Star Ocean Till the End of Time Review

Well, this is a solid example of an otherwise decent game swiftly going downhill due to a certain story reveal. When I started Star Bounding main iii, I was having a nail — by the time I got to the last dungeon, I just wanted my suffering to end. Oh well. The game was still overall okay.

But fuck me, that twist.

So, as yous may or may non know, I was a large fan of the original two Star Oceans back in the 24-hour interval, then it felt merely natural that I'd eventually play the tertiary 1, as well. So here nosotros are at present. And if you've read the first few lines I wrote to a higher place, you can also probably figure out that my feelings on this game are… kinda mixed.

I'thousand withal a bit too salty (I'll explain why later) to write a proper intro so here'southward what you get: yous play as Fayt, some blue-haired twat with a childhood friend (Sophia) who clearly has a trounce on him but his donkan ass won't realize information technology. Considering of course. Fayt is also voiced by Souichirou Hoshi and so 90% of the time I was like "what the hell is Hinata Youichi doing in this game, become back to banging Aqua or something". Anyway, in usual Star Ocean fashion, you start out in an ultra sci-fi hi-tech civilization only by some twist of fate, end up crash landing on a planet with a civilisation level equivalent to the middle ages, if the middle ages had magic and dragons and beautiful kuudere oneesans (I'll likewise explicate that concluding one later, carry with me for now).

You spend the offset few hours in the game looking similar a dork in your slippers (Fayt was in the middle of some holiday iirc when Shit Happened), but that doesn't stop you from murdering unarmed people in cold blood. Who beg for their lives before you lot fucking stab them with your sword.

You think I'm joking.

I'm not:

Presently enough, yous meet upward with muscular broseph Cliff and the aforementioned redhead kuudere, Nel, and the three of you lot spend the majority of the game adventuring in Medieval Fantasy Land. Nel is best girl, by the way. Let'southward just make this clear. Fuck Maria and fuck Sophia, I don't give a shit about either of them. Delusion doesn't count. The chocolate-brown loli likewise doesn't count.

Past the way, I went to painstaking lengths to do all of Nel'southward optional events (Private Actions) to finally go her ending in the epilogue, and then I didn't fifty-fifty bother finishing the game. How funny is that? Anyway, before yous showtime freaking out, I did play through like 99% of the game, I simply quit at the final dungeon because I couldn't take this shit anymore. I guess information technology must be because I didn't spend ages messing around with the item creation system to make my weapons the all-time they can be, or maybe I didn't level up enough. I'm non sure, but fights towards the finish became increasingly more than frustrating and difficult, so I was like, screw this I'll but sentinel the catastrophe on Youtube. And I did. And Nel's ending likewise, because that one's too on Youtube. My soul is at present at peace, and I balance easy knowing that Fayt and Nel spent the rest of their lives making babies like no one's business.

Nel is very cute when her scarf covers her mouth btw

Oh, right, I should talk nearly the game, too. Right. Okay. I got this. No more rambling about how much I want to smell Nel's hair and potable her piss. None of that. Promise.

Then, the battle system. I keep seeing people say how this game has a really amazing battle system, evidently. Did we… did we play the same game? Well, okay, peradventure this was amazing dorsum in, like… 2003 or whenever this game came out, only I honestly institute it kinda clunky. The fact yous have to hold down a push to practice special attacks, how enemies have a bunch of moments where they can't be damaged (like when they get knocked to the flooring and are getting support; I'm here to stunlock bitches, non to politely await for them to pull their pants back upwardly), the way your idiot grapheme will go on slashing at empty air if the enemy moves two pixels to the side, and how I spent most of the game demolishing everything by spamming/cancel comboing the same two or three attacks… Well, I dunno. Information technology wasn't terrible, but it didn't exactly rock my world and shake my foundations (Nel did that). It did grow mighty repetitive, though.

Have a shot now if yous're playing the "Gare Mentions Nel" drinking game, by the way.

I want Nel to await at me similar that as she steps on me

Anyway, let's talk virtually more of import things. Like Nel. She has the almost soothing vox e'er. Virtually the end, I was getting really burned out on the story so I kept skipping the text once I read information technology (instead of letting the voices play), EXCEPT FOR NEL'South LINES. I always listened to those. Always. At times, I wished she would sit at my bed at night and sing me lullabies. I'm not exactly certain how much of that previous sentence is a joke, and that scares me a little. Equally I've previously mentioned, I didn't intendance virtually the crafting organization because I play JRPGs to explore cool worlds and go to know cool characters, non to stare at a menu that tells me I'm cooking borscht. (Annotation: I have no thought if yous can make borscht in Star Ocean: Till the End of my Patience, merely maybe yous tin. Or maybe you can't. It doesn't matter.)

EXCEPT… that one time I did become into the crafting menu just to look at Nel chopping vegetables. Look how adorable she is. Await!

On a more serious note, Cliff and Nel were probably the only two characters I really liked, the rest I couldn't give ii shits about, sadly. Maria is non bad, I suppose, Mirage is barely in the game, Fayt is Fayt, Sophia is Tedious Osananajimi #631, Albel is the Edgy Edgelord and there were a few other characters as well just who cares. I judge Clair was cute just she's non playable, goddammit. And the villains exercise the typical shounen villain cackle while throwing their heads dorsum. I mean, come on. Also, some of them expect like the morbid lovechildren of Humpty Dumpty and a manatee:

Anyhow, back to the boxing arrangement. This game has MP decease. Have I told you that? No? Well, this game has MP death. Yes, really. If you run out of MP in battle, you fucking Die. If you run out of HP in battle, you also fucking die. Wow. Information technology's also kinda weird how the game gives you peanuts for XP so in the end, information technology kinda-sorta expects you to unlock the 300% XP bonus and exploit the shit out of it if you want to take any chance at leveling upwardly in a timely manner.

Incidentally, and this is not related to the battle arrangement at all, but you can climb every ladder in this game, fifty-fifty if it makes no sense. I'grand serious. I loved this. Equally such, I made it my mission to climb every ladder, even if information technology was completely pointless. Look:

There's too a picture of Thomas the Tank Engine in this house for some reason. I don't fifty-fifty know.

So what did I like about Star Sea 3? Well, the world was sort of cool. The environments, the cities, the interiors… all that stuff.

*Hot Have Imminent* Every bit I kept playing Star Body of water 3, I was thinking to myself "damn, the frequently-praised and tremendously overrated Tales of Berseria had a bunch of garbage-tier locations/dungeons, and here I am, playing a game from 2003 that has a way lower polygon count simply ends up making its world way more interesting. Imagine that." Indeed. Star Ocean 3's cities were fun to explore, were decently big, and had a bunch of NPC houses to clomp into where y'all tin can talk to the locals. Y'all know, the way all JRPGs used to do things before we of a sudden started praising the likes of Berseria as the second coming of JRPG Christ. I bet people think the J in JRPG even stands for Jesus. (70% of my body is made of common salt correct now, in instance you were wondering.) Anyway, despite the aged graphics, the interiors all felt cozy and had a sure lived-in feel to them. Here, I'll even show you a pretty picture or two:

And this is what a boondocks should wait like.

This game even has proper (and adequately lengthy) dungeons, by the manner. With puzzles. Actual goddamn puzzles. And you can check a lot of things in houses. Like shelves and such. There'south a lot of stuff to just inspect and read. Like, if you go into the room of the King (who's looking for a bride), y'all find this volume almost romance. Another shelf has some cool tri-Ace references. Or airheaded jokes. Oh, and items have bodily 3D models you can check out on the inventory screen. Games should exercise that more than. There's lots of little things that all convey how much care went into the world. I always appreciate stuff like this, and it'south something that tends to be missing from a lot of games, I feel.

The not-and so-cool function about Star Ocean iii's world is that the game also has a LOT of backtracking, where you'll just be running back and forth between cities. A side quest even has you running all the fashion from one end of the world to the other, but to deliver some letter. And in that location'southward actually no fast travel in this game, except for that one guy who offers to take y'all between 2 specific spots, but that's all I remember. The residue of the time, you walk. Bleh.

Right, and then near the storyline. It honestly plays it fairly straight at first. You land on this fantasy planet, outset to get into some problem, meet some new faces and all that jazz. I've always enjoyed how Star Bounding main mixed fantasy with sci-fi, and it was pretty interesting to see Fayt go on about how he must keep his howdy-tech gadgets and origins a secret so as not to interfere with an underdeveloped planet's history and such. So eventually you offset getting more than and more involved with the various major powers on Fantasy Planet, and then some dramatic stuff happens, more problems arise… well, it'southward typical JRPG fluff, but I didn't mind. I came to play a standard but solid JRPG and that's what I got. In the first one-half, anyhow.

And so The Twist happened.

Allow me illustrate what my reaction was:

Yes. I obviously won't spoil what the twist is, just it honestly made the entire game, no, the entire franchise feel kinda hollow. I don't think I'll be able to look at Star Ocean games the same fashion again, all cheers to this one reveal. I hateful, it didn't piss me off or anything, I'yard not frothing at the mouth here, but I kept asking "why?". There could've been a dozen ameliorate ways to wrap up this storyline, and they went with this load of distortion.

After The Twist (*laugh track plays*), the rest of the game mostly focuses on sci-fi stuff, and your adventures in Fantasy Land are mostly over, and you're stuck wandering boring steel hallways and dull spaceships and other boring places. The ending is sort of meh, plus the concluding villain comes out of nowhere and suffers from Generic Villain Syndrome, even if some of what he says is mildly idea-provoking, though I won't go into details so as non to spoil The Twist.

たーのしー！

I recall this review ended upwardly beingness a scrap rambly, simply that's okay. It might also be proof of my gradually unraveling sanity, which is… not so okay, simply I'll deal with it. For now, all I can say is that Star Ocean 3 was fine until it decided to shit the bed with its 2d one-half, and by the end, information technology kinda left me burned out and wearied. It's worth a playthrough, and there'southward much to like about it (not only Nel) if you desire a decent JRPG from the good ol' PS2 era, simply don't wait also much.

Are you nevertheless doing that drinking game, by the way? Is your liver okay? I'g starting to get worried.

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Source: https://gareblogs.wordpress.com/2017/07/01/review-star-ocean-till-the-end-of-time/

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