Missed exposition (and some other flaws)

[Ash]

I'm about 8 hours in and, to be honest, I don't understand the hype. Initially I was very intrigued in this world, but the lack of exposition or some kind of encyclopaedia makes it difficult for me to dive into this world.

Here are some things I don't like / understand (I'm currently still in Act 1, after the group found Esquie):

• Somehow everyone knows about Gestrals and Esquie, but...how? I was confused when everyone cheered that they are going to meet Esquie, but I've never head this name before. How do they know about this?
  
• Some explanation about Chroma and some other vocabulary would be nice...
  
• The world map is very unintuitive. It looks good, but without a minimap or something the navigation is difficult.
  
• Some kind of quest log would have been nice. I'm using Steam notes to track locations of mimes and quests, but this is not optimal
  
• I thought we would get more information about previous expeditions, but currently it's just a single page for each.
  
• It would be nice to place some markers on the map, simple icons to mark special locations.
  
• The skills are, at some point, ridiculous. When Sciel was introduced I just laughed. "Apply this to an enemy, then consume it, get a sun or a moon, if you have both get twilight, which applies more stuff from the first step"...it's so contrieved.
  
• As was mentioned by others, the parry / dodge window is kind of janky. There was one enemy move, the Gestral puppets falling into the group. It's hard to get the timing right. I thought there was an audio cue shortly before it fell, but dodging here did not work. Also, there is an indicator for jump, but nothing more.
  
• The music is very nice, I've saved the album in Spotify.
  
• Graphics-wise...it's too much for me, too "otherwordly".
  
• Would be nice to change characters during a fight to level them up as well (like in FFX).
  
• UI is not the best, I've looked way too long to find the Lumina sub menu...

It's an ok game, but (for me) far off GOTY. I think I'll play some more, the story is intriguing ...

[SeraphLance]

1. I don't remember everybody knowing about Esquie, but I could be wrong. Everybody knows about Gestrals because stories about Gestrals predate the big cataclysm that broke the world apart.

2. Yeah they don't really explain this at all. I don't want to go into spoilers but everybody just kind of bandies the word around early on and it doesn't make any sense that they do.

7. Yeah, the skills are kind of contrived, but it's pretty par for the course for JRPGs.

8. You can't really rely on the audiovisual cues, yeah. The "explosion" sound that plays can be before, during, or after the timing window depending on what you're fighting. Eventually you just get a "feel" for each enemy by trial and error and it really feels less reactive and more like a groove, for better or worse.

12. The more proper word for that would be UX, and yeah it's pretty awful.

I personally give it somewhere between a 7 and 8. I thought it was a good game and well worth the price, but it's not even my favorite JRPG of the year, let alone GOTY.

[Jfwizz]

Sorry you are unable to use your brain. Not everything has to be explained to you. Sometimes, it's real ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ easy to fill in the blanks yourself with the smallest amount of problem solving skills or inference.

1. They get reports back, maybe, from previous expeditions. They have scouts. they have tales from people who travelled to the continent and back. not hard to think about how legends could exist.
2. Chroma is pretty synonymous with magic or mana but its got painting/color terminology. Not hard to deduce.
3. Try exploring and using your brain to remember where you're going. Again, not everything needs to be holding your hand. Also Press M. There is a larger map. You do _not_ need a minimap to learn where you're going.
4. Taking notes is actually a fun way to remember things. You don't need a quest log cause it isn't that type of game. It's not a massive RPG like skyrim or witcher or w/e. Just by exploring you will naturally complete side quests and you can use your ever so massive brain to remember things to go back to when you get new abiilities, ala, metroid prime, loz, etc.
5. Its whatever. Told in the environment and trickle fed through journals and some exposition. Not a big deal. Could be explored more. You're not entirely wrong.
6. Markers on the map would be nice. The overworld map could use some work.
7. Sciel was explained poorly. But her method of playing is beyond simple if you just play her. Her tutorial could have been MUCH better explained.
8. Parry and doge are actually not a point of issue for me, at all. Seems to be in a good spot other than a few outliers that dont match up with their animation.
9. Music is phenomenol.
10. Graphics are nice too. I wish they explained some of the scenery just a td bit more cause it does just look like visual noise at some point. like "oh, this might look cool here" without any reason beyond that.
11. Changing characters would be nice, or more reason to use other characters once youve found your select 3 to use.
12. Ui seems fine. haven't had too many issues. Small grievances. Easy to fix in a small patch, like going into the second ability window in combat too fastmeans you cant use any of them until you cycle back twice. Some abilities don't get selected even when you press it. second ability being the most notorious. No option to save and have to find contrivences to get the game to auto save for you like changing lumas or clothes. No refight option if you just get reloaded to before the fight anyway. Just speed it up. Maybe even a restart fight option in the menu as well for some longer bosses that need to be done perfectly. Not being able to mount/dismount esqie sometimes. Im sure theres more.

[Ash]

Originally posted by Jfwizz:

Sorry you are unable to use your brain. Not everything has to be explained to you. Sometimes, it's real ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ easy to fill in the blanks yourself with the smallest amount of problem solving skills or inference.

It's not that I'm unable to use my brain, but the game provides just so little information. I've had no problem with something like Dark Souls, here at least the item descriptions fill in some of the blanks. But here there is just so little to work with. For example, the entire diary of one expedition just states that they ate poisonous mushrooms...if this is the amount of information they are able to convey to following expeditions, then it's no surprise they fail every time.

There are some "maybes" in your text. I did not get the impression that, e.g. during a year scouts sail back and forth from the city to the island, or that multiple expeditions are started, or that some of the expeditions coming back. I thought they start an expedition, but no one did come back.