZj9sWPkY
Dread and Skyward Sword were two games that were dropped into the Nintendo release schedule to keep fans happy while BotW 2 and Metroid 4 were pushed back down the release date line.
BotW 1 and many other game's have been announced then the release date put back and sometimes on more than one occasion.
There will be a more powerful Switch release next year and that is when we will see BotW 2 and Metroid 4 and even a new Mario Game. So you trying to justify release dates, when the release is controlled by Nintendo's marketing is pointless.
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