Octopath Traveler II is a fully realized and wonderful HD-2D JRPG from Square Enix that is full of charm and heart. While there some unfortunately typical genre shortcomings, the full experience is definitely one of the best JRPGs I have ever played.
Octopath Traveler II is centered around 8 unique characters that fit into some typical RPG archetypes, the samurai prince, the cleric, a hunter, etc. The way the party kind of forms together is a little clunky as not much exposition is given to support them joining your group other than they are on some kind of adventure/quest of their own. My favorite of the 8 is definitely Partitio, the merchant character, who's southern salesman charm just bursts off the screen, I love it every time he says "Thankee Kindly!".
The music, composed by Yasunori Nishiki is another extremely high selling point. There are multiple town and battle scores that really elevate the exploration of the world and the cutscenes. Also I have been saving and quitting the game app and relaunching it just to have the main menu music on in the background.
The combat is your standard turn based system that is really fine tuned for speed of play and simplicity of design. Each enemy will have a few weapon/element types that they are weak to that if you hit enough times it will 'break' them and cause them to take increased damage as well as skipping their action this turn and the next one. The BP system, which allows you to add additional weapon swings or boost your spells/abilities, and the latent abilities, each characters 'special' ability so to speak, add good depth but don't much up or complicate the proceedings. The job system allows you to fully flesh out your roster so you have can have every class available for the tougher fights.
The only real bummer is that there is some grinding required to keep up with the games level recommendations for the later missions. It even got to a point where I was 10 levels behind for some the quests on the map. In total, it took several hours of just mindless enemy grinding to catch back up. The side quests in the game are plentiful with each city/town having several to get, the solutions and paths for these side quests range from very simple to a little too hard to find in my experience. The map is good looking and easy to read, it would be helpful if it had a little more detail. Maybe just some simple checkmarks if you have completely explored an area/dungeon and some aids for the side quests.
The end game is very difficult which is another JRPG hallmark, I wish it hadn't been that way because the combat was not what was driving my enjoyment of the game the most. End game bosses can 1 or 2 shot characters who are 10 levels over the recommended if you aren't prepared. The final bosses even require you to use all 8 characters in 2 split groups back to back. Overall, that is a lot of gearing and grinding to have any hope in these fights.
Octopath Traveler II is centered around 8 unique characters that fit into some typical RPG archetypes, the samurai prince, the cleric, a hunter, etc. The way the party kind of forms together is a little clunky as not much exposition is given to support them joining your group other than they are on some kind of adventure/quest of their own. My favorite of the 8 is definitely Partitio, the merchant character, who's southern salesman charm just bursts off the screen, I love it every time he says "Thankee Kindly!".
The music, composed by Yasunori Nishiki is another extremely high selling point. There are multiple town and battle scores that really elevate the exploration of the world and the cutscenes. Also I have been saving and quitting the game app and relaunching it just to have the main menu music on in the background.
The combat is your standard turn based system that is really fine tuned for speed of play and simplicity of design. Each enemy will have a few weapon/element types that they are weak to that if you hit enough times it will 'break' them and cause them to take increased damage as well as skipping their action this turn and the next one. The BP system, which allows you to add additional weapon swings or boost your spells/abilities, and the latent abilities, each characters 'special' ability so to speak, add good depth but don't much up or complicate the proceedings. The job system allows you to fully flesh out your roster so you have can have every class available for the tougher fights.
The only real bummer is that there is some grinding required to keep up with the games level recommendations for the later missions. It even got to a point where I was 10 levels behind for some the quests on the map. In total, it took several hours of just mindless enemy grinding to catch back up. The side quests in the game are plentiful with each city/town having several to get, the solutions and paths for these side quests range from very simple to a little too hard to find in my experience. The map is good looking and easy to read, it would be helpful if it had a little more detail. Maybe just some simple checkmarks if you have completely explored an area/dungeon and some aids for the side quests.
The end game is very difficult which is another JRPG hallmark, I wish it hadn't been that way because the combat was not what was driving my enjoyment of the game the most. End game bosses can 1 or 2 shot characters who are 10 levels over the recommended if you aren't prepared. The final bosses even require you to use all 8 characters in 2 split groups back to back. Overall, that is a lot of gearing and grinding to have any hope in these fights.