The design of Etrian Odyssey: Problems and Positives
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- Опубликовано: 29 авг 2024
- Etrian Odyssey is a niche, beloved franchise, but does it really live up to the hype? While the fundamental design is great, many frustrating elements of the series tend to turn people away, and while some get better with series refinement and player skill, others persist even to this day.
Note: Almost all of the background footage was donated by @HitokiriKurtai, if you have any issues with the playstyle or anything, very little of it is actually mine. I didn't plan this video making process out very well, so I ended up having to use other people's footage for most of it, but lesson learned.
Random short clips from:
Acea Ivalia
Reina Sakuraba
Yung Maestso
All music in the video is from the EO series, except for the Rewrite forest theme.
The positives: It's fantastic.
The problems: It's fantastic, but we have to wait for more.
wonder what's gonna be after the EOHD Collection...
I feel like just letting people respec and reclass their characters freely (or maybe for just a monetary cost) would fix a lot of the issues. They are great games though if you build a good team
You can respec in Untold.
@@sevenchambers You can respec in every game and reclass in most games since Untold (might be Story Mode only for those two, V allows it for everyone)
They are talking about removing the cost. Which, actually, I'm fine with the rest cost being 2 levels since reclassing your Elemental attacker for every stratum/boss could be a thing otherwise. But I could go for cheaper reclassing.
I just can't get enough of Etrian Odyssey videos. That's just how good the game is for me. It's way too good with or without it's problems.
I’m starved for EO content on RUclips but luckily we have excellent stuff like this to make up for the lack
I feel like your issue with the grinding has more to do with optimization / system mastery. As an EO obsessive I consistently am capable of handling bosses at the level that my party is naturally at by the time I progress to them but I'm also leveraging the mechanics to do so. I feel like in one sense that's just what it means for a jrpg to be difficult but it's also unintuitive to a lot of players that this is what you're supposed to do so their response to a boss they can't beat is to grind for several hours when reworking their strategy would actually be faster. Like you can beat postgame bosses with incredibly low level characters, you're basically grinding because you want the game to be easier when these games are much more enjoyable when you embrace the difficulty instead of trying to brute force encounters with sheer levels
I fucking wish going to the gym was analogous to grinding in a video game, because that would mean it's an activity that only clueless people do and not something you basically have to do to not be in constant pain
yes! changing up a class in your party or hitting with the right ailment can mean all the difference in these rather than just using bruit force. (paralysis in EO4s second strata boss comes to mind)
I had a similar experience in EO V, got to the first stratum boss at level 15 and I died almost instantly, tried about 4 times and still didn't have any significant progress, so I just checked my character's skills, made a strategy, and won even without a dedicated healer (just a Shaman and a Rover) and almost no items (just a soma and a amrita because I forgot to buy medicas xD).
That being said, EO does need a clear way to see how the numbers go, but the being able to look at the whole level growth of skills since the bery begining is a great addition.
Being underleveled for bosses and missing that one skill that would make everything easier is so much more fun. That feeling when you sit there for 35+ minutes carefully thinking about what you do each turn and what might happen in the next and then you win, barely alive. It's so good. It's so damn good.
You should come over and optimize my EO2 Untold Story Party for Scylla. It's my favorite EO game but every time I hit the 15th floor my enthusiasm to continue just goes right down the toilet.
The part about "side-quests in EO are obligatory in order to keep up" is a good observation, as it does contradict the idea of "optional content".
Yet despite that, I'd still rather have that kind of design choice, purely so it let me be a completionist without fearing of ruining my experience by being overpowered.
(of course, it can be argued that giving the option to lower your levels, xenoblade-style, could easily solve the problem)
I agree with that so much
in recent years I have desperately tried to approach games in an open world mentality, trying to do whatever I wanna do and not worrying about sidequests.
But I simply can't, I need to check every part of the game before moving to the next levels. And when I manage not to do this, it's because I'm not engaged with the game to begin with, which is much worse.
Problem is, it doesn't feel like a reward to do that, and more like a punishment, because I just get too op and all immersion is gone. I feel that a lot with pokémon especially. And that's one of the reasons I love EO - it's hard, and you need to grind. Even if you do all sidequests - that makes the entire labyrinths seems way more real and threatening.
I started with IV because a lot of people recommended it to get into the series and I can't put it down. I'm at the 4 stratum and it's a blast.
I love "Well actually w/ this very specific strategy, you can beat it at x level" which I know is in the comments. A new player isn't going to approach a game in the same way a Vet will. We need to recognize that when we approach game design discussions. The video acknowledges this really well.
Its not really a specific strategy, its just generally building decent. I do acknowledge that it is hard to build well without the data sheet. Visual clarity is a major problem. You really only need to grind ever to make up for major errors in build design and major errors in build design are usually a result of not knowing what skills do. I don’t think grinding is the problem in this game, its the visual clarity of what skills do thats the problem, once you know there is a data sheet, building at least averagely becomes pretty manageable.
@@shawnscouten5184 Not knowing how skills interact and what is actually a good skills or not is the difference between building "bad", "good", decently. As said u said Visual Clarity/Lack of Transparency is a big problem, so why wouldn't result in some type of build error? This is a big error w/ the series. Love the game, but you aren't talking from a beginner standpoint.
The god tier music, immersive environments, teambuilding freedom, intuitive mapping, FOE avoiding, mysterious hidden lore, and farming for special drops is what kept me going through the games from 1 to Nexus. 100% them all, including the spinoffs (Persona Q, Q2, Strange Journey, Mystery Dungeon). All I'm missing is the lost game Etrian odyssey Mobile, lol. EO1 and EO2 are a little bit "boring" if you're not into the gameplay much, as they lack an actual scenario... But the Untold games are here for that. "The Real Problem" as you call it is my biggest gripe with the games: skills are poorly explained and don't give you any numbers. Like, in the first game, the medic class has a skill that increase resistance to "all elements". I assumed, fire/ice/lightning. But no... It also applies to slash/pierce/bash elements, making that skill absurdly OP, better than what the protector class has.
Bro called Strange Journey an Etrian Odyssey spin-off lmao
@@brightonic Fite me
@@galloviking4766 I will.
Strange Journey is so wildly different from Etrian Odyssey calling it a spin-off is like calling Blazblue a spin-off of Guilty Gear.
Sure, they run in the same engine and have “similar” gameplay, but the difference is like night and day.
Can you recruit and fuse demons in Etrian Odyssey? No.
Do you make important alignment changing decisions is Etrian Odyssey? No.
Does your map automatically fill itself out in Etrian Odyssey? No. That’s the main gimmick of Etrian Odyssey and it isn’t present in Strange Journey, however it is present in Persona Q, an ACTUAL crossover between Persona and Etrian Odyssey.
What’s next? You gonna call Soul Hackers an Etrian Odyssey spin-off because they’re both first person dungeon crawlers?
No, because that’s mental gymnastics.
@@brightonicWhat do you call crossover between Persona and Etrian? Persona spin off or Etrian spin off?
@@shuraamano It’s a Persona game first so I’d say a persona spin-off.
But Strange Journey is still nothing like Etrian Odyssey to be considered a spin-off
This seems to be the only video on EO I've seen to criticize just how awful these games are at teaching you core gameplay mechanics and how obtuse the skill progression is, using only the in game knowledge about skill choices you will inevitably make poor decisions that leads to making you feel like the game is way harder than it really is. I initially didn't like EO the first time I've played it but after I've read explanations online on how skills items stats and especially turn order actually works the game started to click with me and I started to have fun.
It's a problem with the series how it doesn't have a great learning curve, and the earlier games were horrid with skill balance, which is a big part of making things harder. Which is probably going to be a problem as those games are the ones getting the HD re-release as newbies are inevitably going to fall into some skill traps. There is basically no indication of how powerful a skill is, not even some sort of ranking system if they don't want to use specific numbers. Later games make it harder to have bad skill builds at the very least but it can make the series hard to leap onto for some people.
Nice to see someone talk about the Etrian Odyssey series.
I think any discussion of Etrian Odyssey's EXP curve is incomplete if you don't bring up how _perfect_ the EXP curve is when you play the game as intended: have one team of five (and possibly backup farmers if there's leaked EXP), take them through exploration, all missions, and all quests, and don't retire or rest your characters. For most of the series, the EXP curves were so well-calibrated that I could feel the difference from other games. Grinding is difficult because you're not _supposed_ to grind, and it means that you probably won't be too far off in EXP if you feel the need to step on every tile vs if you map out the labyrinth but are willing to paint and draw ahead of where you step. You're expected to want to complete the quests, and it'd be a shame if you were overlevelled because you consumed all level-appropriate content. (Plus, most difficulty walls will be bosses, but by the time you can fight a stratum boss, you can challenge the FOEs. And for people who look it up, in later games you can use QR codes to grind one character because QR party members don't gain EXP.)
That doesn't detract from your main complaint about it though, which I think actually boils down to how hard it is to change your mind, fix your build mistakes, try out something new, or have a bigger team than the game intends. The game is deliberately designed to discourage these options, but it's common to not want to play that way. But grinding isn't a desirable way to resolve this, and it's better if the game makes it hard to accidentally _get ahead_ of the level curve. It would be better to have more options to get characters to _catch up_ to the appropriate level, in which case there's no need to force the player to grind for it; I don't know that it should be free to respec your characters (because that would suggest the game should be designed around optimising your characters for the upcoming challenge; two levels isn't too much to respec every so often, such as whenever you pass through level gates +2, though it does unfortunately still discourage experimentation) but something like EO4's level catch-up tokens could have been unlimited (though perhaps not free), and higher-level tokens could be available later in the game rather than just when you unlock new classes.
100% agree on skill tables saving my enjoyment of the series. EO is now one of my favourites, but I consider looking up the skill tables to be an essential part of the experience, and I wish I could just look at them ingame.
just finished eo1 for the first time yesterday (100% baby). I ended up resting my protector like 5 times, but only went out of my way to powerlevel characters twice. once for an alchemist for the 6th stratum and once for a medic to rng abuse the scale drops so I could finally move on to another game lol.
while single level ups can feel insignificant it never really felt like leveling got super hard as the enemies give steadily more xp. what felt bad was forcing you to have like 3 fixed classes for the post game content.
I agree with a lot of the critiques here: my brother and friend that loved EO would say otherwise to the arguments about it being obtuse and unfair, but i agree with them
One idea i have for my own EO style game is "resolve tokens". they would work in the following way:
Resolve tokens is a token that most characters have at least one of. Once per dungeon run, when you would normally die from a damage attack or maybe a status, instead of dying, you stay alive but with a certain% of health left and a timer of 3 turns. You get rid of the timer by healing the character with a spell or item, or by winning the combat. When the timer runs out the character dies as normal. You can still take damage from other attacks or statuses after the token is used, so multi attack hits are still deadly.
Some character would have abilities that interact with resolve tokens, or even regenerate it. And some bosses or enemies would also interact with resolve tokens, or even have their own resolve tokens.
The idea with the resolve token is to allow for enemies to still be deadly suprises, but also to give players a chance to understand what the enemies does, and to make early dungeons have less "oh a member just died in the first combat, ill load a save to save money". The token should also give more design space, such as a tank/healer that works around dodges and resolve tokens.
The superboss would, of course, be able to strike through resolve tokens or absorb them with certain abilites. you could say its because its an absolute eldricht horror that errodes your resolve idk
How does all this sound to you?
That actually does sound pretty cool honestly. Giving the player the ability to refill them would probably be too OP (unless the game has no other revival spells or something) but aside from that it sounds great. Maybe you could also make it so that characters get buffs when no tokens are left for a cool risk vs reward thing.
Another couple of ideas i got while thinking about my potential EO games
1: Guild points: These are points you can spend at the guild to Rest characters without losing levels (one Guild point, or GP, required), reclass without losing levels (2-3 GP), and even Give weaker characters Xp (of which the xp value goes up with each boss clear)
This obviously needs to be tweaked as to not break the game. But the idea for these are that Resting and Reclassing is something that should be encouraged more in etrian odyssey: I hate the feeling i get when i discover that a boss has specific weaknesses and builds that just destroyes my party, and resting takes away levels and makes my party weaker
So by giving away 5 GP at each boss clear or so, i give the players more freedom to readjust their party without punishment. While making sure they dont spend it willy nilly.
The GP gained from boss clears is 5 for normal bosses, 10 for endgame bosses, and +50 For the super boss because at that point you proven you mastered the game, so no need to limit it much. All bosses aside from the endgame boss gives you less GP on subsequent defeats.
The Xp gain system from GP would work like this: The game checks what max level (N) you have gotten so far: You can then spend GP for XP points for any party member that is at N-10 levels. If you have beaten the endgame bosses, this check goes away cause as to remove grinding a bit for the super boss.
If Xp scaling is the same as in normal etrian odyssey, then you need 5 000 000 xp to get to level 99.
The GP XP gain scale is like this
(GP unlocks after first stratum boss clear)
1000Xp for each stratum boss 1-2-3-4 cleared, and each end game boss cleared.
+2000 xp for stratum boss 5-
If you have beaten all bosses aside from Super boss, a GP xp gain is then worth 10 000 XP.
When you beat superboss, GP is worth 30 000 Xp cause the game is done at that point.
Idea 2:
have more level caps to keep player at intended level for that point.
The formula would basically be (stratum x 10 ) + 5.
So the level cap increases by 10 each stratum clear, and jumps up to lvl 80 when defeating final boss in Stratum 5.
Then when you have beat all end game bosses, it goes to lvl 99 max cap.
i like this idea cause i HATE when i meat an enemy and dont know if im correct level for that boss, grind a bit, and then am way to overleveld.
If you reach max Level and gain excess XP, it can be converted into GP that can be spent later, so Grinding still can have a point.
idea 3.
if you encounter and beat an enemy, FOE, or boss you havnt beaten before, you gain twice as much XP (since the experience is far more novel than if its repeated)
The idea for this is to increase forward momentum and sense of exploration
does that sound like an interesting system and good quality of life features?
That sounds like a good idea! One question, how does one gain more GP other than bosses? Do repeat boss fights count? How often can you respec/reclass? How does this account for different playstyles or what if you needed to respec AND reclass your entire party? If these ideas can be iterated on then it would be even better.
gotta agree with your take on EOX, I ligitamately had an entire different party at the start and end of the game, just because some of them were useless at the start. Beyond that I'm super glad for this comprehensive guide to the games, nobody talks about these so it's a breath of fresh air to hear.
I dont. I got exactly what I wanted from start to end. Probably reclass the subclass a bit because don't like. I have it in mind what kind of party I wanted if every class I like is in one game. Still created some characters for experimenting classes synergy but I stuck to bitter end with my party comp.
It's great seeing someone talk about the series especially since nobody does, it's also surprising it's your first video I hope you keep talking about RPGs or something similar
I'm glad that I'm not the only "get bored in the 4th stratum" kinda EO player. Great vid, I watched the whole dang thing.
My first was Untold 1, so that one has a special place for me. 4 has the best music, and is probably the best one overall. 5 seems like a spiritual successor to 2, a "return to roots" kinda game.
Who's hyped for the EO origins this summer?
I’m hyped, butt also skeptic about what they’re adding except for the price.
Me
So... Halfway into the video do you express the actual issue at hand.
You are expecting something of the game that the game is not advertising.
You don't build parties in Etrian Odyssey based on what might be fun, you build them on what might be effective. While it is entirely possible to do weird, unorthodox party compositions, they still need a proper set-up in order to function well.
And let's take the argument that some classes are better than others. There are definitely some where this is the case. The original EO Ronin being an exceptionally well-known case. However, let's take your argument of the Nightseeker and Arcanist. The difference between these two is that a Nightseeker is a damage class and not an ailment class. They are like the Dark Hunter in EO1, which you also wouldn't compare to that game's Hexer despite it being the exact same comparison. Each class brings something unique to your party, even if they sometimes overlap in what they can do.
As a result, you need to look at the information you do have on what each class can do and match the builds of your party so that each has their own job during combat. Usually, damage output is the one thing that's never a bad thing to double up on.
Great video, can't wait to see what you make next! Big ups for the EO3 beginning of the game strats, you convinced me to start there when the remaster comes out on switch
Great stuff man, but it’s often hard to hear you above the music
EO3 Shopkeeper Edie is best girl, confirmed.
I too really wish there were hard numbers in the game to help players judge the skills, even I had to look up the skills in the early games in the series just to know what the hell they did, and that they jumped drastically in power at max level/halfway always baffled me a bit.
Its a well thought out video and your experience with the series shows. You may get a bit of foot traffic here due to the recent Nintendo Direct announcement that EO1-3 are being ported to PC/Switch. I put a lot... LOT of time into multiple plays of these games, often once personally then one on camera, so I think your viewpoint is very grounded and has a lot of merit, just based on what I know myself.
The Napier fans would like to have a word with you.
Nice to see you're still around after all this time.
Music is far too loud, too much of a chore to hear your nice voice. It’s a pity, I’d love to experience the video but it’s far too frustrating.
This is a great vid. I've been playing the series since back when EO1 came out, and it's always been hard to sell my friends on these games beyond the music consistently being absolutely stellar (bless Yuzo Koshiro), but I think this vid does a decent job of explaining why that's been the case. Since I've been playing the series for so long and am the kind of guy to crank up the difficulty, while trying to turn most gameplay into puzzle mode since I know how ATLUS games tend to be balanced, it never really clicked for me how rough the gameplay experience can be to the inexperienced or those with different playstyles.
I think I know why we don't get numbers, it's likely the thought that if players got numbers, they would probably just focus too much on optimization rather than experimentation, which is a totally valid thought... except it requires a far more balanced game, or at least one with much less volatility in combat where a single fuck up can result in a positive feedback loop of disasters that becomes too unmanageable making the fight miserable or just immediately party-wiping you.
ADDENDUM: A bit of advice on the video making front, your audio balance is a bit off, your voice is way too quiet in comparison with the music. If you are planning on making more vids, try tweaking in small increments while listening back to the audio during editing, that'll help ya find a better balance.
Ya know, I've taken the conditional drops waaay too much for granted as part of the many reasons why this game totally captivated me. And it's also another reason why other DRPGs just basically failed to rope me in just as much... but SMT: Strange Journey manages to do it due to the myriad of material collection funsies.
The bigger part of the game that lasted even till this day for me is the phenomenal music. The entire series still lives rent free in my playlists. For how in-depth this video was, I'm surprised it didn't touch on the music even ONCE. EO3 was the favorite of many simply for having the best rendition of Raging Waves.
12:20 Great music choice! It has a very fitting atmosphere for RPGs like EO.
I absolutely love it.
For anyone wondering: Maiko Iuchi - Forest Depths
I love everything. Every each one of them. Yes. Even EO1 jank. My favourite is 2 Untold as my entry was 2. So good. Everything is so good. This game really is an acquired taste.
I think you have some minor class inaccuracies:
- Nightseeker has better poison damage than Arcanist in every game they're both in.
-Imperial in Nexus, while kinda boring, does have one of the better earlygames. Natural Edge when imbued oneshots most randoms and hits pretty hard for cheap and you can all-in on Assault Drive to decimate in early big fights, way above most classes. I kind of hate level gating entirely though.
-Dark Hunter deals dramatically more damage than War Magus, whether it's by stats (dh wins), damage mods (dh wins), weapon (dh wins). and due to force (Trance doubles damage!!!). I feel like saying DH is remotely close to bad and not a top 5 class is absolutely ridiculous when it can effortlessly oneshot bosses and War Magus cannot, and this is a game where Dark Hunter can be given Fafnir or Landy skills early on to contribute damage before its big skills. Furthermore, Soul Liberator exists as an option for Dark Hunter to use to have burst damage without elaborate setup (which, again, can oneshot bosses) and you literally have an entire team to help contribute to fully binding a boss, and this is a game where Hexer can literally guarantee disables. In the grand scheme of things Ailing Slash isn't really that strong outside of the early parts of the game.
Also, Dark Hunter does in fact have aoe and even has the ability to heal and has the most potent physical defense debuff in the game.
Second on the DH point. In the story mode speedrun they even respec Chloe into a DH in the third stratum as the main boss killer for the rest of the game.
I get that having no numbers in skill description can be daunting , but I think it's better than being over-tutorialized . Also , to be honest , I don't think the fans have this ' git gud ' attitude , many times I've seen players struggling and the fans being helpful to them .
That being said , I'm glad I watched this video . I have this problem when I love a series so much , I feel like I can overlook every single flaw it has . Personally , I have no issue with the games whatsoever , but I'm really glad to see constructive criticism being said about it . Hopefully upcoming releases will be even more friendly to newcomers
great video. im getting into the series myself and loving it.
this has to be the first in depth video about Etrian Odyssey I've seen! You did an amazing job, and I really like your analysis. I was one of the few people who EOU2 was their favorite, but I sort of brute forced my way through the series, haha. Its really nice seeing my favorite game franchise get the video analysis treatment, well done !
Great overview. My only gripe with the series is the lack of detailed info on skills/ranks and the very lacking information in the compendium. But it's a very small gripe of mine as I don't mind looking up 3rd party breakdowns of skill rank damage percentages. Praying 4,5,Nexus get HD pc releases as well
Great analysis. You really should continue with this. Looking forward to that!
It's funny to me that IV is the one you couldn't put down.
A few friends of mine and myself started with 1 and played through 2 and 3 as they came out. 3 quickly became one of my favorite RPGs of all time, while IV and V were a huge slog that took me forever to get through.
That's interesting. I started with 4, I blazed through the entire game and 100% it. Then I played through the entirety of 2 and 3, but I just couldn't finish 1 and 5. It seemed to me like the game formula was getting a bit repetitive for me.
4 and nexus are super good imo, they have so much content in it. 4 field maps make it feel like the world is vast and mini dungeons are like cherry on the top. 5 is kinda dull at the post game but class branch proficiency was a good idea though. They try to twerk the formula of end game 3 super boss so veterans can get fresh new opponents.
@@Gummi2946 ive never played these games really. do you recommend eou2 as a starting point?
@@theozziepotato eou2 was really good one, by the story i mean. It has an additional dungeon for story mode and has force like limit break every modern rpg has. About difficulty that was balanced for story mode. It can be bit grindy but just for equipment. Eou1 also not bad for start but the story not as well written as eou2.
@@Gummi2946 i guess im ok with grinding because its a portable system, and as long as the combat is engaging
awesome video
before watching this I knew very little of this series, but now I'm already working on the post game for EOV and thinking of what to play next
thanks for introducing me to these great games!
Also, I don't think any game past EO1 really mandates a healer and tank. It is possible to get through the first game without healing because items are strong, Medic is super broken because of Immunize, is a top tier DPS, and its healing saves you money. As early as EO2 people realized that you don't really need a healbot or super dedicated tank, and from that game onwards they added mists to mitigate a ton of damage and healing items in general got buffed. Tanks are very strong in this series and are strong safety nets, but proper uses of disables and items can allow you to play through games without tanks. After EO3, disables got buffed enough to effectively be damage mitigation. The fact that armor is so bad in most games really feels unfair because a lot of players spend their money on useless armor instead of stacking HP or getting physical resistances which would do way more. The healer classes have been becoming more and more flexible as the games go on, with classes like EO4 and Nexus Medic being damage ampers that can also heal, so they're generally more interesting than in EO2 where Medic got nerfed so badly you just had to spam aoe healing and nothing else.
Sorry for blabbing a lot. I like EO a lot and I love talking about balance and other ways to play the games.
Supposedly 5 was originally designed to have an overworld, which is why each stratum is so completely different, but they had a time crunch to deal with.
I love to see any discussion of EO so I appreciate this video. Great stuff man!
Improvements for a new entry I thought up whilst watching the video:
(incomplete, still watching vid)
*Idea 1:*
More skill transparency:
Allow for the previewing of skills, skill upgrades, the numbers and specifics, what the stats the skill uses, etc, put it in a little tuck away bar or something.
It's just nice to know. Without having to pull up a wiki.
Have everything explained in game.
This next one will kill two birds with one stone...
*Idea 2 & 3:*
Build previews and grinding exp:
My idea was...
An arena.
Lemme explain...
So for previewing builds. Have a function where you can create a 'hypothetical template team' and have them artificially/temporarily leveled to certain checkpoint levels, that unlock certain tiers of skills and skill points.
Have lots of slots that you can save these artificial team builds to.
Then allow you to build their skills out to however you like, increasing/decreasing and unlocking skills and skill levels as you please.
Then use that artificial team in a fight against certain leveled bosses in the arena to test how it works in actual combat.
It just allows for less guesswork when building out your own team.
Make it completely optional of course.
My next reason for using an arena function.
Exp grinding, or well, trying to reduce the grind.
Allow players to attempt to capture monsters out in the field,
(this should be a difficult undertaking),
but once captured they can be bred and fought at the arena every *insert amount of in-game time*, e.g. 3 in game days, for a large set amount of experience, from whatever enemy you captured.
You don't actually have to waste time battling these monsters, instead it can just show you a little animation, then you gain the exp.
Or maybe battle them automatically at high speeds?
I'm not sure yet...
This allows for passive exp gain as you explore and get further into the game, also allowing you to raise up extra teams or boost the exp amount for your main team.
Or just some sort of feature that dictates you return to town every so often to reap some kind of exp based reward that you can cash in every *insert amount* of in game days, (which pass decently fast whilst exploring).
Oh ooooo that gave me another idea.
Flesh out the function of the town/home base more.
Like I said before, have a function that dictates you should return to town every so often for passive rewards.
Maybe have the town be upgradeable?
Maybe have certain sub quests that once cashed in will renovate a certain part of town that will net you certain rewards every so often?
This is also completely optional, but very rewarding if done.
*Idea 4:*
Bit of a crazy one and very much a complete departure for the series but...
And hear me out...
Do away with the set classes and have a very expansive and sprawling custom skill tree instead?
Food for thought.
Do you think it would work?
And if so, how would you implement such a thing?
Man, the second game is beautiful, dont get him on the "Skip it" and the third looks cool as hell, the eccenarios and music are just worth the pain, and here is really ur fault if the party is broken or weak af.
If you finish the first one before all the others will be glorious with the small QoL Atlus add with time
When people are saying EOU2 is unbalanced in favor of the OP story mode characters, it's actually the exact same difficulty ease you're talking about, not that it's too hard. It's because the story party's baseline damage output is terrible, to be built around the burst damage mechanics of the main character, which requires buildup over time. So you end up with a lot of bosses with huge HP pools, but not a lot of threat, to be built around that story party. Classic mode has a more evenly distributed power level, which means the HP/enemy damage divide isn't well balanced by them; you either have huge damage power and nuke down bosses without punishment or you have to chip away at high HP pools for what seems like forever.
Spot on video. 4 is still my favorite and likely always will be because it just felt rhe best to play to me. It also inadvertantly got me into the Shin Megami Tensai series which is now my favorite RPG series minus the Persona off shoots.
I'm convinced to give this series a shot based off this and other videos I appreciate it seems like an interesting dnd kind of game!
That is quite a thumbnail. What an intriguing character
I love the team building, in nexus after playing every other game I decided to use a randomizer sheet to choose my teams in it and I got like a Medic/Zodiac (Physical DPS), Survivalist/Arcanist, Landsknecht/Nightseeker, Arcanist/Ronin, and a Medic/Farmer, I'd say it was quite fun and actually reached like 40+ turns or something because it takes forever to kill monsters sometimes like the collosal beast in on of the labyrinths
1:23 "Dungeon crawler" litteraly mean, that you "crawl" through the dungeon entire game. Games like Torchlite or Diablo, are not "dungeon crawlers" because they are hack-n-slash games, you don't need to manage resources and draw the map manualy (like crawler games do in general). Same is for TES series. Games like SMT are literaly Dungeon crawlers, because most of the time you just crawling "dungeons" and trying to survive there. Also first JRPG took first editions of D&D as reference and at that period of time people mostly played dungeon crawlers in D&D
This video was the first real EO experience I had, I had just seen the collection announcement and wanted to check this out just to say I knew Atlus for more than that three letter series.
After watching the video and considering everything I picked EO3 as my starting point, it was in the collection so when it released I could feel smug about playing it before everyone else and the atmosphere was really appealing to me.
I beat the main game yesterday and I can safely say this is one of my new favorite RPGs ever, for all their flaws, EO had me hooked from the start and I can't wait to start the post game content and then play the other games in the series.
I'm watching this almost half a year after you made this, but 2023 is an amazing year for dungeon crawler fans. Remasters of Etrian Odyssey 1-3 are releasing. AND Dungeon Travelers 2-2 (and 1) are being localized! Not to mention Labyrinth of Refrain 2 just came out February. I haven't been so full since the heyday of the Vita!
Nice video mate. You should make more videos!
I really love EO. EOU may be my favorite one simply due to nostalgia, but I would put EO4 at second place. Also a suggestion, it seems like you are a slow talker(or maybe you are speaking straight from the mind), so I recommend just speed up you video just a tad. Like I put this vid at 1.25 speed and you still sounded fine with the added benefit of sounding clearer, more energetic and have more flow. Maybe consider this for future vids.
I hope you have as much fun with the 1-3 remakes as I will! Kinda sad they didn't include 4, maybe they will someday!
Personally, I think EO V is the best as of 03/20/2023. One thing you didn’t mention is great VO in 3DS games ‘til Nexus… where they someone inexplicably dropped it and put on the box “Original Japanese VO” like we ALL wanted that. I hope they undo that in the future.
I say “somewhat inexplicably” bc the 3DS was at the end of its lifespan and the Switch was eating all the sales.
Still one of my favourite YT videos
Great video. I agree that the opaque nature of the skills and classes kind of ruins the games because you have to look up in a guide what is good and what is not. I also tend to get bored in the later parts of these games, just because the core gameplay loop tends to get repetitive after a while and if you haven't min/maxed your party in a specific way (by looking it up in a guide), the later game bosses can be nearly impossible.
Really good video. I really like this series in theory, but the grinding when making honest mistakes, build confusion and guessing is 100% accurate to my experience playing these games since the DS, and I've played them all. Nexus tried to be this "greatest hits" type of game, but I actually just had decision paralysis and it was the game I dropped pretty quickly compared to any of the others. I also remember the first dungeon being a lot harder than the past games, and this is a hard series to begin with so that is saying something. These games definitely need free respecs. It doesn't fix everything, but at least you are not punished for when you run into these kinds of unfair problems.
Yeah i felt the same about the early ones until eo4, such a smooth and enjoyable experience with my knowledge helping me along. Nexus was also amazing. The old ones were harder in sillier ways, some good some bad.
So let me get this straight - you have beef with skill descriptions being vague and hate the trial and error of figuring out what abilities are good, or what level you need to get them to.
But you also hate the Imperial because it does exactly what it says on the tin - Giant Sword = Huge damage. It's "braindead and busted" because it's NOT forcing you experiment with obtuse Skills like the classes in EO 1-3 that you were just griping about.
So when the game doesn't tell you enough it's a problem, and when they spell things out, that's also a problem. Like, what?
I guess my stance is that EO is a niche of a niche for a reason. You either get these kinds of games, or you don't. Most of this video feels like overly strict nit-picking, even if you do have a lot of interesting things to say overall. It's probably a personal thing - you seem to value radically different aspects of EO than I do. For instance, the Ship mini-game in 3 and the Overworld in 4 are just sort of there for me. I don't hate them, but I don't really care much for them either. Same with the Mazes - while great on paper, what they really end up doing is shaving TWO ENTIRE FLOORS off of every major Labyrinth, a trade I feel is totally 100% NOT worth it. I actually liked EO 5's "return to our roots" stance, removing all the fluff and just giving us one massive, 30-floor super-Labyrinth again (but I appear to be in the minority here, since everyone else gripes about "ermagerd, no erverwerld" constantly).
So I guess we'll probably have to agree to disagree, for the most part. Still, this was a really fun little trek through the EO timeline.
One additional point on the Races in EO5 - not only is making an "off race" class a total pain in the ass, each Race's stats are pretty much tailor-made for the Classes they can originally be assigned to. So while it's great that you can make, say, a Potato Masurao, that character is going to be total shit with low Str and high Luc, neither of which helps you when swinging a bunch of Katanas around. That means that even after jumping through all the hoops to get one made, the resulting character is almost guaranteed to be worse than the default version would be. Brilliant.
Always happy to see people talking about Etrian Odyssey, and it was very nice to hear some criticism of the series - I feel that most of the time people gush about the series (and rightly so, imo) without stopping to give any thoughts to how it could improve. While I'm here I want to give my 2 cents on the games:
EO1: I haven't played
EO2: I thoroughly enjoyed. I felt like the classes were generally well balanced, with a few exceptions
EO3: Great game, but I really think the class balance lets it down. Once you unlock subclassing some classes just get totally outclassed by other classes using their skills. Buccaneer, for example, can be well played by a Gladiator because it'll deal more damage, but with a little less accuracy and TP. It's a very minor trade-off.
EO4: Great game. Love the overworld, it's a big and natural step up from EO3's ocean and the mini dungeons are great too. The class balance is a little off here too with Nightseeker and Arcanist being busted and Sniper being underwhelming; but they're much better balanced than EO3 because of how subclassing was reworked
EO1U: Is fine... it's a bit of a mixed bag, but it does let you play an approximation of EO1 without the bugs. These days though, I'd just recommend people play EO1HD
EO2U: Is great, probably the one game I played the most out of the entire series. I just wish you could recruit the Story mode class in classic mode for goofing around. Lock it behind Ur Child or something, just let me use it (also Troubadour is better than Sovereign and you can't change my mind).
EO5: Is... I don't know. This is the only game I've never been able to beat despite starting (and restarting) it several times. I find the classes interesting conceptually, but are all pretty boring mechanically. There's some balance issues too: for example, you're 'soft required' to take a summon class because you may as well take advantage of those slots. The Pugilist is underwhelming - iirc they have pretty low damage and their signature Clinch ability has a very low bind chance. I also think EO5 suffers the most from the issue you touched on when talking about Nexus; many classes are very weak or incomplete with their base kits. The furthest I got in EO5 I used a debuff Reaper, but that's a build that just can't work before beating the second stratum (which has the biggest roadblock of a boss from the entire series IMO). Ultimately, EO5 feels like you're locked into only one or two valid teams for the entire first and second stratums before you can actually have fun.
EOX: Is pretty good. I enjoyed it, but god damn I wish the class selection had been done with some brain power instead of literally just being the results of a Twitter poll. I would've loved to have some more support classes, or a second mage or tank class over the tsunami of damage classes. It's a fine game, and the classes that got into it are interesting - that's why they're popular - but having interesting support options is normally what lets those big damage classes shine in their home games.
EO1HD: Best way to experience EO1
EO2HD: Worse than EO2U, but still worth playing for Hexer revenge shenanigans
EO Next: Never Ever
Playing through the games in order right now (though I *did* choose to use the HD collection instead of tracking down the DS games, which blesses me with sweet QoL) I resonate so much with the rant on lack of information. Most other things mentioned in this video is stuff I am neutral on (like the side content or the world maps) but especially after EO2 beat my ass into next week, I would have loved proper information on skills and especially skill growth. 90% of my problems in EO2 came from not knowing that some skills are perfectly fine at Lv1, while others are absolute garbage at Lv1 and become absolutely broken at Lv7 to 10 (see Hexer). The amount of time I spent reconfiguring (and thus retraining, though level is thankfully less impactful than equipment to a point) because of the obtuse skill descriptions is insane. I still had fun with the game, but without Dr. Fetus' skill tables over on GameFAQs, which I later ended up consulting, it would have been an ordeal.
I look forward to EO3 and 5 especially, since those two have all the classes I'm interested in.
This vid addresses some really good points about the whole saga. When you're used to playing games like these you don't think much of looking at online resources to see numbers and rates of skills, items and such. But it really doesn't make much sense that these are not shown in the game itself.
In any case, not much I can say you didn't cover here. After watching this and seeing what other vids you're making I'm definitely subscribing.
I'd be very interested to hear your take on slight changes made to the original 3 with the HD editions, since although they don't bring everything with them from the remakes, they do offer some things like the adjustable difficulties and QoL such as speed options.
28:28
That is actually unreal combat study isn't already implemented for characters you aren't actively using.
Being able to respec in town for free would add a great layer of fun tinkering and strategic optimization. You could counter particularly enemies instead of just making 1 build that you stick with
It's really one of my favorite series. My tier list (from best to less than best): 5, Nexus, 2U, 1HD, 4.
I think complaining about Fafnir is pretty misguided. It's one of the weaker classes in the first half of the game and the roster is extremely powerful in general. The roster is so strong that it's pretty easy to consistently kill bosses in less than six turns as long as you build classes properly and understand the diminishing returns system, which I think deserves more of the blame of "bloat" than people think.
I'm mostly critical of how pathetic randoms are and how anemic floor design can be. They basically put in all the difficulty into bosses but the overpowered roster can really just bulldoze through the game. I do play on Expert because the game was designed around expert, though.
I mostly disagree with your statement on "games should show numbers." After the DS era where so many skills are worthless, skills tends to be reasonably powerful and their power is generally intuitive by the factors surrounding the skill (where they are in the skill tree, tp costs, whether they are conditional or aoe, etc). I think there are dumb exceptions of scaling (charged shots, heavy strike in nexus), but other than a few exceptions I think the modern games are generally good enough at telling you how powerful a skill is without telling you the numbers. I'd rather not be told what's under the hood until after a first run of a game.
Hey you play EO and read visual novels. That's rad. I hit the sub button the second I heard my favorite track from Rewrite.
I knew when I saw the Suzume channel icon this would be worth my time.
I saw a news on Nintendo Direct, the first 3 games are getting an hd remaster.
i didn't know they changed the antielement shield skills damn. in og EO they completely negated damage at 5 and started absorbing past that!
which resulted in a bug where the instakill elemental skills from the dragons could kill if you absorbed instead of negating them hehe :(
I felt a blind hard playthrough of Eo1, Eo2, EO3 was reasonable, but I did have a couple of rage quit moments. My most frustrating moment in EO1-3 remake was getting to the golem boss, having the defence and MP regen to fight him indefinitely, but then the slow sinking realization that I didn't have buff removal or enough DPS to overcome his healing. Then I realized I couldn't escape and my whole journey to the golem was about to be lost....
"if you want to use a nightseeker in EO4 for status effects, you might as well just not bother, because the arcanist does better status effects, more reliably, and in an AoE"
Wait what? Nightseeker's poison damage more than doubles Arcanist's damage and leveling auto-spread allows them to use it as an AoE turn 1 in more than half of fights. Yeah they can't do poison or AoE throws until level 40 but that's not too long after you're able to use Arcanist anyway so it's not a huge drawback. And you're talking about poisoning bosses anyway so you don't even need spread throw for that.
You're just plain incorrect there my guy.
Not to mention Nightseeker's poison has higher base infliction rates. 80% compared to Arcanist's 50% (40% on subsequent turns). Though that's just going off skill data not accounting for luck stat, so it could be closer than that.
Thank you for your thoughtful analysis. I find myself ultimately agreeing with you, but I will say my perspective is a bit different in some areas. No EO game I have ever played required an optimal team build to beat the regular game (not endgame). While to min-max and create uber teams you might need to peak behind the curtain at stats, but for the most part if you just pick what you like you can beat the game with any team. Also, I think most games that Atlus publishes are for Video Game Masochists. I dunno, I like how hard the game is and how vague the descriptions are. It really makes me feel good when I go through the game a secondtime and know what how to spec a character, its like the game taught me or something. I like the idea of vague skill trees and having to commit to your decisions (like diablo). Everything is viable, but only some things are overpowered. You can beat the the regular game with viable builds. ALSO!!!!! How dare you not mention Yuzo Koshiro's music.... smh especially his FM Synthesis OSTs... still praying for a EOIV FM arrange...
I like your voice man, very soothing. Like your analisis as well.
The next time try to speak a little louder, in certain parts your voice was so low that I couldn't hear you well.
You gained a subscriber champ
I have an interesting gameplay relationship with Etrian Odyssey.
I always play on the highest difficulty(because the easier ones were too easy for me as a first timer), build a casual party and explore the world as my journey starts/continues.
My battle against bosses for example are a wild rollercoaster, where all possibilities are on the table within my entire 40+ turn counts, as my party usually survives until the disaster inevitably strikes and my party formation starts to fall apart.
If this was not a complete blow out and the stars somehow allign by some miracle, my party pulls through until the end, where the remaining members(or the last one standing in some cases) pulls off the victory(at the final possibllity).
Also: RIP Untold 3.
I barely can hear your voice man, adjust the volume next time please
Same, this video is awesome and he's making lots of really good points. But this mic and this mixing is terrible lol. I had to turn it way up and strain my ears just to hear lol.
EO4 is literally the reason I started playing this series. I spent so much time on the demo before I finally got it
I really want to like EO5, but I find it such a drag to actually play. I don't care much about the extra world-map-ish areas, so I don't think my issue with it is the same as yours, but I haven't been able to figure out what my problem with it IS yet, either.
I'd also like to add "mages" to the list of "Classes EO never gives you more than one of." I love mages in almost every other franchise, but EO usually gives you exactly one mage option and maybe allows you to spec a healer into an off-mage class if you're lucky. EON is the worst offender: 19 classes, but of them, exactly one mage (Zodiac) and one support mage (Arcanist).
I still really enjoy EO3 and EOU2, though.
EO is awesome
If you have a problem with the skills, just look up a guide.
Personally I'm fine with investing a few "wasted" skill points to test out different abilities; most games let you reset skills for a small (level?) penalty.
Great video! Looking up what skills do is something that can make your experiences with these games a lot better.
I think that something that was missed is that you can get really creative with your parties. Having a tank isn't necessary although it does make things much simpler, etc. I've beaten EO1 without a medic and without defender on my protector since my first playthrough I spammed defender+immunizer and it was definitely doable. If you have a good plan you can overcome pretty much anything.
A lot of the series really is just 'got gud' since in this game even random encounters frequently kick your ass while we're usually used to them being braindead.
I do agree that if you mess up your build and party composition it can take a while to grind up to a point where you're strong enough and it should be easier to fix your mistakes.
Great vid my brother. feels good for eo to get discussed in youtube
Hey, nice video, not too bad. Wanted to reply to a few things about it myself, esp since the Remasters come out tomorrow.
Now, I haven't finished Nexus, or played eo1&2 (i'll be using the remasters to do that, the added QoL is gonna be Amazing), but I've been playing since eo4. Beat eo4, 5, 3, Untold 1, and... kind of untold 2. Need to give it another shot, didn't like it my first time around.
Positives you mentioned... honestly I agree with all of them. I especially like how no matter what build you do, you always have something your team isn't good at, which doesn't bone you. Since all of the available mechanics are strong for both sides. Also can't get enough of the atmosphere, and encounter design is mostly really fun. And while bosses are definitely trial-and-error, i find em really satisfying usually.
Now as far as the main negatives...
100% agree on not having hard numbers. That should've been a thing. Having more detail since 2U is goddamn amazing, but all it really needs is hard numbers. I'm not completely boned without em, but it would be overall better imo. That, alongside the better skill descriptions and added detail we have in later games, would almost eliminate the Skill Testing issue as far as finding out what it does.
Also having only 1 tank usually is still lame. 2 and 2U having the Protector and Beast is good, but having more options would be a good thing. Though with how dodge tanking is a pretty good thing usually, i'm probably not as hard on it.
The grind... I both agree and disagree. When you do need to grind, it's pretty fucking boring, I'll agree. This is probably my experience talking, but nowadays I don't find grinding as necessary, especially in games like eo4 (yes 4 is my favorite). If you generally fight most of the battles put in front of you, by the time you reach the boss, you'll be at a decent level. And if not, you can clear out the FOEs in a chain almost, which can top you off.
That being said, on your first time, you're almost certain to mess up your build, so I also have to agree there, since it means a new player will probably grind more than a veteran on average. Which gets boring, even more for the new player.
Now, individual levels I think are actually not all that good in EO games. The stats from a level up don't help *that* much. The SP you get is what you get the level for. So sacrificing 2 levels to rest and reallocate points is usually fine for me. Do that before a boss, and I can still fight the boss. But in EO3 where it's 5 levels, or even harsher elsewhere... yeah. That's rough, I'm glad it's 2 levels now.
And also your point about making new party members, retiring, that is also a lot of grinding. I usually don't end up doing this admittedly, I stick to a team of 5 for the whole game. But for those who do want to do it, it's annoying.
Thank god EO4 had the Books to at least get you to a place where you're still Underlevelled, but can at least do something in the current area. Alongside giving you the new party members to represent each new class.
I absolutely love EO4, one of my favorite games ever.
I also love EO3 & 5, and rather like U1.
2U i didn't like as much since most bosses are kinda designed with Damage Racing in mind, at least on Expert (tho I hear Normal has an issue here too). If you have a primarily defensive party, which would work in other games, suddenly it doesn't work very well in this game. Feels a lot less open ended overall when instead of a damage party being Rewarding, it's Required.
but, again, should give it another shot. Classic mode party was weird as fuck, having 1 damage dealer (mediocre normally, broken in F.Boost), and a bunch of support/survivability characters that you need to squeeze damage out of. If I had my own party, maybe i'd like it more.
Also Artelinde & Wilhelm is an absolutely terrible boss in 2U specifically, what were they thinking making Artelinde practically immune to anything that shuts her down, when she's THIS good at shutting you down?
I admittedly think more of the games are better about the whole Needing-A-Tank thing than given credit here. It is risky, a first time player probably should have a tank, but honestly statuses, debuffs, etc are so powerful as is that you can usually make up for not having it. EO4's the best at that, even if it's a bit easier overall, but I usually don't feel like I'm super dead if I don't have a tank. Healer... I need at least an Off-healer, but most Off-healers have healing as a thing they do alongside all of their other stuff, like Dancer's Waltzes, Sovereign's Reinforce, etc.
Classes definitely got more interesting in 3/4/5 than in 1/2 imo.
But yeah, I'm excited for the remasters (tho $80 is fucking stupid), and I hope we get an EO6 someday. And honestly you made a lot of valid points.
I'll finish Nexus and replay 2U eventually, I wanna do replays of this whole series.
Interesting. IV and especially V were actually huge letdowns for me. I definitely preferred the more all over the place style and (even more) minimalist presentation of the first three games. The second game in particular was an absolute highlight for me back in the day.
Oh! I will say though that I was shocked how much I enjoyed the 3D visuals in those games - I was super skeptical about that change before the game got released.
This was a good in depth experience i was looking for. Newbie to the series. Bought 1+2 untold and 3-5. Starting with 1 and trying not to look anything up but now I think I may need to at least search skills and party make up. Other than these, a game called Mind 0 is the only dungeon crawler I've tried, but so far they seem pretty fun. I'm an extreme casual player these days though, so hopefully the difficulty spikes aren't too horrible.
And? How did it go?
For me EO5 is my first experience with dungeon crawlers and EO as a whole.
Game gave me max difficulty from get go and i keep it there.
Got stat checked on the final boss of the first stratum but it worked out after slightly changing my strategy from defensive to more offensive.
Id say there shouldnt be too bad spikes just that fights can go south and bad real fast on a mistake made.
Also in eo5 to me at least it seems poison dmg is pretty damn strong.
The damage of poison essentially equals the damage my party does if everyone attacks.
So even FOEs kinda can be cracked down on fairly comfortably if not done too reckless.
As someone who has played every etrian odyssey game on max difficulty to some degree I think 3 and nexus are the only ones I haven’t 100% beat yet, I think the only time you really need to grind is postgame, before then if you need to grind it is usually a sign you built your team wrong in some way, the only game where I recall this happening to me was in 2u and 4, but that was my first and second game and I was awful at team building then. I also don’t think there is a problem with side quests, yes, you need to do them to stay up, but most of them are super easy and don’t take a long time outside of a few specific examples, I don’t really think thats a problem its more just part of the gameplay loop. It is very punishing if you do mess something up though, like you said, losing levels really does not feel great, so I could see that as a flaw. Good news is if you do end up in a scenario where you do need to grind its easy to get out of, in every game but the first 2 you can set up an autowalk path in a loop on the lowest stratum you can autobattle through, turn off action confirmation in the settings, turn on autowalk and shove a paperclip over the A button. Super helpful during the grindfest portions of post game. I do agree that this game does need wikis to know what things do, it would be absolutely better if they showed you. In regards to the balance aspect, later games do get noticeably better in that regard, like from 4 onwards, the first 2 EO games had a specific inarguable meta class composition, post eo3, the meta becomes harder and harder to pin down, and for class variety post eo4 you don’t really need a tank character that much to live, 5 in particular you can kind of just shove whatever in the front and it usually works out, so it manages to improve in that regard a lot.
I never heard the term "blobber" until a few months ago. How did they get that name? I've been playing the genre on and off since bards tale, and I have no clue
Wee bit late but I'll try to explain: it references the fact that, while the party is composed of many characters, they all walk and think as one, like a huge multi-armed blob going around the dungeon.
Going to use this video to get into EO (I think I bought EOU1 for my 3DS a few years ago before my emunand died due to a faulty sd card, but only played a couple floors in story mode)
I have a switch now and I hear its out on that
When EOV came out one of the things I really did not like the legendary titles. This was because the skills were completely hidden from you till a certain point in the game, and all the guides at this point were ether in Japanese, or chalk full of spoilers for things I didn't want to know. How does one create a balanced party if they can't see what a class does? Some might not like EOIV's level gating skills, but at least you could see where a class was headed from the start.
I remember bringing this up in a fan community, and just being told off by multiple people. So that really soured me to that game (and really the EO community) and just kinda left for many years. - Though not without pointing out their hypocrisy of hating EOIV's level gating when legendary titles were doing the exact same thing.
I get what you're getting at but to be fair... You do see what the classes are about in their base form. Mastery titles don't throw in new mechanics onto the class but rather expand on what's there in the base tree. With Harbinger, Dragoon, Fencer etc their new trees starts where the previous specialization left off. Binds or Single Bug hit for Pugilist, Ailments or Healing from Botanist, Dog or Bird as Rover. Hell the three classes that lack such distinction both start their new trees from roughly same points. Doesn't matter if you pick Elemancer or Omnimancer you still open from your basic three spells and the charge skill. Same with Necromancer. Only one with not as detailed direction would be Murasao but they're still manageable.
While it doesn't excuse how "community" you asked for help or pointed it out reacted it's also not true that the game obscures everything from you. Yes you don't know exactly which ailments will Harbinger get but you know one part of it is about inflicting them. The game does not try to pull 180 of you by suddenly throwing tools the class didn't have access to on large scale.
@@Jaquan018 I could probably word it better. But "Mastery titles don't throw in new mechanics onto the class but rather expand on what's there in the base tree" wasn't a given to me, at the time. But even if they didn't massively change the class, it was more a question of "How far does this go?". Ive played a lot of RPGs with similar class can go one of two ways and one side of the tree doesn't go far enough.
But I'm moreso talking minor things. Like If I didn't have a Warlock, or Shaman, what kinda elemental coverage would I have to deal for that one physical resistant enemy/conditional drops. How much am I gonna need to rely on items?
I dunno I like knowing this stuff before deciding this is the party I am going forward with.
And I do not like arbitrarily hiding things from the player, that were not hidden in previous games. - I also don't like the unlockable classes for similar reasons, but at least that tends to just be limited to 1 or 2 classes a game.
@@-DeScruff Understandable. Although the usual answer to that question in V was "A lot".
Still I personally prefer the class design in V even taking into account hidden Mastery system. For one unlike Level Gated IV and Nexus I don't feel like games tries to force me to waste SP. Oftentimes there was only handful of skills worth taking in a tier and I would end up saving points many levels in advance. While I understand value of extensive planning ahead of time the keeping away information does allievate the problem with information overload. The more tight design of classes in V compared to it's predecessors (4 especially) was giving me enough information to make an educated guess.
In the end it is of course a matter of preference. And I strongly prefer Mastery system as a hidden gimmick compared to subclassing or Grimoires.
I’m waiting for a new main line Etrain Odyssey switch game. I’ve played most of them. And I don’t want to buy an older version at the moment. I want a brand new adventure with the switch hardware in mind.
Also, 2U Troubadour is pretty universally considered the most broken class in the game:
- Has Crusade, which is the most broken force break in the game since it dramatically boosts offensive power to extreme levels
- Preludes and Fantasias can be used to ignore the game's severe diminishing returns, skyrocketing damage (especially elemental damage) to extreme heights
- Is actually significantly tankier than Sovereign in every way but elemental defense: it has drastically better vit and basically the same HP and is way more evasive. Armor is so functionally worthless in this game that shields and heavy armor is barely an advantage (and grims let anyone use good shields). I'm surprised you didn't mention the worthlessness of armor in this video because it plagues every game but 2, 5, and Nexus. If anything, Troubadour can flex rows but Sovereign really should not since it's one of the squishiest classes in the game while Troub is in the middle.
-Shelter + Barbaric March makes it the better class at making your team tanky
-Energy Ensemble, Troub's TP regen skill, refunds an insane amount of TP on demand and can be potent enough when rushed that it can actually make classes GAIN TP when using their skills, making it actually the better TP battery of the two classes.
-Has drastically better healing than Sovereign and Life Ensemble can completely outheal any damage you take.
Sovereign is very good, mind you, but its strengths are a bit different. It has a better defensive buff via Guard Order, has more consistent healing, has a better buff at dealing with enemy disables, and actively deals more damage. I do think Troubadour is a way better class.
This is amazing! I was hit with the same frustration with unclear skill descriptions. Hexer's sacrifice come to mind as a massive disappointment.
but nexsus: Imperial may be suc at start, but he have BEST gun first, making it endgame right after a whale boss
I love this series to death and have played each game multiple times, and the lack of transparency with skills is still my biggest issue by far. I've resorted to always playing with a skill sim open on my PC just so I can easily double-check skill values. It's especially a huge problem considering the games' difficulties and how punishing they can be.
A game like Darkest Dungeon is also a challenging turn-based RPG with pretty simple baseline mechanics and heavy emphasis on party building and enemy party comps, and it tells you just about everything you could possibly want about your skills, from ailment infliction rates, to hit rates, critical hit rates, defense values and so on. Atlus really has no excuse, honestly.
I started the series with story mode in EO2 and honestly didn't mind the class restrictions because there was already a lot to choose within the available classes. I went into it looking for a "baby's first EO" experience so it did deliver on that.
Complete agree with how awful the way info is conveyed to the player is though. It's like Dark Souls games but even worse!
I need story in most RPGs, ideally story I can effect myself.
I fell off SMT V because of the lack of any reason to be doing what you’re doing, even though it has really, really good turn based combat
Oh hey, you have the same experience as me! Love the early game, can never finish it, but 4 is phenomenal and I beat it entirely.
Fantastic video!
i used to play the first Etrian Odyssey allot when i was in high than my dsi got stolen (was grinding/farming for the ice dragon)
Elf Booba
Etrian fan since the first game here, I have some fairly unusual takes actually but I'll start with the obvious ones.
1: you compliment the art style but not the music?! how dare you! =P
2: EO4 is indeed a bit too easy to the point that it is a flaw to the game's overall quality IMO. However, it is my personal fave EO game too. I in fact love the overworld exploration, the variety of mini dungeons and less mini dungeons, the overworld FOEs being both more accessible at will, and also a bit more meaningful to defeat, etc.
3: I actually enjoyed EO2 (the original, not the remake) the 2nd most. I haven't played it for quite some time, so I can't provide very definitive concrete examples as to why. But i just remember the challenge level seemed spot on, and the dungeon exploration was quite fun too. This is in fact why I was most disappointed with its remake. I was completely bummed that they completely overhauled the dungeon itself. I felt like something was wrong when I was playing the remake for 2, I was like 'am I wearing rose coloured glasses thinking back? This dungeon doesn't seem as cool!'. But then it became too obvious when there were none of those invisible FOEs in the 2nd stratum, and before you think they simply lost their invisibility, the layout they patrolled in was different, the maze itself was shaped different, and the stats of them got greatly nerfed, which isn't that important alone (well the maze thing is), but that's just one example that I was absolutely sure of that I wasn't losing my mind. Afterwards I looked at maps between both games and they were not the same. Very bummed!
3: I kinda think EO3 gets hyped up because it's the most esoteric of the series. By saying you like EO3 you have a medal saying 'I know the least-played game in the series! I'm a vet!'. I honestly didn't like 3 as much as 2, the sea exploration is complete carp IMO, I hated every moment of it (contrary to 4's overworld exploration), and while some might think the new classes were interesting... They were greatly changed from 1 and 2, and as you say yourself. This series really really punishes you for experimenting with classes, skills, leveling them up if you didn't like the results of said experiment, etc. At least with EO1 when I was learning it for the first time, most of the classes were pretty intuitive with what they do, but 3 was less so, AND you had to re-learn for the first time. blast.
4: When I first got into the series I was excited to see dedicated buff/debuffer classes like the trebedour and the hexer. However this was before I learned that there was a 3 buff/debuff cap, making those classes very underwhelming if anyone else in your party needs to use 1 or 2 of those slots themselves even as a situational hybrid. blahh. Just a series gripe I have in general that you missed. This incidentally is one of the reasons why the arcanist is my fave status infliction class too. The way those circle things don't use up a slot unti a debuff successfully gets inflicted is noice.
To further emphasize your point, you also get confusing contradictions where provoke, cover, and parry take up a buff slot, but front guard/rear guard does not. wut?
5: Speaking of underwhelming sidequests, it seems obligatory where the game has a 2nd or 3rd statum quest where you have to dive for like 3 days straight or something. I hate these ones because not only are they tedious to do, but then they make it so your party just got a bigger grinding spike than ever before by a long shot making the difficulty curve at that point in the game all wonky.
6: Speaking of difficulty curve. One of the things I absolutely LOVE about EO, is the economy in the game is actually meaningful for the first 2 stratums or so. In every other JPRG you can generally buy out all the best new armor and weapons in a new town's shop as soon as you get there, unless there's an especially expensive overpowered piece of gear meant for endgame or something. EO doesn't do this. The games make you INVEST towards equipment upgrades, it makes you NOT visit the Inn despite you lacking hp/mp sometimes becuase you need to pinch every penny, and it makes you think those treasure chests that have just 100 gold actually feel rewarding, and it makes you strongly consider how many heal potions to buy before you go dungeoning. I LOVE IT.... But, generally that kinda ends by the end of the 2nd stratum, where most of the stuff becomes inconsequentially affordable, and the only gear you need to invest in are ones from boss materials which are more meant for endgame anyway. blah.
7: Regarding your gripe about the grind being slow. I totally agree, not because I think it's too hard or whatever, but because the games want you to role-play as a GUILD, not as an individual party. I really wish the game had elements to it where you were ENCOURAGED to have multiple parties for your guild (and it even has the guild manager/muster system to accommodate this). However the way experience works in it. It really multiplies how slow the game is if you DO decide to play multiple parties simultaneously, which I like to do btw. I'm someone who had 8 different character builds in Elden Ring playing simultaneously before I even finished the game for the first time. Don't even ASK how many characters I have in Nexus (all of them, 2 of some, and no I didn't even finish the game once yet).
The fact it has the retire feature on top of this is like the game is taunting you to stab yourself in the foot and twist the knife and pour salt on it lol.
Then there's the fact that secondary and tertiary parties don't even get to enjoy the experience rewards you get for doing sidequests and missions. blah.
Looks like a lot of complaints but I really do love the series. I can think of a similar game with an even MORE brutal grind though. Dungeon travellers 2 on the psvita. good lord the grinding in that game is slow. And when you unlock new characters further and futher in the game, they start at level ONE, and NO they don't get exp faster for being underlevel, and NO the baddies don't just give alot more experience later in the amount you would expect. holy hell. Worst part is, THE GAME IS GREAT. whyyyy! lol.
i think ive played 3? or 4? games in this series and i never feel like the party does enough damage for the level youre in. it always feels weak compared to the random crap let alone the boss you face at the end.
EO 1,2,3 are in switch and PC now :D just disappointed why we couldn't get the EOU1 and EOU2 instead :(
Honestly as someone who has been a fan of the series for a few years now I agree with you that the games desperately need more accurate skill descriptions. EO 1-4 also have the nasty little caveat of some skills just straight up being broken and not working as intended or like at all.