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Players begin their magical journey with a choice: the pursuit of wealth, power, or fame.
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The depth of the Octopath Traveler: CotC narrative is evident from the beginning. From eye-catching lighting effects to sprawling 3D backgrounds, the game is a visual delight. The 2D pixels live within an Unreal Engine-powered 3D environment, and the blending of these two formats works wonderfully. The title uses a graphical aesthetic known as HD-2D. Now that app gamers have been spoiled by the likes of Apex Legends and Black Desert Mobile, I was not prepared to find myself blown away by some 2D pixels. Which is why I was shocked to find myself gushing just as readily over a game whose graphics are ripped straight from the RPGs of the 90s.
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Call me superficial, but I love a game that looks flashy. I spend a lot of time gushing over the graphical capabilities of modern phones because – truth be told – I’m just one of those people. Make no mistake, though: keeping up with the difficulty curve will require a fair bit of time and effort. But powering through the first few hours in Octopath Traveler: CotC may lull some players into a false sense of security as they breeze through their travelers’ levels at a breakneck pace. Grinding is no big deal for past masters of JRPGs who may have spent their youth trawling through Victory Road in Pokémon or preparing for some rendition of Shinryu in Final Fantasy. Exploration of the open-yet-linear locales is also a beneficial experience for completionists and helps to soften one of Octopath Traveler’s main downsides: the grind. This sense of accomplishment is bolstered if you decide to avoid guides, which I would heartily recommend. And controlling eight characters – each with a particular set of skills and talents – requires some strategizing that makes each boss encounter feel like an oh-so rewarding challenge. Unlike its predecessor, battles are waged with a troop of eight fighters instead of four. It features outlandish foes to best in turn-based combat, quests and side-quests aplenty, a team comprising a colorful host of characters, and inventory management with *ahem* unusual weapons (seriously, Scholars just bop beasties on the head with a book). Right off the bat, Octopath Traveler: CotC is a great choice for JRPG app game fans. With that in mind, this Octopath Traveler: CotC review should help any app gamers out there who have yet to dive into the franchise figure out if this free-to-play foray is worth their time. My experience of this JRPG app game, then, has been untainted by the title that came before. Which, according to many a CotC review that can’t help but compare it to the original, is pretty rare, apparently. This means I jumped into this title as a complete noob. Octopath Traveler: Champions of the Continent (CotC) is a JRPG app game, a prequel to the console and PC-based Octopath Traveler, and my first foray into the franchise. CotC Review – Everything You Want To Know
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