After hearing so much praise about Star Ocean 2, I'm surprised the game is so.....just Ok. Am I missing something? I've heard it a bunch of times, that the game is one of the best JRPGs ever made. Yet, there's a lot of exposition and dialogue, and it's so straightforward in its approach. Is it that the genre is so basic, that when one has an action based combat, and skill systems akin to the Elder Scrolls series, it's simply better than the others?
 It's All Fucked Shirt $22.14 |
 UFOs Are A Psyop Shirt $21.68 |
It's All Fucked Shirt $22.14 |
>Is it that the genre is so basic, that when one has an action based combat, and skill systems akin to the Elder Scrolls series, it's simply better than the others?
Yes
It's good for a JRPG but that's only a 6/10 when compared to actual games
The game is mainly praised for being fun, very replayable and offering you lots of option. The plot has never been considered outstanding, but it's entertaining.
What's your example of an actual game?
A game that plays by itself like Zelda Ocarina of atrocious framerate and desertic map? Old WRPGs where you press a button and the characters start hitting things?
I think you're right, I probably am not seeing it much from the replayability and open world/sandbox factor. This is after all my first playthrough, I can imagine whatever my impression of the game is, an objective metric would be that +plus an additional flourish or tier rating on top of it.
JRPG gays have weird standards
SO2 is overrated, the first half of the story is a snoozefest and the second half isn't much better. The only SO worth playing is SO3, as it has the best combat and crafting systems in the series, as well as a "so bad, it's good" storyline.
The first disc is really good. The other is average at best.
No, SO3 is terrible, story and gameplay-wise. It also ruined the franchise with the story twist.
>After hearing so much praise about Star Ocean 2, I'm surprised the game is so.....just Ok. Am I missing something?
who are you hearing this from? SO2 is and always has been your basic b***h jrpg. it's a fun game, but not spectacular; simple, with decent pacing.
don't listen to this guy either. SO3 is praised by the PS2 babbies, but it's the worst game in the series. combat is slow and janky with under-used mechanics. also, the plot is simply bad.
>who are you hearing this from?
I've heard it a dozen times over the past few years. I experimented with Star Ocean about a decade and a half ago, and kinda forgot all about it. I rediscovered the series a few months ago I reckon, finding there's several games, and all of them save for the second and the third tend to get a muted "eh/meh". The second has gotten acclaim which I've heard verbatim as "one of the best JRPGs of all time/ever made". The third one tends to get praised but I've also heard the combat is too punishes or not rewarding enough, and there's a plot twist that nearly everyone it seemed doesn't like. Sadly the plot twist is kind of spoiled, but from the outside looking in I quite like those kinds of story motifs as long as it does something with it and doesn't just handwave it away.
well... JRPGs need a lot of suceptibility and actual ROLE-playing to enjoy it, it's not the gameplay adrenaline slot machine of a click and grind
back in the day I loved SO2, its world felt distant, alien, yet peaceful and melancholic. It was also a very big world for the time if you consider the crafting, the number of characters and the private action mechanic. The plot had many happenings that kept it in crescendo during the first disc, which is for me, the whole of the game
this feels like magic after all these years
?si=t9StZzaGmWsM7kY9
SO3 hooked me fast when I tried it, but I don't remember why I quit it during the desert part
>Am I missing something?
Nope.
Welcome to absolutely almost everything Tri-Ace has done. I also played Radiata Story and the battle system was a big "Wait, that's it????" which felt like it was half implemented
It's basically all half thought-out mechanisms. Almost all of the skills you unlocks are either gimmicky crap like stealing, or crafting shit that basically never work even on the top level and it's brutal and the item losses too great that you won't want to experiment. Absolutely a "gotta check a guide" thing
The battle system pale when compared to Tales or something, you're stuck in semi-auto mode whatever you set and the character will automatically go frick itself on the front of the enemy (Apparently, not a problem with the later remakes)
The only advantage with the battle system is if you play it right, you can juggle enemies hard. But god forbid you accidentally did a magic compatible with the enemy's
Ive attempted to play through SO2 3 times and i still have not grasped wtf im supposed to even be doing in battle or its mechanics.
I haven't played for a long, long while, so I might be missing some infos right now, but you could think of it as Tales of games in semi-auto, you press hit, and the character will go to the enemy and hit it in front of it. Now with that, you can switch to other characters and do the same, cast magic, etc. If you do it just right you're going to be stunning the enemy into not moving
So there's a rhyme and reason for it, but it's kind of weird, especially if you consider that Tales of already was a thing by that time. Apparently you need an item so that the characters can hit them from behind
>one of the best JRPGs ever made
That isn't a high bar.
>so.....just Ok.
never talk to me and my elf waifu ever again.
I'm going to get lynched for this but I think the recent remake makes it a lot better and in my opinion the best version of the game by quite a large margin
For its time, it was an ostensible masterpiece. But age wasn't very kind to it and then there was that absolute joke of a "remaster" on the PSP, where they let some 1st graders redo all the "art" in MS Paint and sent it through. I mean what the frick was that 10-year-old Rena? Goodness. And the forced voice acting (which was awful, btw), goodness. Adding Welch was neat, I guess; at least they added SOMETHING. The three-hit melee combos were cool, too. That's really all they did, though, other than bug fixes.
Thankfully, the recent actual remake was pretty good, even though I haven't finished it yet. Because like you said, it's just kind of meh. Sad, it used to be my favorite game ever. But it's...pretty mid by today's standards, and that's being generous.
Plus, the remake has some things I don't like, like nerfing Claude to shit and making the combat boring. Idk how they did it, but it's just not really fun now. I always played as Claude and had a gay old time. Now, it's shit. Ripper Blast sucks. Mirror Slice is even worse. Cool, Phase Gun is back! Too bad it's shit like all the other special moves.
Nah just slap on a bloody armor like last time and use the improved energy sword (only move that actually got upgraded imo) and just never lose or have any real challenge and enjoy it because eh, the original let you do that too.
play the remake
It never occurred to me that the remaster might be why the game feels so middling. I watched a video comparing all versions before I event started playing the game, and I either didn't pay enough attention, or it didn't bring up a couple of the things you mentioned. I thought it was just me! Claude felt kind of weak at the onset, and I found myself reminiscing about how 'cool' Roddick was. I guess he really is just that great, lol.
well I missed a private action, and that made me miss out on some sidequesting. it's a bit ole love 'n hate I guess. the first game had like four side and optional pieces of content, the sequel seems to have many more, but you can miss them, in the name of replayability I suppose.
It's fun, chock full of cool stuff to craft, steal, find, what's not to like?