Over the past few years, we’ve been in a JRPG renaissance with the genre oozing with great titles for players to check out. Now we have the next entry in the series that’s the progenitor of Square Enix’s HD-2D art style with Octopath Traveler 0. While a new entry in the series, it is not a brand new game, but more of a revamped adaptation of the mobile game Octopath Traveler: Champions of the Continent which released in Japan in 2020 and officially worldwide in 2022. While that might give some with an aversion to mobile games, apprehension, Octopath Traveler 0 is easily one of the better transitions from mobile to consoles and PC, and doesn’t have a mobile game feeling at all.
The story of Octopath Traveler 0 is the same premise as the mobile game and hits the same overall beats with some slight changes to the narrative. Overall, the way the story is handled gives the game the best overarching narrative in the series. Whereas in the original game and its sequel you pick and choose which of the eight protagonists to start as follow their individual stories as you eventually gather all eight characters, you start this game creating your own character dubbed “The Chosen One” who the story follows throughout the entire game. At the start of the game, your hometown is burned and razed to the ground, and then it’s up to you to rebuild the town and take down those who did it. The story then evolves past just being a tale of revenge and provides multiple twists and turns that catch you off guard as you play.
One of the biggest complaints about about the mainline games was the fact that the stories felt so disconnected from each other with each of the other protagonists not having any input or impact on each other’s stories whatsoever. This time, with one central protagonist, the stories you follow build up and contribute to the overarching narrative the game has. This also gives the game a centralized group of characters that are connected to each other the entire time, and there are a plethora of interesting characters that have a major impact on either the overall narrative or the current story you are following. Some of these characters can be recruited to your party or join you for a portion of a story as an NPC helper in battle. With the sheer amount of characters that can be recruited, most have a small mission before recruiting them, but don’t contribute to the story overall. Then, the game is full of side content to see, but most side stories don’t have the most in depth storylines with most being a bit of fetch quests.
On the gameplay front, Octopath Traveler 0 still has the turn-based combat system the series is known for, and it feels as good as ever even with all the random encounters. Then, the game takes all the good about what Octopath Traveler: Champions of the Continent introduces and removes all the mobile aspects of it. Thus, there are no gacha elements nor microtransactions in the game at all. The game keeps the expanded eight person party which gives so much more depth to the combat than ever as you are able to build parties easier to cover and exploit enemy weakness even better. Your party is separated into four member front and back rows and you can switch between at any time in battle with the front row being the main characters you control during a turn. While the mainline games kept the party to the eight protagonists, this time around there are around thirty recruitable characters, including some familiar faces, to have along in your journey, and all characters have different skill sets so no two characters with the same job are exactly the same. Then, the main character has the ability to unlock and switch jobs at will once they are unlocked.
The biggest difference between Octopath Traveler 0 and Octopath Traveler: Champions of the Continent is the introduction of the town building. As aforementioned, at the start of the game your hometown is destroyed, and you and your surviving friends intend to rebuild the town to its former glory. There is a whole major questline associated with rebuilding the town that is enjoyable to follow and is full of positive vibes. Town building is simple as you can place houses, shops, farms, and more for the characters you recruit. Playable characters aren’t the only characters you can bring back to your town as there are multitudes of NPCs you can invite back to the town as well. These characters usually have some sort of incentive upon coming to your town such as providing you a bit of money or resources. Then, as you progress through the questline your town levels up and you are able to build new things which allow you to bring more people back to town and do more things.
Overall, the developers were able to turn a mobile game into what may be the best game in the series. Octopath Traveler 0 adds more content and improves upon the series’s storytelling in the best way possible. This game shows why the series has done so well and stands out on its own in the JRPG space. With this new foundation Octopath Traveler 0 builds, it gives the future of the series the brightest outlook it has had.
Score: 8 out of 10
Reviewed on PlayStation 5