Story:
The story begins with a young man named Tiz Arrior, who miraculously survives a disaster that befalls his home village, creating a great chasm. He loses everyone he knows and sees his younger brother die before his eyes. It's no surprise that he becomes traumatized by this event. He went through such a shock that he fainted and was asleep for three whole days; it was by chance that a rescue party managed to find him after the disaster.
This, however, doesn't stop Tiz. He's almost certain that there may still be survivors after the catastrophe. When he arrives at the chasm, he finds a girl standing there, looking over the edge of a cliff. He goes and tells her that it's dangerous, but then all of a sudden, they are attacked by the Sky Knights! The Sky Knights are from the Kingdom of Eternia, who are hunting the mysterious girl.
Tiz saves her and learns that she is Agnés Oblige, the Wind Vestal of the Wind Crystal. She is investigating the darkness that has taken over the Wind Crystal and how it has affected the world, accompanied by a Cryst-fairy called Airy. Tiz, feeling a strong sense of justice, decides to help her so that no one else has to go through what he endured.
Airy is a mysterious character. She helps the party by telling them where they should go next and what they should do. You don't learn much about her except her goal, which is to awaken all the Crystals around the world.
Tiz and Agnés seem kind of bland at first... okay, really bland. They are very basic for a JRPG story, and we've seen their character types thousands of times before. However, after you get your third party member, Ringabel, the game's story really starts to get interesting.
Ringabel is an amnesiac fellow who happens to have a book he calls "The Book of D." No one knows who wrote it or why. The book has the ability to predict the future, which means it will be brought up in the story many times, but it's also an interesting read. When you read the so-called "future," it may tell of events that are to come, but it never really tells how they happen. The book is more of a journal written by someone, and the author tells about different events they were a part of. It never actually spoils the story in one way, which is a surprisingly hard thing to do. The book is also a guidebook, giving you details about monsters you have seen and a detailed description of every person you meet on your journey. It also has tutorials to help you understand the game better. However, that's not what makes Ringabel the one that gets the story going; he is one of the best charmers in any JRPG I have ever had as a party member. He gets all the funny and good lines, he is kind of a dork in a good way, and his English voice actor (who is well-known Voice Actor Spike Spencer) sounds a bit like French (if I am not mistaken), which works with the character perfectly. Actually, the surprising part was that Ringabel's English voice sounds much better than the original Japanese one (by the way, you can change your voices in the tactics, config option). Everyone else sounds just fine, but for some reason, Japan thought that a cool young charmer like Ringabel needed a VERY deep voice. It just doesn't fit him in my own humble opinion.
Last but not least, you meet Edea Lee, who is one of the Sky Knights. She turns against the Sky Knights after seeing how dishonorable they are toward innocent people. Edea is what you would call a tomboy girl; however, compared to your stereotypical tomboy character, she still actually acts like a girl. What I mean by that is a typical tomboy girl (especially in anime) is the kind of character that always wants to compare themselves to guys and never wants to "act like a girl"; they actually detest everything that has to do with being a girl. However, Edea is the more rare kind of tomboy character. She acts tough and strong, but she likes going to a store and having shopping sprees. She is just a fun, interesting character, and for a while, she is kind of the main character since you keep on meeting different Sky Knights who know her. She also is a really good combo with Ringabel, as they both share a lot of funny, awesome dialogue together. I'm just going to say this: Edea is my favorite character out of the main four. Why? Because I really like her design.
Ringabel and Edea are the ones making the story fun to experience and complement the otherwise bland Tiz and Agnés, but later on, they will develop into more interesting characters, too.
There will also be many different side quests. Most of them early on are about getting jobs (more on this later) and getting to know more about the side characters. Although, to be fair, you CAN skip them, but you won't get the story behind the characters or get the job.
Now I want to talk about the more "controversial" part of the story. The crystals in this world are treated largely by everyone as holy entities and are part of a well-known religion called the Crystal Orthodoxy, which Agnés is part of. The Kingdom of Eternia believes that it's useless to call the crystals holy entities and they should instead be used for resources. Then the Kingdom of Eternia starts a new way of viewing the Crystals called Anti-Crystalism. They start a war against the world and try in every way to force people to stop believing in Crystal Orthodoxy, even outright telling lies about it.
The game also offers a fair amount of criticism against the modern age. For example, later in the game, you'll visit the city of Florem. This city was once well-known for its close, healthy relationship with the beautiful nature surrounding it. However, when you arrive, most of the girls are obsessed with achieving idealized beauty and have forgotten everything about nature.
Now, you, the reader, might be thinking, "That's a lot of very touchy subjects!" Indeed it is; however, it doesn't make the story any less enjoyable. The messages and criticism aren't the kind that slaps you in the face and then starts shooting you with a shotgun at close range. Rather, they're there to make the world that much more interesting. The story follows the main characters and their viewpoints and thoughts about what is happening around them. While there are indeed a lot of very touchy subjects, and some of you may have a problem with that, it seriously doesn't destroy the story at all. Quite the opposite, actually—it gives the world that much more life.
Gameplay:
The game follows old JRPG traditions, with random encounters on the world map and in dungeons. Combat then shifts into a turn-based strategy game, much like most JRPGs. However, three main features here change the whole game.
First, there's Bravery. This mechanic lets you perform more actions with one character in the same turn. When you do that, you get minus one or more on your BP counter. BP is your turn counter. If a character's BP is in the positive, it allows them to make more moves, up to three additional actions. When your character has a negative BP, they won't be able to do anything on their next turn, or for the next four turns if you went "all out."
This mechanic changes all the fights in the entire game. Defending now has more of a purpose, unlike in other JRPGs where it was often underutilized and simply prolonged the fight without much strategic advantage. What makes the battles even more interesting is that bosses also use Bravery and Default. You have to be extra careful when a boss is charging their BP meter.
The last new feature is the difficulty settings. You can play this game almost however you want. You can change the difficulty from easy to hard whenever you wish. You can also set the encounter rate higher, or turn it completely off, which makes it easier to navigate dungeons. There's also a feature to turn off gaining XP (experience points) and job points.
Now, readers, I dare you to try beating this game on hard and turning off XP/job points gain—if that's even possible, I have no clue! However, because of this feature, essentially any kind of player can enjoy this game exactly how they want. Though to be fair, this feature also means that if you're having a hard time, you can just change it to easy or put the encounter rate to the highest and grind yourself up. You can also speed up battles and put them on Auto mode, which makes grinding even easier. It can be incredibly easy if you wish, which might turn off some hardcore players.
After winning a battle, you can earn bonus points depending on how you finished the fight. For example, if you clear the fight in one turn, you get bonus XP. If you win the fight without taking any damage, you'll earn more job points. Lastly, if you manage to kill all your enemies at the same time, you will earn more money. If you keep earning the same bonus multiple times, it will become a bonus streak, and you will earn even more. This makes grinding even easier for those who enjoy that.
There's also another feature called Bravery Second. It's a move that lets you perform any action at any time during a battle, though it consumes SP (Sleep Points), and you can only hold three at a time. You gain more SP by leaving your 3DS in sleep mode or by purchasing them with real money from Square-Enix's in-game online shop.
I can tell you, readers, this is one of the most pointless features I have ever seen in a JRPG. Firstly, you can get SP for free by leaving your 3DS in sleep mode for a few hours. Secondly, SP costs actual real cash, and the game will never be so difficult (especially with the adjustable difficulty settings) that you'll actually need to buy more. It's obvious the developers just included this to try and get some desperate person's money. However, it doesn't make the game less enjoyable, and you'll likely forget it even exists in the first place.
A familiar feature from the Final Fantasy franchise returns in this game: you'll get different jobs that anyone in your party can use. Jobs level up after earning a certain amount of job points, which you acquire at the same time as normal experience points. When a job levels up, you gain either a new ability specific to that job or a support ability. Support abilities are skills you can equip even if your character is using a different job. Some support abilities increase different stats or make you immune to certain statuses like blind or poison.
Unlike most JRPGs, you can equip two jobs at the same time, though only the one you've chosen as your main job will level up. This makes strategy even more rewarding. For example, you can equip one character with both white and black magic to create an awesome mage, or equip your melee class with white magic to serve as an extra healer for the party.
Jobs also change your characters' appearance. All jobs have different stats, which will be better or worse for your main characters depending on their starting stats. Depending on the job, different equipment works better. For example, a staff is better for a white mage, while a sword is better for a knight. You'll see a rank next to your character when choosing equipment, so you know what is good for that character at that moment.
Now, let's talk about the other main feature: Norende reconstruction. Early in the game, Tiz is tasked with rebuilding Norende. In practice, this means you'll be able to put a few villagers to work building shops or clearing roads to new places. After you've built any kind of shop, you can keep leveling it up until level 11. You'll get new items from the shop that a mercenary will sell, which you can find in towns or even dungeons. However, these shops need villagers, and there are two ways of getting them: either you meet random people through StreetPass, or you have to connect to the internet. It takes real time for the shops to be built; they will continue construction even if you leave your game in sleep mode.
You'll also get random people added to your summon friend list through the internet or StreetPass. Summon Friend is a command you can use in the middle of a battle to call forth a main character from another person's game. This summoned character will unleash a specific attack that the other player pre-selected and sent. You can also send your own characters to help out another player; before you make your move, you can choose if your selected command will be sent to other players. It's a great way to help out friends you know who also have the game.
You'll also receive Nemesis data from other players. A Nemesis is a really tough, special boss that will inhabit your Norende. It won't actively do anything, but you can battle it if you like. It's just there for an extra challenge, and you can send it to other people too.
Graphics:
The game mixes hand-drawn backgrounds with a 3D-modeled overworld and 3D character models. The hand-drawn art looks really good, and the 3D models of the characters are very cute. I personally like it, although if you look at the official art, they look much older than their 3D models. The game is detailed, but I feel that they could have done a little more with the overworld; it feels kind of bland. Then again, it isn't that important; everything else is a treat for your eyes.
Music:
The composer of the entire soundtrack is the band Sound Horizon, well-known for their main theme for the anime hit, "Attack on Titan." The soundtrack mixes symphony with power rock and trumpets. As strange as that combination may sound, it actually sounds AMAZING; many of the tracks are memorable and fun to listen to. There's really nothing more I can say—go look up some videos of the soundtrack and judge for yourself; they are truly that good.
Replayability:
Because of the different difficulties and diverse jobs, this game is a great choice for speedrunners. However, for everyone else, after clearing the main story and doing pretty much every side quest, there isn't really anything that would bring a player back. Perhaps some will play it again after a few years for the story. There are, though, plenty of side quests, and to 100% the D-book with all monsters, items, and story bits, will take a pretty long while.
Final Verdict:
I highly recommend this game. It's an experience that pretty much anyone can enjoy without problems, though the Bravery Second feature is really unnecessary and could have been left out entirely. After playing through the game once, you won't have any reason to play it again, except to re-experience the story.
With all that said, the story is well-written, the characters are memorable, and the soundtrack is amazing. It's a game that deserves all the hype it has received. If you are an RPG fan, then you cannot miss out on this gem.
VERDICT: Recommended
Reviewed on Nintendo 3DS
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