Back at the beginning of March 2024, it was discovered that the original Octopath Traveler game was suddenly unavailable to purchase from the Switch eShop. Now over a month later, Square Enix confirmed people can buy it from the storefront again. 

Here's the official announcement that it is back. Square Enix didn't explain the temporary issue:

The game is still showing as $59.99, as usual. All of the descriptions and screenshots are all the same as well. It does now show Square Enix as the publisher, rather than Nintendo, just as the page abruptly did once it showed it was unavailable in March 2024. 

As a reminder, this issue only affected the eShop version of Octopath Traveler that was initially published by Nintendo. During this period, people were still able to get the Windows PC version via Steam and Xbox One version via the Microsoft Store.

Octopath Traveler is immediately available, and people can find it on the Switch, Xbox One, and PC. There are a total of three games in the series so far. Octopath Traveler 2 is out on the PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, and PC. There is also a mobile game spin-off called Octopath Traveler: Conquerors of the Continent. 

The post Original Octopath Traveler Switch Digital Game Back on eShop appeared first on Siliconera.

Square Enix's RPG Octopath Traveler has been delisted - temporarily, at least - from the Nintendo eShop.

The game's disappearance was noticed at the end of last week, though it's still available on Steam and the Microsoft Store.

Some fans have linked Octopath Traveler's delisting due to an apparent change in publisher. Archived versions of the game's eShop product page show that its publisher was changed from Nintendo to Square Enix a some point between 11th February and 1st March.

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One of the Switch's most notable early RPGs is temporarily unavailable on its storefront. Today, users noticed that the first Octopath Traveler is unavailable to buy on the Nintendo eShop.

Visiting the eShop page for Octopath Traveler, at the time of this writing, will display a greyed-out "Not available" icon where the purchase button should be. We reached out to Nintendo to inquire about this, and were directed to a support page that explains some of the situation:

Octopath Traveler is temporarily unavailable for purchase on the Nintendo Switch eShop and My Nintendo Store as of March 1, 2024. The game will be available to purchase again soon.

If you previously purchased this game, it can still be re-downloaded from the Nintendo eShop.

Those have already purchased Octopath Traveler should still be able to redownload their game. Nintendo outlines how to redownload it from the eShop on its support page.

It's unclear why, exactly, the game has been taken down from just Nintendo's storefront. The RPG remains available on other platform storefronts like Steam, and on stores like Humble. It's worth noting that, while Nintendo was originally the publisher of Octopath Traveler, the eShop page currently lists Square Enix as the publisher, as spotted by Gematsu.

We've also reached out to Square Enix for comment, and will update if we hear back.

Traveler currently unavailable

Octopath Traveler was an early hit for the Switch, providing a big RPG exclusive for Nintendo's handheld hybrid. Though its now six years old, seeing it mysteriously disappear from the storefront is strange. I'd hope this is just a case of some back-end changes, and that the game pops back soon, as Nintendo's support page indicates.

Still, if you're seeking some gorgeous adventures, you can't really go wrong with its sequel either. Octopath Traveler 2 was a highlight of last year's RPG lineup, and remains available on the eShop. Regardless, hopefully this first entry will be readily accessible again soon.

The post Octopath Traveler is temporarily unavailable on the eShop, but it’s coming back ‘soon’ appeared first on Destructoid.

Shortly after David Gaider was born, his parents bought a set of 1971 encyclopaedias to freeze-frame the world as it was when he entered it. He still remembers the maps they contained: his first atlas. But there are two moments in Gaider's life when a gift of maps leads to adventure. In the second, he's older, and already working at the job we know him best for. He was a lead writer at BioWare.

At the time, BioWare was embarking on a new adventure, creating two brand new games and the universes around them. One was to be science fiction and would become Mass Effect. One was fantasy and would become Dragon Age. That's the game Gaider was working on - or rather, it was the world he would dream up.

Ideas had been swirling about what Dragon Age would be for a few months. The team knew it would be like D&D but would not be actual D&D, because BioWare was sick of licensed games at the time. They knew they were going for Tolkien rather than Conan or Diablo. "We definitely had at least some idea of the kind of RPG this was going to be," Gaider tells me when in a video call. But BioWare didn't have a world, and that's where the second collection of maps comes in. One day, Gaider was handed a historical atlas of Europe and tasked with going away and coming up with a fantasy world for players to explore.

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