Octopath Traveler Review

[{UC} Reviews]

Pros 👍🏻

Cons 👎🏻

• Simple combat system
  
• Great soundtrack
  
• Long game length
  
• Beautiful pixel art graphics

• Takes a while to 'catch on' to the game
  
• Characters rarely interconnect
  
• Bad mini-map design
  
• A lot of grinding

🎮 Gameplay

In OCTOPATH TRAVELER, you begin your journey by choosing one of the eight playable characters. No matter which one you choose, the game will still start and play out the same; you will just start the game by completing the first chapter of your selected character.

The game is separated into eight stories, each one containing four 'chapters'. You can choose which stories/chapters you want to complete first; as there is no order you need to follow, and each story has a respective character. Sadly, characters will never interact in each other's stories, other than the sparse travel banter.

The in-game world is quite large and contains several different locations for you to explore. Upon entering a town, you will be able to visit some important buildings, as well as being able to quick travel to that town in the future. This makes it much easier to travel to where you need to be in the later chapters.

To start a character's chapter, you must have them currently assigned in your party. When you enter a town you will be prompted to continue a character's story and you may either continue it or choose to continue another time.

In the many towns you will venture to, there are plenty of things to do within. You can purchase items at the provision shop or weapons/armor from the weapon shop that will greatly assist you while battling.

While in towns, you will have the option to complete side-quests, for which you will be rewarded. A side quest is marked by the orange star on the mini-map. When you confront an NPC with a speech bubble, you may notice some white icons. These are known as 'path actions', and are a character's special ability. Simply press J and select which path action you wish to take. Depending on your current party, different abilities will be available to use.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2091593079

⚔ Combat

OCTOPATH TRAVELER uses a turn based combat system when it comes to fighting enemies. While wondering through any non-town map area, you have the chance to enter into battle. The screen will fade black, and then clear into a battle scene, where the enemies are on the left, and the characters on the right. The turn order bar is shown at the top of the screen, and the current attacking enemy or character is shown on the left of the bar, followed by the next attackers.

Each character has three main stats: health points (HP), skill points (SP), and battle points (BP). HP determines how much damage a character can take before becoming incapacitated.

When you start a battle, you will begin with one BP. BP is depicted by a little gold circle under a character's name. You can use BP to double, triple or quadriple an attack (one BP for x2, two BP for x3 etc.).

SP is needed to use a character's skill abilities, which offer stronger elemental physical and non-physical attacks. Character skills can be unlocked by spending 'job points' (JP) in the skills tab of the menu. Unlocking will grant access to more skills and support skills - which are certain benefits not affected by equipped weapons/armor or status ailments.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2083983370

All enemies have little boxes displayed under their names with a question mark inside. These are undiscovered monster vulnerabilities, and by attacking with different weapons or elements, you can reveal different weaknesses. Whenever you make an attack that the monster is vulnerable against; you will deal extra damage as well as reducing a monster's defense (illustrated by blue shield icon) by one. When you deplete a monster's defense to zero, you will 'break' their defense and they will become stunned and lose a turn. During this time, all attacks will deal more damage.

Status ailments can cause positive and negative effects on enemies or allies, and can be acquired through random chance or apothecary skills and item usage. A status ailment may last a number of turns. Degrading ailments such as poison take effect after each characters turn.

After battle, your characters will gain XP to increase level. When entering the final chapters of the game, 'grinding' battles to level up characters to make them strong enough to continue becomes a necessity. For most - including me - this is a very dull and boring part of the game, but the soundtrack enhances the experience to make it 'bearable' enough to continue.

💻 Graphics

OCTOPATH TRAVELER uses pixel art graphics known as 'HD-2D' to give the game a retro NES look while remaining visually appealing to the modern age. The game is very easy on the eyes; and the pixel-like art is colorful and crisp.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2083983250

🎶 Audio

A key component of OCTOPATH TRAVELER are the multiple in-game soundtracks. A soundtrack will always be playing while in-game, whether you are exploring a town, battling monsters or wandering around the map. Overall, I'd say the music has been very well made, and even the best music I've heard. The soundtrack creates a more involving and invigorating experience while in battle, and makes you enjoy battle scenes a lot more.

While most of the game characters don't speak, when they do, they sound great! They really add a much needed part of the game, and creates a much better story-telling experience.

👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 Audience

This game is great for anyone who enjoys old-style RPGs, or just pixel art in general. To enjoy playing, you'd need a little patience to let the stories play out, as well as the many and sometimes long battles.

🔥 Performance

The game was played well on my system setup with video settings set to high:

Operating system: Windows 10 Pro
Processor: Ryzen 3 2200G @3.5/3.7GHz
Graphics Card: GALAX GeForce® GTX 1650 Super EX 4GB
Memory: 16GB DDR4 @2666Htz
Display: 1920x1080 @60Htz
Storage: 480GB SSD

I achieved 60FPS at all times, albeit dropping when moving from one part of the map to another.

❓ Conclusion

OCTOPATH TRAVELER is a well-made pixel art JRPG with eight well structured stories. I recommend definitely playing, but for a lot of people the high price is a negative factor. For the amount of content this game provides (around 100 hours in one playthrough), I view it as a fair price for the game. If you aren't looking to pay full price, wishlist the game and wait for the next 50% off sale.

Rating: 8/10

Reviewer: Alex Lavers