i know i will never make games and thus never understand the difficulty that comes with making a sequel to a game, especially one as beloved by a niche crowd as the first etrian odyssey. so, i appreciate the attempt at balancing and iterating this game made. the new classes are interesting too. but, when you nerf relaxing and immunize, you have new skills that pop up and are arguably more broken than the former in force skills and virtually all of the skills that hexers and war maguses can use. it's different, but it's really the same.

and the plot feels... like a retread. i don't mean this in quite the negative way that implies, but i don't think anything new is accomplished here. the game even goes so far as to ape one of the biggest plot twists of the game (that i won't spoil, despite the fact that these games are approaching two decades old), but it loses all bite because it's beat-for-beat the same type of twist that was in the first EO game. i can appreciate cultivating similar themes and recurring motifs, but where is the surprise? where is the narrative weight if it's all going through the motions?

i don't have any strong complaints with this game, it just feels a bit safe and same-y. nothing here is bad, and i remember much of this game fondly. but, as a previous reviewer said, this is always the last EO game i think of when i think of the DS trilogy. the first game felt like this brand new take on a familiar concept, but this game just feels like a familiar take on a familiar concept. it's more of the same, in both a good and condemning way.

god why does this review make it sound like i don't even enjoy the game when i had a great time with it. it's weird how sometimes a game can be so good but shy of greatness that you can't help but only mention its shortcomings.

Reviewed on Sep 14, 2020


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