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Octopath Traveler: Preview Thread
- Thread starter Meelow
- Start date
They could have written a nonlinear narrative where your decisions matter to the overall narrative structure; branching paths if you will, but I suppose that was too ambitious with a relatively small budget. Tempering my expectations now.
That doesn't mean there isn't one, which is the only thing I've been trying to disprove this entire time. The developers said that the game could take 100+ hours to beat if you do a lot of sidequesting and grinding, so 50-60 hours in would only be around halfway at that point.
Okay, dude. Keep justifying an obviously shitty decision because it's "different" and we're just blind because other developers know how basic storytelling works.
I'm not sure you've spoken to some of the people in this thread.
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I'm not sure you can really defend that not having meaningful character interactions is an artistic decision. If they don't interact much, is because they could not afford to spend more time developing interactions for all the permutations of party members you can have, since you have total freedom as to who you start with and meet up. No one in good mind would want to artistically stop interpersonal character development.
However, I think 20 hours is just a third of the expected length of the game, and I fully expect a narrative that has them battle together and hopefully those interactions will show up, since they don't have to account for all the variations. I remain excited and hoping to see more.
However, I think 20 hours is just a third of the expected length of the game, and I fully expect a narrative that has them battle together and hopefully those interactions will show up, since they don't have to account for all the variations. I remain excited and hoping to see more.
I mean, that's ambitious even for games with really high budgets.
Regardless of the reason for it, it is still an artistic decision. No one has to defend that it's an artistic decision, it just is one. That said, it can still be properly criticized just like all artistic decisions are.
Yes for me it does feel like playing side quests that what makes it really bad , i mean cmon playing other character story and they treat them as they dont exist ? Wtf.
So its not about getting together and defeting the evil villain , its about meaningful interaction ,
Cause at they end they make it feel like they defeted the evil villain alone which tottaly doesn't make since .
I really wished they thought through this alot before doing it.
"so guys, how are the prewie..."
lol, just wait for the review thread. It's a divisive niche game that just so happens toalso be the Switch's biggest exclusive in a while; things are going to get heated.
Oh yeah, I will stop now justifying their "obviously shitty decision" only.. because it is different? I never said that. But keep on digging.
The artistic decision here is that the game features eight self-contained independent character stories in the same universe. That meaningful character interaction doesn't happen between these characters in that case is a logical conclusion as the other characters aren't even a direct factor in each character's narrative.
I doubt it's going to be that divisive. And it's probably going to be as niche as the Xenoblade/Persona games.
The surprising thing is that ALL the previews are positive, some of them glowing."so guys, how are the prewie..."
And that we played 2 demos, so it's kind of strange how many people is reacting to the game now.
I'm a little bit concerned too about the lack of character interactions, but I'm open to try the new open narrative style, and all the other aspects in the game look really good.
Yes, thats the way to make another boring mainstream RPG or a boring game in general.
Game Designer that have no vision and only wants to appeal to the mainstream should probably let playtesters tell them whats "wrong" with their game.
Playtester will only tell you whats offside of the norm. Probably a good way to make blockbusters, but obviously the wrong way to make an outstanding game that really impress people.
Yeah, that's very true. Even games like Breath of the Wild dodged it by not making the four divine beasts more relevant than the final boss's HP bar.
I somehow forgot that high quality pixel art is time consuming and where a portion of the budget must have headed to. Also the orchestral music of course.
That has been my thought, too. It's a low budget jrpg, and that's fine. It's just that marketing shouldn't have made it look so self-important in regards to '8 stories, 8 characters'. Skyrim has more than 8 meaty quest-lines, but you don't see anyone make a big deal if it. And why would you, it's standard procedure.
Yeah, I expect this to be a YMMV game based on these previews. I liked the laid back approach to narrative from what I played so definitely on board still. I fully expect around a 77 - 79 meta because of reviewers placing different emphasis on narrative and any possible dissonance caused by a lack of interweaving plots. It seems like it will be good fun dipping in and out of each of these stories and personalities, hopefully the final few areas also connect would be fun to see an area designed around each characters path actions.
I've got no quarrel with you, man, but you really ought to learn a bit more about game development. I don't know of a single well-received game in history that didn't use extensive playtesting.
No one is saying make the initial design or vision based on a committee of random game players, but every good developer figures out what's working for players and what's not all throughout the process, and usually makes tons of adjustments based on that.
Y'all are missing the point, though. I wasn't yelling at Octopath specifically for not redesigning their narrative based on playtesting, I was making the point that literally anyone who has had a freshman intro level class in creative writing would realize this would be very unsatisfying in a lot of ways. It's a poor writing decision and it's going to hurt the game. Even if you argue it's just "expectations"...well, read about Chekhov's gun. Interpersonal relationships are what make almost every story *go*. You can get away with some interesting stuff in limited circumstances (a lot of Arthur C. Clarke comes to mind), but I'm pretty sure this isn't one of them. I, and many others, are disappointed.
Edit: In case anyone hasn't read through the last couple pages, all of my arguments are predicated on there not being much character interaction, and why that would be bad. If there ends up being quite a bit of stuff toward the end of the game, cool, no problem.
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I don't know what's more embarassing: the people who haven't played the game and say that it will be the next great JRPG masterpiece or the people who haven't play the game and is critizicing the story structure and developers decisions.
In 2-3 weeks we will be able to make a sound judgement and opinion, now we can only especulate and critizice elements from the demo.
We should relax until then.
In 2-3 weeks we will be able to make a sound judgement and opinion, now we can only especulate and critizice elements from the demo.
We should relax until then.
If you are into JRPGs don't even bother the reviews, and play it cause i've the feeling even if Square Enix makes a proper new FFVI with a different name, (western) reviewers would always find random reasons to complain.
I just hope we are not falling again into the Wii U trap once again where every Nintendo exclusive (first or third) was criticized for really random stupid reasons, so you have games like Tropical Freeze (one of the best platformers of the past decade) being treated like a meh game.
Just review the game based on what this is, and not your bias.
I got teary-eyed at Ophillia's intro. I am an emotional person, but I rarely cry when playing videogame. Last time this happens is at the final scene of Kass's quest line in Botw. Somehow the childhood scene really touches my heart. Maybe due to the beauty of graphics, or the wonderful music and JP voice acting.
Divisive or not, this is probably going to be my GOTY.
Divisive or not, this is probably going to be my GOTY.
I'm happy we're getting something more like Saga than a thousandth basic RPG.
I'm all for fresh ideas and divided scenarios to learn about the world in different ways.
Yes games like Suikoden 3 are amazing but not everything has to be the same and I'll give its chance to this one for what it is.
I'm all for fresh ideas and divided scenarios to learn about the world in different ways.
Yes games like Suikoden 3 are amazing but not everything has to be the same and I'll give its chance to this one for what it is.
Sorry but you sell your opinion here as a law. No, an overarching story line is not needed, obviously.
And constantly insulting the developers of Octopath because "you now it better" because you had visited a creative writing class sounds... not very creative it sounds infantil and honestly not like you are a real developer at all. More like a nerd that pretends to know something. What games are you responsible for?
Before the Echo, There Came an Echo, a few unannounced/uncredited projects. My name is Jason Wishnov, head of Iridium Studios. Feel free to reach me at [email protected].
I'm sorry that the sentence "primary characters not interacting in any meaningful way is bad" is a divisive statement. Apparently I need to study more.
Could you name 10 movies/games that tell different stories that never connect AND are satisfying?
There's a reason why such is mostly found in niche indie hipster-projects. It's not generally appealing to a bigger audience. I remember watching Durararara and it was sooo hard to keep watching until FINALLY the plots began to converge in the last 2-3 episodes. If they had never converged, ugh ...
You make it sound as if what Octopath is doing is common practice in story telling. It's not. And Feep explained why.
Just to be clear, as I've said before, what's most offputting about Octopath isn't the lack of an overarching plot, it's the fact that each story pretends that none of the other characters exist. Every time you do a new chapter for any given character, you'll only see that character in all the cut-scenes -- nobody else will appear or talk. (The "banter" scenes are short, optional, and take place outside of the main story.)
Considering this game is about eight people teaming up to travel the world (why? it's not clear), this is really fucking weird and unsettling. I understand why the designers did it -- there are too many possible party permutations, and you could even just be playing as that one character -- but that doesn't make it any less bizarre.
Despite this, to repeat again because few people here seem to be listening when I say this, I am still very much liking the game.
Considering this game is about eight people teaming up to travel the world (why? it's not clear), this is really fucking weird and unsettling. I understand why the designers did it -- there are too many possible party permutations, and you could even just be playing as that one character -- but that doesn't make it any less bizarre.
Despite this, to repeat again because few people here seem to be listening when I say this, I am still very much liking the game.
Yep.
And for the record, still super-pumped about the battle system, graphics, music, and character advancement. I'm just a bit sad about this. Hell, The Last Story was basically a trash game, but the party camaraderie was so strong I finished it anyway. That's just what I look for.
I was waiting for this since he asked for "what games did you make lol" :D
Feep's right, and he's got the arguments to underline his (and mine) worries. I don't doubt the game will end up being fun for a lot of JRPG fans, but this thread in general feels a lot like all, valid or not, potential criticism is being marked as thread whining, fanboying or nitpicking. I don't get it. It's fine to talk about this point imo, especially since it seems weirdly prominent while constantly being shoven under the rug.
I dunno.
I still don't understand why people are thinking there won't be an overarching plot. It'll be the last act of the game and will require you to have beaten all 8 character's stories, of course people haven't reached it yet. There's already hints that it's in there and there's no way everything is completely separate.
Of course te party interactions will be extremely sparse until then, and probably won't be satisfactory if that's what you want, so don't buy the game if that's you.
Of course te party interactions will be extremely sparse until then, and probably won't be satisfactory if that's what you want, so don't buy the game if that's you.
Thing is, some party pickups from previously played characters already have been explained as being as story-driven as "Do you want XY to join? yes/no" without any actual plot- or character-driven interaction coming up between the two. If you just "collect" 6 or so other party members that each have their individual, interesting stories, but absolutely none to team up, interact or work together, that overarching plot might fall apart pretty quickly, if it's just "And now defeat the big bad".
I can tell you right now in this thread, the people who are heralding this to be the next great JRPG masterpiece are outnumbered ~100:1 vs those who are tearing the game apart. This is the most negative, soul-crushing Octopath thread the game has seen, and will only really be trumped by the actual review thread in terms of negativity.
Basically this thread exists to tear the shit out of the game for not having an overarching story. Forget about the $60 price, or the poor writing, or anything else wrong with the game, in here, we are all expressing our disdain for completely illogical choice they made to have 8 characters with no interactions.
Maybe they'll make an Octopath 2 sequel where all your characters finally say hello to each other?
Likeliness is next to 0%. Figure it has about the same chaces as Bravely Default did.
I think the same, a last big chapter will be unlocked when you finish all the 8 stories, but I won't be that surprised if this is not a thing.
If the 8 stories are good, this will be a nice bonus.
Nintendo is distributing and translating the game on the west, so I don't think so.
Nintendo and SE surely did some pact to keep the game exclusive to the Switch.
This is what I don't understand. Why wouldn't you want that? Can you or anyone who argued like that explain this? What's the potential downside of party interaction? It cannot be the fear of bad writing, when you already enjoy the writing that's there.
The problem is people don't want to spend 60-80 hours playing a game with no main plot, no character interactions to finally see it in the last 10 hours of the game.
Heck they don't even want to spend 20 hours without that stuff. They want it immediately, like as soon as your characters start joining each other, there should be meaningful reasons and discussions and plotlines for them to do so.
I'm talking about the people commenting in this thread, to be specific. If you have made it through this thread without coming to that realization, that is very very impressive.
They are not really the same genre of games are they? I would argue the people playing an adventure game have different priorities than those playing a competitive fighter, would you not agree? And yes, I'm sure there have been JRPGs without any sort of central plot or inter-party character interaction that still do well I'm sure. But going by this thread, there are a very large number of people who are pretty appalled by the lack of such a thing in this game at this point and time is all I can say.
Have you seen sales of games like Mount and Blade?
That the game is not what you think it "should" be does not make it bad.
Meaningful party interactions would be ideal but I'm okay with this, it's pretty much what I expected from the start.
This is pretty much a niche RPG that by getting decent exposure made people think it'd be something with more mainstream appeal like Final Fantasy.
That's exactly it, I realized it'd be a relatively quirky kind of game from the start due to its SaGa influences and knew people were setting themselves for a huge disappointment, it's a shame.
This is pretty much a niche RPG that by getting decent exposure made people think it'd be something with more mainstream appeal like Final Fantasy.
What is there not to understand? I'm not saying people don't want it. But for some it might not be a priority. "Oh I get 8 separate stories? Fine." If you're playing the game specifically for party interaction or that's a huge part of the game for you, this might not do it for you. Keep in mind people play JRPGs and skip all the cutscenes, they have different things they like about games.
Live-a-Live pulled it off, it doesn't coalesce until the end.
I mean technically speaking they're not wrong, the majority of people who buy the game won't even play to completion lol
But it's not really anything like FF6. Unless there are big changes past the 20-30 hour mark, characters don't really interact and all their stories are separate. Plus, from what I played combat is not even close to as enjoyable as 6. Also no suplexing trains.
Easy solution: play another game.
I'm not defending the developer's approach, but if this game ends being this way, which seems likely, it's not for these people and there's no use complaining about it.
Not everyone put that factor as the most important thing that they must have. Some can enjoy game with minimal interaction lets said like 7th Dragon or Etrian Odyssey and still feel the game is masterpiece lol. Each game had their own vision. If they feel those thing is not important for the devs and its targeted players, i am not sure why thats hard to understaand?