Star Ocean: Till the End of Time

"Average and simply cliche."

Star Ocean 3: Till The End of Time, is the fourth game in the Star Ocean series. (Yes I'm counting Blue Sphere even though it only came out in Japan) For those of you who enjoyed Star Ocean 2 or who were lucky enough to play the original Star Ocean, which also never came out in America or rom'd it will probably enjoy this game. Personally I found the game to be extremely disappointing. It carries all the game play and feel of its predecessors, but doesn't quite meet the standards of next generation gaming even by the games original release two or three years ago in Japan. Most importantly, the game is so cliche I was laughing during the dramatic moments.

Graphics: 6
The graphics in this game are just horrible! The main characters look so simple and static (Xeno Saga style) compared to other games and surprisingly enough there are normal non-playable characters, which have more details than even the main character Fayt Leingod. The background environments are a little better than the character models fortunately, but they don't stand for much. Water effects are way outdated and for those of you who have played Metal Gear Solid 3, you should know what good water and reflections should look like. Fortunately this is an RPG so I personally don't care about the graphics as the game play, storyline, and the musical score is most important to me. Those of you, who want an RPG with cool graphics, wait for Final Fantasy XII.

I must mention one more thing about the graphics. Dungeons! Yes dungeons are in this game and most are really bad. Almost all of the dungeons in this game are very flat and with boring maze-like areas. Worst of all you will see all kinds of objects being reused in other dungeons. If these dungeons had a little more variety, then I think they would have been more fun.

Sound: 2
This game has some of the cheapest sound effects I've ever heard. During some cut scenes, you won't hear any sound at all; long enough I would say to make it feel really cheap. At one point in the game, a character lifts her right hand and casts a spell. Everything's completely silent as a glowing ball emits from her hand. Then you hear this extremely cheap sound effect, which is supposed to represent some kind of magic.

Music: 6
This game has very average music. The only good songs in the game are the two remixed songs from Star Ocean 2 and one or two tracks from some of the towns you explore. The battle music is average, final boss music is average, and even the dungeon music is pretty average too. Very disappointing when considering the great music SO2 had.

Game play: 7
Just like Star Ocean 1 and 2, you are able to control any of your characters during battle. The battles are much more fast-paced so usually you will have to stick with using only one character. I found that switching between the other characters was too tedious and annoying and increased the difficulty of the game. Most players will probably use Fayt for the majority of the game and move on to using their character of choice after earning them. Another nice feature, which returned for SO3 was the special attacks. As your characters build up, they learn new moves. The moves can be set to the O or X button on your controller and are activated when you press and hold. You can also select, which moves you want to use based on your distance from the enemy. Some attacks can only be used from a long distance, while others can only be used from a short ranged distance. To make your attacks even better, you can chain them. To perform this you basically use one move right after the other and after each successful attack, your characters attack power will raise by 150%-300% depending on how many times you are able to perform them. What limits you from attacking an enemy infinitely is your stamina. Usually during battle you begin at 100%. Some attacks use up 30% of your stamina or more. You can perform as many attacks as you wish in concession as long as you have stamina. To regain stamina, standing still or waiting will quickly refill it. Trust me it's not that big of a deal since your stamina refills in 5 seconds.

Another near game play feature is the shield. If your stamina is at 100% and an enemy attacks you with a weaker attack, you can counter this and take no damage. Depending on what kind of shield you have selected, you can damage, stun, etc. the enemy. The shield only works when you are standing still since the moment you break into a run your stamina goes to 99% and won't refill to 100% until you stop once more.

You can also craft new skills if you find books. Unfortunately magic in this game is useless. I only used fighters throughout the entire game and did fine. The one nice feature about crafting skills and magic is that any character can use them. Some characters obviously will use them better than others.

Another game play element is the dodge feature. Dodge enemy attacks by pressing left or right on the left control stick. I never used the feature.

Another new element to game play is the weak and strong attacks. Pressing the X button will initiate a weak attack. Pressing the O button will initiate a strong attack. Obviously a strong attack will do more damage to the enemy. There are downsides with both kinds of attacks. If you use a weak attack on an enemy who has 100% stamina, he will counter you. If you use a strong attack, your character usually performs the attack slower so you are left open for attack, but you are able to break through his defenses even if he has 100% stamina. Deciding on which attack to use becomes second nature early in the game.

Story: 7
I really had problems with the storyline. I enjoyed the outline of the story, but its execution could have been better. Most of the time you are off doing other things and you must play through over half of the game before the main point of the story is revealed. There are plot twists in this game, but none were that special or shocking and probably came from the fact that the graphics seemed to limit the game; and bad voice acting, static boring characters dulling scenes, which are supposed to be dramatic. Most were dulled by the fact that the voice actors sucked, the visuals were dated, and the characters moved extremely static like in Xeno Saga; and all of the FMV's were stupid and a waste of disk space. Yeah there is probably a decent amount of FMV footage, but they spread all of the FMV's throughout the entire game in small 20-second sequences. Like for example, showing a ship fly to a planet, but not even showing its descent through the atmosphere and landing. Or during a really cool scene they will show you something not so interesting and then show you something that would have been really awesome in FMV in real-time graphics. If this were Metal Gear Solid, I would have no complaint with cut scenes done in real-time graphics, but SO3's are just terrible and boring.

Dialogue: 1
Yeah this needs to be discussed. First of all this game really feels like an anime. I have nothing against anime and I even like a few titles out there, but the same cliché dialogue you might see in anime, happens right here in this game. The "power" cliché the main character always seems to pull, the fact that the main character has to be better then everyone else, the annoying dialogue where everyone has to make a comment before a conversation or beginning of a battle even if its just a single word, the "It's too dangerous" line even though that character is completely capable of fending for his or herself cliché, the there is always just a little power left to beat the boss even though the main character and friends should have been defeated cliche, the "I'll wait here and fend them off while you run away to safety" cliché even though it's completely stupid and pointless and if everyone just kept on running together, everyone would probably make it out alive. I could go on.

Replay Value: 1
I'm giving replay value a 1 because that is how many times I will ever play this game. The game does offer two other modes of game, which basically make the game more challenging. Universe mode is one of them. These features would be cool if the game wasn't so unreplayable and if they actually didn't cheapen the game to make it harder by giving all enemies 100% stamina all the time and more HP.

Overall score: 6
I am giving this game a 6 because of its average cliché storyline, missing cool plot twists, elevator level soundtrack and sound effects, stupid dialogue, flat and uninteresting dungeons, and pointless FMV's. This game gets a 6 only because the game play really is the only feature in this game worth checking out. Renting would be advised; borrowing for free from the poor soul who bought this would be recommended.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 01/03/05