why does this every vista in this game have such a urinous tint and glaucomal depth of field??? I dont find it visually appealing at all it looks like someone tried to make the Piss Christ out of an Illusion of Gaia screenshot
it's pretty
pretty fucking boring
pretty fucking boring
The soul is gone. That era is somewhere else. In its place, hollow exercises in innovating the same ideas, imitation of the text, lack of vision, and eye candy
if you ever wanted to play through the slow, badly paced early parts of a long JRPG eight times in a row and also deal with random encounters all the way through, here's your chance
amazing how they managed to create such a colorful and memorable cast of characters and then just not have them meaningfully interact with one another, at all
amazing how they managed to create such a colorful and memorable cast of characters and then just not have them meaningfully interact with one another, at all
octopath traveler is like if all of the asinine, bullshit, uninformed, absolute headass opinions videogamedunkey has had about what makes a jrpg bad were real and made into a game
Despite being far from perfect and having a lot of room for improvement, Octopath Traveler is a fascinating game. I wouldn't recommend it to everyone, as this game is mainly aimed at fans of more classic JRPGs, with all that implies, such as turn-based battles and random encounters. Still, it's not a game worth playing just for that nostalgic factor alone, but it's pretty good on its own merits, and being honest, I think I've found what is one of my favorite games.
Let's start by talking about the main appeal of the game, and that is the fact that we have 8 protagonists, each with their own path and journey to go on. The game gives you a choice of which story you want to start with first, and after finishing a short prologue with that character, you can explore the map to meet the other travelers and recruit them to your party. The character you choose first will become the party leader for the rest of the game, this serves as a balancing measure, as the fact that you always have that specific character in your party means that you somehow always have a strong character that can deal with tough enemies such as those above your level.
As such, each of the characters represents a typical RPG class, such as the mage, the cleric, the thief, the knight, etc. But what Octopath Traveler does to distinguish its characters from each other is by giving them exclusive abilities, each character is unique and has their own gimmick both in and out of battles, for example, H'aanit has the predefined hunter class, which gives her the ability to unlock useful support and attack abilities, but she also has the exclusive ability to challenge villagers to fight against them in towns and additionally the ability to capture monsters in battle, which serves to summon monsters and use their special moves. This is further expanded with the class system that makes the characters even more versatile by allowing them to access the classes of the other travelers, so the fact that everyone has their own unique ability is something I like, but still the game is permissive enough to not make a specific character indispensable in battles thanks to the class system itself, so any combination of characters in your party can be completely viable.
First of all, the gameplay of this game is excellent, it builds on the foundations of classic turn-based combat gameplay, but expands and modernizes it by adding unique risk-reward elements that add a lot of depth to the combat, it's simply amazing. The game is driven by the boost system, which serves to make the attack or ability you perform in one turn have the effectiveness of 2 or more turns depending on how many points you use, it's quite similar to the tension system of DQVIII and DQIX (just to make a quick comparison), only much more flexible and taken to another level. Also, another system that the game implements is to "break" your enemies, which is achieved by attacking them in their weak point until their shield indicator is "0", when this is achieved, you can take 2 turns away from the enemy, besides making him more vulnerable to all kinds of attacks. These two systems together make Octopath Traveler's combat system extremely fun and engaging, as well as satisfying, as it rewards the player's ingenuity and is very versatile which allows you to experiment with all kinds of strategies, as you can approach battles either by playing the traditional way, focusing on applying buffs to your party and applying debuffs to your enemies, or on the other hand, focusing on exploiting the weaknesses of your enemies, or even with a combination of both approaches. One of my favorite classes was the merchant, because it has the ability to donate boost points to other characters during combat and makes strategizing even more fun, because if you play well, most normal battles are over in 1 or 2 turns.
The game gives you a LOT of tools to get through combat, ranging from items you can steal/buy from villagers or find in the myriad of chests scattered around the maps, and there are even support abilities that can help you narrow down the range of random battles quite a bit. On that note, I like how Octopath Traveler really cares about making your experience as smooth as possible, as there are even save points scattered around at key points, such as before entering caves/dungeons and before any boss fights. I really like how incredibly well balanced this game is. Still, I can see less experienced players in the genre thinking that this game is very difficult and requires a lot of grinding. But even so, I was sometimes able to be in many fights where the recommended level was above my own, and I always tried to make it so because I liked the increase in difficulty that comes with it.
Even with all the good things, this game does not save itself from having some defects to highlight, for example, in each chapter the characters can have conversations with each other, similar to the party chat of DQ7, the detail here is that to get these dialogues you must take certain members in your party at specific times that the game never tells you, I had to guide me with this post to know which characters to take, and even so it is a drag that to change the members of your party you always have to go to a tavern. I think it's a big mistake that the interactions between the party are guarded in this way.
Speaking of the structure of the game, it is somewhat monotonous, as it consists of arriving at a town, starting the story of a character, watching cutscenes, defeating the dungeon and its boss and continuing in the same way with the other chapters, even so, I do not see this as something bad, as the game is not linear and allows you to approach the stories and explore the map in any order, although I think it is something that could be improved by making more variations to this structure.
The world of Octopath Traveler is large, as there is quite a lot of optional content such as dungeons and side quests, but still, I feel that in this section sometimes the game focuses more on offering quantity over quality, for example, on the map there are a lot of caves that are totally optional, You would think that completing them would reward you with a very useful weapon or something like that, but the truth is that most of the time the items you can get from these places are not that useful, being more useful the same items you can get by stealing/buying from NPCs.
At the end of the last chapters the game has post-game content with a good length, which gives closure to the stories of some of the secondary characters, besides having some secret bosses of high difficulty and 4 secret advanced jobs that will be necessary for the super-boss, which speaking of the super-boss, this one is very difficult, which I did not like, because although it is not essential, it is advisable to face it because it unveils a lot of relevant background to the history of each of the protagonists. The side quests are pretty generic most of the time, so it's surprising to learn that there's a side quest that unlocks the game's super boss and the hardest battle. I didn't entirely like this, as there is a lot of story-relevant information that is unveiled in this side mission, plus the battle song is great. I think it would have been better to have made this the final chapter of all the stories and made the boss a bit easier.
And of course, the graphic style is excellent and somewhat novel. If you like the pixel art that the SNES/PS1 games had, you'll love the art style of Octopath Traveler. It's a weird mix of pixel art and realistic high-fidelity effects, but it's quite well done and together they add a lot to the immersion by giving more depth and detail to the environments in this way. In my opinion, it revives and gives another chance to the pixel art style in current games, as it looks quite familiar, but at the same time modern enough for current standards. It's like seeing an evolution of the art style that games like Dragon Quest VII or Xenogears had on PS1, as it combines pixel art textures with 3D structures, this game in particular achieves the look of a diorama that looks pretty good.
Another thing to highlight about this game is its soundtrack, one might think that it would be in a 16-bit style like pixel art or synthesized, but no, each piece is made with real instruments, and this time the composer Yasunori Nishiki delights us with a soundtrack of extremely high quality. Without a doubt my favorite themes have to be the boss battles, both the first and the second are fantastic, so much so that I simply couldn't help but get goosebumps every time there was a boss battle. But there are other themes that also fascinate me because of how atmospheric they are, like the ones that sound when you explore the forests or the icy areas. Without a doubt there are a lot of quality songs, which show that the composer really made an effort not only to create melodies that are pleasant to listen to, but that also portray the personality of the game, because for example, the theme of each character encapsulates the personality of each one that is almost as if their themes had been composed for them and no one else, in the case of Ophilia, her theme captures that tenderness and kindness that the character has, while Therion's theme conveys very well her loneliness and affliction.
Finally, speaking of the 8 stories that the game has in store, each one is good, some have a somewhat slow pace, but each one ends up being a good story with interesting themes and characters. The bad thing, is that each story is disconnected with all the others, that is to say, when you are inside the chapter of one of the main characters, the other 7 will not have any kind of participation and in general, no story is related to the others. Somehow, by the end I felt a lot of attachment with each character and each of the stories resonated with me. If I had to mention my favorite stories, they would be Alfyn, Therion, Ophilia and Olberic, although I really like the others as well.
Conclusion
This game is important. In a time where even Dragon Quest wants to leave aside the traditional JRPG structure, it is comforting to see a game that stands up to the rest and reclaims styles from the past that are not necessarily "outdated" as many believe, but are simply another style of game that many of us still enjoy and want to continue to see. Octopath Traveler presents classic systems, but modernized with original mechanics and better balanced, with a unique pixel art visual style when nowadays almost any company wants to leave that style in oblivion.
I think what the development team did for classic JRPGs and pixel art games is to be admired, because thanks to Octopath Traveler games like Triangle Strategy, Live A Live Remake or Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake can exist. This game not only serves as a tribute to the classic era of the genre, but is original enough to be considered its own thing.
Let's start by talking about the main appeal of the game, and that is the fact that we have 8 protagonists, each with their own path and journey to go on. The game gives you a choice of which story you want to start with first, and after finishing a short prologue with that character, you can explore the map to meet the other travelers and recruit them to your party. The character you choose first will become the party leader for the rest of the game, this serves as a balancing measure, as the fact that you always have that specific character in your party means that you somehow always have a strong character that can deal with tough enemies such as those above your level.
As such, each of the characters represents a typical RPG class, such as the mage, the cleric, the thief, the knight, etc. But what Octopath Traveler does to distinguish its characters from each other is by giving them exclusive abilities, each character is unique and has their own gimmick both in and out of battles, for example, H'aanit has the predefined hunter class, which gives her the ability to unlock useful support and attack abilities, but she also has the exclusive ability to challenge villagers to fight against them in towns and additionally the ability to capture monsters in battle, which serves to summon monsters and use their special moves. This is further expanded with the class system that makes the characters even more versatile by allowing them to access the classes of the other travelers, so the fact that everyone has their own unique ability is something I like, but still the game is permissive enough to not make a specific character indispensable in battles thanks to the class system itself, so any combination of characters in your party can be completely viable.
First of all, the gameplay of this game is excellent, it builds on the foundations of classic turn-based combat gameplay, but expands and modernizes it by adding unique risk-reward elements that add a lot of depth to the combat, it's simply amazing. The game is driven by the boost system, which serves to make the attack or ability you perform in one turn have the effectiveness of 2 or more turns depending on how many points you use, it's quite similar to the tension system of DQVIII and DQIX (just to make a quick comparison), only much more flexible and taken to another level. Also, another system that the game implements is to "break" your enemies, which is achieved by attacking them in their weak point until their shield indicator is "0", when this is achieved, you can take 2 turns away from the enemy, besides making him more vulnerable to all kinds of attacks. These two systems together make Octopath Traveler's combat system extremely fun and engaging, as well as satisfying, as it rewards the player's ingenuity and is very versatile which allows you to experiment with all kinds of strategies, as you can approach battles either by playing the traditional way, focusing on applying buffs to your party and applying debuffs to your enemies, or on the other hand, focusing on exploiting the weaknesses of your enemies, or even with a combination of both approaches. One of my favorite classes was the merchant, because it has the ability to donate boost points to other characters during combat and makes strategizing even more fun, because if you play well, most normal battles are over in 1 or 2 turns.
The game gives you a LOT of tools to get through combat, ranging from items you can steal/buy from villagers or find in the myriad of chests scattered around the maps, and there are even support abilities that can help you narrow down the range of random battles quite a bit. On that note, I like how Octopath Traveler really cares about making your experience as smooth as possible, as there are even save points scattered around at key points, such as before entering caves/dungeons and before any boss fights. I really like how incredibly well balanced this game is. Still, I can see less experienced players in the genre thinking that this game is very difficult and requires a lot of grinding. But even so, I was sometimes able to be in many fights where the recommended level was above my own, and I always tried to make it so because I liked the increase in difficulty that comes with it.
Even with all the good things, this game does not save itself from having some defects to highlight, for example, in each chapter the characters can have conversations with each other, similar to the party chat of DQ7, the detail here is that to get these dialogues you must take certain members in your party at specific times that the game never tells you, I had to guide me with this post to know which characters to take, and even so it is a drag that to change the members of your party you always have to go to a tavern. I think it's a big mistake that the interactions between the party are guarded in this way.
Speaking of the structure of the game, it is somewhat monotonous, as it consists of arriving at a town, starting the story of a character, watching cutscenes, defeating the dungeon and its boss and continuing in the same way with the other chapters, even so, I do not see this as something bad, as the game is not linear and allows you to approach the stories and explore the map in any order, although I think it is something that could be improved by making more variations to this structure.
The world of Octopath Traveler is large, as there is quite a lot of optional content such as dungeons and side quests, but still, I feel that in this section sometimes the game focuses more on offering quantity over quality, for example, on the map there are a lot of caves that are totally optional, You would think that completing them would reward you with a very useful weapon or something like that, but the truth is that most of the time the items you can get from these places are not that useful, being more useful the same items you can get by stealing/buying from NPCs.
At the end of the last chapters the game has post-game content with a good length, which gives closure to the stories of some of the secondary characters, besides having some secret bosses of high difficulty and 4 secret advanced jobs that will be necessary for the super-boss, which speaking of the super-boss, this one is very difficult, which I did not like, because although it is not essential, it is advisable to face it because it unveils a lot of relevant background to the history of each of the protagonists. The side quests are pretty generic most of the time, so it's surprising to learn that there's a side quest that unlocks the game's super boss and the hardest battle. I didn't entirely like this, as there is a lot of story-relevant information that is unveiled in this side mission, plus the battle song is great. I think it would have been better to have made this the final chapter of all the stories and made the boss a bit easier.
And of course, the graphic style is excellent and somewhat novel. If you like the pixel art that the SNES/PS1 games had, you'll love the art style of Octopath Traveler. It's a weird mix of pixel art and realistic high-fidelity effects, but it's quite well done and together they add a lot to the immersion by giving more depth and detail to the environments in this way. In my opinion, it revives and gives another chance to the pixel art style in current games, as it looks quite familiar, but at the same time modern enough for current standards. It's like seeing an evolution of the art style that games like Dragon Quest VII or Xenogears had on PS1, as it combines pixel art textures with 3D structures, this game in particular achieves the look of a diorama that looks pretty good.
Another thing to highlight about this game is its soundtrack, one might think that it would be in a 16-bit style like pixel art or synthesized, but no, each piece is made with real instruments, and this time the composer Yasunori Nishiki delights us with a soundtrack of extremely high quality. Without a doubt my favorite themes have to be the boss battles, both the first and the second are fantastic, so much so that I simply couldn't help but get goosebumps every time there was a boss battle. But there are other themes that also fascinate me because of how atmospheric they are, like the ones that sound when you explore the forests or the icy areas. Without a doubt there are a lot of quality songs, which show that the composer really made an effort not only to create melodies that are pleasant to listen to, but that also portray the personality of the game, because for example, the theme of each character encapsulates the personality of each one that is almost as if their themes had been composed for them and no one else, in the case of Ophilia, her theme captures that tenderness and kindness that the character has, while Therion's theme conveys very well her loneliness and affliction.
Finally, speaking of the 8 stories that the game has in store, each one is good, some have a somewhat slow pace, but each one ends up being a good story with interesting themes and characters. The bad thing, is that each story is disconnected with all the others, that is to say, when you are inside the chapter of one of the main characters, the other 7 will not have any kind of participation and in general, no story is related to the others. Somehow, by the end I felt a lot of attachment with each character and each of the stories resonated with me. If I had to mention my favorite stories, they would be Alfyn, Therion, Ophilia and Olberic, although I really like the others as well.
Conclusion
This game is important. In a time where even Dragon Quest wants to leave aside the traditional JRPG structure, it is comforting to see a game that stands up to the rest and reclaims styles from the past that are not necessarily "outdated" as many believe, but are simply another style of game that many of us still enjoy and want to continue to see. Octopath Traveler presents classic systems, but modernized with original mechanics and better balanced, with a unique pixel art visual style when nowadays almost any company wants to leave that style in oblivion.
I think what the development team did for classic JRPGs and pixel art games is to be admired, because thanks to Octopath Traveler games like Triangle Strategy, Live A Live Remake or Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake can exist. This game not only serves as a tribute to the classic era of the genre, but is original enough to be considered its own thing.
tedious as fuck but still quite beautiful
i will make something very clear here I played this game in 2020 or something and i liked it for the first chapters but as soon as I got into the 2nd chapters and got accustomed to the disgustingly agonising racking excruciating grinding I completely lost any interest in it
I never enjoyed grinding and I will never enjoy it in any way shape or form I can understand grinding in SMT (my prototype for any rpg ever I am a smt fag after all) which is a party builder and it's focused in leveling up to fuse more demons so it's always interesting but grinding for only numbers to go up so I won't fucking get annihilated by a boss with too many HPs its too much for the game to be enjoyable
so because I wanted to enjoy this game without fucking around for hours and hours only to see 5 minutes of story each I used a mod which made the ability of primrose (dancer) I have no idea how its called in english so I'll say grazia eccelsa like anyone on this site knows italian increase the chance of EXP x100 from 0.1% to 7% which isn't THAT cheaty but if anyone wants to say I cheated and i ruined the experience or whatever I dont give a fuck I would not be able to finish this game if I had to grind the shit out of it and this mod actually made me able to enjoy the game more than I would've ever done without it and it's absolutely jarring to me that I managed to finish the main story in 30 hours VS the 60 hours this game usually takes to beat which means theres 30 WHOLE HOURS of grinding this is fucking awful people I'm so sorry I thought 30 hours was a great clocking time for this game and if the developers didn't use this expedient of doubling the playing time using boring grinding I think more people would like this game
reason why this is a 3.5 and not 3 or less
so that being said for transparency purposes here's what I think about the game
you play as 8 characters and each character got his own story and his own set of bosses and OSTs more on that later
the characters aren't that deep they all have pretty superficial characterization but god do I love every fucking one of them I enjoy seeing my sweet babies going through hardships and deaths a bit too much
all of them got some archetypes theres the dancer femme fatale primrose (favourite character she carried the entire game) strict but generous ex soldier olberic and cute and sweet and hot alfyn and baby tressa and and and ophilia and therion and cyrus I UGHHHHHHHHHH I LOVE EVERYONE HERE and yeah there's ha'anit … she exists
now I won't disclose every single story because it would take so fucking long and I don't want to get into spoilery territory this time I can say the different stories got some major ups and downs and it's just an expansion of the premise like primrose avenging the death of his father ophilia travelling the world to bring the sacred flame or cyrus who gotta unveil the secrets of a lost tome it's just every single story got some sexy ass synopsis whose progress may or may not be fulfilling
considerations: in my first playthrough I hated cyrus and tressa but this time I actually grew tender towards them and actually cyrus story absolutely blew me away and now he's one of my fav characters in this game and tressa well tressa has a nice character and her story is cute so yeah growth
my absolutely not biased thoughts about the stories are primrose > cyrus/ophilia > olberic/alfyn > tressa/therion >>>>>> ha'anit I'm sorry this is how it is for me primrose ate
i do actually love all the stories though so yeah and the side characters and villains are also pretty interesting and varied although most of the main intrigues fall into the same tropey stuff
erhardt in olberics story is actually one of my favourite characters in the entire game and he's not even in the main 8 he's just the love of my life incredible groundbreaking love him dearly best boo
now to add to that theres the battle system which is great when you don't have to grind and grind and grind if you played bravely default it has a system like that where during turns you will accumulate some power ups for your abilities and you can use them to unleash greater moves and its fucking addicting id say plus theres a lot of abilities for each job (+secondary jobs) and it can get really tactic y at some points which I enjoyed and that accompanies the exploiting weaknesses mechanic and its good good shit
apart from the fact that some enemies are literal damage sponges if youre not overleveled
that being said we can get into the real meat of this entire game which is the art direction
artistically speaking this is one of the most beautiful games I have ever touched in my entire life it basically uses a SNES inspired pixel art for the main character and they move in a 2.5D landscape with 3D objects and 2D objects adding the luscious unreal engine flair with dramatic lights incredibly vivid hues and depth of field
this single handedly gave birth to the 2D HD engine which opens a wide variety of possibilities for new games and still looking at this it's a great great blueprint and a beautiful view to behold
the landscapes are also varied and full of life going from deserts to forests to shores to mountains its actually really great it could look pretty bland to some but I think its great how seamlessly you move from a biome to another and there's at least some stuff to get in the meantime so you dont grow tired or anything
my main issue is with dungeons which have like 4 prototypes and they repeat it for the entire game like Random Palace and Spooky Cavern and Sandy Place and Mysteryous Woods the end ok actually theres some other stuff too but the other optional dungeons have one of these samples and repeat it again and again and again with some different landscape aspect or something but I didnt think of it as an issue or anything is just something that may have been further expanded
still some of the best things in this game is still the pixel art some bosses have gorgeous looking pixel arts it's stunning STUNNING truly and also the animation of spells and stuff is pretty cool I love particle effects maybe its the ADD kicking in
but
the real shining stuff here is the OST . now this fucking ost is something else people it's great it's incredible its absolutely breathtaking every single character has their own theme and every single (type of) dungeon has a fitting music towns have great tunes and battles get that extra punch with some bangers but what to this day surprises me is the boss battle theme transition
whenever you get into a boss battle during the cutscenes a motif for the character will play out and when you click the last textbox the ost escalates quickly and seamlessly into the boss battle theme this actually to this day bewilds me even tho I listened to it a 100 times (if youre lucky it will get into decisive battle II or else it will get into decisive battle I that first theme is UGH BEAUTIFUL BEAUTIFUL)
favourite transition is tressas motif to decisive battle II that's actually some of the best musical piece I've ever listened to I can't even lie here
or actually listen to primrose theme or THIS BEAUTIFUL THEME FOR THERION or this theme for frostlands or MY FAVOURITE FUCKING DUNGEON THEME UGHHHHHHH it's great I love this games soundtrack it truly heightens the experience
ok anyway in the end there's actually a "post game" or something where you get into a final dungeon and words and words and words of infodumps to actually connect the different stories into one by using a character to entwine all the plots
I didnt find it that gripping or that groundbreaking because it feels like an after thought and too derivative of a live a live post gameplay experience but the disgustingly detailed final boss is great as fuck so I cant complain even tho I sure didn't want to read a hour of retconned content even though it's kinda cool
so whatever good or something
umh I liked this anyway this would realistically be a 3 but I ended up falling in love with it too much
i would suggest for people that can't stand grinding to use the mod because this game actually feels playable like that and a 30 hrs runtime is bomb so yeah
high hopes for octopath 2 to fix some stuff
i will make something very clear here I played this game in 2020 or something and i liked it for the first chapters but as soon as I got into the 2nd chapters and got accustomed to the disgustingly agonising racking excruciating grinding I completely lost any interest in it
I never enjoyed grinding and I will never enjoy it in any way shape or form I can understand grinding in SMT (my prototype for any rpg ever I am a smt fag after all) which is a party builder and it's focused in leveling up to fuse more demons so it's always interesting but grinding for only numbers to go up so I won't fucking get annihilated by a boss with too many HPs its too much for the game to be enjoyable
so because I wanted to enjoy this game without fucking around for hours and hours only to see 5 minutes of story each I used a mod which made the ability of primrose (dancer) I have no idea how its called in english so I'll say grazia eccelsa like anyone on this site knows italian increase the chance of EXP x100 from 0.1% to 7% which isn't THAT cheaty but if anyone wants to say I cheated and i ruined the experience or whatever I dont give a fuck I would not be able to finish this game if I had to grind the shit out of it and this mod actually made me able to enjoy the game more than I would've ever done without it and it's absolutely jarring to me that I managed to finish the main story in 30 hours VS the 60 hours this game usually takes to beat which means theres 30 WHOLE HOURS of grinding this is fucking awful people I'm so sorry I thought 30 hours was a great clocking time for this game and if the developers didn't use this expedient of doubling the playing time using boring grinding I think more people would like this game
reason why this is a 3.5 and not 3 or less
so that being said for transparency purposes here's what I think about the game
you play as 8 characters and each character got his own story and his own set of bosses and OSTs more on that later
the characters aren't that deep they all have pretty superficial characterization but god do I love every fucking one of them I enjoy seeing my sweet babies going through hardships and deaths a bit too much
all of them got some archetypes theres the dancer femme fatale primrose (favourite character she carried the entire game) strict but generous ex soldier olberic and cute and sweet and hot alfyn and baby tressa and and and ophilia and therion and cyrus I UGHHHHHHHHHH I LOVE EVERYONE HERE and yeah there's ha'anit … she exists
now I won't disclose every single story because it would take so fucking long and I don't want to get into spoilery territory this time I can say the different stories got some major ups and downs and it's just an expansion of the premise like primrose avenging the death of his father ophilia travelling the world to bring the sacred flame or cyrus who gotta unveil the secrets of a lost tome it's just every single story got some sexy ass synopsis whose progress may or may not be fulfilling
considerations: in my first playthrough I hated cyrus and tressa but this time I actually grew tender towards them and actually cyrus story absolutely blew me away and now he's one of my fav characters in this game and tressa well tressa has a nice character and her story is cute so yeah growth
my absolutely not biased thoughts about the stories are primrose > cyrus/ophilia > olberic/alfyn > tressa/therion >>>>>> ha'anit I'm sorry this is how it is for me primrose ate
i do actually love all the stories though so yeah and the side characters and villains are also pretty interesting and varied although most of the main intrigues fall into the same tropey stuff
erhardt in olberics story is actually one of my favourite characters in the entire game and he's not even in the main 8 he's just the love of my life incredible groundbreaking love him dearly best boo
now to add to that theres the battle system which is great when you don't have to grind and grind and grind if you played bravely default it has a system like that where during turns you will accumulate some power ups for your abilities and you can use them to unleash greater moves and its fucking addicting id say plus theres a lot of abilities for each job (+secondary jobs) and it can get really tactic y at some points which I enjoyed and that accompanies the exploiting weaknesses mechanic and its good good shit
apart from the fact that some enemies are literal damage sponges if youre not overleveled
that being said we can get into the real meat of this entire game which is the art direction
artistically speaking this is one of the most beautiful games I have ever touched in my entire life it basically uses a SNES inspired pixel art for the main character and they move in a 2.5D landscape with 3D objects and 2D objects adding the luscious unreal engine flair with dramatic lights incredibly vivid hues and depth of field
this single handedly gave birth to the 2D HD engine which opens a wide variety of possibilities for new games and still looking at this it's a great great blueprint and a beautiful view to behold
the landscapes are also varied and full of life going from deserts to forests to shores to mountains its actually really great it could look pretty bland to some but I think its great how seamlessly you move from a biome to another and there's at least some stuff to get in the meantime so you dont grow tired or anything
my main issue is with dungeons which have like 4 prototypes and they repeat it for the entire game like Random Palace and Spooky Cavern and Sandy Place and Mysteryous Woods the end ok actually theres some other stuff too but the other optional dungeons have one of these samples and repeat it again and again and again with some different landscape aspect or something but I didnt think of it as an issue or anything is just something that may have been further expanded
still some of the best things in this game is still the pixel art some bosses have gorgeous looking pixel arts it's stunning STUNNING truly and also the animation of spells and stuff is pretty cool I love particle effects maybe its the ADD kicking in
but
the real shining stuff here is the OST . now this fucking ost is something else people it's great it's incredible its absolutely breathtaking every single character has their own theme and every single (type of) dungeon has a fitting music towns have great tunes and battles get that extra punch with some bangers but what to this day surprises me is the boss battle theme transition
whenever you get into a boss battle during the cutscenes a motif for the character will play out and when you click the last textbox the ost escalates quickly and seamlessly into the boss battle theme this actually to this day bewilds me even tho I listened to it a 100 times (if youre lucky it will get into decisive battle II or else it will get into decisive battle I that first theme is UGH BEAUTIFUL BEAUTIFUL)
favourite transition is tressas motif to decisive battle II that's actually some of the best musical piece I've ever listened to I can't even lie here
or actually listen to primrose theme or THIS BEAUTIFUL THEME FOR THERION or this theme for frostlands or MY FAVOURITE FUCKING DUNGEON THEME UGHHHHHHH it's great I love this games soundtrack it truly heightens the experience
ok anyway in the end there's actually a "post game" or something where you get into a final dungeon and words and words and words of infodumps to actually connect the different stories into one by using a character to entwine all the plots
I didnt find it that gripping or that groundbreaking because it feels like an after thought and too derivative of a live a live post gameplay experience but the disgustingly detailed final boss is great as fuck so I cant complain even tho I sure didn't want to read a hour of retconned content even though it's kinda cool
so whatever good or something
umh I liked this anyway this would realistically be a 3 but I ended up falling in love with it too much
i would suggest for people that can't stand grinding to use the mod because this game actually feels playable like that and a 30 hrs runtime is bomb so yeah
high hopes for octopath 2 to fix some stuff
Kept teasing me with interesting ideas, compelling me to play as long as I did (through everyone’s second chapter and into a couple of their thirds), but eventually I had to admit to myself that it was just a complete chore to play. I like customizing each character with the jobs, I like the whole pixelart meets pop-up book styled aesthetic. But the random encounters are obnoxiously frequent, the enemies are overly tanky, once you’ve figured out their weaknesses fights become a tedious formality, as well you’re hit with frequent grindwalls that completely stall your progress.
The stories themselves vary in my eyes, ranging from generic and cringeworthy, to unique and colourful. I started with Olberic for example, who I found to be just a complete plank of wood, and I really wish I could’ve changed protagonists because I was much more interested in Haanit, the huntress who speaks like Shakespeare, searching for her master, or Primrose, the stripper lady who fights Donald Trump and hunts down the crow people (I joke, but her story goes to some dark places). It’s also really jarring structurally, the game advertises an open ended structure, a “make your own adventure” type deal, but the level requirements roughly constrict you to a set sequence for the most part, which means you’ll constantly be jumping from one story to the next, and given how your characters don’t interact outside of some kind of disconnected instances, the game’s structural and narrative momentum is non-existent. I will give it this though, I like how local it all feels. I kept waiting for the part where all the stories converged and we had to stop the bad guy from resurrecting some legendary super villain, preventing him from laying waste to the world, but that part never came. It felt like a simple, self contained journey through different corners of this world. It’s a refreshingly modest approach.
The stories themselves vary in my eyes, ranging from generic and cringeworthy, to unique and colourful. I started with Olberic for example, who I found to be just a complete plank of wood, and I really wish I could’ve changed protagonists because I was much more interested in Haanit, the huntress who speaks like Shakespeare, searching for her master, or Primrose, the stripper lady who fights Donald Trump and hunts down the crow people (I joke, but her story goes to some dark places). It’s also really jarring structurally, the game advertises an open ended structure, a “make your own adventure” type deal, but the level requirements roughly constrict you to a set sequence for the most part, which means you’ll constantly be jumping from one story to the next, and given how your characters don’t interact outside of some kind of disconnected instances, the game’s structural and narrative momentum is non-existent. I will give it this though, I like how local it all feels. I kept waiting for the part where all the stories converged and we had to stop the bad guy from resurrecting some legendary super villain, preventing him from laying waste to the world, but that part never came. It felt like a simple, self contained journey through different corners of this world. It’s a refreshingly modest approach.
Good lord, I tried to like this game, I really did.
I really don't see the appeal of wandering around a circular loop of a map to do one disconnected story quest that one character has to do to the next one. It's an arduous repetitive loop that Octopath just lavishes in which drags the games pacing to a slog, which doesn't help that the story and characters are just not interesting. There's absolutely no originality here, just what Square Enix believes is ye olden medieval speaking stereotypes going around on their predictable journeys, with no resemblance of having interesting themes or story cohesion. God forbid any of these characters to attempt to talk to one another. That's really the main issue with Octopath Traveler, it feels split apart by design. It makes you want to go on a journey with party members with their own aspirations and goals but never together like in a normal JRPG, at least not until its final quest that attempts to make the journey worth it, but comes off as rushed and half-hearted. It makes the whole experience at most bland or at worst soulless. It seems whenever Square Enix makes JRPGs now, they only have two choices to handle the narrative: full-on anime sicko mode, or what Square Enix believes people want from the old turn-based RPG from their old days. The looks and the setting, but never the heart that was the driving force of those games.
And good lord, the lighting in this game alone ruined the art direction for me. What is the appeal of having these neat sprites clashing with lens flares and blinding light sources out of a Michael Bay movie but he rubbed the camera with extra Vaseline? It looks awful.
I really don't see the appeal of wandering around a circular loop of a map to do one disconnected story quest that one character has to do to the next one. It's an arduous repetitive loop that Octopath just lavishes in which drags the games pacing to a slog, which doesn't help that the story and characters are just not interesting. There's absolutely no originality here, just what Square Enix believes is ye olden medieval speaking stereotypes going around on their predictable journeys, with no resemblance of having interesting themes or story cohesion. God forbid any of these characters to attempt to talk to one another. That's really the main issue with Octopath Traveler, it feels split apart by design. It makes you want to go on a journey with party members with their own aspirations and goals but never together like in a normal JRPG, at least not until its final quest that attempts to make the journey worth it, but comes off as rushed and half-hearted. It makes the whole experience at most bland or at worst soulless. It seems whenever Square Enix makes JRPGs now, they only have two choices to handle the narrative: full-on anime sicko mode, or what Square Enix believes people want from the old turn-based RPG from their old days. The looks and the setting, but never the heart that was the driving force of those games.
And good lord, the lighting in this game alone ruined the art direction for me. What is the appeal of having these neat sprites clashing with lens flares and blinding light sources out of a Michael Bay movie but he rubbed the camera with extra Vaseline? It looks awful.
it's entirely possible the final 30 hours of this game are peak, but i'm absolutely not willing to go from the 10 hour mark to the 20 hour mark
going in blind through 8 prologues only to be met with an actual level gap of 10 levels to the next quest at level 15 is insane - i did my best to stick with it but after going at it and realizing it would be several hours just for half of the party unless i did some serious wikicheesing ive decided there's about 15 atelier games more worth my time for the same output
it's a shame because the fundamentals - combat, visuals, sound, world design and character writing - all seem excellent, but it's like they released this with a force field around it to keep anyone but people who calculate game ratings by ($/hour of playtime) away from it
at least it made an engine for old square jrpgs to be remastered in
going in blind through 8 prologues only to be met with an actual level gap of 10 levels to the next quest at level 15 is insane - i did my best to stick with it but after going at it and realizing it would be several hours just for half of the party unless i did some serious wikicheesing ive decided there's about 15 atelier games more worth my time for the same output
it's a shame because the fundamentals - combat, visuals, sound, world design and character writing - all seem excellent, but it's like they released this with a force field around it to keep anyone but people who calculate game ratings by ($/hour of playtime) away from it
at least it made an engine for old square jrpgs to be remastered in
I love the art style, the interesting 3D version of a 2D game is so cool and they added this unique depth of field that makes the game feel like you are looking at it almost through a snow globe. The combat is nostalgic yet doesn't feel completely derivative. There are also a few genuinely interesting characters (Olberic and Primrose really stood out to me) and the voice acting is good across the board which was a genuine surprise. Boss fights are challenging and require good team composition and strategy though sometimes border on overly long and tedious instead of difficult but some people like super long boss fights so your mileage may vary.
The problem for me with Octopath Traveler is that every character has their own seemingly isolated questline with relatively small stakes. There is no overarching narrative forcing the characters to team up, rather they just choose to travel together for some reason. This might be perfectly fine for some people but to me it's a real crime to write a JRPG and not include interpersonal conflict and story arcs that challenge and develop teammates bonds with each other - This is what makes stories like FFVII and FFX so memorable and it's just not here at all in this game and I don't really understand why. The archetypes are all there, it had so much potential but I guess going with the modular chapter design where you can pick up any party members story at any time as you see fit made having an overarching plot and interpersonal character development difficult. As I'm sure you can tell, this juice was not worth the squeeze in my opinion and actually hamstrung what could have been an amazing classic JRPG.
The problem for me with Octopath Traveler is that every character has their own seemingly isolated questline with relatively small stakes. There is no overarching narrative forcing the characters to team up, rather they just choose to travel together for some reason. This might be perfectly fine for some people but to me it's a real crime to write a JRPG and not include interpersonal conflict and story arcs that challenge and develop teammates bonds with each other - This is what makes stories like FFVII and FFX so memorable and it's just not here at all in this game and I don't really understand why. The archetypes are all there, it had so much potential but I guess going with the modular chapter design where you can pick up any party members story at any time as you see fit made having an overarching plot and interpersonal character development difficult. As I'm sure you can tell, this juice was not worth the squeeze in my opinion and actually hamstrung what could have been an amazing classic JRPG.
This is a better video game than NieR Replicant
square enix hire this man
I enjoy this game. It's extremely flawed mind you. There's a lot of grinding and there's no bonus EXP to share with reserve party members, meaning you have to prepare for the long haul if you wanna complete every story. I also think the Job system is limiting since only one character can have one secondary job and you have to do some musical chairs to make sure your party is aligned correctly. Same with equipping armor for that matter. The journey to the final boss is also really time consuming
Despite this, I pretty much love everything else about this game. I enjoy the break system and the strategies that come with it, making you feel like a genius when you exploit an enemy's weak point. Each character's unique talent really do help with how you strategize each battle. The boss fights are also exciting when you figure them out, and this game can be pretty hard if you don't play it right.
Also being the first game with the HD-2D pixel art aesthetig of 2D sprites in 3D backgrounds and worlds I think it's a pretty killer style. It's definitely pretty flat compared to the games that came after (Octopath II isn't out yet as I type this), but I really do enjoy how the desert, snow, ocean, and forest area look the most as they really show what you can do with this art style. And the music for each of these areas are my favorite. The music during battle is also full of variety depending on the encounter. Being Yasunori Nishiki's first gig in fully composing his own soundtrack and he knocked it out of the park, and I can only hope he does more from here on out.
If you want to know my favorite character stories it's Alfyn > Therion > Primrose > Cyrus > Olberic > Ophilia > Tressa > H'aanit. I think every character has a good story though I definitely have my preferences. Alfyn's surprised me the most hence why I put him on top
So yeah, not a perfect game at all but I really love what this game set out to do. I disagree with the criticism regarding actual character interactions within the story because this game is about their stories in a vacuum; its like Live A Live in that sense, which is probably why we got a remake.
Despite this, I pretty much love everything else about this game. I enjoy the break system and the strategies that come with it, making you feel like a genius when you exploit an enemy's weak point. Each character's unique talent really do help with how you strategize each battle. The boss fights are also exciting when you figure them out, and this game can be pretty hard if you don't play it right.
Also being the first game with the HD-2D pixel art aesthetig of 2D sprites in 3D backgrounds and worlds I think it's a pretty killer style. It's definitely pretty flat compared to the games that came after (Octopath II isn't out yet as I type this), but I really do enjoy how the desert, snow, ocean, and forest area look the most as they really show what you can do with this art style. And the music for each of these areas are my favorite. The music during battle is also full of variety depending on the encounter. Being Yasunori Nishiki's first gig in fully composing his own soundtrack and he knocked it out of the park, and I can only hope he does more from here on out.
If you want to know my favorite character stories it's Alfyn > Therion > Primrose > Cyrus > Olberic > Ophilia > Tressa > H'aanit. I think every character has a good story though I definitely have my preferences. Alfyn's surprised me the most hence why I put him on top
So yeah, not a perfect game at all but I really love what this game set out to do. I disagree with the criticism regarding actual character interactions within the story because this game is about their stories in a vacuum; its like Live A Live in that sense, which is probably why we got a remake.
NEED more JRPGs like this game!
This a is a gorgeous modern classic JRPG. You play as 2D pixelated characters in a 3D world which looks unthinkably cool. The game's graphics and visuals suit it so well. You'll explore all kinds of biomes like snowy mountains, dungeons, caves, deserts, forests etc. Gameplay makes you think very carefully about your next move. It really makes you come up with a strategy on how to overcome enemies. It’s also important to upgrade gear but that aspect can also be overwhelming since you need the money to buy it. Each character has a unique ability that helps you interact with NPCs you encounter on your journey there the land or you can use those abilities to take on quests in certain ways. You can also give your characters jobs so they can use weapons or spells they previously couldn’t use which can give you a huge advantage, however to acquire these jobs you have to defeat powerful bosses that really put your strategy to defeat them to the test. Unfortunately there will be times where you do have to grind in order to progress the story as there are level recommendations before doing a chapter and even if you meet the level requirements the chapter can still be very challenging. And also, the soundtrack is damn good.
As for the story, there's no main story to follow. You go through this game following the individual stories of each of the 8 characters you can play as. I loved most of the stories and only liked the rest as some of them weren’t as interesting. Each story will give you hope and happiness and some will leave you speechless and amazed by its brilliant and deep writing. I do wish we had better way of letting all main characters interact with each in some way during their storylines, I feel like that would’ve made things immersive.
I hope for a new Octopath Traveler game in the future as I loved the living hell out of this game or it would be very cool to see a Final Fantasy 6 Remake in the style of Octopath Traveler. If you’re looking for a turn based JRPG that will challenge you with a great story, this game is for you.
This a is a gorgeous modern classic JRPG. You play as 2D pixelated characters in a 3D world which looks unthinkably cool. The game's graphics and visuals suit it so well. You'll explore all kinds of biomes like snowy mountains, dungeons, caves, deserts, forests etc. Gameplay makes you think very carefully about your next move. It really makes you come up with a strategy on how to overcome enemies. It’s also important to upgrade gear but that aspect can also be overwhelming since you need the money to buy it. Each character has a unique ability that helps you interact with NPCs you encounter on your journey there the land or you can use those abilities to take on quests in certain ways. You can also give your characters jobs so they can use weapons or spells they previously couldn’t use which can give you a huge advantage, however to acquire these jobs you have to defeat powerful bosses that really put your strategy to defeat them to the test. Unfortunately there will be times where you do have to grind in order to progress the story as there are level recommendations before doing a chapter and even if you meet the level requirements the chapter can still be very challenging. And also, the soundtrack is damn good.
As for the story, there's no main story to follow. You go through this game following the individual stories of each of the 8 characters you can play as. I loved most of the stories and only liked the rest as some of them weren’t as interesting. Each story will give you hope and happiness and some will leave you speechless and amazed by its brilliant and deep writing. I do wish we had better way of letting all main characters interact with each in some way during their storylines, I feel like that would’ve made things immersive.
I hope for a new Octopath Traveler game in the future as I loved the living hell out of this game or it would be very cool to see a Final Fantasy 6 Remake in the style of Octopath Traveler. If you’re looking for a turn based JRPG that will challenge you with a great story, this game is for you.
videogamedunkey's negative impact on this game has been immeasurable and i urge you all to gather your own opinions
I cannot explain how much I love this game. This game frustrated the hell out of me, but in a good way. It kept me coming back. I died a lot, but each time I died, I benefitted. Finding the perfect cast of characters for each boss and pulling off perfect strategy is so satisfying. There isn’t a bad character in the game, they are all great for their own skills. And though I wasn’t sure if I’d like the “second job” option, it became really fun really quickly. The game is an eye-gasm to say the least, it’s gorgeous to look at, not to mention the soundtrack that lives in my head rent-free. The voice acting is above and beyond. Needless to say, this game had a death-grip on me and I grew fonder and fonder of it the more I played it. Each character became very special to me. I know this is one of those ‘either you love it or you hate it’ kind of games to people but I can honestly say it’s one of my favorite games I’ve ever played.
Obviously quite gorgeous but unfortunately more often than not its a real chore to play.
If people hate HD 2D so much, why don’t they just put on a pair of 3D glasses?
Octopath Traveler is a surprisingly good game. It's mechanics have depth and are interesting, the characters stories were actually compelling enough to where I actually cared for their goals, soundtrack is great, and it has the right amount of difficulty. Only flaws are that some areas and the mini dungeons are copy pastes and that the final boss for whatever reason is completely optional. Its stupidly hard but it is worth beating. Overall, it's underrated and one of the best RPGs I've played.
I feel like I've given this one a pretty good try, doing a few of the chapter 2 stories before wanting to fully put this down, but yeah, I'm just really not a fan of Octopath Traveler unfortunately. When you look at it broadly, it seemingly has a lot of ideas that could make for a really engaging RPG, but unfortunately, I feel like the skeletons of most of these ideas are all that's present. You have 8 characters, but none of them feel interesting and barely even talk to each other, you've got unique ways of interacting with a lot of NPCs, but the interactions themselves feel hollow, you have a ton of plot threads going on at once, but never any sense of actual stakes nor an instance of them intersecting, and this issue pervades the whole experience. This isn't even a case of just disliking this for being an RPG either, because RPGs are cool, this one just doesn't do it for me despite the amount of promise and how genuinely great certain aspects of the experience were, it's all just disappointing really.
Everything surrounding the writing is where a lot of my biggest complaints stem from, not just from one particular aspect either, it's just all rather bad to me. The premises of each of the 8 plotlines is where I especially take issue with, as none of the set ups really do anything especially interesting on their own, but due to the way everything is structured due to the fact that there are 8 of these, none of the individual plotlines feels as if they really have any ground to fully take off, instead feeling like truncated ideas that aren't allowed to actually expand in interesting directions. This causes the narrative to feel like a consistent drag without an end in sight, further hindered by the pacing being rough thanks to having to jump between each of these narratives regularly, causing everything to feel stagnant with how long it takes to see anything progress in any meaningful way.
Doesn't help that the characters don't really have much going for them, similarly largely feeling like skeletal concepts and tropes without much to really differentiate them. The choice to write all of this in such a self-contained manner as if each adventurer has entirely set off on their own does no favours either, completely hindering a lot of potential interactions and making everyone feel like even more of a blank slate. I personally feel that structuring the game in a way where after the intros for each character, it was possible for a player to fully complete each storyline in full would've done a lot to help with the pacing issue, because as it stands here, it really just feels like an endless sea of nothingness.
The world itself similarly doesn't really do anything for me, neither to towns nor the overworld. I'll say that the game mostly looks very pretty, including these environments, but that's really where it ends for me. I didn't really feel any sense of cohesion in it especially, with generic biomes bleeding into one another without much that felt like it was connected in an especially interesting way, just, "ok and now the scenery is suddenly a desert, and now it's a beautiful, grassy area with absolutely beautiful water, and now it's a giant, mysterious forest" and it just, doesn't feel interesting, there's no real intrigue to any of these places, and as such I end up feeling absolutely nothing when exploring them. Doesn't help that the NPCs don't really add anything to the experience either, having a tendency to just not really say anything of note, at most occasionally providing a single line tidbit of information that I never really found myself caring about given that it never really did anything to make the setting feel any more interesting. The side quests also suck and reveal how empty the whole path action mechanic feels in its implementation, not to mention having other issues to go along with it. So many of them feel vague to the point of being ridiculous while simultaneously almost always just being solved by spamming certain path actions towards surrounding NPCs. It makes for a dynamic that simultaneously feels obtuse while being totally braindead, almost never really knowing the exact thing you need to do, but being able to brute force your way through a lot of them anyway.
Despite all of these complaints, there's one area that the game absolutely excels at (mostly), and that's the combat. Even some of the earliest fights feel pretty engaging due to the combination of the break and boost system being tools that are able to contribute both to long term strategic play while also giving the player a lot of tools to make a lot of nuanced spur of the moment decisions. It adds a lot to the battling experience in a few different ways, as not only does it lead to a more dynamic experience as a whole, but it also feels awesome when you've planned everything out and then enact it all to deal an utterly absurd amount of damage, and can also make each individual fight feel a bit more involved. This last point is a bit of a double edged sword however, as while making it that even a lot of common enemy fights require a bit of thought at times is cool for giving a bit more gravity to each encounter, it also has the effect of making grinding feel agonisingly tedious when you can't really have anywhere to fall back on to only half pay attention while mashing the attack button to gain those extra couple of levels you might need. If the game didn't feel grindy that'd be one thing, but the jump from the chapter 1 areas to the chapter 2 ones felt pretty steep to me with how tanky some of the enemies ended up getting, and it doesn't help that only your 4 active party members even gain any exp, basically forcing you to either grind, or to kneecap yourself by having certain party members be slacking in a combat scenario. Doesn't help that actually exploring a lot of the dungeons was just lame, nothing really going on in them.
Octopath Traveler is a game that has some serious promise in some areas and is outright amazing in others, but the whole package doesn't connect in a way that I feel is particularly interesting, especially since so many of the promising ideas never really deliver on anything more concrete. So many times I was thinking "this could be awesome" only to repeatedly see it exclusively utilised in the more barebones way possible, doesn't matter if this was to do with the world, the characters, or the narrative, basically anything that wasn't the core combat felt lacking, and combat alone really just isn't enough to make for a game I want to play to completion, especially when it's this long. Basically a game that I could only recommend to someone who just reaaalllly loves JRPGs and enjoys this sort of very stylistically basic experience, but even in that case I would probably just recommend playing through a Dragon Quest game instead.
Everything surrounding the writing is where a lot of my biggest complaints stem from, not just from one particular aspect either, it's just all rather bad to me. The premises of each of the 8 plotlines is where I especially take issue with, as none of the set ups really do anything especially interesting on their own, but due to the way everything is structured due to the fact that there are 8 of these, none of the individual plotlines feels as if they really have any ground to fully take off, instead feeling like truncated ideas that aren't allowed to actually expand in interesting directions. This causes the narrative to feel like a consistent drag without an end in sight, further hindered by the pacing being rough thanks to having to jump between each of these narratives regularly, causing everything to feel stagnant with how long it takes to see anything progress in any meaningful way.
Doesn't help that the characters don't really have much going for them, similarly largely feeling like skeletal concepts and tropes without much to really differentiate them. The choice to write all of this in such a self-contained manner as if each adventurer has entirely set off on their own does no favours either, completely hindering a lot of potential interactions and making everyone feel like even more of a blank slate. I personally feel that structuring the game in a way where after the intros for each character, it was possible for a player to fully complete each storyline in full would've done a lot to help with the pacing issue, because as it stands here, it really just feels like an endless sea of nothingness.
The world itself similarly doesn't really do anything for me, neither to towns nor the overworld. I'll say that the game mostly looks very pretty, including these environments, but that's really where it ends for me. I didn't really feel any sense of cohesion in it especially, with generic biomes bleeding into one another without much that felt like it was connected in an especially interesting way, just, "ok and now the scenery is suddenly a desert, and now it's a beautiful, grassy area with absolutely beautiful water, and now it's a giant, mysterious forest" and it just, doesn't feel interesting, there's no real intrigue to any of these places, and as such I end up feeling absolutely nothing when exploring them. Doesn't help that the NPCs don't really add anything to the experience either, having a tendency to just not really say anything of note, at most occasionally providing a single line tidbit of information that I never really found myself caring about given that it never really did anything to make the setting feel any more interesting. The side quests also suck and reveal how empty the whole path action mechanic feels in its implementation, not to mention having other issues to go along with it. So many of them feel vague to the point of being ridiculous while simultaneously almost always just being solved by spamming certain path actions towards surrounding NPCs. It makes for a dynamic that simultaneously feels obtuse while being totally braindead, almost never really knowing the exact thing you need to do, but being able to brute force your way through a lot of them anyway.
Despite all of these complaints, there's one area that the game absolutely excels at (mostly), and that's the combat. Even some of the earliest fights feel pretty engaging due to the combination of the break and boost system being tools that are able to contribute both to long term strategic play while also giving the player a lot of tools to make a lot of nuanced spur of the moment decisions. It adds a lot to the battling experience in a few different ways, as not only does it lead to a more dynamic experience as a whole, but it also feels awesome when you've planned everything out and then enact it all to deal an utterly absurd amount of damage, and can also make each individual fight feel a bit more involved. This last point is a bit of a double edged sword however, as while making it that even a lot of common enemy fights require a bit of thought at times is cool for giving a bit more gravity to each encounter, it also has the effect of making grinding feel agonisingly tedious when you can't really have anywhere to fall back on to only half pay attention while mashing the attack button to gain those extra couple of levels you might need. If the game didn't feel grindy that'd be one thing, but the jump from the chapter 1 areas to the chapter 2 ones felt pretty steep to me with how tanky some of the enemies ended up getting, and it doesn't help that only your 4 active party members even gain any exp, basically forcing you to either grind, or to kneecap yourself by having certain party members be slacking in a combat scenario. Doesn't help that actually exploring a lot of the dungeons was just lame, nothing really going on in them.
Octopath Traveler is a game that has some serious promise in some areas and is outright amazing in others, but the whole package doesn't connect in a way that I feel is particularly interesting, especially since so many of the promising ideas never really deliver on anything more concrete. So many times I was thinking "this could be awesome" only to repeatedly see it exclusively utilised in the more barebones way possible, doesn't matter if this was to do with the world, the characters, or the narrative, basically anything that wasn't the core combat felt lacking, and combat alone really just isn't enough to make for a game I want to play to completion, especially when it's this long. Basically a game that I could only recommend to someone who just reaaalllly loves JRPGs and enjoys this sort of very stylistically basic experience, but even in that case I would probably just recommend playing through a Dragon Quest game instead.
Rumor has it if you say this game is good in front of a dunkey fan they will die on the spot
Yasunori Nishiki deserves the sloppiest of kisses for composing this soundtrack, genuinely one of my favourites in a long time
The charm of chibi and this games HD-2D art style is something that'll never leave my body, despite the grinding nature and traversal of this game I still think it keeps itself at bay without hurting its core too much with how atmospheric it ends up being, specific ones like ‘An Ill Omen’ and thermions theme are fucking fantastic. id even go as far to describe its soundtrack as whimsical in a sense.
I feel as though the lack of intertwinement of the cast is the biggest missed potential of this game as a whole, its split into eight individual stories to branch out the combat and the travel banter is there attempt at closing the gap but it still feels missed.
The maturity and overall tone of Primrose’s story moved me the most out the bunch, its take on you having to fight Primrose’s version of her final obstacle and then the real obstacle is a very welcomed detail. Aside from that Therion and Olbersic’s stories were favourites and even characters who weren’t on screen all that much like Leon added alot to not just Tressa’s story but everything as a whole.
All in all it’s a welcomed experience, one that I pumped 150 hours into but something id say was worth my time. I’ve been told my main gripes with this story get improved upon in 2 so im genuinely excited to continue sometime later this year
“Where’s the nearest tavern!”
The charm of chibi and this games HD-2D art style is something that'll never leave my body, despite the grinding nature and traversal of this game I still think it keeps itself at bay without hurting its core too much with how atmospheric it ends up being, specific ones like ‘An Ill Omen’ and thermions theme are fucking fantastic. id even go as far to describe its soundtrack as whimsical in a sense.
I feel as though the lack of intertwinement of the cast is the biggest missed potential of this game as a whole, its split into eight individual stories to branch out the combat and the travel banter is there attempt at closing the gap but it still feels missed.
The maturity and overall tone of Primrose’s story moved me the most out the bunch, its take on you having to fight Primrose’s version of her final obstacle and then the real obstacle is a very welcomed detail. Aside from that Therion and Olbersic’s stories were favourites and even characters who weren’t on screen all that much like Leon added alot to not just Tressa’s story but everything as a whole.
All in all it’s a welcomed experience, one that I pumped 150 hours into but something id say was worth my time. I’ve been told my main gripes with this story get improved upon in 2 so im genuinely excited to continue sometime later this year
“Where’s the nearest tavern!”
i tried so hard to pretend the characters were interesting enough to warrant playing more but they just weren't. my copy is missing though so i will take that as an act of god and never finish this game
Disappointingly mediocre in almost every category. The stories of each character are satisfactory at best; the story overall is non-existent. There is zero canonical character interactions within chapters, with the game even flat-out saying multiple times that characters are alone when that literally isn't true because you have seven other characters with you at all times. It's extremely repetitive in structure across all chapters. The battle system is reliant on type weaknesses to the point of being a cakewalk if you have an enemy's weakness on your team and an eternity if you don't. At the same time it's also very grindy, especially in the beginning.
Pretty much the only thing it has going for it is the visuals, which I would be cracked if I tried to suggest that they were anything less than incredible. This is the only game on the Switch that does the depth of field effect well, and I will stand by that. And the sprite-work, especially on bosses, is amazing. But I'm gonna complain about the visuals anyway. Would it be too much to ask for these sprites to have more than like four frames of animation? This game commits so much to having an aesthetic almost identical to older Final Fantasies to the point that these incredibly detailed sprites will stand there like statues and flash when they attack, and your party members have a handful of vague action sprites and that's it. This is where the effects animation on spells picks up most of the slack, and it was what I found to be the most impressive. But aside from that, there is hardly any movement at all, and I find myself really upset by that.
I will say, this is a fun RPG to play optimally. Once you finally have an ideal party setup and can pretty much do everything with all of the jobs at once, it's really fun to take on the superbosses. But that's also a compliment I can give to basically any other really good RPG, most of which don't require getting close to the end before the battle system becomes engaging.
Oh well. I'm glad I finally played it at least.
Pretty much the only thing it has going for it is the visuals, which I would be cracked if I tried to suggest that they were anything less than incredible. This is the only game on the Switch that does the depth of field effect well, and I will stand by that. And the sprite-work, especially on bosses, is amazing. But I'm gonna complain about the visuals anyway. Would it be too much to ask for these sprites to have more than like four frames of animation? This game commits so much to having an aesthetic almost identical to older Final Fantasies to the point that these incredibly detailed sprites will stand there like statues and flash when they attack, and your party members have a handful of vague action sprites and that's it. This is where the effects animation on spells picks up most of the slack, and it was what I found to be the most impressive. But aside from that, there is hardly any movement at all, and I find myself really upset by that.
I will say, this is a fun RPG to play optimally. Once you finally have an ideal party setup and can pretty much do everything with all of the jobs at once, it's really fun to take on the superbosses. But that's also a compliment I can give to basically any other really good RPG, most of which don't require getting close to the end before the battle system becomes engaging.
Oh well. I'm glad I finally played it at least.
Absolutely gorgeous visuals and that's it, unfortunately. I was pretty hyped for this game, but it's just dull and too grindy, which I can't stand.
Octopath gets a lot of flak for how divided each character's story was, and while I think that's a fair assessment, I feel its a little overblown. Most of the characters who join your party have their own little self-contained tales for why they join the party, and ultimately there are some dialogue moments between party members. Gorgeous spritework, the HD-2D style became an instant hit for me. Can do some absolutely broken stuff gameplay-wise too.
I do feel a little bad about this. When I decided I Like RPGs Now the other month I dove into this one with the mindset that I'm going to see the story through and not give up when it gets tricky, and here I am doing that.
The battles are fun, or at least they were 30 hours ago. I kind of dread them now but that's probably me getting impatient with the game. The BP and weakness system create good strategies without getting overwhelming. Thing is, I ended up building a party that relies heavily on multi-target elemental attacks to whittle down the enemy defense, and I just ran into a boss whose ability is disabling those specifically.
Not a huge deal, all I have to do is change my party and grind the weaker guys up while figuring out a new angle of attack. Except... in 40+ hours, this game has not managed to make me care about any of these characters. The story is bad. No, worse: the stories are bad. All 8 of them, equally insipid.
I could do the grinding, or I could stop playing.
Oh well. I was only playing this because I heard such good things about the sequel. I established my baseline. Mission accomplished, moving on.
The battles are fun, or at least they were 30 hours ago. I kind of dread them now but that's probably me getting impatient with the game. The BP and weakness system create good strategies without getting overwhelming. Thing is, I ended up building a party that relies heavily on multi-target elemental attacks to whittle down the enemy defense, and I just ran into a boss whose ability is disabling those specifically.
Not a huge deal, all I have to do is change my party and grind the weaker guys up while figuring out a new angle of attack. Except... in 40+ hours, this game has not managed to make me care about any of these characters. The story is bad. No, worse: the stories are bad. All 8 of them, equally insipid.
I could do the grinding, or I could stop playing.
Oh well. I was only playing this because I heard such good things about the sequel. I established my baseline. Mission accomplished, moving on.
I remember this game quite fondly, it was one of my first "real" JRPGs I ever played, and I loved it. Since then, I've played a lot more JPRGs so does this hold up to being my top 10 games still? Unfortunately no. While I love the combat still, compared to it's spiritual predecessor (Bravely Default), the difficulty really is way too easy. A hard mode would've been appreciated.
It suffers with a similar problem Persona 5 has, where the combat has a lot of depth and can be super engaging, but you'll be constantly finding yourself killing bosses on first tries with ease. With Persona 5, I usually do challenge runs to make the game more balanced against me, so next time I play this game, I might do something similar. As I said though, the combat is still a blast, and breaking the game was fun, AND the true final boss was a worthy challenge. So it's not the end of the world I suppose.
The art style and music is obviously amazing so I wont harp on that. The stories though? Well most games follow a long form story arc, this game instead opts for 8 mini stories. While I do like how unique this is, the downsides are that characters cant be fleshed out much and lack screentime. The pacing of the stories can also feel too quick at times. I still liked the stories, and liked how they were all connected together.
Overall, while it isn't as good as I remember, I still had a blast playing it. And you will too if you like traditional JRPG combat. Give it a go if you want
It suffers with a similar problem Persona 5 has, where the combat has a lot of depth and can be super engaging, but you'll be constantly finding yourself killing bosses on first tries with ease. With Persona 5, I usually do challenge runs to make the game more balanced against me, so next time I play this game, I might do something similar. As I said though, the combat is still a blast, and breaking the game was fun, AND the true final boss was a worthy challenge. So it's not the end of the world I suppose.
The art style and music is obviously amazing so I wont harp on that. The stories though? Well most games follow a long form story arc, this game instead opts for 8 mini stories. While I do like how unique this is, the downsides are that characters cant be fleshed out much and lack screentime. The pacing of the stories can also feel too quick at times. I still liked the stories, and liked how they were all connected together.
Overall, while it isn't as good as I remember, I still had a blast playing it. And you will too if you like traditional JRPG combat. Give it a go if you want
Stunning visuals, incredible soundtrack and overall great atmosphere. But you can't ask me to play the same thing over and over and over again just with different characters and in different biomes...