Dan Rykert gushing about a Square-Enix sprite based JRPG was my daily moment of weirdness. But hey, long hot summer of gaming.
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Octopath Traveler Review Thread
- Thread starter Wise
- Start date
Well Bravely came out in the US 4 years ago in 2014, and 6 years ago in Japan. So yes its the best SE reviewed game in years
I was worried I'd feel like Jason S did so it was worrying to see his review literally articulate absolutely everything in my head just from the demo that worried me. I'll try it if it ever goes on sale but I can't pay what it costs in canada to try it...
It is now a pre-order only discount. It used to be a pre-orders and up to two weeks after the release of a new game. but the two week 20% discount was removed and now it's strictly a pre-order discount.
GB or Dan?
Cause if it's the latter then I'll need to wait for some more impressions. The Quick Look starts off with Vinnie saying he had heard lots of meh responses to the game.
Not sure if you can, but still, the idea of having to just fight for long sessions because you need to be at a higher level to progress through some bosses or sections, is not that appealing to me these days.
Dan is gushing in the QL? I haven't watched QLs in a while but maybe I'll watch this one. I'm playing it regardless, but I'd like to hear what they think. Though I guess tomorrow's Beastcast will provide that regardless.
I ask cause I'm catching up on Beastcasts now and in the one for 2 weeks ago he's extremely high on it, but he's only done 2 characters' chapter 1s at that point and I know last week he was out so the next episode won't have updated thoughts.
I take it you're not counting ports/remasters or action rpgs? Because FFXII:ZA, FFXV Windows Edition and Nier Automata all have higher MC scores at the moment.
FWIW, I post heavily in review and preview threads for games I'm interested in, but almost never post in the OT other than to say "nice OT." I'm usually too busy playing the game I've been hyped about to bother in those threads, the threat of spoilers aside.
I don't think whatever trend you think you are seeing is nearly as concrete as you believe it is.
Fantastic reviews. Looks like I have some shopping to do tomorrow.
Fortunately Dan from GB said the grinding is actually sort of pleasant because the combat system is so good. So at least there's that?
And something isn't good just because you did like it.
Phew. Glad we got that sorted out.
Regarding the Kotaku review, he made more than enough fair and objective points about the game. Dungeons being incredibly similar isn't opinion. Bosses being incredibly similar isn't opinion. The story ignoring your party in cutscenes isn't opinion. Being blocked from continuing the game because you aren't at the "recommended level" isn't opinion.
People need to learn what an opinion is.
what a completely pointless post full of disingenuous strawman replies.
If that's the best you can do, then don't even bother responding.
Do you even know what disingenuous and/or strawman means? Clearly, you don't, judging by your post. Just because you see a bunch of other people incorrectly using those words, doesn't mean you need to.
Not really sure why you replied when you had absolutely nothing of value to say.
Like it or not, the Kotaku review has many valid, non-opinionated criticisms (unless the author is lying) about the game, such as all the ones I mentioned in my post, and hence brought the author to the "another botched JRPG experiment" comment.
To be fair only DQ8 is the DQ that could be considered grindy beyond the Famicom years.
Several people in the late game have been chiming in to the Octopath Discord. Here are a couple interesting things we've learned:
- Character interactions increase as the game goes on. They continue even after the personal stories are completed. The ones in Chapters 3, 4, and postgame involve as many as your entire active party (so tailored interactions depending on your individual party combo), and get quite lengthy. Downplaying the amount of party interactions is doing what the game does a disservice.
- Around half of the personal stories have emphatic references to something afterward (i.e. the postgame), which suggests this postgame will actually have some amount of story. I don't know why some reviewers were saying there were absolutely no hints at a postgame. It's flat-out incorrect according to multiple people and the dialogue discussed.
- The world-building and lore are extremely robust.
SMT at least is definitely not, unless you mean exclusively the pre-Nocturne ones, and even then it's a bit of an exaggeration. Stuff like this is why I rarely believe people when they describe a game as grindy.
The interactions part... Remind me to never trust reviews, let alone previews for robust RPGs again lol. Fantastic news tho, thanks for sharing.
You can't fault them when the people behind it name drop FF VI for marketing play.
thanks for bringing us up to speed!
Some of this review discussion is going to become really interesting as new information trickles out over the next week lol
I remember people getting mad at me for pointing out it was pr and coached statement
Like duh
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If there does end up being any post game story a lot of reviews need to be updated
IGN's video review just convinced me to get it. 46 euros - would have been less if I had some extra discounts in time - and to be delivered this evening by Amazon Italy.
Love when my ignore list does its job
Love when my ignore list does its job
Nintendo/SE kind of screwed up by not telling reviewers if there really is some significant finale postgame.
Lol, this week has been great. What a ride!
I'm going to be super bold and predict multiple unified chapters, numbering continuing from the regular endings, to represent unity.
The developers wanted to make a game that makes people talk about their adventures. They succeeded. So much to unpack.
I think the Kotaku review mentions Nintendo told them there's "more" but didn't explain how to access whatever that is.
Edit: Here
Nah, this industry needs more mystery and intrigue. More organic discoveries by the community.
But yeah, Nintendo did tell Shreier there was some endgame content but he couldn't find it:
So it wouldn't be at all surprising if there was some content that reviewers haven't discovered yet. Besides that,
people have uncovered lore that points to an endgame dungeon, and boss music that hasn't been discovered in-game yet.
So there actually is a post game? Kotaku made it sound like they couldn't find it.
Also is it true in story cutscenes your party is non-existent and only the main character is in them?
TBD. My money is on a unified chapters later that requires beating the major sidequest chains.
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For personal stories, that is the case for a reason. There's significant party interaction in optional scenes outside of them as you get later into the game.
Alright, as long as there's a logical reason for this kind of thing, then I'm cool with it. I just found it kind of strange the way Kotaku complained about it in their review
I'm picking this game up in an hour (yay Australia) so I'll try to comment on some of the controversies soon.
I think it would have been hard to plan it in advance for solo runs then, as it seems like it's an actual option.
It's gameplay-story segregation, related to the narrative inspiration of Octopath being The Canterbury Tales, where a group of travelers meet at a tavern and decide to embark on a pilgrimage, telling each other short stories of their experiences along the way.
It's imperfectly framed in Octopath with awkward implicitness, rather than explicit showing, but the Tavern option to switch character stories is, for instance, "Hear a Tale."
Wonder why all the concept art has the characters in conversation in a tavern? That's why.
I really wish they'd nailed the execution more so that people weren't confused by the occasional contradictions, but such is life. It's an ambitious effort whose flaws will be less acceptable to some people than to others—particularly those who aren't aware or a fan of the intended concept.
Other than that, the pragmatic gameplay reasons that the characters' personal stories are siloed are rather plain. There's 162 combinations of characters to form a party, so writing them into every single scene—many of which simply weren't written for anyone else to be there—would be too much effort, and stock dialog would do characterization a disservice.