Amazing Turn-Based Combat Outshines Melodramatic Plots

I have a love-hate relationship with Square Enix’s Octopath Traveler series. While I love the HD-2D style they first pioneered, enjoyed the turn-based combat, and appreciated some great music, I’ve always found how they split their stories into eight different threads too disjointed to follow. As such, I cleared the first Octopath Traveler, but I only put a couple of dozen hours into the second before jumping between Agnea, Hikari, and the other five stories before it wore me down. Once was enough for me, as I never went back to finish.

I wasn’t sure I’d enjoy Octopath Traveler 0 as it’s based on the free-to-play gacha game Octopath Traveler: Champions of the Continent; however, any signs of microtransactions are removed, and it is far more fleshed out, making this a fully-fledged single-player RPG like the first two with two key differences: a comprehensive town building mechanic and – more importantly for myself – a singular character following one main narrative.

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Rebuilding Wishvale is a joy in Octopath Traveler 0.

One Ring to Find Them

It took me a couple of dozen hours to suss out whether or not these changes were enough for me, as Octopath Traveler 0 still bounces between loosely connected plots. In the beginning, your voiceless hero or heroine resides in the peaceful village of Wishvale, which doesn’t stay peaceful for long, as the warmongering Tytos stops by to raze the village to the ground.

You and a handful of others escape and take refuge with a mysterious scholar living nearby. After an indeterminate amount of time passes, you return to Wishvale to rebuild while also receiving a mysterious ring from that scholar. He informs you that you’re the Chosen One and that other rings just like the one he gave you are corrupting powerful people across the continent of Orsterra. It’s up to you to defeat them and seal the rings away.

No, there aren’t any Hobbits in this game.

A Touch of Melodrama

Much like the first two Octopath Travelers, this story has you jump between three plot threads tied to major villains. I found bouncing around between these three much less disjointed than the eight threads in previous games, though your party members – of which there are over 30 to recruit – do not factor in here, so you’re basically a fly-on-the-wall as these stories introduce new characters that may or may not eventually join you and the ones you bring along with you are nothing more than sprites with skills tied to them.

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There is a lot of melodrama in Octopath Traveler 0’s many storylines.

It took me about 15 hours to take down all of these first free villains before the plot coalesced into a singular one, and the continent opened up a bit more before branching out again late in the game. While by no means poorly written, these stories have to convey high stakes quickly, which in turn has them falling into eye-rolling melodrama more often than not. Scenes depict shocking murders and tears shed before princesses decide to take up swords to reclaim kingdoms from one-dimensional evil kings.

Don’t get me wrong – it was always satisfying to take down a ridiculously evil villain, but I can’t say any one of these numerous plots was any more memorable than those daytime Soap Operas my mom watched when I was a kid.

Plentiful side-quests don’t stand out much, either. While some result in fun little boss fights, most – including the ones that add a new party member – simply play out a few scenes and task you with fast traveling to another town in order to recruit someone to fix a problem.

Though not in actuality, it feels like most of the 100+ runtime it’ll take you to see all of Octopath Traveler 0 has to offer is filled with overall forgettable characters and the twisting plots they find themselves in. Rarely do I skip dialogue in games, but here I was bogged down by so much of it that my finger itched to do so.

Turn-Based Bliss

It’s a good thing Octopath Traveler 0’s combat is so sublime. The turn-based core from the other titles remains: you take turns discovering and attacking enemies’ weak points in order to ‘break’ them, allowing your party to go all out and deal massive damage. Each character gains a single Boost Point each turn that you can use to add more attacks or power-up a skill or spell; however, if you use a Boost Point, that character won’t gain one on the next turn.

The big change this time around is that you can have eight total party members in battle instead of four, paired up between front and back rows. Back row characters won’t take damage, but they also can’t attack; however, they’ll regain health, skill points, and still gain BP back there, so you can swap them in to help heal up your allies, give your main attackers a break, and more, adding layers to already deep combat mechanics.

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The combat is as brilliant as always here, especially with 8 party members to control.

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Boss encounters are always a thrilling moment as you work out their weaknesses.

Against difficult bosses, I often had the front row there to attack weak points and wear the opponent down in order to ‘break’ them, allowing my back row to jump in and wallop them with fully charged spells and attacks; however, enemies often interrupted these plans by KO’ing someone or changing up what exactly they’re weak to, which made me have to quickly change my plans on the fly. More often than not, in boss battles, my attention was rapt as I worked out a way to take them down.

With over 30 different characters with their own skills that deal different types of damage, status effects to trigger, equipment to seek out, and what-have-you to experiment with, when you gain the ability to ‘master’ skills on one of these and equip them to any of the others, the whole system becomes almost overwhelming in its potential and – for someone like me who loves a steep challenge and depth in his JRPGs – a serious contender for the best turn-based battle system out there.

JRPG Crossing: New Horizons

While I’m high on the turn-based combat and low on the narrative, the town-building mechanic has me somewhere in the middle. To rebuild Wishvale after Tytos razed it to the ground, you and your companions set out to find former residents who survived, often solving some little problem like finding a rare herb to cure an illness in order to convince them to head home.

A lot of these side-stories are, once again, steeped in melodrama – everyone lost someone in the attack, and there’s just a bit too much dialogue and crying about what a tragedy it all is. However, I found it rewarding as Wishwale grew and so did its population, adding a tavern to cook stat-boosting dishes in, a salon to change your protagonist’s appearance, training grounds to keep your abundance of companions flush with experience, and even an arena for monsters to do battle in. Rewarding enough, in fact, that despite not being much of a decorator in these types of games and the residents of Wishvale not having much to say, I found myself laying out paths and spreading flowers as I went along to make sure they were cozy.

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The HD-2D style is as gorgeous as ever.

HD-2D? More Like HD-3D

Rounding this all out is the gorgeous HD-2D style and stellar music you’d expect from the series, though, as Octopath Traveler 0 is a prequel of sorts that features many of the same areas as the other games, you might find it feels a bit too familiar. As someone who mostly skipped the second, I enjoyed revisiting towns and cities like Flamesgrace that I vaguely remembered, using Path Actions – that are now completely tied to the protagonist – to obtain items from citizens and learn about the continent of Orsterra.

All told, and despite my mixed feelings on the previous two Octopath Traveler games, Octopath Traveler 0 won me over by the end by virtue of its evolved turn-based battle system that had me looking forward to booting it up any time I had a spare minute. Stories that were often melodramatic or overwritten are a detriment for sure – but not enough to keep me away from rebuilding Wishvale and delving deep into the depths of one of the best turn-based battle systems around.