Better than Octopath? I'm still only 15 hours in in Octopath but I can't see how any JRPG can beat it on the switch tbh, definitely better than Xenoblade 2.
Different from octopath, but a more enjoyable experience for me overall.
Octopath scratches that old styled rpg itch, but apart from a enjoyable battle and progression system I found octopath bland (story wise) and while the nostalgia in the old graphic is nice, it doesn't make it good.
Xenoblade 2 is way better graphically and has a somewhat interesting gameplay and story, but takes a long ass time to get going, and even then there will be some annoyances.
Lost sphere is just a lesser octopath traveler that goes for crono trigger feel instead of ff6 feel.
Ultimately has the same issues, but doesn't have a enjoyable development of the characters as opposed to octopath.
Lacrimosa of Dana is basically lesser graphically than Xenoblade 2, but is much more easy to get into as you won't have 20 hours of tutorials. The fighting is also more fast-paced which to me is the whole point of going from turn-based rpg and to action-based rpg. So where Xenoblades combat is good when you finally get into it, you will understand lacrimosa of Dana in half an hour or so. Can't speak about the story yet of course, but just the premise of being stranded on a island and having to explore, evolve and work to get off it is quite interesting for me.
I always loved leveling up skills, weapon/armor Smith and other stuff, and now I feel like I get a lot of it.
Edit:
Apart from the troubles of enemies not moving around before you are close to them (performance or coding issue), I've had the game freezing completely twice. First time the home button sorted the issue, second time i had to restart the software and lost a few minutes of gametime.