Star Ocean: First Departure R is Very Old-School Japanese RPG... And That's Good
Final Party: Roddick (Roddi)/Ilia (Ilya)/Ashlay (Ash)/Millie (Millie)/Erys (Eris)/Ronyx (Ron)/Ioshua (Josh)/Welch (...)
Disclaimer: I used a guide for Character Recruitment and Item Creation
Just like how our party got sent back 300 years into the past, I also was taken back to my early days of playing RPGs. That's the feel of playing through Star Ocean. This game is old-school af in both positive and negative ways. Let's talk about it.
Pros
+ Combat is hard. It discourages button-mashing and requires a fair bit of strategizing. I enjoyed it, until I discovered the right equipment and skills. It then becomes a bit repetitive but mostly, very fun.
+ Gameplay Progression is great. At the start, it's clunky and pretty hard but once it gets rolling, it feels like an actual party of heroes deserving to fight the Demon Lord. Roddick may be a lackluster main character, but gameplay-wise he's my favorite.
+ Characters are very likeable. Story-wise, I like that everyone, including the optional ones are proactive but the Private Actions are the MVP of this game. It helps make them feel like a real group of friends and yeah, I teared up at the ending because of it.
+ The Story is simple. It's the classic 'Take down the demon lord, o heroes' trope and ngl I don't remember a single thing about it but because of its simplicity, it's easy to digest when playing long RPGs and helps focus on the characters instead.
Cons
- The new HD portraits clash with the low-res sprites of the game. Also, a minor gripe but weird is some portraits doesn't match the sprite! Why does Ronyx have purple hair when it's black in his model?! Also the animated cutscenes use the old character designs. I'm going nuts thinking about it!
- OST is too loud. I can barely hear the VA. A simple volume slider should be very possible for a 2019 remaster.
- Roddick as a main character is really boring. He's a good guy, that's his character and it gets nowhere. He's the same in hour 1 and at the end. I guess it's a product of its time but he's no different from the silent protagonists of old JRPGs.
- Wish we jumped to different periods/planets. The game is called Star Ocean ffs. When the party goes to a different area at the end, it was awesome. I wish there's more of that in future titles.
- Gameplay has some clunky aspects to it. Auto-target sometimes makes your character just run around, seemingly having a hard time deciding whether to attack the front or back of enemies. Allies aren't smart about their use of skills, sometimes barely hitting enemies. Mages are useless for half of the game. Early-game, yeah their AOE spells are OP but about 10-hours in once you get the better skills, Melee fighters just obliterate everyone before your mage finish casting.
- Certain sections require you to grind a lot. Just that it's mind-numbingly boring when you spend at least 30 minutes to grind because some enemies just one-shot you and you don't get a healer, at least in my party setup, until 20-hours into the story.
- Backtracking sucks. You get different Private Actions per towns and you can't fast travel outside of Port Towns. There's no way to prevent encounters so it takes a while to go through every town for PAs and certain shop items.
- Menu navigation is tedious. Going through the item creation stuff involves a lot of button presses. Wish it was streamlined a bit.
- Speaking of crafting, I HATE RNG in any form. It's not hyperbole to say I spent more time crafting than the entire story itself. Mainly because It took me a while before I just gave in and just looked up a guide. Even then, it's still RNG-heavy and the only way to ease it up is to play Orchestra repeatedly. It doesn't help that the last 10 hours of content relies on you making the best set of equipment (Yes, I finished Cave of Seven Stars. It was HELL)
- Welch
I might have a lot of gripes with it but overall, I enjoyed my time with Star Ocean. I can't wait to see where this franchise goes especially after Second Story R is getting some traction. I'm a new fan and I'll definitely (slowly) play through it all someday!
44 hours/672 battles/2000 failed crafting attempts later, I give Star Ocean: First Departure R a 3.5/5
Final Party: Roddick (Roddi)/Ilia (Ilya)/Ashlay (Ash)/Millie (Millie)/Erys (Eris)/Ronyx (Ron)/Ioshua (Josh)/Welch (...)
Disclaimer: I used a guide for Character Recruitment and Item Creation
Just like how our party got sent back 300 years into the past, I also was taken back to my early days of playing RPGs. That's the feel of playing through Star Ocean. This game is old-school af in both positive and negative ways. Let's talk about it.
Pros
+ Combat is hard. It discourages button-mashing and requires a fair bit of strategizing. I enjoyed it, until I discovered the right equipment and skills. It then becomes a bit repetitive but mostly, very fun.
+ Gameplay Progression is great. At the start, it's clunky and pretty hard but once it gets rolling, it feels like an actual party of heroes deserving to fight the Demon Lord. Roddick may be a lackluster main character, but gameplay-wise he's my favorite.
+ Characters are very likeable. Story-wise, I like that everyone, including the optional ones are proactive but the Private Actions are the MVP of this game. It helps make them feel like a real group of friends and yeah, I teared up at the ending because of it.
+ The Story is simple. It's the classic 'Take down the demon lord, o heroes' trope and ngl I don't remember a single thing about it but because of its simplicity, it's easy to digest when playing long RPGs and helps focus on the characters instead.
Cons
- The new HD portraits clash with the low-res sprites of the game. Also, a minor gripe but weird is some portraits doesn't match the sprite! Why does Ronyx have purple hair when it's black in his model?! Also the animated cutscenes use the old character designs. I'm going nuts thinking about it!
- OST is too loud. I can barely hear the VA. A simple volume slider should be very possible for a 2019 remaster.
- Roddick as a main character is really boring. He's a good guy, that's his character and it gets nowhere. He's the same in hour 1 and at the end. I guess it's a product of its time but he's no different from the silent protagonists of old JRPGs.
- Wish we jumped to different periods/planets. The game is called Star Ocean ffs. When the party goes to a different area at the end, it was awesome. I wish there's more of that in future titles.
- Gameplay has some clunky aspects to it. Auto-target sometimes makes your character just run around, seemingly having a hard time deciding whether to attack the front or back of enemies. Allies aren't smart about their use of skills, sometimes barely hitting enemies. Mages are useless for half of the game. Early-game, yeah their AOE spells are OP but about 10-hours in once you get the better skills, Melee fighters just obliterate everyone before your mage finish casting.
- Certain sections require you to grind a lot. Just that it's mind-numbingly boring when you spend at least 30 minutes to grind because some enemies just one-shot you and you don't get a healer, at least in my party setup, until 20-hours into the story.
- Backtracking sucks. You get different Private Actions per towns and you can't fast travel outside of Port Towns. There's no way to prevent encounters so it takes a while to go through every town for PAs and certain shop items.
- Menu navigation is tedious. Going through the item creation stuff involves a lot of button presses. Wish it was streamlined a bit.
- Speaking of crafting, I HATE RNG in any form. It's not hyperbole to say I spent more time crafting than the entire story itself. Mainly because It took me a while before I just gave in and just looked up a guide. Even then, it's still RNG-heavy and the only way to ease it up is to play Orchestra repeatedly. It doesn't help that the last 10 hours of content relies on you making the best set of equipment (Yes, I finished Cave of Seven Stars. It was HELL)
- Welch
I might have a lot of gripes with it but overall, I enjoyed my time with Star Ocean. I can't wait to see where this franchise goes especially after Second Story R is getting some traction. I'm a new fan and I'll definitely (slowly) play through it all someday!
44 hours/672 battles/2000 failed crafting attempts later, I give Star Ocean: First Departure R a 3.5/5