gekigengar gargant III!!! (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
aestivalis) wrote2021-04-15 04:24 pm
aestivalis) wrote2021-04-15 04:24 pm
that was meant for me...!
HELLO AND WELCOME TO MORE BRAVELY DEFAULT! Last time, our intrepid adventurers had made their way to Florem, The Land of Flowers. Now we find them in Eisenburg, navigating the mysteries of Grapp Keep. What has befallen them along the way? Let's find out together!
✦ I still miss elements of the Bravely Default II gameplay and interface, but I've definitely gotten into the swing of things now. Playing on Hard from the get-go is... hard! Plenty of boss battles have left me in the ground, and I've wiped on random encounters as well. But I'm definitely having a lot of fun with it! And now that I've got a couple of Crystals cleansed, ability options are beginning to open up a little more. Plus Eisenberg has some of my favourite asterisks in the game, looking forward to getting my paws on those.
✦ I forgot just how relentlessly cruel this game is to my sweet child Agnes Oblige. Like, I didn't think I'd forgotten, but it's just even more endless bleak for her than I gave credit to. That poor girl...! If there were ever cause for such a thing I would definitely be one of the people holding a placard saying 'Agnes Oblige Did Nothing Wrong, You're All Just Mean'.
Right now she's at her lowest point, and becoming very closed off from people. I think we're supposed to interpret her as being too offish and cruel with her companions, Edea in particular, but I really have a hard time feeling anything but intense overwhelming sympathy. Not to be all like "her video game friends aren't supporting her enough...!" but I'm not gonna lie to you, lads, her friends are not supporting her enough. Very ready to stop seeing scenes of Agnes saying something firm but reasonable (we can't afford to get involved in this unrelated thing, we must focus on saving the crystals), having Tiz scold her for being too harsh, and her wincing quietly back into herself.
Bravely Default is a game about people talking down to Agnes Oblige and I will not stand for it.
✦ The Eternian Forces are insane. All this stuff about Edea ~seeing the world in black and white~, with the intention of challenging that world view? Okay, sure! Good! Fine! But it's really hard to see this as particularly nuanced when one half of our balanced scale has a bunch of literal nuns and unaffiliated commoners, and the other half is just a squadron of overpowered lunatics willing to commit genocides, assassinate literal children, enable financial corruption, incite civil wars. Like... not gonna lie, lads, I'm pretty sure there actually is a good side and a bad side here!
I think the theme they're going for is sound enough, and this would hardly be the first JRPG with antagonists committing extreme actions for a secret undisclosed greater good. But phew, Bravely Default. If you want me to step back and realise that maybe these villains weren't all that bad, you should probably stop making them all so gleefully complicit!
✦ I'M REALLY ENJOYING IT THOUGH, GUYS. Every update I swear to myself that I'm not going to seem like such downer, and every time the things that jump out at me are all just 'AND ANOTHER THING'. But it's still a really fun game, and as ludicrous and moustache-twirling as most of the antagonists are, they sure are a delight.
It's been fun trying out different asterisks as well! It does mean poor Agnes was dressed in her pink wolf fursona during the climatic events of Florem, which was an awful disgrace to the sincerity of the moment, but... she is a very good Ranger...!
I'm so excited to get my Songstress job back. Is it Songstress? Bard? Pop Star? Diva? I don't remember. But I am ready.
✦ I still miss elements of the Bravely Default II gameplay and interface, but I've definitely gotten into the swing of things now. Playing on Hard from the get-go is... hard! Plenty of boss battles have left me in the ground, and I've wiped on random encounters as well. But I'm definitely having a lot of fun with it! And now that I've got a couple of Crystals cleansed, ability options are beginning to open up a little more. Plus Eisenberg has some of my favourite asterisks in the game, looking forward to getting my paws on those.
✦ I forgot just how relentlessly cruel this game is to my sweet child Agnes Oblige. Like, I didn't think I'd forgotten, but it's just even more endless bleak for her than I gave credit to. That poor girl...! If there were ever cause for such a thing I would definitely be one of the people holding a placard saying 'Agnes Oblige Did Nothing Wrong, You're All Just Mean'.
Right now she's at her lowest point, and becoming very closed off from people. I think we're supposed to interpret her as being too offish and cruel with her companions, Edea in particular, but I really have a hard time feeling anything but intense overwhelming sympathy. Not to be all like "her video game friends aren't supporting her enough...!" but I'm not gonna lie to you, lads, her friends are not supporting her enough. Very ready to stop seeing scenes of Agnes saying something firm but reasonable (we can't afford to get involved in this unrelated thing, we must focus on saving the crystals), having Tiz scold her for being too harsh, and her wincing quietly back into herself.
Bravely Default is a game about people talking down to Agnes Oblige and I will not stand for it.
✦ The Eternian Forces are insane. All this stuff about Edea ~seeing the world in black and white~, with the intention of challenging that world view? Okay, sure! Good! Fine! But it's really hard to see this as particularly nuanced when one half of our balanced scale has a bunch of literal nuns and unaffiliated commoners, and the other half is just a squadron of overpowered lunatics willing to commit genocides, assassinate literal children, enable financial corruption, incite civil wars. Like... not gonna lie, lads, I'm pretty sure there actually is a good side and a bad side here!
I think the theme they're going for is sound enough, and this would hardly be the first JRPG with antagonists committing extreme actions for a secret undisclosed greater good. But phew, Bravely Default. If you want me to step back and realise that maybe these villains weren't all that bad, you should probably stop making them all so gleefully complicit!
✦ I'M REALLY ENJOYING IT THOUGH, GUYS. Every update I swear to myself that I'm not going to seem like such downer, and every time the things that jump out at me are all just 'AND ANOTHER THING'. But it's still a really fun game, and as ludicrous and moustache-twirling as most of the antagonists are, they sure are a delight.
It's been fun trying out different asterisks as well! It does mean poor Agnes was dressed in her pink wolf fursona during the climatic events of Florem, which was an awful disgrace to the sincerity of the moment, but... she is a very good Ranger...!
I'm so excited to get my Songstress job back. Is it Songstress? Bard? Pop Star? Diva? I don't remember. But I am ready.