Octopath Traveler 2 - Ochette Chapter 3

We have reached the first of the final chapters, and we start with the one I had the lowest expectations for and am not surprised with the result. I recorded most of the videos you've been seeing over a month ago and am just now editing things together, so I don't remember whether I tore this narrative apart in the video or not.

To summarize my grievances, Ochette has zero character development. She is the exact same as she was in chapter 1 with absolutely no insights or anything. There is no moral story around her gluttony, she does not behave any differently than before, and I think it is safe to say she learned nothing. Her setting is as derivative as it comes, with dozens of games and stories doing everything you see here exponentially better, and there is no impetus for any of this to change other than the Red Moon. The fact that everything is so tense there after the rescue she did in chapter 1, makes literally everything she has done meaningless and worthless. I believe that the average child could come up with a better story than you find here.

As for the gameplay, we get to fight the moon infected creatures, and none of them can be captured. They are a little tougher here since this is the first of the final chapters and I don't have a lot of the broken gear yet (or the secret jobs). We just need to power through as the average enemy is just bulky rather than dangerous.

As for the chapter boss, the stupid gimmick here is it has an AOE move that reduces everyone to 1 HP, then it can kill them on its following turn, because it gets more than one. It will gradually transform through the fight changing weaknesses, which isn't that big of a deal for a single target enemy (foreshadowing the next video). The major hurdle here is that you cannot accumulate BP or latent energy due to the frequent KOs, miss out on turns due to the KO and needing to revive someone, and then just deplete resources in trying to stay afloat. It is not possible to prevent the KOs, as the thing has multiple turns and you have no guarantee to heal enough between its turns, so this is essentially a real slog. Overall, I just am not impressed, and will go into more detail as we go deeper and deeper into these finales.