I've been Granblue-pilled. Alright Cygames, I'm listening.
Granblue Fantasy was always in the nebulous realm of "this sounds good on paper but I'll wait until a non-mobile game comes out", and now that they've released an RPG proper I guess here I am. Relink is good. It's great, even. I went into this game knowing virtually nothing, and after nearly 45 hours I can't help but want to know more. The storyline is standard JRPG fare, "magical mystery wife falls out of the sky and drags the hero on a grand adventure", and frankly I'm fine with this because it's done in a charming enough manner. Cygames has a large and comprehensive glossary (that you can even check during key story beats) to get you up to speed in the Granblue universe, which is good because there's a lot. "Standard JRPG fare" can be used to describe a lot of things in Relink, which isn't a bad thing; it evokes a kind of early 2000s nostalgia with its grandiose setting, beautiful locales and delightful music.
Most people aren't here for all that stuff, though. Most people are here because the trailers made the combat look buckwild, which it is. A modern ARPG through and through, you have an enormous cast of characters to slash or blow enemies up with, all with varying distinct playstyles for whatever flavor of combat you feel, from unga bunga potato Charlotta spinning to win, to Io methodically blowing shit the fuck up, strong supports like Cagliostro, or even stance-driven characters like Narmaya. And once you settle on a character(s) you like, it has all the quintessential moving parts and levers of games like Diablo or Monster Hunter.
This is a grindan game. While you can make a good case for the story mode, we are ultimately here to watch the numbers go up. We are here to clean up mobs of enemies and frag large and epic boss fights, that of which there are many. All in the name of customizing your character and making the numbers go up. Grinding all your weapons to filling out tech trees to equipping sigils to collecting loot to enable all three of those things.
The only real critiques I have of the game is that for an RPG, everything in Granblue feels pretty localized to hub worlds and what-have-you. The quests never amount to anything more than kill x number of things, kill the big thing, protect the thing by killing things. If you want an RPG with exploration and puzzle-solving, this game is very much not that; again it's more akin to a Monster Hunter or even a PSO. It feels really linear. I just wished there was more to do in the game other than killing things and making the numbers go higher, but maybe that's just misplaced expectations. And yes, there is gacha in the game, and it involves rolling and hoping good sigils drop to push the DPS ceiling for your character higher and higher. Literally: there's a hard damage cap in the game and sigils can increase that cap. And finally, on top of matchmaking being a bit wonky at times I'm sorta bummed that there's no crossplay between PC and PS4/PS5 players.
This game tickled a particular bone in my body almost perfectly, though. It's a good grinding game that has a lot of personality and charm to it. I will continue minmaxing my potato until she can slay gods. But I think most importantly, it made me interested in what this series has to offer.
Granblue Fantasy was always in the nebulous realm of "this sounds good on paper but I'll wait until a non-mobile game comes out", and now that they've released an RPG proper I guess here I am. Relink is good. It's great, even. I went into this game knowing virtually nothing, and after nearly 45 hours I can't help but want to know more. The storyline is standard JRPG fare, "magical mystery wife falls out of the sky and drags the hero on a grand adventure", and frankly I'm fine with this because it's done in a charming enough manner. Cygames has a large and comprehensive glossary (that you can even check during key story beats) to get you up to speed in the Granblue universe, which is good because there's a lot. "Standard JRPG fare" can be used to describe a lot of things in Relink, which isn't a bad thing; it evokes a kind of early 2000s nostalgia with its grandiose setting, beautiful locales and delightful music.
Most people aren't here for all that stuff, though. Most people are here because the trailers made the combat look buckwild, which it is. A modern ARPG through and through, you have an enormous cast of characters to slash or blow enemies up with, all with varying distinct playstyles for whatever flavor of combat you feel, from unga bunga potato Charlotta spinning to win, to Io methodically blowing shit the fuck up, strong supports like Cagliostro, or even stance-driven characters like Narmaya. And once you settle on a character(s) you like, it has all the quintessential moving parts and levers of games like Diablo or Monster Hunter.
This is a grindan game. While you can make a good case for the story mode, we are ultimately here to watch the numbers go up. We are here to clean up mobs of enemies and frag large and epic boss fights, that of which there are many. All in the name of customizing your character and making the numbers go up. Grinding all your weapons to filling out tech trees to equipping sigils to collecting loot to enable all three of those things.
The only real critiques I have of the game is that for an RPG, everything in Granblue feels pretty localized to hub worlds and what-have-you. The quests never amount to anything more than kill x number of things, kill the big thing, protect the thing by killing things. If you want an RPG with exploration and puzzle-solving, this game is very much not that; again it's more akin to a Monster Hunter or even a PSO. It feels really linear. I just wished there was more to do in the game other than killing things and making the numbers go higher, but maybe that's just misplaced expectations. And yes, there is gacha in the game, and it involves rolling and hoping good sigils drop to push the DPS ceiling for your character higher and higher. Literally: there's a hard damage cap in the game and sigils can increase that cap. And finally, on top of matchmaking being a bit wonky at times I'm sorta bummed that there's no crossplay between PC and PS4/PS5 players.
This game tickled a particular bone in my body almost perfectly, though. It's a good grinding game that has a lot of personality and charm to it. I will continue minmaxing my potato until she can slay gods. But I think most importantly, it made me interested in what this series has to offer.