It all started when I was looking for Patapon for the PSP after watching a Let’s Play of it. The game store didn’t have it. Normally I didn’t want to waste my security check money, but my dad told me to hurry up and I didn’t want him to feel like the trip had been a waste. My eye had kept glancing to the title on the bottom shelf: Star Ocean: First Departure. After fifteen minutes of debate, I decided to screw it and bought it(and the strategy guide for safety).
When I learned this game was a PSP remake of the never-translated first game in the fabled series joint-made by Enix and Tri-Ace, I was a little torn. I had been a Star Ocean virgin until I had been “deflowered” by that game’s sequel, Star Ocean: The Second Story. I had beaten it twice, as far as I can tell – one with the Rena storyline, one with the Claude storyline, and both time Claude and Rena… well, I don’t want to spoil anything. The final boss of that game and the final dungeon was as hard as heck, and I had to torture myself with the bonus dungeon, the Cave of Trials.
Sadly, the game was glitchy at times and crashed when I didn’t want it. So eventually, I threw the game away. Then came the third game for the Playstation-2, Til the End of Time. Oh, I beat it and got Nel and Peppita(who I really liked at the beginning) as my optional party members, but that game had crashing issues too, and I got bored after I beat the final boss. The problem was I was trying to get all the battle trophies on a spanking new game, which is hard at best and impossible at worst. I had even bought the strategy guide.
So, it’s sort of hard to get interested in the first game of the series. I had played a translated ROM of it – yes, emulated it, but I don’t have it anymore – and the game was boring. It then crashed during one of the final sequences and I got ticked off and deleted the ROM out of disgust, going on to Pokemon and other things. You can tell I was sort of going into this with low expectations.
I was horribly disappointed… in the reverse way. The anime clips of some of the beginning cutscenes was excellent. I know some of you get chewed up over some of the name changes, like Ronixis called “Ronyx” now, and I did like Ilia/Ellya’s hair in the original version, but the game refuses to be boring. Right now I’m on the special emblem quest and got my seventh party member – who is a werewolf whose human form looks like a spectacled Ranma Saotome. WIN!!! I can’t wait to meet Welch. Anyone who looks like a grown-up Chibi-Usa and has an ultimate technique that requires you to use the game’s crafting system is awesome. I also have Ashlai because I want that ultimate skill for Roddick. (BTW, if you change the character’s names, it will only display the change in text dialogue.)
OH YEAH, the game has voice acting in all the private actions and major cut scenes(I didn’t get Ioshua or Erys in this playthrough) – WINx2!
I’ve heard that these people are also doing a PSP remake of the very game which attracted me to this series in the first place and calling it Star Ocean: Second Evolution. I would buy this in a heartbeat, as it was this game which gave me my “star sea legs”, so to speak.
Claude, Rena, Ashton, and pretty Precis will be mine again – and I heard Welch is going to be here too, which would make my day, considering how much I love her in the first game.
Shrine of the Sacred Eclipse 