The Etrian Odyssey series has been my fondest game series to date as Nintendo's handhelds are where I spent ALOT of my time growing up. From Color, to Advance, to SP, to DS, etc. During the DS era I found a used copy of Etrian Odyssey 2 at a gamestop in one of those baskets that just have a mish mash of games and have fallen in love with the series since. The series at its simplest is a dungeon crawler where you create a party of adventurers through a selection of character portraits and classes and go off to dungeon crawl labyrinths. Nexus, being the latest in the series, is a culmination of everything the series has done up to this point, including multiple classes, portraits, music tracks, mechanics, and labyrinths from every single game so far, making it the ideal EO experience for new players and veterans alike. This won't be a review really, so much as what I've loved about the exclusively about the series as a whole. Honestly, I can chalk it all up to EO being DnD Lite.

By far, EO's most unique mechanic and what led it to be a (3)DS exclusive for so long is it's map making system. Using the touch screen and stylus, you are tasked with creating your own map of each labyrinth as you explore, given an array of fonts, colors, and icons to denote special events, shortcuts, enemy patterns, areas of interest you may find, or to make special notes. These tools sometimes become essential as some Labyrinths will be a puzzle in of itself, whether it be certain paths you have to take or making note of multiple FOE(REALLY strong overworld enemies) movement patterns in order to get around them. It was a charming system back then, but probably one that has fallen out of favor for some, as the latest games include auto-mapping options. The biggest draw though is in the flexibility of the class system. After creating your explorer from a pre-set list of portraits (and hair color, eye color, voices, and more in Nexus) and giving them a name, you can assign them a class. Your party will consist of five explorers(or not) so your class composition will normally reflect this. While you CAN do a standard tank, healer, dps composition, you are not discouraged from experimenting with your class choices. The best I can describe this without going into too much detail is the game won't force you to NEED a healer or tank (though it certainly will make it harder for new players) as there are enough classes and compositions that can cover the weaknesses of not having either. Don't want a standard face tanking Protector? Go for Nightseeker/Survivalist composition, relying on status afflictions and binds to essentially evade tank or prevent the enemy from acting. Don't want a Medic? Go for a War Magus who while does have heals, specializes in dealing massive damage to afflicted enemies, or buffing allies defenses. Each class will come with an extensive skill tree that opens up more the further you progress and the more points you allocate. By extensive, I mean each skill tree for each class has different builds you can choose to go for said class. You can make your War Magus fully focus on DPS skills, buffs, heals, or a little of everything. Your composition will further open up and evolve when you unlock sub-classes, allowing you to assign a second class and second skill tree, further complimenting their specializations (or not). Each game has its own unique set of classes, with Nexus including a little of every game but not all, so I actually implore people to try out the older games for its variety in classes and labyrinths even though Nexus is absolutely the best starting experience. And while the newer games have difficulty options, the older ones are locked at its original brutal difficulty setting that I believe are harder than the current difficulty options and those of the remakes. Not to mention the old games take a "Figure it out" stance and only explain the bare minimum needed to play the game. If you're new to this genre and start with the old games, you WILL die alot, you WILL grind alot, and your party WILL change alot. If you desire this experience, 1-3 are your friends, any after that are far friendlier to newer players, including tutorials for its mechanics.

Outside of exploring, you have a hub where you can rest, save, accept quests, buy items, weapons, armor, and in newer games, upgrade weapons even. Each game includes different areas in the hub that pertain to unique mechanics within that game. For example, the Untold series includes a complicated skill system on top of the skill trees that I won't really touch upon, as it would take a bit of time to explain. Others include a cooking system where you can cook and eat food with ingredients gathered from labyrinths, giving you an array of buffs or resistances. 4 in particular includes an airship system to fit its grander exploration system with mechanics pertaining this game exclusively.

The music... the soundtrack of every series is absolutely phenomenal. Even on the DS' limitations, EO's FM synthesis soundtracks are absolutely spectacular. While the new games have upgraded from FM music, the Untold series gives you the option of selecting whether you want to listen to the original FM soundtrack, or the newer updated remake soundtracks, both of which are fantastic. Though personally, I really love the crustiness and bit sound from the DS... You know, I'll just link the music.

Whether you're just walking around exploring..

or face to face with a foe of unimaginable power..

For the mainline games, there isn't really a story. You're given a reason to explore the labyrinths and a little bit of lore to explain why you're exploring with a few important events here and there. Outside of that, everything is entirely up to your imagination. Who are your characters? Why are they each exploring? Their goals? Their personalities? Their interests? W̶h̶o̶ ̶s̶m̶o̶k̶e̶s̶ ̶w̶e̶e̶d̶?̶ All this depends solely on your imagination and will be assisted through random events littered all throughout the labyrinths to help build your party a bit. This is what truly captivates me about the EO series. While you can enjoy the game perfectly fine without worrying about these details, to me this is what made me love the series. A series that focuses entirely and purely on its gameplay, with its character building entirely up to the player's imagination. On the flipside, the Untold series actually has two game modes you can choose from. The classic mode from the original game, and a new story mode that has you following a party of five members with pre determined classes. Quite frankly, the story of the two games in the Untold series isn't anything spectacular but it's a nice bonus that was included. You might even enjoy it more than you think.

There's so much more I could say about each game individually but I think I've already written too much. I really love this series and if you're a fan of dungeon crawlers and haven't checked out this series, I believe it's well worth a 3DS buy or emulation, as the older games are quite difficult and expensive to buy. I'll just leave you with a little excerpt from the director of the 1st game, who better explains just how imperative your imagination can be when it comes to these kinds of games.

https://imgur.com/a/GAFXLIa