Brigandine Abyss Review: Grand Strategy Ambitions Undermined by Repetitive Combat and Shallow Storytelling

The strategy RPG genre has long been defined by linear narratives punctuated by carefully designed tactical battles, but the original Brigandine on the first PlayStation charted a different course entirely. Released in 1998, it distinguished itself from contemporaries like Final Fantasy Tactics and Vandal Hearts by incorporating a macro-level grand strategy layer that drew more from PC titles than console SRPGs. Players conquered territories across sprawling continental maps, engaged in detailed preparation phases, and then deployed their forces in hex-grid turn-based combat. The formula was undeniably niche, but it cultivated a devoted following among strategy enthusiasts who appreciated its unique blend of conquest and tactics. After two decades of silence, publisher Happinet surprised fans in 2020 with Brigandine: Legend of Runersia for Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4, proving the franchise still had life. Now, the wait for a new installment has been significantly shorter, as Happinet teams with developer Adglobe—the studio behind the acclaimed Ender Lilies and Ender Magnolia—to deliver Brigandine Abyss.

A Continent at War: Setting and Faction Selection

Brigandine Abyss unfolds on the continent of Meltitea, thrust into chaos when the Kingdom of Solginat falls to internal treachery. The king’s scheming advisor, corrupted by a malevolent force known as Abyss, seizes power and transforms the realm into the Abyssloa Empire. This new tyrannical power immediately begins its conquest of neighboring territories, setting the stage for players to select one of six distinct factions, each with unique starting positions, character rosters, and motivations for opposing the imperial threat. The Scarlet Will comprises loyal mercenaries forced into exile alongside the kingdom’s princess—a familiar narrative foundation for fans of Fire Emblem and similar titles. More unconventional options include Pandemyuon, led by a mad scientist commanding an army of human experiments, and Gran Dragnica, whose young dragon tamers seek vengeance for Abyssloa’s cruel treatment of their draconic companions.

Your faction choice fundamentally shapes your early campaign experience, determining initial rivals and the geographic challenges you’ll face. Every nation eventually confronts the Abyssloa Empire as territorial expansion progresses, but each maintains its own narrative justifications for the conflict. The Scarlet Will’s storyline, for instance, centers on confrontations with the Ebony Fang, a rival mercenary band that betrayed their homeland to serve Abyssloa. These factional conflicts manifest through Event Battles that advance each story arc, creating personalized campaign experiences depending on your initial selection. Unfortunately, the game limits each campaign to just three main characters, severely constraining opportunities for meaningful character development and emotional investment in your faction’s journey.

Grand Strategy Meets Tactical Combat

Brigandine Abyss diverges significantly from traditional SRPG structure, eschewing linear battle sequences for a season-based campaign system more reminiscent of grand strategy titles like Koei Tecmo’s Nobunaga’s Ambition or Firaxis Games’ Civilization series. Each season divides into three distinct phases: Organization, Attack, and Invasion. The Organization Phase consumes the majority of playtime as you prepare units for combat, undertake quests to gather materials, and purchase equipment from the Niffrom Market. The Attack Phase proves briefest, involving declarations of aggression against neighboring territories while observing rival factions’ movements. Finally, the Invasion Phase delivers the actual hex-grid tactical battles as you assault enemy holdings or defend your own borders against aggressive neighbors.

This macro-strategic layer proves genuinely compelling, requiring careful attention to continental politics and rival expansion patterns. As your territory grows, you acquire additional units to manage, locations to upgrade and fortify, and quests to complete. NPC factions pursue their own agendas during each phase, and considerable time passes watching AI-controlled kingdoms conquer and fall across the map. The Organization Phase offers remarkable depth: assigning monster retinues to human leaders, planning troop movements to protect an ever-expanding network of territories, and developing newly conquered or recruited soldiers. However, unlike pure strategy titles, everything revolves exclusively around military conflict—diplomacy, alliances, and trade remain absent, leaving warfare as the sole means of factional interaction.

Narrative Ambitions Undermined by Structure

The open-ended seasonal structure that makes Brigandine Abyss strategically engaging simultaneously undermines its storytelling ambitions. Story content primarily occurs during Event Battles—essentially designated story missions—but these trigger after arbitrary seasonal thresholds rather than responding to actual campaign progress. Whether you’ve spent twenty seasons aggressively conquering half the continent or cautiously maintaining your initial territory, Event Battles play out identically regardless of the map state. Individual seasons can stretch beyond an hour of playtime depending on territorial holdings and invasion frequency, completely destroying narrative stakes. By the time rival mercenaries appeared as threatening antagonists in my Scarlet Will campaign, I had already amassed an enormous army and controlled vast territories, yet cutscenes still portrayed my forces as a struggling band of inexperienced fighters.

Presentation issues compound these structural problems. The handful of cutscenes scattered throughout the campaign feature minimal animation, barely exceeding motion stills, and appear so infrequently that they fail to generate meaningful investment in unfolding events. Character artwork represents a notable step down from Legend of Runersia’s evocative fantasy designs by artist Raita Kazama, with Abyss presenting generic modern fantasy anime aesthetics rather than establishing a distinctive visual identity. Most leader characters lack unique battlefield models matching their portraits, instead inhabiting generic class-based representations. Only faction leaders receive distinctive on-field models—a significant missed opportunity given the diversity of character designs. The musical score by Rei Kondoh, known for his work on Fire Emblem: Three Houses, provides one presentational bright spot, delivering appropriately epic compositions befitting continental warfare.

Combat Mechanics: Serviceable but Repetitive

The tactical combat at Brigandine Abyss’s core proves functional but struggles to match the strategic layer’s depth while suffering from similar pacing difficulties. Battles occur on expansive hexagonal maps, with each side deploying up to three leader units accompanied by as many as six monster companions. Leaders possess command scores determining how many and which monsters they can control, with early-game commanders typically managing only two or three weak creatures. As leaders level up, their command scores increase alongside their potential monster retinues. The system encourages satisfying tinkering with unit compositions, as over twenty distinct monster and leader classes offer unique abilities and roles. Leaders can Rally monsters to their side, removing them from active combat in exchange for powerful passive bonuses like enhanced movement or strengthened counterattacks, ensuring even weaker creatures contribute meaningfully.

The fundamental problem lies in campaign structure requiring endless repetitive battles during Invasion Phases, particularly as territorial holdings expand. Each phase potentially involves four or five consecutive engagements, all sharing identical victory conditions: defeat all enemies when invading or survive twelve turns when defending. Battle maps are large and mostly empty, requiring multiple turns simply to reach enemy forces. While some memorable maps feature unique mechanics—walls that raise and lower to obstruct movement, fortified defensive positions—most lack interesting elements and become tedious to traverse. The difficulty curve remains disappointingly flat due to easily exploitable AI behavior; defeating a leader causes their entire monster retinue to flee, making leader-focused strategies overwhelmingly effective. While Zone of Control mechanics should create defensive opportunities, enemy AI rarely protects its leaders, frequently pushing them forward into vulnerable positions.

Mission Mode: The Saving Grace

For players seeking genuine challenge, Mission Mode offers substantially more engaging content than the repetitive Story Mode campaigns. This alternative mode unlocks all 24 Meltitean factions rather than restricting players to the six core options, with each faction pursuing unique victory conditions. Some objectives remain conventional—conquering the entire map before ninety-nine seasons elapse or completing specific Event Battle sequences—but others prove surprisingly creative. Certain factions must amass fortunes to pay outstanding debts, others must collect specimens from every monster species, and some impose strict class limitations or severe seasonal constraints. Mission Mode demonstrates remarkable creativity with core mechanics, forcing bespoke strategies and fresh engagement with systems that feel monotonous in Story Mode. Players who enjoy self-imposed challenges in sandbox strategy titles will find hours of demanding content straining their strategic capabilities.

The accessibility improvements that presumably aimed to welcome newcomers ultimately dilute what made Brigandine distinctive. Previous entries made resurrection items extremely rare, lending genuine weight to every tactical decision. Abyss stocks revival consumables plentifully in shops, completely removing consequences for mistakes and eliminating tension from combat encounters. The resulting experience feels simultaneously too demanding for casual players—thanks to extensive organizational complexity—and too forgiving for veterans seeking meaningful tactical challenges. Mission Mode partially addresses this imbalance, but it lacks the narrative framework and measured progression that make story-driven SRPGs compelling for many fans. As a grand strategy sandbox emphasizing combat, Brigandine Abyss offers substantial content for dedicated players, but it ultimately fails to synthesize its competing gameplay styles into a cohesive, satisfying hybrid experience that honors its cult classic heritage.