Granblue Fantasy

As a fan of old school JRPG’s, I was very excited to finally get the chance to play Granblue Fantasy on my Android Phone. There have been some great mobile JRPG’s over the years, but if you want one with a bit more of a pedigree behind it, you need to take a closer look at Granblue Fantasy.

Bringing The Band Back Together

As a Final Fantasy nerd, I wanted to take a moment to tell you why so many people were interested in Granblue Fantasy. Nobu Uematsu is a music composer who along with art director, Hideo Minaba worked on some of the more classic games together. Final Fantasy V, VI, IX and Lost Odyssey are very beloved games. So these two getting to collaborate again was something that got Final Fantasy fans very excited.

Keep On Reading And Listening

A mobile game should be quick and straight to the point right? Well, that is not what you get with Granblue Fantasy. This is a proper JRPG and with that comes a proper story that you actually care about. I was very impressed with how well it was written and found that I did actually care about the characters. The game fuses together two characters, The Captain and a girl called Lyria and them along with other people they encounter set out on a quest to find out about the Captain's father as well as escape the empire that had imprisoned Lyria. It does not sound super excited, but I found it very interesting and it has a lot of voice acting as well as text.

Combat!

Of course, any JRPG that is worth playing has to have solid combat and I found the combat in Granblue Fantasy to be very well done. It is best described as a turn based combat style game. You will come across monsters and you have to fight them! The combat is very easy to get the hang of and I found it quite fun. The way you use your special attacks is interesting. Instead of having a charge meter, you can only use them after so many turns so the combat does have a lot of strategy behind it.

All That JRPG Goodness

As well as having classic JRPG style combat. Granblue Fantasy also has many other things that you would find in a JRPG. The job and class system, for example, is way more in depth than I was expecting in a mobile game. You have a set of default jobs that you can do, but by reaching a certain level in one job a new one will open up. There are over 30 classes and while each one has their own strengths and weaknesses, you can mix their subskills to your liking. It can be a little on the confusing side, but you do eventually get the hang of it and start to realize what your party and your playstyle needs to progress through the game.

Gambling With Your Characters

Come on as this is a mobile game you knew that it would have some kind of money making gimmick! The way that Granblue Fantasy is raking in the cash is with the way that you get new characters and equipment. You can buy these crystals which are kind of like loot boxes. You open one up and you can get a random character or piece of equipment. As far as I can tell you cannot just buy a character that you want, you have to buy a crystal. This is something I am not cool with in all honesty.

I really do think that Granblue Fantasy is a very well made game and one that I really hope does get a full and proper English release at some point. If you are a fan of the older Final Fantasy games and old school JRPG’s in general. I really do think that you will have a lot of fun with Granblue Fantasy.

7/10

Pros:

• Really cool art style and presentation
• The story is more engaging than you would think
• Combat is easy to learn and a lot of fun
• Plenty of choices when it comes to class/job
• Made by people with a real Final Fantasy pedigree

Cons:

• The crystal system feels like a rip-off
• If you are outside of Japan, playing it is a bit of a pain