Some of my fondest and most formative memories of video games come from what I consider the glory years of the JRPG. I spent so much time playing JRPGs on the PS1, from more obvious classics like the Final Fantasy games to lesser known titles like Koudelka and Jade Cocoon. That first PlayStation console was a magical RPG machine, and any nostalgia blasts I can get from those times just hit differently. Bravely Default Flying Fairy HD Remaster is a shiny new version of a 3DS game that felt like a PS1 game, that you can now play on the Switch 2 with added minigames.
The opening of Bravely Default introduces Tiz, who is a simple farmer living the cosy life until his entire village and everyone he loves is swallowed up by a magical sinkhole. He then meets Agnes, who is the vestal of the Wind Crystal trying to prevent magical disaster by traveling the world and visiting other crystals. Along the way you’ll gather up two more party members, and head out on an incredibly traditional JRPG adventure. There are some intriguing characters and nice twists and turns along the way, but for the most part the narrative of this remaster is more nostalgic than anything else.
Equally nostalgic is the turn-based combat, which has a whole lot of old school Final Fantasy about it – albeit with a twist. Each member of your party has a list of attacks and skills they can choose from to take down the enemy, but instead of using one of these a turn they can use up to four by using the Brave command. This essentially lets you have four turns in a row, but when you do you’ll be unable to act on those future turns that you used ahead of time. Conversely you can use the Default command to block a bit of damage and store up an extra turn for a rainy day. In basic battles you’ll often just Brave your way to an especially quick victory, but when facing tougher bosses you’ll really need to take advantage of both these mechanics and all your job skills to succeed.
That’s right, Bravely Default Flying Fairy HD Remaster is a JRPG with a job system. Each of the four party members can equip a different job, and there are bloody loads of them. All the basics like the white mage, dark mage, thieves and knights are available, alongside some more unique classes like pirate and performer. You’re free to use whichever of these suits your playstyle, and they can all be levelled up to unlock new skills and passive abilities.
Alongside equipping a main job, you can also give Tiz and the gang a secondary set of skills from another job you’ve levelled up. Choosing the right combination for each of your allies is a lot of fun, with a ridiculous amount of options to choose from. Whether you want a hybrid of melee and magic offense or a healer who can steal from the baddies, you’re able to craft the perfect mad creations to make up your party. You can also equip a selection of passive skills to buff your buddies too, adding even more depth to character building.
Now that party is all dressed up and ready to fight, it’s time to head out on an adventure. You’ll go through various themed dungeons, fly around an overworld in an airship, and take on plenty of random battles. This time capsule back to the late nineties will delight lovers of retro RPGs, but it also has some lovely mod cons. Being able to speed up battles to ludicrous levels makes the slightly duller early game combat a breeze, and the ability to change your encounter rate on the fly makes exploration much more enjoyable.
Perhaps the most compelling thing about all of Bravely Default Flying Fairy HD Remaster though is the village rebuilding side quest. Without a home after the crystal-based disaster, Tiz wants nothing more than to bring back his hometown Norende. By gathering the ghosts of other players in towns (or if you’re offline random AI ghosts) you’ll gain workers to help with construction, and they’ll take real world hours to repair or upgrade the village. Every time I picked up my Switch 2 I always jumped onto Bravely Default to assign my workers before doing anything else, because the rewards of new powerful weapons, armour and items are so worth it. This whole Norende part of the game used to be StreetPass based on the 3DS, and I much prefer this simpler way of building a village.
There are other changes to enjoy in Bravely Default Flying Fairy HD Remaster too. The most obvious of these are the visuals, which are spruced up nicely and have an almost hand drawn storybook quality. There are also brand new minigames that use the Switch 2’s mouse controls, and are a fun distraction. One of these involves piloting the airship by using two mice at once to steer and flip switches. There’s also a rhythm game where you wave two wands around and move mouse cursors to hit notes, which is a bit tougher to get your head around but still entertaining. Both of these mini games are frantic and silly, and a nice distraction from the main campaign.
These minigames do come with a caveat though, and that’s how much effort they take to unlock. When you start the game you can play one level of each minigame on the lowest difficulty level and that’s it, and it took me about fifteen hours of playing through to reach the point where a second level unlocked. It felt bizarre to me that they’d lock away so much of this heavily advertised content, and I really wanted to play more of it much sooner.
Outside of this weird issue though, there’s not a whole lot to complain about in Bravely Default Flying Fairy HD Remaster. The visuals won’t be to everyone’s taste, as even polished up they’re certainly still dated. The start of the game is pretty slow going as well, especially in terms of the amount of jobs you can choose from. Nobody wants to spend hours punching as a brainless Monk.
Bravely Default Flying Fairy HD Remaster is a wonderful old fashioned JRPG, with clever combat, loads of character customisation, and some seriously compelling side activities. Not everyone will get along with its slow start and trope laden story, but if you’ve been playing RPGs for anywhere near as long as I have this Switch 2 launch title will flood you with nostalgic joy.
