Etrian Odyssey V: Beyond the Myth

2025-11-23
Etrian Odyssey is at its best when after hours of having your teeth kicked in by the brutal difficulty you build up a team comp that finally, finally lets you turn the tables on your enemies. Out comes your swaggering team of anime freaks accompanied by the most bombastic combat music you've ever heard in your life, replete with a guitar-sax dual shred sesh. “Yeah”, you think to yourself, “this shit rules."

For me that crescendo in Etrian Odyssey V was when I finally unlocked Zombie Powder on the Necromancer's skill tree. A move that has a chance to instantly kill an enemy and summon a Wraith minion with matching health. And, because this is Etrian Odyssey, there is of course an enemy in the game weak to this move that has 9999 health. At that point, with a party full of unkillable Wraiths--that I could optionally suicide bomb at enemies for 9999--I basically became Uma Thurman in Kill Bill, a being of relentless terror whose sole purpose in life is to get revenge on the enemies of Yggdrasil.

Delightfully this is only one of many possible options that EOV gives us to wreak havoc. The limits are only how willing you are to tap into that latent autism that exists in all our brains and leverage it to concoct the most diabolical chain reaction of moves. Moves that the developers in their awe-inspiring genius laid out before us, beckoning, "Go on, break it." For me while I was comfortably able to clear the game I met my match against the final post-game superboss. And while I found it insurmountable it--of course--can be killed in a single turn with some true galaxy brain cheese.

For my money, EOV is the best of the series because it hits all the right notes. Yes it has the perfect balance of challenging difficulty tempered with fun, powerful build options. But it also has good QOL you'll find lacking in the OG trilogy. Yes it has amazing music but it also has weird, interesting classes, and fun, beautiful dungeons. Shit the third Labyrinth is called "Fetid Necropolis" and has a theme that sounds like the main character in an HBO drama has heroin relapse. It's amazing. Beyond the Myth also has one of the few stories I actually enjoyed mainly because it gets so fucking weird in the post-game.

So, hey, if you're one of the many people who hasn't checked out an Etrian Odyssey and are down from some brutal old-school dungeon crawling with a decidedly wacky, broken JRPG spin, check it out.