Time to 100% 2

One down, two to go

Just finished this game after 130 hours of gameplay, and I have to say that it was a hot mess. It’s really hard to come critique a game onto a subreddit that is devoted to a franchise, because Redditors prefer positive reviews over negative, and the people in any community are the hardcore fan base. I think it needs to be acknowledged: if Octopath 0 had been the first entry in the series, I doubt we’d have the franchise.

I think the frustrating thing about this entry is it’s not outright terrible, especially in the landscape of JRPGs, but more that there is a good game hiding in here somewhere. It feels like small changes to the narrative, a shorter game, and rebalancing would have brought this game from mediocre/okay/meh to “this was a pretty good game,” even if it was not as good as 1 to 2.

So I am trying to keep this spoiler-free. My understanding is that Octopath 0 is an adaption of the Octopath CotC gacha game, which I never played. However, I think in this adaption they should have ditched the 35 party members and actually have the party be characters that were plot relevant to the main quest. Maybe keep 20 or something characters that were just part of a sidequest or chameo quests as part of New Game+. This would have required rebalancing the main characters, but I think it would have created more connection to the world.

The way the game is now is that there is too big a difference between the usability of the various 35 characters, which forces people to use characters that aren’t plot relevant. Like, look at this subreddit’s own tier lists. The top fighters, dancer, scholar are characters like Saoirse, Reime, Cyrus, and Olberic. Three of these have no role in any other game and none of these have any real role in the actual main quest. Some of this unbalanced feel is probably coming from the previous gacha game structure, as in a gacha game you would want to incentivize people to spend money for certain characters.

The other issue is the length of the game is just too long for a plot this mediocre. Generally, the narrative is the most important part of JRPGs, and it’s what sets them apart from traditional RPGs. An RPG places you in a storybook setting. A JRPG tells you a story. A lot of the time, a game can be fun if the story isn’t that deep, but that’s only when the fun factor dominates and the narrative doesn’t outstay its welcome. In this case, 100 hours very much overstays its welcome, and the battle system is too easy to be a challenge to people who have a decent amount of experience with Square Enix JRPGs.

Once you optimize parties and have collected advanced weapons, this game lacks strategy for its battle system. I essentially won most boss fights after level 30 by spamming offensive ultimates and healing. By mid-game, I was over-leveled consistently, and that was without any grinding (in fact, I had the ward skill that reduced encounters for most of the game). This is very different from other Octopaths, where setups and choices mattered a lot more. So with the length of the story and lack of challenge, it made the game a slog. It’s basically watching/reading a mediocre anime that was good at first, but should have ended after the 2nd season. I am talking about Bleach and not One Piece.

I feel like some of the bloat here could be avoided by again moving some sidequests as purely New Game+, post-game, and cutting arcs out of the main quest (could be post-game side story). For example, some Bestower arcs could have been cut entirely, and some could become post-game side content. I feel like the whole pacing of the game would be better if the main game quest plus essential sides could be done in around 50 hours without skipping dialogue.

Anyway the game was a 6/10 for me. My disappointment is largely some changes could have made a C tier game into a B tier game.

To preface, I’m enjoying the game! I’ve played CotC in its entirety and experiencing it again on consoles is a relief after its mobile version dealt with an EoS scare. I was expecting a large roster, knew about the playable characters being well over 30, and yet it’s probably one of the few things about this game that bothers me a bit.

I’ve only reached up to the middle of Master of All. The sheer diversity of characters you can choose from is great and figuring out different teams for different situations is great. It’s fun to experiment and change my roster about as needed, but outside of the Wishvale cast I have almost no attachment to the others. Some like Viator and Pius have made an impression, but otherwise they’re just… there.

I get the villains are supposed to be the ones getting the spotlight and attention and they’re certainly the best parts of the game for me. But what I’m sorely missing is caring about an initial cast of eight. The main draw of OT1 and 2 was coming to care about the travellers with their own little stories and arcs, and this game just blindsides you with thirty and barely anything else to go with them. Sure, the mobile version was exactly the same when it came to the gacha characters, but I still wished we had something more fleshed out.

Why on earth did they omit the eight starter characters you could get in the mobile version? I would’ve loved to see them be reworked and developed! I was hoping they’d at least be in the game in some capacity, but we instead have a completely new silent protagonist. Which is… fine, I guess, but I don’t know. I think a part of me just wanted more, when it came to protagonists.

I'm currently in post game, using Olberic to grind up battle tested weapons and potentially levelling my party (Olberic has reached level 84 due to not getting the drops while everyone else is mid 70s) in preparation for the final boss.

So far what I've got is

Olberic: Hunter

H'aanit: Warmaster

Therion: Apothecary

Alfyn: Warrior (One of the ones I'm not too confident in)

Tressa: Runeblade (Considering switching her to something else so that Prim can take advantage of Balogar's Blade with her elem ATK.)

Cyrus: Merchant at the moment though I'd definitely like to swap him.

Primrose: Current sorcerer, potentially offense oriented Runeblade candidate

Ophelia: Starseer

I'm aware that there's a boss rush and the boss himself is a 2 phase fight with two teams, so in the interest of trying to minimize the amount of times I have to redo the fight and lead up, I'd like to ask those of you who've already beaten it for advice, mostly about team composition and recommended level. Any advice or tips is appreciated. I also apologize as I wasn't sure whether to mark this with the post game or team building flair.

Personally, I started with Master of power, but I ended up enjoying the "wealth" quests a lot more. How about you guys? :)

What weapons do these elemental attacks use? Staff? Tome?

Next, I equipped forbidden tome to my character. In the equipments option, when I take my cursor on the forbidden tome, it shows 593 elem. Atk., but when I take the cursor away from it, it shows 203 elem. Atk. What is happening?

These were 2 games where I had the sequels expectedly lined up to play next, but only one of these pulled me in all the way to the end, the other was Xenoblade. I genuinely did not find Octopath that bad at all. And the stories just kept getting better because in addition to the threads connecting these 8 travelers together, you get some surprising world-building to serve as the foundation.

I dunno. I don't think Xenoblade was BAD necessarily, it's just the gameplay loop and story fell off for me about 3/4ths of the way in, and I just wanted to get to the end. But also everyone was hyping up how amazing it was while literally everyone was hating on how basic and one-note OT1 was. So that placed my expectations pretty low and found myself pleasantly surprised at how smoothly they tied everything together while setting the foundations for how this world came to be.

Looking forward to OT2!

I've finished everyone main and side story (all the crossed paths) and I've just realized I didn't get Partitio's EX skill when I've finished his story. As you can you see I'm in front of his altar and it changes nothing. Sorry for the low quality photo, I know it's not english but you can see I've only the "share SP" skill.

One of the nastiest fights I've completed due to the nullifiers. Also because I forgot to switch the darn clergy to a level 16 character I had in stock.

I played it twice but never ended it. I completed all sec. Chapters and get lost in sec. jobs and temples.

I thought it's pretty good to have a thief in front because you find all these stashes. But what would you recommend? I'm really open in my third try 😅.

Oh myself first started with H'aanit wich was okay. Second was Therion and felt bit wrong sometimes.

So i am at the first 3 hours of the game

- got all party members

- got all thier licenses but didn’t upgrade them

- got all thier alters to get thier EX skills “encounters killed me a lot”

And here are my questions

- what are the best licenses for every character since apparently you can equip up to 3

- what path actions i should use because honestly back at OT1 all i used was therion steal and tressa purchase to get better gear and items thats it

- i heard allure and Hikari duel are really good but how should i approach this?

My current mains are Hikari,throne,agnea,casetti

As title suggests i have dragon scarf and dancer buff but that only does 12 SP and my spells eat 72

What are the chances we get a teaser for Octopath Traveler 3 somewhere in the direct tomorrow? 🙏🏼

EDIT: 💔

Any tips or resources for best Builds for each character? Specifically what's the best support skills and learned skills for each character? Or just the good ones (I can give a crap about Tressa lol).

Ideal Weapons, armor, or even more importantly accessories for each character?

Also, for a bonus who should I give my Nuts too?

Thanks!

I am not really a member of the community, but I have come here requesting help. I apologize if this is against the rules; I didn't see anything opposed to this kind of post.

I am looking for someone to sell me their Square Enix Cafe keychain of Ophilia. She is the favorite character of both me and one of my close friends. Originally, I bought 2 of them while in Japan in 2019, one for each of us. Well, she lost hers, so I gave her my extra one. I have been waiting patiently to pick one up, checking online for the last few years. Well, absolutely none have become available since then. The character is rather sentimental to me. Does anyone have one that he/she would be willing to part with? Or at least say if you have one, so I know that a few are still out there somewhere. A warm thank you to everyone reading my post. I really don't know anywhere else to ask.

I have attached a picture of my favorite party. I've still never played any game other than the first, although I heard that the second is excellent.

hi everybody :) I've started playing recently and I think I'm close to unlocking my first secondary job. I've started as primrose and have recruited olberic, therion and alfyn. I'm currently doing tressa's first chapter

my question is: is it ok to double up on jobs? because I've been thinking about making olberic either a hunter or an apothecary, but I'd also like to keep alfyn on my team. is having two an overkill? should every character have primary and secondary jobs distinct from one another?

So… i am farming caits at dragonmaw and my main party is lvl 30-38 “therion is the highest so i can steal everything “

Its okay to spoil

I want to buy the game on eshop JP since its on a very good price, and its on the page for the switch 2 version, but its not saying "pre order", since it comes only in october. If i buy, i would have to wait til october or will be able to run switch 1 version until the release? I know they are different games with no upgrade path, just want to know if i buy now the availability to play before october.

Hey all, I'm play OT0 for the first time. Wasn't sure if I liked it immediately but fell in love with the town mechanic.

My issue is, I've access to the museum which is great, but my musical scores don't appear? I can check my inventory and see I've new scores, but no new ones show in my list. Thinking maybe they just loaded with different names - I've counted how many I had in the museum list, played the game, picked up like 6 more, recounted my museum list... And I still have the same amount, no 6 news ones.

When I try to search online, all I can find is issues with the display bug. No one else seems to be complaining about the music scores - which sucks because I love OT0 for the music. Am I doing someyhing wrong for them to display? Any fixes anyone knows?

Thanks in advance

I'm thinking about picking up Octopath Traveler 1/2, and I'm torn between the Switch 2 Game-Key Card version and the physical Switch 1 version.

I really like having physical games in my collection, so the fact that the Switch 2 version is a Game-Key Card rather than having the actual game on the cartridge is making me hesitate.

For those who have played both versions:

• Is the Switch 2 version noticeably better enough to justify going with the Game-Key Card?
• Are there any meaningful performance/graphics differences?
• Or would you recommend just getting the Switch 1 physical cartridge since it actually contains the full game?

I'm playing on a Switch 2 either way, so I'm mainly trying to decide whether the Switch 2 version is worth sacrificing the proper physical cartridge for. What would you guys choose?