Octopath Traveler is one of those games I didn’t know I wanted until I saw it for the first time. After dozens of hours and numerous tough battles it brought back nostalgia for an era of jrpgs I had thought had died long ago and I am more than happy to see making a resurgence.
Story
Octopath starts with choosing from one of eight characters all of which I came to like by their stories conclusion. From the Warrior Olberic who Travels to find out why he was betrayed, to the Merchant Tressa who decides she needs to go on a journey to see the world, I found every story interesting in its own way. It starts off with choosing one of these eight to be your main character. The only real consequence of this is that they will always have to be in your party and you will still be able to experience all the story’s no matter who you choose in the beginning. Certain chapters tend to drag on a little too long but I found ultimately that they all paid off in the end.
Battle System
Octopaths battle system works in about the way you would expect a game modeled after classic jrpg’s to work with a big twist. Every enemy you fight will have a weakness to something.that could be a sword or fire and a large part of the game is centered around this. These aren’t known to you at first and there’s a couple of ways to find out an opponents weakness such as using Cyrus to reveal a weakness at the beginning of battle or his analyze skill. You can also just keep switching weapons and elements until you find one that works. Once you find that weakness you can hit your enemy with that weakness until they break which causes them to lose a turn and be more vulnerable to your attacks. This might not seem to be necessary at first however as you advance further in the game the more important it becomes. Another important aspect of the battle system is battle points which will allow you to attack multiple times in one turn of make a spell more powerful and I really enjoyed the balance between using it right away or saving up and decimating my opponent later.
Path Action
Each character has two unique actions which are a path action and a Talent. Path actions can range from being able to challenge people in towns to a duel to stealing items. They are all useful in their own way and I found myself using them quite often. Talents are also very widely varied and I found some of these to be more useful than others. Cyrus and his ability to scan for one weakness of each enemy was one I couldn’t live without in the later parts of the game.
Final Thoughts
I spent roughly seventy-five hours with Octopath Traveler and enjoyed every second of it. From the amazing combat to the endgame content every part of this game felt like it was made with rpg fans in mind and I can see why Square Enix don’t think its necessary to have any DLC for the game as it feels complete in its current form. There are few minor annoyances but overall, this might be my favorite rpg this generation and I am already look forward to the sequel.
