Octopath Traveler 2 is eight good stories in search of a great one

polygon.com:

Many of Octopath Traveler 2’s most memorable moments are about human connection. Castti, the amnesiac apothecary, learning about her lost past from her previous patients; Hikari, the exiled prince, tracking down and reconnecting with his allies; Agnea, the dancer, wanting to bring joy to people by putting on shows in her mother’s memory.

There’s a lot more to the eight characters and their adventures, but it’s those moments of interpersonal care that stand out, because they cast an unavoidable question on the game: Why aren’t any of these protagonists actually friends?

For dozens of hours, some combination of four out of the eight will be together. While exploring the gorgeous, meticulously drawn 2.5D world, they run together in a neat little row. When fighting, considering their strengths and weaknesses and using their abilities in concert during turn-based battles is crucial. But come to a main story scene, and everyone but the single person directly involved will suddenly disappear.

The occasional prompt to see “travel banter,” wherein two characters suddenly stand in a foggy nowhere world overlaid on their previous position and awkwardly chat as if they’ve just recently met, does nothing to alleviate this problem. Neither do the occasional, shallow side stories that see characters’ paths cross. In fact, these feel more jarring than having everybody disappear, because they neither develop nor showcase any believable connections.

The same separation apparently existed in the original Octopath Traveler (which I haven’t played), and I wonder whether it, too, felt so at odds with the story the wider game was telling. Every one of the eight narratives weaves in side characters so skillfully that their relationships with