Thursday, March 20, 2014

Shall We Do It? (I'm back in Seattle, and back to sashaying my way through Bravely Default)

Some of you may have noticed that I've published fewer posts than usual over the last two weeks. Don't worry, this recent dip in output has had nothing to do with a corresponding dip in my blogging interest or anything like that. Rather, it had to do with my husband and I traveling to Palm Springs, California, to take in a little sun and a lot of professional tennis. (A few photos of both experiences can be seen here, if you're interested.)

Sadly, we're back in Seattle now, which means I'm not only back to publishing blog posts five or six times a week but I'm also back to playing as many video games as I'm able. (Although I took my North American 3DS XL with me, I barely touched it during our week-plus vacation.)

It also means, of course, that I'm back to playing Bravely Default--a game that had nabbed more than 40 hours of my life before Palm Springs et al stole my attention.

Anyway, last time I checked in, I was just about to complete this 3DS RPG's fourth chapter, right? Well, I finally did just that in the days before my recent travels began. Currently, I'm meandering my way through the game's controversial fifth chapter.

I don't want to spoil for any latecomers what happens at this juncture in the game, so all I'll say here is that initially it had me rolling my eyes. I've since moved past my annoyance, thankfully, and I'm now back to mostly enjoying the experience.

I say mostly, of course, because I'm still a bit irked by this game's obsession with conversation. Every time someone starts speaking, my eyes glaze over. I feel kind of bad admitting that, as clearly a number of people spent a lot of time localizing Bravely Default's text, but I can't help but wish they'd simply removed, rather than translated, a good portion of it.

Other than that, though, I'm liking it well enough and I'm curious as to where this journey is going to take me in subsequent chapters.

Oh, one thing I should have mentioned earlier: in the days leading up to my vacation, I gained access to the game's "vampire" job--which, of course, caused me to obsessively scour the globe in search of "genome abilities." (The vampire job in Bravely Default is a lot like the "blue mage" one in Final Fantasy V, for those of you who've played the latter. And for those of you who haven't played it, the vampire occupation enables party members in Bravely Default to learn certain moves and spells from enemies.)

With that done, I completed the chapter and ... continued obsessively scouring the globe in search of genome abilities. (This will make a lot more sense once you've gotten to this part of the game, believe me.)

I've also been completing the other tasks that are required of players in chapter five, mind you, so it isn't like my last five to 10 hours with the game have been a total waste of time.

Aside from that, I'm not sure what else to say about Bravely Default at the moment--other than I'm kind of looking forward to finishing it so I can start playing Yoshi's New Island and a bunch of other games that have fallen into my lap in the last couple of weeks. (More on those in an upcoming post or two, of course).

In the meantime, are any of you still plugging away at Bravely Default? If so, what is your current opinion of it? And if not, what games are you playing instead?

See also: previous 'Shall We Do It?' posts

6 comments:

  1. Justin Difazzio8:01 AM

    I'm still Bravely Default-less. But maybe I'll get it soon. Maybe today.


    In the meantime, I'm blasting through Tomb Raider, the recent reboot. I'd be lying if I said I didn't love it. It's amazing, well-written, well acted, and pretty engaging. But I'm a sucker for a female who kicks ass, and watching Lara grow into her ass-kicking self is really an experience. I'm hoping I'm near the end, though. Ten to fifteen hours makes for a good length for something like this.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ah, sorry to hear that, Justin. Let me know when you get, though, OK? I really want to hear what you think of it after you've finally had a chance to play it.


    As for Tomb Raider: I've never really gotten into that series, although I have no idea what that is, as I've also always loved females who kick ass :)


    Anyway, it sounds like this one's a good one, and I'm glad you're enjoying it!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Justin Difazzio7:33 AM

    Well, I bit the bullet yesterday, so to speak, and went to my local GameStop. Bravely Default is in my 3DS right now. I played the first half hour or so last night and will continue tonight and through this weekend, I think. I just finished Tomb Raider, which was a thoroughly enjoyable game aside from the plot reveal I didn't realize Lara wasn't clued in to until the final moments. I was like, "Wait...she didn't figure that out yet? Really? But she's so smart everywhere else."


    Anywho...Hooray Bravely Default!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hooray! Can't wait to hear what you think of it--and see if you're similarly turned on and turned off by certain aspects of it.


    I'm currently working my way through Chapter 6, by the way, and back to almost completely loving it. Ha! Yes, I'm a bit two-headed when it comes to this game.


    As for your issue with Tomb Raider: I'd be annoyed by the same thing. I wonder why the devs decided to do that?


    Aside from that, though, you really enjoyed the experience, right?

    ReplyDelete
  5. Monster_Hunter28827:15 PM

    I beat it last night. Make sure to find the ribbon in the last dungeon and give it to your ninja because it will probably help a lot in the final boss. I was able to power through without it though on hard but I wish I had equipped it. Also you can skip the alternate ending if you want because you'll ended having to do everything in the true ending and it doesn't really added anything to the story.


    They should of took the begging of chapter 5, the end of 6, & the side quests of 7 and made them one chapter.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Will do, Sam! As for the rest of what you had to say: well, I'm in the middle of Ch. 6, so I can't quite say if I agree with you. Hopefully by the end of this weekend :)

    ReplyDelete