(Final playtime is 65:52, mostly due to doing optional stuff. I also did do both endings).

Before beginning, I will TRY not to be biased in my opinions whenever I bring up Bravely Default II. While I do think, in almost every metric, this game blows that one out of the water, I want to try at least being a little fair. Just a little bit, though.

Originally a Switch 2 exclusive (even though it also exists on the 3DS), I never expected the HD Remaster to become multi platform. I didn't even know they just dropped it on Steam right away, so now I have even less incentive to buy a 450 dollar console. Anyway, this is still the same Bravely Default as the one on the 3DS, but in HD this time. After a quick Google search, turns out it's the exact same price as it was back in 2014. I'm not going to think about how that makes me feel ancient and move on.

At first, the story feels like your generic Final Fantasy flair. 4 crystals, warriors of light, evil empire trying to stop you and do villainy things, the usual. The story does not stay in that direction, however. As one who played this game on the 3DS, an interesting part of this playthrough was seeing the "in between the lines" moments during the story and how it all connects to the big endgame that one usually wouldn't pay much mind to in a first playthrough.

However, all discussions of Bravely Default always land on one major point, and the single biggest negative of the entire game. We're talking literal "drop the game" worthy levels of negative here, and that is a majority of the second half of the game, Chapters 5 through 8. Sure, on one hand, you get a chance to try out all the jobs (besides 1 until late Chapter 6) against the Asterisk bosses, and in some cases, they get new info added to their cutscenes. However, main story content is not only glacial, but the repeat bosses, up to 4 additional fights with the same goobers you already dealt with in Chapters 1-4 can get VERY old very fast, especially if you have a strong setup to obliterate them. Even worse is the backtracking for two of them, as the entire encounter pool in every dungeon is changed starting in Chapter 5.

Chapters 7 and 8 are the worst offenders. You get ZERO new story content, unless you go for the alternate ending. The only upside is that the Asterisk bosses are placed in new, harder to handle formations, where the Chapter 8 bosses really show off the power of their individual jobs. Even then, it doesn't change how badly the game's pacing gets the Old Yeller treatment, and you have to endure it if you want the satisfaction of hearing Serpent Eating the Ground during the final boss fight.

If you've played Final Fantasy V, this game's job system should be pretty familiar. I have not played that game, though, so 3DS Bravely Default was my second game with a job system, the first being Final Fantasy X-2, but I honestly don't like the Dresspheres as much as this game's job system. Mix and match the various tools given to you to turn your little warriors of light into walking nukes or support juggernauts that can even make it so your enemies can't even damage you. I personally feel breaking the game is part of the point of a job system like Default's, and unlike a certain other game that came out in the future, turn order is based on agility and not a pseudo ATB system where characters can get multiple turns before others.

Of course, some jobs are better than other. Ninja literally stomps on physical attackers while something like Black Mage falls off very hard in the second half without wasting 3 supports slots on Pierce Magic Defense as the Magic Defense of enemies surges in the second half of the game. Phys is basically king in this game (barring a couple of exceptions who ever have monster defense or literally are immune to phys.) As some may know, Bravely Second goes in the polar opposite direction with how OP Spellcraft is.

But you're probably wondering "what's so Remaster about this game? Isn't it just the 3DS game ported to modern systems with HD?" Well...they added minigames. A rhythm game and one where you play around in the airship. Granted, this game was originally a Switch 2 exclusive, so controlling these activities is a little jank with a controller (or you can use two mice, who even owns 2 mice). On top of that, the Airship Panic minigame only has 3 scenarios barring the tutorial and the rhythm minigame has one of it's songs locked to beating the final boss. But apparently we needed a full version of Love in the Crossfire, so that exists now, I guess.

No longer being on the 3DS, some changes had to be made. Bravely Second, the mechanic, not the game (for now, hopefully) is gone. In it's place is an item you put on your Special Attacks in order to break the damage limit, but this is locked behind those minigames (or you can get one from the optional superboss at the end of the bonus dungeon in the true ending only.) The ability to lower the encounter rate to 0% has also been relegated to an accessory, with the max you can do from the menu being 50%. If your party is strong enough, this shouldn't be a concern, but even so.

On the topic of "stuff from the 3DS version having to be reworked to work on modern systems" is the Nemesis encounters. Originally big monstrosities of death haunting Norende Village are now the party's living nightmares if they happen to use a Nightmare Pillow at an inn, usually obtained from the Chapter 5-8 optional asterisk fights, giving an incentive to fight them. The game, as far as I know, doesn't tell you which Nemesis spawns where, though, so I had to look that up during my playthrough.

The final change regards Norende Village and getting more villagers. Naturally, StreetPass and SpotPass don't exist on modern systems, so they had to find a workaround to that problem. Entering wandering souls (or whatever they called them), that spawn in every few hours, two per town, that can add to your village's numbers for those great items and equips (and Special Attack moves and parts).

As for things I'm pretty sure weren't in the original game, dungeons now tell you the general level range you want to be at, which is a carryover from Bravely Second. Another even better carryover from Second is the ability to make sets. Want to save your random encounter killer strategy to build your party for the latest boss fight? No problem, you can make a set for it. You get 10 sets and it really helps with saving time having to switch over stuff when you want to either try out a new thing or change your builds around for the scenario. This is a very welcome addition that they removed in Bravely Default II for some reason.

At the end of the day, it was nice to play this game again, even if I wish the second half was trimmed down significantly or at least had more going on. At least the first half had some character conflict going on to keep things interesting, especially during the end of Chapter 2 and most of Chapter 3. Hopefully, in not 1,800 years, we get a Bravely Second HD Remaster...even if I'm not a big fan of that game's protagonist, but for totally different reasons for why I'm not a big fan of Seth from Bravely Default II.

It's been 3,000 years. For months, I read all over Twitter and Reddit about people hyping up this game, but at the time, it was still exclusive to Japan. Now that I've finally played it, I can see what all the hype is about. To preface this right away, do NOT play this as your first Trails game. Similar to Reverie, this game heavily expects you to already know things from past games, especially since this the third game in an arc.

If Daybreak 1 was an introduction to Calvard and the Arkride Solutions crew and Daybreak 2 was a more character focused story that let the main narrative take a bit of a back seat for a while until the finale, I would classify Horizon as the polar opposite of Daybreak 2, a game where the main narrative is front and center. Not only are returning characters back like our favorite onion priest, Kevin, and Mr. Cold Steel himself, Rean, a bit of information brought up during Cold Steel IV's final chapter gets more limelight here.

Now, before going on about the plot, let's go on about gameplay. A lot is still the same as the last two outings of Calvard, but thankfully, S-Crafts now only need 1 Boost Gauge again. They still require a cooldown after using one, but using 1 Boost lasts less time than two. A few new Shard Skills got added and I feel like the Guardian skills got their requirements altered in this game, but don't quote me on that. New features, however, are always nice to have. First is ZOC, which temporarily slows down time and lets you do more damage to enemies in field combat. It can also be used to get 2 actions in Command Battle, which is useful for setting up an art and casting right away. The second thing was Awakening, where certain characters can power up and do more damage in field combat. Using this really makes melting enemies in the field easier and faster because of the increased damage.

The problem I have with Awakening, though, is that only certain characters have access to it. It creates a bias of "use this character over this one because Awakening is useful." More on this later. The last thing is an old mechanic revamped. Remember Brave Orders from the latter half of Cold Steel? Well, they're back, and about as fair and balanced as always. One thing I do like about the system that Cold Steel didn't do is when an enemy shuts down your Shard Command, you can rewrite theirs by setting up a new one, with an additional cost. Where the system falls apart into "fair and balanced" territory is with two specific Shard Commands, Gordias Guard and Ultimate Wind.

Gordias Guard amps up your defenses for 8 turns, and makes your party so tanky they can endure even lategame S-Crafts with ease. Ultimate Wind, however, basically shatters all game balance entirely. Sure, it's locked to a connect event, but we'll put a pin in that. However, it lowers delay enough to turn casters into infinite turn nukes that barely let the enemy get a turn most of the time. I used this on numerous fights, including the final boss, and he only got about 2 turns in. These two Shard Commands are likely going to be nerfed to oblivion in the next game.

(Somewhat) back by not any popular demand is the Garten, this time in dark castle mode. Unlike the Marchen Garten last game, this place is somewhat optional, but there is a sort of plot going on, which in a way does tie into the main plot. I did like it a bit more than the Marchen Garten, but the last Garten kinda sucked, so that's not a very high bar to clear. You can also now view unseen Connect Events, so there's now no excuse for not seeing all of them, but why not make this a feature sooner? It's also the place where you have more party freedom...in which let's address that part.

Similar to Reverie, this game does the "3 protagonists" thing again, between Van, Rean, and Kevin. I do feel like Rean and Kevin got most of the main limelight when it came to big revelations in their stories compared to parts of Van, which do feel a bit slow. Namely Van Route 1 and 4. The three plots don't feel too connected until the end, but part of that is probably because each party is doing their own thing. I will admit, there were parts of Van's routes that weren't the most interesting thing ever. A certain moment of Van Route 3 is a big highlight, and I feel that moment was given the seriousness it deserved.

But then it happens. The parts where the game decides to go all in, and it is amazing. The way things come together in the end had me drawn in, especially in the last couple of hours when the big twist happens, and then there's that ending. I don't want to spoil the ending, because I think it's something that needs to be experienced firsthand. I am curious as to how the crew is supposed to win this one, though.

But at the time of typing this, we have no knowledge of the next game, not even a screenshot. It may be another year before we get some answers about what's going to happen in "Van's Final Episode." We've had (more or less) three games worth of setup, and while there is some payoff for the long term quest we've spent the past two games on, how will this end? When that time comes, I'm hoping we get a satisfactory conclusion.