Octopath Traveler likely hitting PC on June 7th after leak
Eight JRPGs for the price of one, almost
I appreciate how easy it is to misclick and post a story early, so I offer condolences to whoever at Square put up (and deleted) a blog post announcing Octopath Traveler's PC launch on June 7th. Spotted by folks at Gematsu, Square's blog confirmed an English PC version of the popular Switch JRPG, and that it'll hit Steam in a couple months. The port seemed likely after a Korean games rating board gave the PC version a thumbs up last week, but now we're as close to having it fully confirmed as possible. Below, a trailer looking at its eight very different playable characters.
For those who haven't been paying attention to hot new releases on the Switch, Octopath Traveler is part of Square Enix's efforts to recapture the spark of their experimental SNES era. Similar to Live-A-Live and Romancing Saga, it's a traditional fantasy JRPG with turn-based combat and eight playable characters, each with their own entirely separate story, almost making it feel like eight smaller games. It's only in the final few hours that these tales converge, giving it an unusual structure, and giving each of the characters room to breathe, even if there's some systemic repetition.
There's no word on technical specs for the PC version, but given that the original version was running on the semi-handheld Switch, low system requirements seem a safe guess. While the game's world is three dimensional, characters are chunky 16-bit sprites standing freely against the backdrop. Between the stylistic clash there and the barrage of post-processing effects, it almost looks like cardboard cut-outs standing against a miniature backdrop and captured with a tilt-shift lens. Square Enix like the look so much they even trademarked it, calling it "HD2D". I dig it too.
If all goes to plan and the leak remains accurate, Octopath Traveler is headed to Steam, in English on June 7th. If you have access to one, there's a demo available on the Switch, which you can find on its official page here.