Bravely Default: Beaten all the way through. Final level was ~80 something and at ~70 hours.
The main plot past chapter 6 disappears or is worthless. I strongly suggest avoiding/ignoring it by doing a certain act at the last available point in C6. The (Blue exclamation marked) sidequests however are great stuff, as in Chapter 7 and Chapter 8 they become more unique and challenging. Chapter 8 especially features some of the nastiest JRPG enemy setups I've seen.
Spoilers for plot.
The good points of Bravely Default's plot are the solid execution of the relatively 'ordinary' story in World 1 and the character interaction/development therein. The Duchy is painted as clearly wrong and the game doesn't try to equivocate on this point too much. The Summoner sidequest is a pretty good example of the solid execution, eschewing a happy ending in favor of a darker one more consistent with the story of that chapter. In general, the characters discuss their actions with each other and they respond to situations in some fairly flawed but understandable ways, which is especially apparent in Chapter 3. Edea is charming and amusing as a character (often saying what the player is probably thinking), Agnes is rather believable as you get acquainted with her and is far from a 'perfectly nice girl' that someone in her archetype normally gets shoehorned into, and Ringabel is rather endearing in his constant stream of jokes (except for a stint in chapter 2 where JRPG boob-joke flaws rear their ugly heads). Tiz is just kind of there, and wasn't worked on very well at all.
I greatly enjoyed paging through D's notebook, even if it proved too much of a spoiler for the most part (it's very very easy to guess it's Alternis Dim's early in the game, as well as what that and the late writings in it entail). The book helped with Alternis' characterization.
The big flaws in Bravely Default plot is... well let's get it out of the way. The 'multiple worlds' thing is not handled well past Chapter 6. At all. The game just kinds of goes two iterations without any discussions at all, despite very big causes for concern amongst the PCs. And then the entire final sequence is just flat out retarded and makes no sense. This is especially bad in comparison to a fairly competent 'bad end' storyline which retains Airy as the primary villain. She works much better as one than the Space Flea Ouroboros (whose design sucks, by the way). The game would have been better served by even more focus on the pre-C6 plot rather than including this silliness at the end. (The final battle music is pretty good though)
More minor flaws include the fact that the villains could have solved the problems WAY more easily had they not been dumbarses and insisted on keeping their mouths shut about what they knew in regards to the situation. Also the failure of Duchy forces to recognize Ringabel as Alternis. Why was this never touched upon? Little things here and there prove to be annoying. And the 'True' ending featured living alternate Light Warriors, which made no sense as there was only 1 Airy who was implied to have killed all the other Light Warriors in the worlds she had been to.
Bravely Default's battle system and job system have gotten a lot of praise and for good reason... So I'll just give classes a lowdown of how I thought of them.
Freelancer: A fairly useless skillset and no good reason to be a carrier class, except for the analyze skill! Being able to see boss HP is useful because it lets you decide when to go balls-to-the-wall offense and take them down by going negative on BP. It would have been nice to have this be a 1-point passive skill option, but you have to dedicate one of your 8 skillsets to it, which is unfortunate! Otherwise the Freelancer has the 'raise probabilities of chance-based skills by 1.5x' which can be fairly cool if utilized correctly, and the ultimate skill, Mime, which does the traditional set of allowing you to use a skill that someone else has without actually having the skillset, OR you can quadra-act something nasty and only pay the price for it once. Finally the class gets a decent passive skill in the ability to survive otherwise fatal attacks with 1 HP at a 75% chance (assuming they were not already at 1 HP). But the cost is 3 Ability Points, so it is quite expensive. The default passive class skill is only useful at endgame, and only very, very slightly useful... washed away by the lack of S's in offensive weaponry. Oh, and Earned JP up is still rather cool for mastering more classes faster.
Monk: A competent enough physical class. Being able to use combat saves means that you can have a solid physical slugger who doubles as a healer with an awesome MT healing/revive/MP restore/BP+ move! The early skills are a bit of a turnoff though, and the lack of good defense hurts even if it is offset by the high HP. The ultimate skills are amusing in the sense that you sacrifice all semblance of defense/equipment versatility for raw amazing attack power. The passive class ability honestly feels kind of wasted when good fists are available for puchase.
White Mage: It is a healer class. You want one, possibly two of these ability sets. White Mage's buffs are rather pitiful (ST 25% Pdef/Mdef for all of 4 turns, oh wow), but Dispel and Esunga are priceless, and competent MT healing is highly desirable. The damage is lackluster to say the least, lacking elemental variety and magic attack power/damage buffing skills. Default passive skill is rather worthless (heal status on winning battles), but the "Angelic Ward' skill you learn is sweet and serves to improve team survivability by a lot!
Black Mage: Elemental canons with status. Early on the MP-reliance hurts a lot since MP restoration is harder to come by. Lategame (especially after learning Pierce M.Def) they turn into impressive damage dealers without much setup/fuss. Their skill to group-cast magic that is normally ST only can be rather cool when combined with other magic types... MT Reraise? MT Reflect? MT Dispel? MT Quick... several possibilities. That magic defense ignoring skill is where the damage is at, though.
Knight: Two-handed makes for an awesome offense skill and is easy to learn. Beyond that Knights tank rather well and Stomp does good damage. The "two Shields" skill makes for a neat way to improve raw and elemental durability on casters/healers/utility builds.
Thief: Speed boosting abilities are always useful and that is what Thieves do. Stealing doesn't usually get you too much good stuff. Beyond that they make surprisingly good damage dealers because Bows are a fantastic weapon type. Their utility skills (Rob Life, basically) isn't bad because Parasitic healing is always cool. Mostly the class is good for speed boosting skills that you can set up how you see fit.
Merchant: Generally a weak class, to be honest. They are for money boosting really, which I'll admit is something you probably do want some of, but as combat PCs they aren't terribly good. Special mention DOES go out to their second-to-last skill, Low Leverage, which reduces all damage dealt/healing done by 50% for friend and foe alike for 5 turns. When facing down enemies that multi-act and have lots of damage, this sort of skill is a godsend. It is rather endgame for use however, as attempting to use it a lot may just prolong otherwise faster battles you would win anyway.
Spell Fencer: Nail weakness on enemies more commonly, and inflict statuses with fair accuracy, all while saving on the MP a Black Mage would expend... the Spell Fencer is an appealing class. The Brave/Default system makes them much better for blitzing then the Magic Knight ever was in FF5, since one spell followed by three blades in a single turn makes for much better quick offense. Drain Sword is a nice way to keep afloat for physical classes too. Generally a competent class.
Time Mage: Time Mage was one of FF5's best classes, but here it is rather underwhelming. Time SLip would make for a better support ability if Autosave wasn't on and bosses didn't have save points before them all. The speed boosting doesn't generally last long enough (4 turns) and there are other ways of getting what you need on that front. The damage could be good if it is twinked for but it isn't something to write home about.
Summoner: The MT magic damage canon of many elements, but Summoner's MP costs are prohibitive early without some kind of gimmick and the damage late isn't something you write home about. Still probably a good randomsmashing class with the right setup. Passive skills aren't worth discussing.
Hunter: ST damage class. The accuracy boost is nice and the skillset allows for plentiful Bow specials (anytime you hit weakness) but ST damage is all the class really brings to the table. I mentioned Bows were good weapons in this game (albeit you eschew a shield, an innate 2-hand property of the weapon type) and Hunters bring an S in that weapon. Does great damage throughout the midgame, although not having a skill to hit weakness against humans is a pain (stuck with a 1.25x mult instead of 1.5x, and no bonus to the Super-move count for bows).
Valkyrie: An interesinting variety of Dragoon that does nice things with MT physical damage. Jumping is always kind of a mixed bag. It could be rather nice if you set it up on multiple PCs I'll grant, as the damage on it ranges from "Quite solid" to "WTF". It is all ST and that 'losing a PC for 1-3 turns is a turnoff. But it still has that MT physical skill, which is good for randomsmashing. The default passive ability is rather decent as well.
Red Mage: Red Mage has a series of interesting passive abilities, but the primary skillset kind of blows. White/Black magic up to L4, when L5 and L6 are where you want to be at endgame. Still it is competent enough at physical offense, and some of the passives make very nice combos with other classes, such as negating MP costs below 20% HP and getting +1 BP whenever an attack is dodged. The default '25% chance of +1 BP whenever receiving an attack works WAY better on the enemy end than the PC end.
Salve-Maker: Bravely Default's Chemist. All of the job's abiltieis are geared towards item usage and it kind of rocks. Skills to double healing effectiveness (that is the default spend-no-points skill!), Auto-Potion, Auto-Phoenix (Phoenix Down as a free action if someone is KOd when you take a turn, and this has no detriment on their BP so is the best revival there is!), can use any regular item MT for an extra BP, has plentiful ITD damage of any element that ranges from astounding (when you first get it) to competent (at post-lategame) and costs only 400pg a shot, stat buffs, mt revival, can grant ST one-element immunity or force a weakness on an enemy ... And the class IS a healing class, with full revival, MP restoration, and ST HP healing. The only thing the class is lacking is infliction of status ailments and more MT options. Truly a ridiculous class, this one.
Pirate: Single-target physical damage and debuffs are what you'll find here. They have means of blowing MP to do lots of damage but this is generally a bad idea (1/4 or 1/2 max MP a shot for a 2x or 4x damage attack). Combine it with some kind of 'zero MP cost' trick and you have yourself a mean damage dealing machine. But they are slow, and their preferred weapon (axes) are inferior to swords on account of lower accuracy/speed/hits. The debuffs are nice, but the really competent ones (-25% enemy attack stats) are kind of late on the class.
Performer: Support skillset that is quite good. +25% MT buffs of every stat kind (speed/str/mag/def/mdef...), and a way to transfer BP to another PC (while not quite as good as 'turn shifting', this improves your long-term offense if used appropriately, or to 'recover' someone whose BP went negative). Compact that with good base class speed and acceptable stats and you have yourself a highly competent support class. The best passive ability in the class is the one that doubles buff duration for 1 ability point, albeit only on the PC that is using it.
Ninja: This class specializes in low-power-high-mult damage and evasion. Both are solid enough niches, and there guarenteed 'dodge 1 attack' skill can be quite a lifesaver vs. certain bosses and enemies who bring to bare very powerful physical skills. Their speed is excellent of course. The damage isn't that competent to be honest, and their skillset aside from the guaranteed dodge leaves much to be desired. The passive abilities are geared toward getting some boon upon a dodge, whether stat boosts or an auto-counter to evading an attack. this makes for some fun times vs. entirely physical opponents.
Swordmaster: The counter class! This works much better on an enemy that is facing a party than it does a party facing enemies. Beyond that the swordmaster has competent enough stats (Speed isn't special though)... and Katanas are the best weapon type (high crit rate) so having the skill that grants an S in that is nice. Being based around counters just tends not to work too well. Although at least the counter skills halve damage and work on MT attacks. So not too bad if you know what your foe will be spamming MT-attackwise (although it can still waste a turn far too often).
Arcanist: Most of the Arcanists skills are for assisting in randomsmashing, and it requires inflicting status ailments on them first. In general this is not an impressive forte. Their skillsets can be abusive towards enemy and friends alike, so that is another point against them. Not actually being able to INFLICT those status ailments with their own skills is another mark... All dark damage which isn't TOO bad except they are soon to be competing with... well... something better at that particular niche. A point for coming with a solid enough default passive, insta-healing 30% of any suffered magic damage. This combines in interesting ways with some other skills like Healing Lore/Angelic Ward, I think. But that is about the only point for the class.
Spiritmaster: This is a support class. Primarily based around manipulating the party's elemental attributes (skills to grant omni-element absorption, skills to grant MT elemental immunity, skills to enhance one PC's elemental offense, and so on). It also features the skills Fairy Ward, which grants MT full status immunity for 5 turns (including stuff like Doom and such that would normally be non-immunable), Stillness, which makes the entire field immune to damage for 3 turns, and Convert BP, which spends 1/4 Max MP for 2 extra BP. The class is balanced by requiring extra BP to use most skills (only the ST elemental absorption doesn't), but that Convert BP along with some MP healing can give you some absolutely ridiculous results. Elemental absorption is extremely valuable and Fairy Ward nips some things in the bud that would be otherwise very frustrating (some bosses like ST status). Stillness is a FANTASTIC 'oh crap' button for when everyone but the Spiritmaster has died or something like that. This class' element nulling is nice for another reason too...
Templar: The Templar is a 'holy Knight' class that is geared towards defense, boasting the best survivability of all classes. It also features a skill to reduce damage while defaulting to 25% instead of 50%, which is solid. Other boons of this class include Rampart, a skill to give everyone a barrier that blocks 1 physical attack (including a lot of POWERFUL enemy MT moves like dragon breaths and so on). The class is extremely slow, and while they have good offensive skills their offense suffers from that speed some. But it never hurts to run a tank PC for emergency situations where enemy offense is overwhelming you some. Helps to buff the speed somehow to make them able to DO something in such an event!
Dark Knight: This class does damage. Not healing, not tanking, not utility... Damage. Usually while sacrificing HP to do so. The default skill boosts stats whenever 20% HP threshholds are crossed (this helps to keep buffs on longer). The class starts with Dark Bane, which is a 1.25x mult ST dark attack that consumes 20% HP. Then it gets Black Bane, which a 1.5x attack that consumes 30% HP, and is MT. Then it gets a passive skill to boost dark damage further. Then it gets a skill that boosts all stats (sans Speed) 50% for 5 turns at the cost of inflicting Doom. But a prize move for this class is the Dark Nebula attack. For 20% HP it does an MT 4x attack. Unfortunately this MT includes your own party. But combined with a Spiritmaster or plentiful use of Dark Shields (of which there are 3 in the game) you can spam it, and it is utterly devastating to enemies. For maximizing damage, there is Rage, a 2 BP move (costs as much as 3 actions) that uses Dark Bane 5x (or until HP reaches 1). A little twinking such as Sword Magic and you have reliable 50K damage for 3 BP, albeit it ST. And this can be used 2 times in a turn. When facing down boss teams there is nothing better than this class for putting them down in a hurry via the MT stuff. Fun fact: If they use the Doom-inflicting move under the Spiritmaster's Fairy Ward, they get the stat buffs without the Doom status!
Vampire: The blue mage class. But while the majority of their skillset is from getting hit with enemy magic, they also feature highly competent things like a skill that serves as a physical attack with parasitic healing, one for magic, and one to steal enemy BP. Then a skill to steal enemy stats (inflict -25% on them and +25% on you), and a skill to boost the effect (damage) of drain skills. They also feature a skill to instaheal 30% of any physical damage received. Their actual blue magic is primarily status stuff, but with some elemental MT and so on in the mix too. The class stats are very solid. Basically a good class, although the default passive is not useful due to being the one for learning new blue magic.
Conjurer: The last class, and not a terribly good one. Their skillset is ST buffs that last 10 turns, which is not terrible but not all that impressive either. Most of their skills are geared towards helping Summoners, which isn't exactly a selling point for this class.
Gamebest classes are... Spiritmaster (Utility of win and awesome), Dark Knight (DAMAGE), White Mage (Dispel, Esunga, MT healing), Performer (more utility of win and awesome), and Salve-Maker (Healing and utility!). Black Mages also get competent on damage with relatively little fuss lategame.
Think I'll go for a 'Normal Mode' stat topic of some kind.
