Review (2025 December)

Octopath Traveler (as "OT" afterwards) is a RPG developed by Square Enix and released back in 2017. I started OT only because it seemed to have something related to the Bravely series, which already I played and enjoyed. Honestly, that was one of the worst decisions I ever made with games. Overall pretty disappointing to me, but the grinding part just drained me dead back then – pretty stressful throughout the play. The key features are listed as below.

• Story: There exists no grand story in OT at all, though the final hidden BOSS somehow links every character in a fishy way. It feels like multiple short but crappy character stories being glued together, very similar to some mobile games like Octopath Traveler: Champions of the Continent (大陸の覇者). As a globally famous mobile games developer, obviously, Square Enix aimed for this from the very beginning and somehow got easy profits successfully.

• Art: Visually unique but that is it, I would not start playing just because of this.

• Music: Very few outstanding ones, nowhere near the Bravely series.

• System: The battle system is okay, but it is just inherited and modified from the Bravely series, which was inherited from Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light, and so on. As with other modern RPGs, regardless of the real performance, you will always be able to find something interesting to play or grind once you dig in.

• Achievements: There are 88 Steam achievements in OT, with extremely nasty ones. Considering the game system, without cheating (like using backups), you would need multiple runs to complete them all. More disgustingly, some collectible achievements have almost zero tolerance for mistakes. This often does exist in RPGs – if you miss something, you will not be able to get it for the whole run. However, usually, there are not many such cases. Sometimes, monsters in the older areas can respawn later, so as items or weapons. But in OT, there exist so any missables.

• Spreadsheet: Assuming no cheating, to avoid making any mistakes, players are usually recommended to use a spreadsheet to record what they have done in OT. This is exactly what I did back then in 2021, flipping between the game window and the spreadsheet (see below) back and forth. It was one of the most stressful gaming experiences that brought me bad sleep during that period, and it was pretty long as well. Some people thought that was a joke, but it honestly was not – I play games in a serious way, not just for pure relaxation or entertainment. In the end, I did complete all 88 achievements on Steam in a legit way. A great achievement indeed, but way too much to think the journey was worth it.

A quick think after finishing OT: next time when I play similar games, perhaps I should avoid the Steam version to avoid being obsessed with all these ridiculous achievements. A deeper think afterwards: I am not even a real RPG fan at all! Both Pokémon and Bravely series are just exceptions to me, which does not counter the fact that my overall opinion towards RPGs is relatively negative.

• Why RPGs, if I usually disregard the storyline?

• Why RPGs, if I believe the game system is usually too exploitable, which is bad?

• Why RPGs, if grinding or 100% is a stressful part but also a "must" to me?

Thanks to my unusual amount of spare time back then in 2021, I survived the insanely tough journey. Overall, a great lesson – think not twice but 20 times – before starting another RPG.