Etrian Odyssey: Drop it like it's hot

After an indecent number of hours spent playing EO, I finally called it quits and erased my save file — and boy, am I insanely relieved. I love that game to pieces, but it was starting to make my gaming life a misery. I made it all the way to the bottom of the Sandy Barrens; and there, on the cursed 20th floor, I was confronted with my biggest challenge so far. I was given the mammoth task of defeating 14 FOEs and a boss in a row, all that without exiting the labyrinth — coz if I did, all the defeated FOEs would respawn. That was the mother of all insane challenges, and in any other circumstances, I would have been thrilled to bits and would have taken up the gauntlet with gusto; but this time, I just didn't feel like it. I have to admit that the level cap did do a number on my motivation, no matter how hard I tried to pump myself up; and so did the 4th stratum's dreary colour palette, the nagging backtracking, the annoyingly high encounter rate, the infuriating status effects and the cursed absence of an instant save feature. In the end, I just got drained, and those hateful 15 were the last straw that broke my crawling drive.

This is not the first time I give up on a FPDC, mind you. My run of Class of Heroes also came to an abrupt end back in the days; however, my reasons for giving up were different. I ditched CoH because I was sick to death of its obnoxious dungeon design; on the other hand, I ditched EO because I was sick to death of its obnoxiousness, full stop. EO is like that new pal you meet and click instantly with, thinking you're gonna be mates forever — only to realize after a few weeks that they're a bit of a prick after all. EO is a game that's stupidly hard for the sheer sake of being stupidly hard; and when I say "stupidly", I mean it literally. The kind of difficulty boasted by EO is neither fulfilling nor genuinely challenging: stuff like the absence of an instant save feature, the low escape rate, the random action order in battle or the level 70 cap are just arbitrary limitations whose sole purpose is to make the player's life miserable and force them to pour more hours into the game.

Now, does that mean that I'm swearing off that game and the series it belongs to? Absolutely not. On the contrary, I see this run as a necessary baptism of fire that allowed me to figure out the series' rules and to be better prepared for my next run. As a matter of fact, here are the things I'm already planning to do next time I play some Etrian Odyssey:

• I'll experiment with other classes before deciding which one to pick for my one and only. I went straight for Protector this time because of that class' high defense and healing skills; but maybe other classes could fit the bill just as well and offer more profitable combinations of abilities. 
• I'll retire my lone ranger at least once to gain yummy stat increases. I didn't dare to do so in my run because the mere thought of grinding all the way back to my current level was more than I could bear; however, I neglected to factor in the gear element. Being decked in powerful gear when I retire means that I can grind on deeper floors and level up faster. Given how fast I reached the level cap, I can definitely afford to keep grinding longer.
• I'll ignore the sidequests and focus solely on roaming. I tackled a lot of sidequests in the early stages of my run and lost some precious time doing so — time that would have been better spent exploring. On top of that, the rewards granted by these quests are not really worth the time and hassle. 
• I'll use more healing items in the exploration phases, i.e. when I map out floors. My playthrough has proved that the money balance in EO is not a problem at all when running solo, so I can afford to stock up on restoring stuff and indulge in longer roaming sessions. 

So, while me and EO are clearly done for the time being, this is absolutely not an adieu. I'm gonna play that game again, I'm gonna play its sequels, and I'm gonna keep purchasing every new game in the series and rejoice at the though of the many hours of crawling goodness that lie ahead. This is not the end, indeed; this is only the beginning between me and Etrian Odyssey! Thanks for reading, and be my guest anytime!