The question of reviving a dormant series and bringing it forward into the modern gaming landscape is always a tricky one to resolve. It’s not that there’s no answer to it; actually, there are several. Sometimesa remaster of an older entry will suffice;other times a full remake is what’s called for.
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Perhaps it’s better to forget about remasters and remakes and just make a proper sequel; it all just depends on what one hopes to accomplish. WithPhantom Brave: The Lost Hero,NIS is going the sequel route, granting fans of the original their first new adventure in nearly twenty years. This, of course, comes with certain challenges, which Hardcore Gamer recently had the opportunity to discuss with scenario writer Kento Jobana after some hands-on time with the game at TGS 2024.
Marona and Ash are back and are more than ready to embark on another adventure.
InPhantom Brave: The Lost Hero,players rejoin Marona and her friend Ash on a new adventure to both help their new friend Apricot to assemble their own pirate crew and put a stop to the ghost ship fleet that’s been wreaking havoc on their ocean world of Ivoire. Marona is a young girl gifted with an unusual power: the power to speak to spirits. In fact, both Ash and Apricot are spirits, each with a goal they hope to achieve while they linger in the mortal plane.
While the original Phantom Brave also took place in Ivoire,Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero’spirate theme is a mostly new addition. It’s one of Mr. Jobana’s solutions for bringing the series back in a way that would be interesting and fun for both newcomers and fans of the original. As for why he and the team settled on pirates specifically, Mr. Jobana offered a couple of insights.
“I thought that, because this is a world that’s entirely comprised of oceans and islands, one thing that would fit in this world could be pirates. So I thought, What if the main character, Marona, were to go on an adventure? What if she were to meet pirates?” Kento Jobana, scenario writer, Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero
It seems that the rest of the story elements and world building that is being introduced inPhantom Brave: The Lost Heromore or less flowed from this, including Apricot and her reason for going on this adventure with Marona and Ash. It seems that she has things she wants to learn as well as something to prove.
“When I started working on the scenario, the first thing I did was research pirates, western pirates in Europe. From that, what I realized, or at least my interpretation of it, was that the average people and the pirates kind of lived together more or less in harmony. […] And to reflect that into the world of Phantom Brave, in the past, the pirates kind of were like what I had read about. […] As a matter of fact, Apricot’s father was this pirate who was kind of like a legendary pirate, and he was a good guy.”
He elaborated a bit further on this too, explaining that one of the main story beats is Apricot, through her efforts, kind of reviving the idea of pirates as good guys. That is restoring them to their original reputation after years of bad pirates dirtying it with their misdeeds.
As for what fans can look forward to doing inPhantom Brave: The Lost Hero,there actually appears to be more than a few systems and activities to enjoy. During our hands-on time with the game at TGS, we were able to experience several. For starters, part of the demo was spent at Marona and Co.’s home base, where their ship could be updated, new units recruited and customized, messages read, and new missions accepted. There may or may not be little secrets to find along the shore in the full release too.
Once a mission is accepted, Marona can sail out with her friends to either make deliveries or solve disputes. The people of Ivoire tend to be a stubborn bunch, unfortunately, and usually require a bit of convincing. Such was the case in the demo, and it served as a good chance to check out the combat system. The core of it is more or less the same, but the team has added a couple of extra wrinkles to play around with.
Marona can both “confine” spirits to objects and “confriend” others to herself to gain new abilities.
Marona can still send her spirit allies to inhabit objects on the map and gain temporary physical forms. What they inhabit can affect their stats, so it quickly becomes clear to think a bit while choosing what spirit to use on a given item. Sprites can also take over things like cannons, though it’s more like they possess such, rather than using them as something to transform into a body. Marona can also use her new “Confriend” ability to allow a spirit to possess her, which grants her new outfits and abilities.
ThoughPhantom Brave: The Lost Herocomes from the same company that makesDisgaea,newcomers needn’t worry about being overwhelmed. Combat plays out in a much more straightforward manner here. All it takes to achieve victory is bringing the right crew and making good use of each character’s turn. It took maybe all of ten minutes to get a feel for how combat worked while playing the demo, and after that it was just fun.
“What we’ve called it in English is a ‘play it your way’ RPG. So that means that, essentially, there’s no one single way, like maybe some hardcore RPGs would demand of the player, to solve a given map. There’s multiple ways for a player to approach any given map.”
Therearealso going to be different difficulty modes available too, so progression will likely still be possible even if it runs into a battle or situation that’s stumping them. It seems the team really wants everyone who decides to pick upPhantom Brave: The Lost Heroto be able to enjoy it to the fullest. What’s more, according to Mr. Jobana, he and the rest of the team that worked on had a similar desire for that game as well, so fans of this new Phantom Brave will likely be able to play and enjoy that one as well.
I’m one of those who couldn’t really get my head around Disgaea so hearing this from Mr. Jobana and experiencing it for myself in the demo was a big relief!
It’s clear that a lot of work and passion is being put intoPhantom Brave: The Lost Heroin terms of both its gameplay and the world players will get to explore. The demo version played at TGS 2024 was easy to pick up and fun to jump into, thanks in no small part to its endearing characters and charming atmosphere. NIS fans will almost certainly love it and it could very well serve as a great jumping-on point for any RPG fans who’ve yet to try one of its games.
Phantom Brave: The Lost Herois set to release on January 30 for PC, PlayStation 4, PS5 and Switch.
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