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Bravely Default II Introduces Holograd, New Asterisks

by Alex Fuller · February 5, 2021

Square Enix provided new information and images in Japan for the upcoming Bravely Default II. The newest update focuses on the military nation of Holograd. The nation was founded 300 years ago by a leader who brought the clans of the country’s barren lands together. Since then, Holograd has expanded by annexing its neighbours, causing the remaining nearby nations to be on their guard.

Adamas Holograd is the nation’s current leader and a descendant of its founder. He is an advocate of military strength, believing peace can be attained by letting the strong rule, and is the holder of the Hellblade Asterisk. The Hellblade is a job that wields a cursed blade. Different attributes can be assigned to the blade, but it draws from the life of its wielder. Maddock Lonsdale is the current Shogun of Holograd and a former mercenary colleague of Excillant’s Sloane. He is loyal to Adamas and his ideals and holds the Bastion Asterisk. The Bastion job takes the role of tank and is balanced between offense and defense. It can generate a barrier for the party that nullifies damage.

Mora is one of Adamas’ subordinates and a master of disguise. She holds the Phantom Asterisk, with the Phantom job specialising in quick short sword attacks. By dual-wielding, it has high evasion and is able to unleash additional hits on enemies. Finally, Vishnu Isaac is another of Adamas’ subordinates. He is a master of death magic, holding the Arcanist Aserisk, and holds a grudge against party member Elvis’ mentor Emma after she beat him in battle. The Arcanist job focuses on powerful area-of-effect magic.

Square Enix also provided some additional details about the game’s combat system. Powerful enemies will have Counters and Jammers, which can strike back against player actions. Counters work against attacks, while Jammers work against other actions such as using an item. These have a fixed chance of activating against the specified actions, but players have ways of mitigating them, such as the Hunter job’s Retaliation Evasion support ability, which evades physical counterattacks.

Bravely Default II will also include a new version of the consecutive battles feature, where players can drag in nearby monsters when activating a battle on the map and have multiple battles in immediate succession. Activating multiple battles will reward players with additional Job Points should they emerge victorious. Bravely Points will carry over between these battles.

Bravely Default II will launch worldwide for Nintendo Switch on February 26, 2021. The game is set in a new world to its predecessors with new characters and a new story. Revo, who composed the soundtrack to Bravely Default, returned to compose the soundtrack to Bravely Default II.