But a few others are hard to care about or actually quite irritating, especially Partitio the entrepreneurial merchant. Some have causes that are easy to invest in – like the thief, Throné, fighting for her freedom from a life-time's slavery in a criminal gang – or compelling personalities, like the exuberant beast-girl hunter Ochette. The pressure is thus on the stories themselves to be compelling, but only a few are, not least because the characters are a remix of the first game's cast, occupying the same range of professions – a warrior, a merchant, a cleric, and so on – and in many cases navigating similar scenarios.
#OCTOPATH TRAVELER CHAPTER 2 GRINDING SERIES#
The party dynamic so central to JRPG series from Dragon Quest to Persona is missing. Except for occasional side conversations and the addition of a handful of inconsequential mini-chapters in which two characters work together, each story focuses on a single individual, with the rest of the crew merely offering support in battle. This open invitation comes at the cost of a singular narrative line that pulls the group towards a common cause. You're never constrained to a single location, and once you reach a new town you can hop back there as you see fit. Now you've got eight quests to see through, one chapter at a time, scattered across the map.Īs before, then, you have plenty of freedom to decide on the order you recruit your gang and tick off their objectives. Before you get anywhere near it, though, you'll meet the other characters in their home towns, play their backstory chapters, then add them to your posse. Select one as your primary character, and you play through the opening chapter of their tale before setting off to pursue a far-flung goal. But neither dramatically alter the flow.Īnd the same is true across the board, starting from the structure of your adventure, which once again focuses on eight travellers from different parts of the world, each with their own reason for hitting the road.
Yes, there are a couple of fresh additions to the system: 'latent powers' build up as characters take damage until they can execute a unique skill – gaining an extra turn, say, or instantly filling their BP supply – while second jobs allow a character to add the skills of another to their repertoire, offering a little more party flexibility. If you played Octopath the first, however, you already know all this, because it's simple recycling.
They're the proof that there's plenty of life in this traditional format yet, given some intelligent tinkering. You may be racing against time to break them as they charge up a devastating strike of their own, and judging when to save or spend BP can be a matter of life or death. This balancing act becomes delightfully taut against bosses – once again brilliantly depicted as towering tyrants that dwarf your diminutive charges.
#OCTOPATH TRAVELER CHAPTER 2 GRINDING FULL#
Ideally you want to save them until you've broken through then pile in at full power, but sometimes it's prudent to deploy them sooner, to break a guard quickly before your opponent attacks again. Your BP supplies can be used either to unleash multiple standard attacks or add oomph to special abilities. To whittle down your opponents' shields and score big hits you need to discover and then target their weaknesses to certain weapons or magic, diminishing their guard counter with each strike until you smash through, leaving them stunned and vulnerable for a turn. That break mechanic, along with the 'Battle Points' (BP) that your combatants accrue over time, also ensure a level of tactical play.
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