A Star Ocean game where the story is really good and the gameplay is pretty bad...not what I was expecting at all. Like if I told myself 3 years ago the one thing that kept me from dropping a Star Ocean game (aside from the fact that I rarely do that) was the story, I would be dumbfounded. Unfortunately it's hard to talk about this game's story without spoiling anything. So I'll try to write it out in a general sense.

This game takes place before the first Star Ocean, First Departure, and answers some questions you may or may not have had such as the reason why Earthlings decided to take to space, how they did so, and the creation of the Underdeveloped Planet Preservation Pact. While all interesting questions aside from the last one, the answers aren't really given that much depth. But that's fine this series is about space travel after all. It does both good and bad with this.

You see the universe through the eyes of Edge Maverick, contrary to his name, his personality is just being edgy or moody all the time. He's a hot headed passionate person who wants to help others without a second thought. But that leads him to do more harm than good through his journey. And with his new found friends, he is able to build the courage and strength to make the hard hitting choices and decisions. Sounds kind of plain when I write it out but I really do like Edge a lot. The cutscenes from early to mid game were just great, I was intently watching them because I enjoyed them so much. Edge’s arc in this game was great too, I seriously can’t believe people disliked it. It helped serve so much purpose that it still affected him even by the end of the game. I know a lot of people hate the models and animations in these cutscenes. But I just love how weird and unnatural it was. Like how in every cutscene Reimi literally never stops moving or having constant eye contact with whoever is speaking and that one scene where Faize is talking real fast about something and the girl who gave him the cloak had no idea what he was even talking but was smiling and shaking her head in acknowledgement (that made laugh since it was so unexpected I missed out on what the scene was even about). The voice acting was honestly great, I can't believe people were saying it was bad. Either I've heard worse or I've heard good for too long, no clue which. Don't really care for the “bad” guy all too much (like I rarely do but the final boss was interesting and surprising. I wish they had developed them a bit earlier but I get why they did it this way.

Interesting thing about The Last Hope compared to First Departure and Second Story (haven't played the 3rd one yet) is that all your party members are chosen for you. I was a bit miffed about it at first but I became okay with it because at the very least each character adds something to the story/dialogue. It probably helps that I just recently finished Second Story R and was wishing the other party members interacted more in the story. But I really do like the characters in this game but only because they're in a game like this. I know that's kind of weird to say but I think if they were in any other game I don't think I would like any of them. Like Faize, Edge, Bacchus, Crowe, Sarah, Lymle, Eleyna, and Klaus just to name a few, who just wouldn't have worked in any other game. Except for Welch, I just really like her a lot more than I should for some reason. She is honestly really good in this game, every scene with her is just great. It may be really corny but it fits Welch to a T. Some designs suck though like Arumat, Myuria and Meracle, no reason to make them look like they did. It was so weird because there’s no way anyone liked it…right? But some designs were really good like Sarah, Lymle, Faize, and Welch (I actually warmed up to it, but blue and blonde are still the best combo for her). Private Actions still exist (they're great btw) and I saw a few of them but it looks like I missed a bunch since I only got one character's ending which sucks because it wasn't the one I was most looking forward to, oh well maybe next time. I will say though I think the female cast was done dirty in this game. A bit too much direction in fetishizing characteristics (something a bit different from the random mill of fanservice imo) on them and making them not too smart or too strong in the story compared to the female cast of First Departure and Second Story. But it's not like they were awful or bad, it was just a step in a different direction than I expected for this series. Which I can honestly say for this entire game to be honest.

The gameplay is not great, luckily though it's not horrendously bad either. Just nowhere near as fun as the first two games. Combat animations and hitstun/delay are way too slow for me to truly enjoy it. Bonus Board is alright but it breaks too easily since every enemy can just crit super easily. I wish being in Rush mode helped such as ignore crits but it doesn't. Quests are a bore since they're active within Item Creation which yes....is bad too. I can't believe the made IC bad like how do you make one of the best subsystems ever in the first two games and then ruin it in the fourth, that's just crazy. You can only do IC in the Calnus that require items from stores/vending machines and enemies that for some reason took forever to drop. I was grinding these mushroom enemies for at least 45 mins just to get some 10 Tasty Mushrooms. It should never take that long to get any items, especially when field skills like Botany are maxed out. Then you'll have to slowly dash all the way to the quest givers and/or Calnus between these long stretches of uninteresting terrain and enemies. No fast travel until the final areas, which is lame. Don't know why fast travel had to have a plot reason to exist; all it did was waste my time throughout the beginning. I got over 56 hours in this game and I’m sure a good chunk was going back and to the Calnus and towns.

Regardless, I still had a fun time. I’m glad I was able to experience this game. Now Square Enix please put Star Ocean 3 and 5 on Steam so I can play them, thanks!

Look.... I just loved this game, okay?

Yes the dialogue is cringe, but I actually found the characters super fun and enjoyable despite that.

I really, really liked the combat, the setting, the music, all of it was just... a really good and fun time, okay?

10/10 I will definitely play it again on the hardest difficulty and unlock all the trophies when I am done with the whole Star Ocean series!