Star Ocean: The Second Story R — Conquering the Galaxy
More than infinite, boundless space
Star Ocean hasn’t experienced a ton of success over its series’ history. Its previous output, 2022’s The Divine Force released to polarized reception, with criticism directed at the game’s inconsistent performance and visuals against a revamped combat system.
I’ve never played a Star Ocean game myself, so I’m in no position to critique it. What I can say is that the series sounds appealing to an outsider’s ears like mine. A space opera across different galaxies and timelines definitely scratches the sci-fi RPG itch I’ve had for a while. And that’s what I got with The Second Story R.
First revealed during the June 21, 2023 Nintendo Direct, the game immediately left an impression on me that this would be more than just a pretty RPG.
Space: The Final Frontier
Claude C. Kenny, a 19-year-old space cadet, receives his first mission to survey the planet Milocinia under the supervision of Admiral Ronyx J. Kenny, his father and esteemed hero of the Pangalactic Federation. Upon coming into contact with a strange device, Claude is transported across the galaxy. Awaking on the planet Expel, he finds Rena Langford, a young 17-year-old girl who possesses a mysterious healing power. Langford brings Claude to Arlia, where she and the town’s villagers mistaken Claude to be the Hero of Light due to his appearance and phase gun.
Convinced of Claude’s prominence as a legendary hero, Regis, Arlia’s Mayor, tells Claude of legends promising a hero during Expel’s time of need. Regis explains cataclysms occurring after meteor crashed in the Kingdom of Ell. Hordes of monsters began appearing, setting the world ablaze. Dubbed “The Sorcery Globe,” Claude and Rena set out to uncover the truth behind Expel’s devastation in hopes of bringing Claude home.
You’re given the choice of playing from either Claude or Rena’s perspective. Neither affects the story outside of certain events and available characters. You’ll only have Claude and Rena to work with until your fates intertwine with the fates of others. Celine Jules, Ashton Anchors, and Opera Vectra are only some of the potential party members that can join you, but whether you’ll recruit them is up to you. You’re limited to just eight members, and some are only recruited under specific circumstances. Don’t plan on recruiting everyone in one playthrough.
Personal Actions can influence the character’s outcomes following the game’s conclusion. These conversations range in circumstances, sometimes requiring input from the player. Your responses in these events affect your friendship and romance affinities. The game’s 99 endings hinge on how close the characters are to each other. While that seems overwhelming, some endings pair characters together if they like each other enough.
One thing I did like was the inclusion of portraits from the original game as well as Second Evolution, as each character received new character stills and updated designs. It’s cool to see how simple their original designs were.
Combat
Enemies are encountered on the world map, distinguished by the color of their shadow. Green shadows indicate lower-level enemies, and red shadows are stronger. There’s hundreds of different enemies you can encounter, all which are fought on a separate battleground using action-based combat. You can take direct initiative of your party, telling your party either to attack with everything, or fight lightly. Swap between any of your party members on the fly and use physical attacks and spells to turn the tides in your favor.
There’s going to be a lot happening on screen, and it gets even more intense the further you go into the game. Characters who primarily use spells, while not necessarily relegated to just support, weren’t nearly as fun to play as over those who are primarily using physical attacks. I often preferred playing Claude over someone like Rena, who exceeds more at using magic to provide buffs and dispel enemies.
Enemies display shields over their health bar, and as you attack, the shields deplete until they’re completely broken. Breaking an enemy stuns them temporarily, and guarantees that your hits will land. Breaking enemies also drops spheres used in the Bonus Gauge, granting buffs to your party depending on the specific formation you’re using, as well as how many spheres you’ve accumulated.
While you’re limited to four characters in-battle, eight characters can partake in battle. You can set your remaining party members to be used as Assault Actions, summoning them in battle for a single attack before being put on a timer. You can even earn jewels throughout the game that utilizes past Star Ocean characters.
Many early game skirmishes tend be relegated to constant button-mashing, but late-game battles will force you to strategize.
Growth
Star Ocean employs an impressive amount of customization when it comes to building your characters. You gain Fol (the game’s currency), skill points (SP), and battle points (BP) for each victory in battle. While you’ll also gain experience for your characters to grow, SP and BP play a larger role in determining the strength of your party.
Using SP, you can maximize different abilities that’ll affect both your combat prowess as well as specialties such as cooking, writing, and crafting. These specialties help in creating weapons and medicine, but can also lead to better abilities for pickpocketing NPCs and changing enemy spawn rates.
Both types of skills max out at level 10. You can also use BP to increase your special moves, although BP seems a bit harder to come by. You can earn SP and BP by completing Guild missions, requiring you to use different specialities.
I’ll admit I didn’t use many of the specialties, especially cooking. You can’t consume your meals mid-battle, something I didn’t realize halfway through my play-through. I forgot I had most of my meals. You can probably beat the game without getting too involved with the specialty skills, but you’ll miss a lot of extra content as a result. Utilizing the specialty skills and effects can break the game wide open by producing valuable and powerful items.
Visual Overhaul
The Second Story R is one of the few times where I’ll admit that graphics made an impression on me. Its initial announcement trailer immediately caught my attention with its stunning 2.5D graphical style. The 2D pixel-based characters mix well with the game’s 3D environment, though some mid-game cutscenes look jarring with the two present at the same time.
I don’t think it’s a stretch to say this is one of the best looking RPGs on the market, let alone ever made. Utilizing updated sprite designs for the world’s enemies and characters, the game doesn’t detract too far away from its original design. The game’s soundtrack is revamped by the game’s original composer, Motoi Sakuraba. While well made, I don’t find it as lively as other RPG soundtracks. Many tracks are reused in the game’s towns and cities, so it’s not overly unique. With that said, the game’s battle theme is fantastic.
English voice acting from Second Evolution is reused, with the Japanese voice acting being re-dubbed. While not a big deal, I’m not a fan of the english voices for a majority of the game. It’s flat with very little emotion expressed until the game’s most decisive moments.
The Second Story R runs steadily at 30 FPS on the Switch. I rarely had any performance drops or glitches occur during my time with the game, although when they were prevalent, were usually in-battle due to the amount of particle effects on screen. The game runs stable enough to recommend it on the Switch, though you’ll miss out on the higher frame rate you get from other platforms.
The Verdict
Star Ocean: The Second Story R is a fantastic remake of what most people consider the best game in its series. It’s not perfect — the English voice acting isn’t too great, and the combat can feel a bit repetitive at times. I haven’t experienced the game through Rena’s perspective, but I found Claude’s satisfying enough to warrant another playthrough when the time is right.
This does not feel like a game that released on the original PlayStation. It holds up extremely well against today’s complex RPGs. While it’s far from my favorite RPG this year, I feel confident in recommending this to those who haven’t dove into Star Ocean yet.
Available on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5 and Windows via Steam.
Total Playtime: 36 hours
Endings: 6/99
