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Bravely Second: End Layer |OT| Those Thighs, Good Gravy! [out now in NA]

jorgejjvr

Member
So I finally finished BD and was wanting to pick this up sometime later. Does it suffer at all the same issue as BD? The second half was a slog and a half. Basically how does this game stack up to the original? Better in every way? Or does it do some things better and some worse?

I loved BD, but it does drag at the end.

I'm about half way through the second, and it is better than the original, and it does not drag. My brother did already finished it, and he just like gaf claim it does not suffer the same issue that the first had at the end.

I am also at a point that I thought the game was going to troll a bit like the first....but nope...mind blown.

Anyways, its the better game in almost every way.
 
So I finally finished BD and was wanting to pick this up sometime later. Does it suffer at all the same issue as BD? The second half was a slog and a half. Basically how does this game stack up to the original? Better in every way? Or does it do some things better and some worse?

1. not really.
2. for me some parts are better but some are worse.
 

th4tguy

Member
Got this during Black Friday event and really like it. Best bravely default and enjoyed it even with the repetitive end. So far this seems to improve and add on everything good about the first one. I can't figure out why it reviewed worst.


Side note: what's the best builds this time around?
 
I started playing the game again yesterday and I forgot I had the no exp option on, so I finished the latter half of Chapter 3 without gaining any exp. -__-

(and I was wondering why all the bosses kept giving me 0 exp)

Also love how the last sidequest becomes available right at the very end of Chapter 3 and you can easily miss it and not have access to it until who knows when.
 
This thread is now my personal echo chamber isn't it?

Anyway I resumed playing yet again now that I'm finally done with college. At this rate I'll never finish the game.

On Chapter 4 now, stuck at the Revenant boss fight because I don't want to cheese him with undo HP. The game keeps throwing jobs at me without giving me ample time to level any of them and see what they have to offer. I'm very tempted to grind jobs.
 
This thread is now my personal echo chamber isn't it?

Anyway I resumed playing yet again now that I'm finally done with college. At this rate I'll never finish the game.

On Chapter 4 now, stuck at the Revenant boss fight because I don't want to cheese him with undo HP. The game keeps throwing jobs at me without giving me ample time to level any of them and see what they have to offer. I'm very tempted to grind jobs.

I had to do this for Revenant as well.
 

Kwame120

Banned
This thread is now my personal echo chamber isn't it?

Anyway I resumed playing yet again now that I'm finally done with college. At this rate I'll never finish the game.

On Chapter 4 now, stuck at the Revenant boss fight because I don't want to cheese him with undo HP. The game keeps throwing jobs at me without giving me ample time to level any of them and see what they have to offer. I'm very tempted to grind jobs.
There's no shame in grinding jobs. That's probably one of the reasons why grinding is so easy in Bravely games, so that it's easy to get jobs up to scratch. If I remember rightly, there's options that allow you to lock exp, so that you only gain jp? (And hence don't become overlevelled)
 

Szadek

Member
I played the game for the past few weeks and I'm having a great time with it.
Shouldn't be much a suprise, since I'm also a big fan of the first game.
I'm playing on hard since that usually the best way to judge a games combat system

Today I deafted the Hawkeye boss.
Turns out 4 tanks for the easier way to win this fight
This thread is now my personal echo chamber isn't it?

Anyway I resumed playing yet again now that I'm finally done with college. At this rate I'll never finish the game.

On Chapter 4 now, stuck at the Revenant boss fight because I don't want to cheese him with undo HP. The game keeps throwing jobs at me without giving me ample time to level any of them and see what they have to offer. I'm very tempted to grind jobs.
This one of the few games were I don't mind grinding.
It's pretty easy and getting all the new skill is so much fun.
 

gardfish

Member
Beat this a little while ago! I'd heard that the music and plot were a step down from Default, but I was pleasantly surprised by both--there were some very good tracks in there, and I found the main plotline and some of the character writing to be more engaging than the first game. On the other hand, some of the dialogue is genuinely some of the worst, most trite shit I have ever read in a video game--whoever decided that the main character's catchphrase should be "coup de gravy" should never, ever write anything again for as long as they live.

I really liked most of the new jobs, although like Bravely Default some of the combinations completely break the game--Meteor Rain is one of the most absurdly overpowered attacks in any game that I've ever played with a guaranteed ~80,000 damage in a single turn with a magic buff and four braves. I wasn't a huge fan of how many jobs returned from Default, but I think that's mostly because I went directly from beating the first game to starting this one.
 
I stood my ground against Revenant for a good while and got him down to around 10k HP, but then he possessed one of my characters while I had Benediction Mist on and he regained 9999 HP for three turns. After that I said fuck it and just unleashed a friend summon attack on him that one-shot him at 150K damage.

Yeah not proud about it but I'll probably face him again anyway.

The writing in the game is sometimes just X_X a hard boss nearly decimated us with no remorse and suddenly we have to feel sorry for him? "Revenant, please be strong!" exclaims Edea after beating the everloving shit out of Revenant. It must also be the tenth time where Janne confirms he's a traitor piece of shit and Yew beats him only to cry about their friendship afterwards.

I have a feeling the Exorcist job is kinda broken lol. Undo HP can work as a cheaper Resurrect spell and with the 30 MP regen ability it should make a good pair with Bishop. Also having a Dark Knight and an Exorcist is OP for damage. Unleash Black Bane + Minus Strike, then Undo HP next turn, rinse and repeat.

Edit: jesus christ they literally dropped the "Bravely Second" line and tried to pass it off as a thing people say. You know Yew, we really are bravely second
 

GeekyDad

Member
Still finishing up Default, but I will likely jump right into this afterward. From the OT, it says only 3 repeatable commands during battle. I take that to mean you can no longer exploit stuff like Big Pharma, leaving the 3DS on auto-battle in order to rack up pg?
 
I had zero issues with my current setup (Fencer / Dark Knight / Bishop / Exorcist) throughout Chapter 5 and I even turned exp off so everyone remained at level 50.

But now it seems I hit a brick wall with Diamante. It doesn't even look hard, just ... annoyingly gimmicky.

Edit: nevermind, it went down veeery easily. Just a couple of characters had to take the hits and die before its mirror broke, then it took hits like a sponge.
 

GeekyDad

Member
Whew...

Just started Chapter 8...

Man, my opinion of this game sure has changed. I mean, whew, what an absolutely excellent RPG...until they drop it back into second gear and leave it there for, what, three or four chapters and let that gear just grind away.

Oh my goodness, what in the actual fuck were they thinking. I don't know how many times I've read about this part of the game, but truly, you just can't quite grasp it until you've played through it for yourself.

Now, I won't go so far as to say it ruins the game. It just kinda...puts the game in limbo. Like a record from the 70s that skips and you have to physically get up and push the needle forward in order to get the music to continue on but you can't because it's fucking stuck!

You actually get some pretty sweet story bits in these repeated sequences, but my God -- what...!? What!?

WTF!?

It doesn't feel like laziness. I mean, the game was already like 35 hours or more for me before I even stumbled into that Mobius strip. It was plenty of game time. There was no need to pad it. And though expressing such a plot thread can be a complex undertaking, it seems like it could have been done in a much more polished and streamlined fashion. I was tempted to just quit.

But I, for the first time, peeked at a walkthrough and found out this is (supposedly) the last fucking time I'll have to sit through this shit.

Wow...
 
Took me a sec to figure out you're talking about Default. Make sure you do the boss gauntlets of Chapter 8, all of them are worth it and some of them pose a greater challenge than even the final boss.

***

Alright, I finished Second about a week ago at level 53 for all characters, and the final boss was surprisingly manageable. I also liked the various meta aspects of the final battle (him forcing you to attack each other, or launching a bravely second attack while you select your actions, or trying to delete your save file).

Overall a very worthwhile game, but ultimately I think Default slightly beats it due to being a more original (using the term here very loosely), whimsical adventure. Second feels too samey to the first one and I'm not just talking about reused assets; even the whole story and final boss feels like a retread of BD. (both Ouroboros and Providence being Giant Space Fleas from Nowhere that suddenly appear at the very end of the game)

Most of the jobs were great however. Except for Catmancer and Patissier, never used those two for anything.
 

Wagram

Member
Whew...

Just started Chapter 8...

Man, my opinion of this game sure has changed. I mean, whew, what an absolutely excellent RPG...until they drop it back into second gear and leave it there for, what, three or four chapters and let that gear just grind away.

Oh my goodness, what in the actual fuck were they thinking. I don't know how many times I've read about this part of the game, but truly, you just can't quite grasp it until you've played through it for yourself.

Now, I won't go so far as to say it ruins the game. It just kinda...puts the game in limbo. Like a record from the 70s that skips and you have to physically get up and push the needle forward in order to get the music to continue on but you can't because it's fucking stuck!

You actually get some pretty sweet story bits in these repeated sequences, but my God -- what...!? What!?

WTF!?

It doesn't feel like laziness. I mean, the game was already like 35 hours or more for me before I even stumbled into that Mobius strip. It was plenty of game time. There was no need to pad it. And though expressing such a plot thread can be a complex undertaking, it seems like it could have been done in a much more polished and streamlined fashion. I was tempted to just quit.

But I, for the first time, peeked at a walkthrough and found out this is (supposedly) the last fucking time I'll have to sit through this shit.

Wow...

Sequel is much better, but Default definitely screwed the pooch in that segment.
 
Bravely Second is great. Doesn't have as good story and music as Default, but the gameplay is improved in enough ways that overall it's the slightly better game IMO. Also it doesn't have the ridiculous repeating chapters that Default has.

The new jobs are wonderful in Second. I'm glad they were able to break out of the Final Fantasy tradition and invent entirely new jobs on their own. They got to be really creative, and it paid off.

Most of the jobs were great however. Except for Catmancer and Patissier, never used those two for anything.
Patissier is great for BP generating shenanigans, and also for deliberately ghosting your mages. I agree catmancer isn't very good though, but I do think summoning the little cats is really cute.
 

vkrili

Member
On the other hand, Second does not feature much in the way of cool and interesting Asterisk Holder refights, which are what made chapters 7 and 8 in BD incredibly entertaining despite the repeating stuff.
 

Szadek

Member
Whew...

Just started Chapter 8...
You almost made it, so keep going. The final boss is awesome.
Patissier is great for BP generating shenanigans, and also for deliberately ghosting your mages. I agree catmancer isn't very good though, but I do think summoning the little cats is really cute.
I tried to make catmancer work, but it wasn't meant to be.
Pretty much all the other new jobs are fantastic, though.

I'm a huge fan of the
kaiser
Asterisk.
Stuff like reverse turn order and no healing can be very helpful.
 
You almost made it, so keep going. The final boss is awesome.

I tried to make catmancer work, but it wasn't meant to be.
Pretty much all the other new jobs are fantastic, though.

I'm a huge fan of the
kaiser
Asterisk.
Stuff like reverse turn order and no healing can be very helpful.

No healing in particular can trivialize that cheating superboss
when she summons her fallen comrade and is stuck in a loop because of it
 

ZenTzen

Member
B2 is that game that has better pacing but doesnt reach the highs of BDs story, still very fun and enjoyed the game all the way through
 
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