Ever since I experienced Granblue Fantasy: Relink back in 2024, I’ve always regarded it as one of my favorite co-op action games of all time. Many will describe the game as “Anime Monster Hunter,” and, while that description is pretty apt, it also is a bit of an oversimplification of the great gaming experience this title provides and how, while similar, it is also distinct from what Monster Hunter is. Now, I’ve had the privilege of being able to quickly play a preview of Endless Ragnarok, the DLC that promises to add a metric ton of content to the base game. Spoiler: I loved it, and I simply can’t wait to dive in some more. Here are my Granblue Fantasy: Relink – Endless Ragnarok first impressions.
Granblue Fantasy: Relink Recap
For those of you who might’ve missed out, here’s a quick recap of what Granblue Fantasy: Relink is. It is basically an action RPG that follows the adventures of the crew of the Grandcypher Airship from the mobile game “Granblue Fantasy”. Do you need to play the mobile game for context? No. Will you miss out on a lot of lore if you don’t play the mobile game? Still no. Is there any strong reason that you should look into the mobile game first? Again, no. Relink was designed for players to hop straight into it. The game will provide all you need to know. In the first hours, you will be playing through the story, which also lets you become familiar with the game and its mechanics (think of it as a very lengthy tutorial) until you get to the real meat of the game that fans have fallen in love with – it’s end game. There, you get to fight against massive bosses that are best done with a party of 4 players. Yes, you can play this as a single player experience but the game really shines as a co-op with friends. This is where the Monster Hunter comparison comes from as you get to experience epic fights whilst performing sick anime moves while also parrying/dodging enemy attacks. The hardest fights even are comparable to those huge MMO raid fights where you are looking to overcome specific boss mechanics to give you the advantage.
What’s new in Granblue Fantasy: Relink – Endless Ragnarok?
As I said in the title, Endless Ragnarok is a massive DLC that basically adds 20-30 hours’ worth of new playtime. Before the quick gameplay preview, the devs from Cygames gave us a quick presentation to tell us what players will find in the DLC. Basically, you will get the following:
- A new solo mode called “The Conflux”
- New “Chaos Tier” Quests
- Players can now do Summons
- 6 New Characters
- Gallanza and Maglielle
- 2 characters from the OG Relink’s story
- Beatrix and Eustace
- 2 characters that share some lore with some of the existing characters
- Fraux and Fediel
- 2 completely new characters to Endless Ragnarok
- Gallanza and Maglielle
- New bosses
- Master Traits
- New events and scenes in the original Relink Story
- New story events
- Crossplay
For the purposes of this first impressions article, I’ll only go through the elements of the game that I saw and was able to experience in the quick preview we played.
Renewed Combat
I was able to play through a few quests and got a taste of the new combat elements that Endless Ragnarok had. The Chaos Tier quests are basically the new quests that feature harder fights as compared to Relink. BUT WAIT. Before you start jumping to the conclusion that they’re just throwing more difficult bosses for you, it’s much more than that. You see, because you now have Master Traits that give you more abilities for your character, you will be able to reach a strength level that will allow you to clear previously difficult content in Relink with much more ease. So the Chaos Tier quests are there to give you fights that will match the additional strength increase your characters will get from the Endless Ragnarok content. Sadly, the preview was kinda short so I wasn’t really able to fully explore Master Traits but I did get to briefly see what they do.
Master Traits can be unlocked once you’ve reached level 100. You can raise your Master Level with MSP and each Master Level you gain comes with some nice passives like additional ATK, HP, and Damage Cap. You will then get to select one of three styles that alter the combat flow of your character by giving you a Perk Effect that can enhance certain moves. Once you select a style, you will also get the chance to boost that style by learning particular passives. From what I can gather, these can really boost your character and it’s nice to be able to choose which style benefits your own particular playstyle.
You also get a new mechanic called Summons and these are quite the game changer. How it works is that you can equip Summons before a fight to a max of 4 (divided among the number of players in your party). Each summon will have a cost (from 1-3) and you now have a summon gauge which fills via link attacks and Skybound Arts. There are 3 segments and, depending on the cost of your summon, you will consume that many segments. One player will then swap with a Summon (which can be anything from bosses to NPCs) and you can spam attacks for a certain period. The player controlling the summon is also completely invulnerable during the summon period and that’s an amazing thing especially if you’re trying to skip certain boss mechanics or trying to iframe certain attacks. These summons are hella strong as they can stun or do control effects to the monsters you’re fighting. During the playthrough, I used the Furycane summon which was actually one of the bosses in OG Relink and it was able to deal a ton of damage. I’m honestly so excited to use this mechanic more when we review the game because I really wanna know more on what Summons are possible (BECAUSE I THINK I SAW THAT LUCILIUS WAS A POSSIBLE SUMMON).
Finally, you also have new bosses to face and they named 2 significant bosses called The World and Beelzebub. I honestly wasn’t able to fight any of them during my preview but the devs did demo to us a battle between them and a boss called THE WORLD which apparently, players from the mobile game will be familiar with. Let’s just say the battle looked amazingly crazy and exciting!
A Whole New World
Aside from combat, they did also add a few more things that players can enjoy. The devs mentioned that there are new story elements that were added to the game: both from the existing Relink story and the Endless Ragnarok story.
One of the very notable additions (that I did get to try) was The Conflux. This is basically a mode where the goal is to reach the end of a gauntlet and, after each victory, you are usually given a choice on what room you can tackle. Being able to reach the end of the gauntlet will give you a bunch of rewards.
Interestingly, it’s not all just fighting in the Conflux. For example, the Conflux we were able to try was called Cycle 4: Illusion. It basically consisted of 14 stages and 3 of those stages are boss floors that were situated at the quarter, midway, and end of the gauntlet. It’s not all just fights, though. Funnily enough, I came across rooms that had minigames on them where, instead of fighting, you got to play games like Spot The Difference and an NPC shell game. It was a nicely refreshing mode and I think this is a good way to really farm for materials and exp.
A LOT In Store
While the preview was relatively short, my Granblue Fantasy: Relink – Endless Ragnarok first impressions is that this DLC is set to be a massive game-changer to Relink and one that would give the game so much more to do and some really epic fights to overcome and conquer. I’m REALLY excited for what’s to come, and I can only hope that the actual content can live up to what the DLC promises. From what I saw, there’s a good chance that people who love coop action / hunting games like this will be eating good once it launches.
Granblue Fantasy: Relink – Endless Ragnarok launches on July 9, 2026 on PC, PS5, PS4, and Nintendo Switch 2.