Sword Art Online: Fractured Daydream is the latest entry in the Sword Art Online game series. After last year’s Sword Art Online: Last Recollection delivered a disappointing end to the Gameverse canon, I wasn’t particularly interested in trying out another SAO game anytime soon. Fractured Daydream has a unique advantage though. It was developed by Dimps, who are responsible for Sword Art Online: Fatal Bullet, the best SAO game to date. That alone was enough to get me back on board. How naive I was…
Another Sword Art Story
Sword Art Online: Fractured Daydream is a live service title, and as such has a heavy focus on online co-op play. However, there is a story mode that can be played offline. This story mode exists to provide a basic narrative framework, and to get you accustomed to the gameplay before you jump online. It is not particularly interesting, and it drags on too long. The story is set in motion when a new system called Galaxia is added to ALfheim Online (ALO). Galaxia allows players to relive fights and experiences from the past, to see how things might play out differently depending on their actions.
Of course, Galaxia gets weird and whacky, pulling in characters from all over the Sword Art Online timeline and trapping them in another mysterious MMO mishap. This setup provides a simple enough excuse for having characters like Eugeo and Oberon fighting side by side. As Kirito and friends (and mortal enemies) work together to get the timeline shenanigans sorted out, we are treated to all manner of unlikely interactions and events, each one more trite than the last. I enjoy Sword Art Online, and I enjoy the concept of these characters bouncing off each other, but it all feels like a rerun. There is no point to the story of Fractured Daydream. The characters aren’t developing, they’re not moving towards anything meaningful, they’re just living through a dull filler arc.
You will have to endure this filler arc though, as playing the story mode unlocks characters for use in the online multiplayer. The missions that make up the story mode are at least straightforward and serviceable. You’ll doss about some rather uninspiring maps, killing hordes of enemies, looting chests, searching for collectibles, and then you’ll kill a big boss and it’s all over. There are some interesting mechanics here that get expanded on in online play, such as acquiring passive stat improvements for each enemy you kill and picking up mods from chests that offer buffs like extra damage output or higher critical rates. Ultimately though it’s all rather tawdry, and I think having the story mode as this wholly separate offline experience only serves to distract from the real meat of Sword Art Online: Fractured Daydream that exists wholly online.
Whacking & Whiffing
The combat of Sword Art Online: Fractured Daydream is fairly standard action-rpg fare, albeit with quite a bit of variance across its 21 characters. Those 21 characters are certainly an improvement on the 42 characters boasted by the previous entry, Last Recollection, despite the reduced headcount. Each of Fractured Daydream’s characters plays differently enough that it’s engaging and fun to switch between them and try out different approaches. Each character fills one of six roles, but even within their roles there is variety. Argo and LLENN for example are both ‘rogues’, but while Argo is a fast striking melee character who can juice extra damage by attacking enemies from behind, LLENN is a ranged shooter who benefits from a buffed critical rate based on their distance to the enemy.
Unfortunately, whilst the character variety is fantastic, things do get stale the more you play a single character. Each character has a fixed palette of skills and abilities, and without the ability to customize their setup you’re going to be playing them in the exact same way regardless of if you’re just starting or you’re 100 hours in. A lack of enemy variety compounds this issue, as you’ll rarely have to change up your approach to any given fight, outside of some of the bosses and raid fights.
Combat also suffers from a lack of useful defensive options. Every character has a dodge, and some can make use of guarding, but neither of these is particularly effective in practice. Dodging is slow and clunky, and you’ll frequently be stuck in attack animations and unable to effectively use it. Guarding suffers from the same issues, though to a lesser degree in my experience. You can somewhat offset these issues by slowing down your play, but even then there is the issue of visual clarity where enemies are obscured by myriad flashing lights and particle effects in combat. In fights with multiple enemies too you’ll have to contend with your fighting being interrupted by attacks from offscreen enemies who, thanks to the rather dreadful camera operation and piss-poor lock-on system, you won’t have a chance to see coming.
Going (Sword Art) Online
Sword Art Online: Fractured Daydream’s online content is split between three modes of play: free roam, co-op quests, and boss raids. There are, at present, nine co-op quests, three boss raids, and two free roam maps. Free roam, as it stands, is a mystery to me. It is a wholly pointless mode that has you dive into an open map with other players to do some open-ended questing for no real purpose. The lack of direction, combined with the banality of the giant empty fields you’ll be running across, make for a painfully boring experience. If it were not for battle pass (or ‘trial’ in this case) quests tied to playing free roam, I’m quite confident no one would ever bother with it. And it would be better that way. Why does this mode exist when it only serves to fracture an already rather meager playerbase?
Players should, ideally, be funneled into co-op quests and boss raids, which are more engaging affairs. Co-op quests are longer format (though still relatively short) dungeon runs that culminate in a boss fight. Up to 20 players can take part in a quest, split into five teams of four. The five teams work their way through the dungeon separately, leveling and looting as they go, before all coming together for the final fight. These co-op quests are fun, but the presence of other players is rather meaningless given a limited need to cooperate and a lack of communication features. There is a competitive element at least, where each team racks up points based on their performance in the quest, and there is a competition (more like a lottery) for the last hit on the boss, but outside of bragging rights there’s not much reason to care.
Boss raids function similarly, with 20 players split into teams working together to fight an even bigger boss. They’re fun enough, but I think the co-op quests are the more substantial experience. Both modes offer some fun rewards like rare cosmetic drops and of course gear drops to enhance your characters. Frankly though, engaging with Sword Art Online: Fractured Daydream’s gear system is even more tedious and boring than free roam. Every character has a weapon slot and three accessory slots. There are tiers to equipment as usual, with epic and legendary gear beating out common and uncommon gear, in theory. The problem is that each piece of gear comes with a set of random effects such as cooldown reduction or damage enhancements, and each of these effects is set at a random level. The difference between the tiers of gear is not the quality of these effects, but the quantity, and so it’s entirely possible to have an uncommon bracelet that is infinitely more useful than an epic one. You can of course fine tune your gear by swapping around effects and gradually building the best possible setup, but you’ll be rather disappointed when you then take this gear into battle and find that its impact on gameplay is minimal.
It Won’t Last
Sword Art Online: Fractured Daydream could have been something special. It could well have been Sword Art Online’s very own Granblue Fantasy: Relink. Unfortunately, it all just feels undercooked. The question repeating in my head over and over is: “what’s the point?”. The moment-to-moment gameplay is mediocre, the gear system is a dull slog, and the online gameplay doesn’t offer anything unique or exciting. One has to wonder how a live service title will last with such a dull foundation. My expectation is that it won’t. Just a couple weeks out from launch the European and North American servers are barren outside of peak times, and even then they’re not exactly flourishing. The Asian server is doing better, but even there I am waiting ten minutes just for the game to give up and put me in a lobby with 4 real players, 16 bots, at 200ms ping.
To be fair to the game I am mostly playing at off-peak hours, but if your game can only muster up decently full lobbies at peak time, two weeks from launch, what is the future going to hold? Who is going to stick around to grind through a rather lacking (albeit admirably free) battle pass, or spend money in your (much less admirable) odious cosmetic cash shop. I don’t see a future for Sword Art Online: Fractured Daydream, even with the upcoming character pass carrying the star power of ‘M’.
Verdict
I cannot recommend Sword Art Online: Fractured Daydream. To anyone. Even the most committed Sword Art Online fans are unlikely to find much to love here. It is a live service title without legs. A real disappointment coming from the developers of Fatal Bullet. Perhaps with more development time and a clearer idea of what the game should be, it could have been a worthwhile endeavor. As it stands though it’s a sad, vapid outing for the series.
Other Sword Art Online games are available.
SWORD ART ONLINE: FRACTURED DAYDREAM IS NOT RECOMMENDED
If you are looking for another Action RPG, you might want to check out Ys X: Nordics. Or if you’re interested in an entry for another long-running Action RPG series, check out Visions of Mana.
Many thanks go to Bandai Namco for a PlayStation 5 review code for Sword Art Online: Fractured Daydream.
A man described by critics as “pretty normal” and “memorable in the abstract”. He has committed his life to the consumption of anime and games, against the advice and wishes of his family and friends. Now writing about his passions, hopefully for your enjoyment.
