Fantasy Life: New Lives Await

Fantasy life is an open world RPG on 3DS that centers around a player made character picking their job or "Life." there are a total of 12 lives each in their own basic subcategory. The job categories are combat, crafting and gathering. Each class has different levels and skills. The player starts  as a fledglings then can progress to master by turning in the milestones earned by living out that life. In the DLC players can reach god rank in Europe and creator rank in North America.

There are 4 of each category of class the four combat roles are; the sword and shield using Paladin, the greatsword wielding Mercenary, the bow using Hunter, and the Magician.  In my playthrough I became a creator level Paladin which is more defensive focused combat role. The roles are influenced by the stats that are chosen as the player levels up which greatly affects the later game as there is a massive difficulty spike in the DLC that makes for a very fun and challenging post game.

The rest of the classes are broken down into gathering and crafting. The crafting class has a few more actions as there are five crafting classes and three gathering classes. Starting with the gathering classes there aer fishing, mining, and woodcutting, the two systems work in a very similar way, you circle the gathering point searching for a sweet spot and chipping away at the health of the resource. Fishing is slightly different as its more of a battle with the fish. The gathering classes also have skills that allow them to do massive damage to the resource. Overall the gathering lives will be a side life to your combat and crafting lives but they provide a side narrative that can be entertaining and even humorous at times.

The crafting classes will have a massive impact on your combat lives as the gear you find in the world is only a standard quality where as crafted items can become god level quality. This isn't as important in the main game but in the DLC top quality gear is needed for the final dungeon. The crafting job that shares the same characteristics as the paladin and mercenary and crafts the gear for them is blacksmithing. Now you may be asking how the crafting differs and the real answer is it doesn't the only difference in crafting is the changes in the minigames whether you mash the A button, hold it down, or press it in time. The different lives only vary those few items. The gameplay loop can start to feel pretty repetitive but the most fun comes from running around the world in the online multiplayer with friends around the world.

Now the story of Fantasy Life focuses on the character choosing their first life then visiting the king and meeting a butterfly that for some reason also needs to meet the king. from then on the two of you travel the continent to the three cities and the three areas surrounding them. Something that keeps the story is all the surrounding side narratives that go with the different lives. One of the biggest advantages to mastering a life isn't the unique gear the game gives you after mastering each job the real reward is the unique song that the game plays for you and that's worth all the time you put in to your life.