Star Ocean: The Last Hope International Review

The JRPG genre has been an unexplored territory for me for many years now. Even with all the good titles and the positive reviews they seem to be getting over the past years, the idea of a bunch teens saving the world has never appealed to me. So when I got the chance to review Star Ocean: The Last Hope International, I had a couple of doubts in my mind: one, is it going to be fair to the game for me to play and review it? And secondly, how well will non-RPG fans like me be able to enjoy this game?

Right, the first thing I learned while playing this game is that it takes a while for it to grow on you. The graphics, at first, were shockingly awful considering how hot Mass Effect 2 and God of War 3 looked on the very same TV a few hours ago. The graphics have a slight cartoonish look, which goes well with the “bunch of kids going to space to save the world” theme.

The game itself first hit the market as an Xbox 360 exclusive game in 2009. Since then the game was gifted with an extra word – ‘International’. Reason behind this decision is simple: the game’s English version in our hands now features the Japanese voice track too, in case you really want to be lost and have no idea what is going on. Of course that is the “non-RPG” fan side of me speaking, it is a good value addition for those wanting to retain the original experience.

Taking Star Ocean International, without caring much about the genre, turned out to be a bit more fun than I anticipated. The game is long and the story, while cheesy to start with, does become a bit interesting later on. The length of the game is nearly triple the 10-20 hours standard limit we seem to be getting with games in recent years. This could be good news for the few of us that actually have that much time on our hands. But the casual gamer looking for quick game will probably struggle with it. Adding drama to the main story line are the characters. Each character on your team seems to have a story to follow and a relationship to understand. These side-quests are completely optional but they do add a good amount of depth to the already lengthy single player campaign.

The action in the game is better then most of the other RPGs I have played. Well, even with my short history with the genre, the previous sentence is still considered a compliment. The action never get old thanks to a solid mix of battle and strategy elements. Powers of each member on your party have to be considered before taking on a specific enemy. Moving around the battle area freely is also a plus. You can also map out attacks and spells for each character on your team onto different buttons on your pad.

Based on how you fight and battle you will also earn rewards on your bonus board. Finishing off an enemy with a critical hit or killing multiple enemies with one hit will earn you a colored gem. Those gems once arranged on the bonus board give you extra goodies such as extra experience gained from each fight and so on. You could lose the whole board if your party leader dies, so play it out carefully and do not risk your rewards.

The only issue I see holding this game back is the save point system. I was turned off by many games released in the last few years where saving the game was difficult or required extra measure from my side. In Star Ocean, you have to find a glowing save point in order to record your progress and quit the game (like FF8!). It’s a pain finding save points as they are rare to come by while exploring in the game.

I am pretty sure I will be picking up more JRPG games after playing this one. I might have not enjoyed it to the maximum, or understood all the weird stuff going around but you can easily tell when you have a good game on your hands. The length of the game is a welcome change and the story does not get boring due to the amount of drama, no matter how cheesy it can get. At the end of the day, people that played this game last year on the 360 have nothing to look forward to in the PS3 version. Everyone else though should probably give this game a shot and see how a bunch of teen boy band look-a-likes end up saving the human civilization.

About Rabie Hassoun

Rabie Hassoun prefers the 360 over the PS3 but still loves all 2 of his systems and that 3rd white motion filled dust collector as well. He prefers Sports games with NBA 2K, Football Manager and FIFA being 3 of his favorite games of all time. You can find him over XBL and PSN @ Rabie1.