Granblue Fantasy: Relink may be delayed, but thankfully at this year’s Granblue Fantasy Fes, Cygames was more than happy to share more details of the game, along with a brand-new look at the current state of the game and loads of action gameplay!
In the reveal, we got to look at the 7 currently playable characters, be introduced to a brand new antagonist, the game’s combat system, and even a practice mode to test out your combos and DPS, along with a look at the game’s interface and customization options. With so much being shown off, let’s take a quick look at the features and things shown off!
Granblue Fantasy: Relink will be released on the PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, and PC sometime in 2023.
▍ Granblue Fes 2022-2023 Day 1 Relink Showcase
▍ Granblue Fantasy: Relink Second Trailer
▍ Granblue Fantasy Relink Characters
During the gameplay demo we got a look at the current characters showing up in the game! While a bunch of characters also had their English and Japanese voice actors revealed, in one of the screens we got to see characters like
Rackam, Charlotte, Narmaya, Lancelot, Siegfried, Yodarha, and Gran are among the playable characters, each at level 20 with several abilities that can be key-binded to an R1+Face button combination.
During gameplay, you’ll be creating a party of up to four characters, each with their “power levels” on display, their elements, and stats. We also got a look at some of the character bios for Charlotte Yodarha, and the newest and fan-favorite addition to Relink, Narmaya voiced again by Brianna Knickerbocker!
■ Charlotte – CV: Kaori Nazuka / Cristna “Vee” Valenzuela
■ Yodarha – CV: Shigeru Chiba / Peter Kelamis
■ Narmaya – CV: M•A•O / Brianna Knickerbocker
A new addition to the game is the mysterious character Id voiced by Kenjiro Tsuda and Robbie Daymond. This powerful knight serves as one of the three generals of Avia, and is a power threat the players will have to deal with as they traverse the Zegagrande Skydom.
▍ Granblue Fantasy Relink Gameplay
Let’s take a closer look at the gameplay shown off~ Here we get to see Charlotte’s abilities that she can attack with during combat. These abilities have more than meets the eye, as these can apply debuffs, and also be combined into more moves by timing taps of the attack buttons after the attack is executed.
Characters can have more than four attacks available to them, but since there are only four face buttons, you’ll have to make a tactical choice between which ones are your favorite, or most useful for the enemy ahead!
In the trial menu we got a brief look at equipment, with Charlotte having a weapon and more gear she can change out of to affect her stats. In one of the later snippets of gameplay we can also see Charlotte’s sword being different from the one she uses in her character artwork, indicating that different weapons will not only have different stats, but look different on your characters!
Next we got a look at the game’s free battle and trial arena. Here the developer showed off some of the game’s combat system with its Link combo system letting you do more damage the longer you chain attacks together with characters.
As an RPG the game of course also has critical hits, with the number being indicated by an exclamation mark, and other seemingly more powerful critical attacks being available based on certain conditions like elemental weakness, and other factors.
After you execute enough attacks with a character, you can drastically power up their ability, unleashing a flashy cinematic finisher for tons of damage!
It also looked like some characters could have completely new weapons, or have wildly different equipment appearances, as here we see Narmaya also wielding a twin-blade while also having her katana by her side.
▍ Granblue Fantasy Relink Assist Mode
Coming to this Granblue Fantasy Relink is also an assist mode, which drastically simplifies inputs for beginner players that just want to release the story. This mode lets you use a single button to perform all of the game’s combat attacks, with the game automatically using the most powerful moves if you meet the conditions.
Of course, this mode is completely optional, but it’s nice to see the game cater to certain players who just want to primarily enjoy the story and don’t want to engage too much in the game’s combat, even if its not something I’d use.
