When comparing Octopath Traveler vs Dark Souls III, the Slant community recommends Octopath Traveler for most people. In the question“What are the best JRPGs for Xbox One?” Octopath Traveler is ranked 4th while Dark Souls III is ranked 8th. The most important reason people chose Octopath Traveler is:
While everyone begins as their own set job, such as warrior, dancer, and so on, you can further customize everyone to your liking. As you progress through the story, you eventually get the option to assign secondary jobs to everyone, meaning they get the benefits of both their main job and the second one you give them. You can give your warrior access to healing magic, for example, to shore up his weaknesses, or double-down and assign him a more combat-oriented secondary job. You can't give more than two characters the same second job, though, so you have to be selective in how you choose to customize everyone.
Specs
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Pros
Pro The job system lets you tailor everyone's playstyles however you want
While everyone begins as their own set job, such as warrior, dancer, and so on, you can further customize everyone to your liking. As you progress through the story, you eventually get the option to assign secondary jobs to everyone, meaning they get the benefits of both their main job and the second one you give them. You can give your warrior access to healing magic, for example, to shore up his weaknesses, or double-down and assign him a more combat-oriented secondary job. You can't give more than two characters the same second job, though, so you have to be selective in how you choose to customize everyone.
Pro You can play through the eight separate character stories at your own pace
As Octopath Traveler is more of an intimate, character-based story, you have the freedom to experience each tale however you want. The stories themselves are mostly well-written with a wonderfully mature tone, with a seriousness that isn't overdone, and a nice sense of brevity that lets you fill in certain blanks with your imagination.
You can start with one character and play through his or her origin story, and as you explore the world map to travel to new locations, you run into other characters' stories that you can complete in any order you prefer. The first character you choose is your "main" character, whose story you see through to completion throughout the game. This freedom of choice makes the game perfect for picking up and playing on the go or in short bursts.
Pro Engaging classic turn-based combat with plenty of strategy involved
The battles are a great throwback to older JRPGs with enough of a contemporary twist. You have the familiar setup of a party of four characters standing in a line opposite the enemies, all of whom have their own weaknesses for you to figure out. Your party takes turn attacking the enemy to find their specific weaknesses, whether it's to sword attacks, certain elemental spells, and so on.
Once you find it, pummeling their weakness depletes their armor, and then you land your strongest hits to combo for massive damage. But their weaknesses can change as the battle goes on, so you have to strategize with how to maximize your damage before that change happens. The system is pretty engaging in the way it keeps you on your toes for every fight.
Pro Gorgeous old school visuals with a modern touch
Octopath Traveler is a beautiful game that updates the nostalgic JRPG formula, especially with the graphics. The characters are all expressive 16-bit sprite models in 2D, calling back to games from the SNES era, while the backgrounds are in 3D with an incredible amount of detail. Walking through snowy mountains, across beaches, or through deserts, parts of the backgrounds glitter in the sunlight in captivating ways. It's a unique style that appeals to longtime JRPG fans while keeping things modern enough for the current console generation.
Pro Extensive lore that's presented in unconventional ways
There's tons of lore everywhere for you to discover, but it isn't necessarily told through a conventional story.
Weapons, armor, spells, and items you acquire have descriptions on them that tell you where in the game world they came from, any prominent characters they're associated with, and a bunch of other relevant and interesting information. So when you find examples of the lore scattered around the game, like bosses wearing a style of armor you read about, or an obscure NPC mentioned in a sword's description, you know the history behind the design and their purpose without that boss or character needing to explain anything to you.
Even though the actual story in Dark Souls III is very thin, there's a lot to find under the surface if you're willing to look for it.
Pro Stunning environments
The world of Dark Souls 3 looks amazing, so you may often feel the need to stop and take in the beautiful sights. This can be the sheer size of structures, mountains, or caves. It can also be the decorations, inscriptions, or details in a room. There's always so much to look at, allowing you to truly immerse yourself in its world.
Pro Can give a great feeling of accomplishment
The Dark Souls series is known for its difficulty and Dark Souls 3 is no exception. It's filled with difficult enemies and tough boss battles, able to cause you grief on more than one occasion. However, every time you progress to the next safe spot or defeat a boss you'll often be filled with a mix of joy and relief. Beating this game will almost certainly feel like an achievement.
Pro Unpredictable boss battles
The boss battles in Dark Souls 3 consist of several phases, changing up how the bosses fight over the course of the battle. They will gain new abilities, become more aggressive, or reveal various nasty surprises. This creates an enjoyable experience that is different from most modern games where bosses are just glorified pincushions.
Pro A great variety of equipment for almost any playstyle
You'll be finding new pieces of equipment quite often, giving you many options to choose from. Each one has its strengths and weaknesses, allowing you to pick the equipment that best suits your playstyle.
For example, heavy armor will make you move slower, but you'll be better protected. Greatswords have a wide reach, but you swing them really slow. Conversely a dagger is very fast but it has a horrible reach.
Pro Solid controls
This game feels and plays really well. Your character responds to button inputs immediately and it almost never feels like you're losing control over it. The control scheme can also be customized, giving you the option of a more personalized experience.
Pro Great combat system
Dark Souls 3 is a very fast-paced game but it's not just about having quick reflexes. A lot of the combat comes down to exploiting your enemies. To do that, you have to learn their patterns and attack the moment they pause or perform a telegraphed attack. This creates a combat system, which rewards awareness and patience, and is satisfying to master, even if you don't have extraordinary reflexes.
Cons
Con The origin stories are repetitive
All of the eight origin stories, the initial chapters, virtually play the same. You get introduced to the character and their world, they work through their struggle, and then there's a boss at the end. This samey structure can make back-to-back playthroughs of origin stories feel like a slog, since there isn't much variety aside from the individual characters themselves. It may help to space out the origin stories to keep things from feeling repetitive.
Con The eight character stories never really come together
While the individual stories are all great in their own ways, the characters don't ever join together as a cohesive group of allies. You can pick and choose who you want to bring along for combat, and who to explore with, but they hardly acknowledge each others' existence. The most they do is speak a few words to certain characters here and there, but there's nothing substantive to help everyone feel like a group that's working together. It makes the story feel hollow with too much wasted potential.
Con Poor support for mouse+keyboard control
The default DS3 key/button bindings actually prevent full use of certain weapons by requiring the shift key to be pressed and not-pressed simultaneously. Rebinding is possible, but limited by issues like the left mouse button overriding all others and certain bindings not actually working in game (e.g. Shift+MiddleClick).
Con It's hard
You should try avoiding the trap of great review scores since most of them fail to mention the difficulty. It's simply put - hard. A lot of the combat requires quick reflexes, good mechanics, and the mental fortitude to carry on after failing for hours. If you're new to the Souls-like genre or simply want to enjoy a relaxing evening playing a video game, you most likely won't enjoy Dark Souls III.
Con Poorly tuned dynamic visiblity
You may notice some texture pop in while sharply turning the camera. It can be somewhat distracting if you notice it, but most of the time you won't because it happens in the distance.
Con Occasional performance issues
There are portions of the game that will have noticeable framerate drops, which can negatively affect the gameplay. Most of the fault lies with the game engine, so getting better hardware won't help that much.