After starting this game over half a year ago, and investing over 90 hours playing it, I have finally finished Octopath Traveler, and now I can safely say that this is one of the worst experiences i've had while playing a video game. While the game has fun gameplay and is overall a well made game, it also has an infinite ammount of flaws all stemming from how the game was designed. The game is very polished, however there's nothing worth polishing in here.

Let's start at the beginning. Octopath Traveler is an RPG made by Square Enix where the main gimmick of the game is that you have 8 characters. That's it. Not at the same time, or anything else for that matter, the game just tells the story of and lets you use 8 different characters. Now, if this doesn't sound interesting... it's because it isn't. And other than the number of characters in the game there's nothing of note to this game. It's as generic as an RPG can get. And while this isn't really an issue by itself, no other part of the game makes up for this, so you're left with one of the the blandest RPGs in the market.

These characters do get a lot of development though: They each get their own questline that elaborates on their personality and background, each with their own supporting characters and unique scenarios. I think these stories are all good, some more so than others, however the game is structured in such a way where it almost feels like it was the designers' goal to prevent you from enjoying everyone's story.

All 8 stories play at the same time, yet they're exclusively about one character. And due to how the leveling system works in this game, you're incentivized to try and keep all your characters at around the same level by progressing all 8 stories at the same time, which only makes this whole thing more confusing and unfocused than it needs to be.

I cannot count the amount of times I forgot who someone was, or why we had to go to a place, or what the main characters were trying to achieve; all because I had to play through multiple stories at once just to keep myself at an acceptable level curve.

But there are other ways in which this game is terribly paced. It also feels the need to detail every little interaction the main character has throughout their adventure. This sounds good on paper, as you're not missing anything, but what it amounts to is just a disproportionate amount of cutscenes where your character is going into great detail about something meaningless, or talking with random townsfolk gathering information, or even worse, flashbacks from stuff you've already played through. In the end, every single questline is stretched to be twice as long as it needs to be just by the amount of fluff the game has, and it's really annoying.

Whatever, who cares about the character's introductory sidequests? Let's just get to the part where all these characters meet up and have an adventure together!

...

But that never happens.

Aside from some random, optional conversations your party can have when you enter a tavern or after certain cutscenes, there's no point in the whole 90 hours of gameplay where two characters interact. Every single story is about one character and one character only. It doesn't matter what you've already done. It doesn't matter who you've met. It doesn't matter who's in your party. This game is always about one single character and nobody else.

Octopath Traveler, a game where the whole point is that there are many characters you can play as, features no scenes where these characters do anything together.

Actually, no, this is a lie. All 8 characters get to be on screen together for one scene after the hidden superboss (they still wont talk to each other though, take it or leave it).

The story does feature an overarching narrative about the devil coming back or some generic RPG crap like that, but half the time it's just tacked on at the end of each questline, and the other half it's just completely ignored.

But that's enough about the story. Let's talk about worldbuilding now! It also sucks!

I think there's something interesting hidden deep inside this game, especially with the whole lore about the 12 gods who created the world and the whole history of the continent, and you do get to see more of this story as you're nearing the end of the game. However, trying to learn anything from the story during the first 70 hours of gameplay is almost impossible due to the amount of useless information and padding the game has, to the point where it's better to just not try at all.

There are way too many towns in this world, and each of them has way too many citizens inside. It gets to the point where everything blends together into one big, boring mess of a world, where anything interesting enough to stand out gets drowned out by the endless amount of generic character descriptions and boring NPC dialogue.

The side quest design is also horrendous. The way these quests work is that you talk to an NPC, they request something from you, and then you give it to them. Half the time, it's gonna be something incredibly cryptic and you won't have any idea on how to progress, and the other half it's gonna be something that you already got from spamming "Scrutinize" on every NPC you encounter. The stories told from these sidequests can be good, but more often than not it's just more padding that adds nothing to the world.

The amount of actually interesting sidequests is minimal, and the worst part of it all?The final superboss is locked behind two random quests that the game tells you nothing about, because why wouldn't it be?

I haven't really talked about the presentation of the game yet, so let's do it quickly: It's fine. I really like the HD2D artstyle Square Enix has been going for lately, however I think this game specifically hasn't aged that well, especially when compared to the games that came after it such as Live a Live and Triangle Strategy. It's good, but in hindsight it's very clear that this was the first game they tried this style on.

I don't have much to say about the music, I thought it was fine and served the purpose of the game however I can't really remember any specific tracks other than the one for the title screen. This is entirely my fault though, as I had to watch YouTube videos while playing this just so I wouldn't go insane.

I do think the main gameplay loop is good. I'm a sucker for combat systems where you get to exploit a weakness and break your opponent's armor, and mixing it with the priority system of this game makes most battles really interesting and dynamic. The BP management aspect of the game does add a lot to the combat sometimes. However, this whole thing is absolutely ruined by the enemy AI, especially during boss fights, which ultimately turns every major battle into nothing more than an RNG check.

Enemies don't really have an AI, it's just a list of values and abilities. Wether a boss decides to hit one of your characters or hit your entire party is entirely up to chance and you can't do anything to prepare for it, all you can do is spend your following turn healing up. And if they decide to use their most effective move twice in a row? Then you're screwed, better luck next time.

And then there's the secret, final boss.

The final stretch of the game is so close to being good, but only showcases every single problem this game has in one, rapid-fire section.

Not only does it require you to grind for literal hours until you basically double your character's levels to even stand a chance against the boss, but also makes you complete two sidequests from characters that, at first glance, are just as generic and unimportant as everyone else.

And once you're finally ready to start? Now you get to do a boss rush before you even get to attempt the big bad guy. You can take a break between each fight by reading a whole novel about every story's antagonist, but at this point why even bother. From the moment you enter this area, until you beat the final boss, it'll take you about 3 hours. And obviously you don't get to save, because why would you?

And finally, after 90 hours of playtime, you get 90 minutes where you finally get to use all 8 characters at once (although split in two teams), before you're inevitably wiped out by the boss nullifying all your defensive buffs and then one-shotting your entire party.

So no, I did not beat the final boss of Octopath Traveler, instead I just watched a video on YouTube. And I'm glad I did because the reward unironically is a ghost showing up and saying "You did it, you truly are the Octopath Travelers!". I'm not doing that.

In conclusion: Just don't.

Octopath traveler is a game with incredible potential, all wasted by designers that couldn't bother to make this a cohesive and engaging experience. For every good thing this game does, there's another design flaw holding it back from being good. While the stories and gameplay are fun, It's overall a bloated mess of a game full of useless, uninteresting content that doesn't fit together at all, and it's simply not worth it. 3/10

this is one of the games i really truly wish i could give five stars, so i'll start with the positives. this game's ambience is PHENOMENAL. the graphics are the most well-executed 2d-on-3d i've ever seen, and the ost is a permanent staple in my studying playlist. every area feels unique and has a real sense of place, and i really wish i could step into this world and just spend an afternoon there.

combat, in my opinion, is one of the things that makes this game stand out. battling is very strategic and innovative, and i haven't found a jrpg combat style i've liked more. it's simple enough to learn quickly but still requires the player to think ahead and account for each turn. no complaints here!

this isn't as popular a take, but i also LOVE the characters in this game. each one. i feel like they are all compelling enough to be interesting without overshadowing anyone. even if their stories were a bit cliche, the characters themselves breathed life into them, and i found myself caring about each of their respective journeys. voice acting is also really solid, nothing phenomenal but much better than some other games i've played. my one complaint about the stories is the little-to-no overlap we get between them. we get to know these people so well on an individual basis that i found myself yearning for more than just the brief travel banters you sometimes get between the travelers in your party. i think one of the reasons the fanfiction scene for this game is so booming is because the game simply gives you little more than crumbs for interactions between its main characters. i will note that this does improve in octopath 2, where the characters get paired off in little bonus routes to solve together. still not as much interaction as i could hope for, but definitely better!

my biggest gripe with octopath traveler is how grindey it is. i'm a ds-era pokemon fan, so i'm no stranger to a little grinding to beat your next milestone foe. the problem is, the majority of the hours i put into this game came from simply grinding to do ANYTHING. experience gain and leveling up aren't rewarding at all, and it can be a little disheartening to beat a boss that took 45 minutes only to see your little exp. bar go up two centimeters. i don't mind longer games if it feels like i'm constantly progressing, but octopath can get extremely slow between character chapters. once again, octopath 2 does streamline this quite a bit, and i didn't find myself grinding nearly as much, but it's definitely something to note if you want to pick up this title.

i love so much about octopath that it's hard to critique it, even if those criticisms are fair. this game is so utterly charming, and it still makes my top ten list, but for those who want an experience with overall quality-of-life improvements, i would recommend picking up the sequel. you can play the games in any order, and octopath traveler 2 really is the superior experience gameplay-wise.

Protagonist/Starting Character: Cyrus the Scholar

Order that I gathered the rest of the characters: Ophilia (Cleric) --> Tressa (Merchant) --> Olberic (Warrior) --> Primrose (Dancer) --> Alfyn (Apothecary) --> Therion (Thief) --> H’aanit (Hunter)

Time: ~120 hours

Completion: I did all of the chapters for the 8 characters. I grabbed all of the sidequests as I saw them, but didn’t go out of my way to complete them (just if I came across the item/info/whatever and happened back to that town to turn the quest in). Acquired 2/4 “secret” jobs. Didn’t complete any post game.

I started with Cyrus because I’m down with the nerdy scholar bois, but I think I mixed up his Path Action with Alfyn’s as part of my choice (Cyrus has Scrutinize and Alfyn has Inquire, the former being a “Rogue” type that can affect your reputation in a town, and the latter just sometimes being unusable if your level is too low, but not having any negative effects otherwise.) Either way, I love Apothecary/Alchemist-type classes so I wanted to get Alfyn too, ASAP, but Ophilia was first priority for healing. Then I backtracked south for Tressa and had to just work my way through the map to Alfyn.

I had a hard time choosing a steady team because I liked all of the characters, but needed to maintain balance. You can change your party any time at taverns, and there is a fast travel option to return to any towns that you’ve visited, but I really wish you could change your party from your menu at any time. It got pretty frustrating being way out in some map area or far into a cave and coming across a chest that only Therion can open, but not having him in my party. It’s not the most terrible mechanic out there, but it was pretty inconvenient and a step backwards for a modern JRPG. I loved most of the characters, but didn't really have much attachment to Olberic or H'aanit.

I read a number of suggestions early on about focusing on four party members and then switching since you can change out your starting character when you finish their fourth chapter. I was originally going to stick with four characters and then trade them all out after completing their storylines, but ended up swapping one or two out at a time to do their earlier chapters and level everyone else up. I still did a decent amount of grinding, but it definitely helped having at least two over-leveled characters in my party so that I could go to slightly more dangerous areas to catch the others up for a run through a chapter. I never took Cyrus out of my party either, because his magic was often the only thing doing decent damage, and he’s mah boi.

My biggest issue with the game is, that…while I don’t think I was doing anything “wrong” in particular as I played this, it still felt like I was missing something. I’m almost positive that it’s just some poor mechanics implementations. Otherwise, it’s just designed to be grindy and for battles to take way longer than I would want. Apparently, leveling doesn’t do much for your stats past level 45 or so (from what I read). Equipment is insanely expensive for much of the game, and leaves (the currency) were hard to come by for a long time. Using Tressa to collect from enemies or her passive skill of finding it whenever you enter a new area or town helped a bit, but I typically didn’t spend the combat turns to collect very often, and if she’s not in your party, you’re not getting that help anyway (unless someone else has merchant as their sub job and you’re having them collect). Stealing is also a risk, so in the early game with Therion at lower levels, you're mostly just able to steal healing items, and not the coin pouches and equipment, without risking harming your rep. By the time I was working through the later chapters, I had hundreds of thousands of leaves, but nothing to really spend it on.

I was always several levels higher than the difficulty level for any given area that I went to (it tells you the danger level in the bottom left corner whenever you near the entrance to a road/cave/etc.), and I’d buy the best armor and weapons I could, but my damage output was just garbaaaage for so long. I realize that the boost and break mechanics are essential, but I think the main flaw with this is that I feel they should be more supplemental. Basically, I think that your damage before an enemy is broken should be a little more “normal,” and then move into the excessive or ridiculous with the breaks as a reward for strategizing to target the weaknesses. The way it’s set up, bosses have insane amounts of HP, do ridiculous damage to your party even when you’ve bought the best equipment available and assigned appropriate skills, you’re level 57 doing a trash 200 damage with a basic attack on a weakness before the enemy shield breaks, and it can sometimes take several turns to even break said enemy (especially when they have weaknesses crossed off so half of them can’t even be used to break the enemy). It makes everything take forever, and it’s really unrewarding. I found the patterns of breaking and then boosting damage, or occasionally boosting to break certain enemies faster, and otherwise strategized the best ways to deal with specific enemies. I reassigned my skills and adjusted my party to best deal with specific bosses. But then I’d still find myself 25 minutes into a boss battle where my party is 10-15 levels higher than recommended, with the best accessible equipment, trying to buff and debuff, and the boss just recovers from a break and hits the whole party twice in a row for 1500 damage and it’s game over. I started making sure to use the Leghold Trap move as often as possible so that bosses were stuck acting at the end of the turn order, but this didn’t always help. I looked into which base stats were highest for each character and focused on the sub jobs that best suited them. I’m sure I could have spent more turns buffing my party, but finding the right balance for doing that AND breaking the boss before they slaughtered my party just never really clicked until later. I am not a JRPG newbie; this is my gaming lifeblood. But this shit just...isn't it. (I did play the first Bravely Default when it first came out, so I am familiar with the boost/break system already, though I quit that game during the repetitive ending BS and it’s been over a decade. I don’t remember it being this ridiculous.) By the time that I was going through everyone’s third chapters, I was just Leghold Trap-ing and poisoning every boss. I was doing fine with the bosses themselves, but damage output just never got really good for anything but Cyrus’ magic and Olberic with boosted Sword skills. I actually did enjoy the combat itself despite this. There are a ton of fun skills to combine and play around with, and the boost/break system is not inherently bad. I was either just not finding my groove for much of the game somehow, or something was fucky.

While looking up strategies occasionally for the more frustrating bosses, I would see comments about how end game was ridiculous, with a difficulty spike and not much reward for doing anything post-character chapter completion. So, once I saw the last chapter 4 last night, I called it. I would generally not do this if there was legit story and relevant stuff to do that meant an actual ending, but the consensus seems to be that seeing the individual stories is the most important, and the “real” endgame is for people wanting to take on challenging bosses and fiddle with party setups. I am wholly uninterested in both of those things, so if there is any relevant story, I’ll watch a video or something.

On the other side of things, I really enjoyed the different character stories, even if they never properly came together into one cohesive plot. (I finished Tressa’s last night as my final chapter 4, and then it just dropped me back into town to do whatever, with nothing to wrap up the overall game or tie any of the stories together.) Primrose’s story was heartbreaking, and I could not wait to get to her first boss fight and murder that bastard. Alfyn’s story had some great depth, as did Tressa’s and Therion’s (with similar notes of finding one’s way in the world). Cyrus’ was probably the most “dire” and with higher stakes across the chapters. I kind of neglected H’aanit for most of the game despite not having anything against her. I just rotated my characters around and found setups that worked for me, and she didn’t really fit in. So I had to do her chapters 2-4 during my chapter 4 round for everyone else.

The music is phenomenal, as is to be expected of a Squeenix title. The backgrounds are absolutely gorgeous, and the snow effect was one of my favorite parts about just exploring towns and talking to people. The monster and boss designs are fantastic, and I love how bosses are always enormous compared to your party, even if they're just a human character. I’m not super into pixel art, so I get kind of tired seeing all of the modern indie games or pixel remasters and whatnot using it, but this game is just so beautiful either way.

The mini map is essentially useless--it shows quest markers, hidden item icons, and major buildings, but it's all just literal fog between those icons, with no actual roads/paths visible. But pretty much every area and dungeon just has a few branching paths for treasures, and there aren't any puzzles to solve. So navigation in this game is very simple.

So, despite the boss/damage frustrations, I had a pretty okay time with this. For all of the effort put into the individual stories, I wish there had been something to tie them all together. The travel banter between characters (like Tales of skits) were enjoyable and brought a bit more life to their relationships, but every time I was completing story events for a character, I imagined the rest of my party just standing in the background watching them get stabbed by the antagonist of the chapter, or having something stolen, etc., and doing nothing. I wish there was some overarching plot that brought them all together. I would LOVE for more games to have character-driven individual stories like this included, but not at the expense of a complete story around them.

Octopath Traveler is a game I've been meaning to play for a long time but have put off due to all the mixed opinions about it. After a week or so of playing, I have completed the main game and its "real" ending and I think my thoughts on it can be best summarized with Octopath Traveler having tons of wasted potential.

On the plus, Octopath boasts beautiful pixel art, a great soundtrack that's a pleasure to just stop and listen to at times, and a vast world with unique environments that make it charming to explore. The presentation and production value that went into the game is honestly phenomenal but lacks in its most critical element to the game: The characters. I'm honestly baffled at how a game that emphasizes and builds its entire concept around eight unique characters with different stories manages to do so little with them. My biggest issue is how none of the characters ever interact with each other's story outside of some short and meaningless banter that feels as if they're just commenting on a movie they're watching, rather than actually interacting with each other. It's a huge disconnect when each individual story is told as if each character was alone, yet the banter makes a flimsy effort to say "No they're... together". Furthermore, each individual story also feels like it wasn't realized to its full potential, which is no surprise there considering they're trying to do eight unique character stories. Some of them get the proper development they deserve, while others feel incredibly rushed even by JRPG standards. Not to mention how a character acts in their story and how they act during the banter that happens immediately after is sometimes shockingly different and inconsistent with what just happened.

The gameplay disappointingly suffers from a feeling of wasted potential as well. Its battle system is similar to "Bravely Default"'s own and yet feels far less strategic. Whereas Bravely Default revolved around risk and reward with its battle system, much of Octopath Traveler's battles boil down to simply saving your boosts until an enemy is guard broken(which is never difficult) and just unleashing your strongest attack. Repeat this process with a boss maybe 3 or 4 times and that's it. Nothing punishes you for using the boost system, the bosses almost never do anything interesting to shake things up, heck, half the time the bosses don't even get to show half their move set with how easy it is to nuke them down. There really isn't much customization for you to do either, with subclasses only really being used to cover weapon weaknesses you may be lacking or further making your character overpowered with the passives.

It honestly feels as neither characters nor gameplay got the focus it needed to really shine and it was all spent on creating the world and soundtrack instead. If the game had chosen to focus entirely on either one, I think it would have been far more enjoyable. While playing, I couldn't help but compare Octopath Traveler to other games that do what Octopath tried to do but better. The "Tales of" series provides excellent character interactions and development that Octopath sorely lacked and "Etrian Odyssey" provides a fantastic gameplay loop that gives you tons of freedom to experiment with despite the lack of story. Ultimately, it was kinda fun for a bit, but I don't think I could recommend this game in good faith to anyone but a diehard (J)rpg fan. At the very least, I wouldn't recommend anyone to pay full price for the game and wait for a sale if you really want to try it yourself.

This is a JRPG done right. It has it all: an incredible battle system, a great story, a multitude of options and ways to beat the game, and stunning retro graphics. This is the longest a game has ever taken me to beat it, and I had so much fun throughout my adventure.

Gameplay

Octopath Traveler sees you taking control of eight different characters who help each other complete their individual journeys. At any given time, you are controlling four of the characters, and you can switch them out at any time. The only restrictions are on your main character, who you can't switch out until you complete their story, and whomever's quest you are currently working on. This allows for a ton of customization, and it forces you to constantly change your strategy based on which characters are currently active.

Battle

The great combat in this game is driven by the Battle Point system. Every turn, you get to choose whether a character will use or expend Battle Points. Saving them up allows you to use multiple or stronger attacks, but using them means they won't replenish the next turn. This forces you to constantly think about when to use your Battle Points, and it reduces the whole "press A" to win style of battle. Although to be fair, once you get used to your characters and the particular enemies, you may find yourself sticking to the exact same script you've found effective, and your fingers may automatically make the same selections every battle.

The final element that creates great customization and strategy is the job system. Like many RPGs, every character comes with a fixed job, or class. Cleric, Thief, Warrior, etc. In this game, you also unlock secondary jobs, and these can be a total game changer. Choosing which characters got which secondary job was a stressful affair, but it made me feel like my team was really mine, and I ended up loving the combinations I chose. And to make it even more customizable, each job comes with secondary skills that provide permanent but changeable buffs to your character. This means that the buffs stay on the character even if you switch jobs, but you can also sub out skills at any time. This is really what made building my characters a lot of fun because I could mix and match skills from different classes to create the ultimate fighters.

Story

The individual stories overall were really nice, and all the characters learn something about themselves and the world around them. They all get to take on a big bad of sorts, and they all become heroes to the people around them. I was only dissatisfied with one character's final chapter, but generally I really liked them all. My only complaint was that going through the chapters sometimes felt like watching a movie, and though the stories were quite different, the beats were often the same: introduce baddy, watch a bunch of cutscenes (which seriously add to the play time), traverse a dungeon, slay the baddy. Some of them have you interacting with NPCs a little more, but it's all very straightforward and laid out for you. I would have liked to see more puzzles and thinking for myself. That's really what prevents this game from being absolutely top tier.

The really nice thing is that you can tackle all of their stories in any order you choose. While the difficulty curve does give you a general guideline of which few chapters would be best for your current level, technically you're free to go anywhere you like any try anybody's next chapter. That freedom is incredible, and once again it adds to the feeling like your experience with this game is completely different from everyone else's.

Also, this is an incredibly long game. While I believe there are four games that I have played for longer than this one, this is definitely the longest it has taken me just to beat a game. But to it's credit, I never got to a point where I just wanted to power through because I was tired of the game; right up until the end I was still exploring and trying to get a full experience.

Imagination

This is something KingK pointed out in his review on YouTube, but I really liked how the game provided opportunities for you to use your imagination. Because cutscenes only showed the relevant character, you got to use your imagination to think about what the other characters were doing at the time (which come with one complaint though: sometimes the story didn't make sense considering the fact that your companions are supposed to be with you; like, there's no way your companions would have let the thing that's happening happen, and they're definitely there because they just fought alongside you).

I also enjoyed letting the story influence my decisions, like rewarding a character with an obtained weapon because he or she was the one that made the kill that earned it, or choosing classes based on things that happened in the story. I found it fun imagining reasons certain characters joined other characters on their particular adventure other than just me putting them together for strategic reasons.

Other Things

Finally, a couple quick points to finish this off:

• I loved the variety of weapons and armour. Again, it provided a huge array of choices and made you feel like your characters were unique and really yours. It wasn't often just a matter of picking the obviously best weapon; you had to take your character's fighting style into consideration.
• The menus were delightful. It made switching armour a breeze by automatically organizing your inventory and showing you exactly what each piece of equipment did and how it affected each character. It really streamlined character building, and it was a much appreciated improvement to the classic menu systems where you almost have to write everything down to figure out which weapon to equip to your characters.
• One small complaint is that the character's sprites didn't show their new clothes in the overworld and cutscenes. Whenever you give a character a secondary job, they change their outfit to match, but this only appears in the menu screen and in battles. When you're walking around or watching cutscenes, they're back in their regular clothes. It's small, but it really would have been more satisfying to see your choices consistency reflected when you see your characters on screen.
• Side quests were a little weird. They are aplenty, but you are given very little guidance on how to go about them. You are given a tiny bit of information, and then interacting with something in the world will give you some sort of item or information to bring back to them, then you go back and collect your reward. There was a lot of variety, and some of them were really nice, but most of them are almost impossible to actually accomplish on purpose; you just have to play the game and keep them in the back of your mind as you collect things.
• The voice acting was good when they did the full sentences, but since acting every line in the game would be a daunting task, they decided to record a few generic lines that each character could say over lines that weren't fully acted. This was annoying after 68 hours. And if you ask my wife, it was annoying after 1.
• Finally, the one downside in any game allowing players to complete the game in any order is that the difficulty can be a little wonky. Overall I thought they handled this extremely well, but the only problem was at the end. By the time I got to the very last chapter, my characters were fairly overpowered, and my final boss was an absolute cakewalk. This made the ending feel a little anti-climactic unfortunately, as the hardest boss was actually a non-essential side boss.

Conclusion

I highly recommend this game to lovers of RPGs. In my opinion, this is one of the top 5 games on the Switch and one of the top 20 games of all time. Despite a few things here and there that were annoying or I would have changed, I really enjoyed my time with this game, and I will remember it fondly.

If Octopath Traveler were a book, it wouldn’t be an epic fantasy novel, but a collection of good short stories. The game is not ambitious in any shape or form, but very modest in scope, telling stories that, at first, seem mostly limited to personal struggles, while presenting a modified version of Bravely Default’s combat system. Nonetheless, the game excels in what it sets out to do, presenting a beautiful world and discussing important themes in a simple, but efficient way.

The game has eight main characters and each one has their own story, which is divided in four chapters. Let’s start with the best one to get a grasp of what the narrative is like in Octopath Traveler.

One of the characters in the game is a dancer named Primrose. When she was a young girl, Primrose had to watch three men murder her father in cold blood, and so she swore vengeance against them, dedicating her entire life to this goal. When her first chapter starts, she’s a dancer working for a cruel man in the desert city of Sunshade.

There is an old man at the entrance of the city, who boasts about its fame: “This is Sunshade, city of a thousand pleasures.” However, if he intended to praise the place, his sentence actually sounds ominous to someone like Primrose. The reason for that lies in the heart of her story: for men the city is certainly a wondrous place, filled with pleasure, but for women, such as Primrose, Sunshade is a dark place where they must deliver that pleasure.

Her relationship with her boss, Helgenish, for example, is clearly an abusive one. Helgenish often tells Primrose that he cares for her, and that she is dear to him, but after his soft words always come the threats and the reminder of ownership (“You haven’t forgotten your debts now, have you? You haven’t forgotten who owns you?”). His objective is to lock her in a world she can’t escape if he doesn’t let her. For Helgenish is a man who treats women like objects that can be discarded when he’s done with them. For him, kind and pure souls like Primrose’s friend, Yusufa, are just “bad investment.” Like all misogynists, he is sadistic and cruel, deriving pleasure from humiliating the women under his thumb. But Primrose can be everything, but owned. Her definitive answer to Helgenish’s oppression is already becoming a classic quote: “Master… go pleasure yourself.”

He may believe he has her, but she is the one who is using him to get near her target. Her fight may be for personal vengeance in the surface, and she even may say “To avenge father. That is all I have – my only reason to live.” However, the themes of her chapters leave no doubt that she is fighting for something more, against men who believe themselves superior and entitled, who manipulate and enjoy acting like they are superior. It’s no wonder that her nemesis is called by the title “The Puppet Master”. Like Helgenish, he objectifies people to use them as he pleases. Primrose’s fight against these type of men is for her, but also for her friend Yusufa and every other woman in the continent of Osterra.

The game doesn’t avoid heavy themes. If Helgenish basically acts like a pimp in chapter one, the antagonist in Primrose’s second chapter is the actual owner of a brothel. Rufus is a gangster who lends assistance to powerful people in order to get favors in return. In his introduction scene, a bishop comes to him seeking help to exact revenge on a lord who deflowered his daughter – which allegedly led her to commit suicide. Rufus immediately lends his hand, but also – and that is the scary part – offers a woman to the bishop get some pleasure in the meantime; a woman that looks like the bishop’s own daughter, shedding a new eerie light on her suicide. Primrose is not just trying to kill Rufus because he murdered her father; she is doing it because he’s part of a bigger system that makes even bishop’s daughters commit suicide.

There is another great scene at the beginning in which a man asks his daughter what she wants to be when she grows up. She looks at Primrose, finds her beautiful, and answer that she wants to be a dancer. The man immediately reacts negatively, telling the girl that he would rather her become a proper lady. The strength of the scene comes at its end: before leaving, claiming that he had an urgent business to tend to at night, the man lingers for a moment and stares back at Primrose, with a look full of ambiguity. He could have looked at her with lust (she being the business he wanted to tend to at night), or with pity and sorrow; or even with disgust. What makes the moment so powerful is precisely the fact that the ambiguity doesn’t leave space for a positive interpretation, and that Primrose gets that.

And this is just a brief analysis of just one of the eight stories present in Octopath Traveler. The others don’t reach the same highs as Primrose’s, but they have their own strengths.

We can find common threads between some of them. The knight Olberic and the thief Therion both are marked by betrayals in their past, for example. Olberic had to go exile after being betrayed in battle by his closest friend and, when his story starts, he’s abnegating his past: “No, I am no knight. Just a man with a sword and nothing more,” he claims. But when his pupil is kidnapped by brigands, history resurfaces to bite him, making the knight face what happened. Olberic’s journey is one of self-discovery, with him trying to understand what drove him to battle before the betrayal and what drives him now. Therion was also betrayed by a friend and he deals with the fact in an equally unhealthy way: if Olberic tried to hide inside himself, Therion choses simply not to trust anyone else anymore: “Take it from me: no matter how much you trust someone, they will betray you,” he warns a girl. But soon he starts to discover that his approach is a very problematic, since betrayal can not only hurt, but also take the victim hostage: the less they trust others the more power they give to the betrayer.

Regarding Olberic, you can find the strength of the writing in Octopath Traveler mainly in the depiction of his enemies. While with Primrose, for thematic reasons, the antagonists were completely despicable men, with Olberic they’re more human. Even the brigand chief, for example, gets a bit of development and shades of gray, explaining that he took no pleasure from his acts (“Never meant to do anyone no harm. But life doesn’t always give us a choice in the matter, does it?”), and accepting the knight’s judgement with no hard feelings (“A man has to own up to what he’s done”). However, with Olberic the writing falters when it comes to exposition, making him often think about his own backstory in didactic terms, just to inform the player of it (“After a time, I came to this village. Here I earn my keep as a hired sword, hiding behind another man’s name”).

The other characters have their stories more intrinsically related to their jobs. Tressa, for example, is a young Merchant who has to take over her parent’s store, but deep down dreams of traveling and discovering “what lies beyond the horizon.” In her first chapter, she meets some pirates who steal from the poor and revel on that, repeating over and over again that “The strong take while the weak quake.” In her second chapter, then, this “strong eat the weak” motto is applied to capitalism itself. She goes to a mining town ruled by a bourgeois who deceives the hardworking people so he can become even richer. As the villain says: “Those with the money make the rules,” resignifying the pirates dialogue.

-----> Read the full review at: http://litonthespot.com/octopath-traveler/games/review

TL;DR

One of the best modernized SNES-era-JRPGs out there. Comes very close to a masterpiece, but falls just short.

General Thoughts

This is everything I wanted FFXV to be. This game is a shining example of how to take an SNES-era style JRPG, bring it up to date with modern JRPG mechanics and mix in a few Western-RPG game mechanics. It's a perfect mix of charming story telling from Dragon Quest, Sprite/Character art from SNES-era Final Fantasy, Press-turn-like battle system from Shin Megami Tensei, and Class system from Bravely Default. It may seem like I wrote a lot about what I didn't like, but this is I enjoyed the game so much and found that it did things so well that it was obvious to point out where it fell flat.

The Good

Graphics and art style

I'm always a fan of very stylized graphics/art style (Wind Waker, DQ8), as I believe these hold up much better than standard graphics/art style. The character sprites look great, monster and boss art is interesting, environments are beautiful.

Battle system

The battle system as a whole is really satisfying. While I do think it is a step down from Bravely Default, I still think it's a great take on a modern turn based system. The boost/break system allows for some really challenging and almost puzzle-like boss fights - where you have to balance between using your BP to break the boss faster or save it to deal out the most damage after you break the boss.

Quest system

As someone who gets overwhelmed by all the quests and collect-a-thons in modern console games (Wither 3, Assassin's Creed, Horizon Zero Dawn), I found it really refreshing how bare bones the quest system is. I love that there's no way points to lead me to the next step in the quest. I love that you actually have to read what the NPCs are saying to know what to do for the quest. I love that you have to think about which character's field ability you have to use to solve a particular quest.

Class system

I'm a sucker for games with classes (like FF5, DQ7, Bravely Default, Etrian Odyssey) and this game does not disappoint. There's not as many classes as in something like Bravely Default, and you can't customize each character as much (you can only change their sub class and 4 passives), but the classes are well balanced and each one is useful in battle in some way. There's still enough customization that you can build your party to defeat challenging bosses in different ways to capitalize on your party's synergies.

The Not So Good

No overarching or central plot

Story-wise, the main problem with the game is that there is not really a central plot. The driving force of the game comes from the player's interest in the 8 mini-stories. The mini-stories are not terrible, but they are not great - and most definitely not on par with even the side stories of characters in games like FFVI or DQ7. For people who value a great narrative, I could see how this could be a huge turnoff. Unless people are drawn to the gameplay mechanics, I imagine most people will just complete the stories of the few characters they like.

Main characters don't interact in a meaningful way

Plot and character interaction often go hand-in-hand. The fact that there is no central story to bring all these characters together means that they don't have the chance to have arcs together. The force of change in each character is the series of events that happen to them in their mini-stories. There are some mini-scenes similar in form to skits from the Tales series, but they are often only between two characters, we never learn anything new about the characters, and even the characters don't really learn anything new from these interactions.

No boosting into debt

You start off each battle with 1 BP and you can only boost by as much BP you have. This is my main major complaint with the battle system. I really wish that they would have taken the Brave/Default system from Bravely Default. This makes random encounters a slog, since you can't just 4x boost every character and defeat the enemies in one turn as you can in Bravely Default.

No encounter rate slider

One thing that I really would have loved is some way to completely turn off the random encounters - ideally the encounter rate slider from the Bravely Series. There is a character ability to reduce the encounter rate, but I really wish that I could get rid of them completely. I enjoy the environments so much that I really would have liked to walk between most locations, but I found myself fast travelling to avoid random encounters.

No beastiary

There's really no excuse for a modern JRPG to not have a beastiary of some sort. It's good that the enemies have their weaknesses displayed under them in battle, but I would have preferred an in game compendium containing more info about each enemy.

The way H'aanit talks

One of the 8 characters talks in what seems like an attempt at Old English(?) and it just makes things harder to understand and adds nothing to the character. It's enough to make me never use her in my party and only begrudgingly go through her chapters.

End game battles rely on RNG too much

(Note: I'm just getting to the end game, so I may come back and update this)

My main complaint is with how the end game treats physical attackers. So the general strategy against bosses is this: attack their weakness until they break, then unload all your damage. The quickest way to break bosses is with many attacks. The only good passive skills that align with this strategy for a physical attacker are "Second Serving" (50% chance to attack again after a basic attack) and "Patience" (25% chance to act again at the end of a turn). The other way a physical attacker can perform multiple attacks is though boost-attacking or using multi-attack skills like "Thousand Spears" or "Arrowstorm" but these attacks often miss - even with accuracy boosting buffs. This makes fighting bosses very frustrating as I've often found myself failing to break a boss when I was planning to because RNG made me miss more than I expected, or I've been able to save myself by randomly getting an extra action. Living/dying by RNG is never satisfying to me

I played about 20 hours and eventually decided to drop this game. I have no complaints about the visuals, characters and music their fine sometimes great but my biggest problem was the story and how it's paced.

This game has 8 characters who are charming if not super cliche/basic, being cliche isn't the problem the characters are charming enough but my biggest problem is that no one interacts with each other.

Each characters cutscenes are just them so even though you can become friends and travel as a group they will never take part in each other's story which just makes the basic story and dialogue boring to read. It's a lonely adventure. They do have an option where you click the start button at the end of each cutscenes to hear the opinions of your teammates on what just happened but it's usually two sentences and no real conversation. Granted I didn't finish the game and if it does pick up later I still think it's to slow of a start and they should just interact with each other right away. But you can't do that when it's non linear because they can't predict what characters you'll have or won't have at certain points. Honestly this game could've been better with a tighter story and linier path I don't see any reason why you can just go anywhere.

Other than the disappointing story the game mechanics are fine nothing really special and it's a classic rpg style so if you've ever played any you know what to expect. It's to bad because the game does look good and the art through the game is nice just really wished the characters would interact like other rpgs. Also small nitpick i wish they would include portraits of the characters when they talk, would be nice to see Thier expressions drawn out rather than just the flat pixel sprites.

I don't really recommend this game since the combat isn't anything special and the story doesn't stand out much.

This was a pleasant surprise. I'm not a super big fan of the hybrid 2.5 HD graphic style, but I quickly got used to it as I kept playing.

Octopath Traveler reminded me of the Bravely series with its retro style and turn-based combat system with the strategy of boosting turns/techniques to break and rack up damage on your foes.

This game gives you the option of playing 8 characters and going through their 4 chapters throughout the world. After picking someone, you can recruit someone new to start their story. Rather than having a larger narrative, you really are just exploring 8 character-based narratives. While none of the character arcs were particularly unique or unexpected, I did find that I enjoyed the characters and their personalities. I wish the characters interacted more with a larger narrative, but because you can pick any of the 8 as your protagonist, the dialogue is often quite generic when talking to others. The game tries to rectify that with optional skits of your party members chatting with each other. While that helped somewhat, I still felt that the characters had no comradery or any larger narrative tying them together. Yes, I know there's a post-game chapter that haphazardly ties a lot of their villains to the Gate, but that just wasn't enough. I'm just not sure why a loner thief betrayed by his best friend would go out of his way for a dancing girl obsessed with vengeance.

Despite my flaws with the story, this game is awesome. Each story, while fairly predictable and drawn out, is still effective and some of these characters will stick in my mind forever. When most RPGs feature orphans with giant swords, there's just something really wholesome about Tressa, whose parents are happily married and just want her to become a great merchant. I love Cyrus's devotion to being a better scholar and teacher to others, never letting his thirst for knowledge cloud his judgment. We also get the perspective of TWO healers, when we usually just get one in these kind of games: the cleric side and the medicinal side. At first, I hated the high random encounter rate, but the second I got the Evasive Maneuvers skill, I was good to go. Every battle was exciting and never took too long (except the sidebosses, but hey that's why they're sidebosses). I also loved exploring the world and all of the job classes. I would argue that the towns and dungeons largely felt same-y, but to the game's credit, it felt like an expansive world compared to other JRPGs which have the one desert and snow town.

In summary, I'd definitely recommend this for JRPG fans, even though I'm sure I'm the last person to play this. If you don't like JRPGs, I don't think this will change your mind. Music is great, visuals are nice, and the gameplay is compelling. I've heard that the post-game content sucks, but I won't let that tarnish my rating even if I have a bad time.