Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero

EDIT: Shortly after posting this review, the game finally received an update that fixed a lot of the bugs and softlocking, at which point I was able to finish the game. Unfortunately, said rest of the game did little to change my opinion. Basically everything I wrote in my original review remained true, with the story feeling sloppy and inconsistent all the way to the very end, and the cop-out "real" villain was quite disappointing. The post game content seems to either be changed on the PC version or bugged, as none of it was voice acted as it is in the console versions, except the Asagi encounter which seems to work as expected. As a fan of many older NIS titles I do appreciate getting some deep cut post game characters like Cornet from Rhapsody and pre demon form Priere from La Pucelle, but once you're done collecting the post game characters you're just hit with a wall of a level 4000 boss and nothing else, and with the simplified gameplay grinding the dungeons to get to this level just sounds extremely unappealing so if there's any post game content past that I'll never know. Considering the massive price tag and lackluster story and gameplay, even with the bug fixes, even as a fan of the original game, I feel I have to keep this review negative. If the developers truly wish to pursue Phantom Brave as a staple franchise going forward, I hope they're able to learn from their mistakes with this entry. Original review below. _____________________________________________________________________________________________________ Been waiting weeks for a patch and since there's still nothing here we are. I didn't want to leave a negative review but with how negligent they've been with this release being in a very poor state since launch with absolutely no fixes in sight it's hard to say anything else other than don't buy this game. The physics bugs can be pretty funny when it's my characters bouncing off random terrain and launching into the sky but it gets old really fast the 15th time you have to close the game because a dying enemy gets stuck bouncing forever and softlocks you. The story is... a massive downgrade. The developers have stated in interviews that the intentions of this release was to push Phantom Brave towards becoming a staple series like Disgaea but it's already failed out of the gate. The pirate theme feels very weird as there's little to do with actual pirating, you get pirate themed characters and boats and that's about it, it's like they had this pirate girl design for Apricot and thought about how to use it and settled on making this a Phantom Brave sequel when it's really about Apricot. Marona herself barely feels like the protagonist as the actual character development and plot revolves around Apricot and Marona is just there as emotional support, like they decided she had her arc 20 years ago and this is just how she is now and there's nothing else they can do with her besides have her play support for other people. Most of the supporting cast is about what you expect but nobody except Rouen really feels like they have anything going on with them, the others are just along for the ride. The English dub is mostly fine it's the same campy yet charming stuff you expect from NIS games like Disgaea except.. for Ash and Marona, two of the most pivotal characters, who sound really bad. Marona is stuck sounding like she's always pepped up even when she's supposed to have different emotions and Ash's voice actor isn't even trying, even when he drops his catchphrase from the original game there's little impact because the guy is phoning this in hard. The new island hub world is entirely pointless despite its size there's nothing on it to see or do and is just another example of them lazily copying things from the first game cause well they had an island hub world so surely we can just do that again without thinking about it much. The gameplay is simplified from the original game but still pretty fun when it's not bugging out which is not often. The Confriend transformation designs are cute and it's fun to unlock them and see the different combination designs but it's a bit squandered when you use their super skill and are met with a disappointingly bland attack animation which is a problem for most attacks in the game. Overall this game is a massive disappointment, and in its current state as of the time of this review, still nearly in an unplayably bad state until they patch the constant softlocking. I've played a lot of NIS games but this might be the laziest, least functional, most pointless release they've ever made. All the potential to revive Phantom Brave and we get this barely functional mediocrity with a bland and uninteresting story. Even with all the bugs fixed the game would just be okay, maybe not a negative review level but it wouldn't be great either. There's potential in more Phantom Brave but this isn't it unfortunately, and I'm sad to say this revival might be dead before it gets off the ground.

I [i]wanted[/i] to like this game. The original is my favorite childhood game. I absolutely loved it. I mean, my cousin and I fought over the single copy we had so much so that my mom gave in and bought a second one. Fusion was probably one of my favorite parts of the original, so I waited until I unlocked it in this game before jumping to any conclusions. Fusion and the game in general are different in ways I don't like at all. The plot doesn't entertain me, and I don't like the style of the 3D models. Maybe I haven't dug into it enough or maybe I'm too in love with the original, but this game isn't it for me.

もう日本一のSRPGは終わりかな… ストーリーは毒気の無いディスガイアになりました、良くも悪くも日本一らしいと言えます 前作やった人からするとまぁ深みが足りないかなと感じるかも 良い点はキャラが超かわいくてマローネちゃんが変身できる（DLCキャラとのフュージョンにも対応）こと、作れるキャラの種類が５０あること 転生でアビリティ集めてくと技の効果範囲がアホみたいにデカくなって楽しいこと 以外は最悪です 頻繁におこるスタックによる進行不可、ダンジョンでのフリーズ 前作でできた合成によるアビリティ習得、ダンジョンの広さや敵数設定はナーフ 行動順に影響するSPDは装備やステ振りで上げられない だいたいの技は対応した装備をつけてないと使えない 戦闘モーションはスキップも高速化もできない 以上の要因によりテンポが最悪です、前作でできたブレイブならではのやりたい放題要素をおおかた消しちゃったのも不思議で仕方ない パーティー全員に省エネとか速攻とか経験値アップとか最強技とか死ぬほど時間かけてアビリティ付けてく楽しみは？　剣を持った前衛なのにテラ属性魔法もオメガヒールもサポート技も自由に使える最強キャラを作り出す楽しみは？ STEAL限界まで上げてステ上限まで強化した武器を持たせた自分の番しか来ないマローネ無双は？ ガ　チ　ム　チ　だ　っ　た　ス　プ　ラ　ウ　ト　は　？ 育成が主体の今作において、それの足を引っ張る致命的な問題が良い点の数倍あります ていうか最高レアリティの地図全然でないよぉ ディスガイア７steam版のアプデもできてないので今作のアプデなんてなおさら来ないでしょう、改善など期待できません 現状では損してでも日本一を応援したい人以外にはオススメできません

まず最初に結論から。前作が好きなら絶対に買わない方がいいと断言できる出来のゲームです。 それ以外の人でもこんなゲームに金払うならそこそこの値段する面白さが確約されてるゲーム買ってください。500円なら怖いもの見たさで買っていいと思います。 ・システム面の劣化 スキル獲得が合成やマナで気楽に出来たのが無駄なスキルレベル制に。ディスガイアみたく上げるための時短要素もないのでただの虚無です　ファントムブレイブ以外でやってくれそんなもん。キャラ固有のスキルにはスキル属性付いてないので使ってもスキル習得が遠のくのも終わってる。前作知らない人向けの小話も置いておくと主人公以外の味方はマップにいられる短めの制限時間があります。なのでこのスキルレベル稼ぎをするのもすっごく手間。 ・無駄な安っぽい３D 8000円するゲームですよこれ？マジで出来が悪いです。主人公組ぐらいもうちょっとなんとかならんのか。一枚絵の会話パートは悪くないのでこれ基準でいいです。 最近の日本一全部そうですがこんなとこに金かけるからクソゲーになるのをそろそろ理解してほしい。お前らに3Dは向いてない ・頻発するフリーズ 再現性が高すぎるフリーズがあります。switch版から考えれば4か月ほど経って尚こんな致命的なバグを残してるのはフルプライスのゲームであってはいけない。舐め腐ってます。 4階層しかないランダムダンジョンのクリアに3回フリーズが起きたといえば伝わるでしょうか。地形の傾向とモンスターだけで無限に発生するのでマジでゲームになりません。マジで条件緩いので多分後半ならストーリーでも頻発しそう 大型モンスターとちょっと狭い地形だけで発生します。 ・ぺらっぺらのキャラとストーリーと演出 信じられんぐらい薄味。中学生の描いたラノベぐらいぺらい。 前作の主役たちが持っていた能力を雑に配ってるのも信じられない。前作に愛のない人が作らないと絶対こうはならない。 能力使って今から戦うぞってシーンも迫力が微塵もない。20年前の前作の方がのめり込めます。 ・かみ合わないシステム 日本一のゲームなのでやり込み要素が大事な部分です。そこまで行かずとも不慣れな人はレベル上げも道中することは多いでしょう。にも拘わらず戦闘中のスキル演出のスキップがない。2.3秒で終わるものばかりならともかく固有技とかになると数十秒かかるものも。 敵で出て来た固有キャラの大群が一生長い演出のスキル撃って来て数分操作できないステージもあります。だるすぎる。 総じて基本的に褒めるところがほぼないです。 唯一前作からの改善点と言えるのはアイテム入手のタイミングがコンファイン終了時からコンファイン時になってるところ。 そのためだけに他の全てを犠牲にしてるので前作をこの仕様にしてくれるだけでいいんですけど・・・ 全部やらずに批判するのも違うかなと思いましたがもうここから覆ることはないと断言できる出来です。 エンドコンテンツぐらい楽しめるといいけど期待薄・・・・・・ そもそもフリーズだらけでまともにランダムダンジョン行けないから実質無いに等しいかも

Awful fanfic tier story. Its a complete downgrade compared to its original game in almost every way, totally ruining its aesthetic it had. Marona (and Ash) may as well not be there, she only exists to confine for the sake of gameplay, which is ironic considering what happens in this story. Not to mention too many of recent NIS RPG games or the disgaea games keep repeating the same exact story beats. Fusion has been dumbed down and the gadgets are almost worthless. They added the juice bar to this game too and im not sure if its a good addition or not but i personally dont mind it. I were one of the few people who didn't mind the 3D chibi models in recent NIS games much but they really look objectively bad in this game. Phantom Brave 2 itself is'nt even really that bad as a whole but the awful storytelling just bothered me that much. Too much of the "plot" revolves around taking concepts from the first game and overcomplicating phantoms completely, its really dumb, sometimes even forgetting that they're just supposed to be ghosts to begin with. The only positive i can say about this game are the quality of life in some of the game play. And some of the designs are rather cute. If you really liked the original Phantom Brave don't bother with this.

game is fun even if dumbed down a bit needing to constantly restart because memory leaks crash framerate or a dead monster is infinitely spazzing out dead is less fun monetization is a sin against god extremely worried we'll never see a patch because how did any of this make it through basic testing already been a month of very common gamebreaking bugs with no word was so hype to see a new phantom brave, would be stellar if it were actually, like, playable for more than 30 mintues at a time get for less than 10 dollars if you can because with it this buggy it's honestly not even worth that better yet just go buy phantom brave 1 because it's 1/3rd the price, has much more content, actually works correctly, and doesn't have a ton of severely overpriced DLC

Phantom Brave is my favorite NIS game, but I'm very mixed on this one. On the one hand, the gameplay is fun, there's some nice build variety and I really liked the "magic pixel" moments you get when a skill is just range to hit all possible targets. On the other hand, there's is barely any post game, some items are extremely rare so you'll never see their unique skills and I really didn't like the story. Getting nitpicky, there are also some details that bothered me: * Most systems (Facilities) are over-explained, others not at all (Titles, Abilities). * Music is actually quite nice, but voice lines are annoyingly repetitive. * There's 3 difficulties (no idea what they do), but the hardest one isn't difficult. * You can get overpowered with some grinding, but there's no stage where that's actually needed. * Whenever you do anything to progress the story, the "Data" facility is updated and you'll see a "!" to make you aware of that; To get rid of that, you'd need to rewatch all cutscenes at least once - so since no sane person would ever do that, there will always be an annoying exclamation mark screaming at you when opening the Facilities menu. At least 100% achievement completion is quite easy, can be done in a single playthrough and doesn't require any DLC. Also, it's worth to mention that game-breaking bugs are fixed at this point, as I didn't encounter any. Overall, if you skip the story and just play through the stages, it's okay.

6月5日のアップデートでキャラは跳ね続けるバグが修正されたとの事でプレイ再開 100時間足らずで後日談クリア ゲーム自体は面白かったがいつもの日本一のやりこみと比べると圧倒的ボリューム不足感 フルプライスで買う価値はない、セールで安くなったら買うことをお勧めします

Full of Bug Bug Bug and more Bug!!

The gameplay is there. The soul of a Disagaea-like game is not. Crashes, hideous 3d, weird mechanics choises (difficulty, dark, dungeons). Only 15 save slots. Story that looks more like a patchwork made from the leftovers of those "13 ideas" (still no idea what ARE those ideas). BS last bosses (obviously Pay2Win), but no cheevos for beating them. In a better world this would be 2d and would have people more invested. I don't like this at all. Go play Disgaea 6 instead.