Etrian Odyssey Nexus is the last mainline Etrian game for the Nintendo 3DS, and it knows it. Atlus built the 2018 dungeon crawler as a victory lap: 19 classes pulled from across the series, more than a hundred quests, and returning locations meant to hit longtime players where they live.
Trailer, via Official ATLUS West.
Princess Persephone Summons the Realm
The setup comes from a royal decree. Princess Persephone of Lemuria gathers the realm’s greatest explorers in the floating city of Maginia. From there they plunge into the Lemuria archipelago and its great Yggdrasil Tree, chasing treasure and glory.
That is a thin frame, and it is meant to be. Nexus is not telling a new story so much as assembling every story the series already told.
Yuji Himukai and Yuzo Koshiro Return
The longtime trio is back: character designer Yuji Himukai, monster designer Shin Nagasawa, and composer Yuzo Koshiro. Their presence matters. Himukai’s portraits are half the reason anyone gets attached to a party of blank-slate adventurers.
The art team also loosened its grip. Character portraits can be picked regardless of class, and the default set adds color customization for skin, hair, and eyes. You can assign a voicebank at creation. Small things, but they turn a roster into a cast.
Nineteen Classes and a Subclass System
Combat borrows the interface and stat system from Etrian Odyssey V. Magic attack now runs on INT and magic defense on WIS, rather than both living under TEC. Stat caps jump to 255 from 99. Weapons can be forged to raise stats and unlock or improve skills tied to them.
The Force system returns. Every class gets its own Force Boost and Break. Past the midpoint, subclassing opens up and lets a character borrow skills from another class. Skills split across three pages: Novice immediately, Veteran past level 20, Master past level 40. Caps and requirements stay low so skill points stretch further once a subclass is in play.
Picnic, Basic, Expert, and Heroic
Four difficulty settings carry the accessibility argument. Picnic can be selected at any point, but once chosen you cannot switch out of it. Heroic is functionally identical to Expert and only available on a new playthrough. Pick it and you cannot drop down later, and you cannot carry over past data if you start it as a New Game+.
Auto-mapping is back, and optional. That single toggle says more about who Nexus is for than any class list.
Lemuria Replaces One Long Dungeon
The overworld adapts the structure from Etrian Odyssey IV to express its strata, rather than the single extensive dungeon the other mainline games use. On exiting Maginia, the player is taken to a world map.
It is a real change, and not everyone will want it.
Forging Weapons at the Guild
Weapons can be forged to improve their stats, and forging can unlock or improve stat bonuses or skills tied to them. That gives gear a second job. A weapon is no longer just a number you upgrade between floors; it is another slot where a build lives.
What Nexus Gets Right
Nexus is a compilation with a spine. The 19 classes, the subclassing, the returning Force mechanics, and the four difficulty tiers are not nostalgia bait; they are the most flexible the series has been.
Where it stumbles is identity. Maginia and Lemuria are staging grounds for other games’ ideas. The overworld from IV dilutes the claustrophobia that made the dungeon crawls work. Princess Persephone’s decree sets a party in motion, but it never gives them a reason to care.
Still, as a final statement on the 3DS, it earns its place. The trio of Himukai, Nagasawa, and Koshiro deliver, and the accessibility options give newcomers a gentler way in than any Etrian before it.
KEY FACTS
– Release: August 2018 (Japan), February 2019 (worldwide)
– Developer/Publisher: Atlus
– Platform: Nintendo 3DS
– Classes: 19, plus subclassing
– Difficulty: Picnic, Basic, Expert, Heroic
– Score: 8.1/10
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