...while the story is still fresh in my brain |||orz
So with that being said, let's start the review! :D
--SPOILER WARNING--
I'll try not to spoil the story, in fact I probably won't at all...but just in case, you have been warned so don't blame me! :,)
~ ~ ~
Fantasy Life!
This game has generated a lot of interest because while it looks like your average RPG, there's also a lot of life simulation aspects to it as well. LEVEL-5 has given this game a great little twist because while you can still experience an RPG by completing the main quest (and side quests!) and going out into fields to level up against monsters, you can also do things like buy clothes for your character, talk to NPC's, decorate your home etc.
So there's really a huge amount to keep you busy when playing this game!
Starting Out~
When your first begin the game, you are asked to create your own avatar :)
Now, I'm someone who enjoys character customisation a lot so it was really important to me that you get a lot of options. I felt with this game...there were TOO MANY options! ;n;
Not even kidding, I probably spent half an hour to forty five minutes creating my avatar :,) there are so many hair styles and colours to choose from! You then go on to choosing your eyes, eyebrows, nose, mouth etc etc. If it can be created and changed, it's pretty much there!
Once you've created your avatar, you are then asked to choose the Life you want to start out in :)
As you can see by this picture, you have 12 possible Life classes to choose from :3
~ Mercenary
~ Cook
~ Angler
~ Alchemist
~ Tailor
~ Miner
~ Carpenter
~ Blacksmith
~ Hunter
~ Paladin
~ Woodcutter
~ Magician
Each Life also provides you with a Master who will give you challenges and tasks in order to gain experience and improve your ranking.
While with any other RPG, you'd most likely have to start another game in order to take on a new Life, but with this game...you can go to the Guild Office at any time and choose to switch Life classes and in doing so, will go and meet with your new Master and take on different challenges.
But don't worry!
By choosing another Life, that doesn't mean your old one is replaced. Go back to the Guild Office and you and switch back whenever you like. And you can do that as many times as you want! Simple :)
[ RANDOM TIP WITH SERAH ]
I recommend starting out with a Life that will provide you with a lot of material. For example, a miner. This way, you'll gain lots of ore that you can sell for dosh (the currency of the game) and it's by far the quickest way to make money fast. Along with engaging in various battles.
Story Time~
When you arrive in the town of Castele, you stumble upon a butterfly being bullied by two goons (who eventually come around later on in the game) and after saving her, find out her name is Flutter.
While all seems fairly peaceful in Reveria you find out that, is in fact, not the case.
It turns out giant meteorites known as Doom Stones are falling from the sky causing monsters within their radius to act out violently and these Doom Stones are threatening the peace within Reveria and if not stopped, will cause total darkness to take over.
Remember our little damsel in distress, Flutter? Yea, she sticks around >. >
She can be a little annoying at times reminding me of Navi from The Legend of Zelda games, but later on...she becomes less annoying. I'm not discriminating against butterflies-- well, maybe I am. I don't like them anyway...but it turns out that her butterfly form isn't her true form and once I found that out, she became a lot less annoying hahahah :,)
But I digress, back to what I was saying!
Throughout the game, Flutter will give you quests to complete and these quests are what triggers the main story to progress but you can choose when to complete them in your own time. I wasn't keeping track of numbers, but if I remember rightly...there are eight chapters overall? Seven or eight, I can't remember exactly. If you were to complete Flutter's quests simultaneously, it would probably take you around...fifteen hours? I completed them within twenty two hours...but I spent a lot of time mining, creating HP potions and just generally looking around :,)
While it's not your average RPG story, I still found it rather gripping and towards the end, played well into the night as I was just like..
"Aah! What's going to happen next?!" x,D
You also visit loads of different and beautiful towns throughout the game :3 my favourite being The Elderwood Village <3
Also throughout Flutter's quests, you'll notice her a lot saying things like..
"Your wish has been heard!"
Turns out that, in order to save Reveria (as well as stopping the Doom Stones), Flutter needs to collect the wishes of townsfolk. This plays a big part in one of the final scenes of the game :)
When you complete Flutter's quests, you gain something called Bliss.
Bliss is, apparently, something you need to live a happy life. But your character seems to be fine without it at the start, so...
Nah, just kidding! :,) after you've gained a certain amount of Bliss, you can unlock a reward. So you gets things like larger storage capacity, being able to own pets, shop expansions etc. So it's definitely worth completing Flutter's quests for all this stuff! :D YAY STUFF! x,D
Going back to your Life. When you complete tasks given to you by your Master, you gain something called Stars. These Stars are what causes your rank within your chosen Life to level up. This probably has a purpose...I'm just not sure what it is :,) I'm guessing you just gain experience and...oh! Yea, when your rank goes up in your Life, it also contributes to your overall level going up. So I know that's a reason...I just never saw a benefit from my Life rank going up other than me becoming stronger and, referring to the Alchemist Life, learning potions by heart. Unless that's pretty much it...then that IS the benefit! :,)
Throughout the game, you also earn a lot of dosh which, as I mentioned before, is the currency of the game. You can obviously then use this to buy items to decorate your room with, buy more armour and weapons...all of that fine stuff :,3
As well as having tasks from your Life Master and Flutter, you can also take on side quests from the NPC's :) you can tell when they have a request as a thought bubble with '. . .' inside will appear above their heads. From what I've gathered so far (I haven't done many of these) they are all quests linking to the different Life classes you can choose. So if you accept a quest that requires something you find through being an Angler and your current Life is a Magician for example, that might be a bit harder to complete. You can always buy what the NPC requires, but you don't always get dosh as a reward :,) but most of the side quests are fairly easy anyway, so it's never really a huge problem!
Online Play and DLC~
In Fantasy Life, you can play online with other friends who also have the game. You can only play with the maximum of three friends, but it's still worth trying out :)
You'd be able to fight monsters with a higher level with more than one player in your party, you can also mine ore deposits that can't be done with just one person and you can also put items in a trade box, I believe so that when you connect, you can swap items that the other person might not have yet!
There is also a DLC for Fantasy Life which consists of;
~ A completely new area to explore with new quests
~ Extra elements for character customisation!!
~ New materials, ranks and recipes
~ New types of pets (birds and dragons!)
~ A new holiday home + décor and more items
~ A Friendship system so when you take allies with you on adventures, they will become more
friendly towards you and the more they like you, they'll get better during battles!
~ Exclusive items to exchange for Lunares Coins
So as you can see, the DLC for Fantasy Life offers a lot of new things! I'm definitely thinking about it since it isn't too much money to download. But I think I'm going to stick with what I have now since there are still so many NPC quests for me to accept and I still have all the other Life classes to try out! So I'm in no hurry :,)
The Game Never Ends~
You can probably gather from what I've mentioned, but in case you haven't, I'll just say that this game pretty much never ends! Unless you play it diligently 24/7, you're unlikely to reach a dead end :,)
With the DLC, all the side quests and Life classes you have to reach top rank in...you'll pretty much never run out of anything to do!
I've only briefly mentioned this, but once you've become friends or well acquainted with an NPC, you can invite them to join your party. You can take them on adventures with you and they'll aid you in battle (a bit like how your friends would in online play) only real life friends would be better since the NPC's I've taken with me don't really sense when it's appropriate to avoid an attack and pass out :,) but other than that, I like having a little buddy to accompany me~! My favourite NPC's are Laura, Yuelia (you'll find out who she is!), Odin and Daemon! :3
They're may buddies! ;3 YAY FRIENDS! x,D
Once again, I've only briefly mentioned this...but you can buy lots of items to decorate your room with. It's a bit like Animal Crossing (if you know that game) in this aspect because you buy items, place items and live with your...items(?) :,3 and if you get the shop expansions from your Bliss rewards, there's also a lot of things to choose from! n.n you also get photos of some characters to hang on your wall which is...a little strange. It's like..
"Hey, this is my room! Oh, but don't mind that. That's just a photo of King Eric on my wall..."
Then you're just like..
"Oh...'kaaaay." x,D
Also Pam, who owns the attic room you stay in, can sell you property in other parts of Reveria! So you can buy a holiday home in Port Puerto which is a harbour town next to the sea and Al Maajik which is a desert town. There is also a river front property just outside Castele that you can purchase. But, just like real life, you have to pay for your home :,) I'm not sure how much, but Pam mentions that you'll need to pay rent which, to me, seems silly since you stay in the attic room for free. I'd personally be fine with paying the dosh up front and being done with it. But, hey! Pam's idea, not mine! :,)
Even though you visit a few other towns and places throughout the game, I believe that (excluding the DLC) those are the only homes you can buy. Which is a shame because I'd LOVE to own a home in The Elderwood Village, but whatever ;3; ..oh! Maybe that's the DLC home!? Could be...eh. Like I'd be that lucky hahahah :,)
My Thoughts~
I really enjoyed this game :) I was expecting it to be good (because the title is Fantasy Life and you could say I'm a biiiiiit of a Fantasy nerd) but it was definitely better than what I imagined! It was the main story line that I especially enjoyed, I thought that it was really interesting and a lot of fun to play though n.n I definitely felt very involved in the story as well which is always important, I think. That automatically makes a game much more enjoyable when you feel a part of that world :) and the ending (which I was looking forward to) was asdfghjkl AMAAAAZING! <3 I wasn't expecting to cry, I mean...I was expecting a moving ending because once you realise Flutter's true form and why she's there, you think..
"Oh god...will she stay?" ;____;
But I definitely wasn't expecting to cry! Nor to cry as much as I did! I mean, I'm a crybaby by nature, so I can't really say if it was purely the story or just me...but I think it really was the story. Such a perfect little ending and a great balance of emotion in that final scene ;3; it was simply wonderful! :)
All the different NPC's you meet as well :3 some of them weren't even what I expected! Like you'd hear the name of a few and think..
"Oh god, this person sounds scary!"
But it turns out they're just another average joe living under a bad rep or something :,)
I also like the fact this game is never ending! Sometimes with games that just continue on and on and ON, it can get a bit repetitive and boring...but since this game offers a lot of side quests and jobs to keep you busy, there is definitely nothing boring about this continuous play!
The graphics, I thought, were absolutely lovely! The character designs and the town designs (especially The Elderwood Village) are SO HNNNNNNG-some I was kinda just drooling on my 3DS hahahah :,) yea, when you see The Elderwood Village, you'll know what I mean <3 it's just so pretty with all the purple and blue and green and white whispey bits floating around in the air and...aah! *u*
You also get a few cutscenes during the game (not many, though...I think I counted two or three?) but they're so lovely! I believe it was Yoshitaka Amano who did a lot of image illustration, so THANK YOU FOR MAKING IT ALL SO PREEEETTY! ;u;
Also, another thing that is important to me with games like this is the soundtrack. Because a lot of the time you spend listening to dialogue and running around, so I really like the soundtrack to be fun and enjoyable to listen to :3 and the soundtrack for this game was definitely amazing! *w*
I particularly liked this piece down below:
It reminded me of something you might hear from a Studio Ghibli film and I thought it was just lovely to listen to! The first time I heard it, typical me, I shed a tear or two :,3 just because WOOOW! <3
I also adored the ending song! ;3; you can hear it by clicking the link below:
I mean, oh wow! <3 this song was so glorious ;3; and perfect for the game and the atmosphere it created! :) I was already crying because of the ending...but this song pushed a few more tears out of me because I just thought it was so delightful to listen to~
I mean, with music featuring Nobuo Uematsu, you wouldn't really expect anything else other than incredible, right~?
My Overall Score~
I'm going to score the game, out of ten, on each main feature :)
So, we have:
> Graphics: 9/10
> Music: 10/10
> Character Customisation: 10/10
> Battles: 9/10
> Content: 10/10
Overall; 9.5/10
I really just loved this game so much, there was nothing really I could fault! My honest opinions and my honest scores on this game, I promise :)
So if you're wondering whether or not to get this game, I strongly recommend that you do! You won't regret it as there is so much in game content you'll probably being thinking..
"Oh god! Where do I even start?!" x,D
I'm just saying that if you get this game, it definitely would not be a mistake! :)
~ ~ ~
So that was my review on the new 3DS and 2DS game, Fantasy Life!
I hope you enjoyed reading this review and that you felt it was informative. If I left anything out that you have a question about or any questions in general, please just leave a comment at the bottom and I will reply and help as best as I can :)
Thank you so much for reading and have a great day! n.n
BYESIES~!
c: xoxo~
