BlazBlue Centralfiction – How to Not Softlock Grim of Abyss

I found almost no help for this, so I’ll take the initiative about 8 years too late.

Guide to Not Softlock Grim of Abyss

All credit goes to resoNathan!

How “Softlocks” Happen

When you start the game, you are given a single green grimoire. This is where all of your stats go. Any upgrades get applied to the book, and NOT to your character. Grimoires are the only way to become stronger in this mode. So what I’m saying is

Don’t destroy your starting grimoire!

The game will give you the option to break it down for free stuff. This is great, if you have more to use. If you don’t, though, then you are left holding a bunch of stuff you can’t really use, and you’ve lost your primary means of upgrading. It’s like selling your car to buy gas. And they make no attempt to warn you about this in game. Please, for the love of God, learn from my mistake.

But let’s say that you’re already beyond saving and you’ve made the same mistake as me…

How to Gain More Grimoires

Beat depth 100 in any level.

That’s it. That’s the only way to get a new book. You see those notifications in the corner every time you win a fight in this mode? The ones saying that you got new skills, and, wow! A new grimoire to replace the one you lost?

They’re lying.

You only get that if you beat the final depth. This means facing all 5 bosses, as well as any fighters that come before that. And just to remind you, this has to be done without any stat boosts. So how can we fix this?

How to Beat Depth 100

In the settings, under “game settings”, there is an option to change the difficulty. This can be changed at any time, and starts on “normal” (3/5). If you temporarily change it to “beginner” (1/5), beat one of the first 3 levels, then change it back to normal after you have your books back, then it won’t punish you.

Now, some of you might consider this to be cheating, but may I remind you that.

• This is a single-player game mode.
• You can change the difficulty higher when you’re done or refuse to upgrade your stats to make up the difference in XP that you got.
• There is not a soul on earth who cares about the competitive integrity of Grim of Abyss mode.

Granted, you are still perfectly within your rights to play normally and git gud enough to win legit, as you’re not really softlocked, but the poor button mashing souls like me need this.