Bravely Second: End Layer

Bravely Second: End Layer
Developer(s)	Silicon Studio
Publisher(s)	Square Enix
Director(s)	Kensuke Nakahara
Producer(s)	Tomoya Asano[1]
Artist(s)	Akihiko Yoshida[1]
Writer(s)	Tomoya Asano Shinji Takahashi Souki Tsukishima
Composer(s)	Ryo
Platform(s)	Nintendo 3DS
Release	JP: April 23, 2015 EU: February 26, 2016[2] AU: February 27, 2016 NA: April 15, 2016[3]
Genre(s)	Role-playing
Mode(s)	Single-player

Bravely Second: End Layer (Japanese: ブレイブリーセカンド エンドレイヤー, Hepburn: Bureiburī Sekando: Endo Reiyā)^[4] is a Japanese role-playing video game developed by Silicon Studio and published by Square Enix for the Nintendo 3DS, and is the sequel to Bravely Default. It was released by Square Enix in Japan on April 23, 2015, and by Nintendo in North America, Europe, and Australia in 2016.^[5][6]

Gameplay

The game, like its predecessor, is a role-playing video game, and reuses the battle system implemented in Bravely Default.^[7] New to the game is a chain-battle feature where a player who defeats a random encounter may continue to battle enemies in succession for greater risk and reward. The original game's sidequests have been revamped; players encounter two Eternian asterisk holders in an argument about an ethical dilemma, and the player must resolve the conflict with the reward being the loser's asterisk.

Story

Two and a half years after the events of Bravely Default,^[8][9] Agnès Oblige has been elected the Pope of the Crystal Orthodoxy. She and Grand Marshal Braev Lee of the Duchy of Eternia seek to end hostilities between their groups with a formal peace treaty. The ceremony is interrupted by Kaiser Oblivion, leader of the Glanz Empire, and his cryst-fairy companion Anne, who abduct Agnès and imprison her in their floating fortress, the Skyhold. Yew Geneolgia, leader of Agnès' Crystalguard protectors, awakens a week after the attack and sets out from the city of Gathelatio to rescue her with fellow Crystalguard leaders Janne Engarde and Nikolai Nikolanikov. However, both Janne and Nikolai are revealed to be moles for the Empire. Guided by Agnès through a crystal shard she dropped when she was kidnapped, Yew assembles three companions: Eternian Ducal Guard captain Edea Lee, the daughter of Braev who aided Agnès in their first adventure,^[10] Magnolia Arch, a young Ba'al Buster from the moon who is the sole survivor of an attack on her village and possesses an hourglass capable of localized time manipulation, and Tiz Arrior, a former comrade of Agnès and Edea who has been comatose for the past two and a half years. The group is unable to prevent the Kaiser from escaping in the Skyhold.

With Agnès' aid, the party pursues the Skyhold to the Harena region. There, the party learns that the Ba'al responsible for destroying Magnolia's home is currently on the Skyhold with the Kaiser. The party meets the highly regarded scholar Professor Norzen, who explains that the Kaiser is searching for a "compass of space and time" before being assassinated by the Empire. Imperial forces successfully transfer the compass to Janne, who reveals that he serves the Empire in order to exact revenge on the Orthodoxy for having his family killed when they opposed the surrender to the nascent Duchy of Eternia. As the party makes for Eisenberg, they begin to receive guidance from a mysterious "man with a purple pen".

In Eisenberg, the party meets princess Yoko of Yunohana and helps her find her brother Danzaburo. They attend a festival in the city of Hartschild where Magnolia and Yew bond. The next day, the group heads to Yunohana, where Yoko reveals Danzaburo is searching for the Sword of the Brave to legitimize his inheritance. Yew reluctantly reveals the sword's location, but when Yoko claims the sword, it takes Danzaburo's sword arm as payment. This horrifies Yew, who reveals that he caused a similar tragedy with his older half-brother Denys, who was disinherited and vanished soon after. Yoko reveals Danzaburo is an illusion and she is a yokai, proceeding to torment the group. She directs the group to discover the Kaiser's true goal at the Fire Crystal temple before being driven off. At the Fire temple, Tiz and Edea find the Fire Crystal has been overcharged, and the group realizes Kaiser Oblivion's goal is to summon the Holy Pillar and end the world. The group hurries to Florem to intercept the Empire at the Water Crystal, where they see the Skyhold shot down by a massive energy blast.

The group consults the matriarch of Florem and has the Vestling of Water, Sylvie, place a shield around the Water Crystal. The group then repels an attack by the Glanz Empire while attracting the attention of Lotus, an engineer from the hidden Sagitta Village. He takes the party to Sagitta and reveals their Ba'al destroying SP cannon, revealed to be the weapon that grounded the Skyhold after they detected the Ba'al within it. The party also meets the man with the purple pen, who reveals himself to be Altair, a Celestial Being who has possessed Tiz since his near-death at the Great Chasm two years prior. He reveals that the Ba'als are being created from his memories. Meanwhile, the Kaiser forces Agnès to dispel the shield around the Water Crystal and overcharge it to summon the Holy Pillar. After killing Nikolai, who followed the Kaiser due to his guilt over the Orthodoxy's corruption, the group mounts an assault on the Skyhold. Janne sacrifices himself to slow the group down, allowing the Kaiser to use the compass to travel back in time with Agnès. Anne uses the Holy Pillar's power to destroy the Moon. The party defeats Anne in battle, but the destruction of the Moon ceases the flow of time and places the world in a state that would eventually end in inevitable destruction.

The party uses Magnolia's hourglass to go back in time to the peace ceremony and stop the Kaiser from abducting Agnès, and discover his true identity is Yew's missing brother Denys. Denys escapes with the aid of Janne and Nikolai, but the party utilizes their memories of the previous timeline to stop Denys' plans. Yew eventually corners Denys in the Geneolgia crypts, learning his brother's intent to use the compass to travel back in time to kill their family's founder to negate the corrupt misdeeds caused by his bloodline. Yew defeats Denys, and Agnès and Braev convince him to own up to his mistakes and create a world of peace in the present. However, Anne uses Sylvie to manifest the Holy Pillar to destroy the moon once again. She summons Diamante, the Ba'al that ravaged Magnolia's home, to destroy the group, and Denys sacrifices himself by using the compass to send himself and Diamante to the end of time.

The party awakens in Caldisla, which is revealed to have been removed from everyone's memory by Yoko until that moment. After a Ba'al attack, the group confronts Anne at the Great Chasm of Norende and learn she is older sister of Tiz and Edea's old enemy Airy. Anne revealed that she manipulated them, Agnès, and Ringabel into defeating Airy as the intrusion of her "god" Ouroboros would posed a threat to her master Providence, the so-called "god" of the Celestial Realm. Anne explains that Providence created the Ba'als using the memories of Altair's lover Vega. After Anne is killed, the group enters the Celestial Realm and frees Vega from Providence's control. After Altair and Vega depart in peace, the group is attacked by Providence, who breaks the fourth wall and attempts to delete the player's save file. The party stops Providence and destroys him.

When the group returns to Luxendarc, Tiz is revealed to be dying again now that Altair's soul has left him. A mysterious Adventurer, who has provided aid to Tiz since Norende's destruction, appears and takes Magnolia's hourglass back in time to give to Tiz at the start of his original adventure. The Adventurer, revealing herself to be a colleague of Altair's named Deneb, returns and informs the group that the hourglass, now with two and a half years' worth of hopes and dreams, will be able to renew his life. Agnès, possessing the hourglass, delivers it to the party and revives Tiz. In the game's epilogue, Agnès retires from her duties as the pope and settles down in Norende with Tiz while Edea sets out as the new Grand Marshall to secure the peace between Eternia and the Orthodoxy. Magnolia decides to remain on Luxendarc with Yew, and the two confess their love for each other. In a post-credits scene, having interacted with his friends under the guise of their world's Alternis Dim, Ringabel is revealed to have become an agent of an interdimensional police force called the Planeswalkers as he gives them confirmation that the Sword of the Brave exists.

Development

As early as December 2012, talks of a sequel to Bravely Default arose, with producer Tomoya Asano requesting feedback from fans to be used for a sequel to the game.^[11] Talks of a sequel also arose again in June 2013, when game developer Yasumi Matsuno announced that character designer and lead artist Akihiko Yoshida was working on a Bravely Default sequel.^[12][13] In August 2013, Square Enix announced Bravely Default: For the Sequel, an updated version of the original that would implement new gameplay ideas developed for a sequel in the series.^[14][15] The name Bravely Second was trademarked as early as September 2013.^[16] The game's name was officially announced as Bravely Second in a December 2013 issue of Jump magazine.^[17] being named after a gameplay mechanic from Bravely Default: For the Sequel.^[18] Upon announcement, the game's only announced platform is the Nintendo 3DS.^[19] The game was approximately 30% complete around the time of its official announcement.^[1]

In December 2013, it was revealed that Yoshida had left Square Enix.^[12] Despite this, he states he still plans on continuing to work on the Bravely games,^[12] and Bravely Second will still retain the same anime art style established in the first game.^[17] albeit with characters having slightly more realistic proportions, being slightly less chibi.^[1] Initial brainstorming led to ideas such as having Magnolia wear a space suit or bunny ears, but this was ultimately scrapped to pursue a more "adult look", something the developers felt was missing in the first title.^[20] Asano also confirmed that the game will stay story driven as opposed to exploration driven, as with the first game.^[21] In April 2014, producer Tomoya Asano announced in Famitsu's Rumour Column that the scenario for the game was completed.^[22] In late July 2014, Famitsu magazine revealed that Revo would not be returning to compose the soundtrack for the game due to conflicting schedules, and that Ryo from the band Supercell would be taking his place.^[23]

On December 10, 2014, a trial version of the game was released on the Japanese Nintendo eShop.^[24]

Reception

Bravely Second received positive reviews. Praise went towards the innovative gameplay following on from the original game, and criticism went mostly towards the story and lack of differentiation from its predecessor.

In their review, Famitsu gave the game the score 36 of 40, consisting of the sub-scores 9, 9, 9, and 9.^[25] Siliconera detailed and translated a series of responses from Japanese players including praise for the "Consecutive Chance" feature and criticism for overuse of memes and modern linguistics drawing comparisons to Hyperdimension Neptunia.^[26]

Janine Hawkins from Polygon criticized the lack of innovation from its predecessor but praised the world and the writing, saying "The world is beautifully realized, and the writing is enjoyable"; Hawkins summarized her review as "Bravely Second takes after its predecessor almost to a fault."^[27]

Mike Mahardy from Gamespot said "One could argue it feels more like an exceptional expansion than a true sequel" citing how "the combat, despite its sleek design, doesn't make any major improvements on the well established formula." Criticizing the writing, he adds "But in the end, Bravely Second transcends the limitations that its poor writing and redundant storyline create."^[28]

Sales

Bravely Second was the best selling video game in Japan during its debut week, with 100,047 copies sold and 53.6% of the initial shipment sold out.^[29] This was a lower debut than that of the original Bravely Default; during its launch week, 141,529 copies were sold, which corresponded to 85.68% of its first shipment.^[30] By April 2017, 700,000 copies had been sold worldwide.^[31]

In North America, the game was the ninth best-selling game of its debut month of April 2016, a feat deemed particularly impressive by VentureBeat, which noted was rare for a physical release of a niche genre like a JRPG.^[32] In the United Kingdom, the game debuted at #12 on the All-Formats chart and #9 on the individual format chart that ranks the releases of multi-platform games per console as opposed to title. During its debut week, it was the highest selling game on a Nintendo platform.^[33][34]

References

External links

• Official website