Etrian Odyssey X

[LowestRes]

Etrian Odyssey X just came out in Japan! Any fans of the series around here? 

I downloaded it and will properly dig into it after work! Many of the series' classes are coming back and I'm excited to try out those I previously overlooked. The new Hero class sounds interesting but its afterimage ability doesn't pair well with ninja clones (also backline afterimages sounds lame). I originally planned on going with a bulky melee frontline with an Imperial, Shogun and Hero, but it might change if I choose a ninja in the back. Also, even though swords are dope, I will probably need pierce and bash damage so... I might have to rethink my whole setup!

Anyway, I might post some impressions later!

[Re: The weirdo.]

ive played partway through the etrian odyssey untold games, and the combat is interesting, mostly due to the progression system, but also because of the class diversity but never touched the "core" series, though it does seem mildly interesting at worst, and pretty fuckin cool at best.

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

OH SHIT forgot about this

 

gotta stalk reddit for now. 17 class or so in this with sub classing right?

[Interdimensional Observer]

Hope you really enjoy things! (Notice the Landy and Ronin in my sig?)

 

Since EO is all about the gameplay, could you please not name the labyrinths/strata and bosses of this game? Or just put them in a spoiler box. Saying X boss was a real challenge is fine, just don't name them please.

I haven't paid attention to the additional information that has been coming in all that much, other than Survivalists and Gunners using Str again instead of Agi for damage, and Harbinger being built as a Deathguard over Deathbringer. I want to save a lot of that nitty-gritty stuff for when the game eventually comes aboard.

Will you try out the new super difficulty at all? I want to know how hellish it is.

 

I'm also a little conflicted over including a Hero in my eventual team or not. I've never played III, so I'd like to try a Ninja too, that and Hero sounds a little too traditional goody good. Ideally I want to do two separate teams when I play the game, in honor of Sonic Adventure 2 actually. A "Hero Team" is led by a Hero, and "Dark Team" is led by a Ninja. If I was the kind of person who would do such a thing, I'd actually just pick one team and do a playthrough alongside somebody else using the other, us competing to get through the game first, and having fun comparing the advantages and shortfalls of our teams over each other.

 

 

7 minutes ago, JSND Alter Dragon Boner said:

gotta stalk reddit for now. 17 class or so in this with sub classing right?

19 classes, with subclassing. To be precise:

Spoiler

1. Highlander
2. Ronin
3. Protector
4. Harbinger
5. Nightseeker
6. Survivalist
7. Arcanist
8. Medic (EO 1-2 version)
9. Pugilist
10. War Magus
11. Ninja
12. Gunner
13. Shogun
14. Zodiac
15. Farmer
16. Landsknecht (EOIV version)
17. Sovereign
18. Imperial
19. Hero

 

Edited August 1, 2018 by Interdimensional Observer

[eclipse]

Someone hit me over the head if/when this is localized.  Even if I'm still in the middle of V.

[Re: The weirdo.]

Just now, eclipse said:

Someone hit me over the head if/when this is localized.  Even if I'm still in the middle of V.

i volunteer

[eclipse]

Just now, (s)ad touch said:

i volunteer

You'll have to tell me if/when it's localized, by who, the expected release date, the approximate number of units that is projected to be sold in the first week, and whether or not there's a squirrel that exists solely to ruin your day.

[Re: The weirdo.]

1 minute ago, eclipse said:

You'll have to tell me if/when it's localized, by who, the expected release date, the approximate number of units that is projected to be sold in the first week, and whether or not there's a squirrel that exists solely to ruin your day.

i'm willing to make that sacrifice

[alatartheblue42]

13 minutes ago, eclipse said:

Someone hit me over the head if/when this is localized.  Even if I'm still in the middle of V.

Same. I remember this happening (or similar) with V, where the localization didn't even get announced until a while after it was released in Japan. I'm still really excited about it, but I don't know Japanese and I doubt there'll be a language patch anytime soon (if anyone hears about one, hit me up), so praying for a localization in 2 years is probably my best shot.

[Interdimensional Observer]

5 hours ago, eclipse said:

and whether or not there's a squirrel that exists solely to ruin your day.

Have you found the one in V yet? I triggered it right away, since at that point, after a little forgetting incident, I always carried around a second Thread. EO2U on the other hand, I think they place that squirrel in like five locations, never are you rewarded for it. As if to make a point this isn't, unlike say the hedgehog instances in the same game, something where there is eventually a payoff.

And how is V going for you?

I'm just collecting materials for forging some weapons before I tackle the 5th Stratum boss, another two days of playing, one for the grind, another for the fight itself (have to be in the mood) and I'll have the main story done before I move on to the postgame. I'm nervous about the final story battle being a real doozy, despite being presently lv 65, so I should be plenty capable of taking them down. 

[eclipse]

32 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Have you found the one in V yet? I triggered it right away, since at that point, after a little forgetting incident, I always carried around a second Thread. EO2U on the other hand, I think they place that squirrel in like five locations, never are you rewarded for it. As if to make a point this isn't, unlike say the hedgehog instances in the same game, something where there is eventually a payoff.

And how is V going for you?

I'm just collecting materials for forging some weapons before I tackle the 5th Stratum boss, another two days of playing, one for the grind, another for the fight itself (have to be in the mood) and I'll have the main story done before I move on to the postgame. I'm nervous about the final story battle being a real doozy, despite being presently lv 65, so I should be plenty capable of taking them down. 

I think I'm on the second stratum.  And I do not trust squirrels.

[thecrimsonflash]

this sounds great, can't wait to play it in 2 years after all hype is dead and I only make it about half way through before getting distracted by something else.

it's really sad, I enjoyed what I played of EOV, but I just couldn't get myself to keep going after over a month of not touching it.

kind of disappointing that there don't seem to be any summons, that was one of my favorite mechanics in V.

[B.Leu]

What IS the hero class anyways ? It's the only true new class.

 

On 01/08/2018 at 8:19 PM, Interdimensional Observer said:

19 classes, with subclassing. To be precise:

  Hide contents

1. Highlander
2. Ronin
3. Protector
4. Harbinger
5. Nightseeker
6. Survivalist
7. Arcanist
8. Medic (EO 1-2 version)
9. Pugilist
10. War Magus
11. Ninja
12. Gunner
13. Shogun
14. Zodiac
15. Farmer
16. Landsknecht (EOIV version)
17. Sovereign
18. Imperial
19. Hero

 

Sublassing, whaaaaaa.
I'm happy to see it back, on the other hand, I'm not because my head will hurt, a lot.

Hmmm, Gunner/Shogun or Shogun/Gunner ?

[LowestRes]

I haven't gone too far yet but I'm enjoying it a whole lot! Playing on Heroic, I found the beginning floor to be more challenging than past entries'. 

The intro was really slow. The setup is that the flying city of Maginia, led by the princess Persephone Maginias (she's the one handing out Missions), set out to explore the yet unexplored island of Lemuria with a bunch of explorers. There is a World Tree there, and the promise of some sort of relinquished treasure is fueling hopes. You happen to be on board but aren't officially sanctionned just yet. Upon landing, there is no labyrinth to explore, as the land is unknown. It is implied that acknowledged guilds are searching the island for points of interest. 

Gunther Mueller (that name...) is the guild master and helps the creation of your original party. But he says you can't be admitted to the princess headquarter until you have proven your worth. He thus encourages you to go to the bar and take on Quests. From the Japanese, I couldn't really understand if he meant to acknowledge you as full-fledged adventurers upon the completion of a few Quests but, as one would expect, everything works out in the end. 

The barkeep is a japanese caricature of a middle-aged queer, so you you know... Anyway, his name is something like Klaus or Kvas (can't remember). Now, and this is where the game starts to open up, the two quests he gives you finally let you leave the city! But there is no labyrinth to explore! Instead, from the cool-looking world map, you choose to go to points of interest where text-based events occur. One of them ended up in my first fight, the other resolved itself through dialog choices. Those events completed, upon turning them in at the bar, you learn of the lost Brigitte-chan, who disappeared north of town. You thus set out to investigate her whereabouts at an inconpicuous point of interest...

There, you save Brigitte-chan from flesh-eating koalas or something and, after agreeing to look for her friend ライカ who is like a younger sister to her, you investigate the surrounding. What you find is what you were looking for: a title screen on which is written "First Labyrinth BF1". The setting is that of ruins overgrown by jungle-like vegetation (reminiscient of EO1 Stratum 2 to me). I found the area noticeably darker than past entries' first stratum. The recurring theme of the area is smell. Everything stinks in there! Some enemies are skunks, and many EOV-type events are centered around bad odors!

Upon finding ライカ for Brigitte-chan, you realize that ライカ is a dog and its romanized name of Laika now makes a lot more sense. You then decide to go back to town with Brigitte-chan and report that you found ruins to the princess. Long story short, you are praised by Persephone who offers you to prove your worth by mapping the new Labyrinth you just discovered. You thus set out for the ruins map in hand to complete what has been the first Mission of everey EO thus far: map some stuff. But this time there's a twist! You can't complete this Mission without killing what ends up being the game's first boss: a really intimidating plant monster that actually managed to wipe my party (and I was really glad to be so challenged!). I killed it on my second try and then stopped playing. 

As you can see I haven't progressed much, but as I'm trying to learn new Kanjis along the way, it can sometime be arduous to keep a brisk pace. 

Enough story rambling, unto gameplay stuff:

My initial party is Nightseeker, Imperial, Shogun, War Magus and Ninja. I'm heavy on ailments but I might be lacking in the defense boosting department, nothing that can't be remedied by subclassing later on I hope. I'm enjoying the setup thus far but it is somewhat fragile. I hadn't realized the armor limitation of the shogun prior to adding it to my party but I'll try working around it as I enjoy dual-wielding classes. 

Speaking of subclass, it's been a while since I played EO4 but I'm excited to try out combos once the system is unlocked! My dodge tanking ninja dream might yet be possible! 

The Force system of EOU2 is back and, although there's no Fafnir, it's still a lot of fun. The reason I didn't win my first encounter with the plant monster was because I didn't properly force break. I thus have reasons to believe its usage will be determinant during FOE/Boss fights, which is exciting! 

If you haven't noticed yet, I really like the game up to now! It's holding my attention a lot more than EOV (which I also played in Japanese, though I was a real beginner back then; I am now intermediate I'd say so my understanding might be a factor). I can't wait to dive back in!

Have a good day!

[LowestRes]

So I left the first labyrinth after only 1 floor and now I'm in Etrian Odyssey 4. Litterally. The first floor of this here new dungeon is the exact same as the first from EO4, and I'm fighting baboons and grasshoppers and stuff. Even the bear foes are at the same place as they used to be. I knew strata would come back but I didn't know it'd be exactly the same maps. The battle music too is from EO4.

I suppose it'll diverge as I go deeper down the floors, but I was still surprised. Before I entered, some adventurers from Tharsis (the EO4 city) were saying "I know this place". My guess is that the island of Lemuria, for some lore reasons that make no real sense, will aggregate all other instances of the World Trees. They mentionned 7 World Trees in the prologue, and there's been 7 other mainline entries in the series, so I'd wager there'll be references to all the past titles. By the way, EOX is technically the 10th entry if we include the mystery dungeon spinoffs so the X has a deeper meaning to that effect. On the JP Website (I think that's where I saw that), there's also reference to 10 years, 10 titles... It truly is supposed to be the end of the 3DS and DS era, huh?

Also, I gave her the chuunibyou voice type... And I love it!

 

Edited August 8, 2018 by LowestRes

[Interdimensional Observer]

2 hours ago, LowestRes said:

They mentionned 7 World Trees in the prologue, and there's been 7 other mainline entries in the series, so I'd wager there'll be references to all the past titles. By the way, EOX is technically the 10th entry if we include the mystery dungeon spinoffs so the X has a deeper meaning to that effect.

I'm inclined to think that the 7 World Trees would include the ones of EMD and EMD2, since the World Trees of EO1/U and EO2/U2 are the same trees. Although I don't know how if they will be converting the EMD trees to standard mazes that'll work out (I haven't played either game).

Also, great to see them totally recycling the Lush Woodlands and I mean it. Since I, and probably a lot of EO players, started with IV, so it's quite nostalgic, and Storm is certainly my favorite 1st battle theme. 

 

Given EOIII hasn't been brought up to 3D yet, they'll need to invent those for this game, it therefore wouldn't surprise me if it got the least number of labyrinths/floors in this game.

And if they bring back the 29th floor of EOU, people will be able to take a slim bit of solace in that they won't have swapped any of the warps around... or will they? You're only at the beginning after all.

Edited August 8, 2018 by Interdimensional Observer

[TildeHat]

Reached the 5th dungeon so far and I'm having a pretty good time. This game does a good job at shaking up the returning dungeons to make if feel familiar but also freshen up the experience. The last floor of the second dungeon has some of my favourite events in the series.

 My party is Imperial/Highlander/Hero/Arcanist/Zodiac. Having an Imperial at the beginning of the game is really weird. Drives cost a ton in this game so they can't spam them for rando fights but it's fun to manage the TP cost during boss fights. Zodiacs have really good synergy with Imperials since their force break makes the TP cost for turn 0. 

I had a fairly rough time with bosses since I had all of one buff and no debuffs before hitting level 20. If there's one thing I'd want to change in this game I'd get rid of EOIV's level gating skill trees. It makes some classes really limited until they hit level 20/40. My Arcanist only set up circles and casted dismissal heal before I got veteran skills. 

Also any fans of EOIII music will be in for a treat.

[LowestRes]

Glad to see you're enjoying it! Also glad to hear it's fairly challenging and that it shakes up the labyrinths' formula. I don't have much time to play these days, and I progress very slowly because I force myself to translate all the main dialog, but I'm still really into it. 

I like my NS/I/SHO/WM/NIN party but I feel very fragile still. My buffing potential is indeed very low, although I got all the debuffs and ailments I could want. Arcanist does sound very appealing for its FORCE. Doesn't it reset the ailment adherence rate? I might change my NIN for an ARC cause he's been pretty underwhelming so far (Kagerou sucks now too. No provoke).

And EOIII music is my jam! 

Also, I thought the new EOX battle theme would be a letdown, but I'm warming up to it! (1:05 is the best part!)

 

[The DanMan]

http://www.siliconera.com/2018/08/15/etrian-odyssey-nexus-arrives-in-the-west-in-february-2019/

February 2019 as Nexus. Aww yeah.

Glad Q2 didn't snub it; definitely surprised it's not coming before EO.

[Interdimensional Observer]

On 8/1/2018 at 3:28 PM, eclipse said:

Someone hit me over the head if/when this is localized.  Even if I'm still in the middle of V.

*Throws an Ameno Habakiri at your forehead* IT'S COMING IT'S COMING IT'S COMING! 

 

 

 

Yipeeeeeeeee!

I've just wrapped up EOV, and now I'll probably hold off on a second run for this. Now I just need to look up what the Farmer is good at.

As for the change of X to Nexus, well in the West, nobody I think would take X to mean "cross", it'd either be "exe" or 10 (which is also true of X factoring in the MDs and two remakes making this EO no. 10).

Definitions for Nexus include:

1. a means of connection; tie; link.
2. a connected series or group.
3. the core or center, as of a matter or situation.

Given this is an intraseries crossover, definitions one and two work here. It also keeps an "x", and puts it right in the middle of the subtitle, which I like.

Edited August 15, 2018 by Interdimensional Observer

[The DanMan]

Welp, there was a catch-- and that catch is Japanese voiceover only.

Probably just going to mute voices entirely. 

At least we're getting completely new cover art: 

Edited August 15, 2018 by The DanMan

[Interdimensional Observer]

27 minutes ago, The DanMan said:

Welp, there was a catch-- and that catch is Japanese voiceover only.

Probably just going to mute voices entirely. 

Not a problem to me. EOV's PC VAs were so bad according to the test snippets they offered (NPCs were always fine though), that I just went without them entirely. It can be hard I guess to create good voices for generic characters, although XCX's MC had some good ones.

I flipped through a skill sim to see what everyone brings. Trying to tease out who I want to use.

Spoiler

Farmer is mostly grinding, darned! It has some options, a partywide bind (albeit only one of three and randomly) + heavy damage on binded enemies attack are good, but I wish there was more. Might find a use on lockdown team, but I just cleared V with one, so I don't feel like doing it again at the moment. It does have some great TP regen, so I could make a powerful but TP-intensive team and let the Farmer patch that up, on top of Strange Seeds, Harvest Festival, Rotten Eggs, and maybe Lullaby.

Checked out Ninja, appears to be eclectic as it was in EOIII, which wasn't a good thing I heard. Why doesn't it have a "counterattack when attack is dodged" skill? This said, I'm trying to conceive of a team with a dodgetank emphasis. Ninja + Survivalist + Ronin (Drawing Stance) + Nightseeker (Shadow Cloak) + Sovereign (for Dauntless Order in case of getting hit)? 

 

Edited August 15, 2018 by Interdimensional Observer

[Sunwoo]

My friend posted in our group Skype chat that this is coming in early February of 2019. That's remarkably fast for an EO game. And I'm happy XD

[eclipse]

7 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

*Throws an Ameno Habakiri at your forehead* IT'S COMING IT'S COMING IT'S COMING!

OW!  But I totally needed that, thanks~!

I'll read up on what all the classes do when it's closer to release day.  I'm going for the team with the biggest lulz, and one of my requirements is that an EO3 class must make its way in.

[TildeHat]

Bit bummed that there's no English dub since the NPC voices in EOV were really good and I have a heart for PC voices but I'll take this over no localization/a really long one.

 

I'm hoping guild cards will be compatible. Be nice to see my current guild show up in Adventure episodes where I can actually understand.