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Mixed or average reviews - based on 45 Critics What's this?

User Score

Mixed or average reviews- based on 85 Ratings

  • Summary: The year is A.D. 2087. In the aftermath of World War III, Earth has been ravaged and the population decimated by a deteriorating environment. The countries that survived have joined together to form the Greater Unified Nations and turned their eyes skyward - to space. Edge Maverick and his childhood friend Reimi Saionji are chosen as pioneer members of the Space Reconnaissance Force, which was created to seek out new worlds beyond the stars. Their ship, the Calnus, takes its place on the lunar launch pad along with four other starships of the first reconnaissance fleet. These ships - humanity’s last hope - blast off one-by-one and sail into the awaiting wormhole that leads to the vast star ocean. And so, Edge and his crew begin their voyage in search of a new haven for humanity...and a second chance. [Square Enix] Expand
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 29 out of 45
  2. Negative: 1 out of 45
  1. Last Hope International is the definitive Star Ocean 4 experience, and as far as I'm concerned, the best next-gen RPG money can buy.
  2. 85
    Even though the game suffers from some visual issues, and save point infrequency can be a huge annoyance, I loved playing Last Hope.
  3. Scifi epic á la Japan is a relic from the 90's. Although the team's love for their game can be seen from all around, it isn't enough anymore. Bioware is breaking boundaries with their games, so when Star Ocean is compared to Mass Effect, the oriental star trek is unfortunately outdated. [Mar 2010]
  4. 40
    It's a shame that the (supposedly) final entry into the Star Ocean series is marred by so many cosmetic and localization problems, because the game does sport a great easy-to-use item creation system and a fast-paced rough-and-tumble combat system.

See all 45 Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 11 out of 13
  2. Negative: 1 out of 13
  1. EstebanP
    9
    I'm really enjoying this game. About 30 hours in. I liked Star Ocean Till The End of Time on the PS2 and so it's not really a suprise that I like this. This is an improvement on that title. I was nearly convinced by the average reviews not to buy this game, I'm pleased that I did. If you liked Star Ocean on the PS2 you will adore this version. P.S. The voices are not that bad. Expand
  2. 8
    A solid JRPG. Fun and dynamic combat, good level design and a great soundtrack are what make this game great. Story isn't all that interesting, characters are as generic as they can be, but the graphics are great. Some animations are somewhat strange, but in battle they look flashy and good.

    Pick this up if you want to sink quite some time into a good JRPG.
    Expand
  3. 5
    In the star ocean series one thing always got me until I was able to see the ending credits, and unfortunately that's not the story. The general plot-line in the star ocean is the space and the travels to various planets and even though this concept is very old and overused the interest of space travelling it's always a nice feature in games when it's used properly (look at Mass Effect to see what I mean). And I just wonder: why did they not develop this concept properly for this game? The story itself starts actually very good and you'll be actually interested in how this will end...but you'll just end up being very disappointed and frustrated after few hours. How can I even start? First of all the story doesn't have a natural flow: you are supposed to explore other planets, which are somehow VERY similar to each others, but soon enough the game puts you through many kinds of boring and sometimes useless fillers that anyone would couldn't stand, making you lose the interest of the story, without mentioning that if you count the story without the fillers this game would be a lot shorter. And also, if this game is called Star ocean, why do we have so much "fantasy-like" features like magic ? Although explained the magic in Star Ocean doesn't fit properly (and again, look at the "magic" of Mass Effect to see what I mean) The story gets worse "thanks" (sadly) to the characters that, in my opinion, are the WORST characters ever created for an RPG EVER: all of them are basically flat characters with very clichè behaviours (the brave-but-stubborn character, the silent-but-cool warrior, the caring female that sticks only with the main character, and so on) and even though sometimes clichès can be interesting if they are done right these ones are so bad that they look more like "parodies" of bad characters...and I beg you to believe me I'm not joking when I say that I didn't care a single bit for them when something bad happened to them because I HOPED that to happen all the time! At least there's one thing that saves this game: the battle system. As usual, the battle system of this series is made action based and it's very engaging and very fun to play, with upgradeable skills, the possibility to chain spells/moves and the possibility to chain the skills of 2 characters by using the rush gauge. Although fun, it's not flawless (It's kinda tricky to trigger the combo properly and not worth it, not all skills are useful and you can basicly use a mage to spam your magic for winning the match) but it's surely the best and only good part of this game. There are also other things like the crafting system and the quests system but both are useless and boring (you'll find better equipment from shops and the quests aren't very exciting). I'll give this game a 5 ONLY because of the battle system so if you don't mind a bad story but at least a good action-based rpg then this is for you...or else beware! Expand
  4. The game is plagued with plot holes, the characters are mostly unlikeable with a couple being particularly bad. The script is awful to the point of being painful to go through at times. Vast swathes of the story are essentially pointless and do nothing to further the main story, which is a real waste, it could have been more enjoyable if they put more effort into the overall story instead of derailing it into a series of dull fetch quests.

    Gameplay starts off pretty good with some new features like blindsiding but as you proceed and unlock more special moves it devolves into spamming the stronger moves, with MP death removed and MP recovery methods aplenty there's little to stop you, especially when you get the endgame attacks that have huge areas of effect.

    The game boasts over 200 quests but sadly most of these are just bring me 20 of x monster drop type deals with only a handful offering anything interesting to do.
    Expand

See all 13 User Reviews