LogFAQs > #926394462

Back to Octopath now.

The way FFVI and CT work is that they don't abandon narrative; rather they start out with a critical conflict and then give the player a handful of well-developed characters and a narrative skeleton on which to build. CT has Marle getting sucked into the past and the discovery of Lavos. FFVI has Terra on the run and the party reuniting to fight Kefka. Octopath admittedly doesn't have anything like this. Instead it has 8 separate, smaller, more personal crises that propel individual journeys. The game here expects players to provide their own motivations for the group traveling together. Here is where, I believe, most people begin to take issue with the story.

However, the game provides attentive players with plenty of motivations aside from the tried and true "you need more party members so you don't die" strategy. Players just have to swing the axe themselves.

Primrose wants to use Alfyn for her own ends, before ultimately becoming actual friends.
Therion similarly wants to steal whatever ultimate treasure Tressa finds
Alfyn comes across a wounded H'aanit in the town tavern and helps her for free

If you didn't absolutely relish coming up with these imaginary scenarios then I truly feel sorry for you. If all early JRPG's are essentially dungeons and dragons for people with no friends then Octopath is the platonic ideal of that model. You get out what you put in. This applies for critiques 1 and 2 in particular. The "additional scenes" of party banter aren't meant to be "Tales of" esque skits... they're meant to jumpstart your imagination so you can do more of this work on your own. It's not that the party members are silent/non-existent when Primrose is betrayed in her story...it's (fill in the blank). This is not a flaw or a plot hole. This is the game inviting you to be a co-author.

The third major complaint - that all the stories are the same - is only true if you allow it to be true. How Alfyn hunts a mythical creature is bound to be different than how H'aanit would. Olberic's quest for revenge is different than Primrose's. Players are given the freedom to tackle chapters in whatever order they wish with whichever character they choose (side note: I DO think the game is flawed in that it won't allow you to change out your initial character). Now if you want to complain about the maps themselves being too similar... that's fine. That's not a story flaw, but a design one.

I think I'm done. I hope I've been convincing. Best case scenario is I get someone who wrote the game off to try it again. But if you still disagree with me that's fine too. People have different tastes and I respect that. I just wanted to speak my peace.