Official Story
Set between the second and third games in the STAR OCEAN series, the Pangalactic Federation is nearing the fulfilment of its mission: Peace and order throughout the galaxy. However, the embers of conflict begin to stir once more on the planet of Faykreed, 6,000 light years from Earth, as a new story begins in the ocean of stars. Follow the adventures of Fidel Camuze, his childhood friend Miki Sauvester, and a mysterious young girl named Relia who holds the key to the story, as they get drawn into a battle that may change the fate of the planet.
Let’s get this out of the way right from the get-go, I do not hate Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness like other reviewers do. I have found the series to be an expectedly slower experience than the Final Fantasy series, focusing a lot on story and content, rather than glitz and glamor. Star Ocean has some history that pulls from the classic days of good RPGs without the tainted 3D nuttiness that seemed to grab the 90s and run. In short, it has a lot of history to build from in the Enix days.
The newest Star Ocean, Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness, does its best to hold onto those golden days and bring in a new flavor of awesomeness that games bring with this generation. While the faults of the game certainly outweigh its positive aspects, it still does a good job of immersing gamers into a specific journey with compelling characters. That keeps the charm of the series intact and allows for ‘some’ leeway when it comes to somewhat defective gameplay decisions.
With that said, let’s get on with breaking the gameplay down a bit.
One of the more positive elements of Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness’ gameplay designs is how it incorporates a massive multiplayer online gaming scheme into a single-player design. You get to set and control all your party characters, assigning them certain duties and tasks during fights in the game. For example, if you ask Miki to fall back and heal people while the rest of the party fights, then you can count on Miki doing just that during battle. Having nearly complete control over the actions of your party members is a huge plus in my opinion. It brings a unique single-player experience to what typically is a single character control scheme. Despite what others have said, the A.I. in this situation proves that it has depth to it. While it’s short a macro-scheme set on a USB keyboard, it does enough to make it different from the usual RPG gaming you generally are delivered nowadays.
Related to this is the simple menu system that developer tri-Ace put together with the gamer in mind. From selecting armor and weapons to an easily given explanation of items and what a character should or shouldn’t upgrade to, there’s a lot to love about the menu system. I know, I know…this should be a no-brainer for games of this type, and not a specifically praised gameplay design, but honestly not all RPGs are good at this sort of design. I have found myself confused with RPG menu designs of recent, especially in the more recent Final Fantasy series titles (online games included). I’m not saying I’m a genius, but some of the designs have been incredibly over-complicated for style, rather than practicality. The Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness menu system does a good job of keeping it simple and doing things with ease. Want to use an item? Boom, no issues, there is a quick menu system that allows it. Want to see if the sword you’re using is weaker than the one you’re picking at the market? Check out the up arrow (upgrade), the down arrow (not as good) or the equal sign (equal) for quick details. No compare button needed. The system is intuitive and nice, which is appreciated.
Anyway, the action RPG element of the game works well too. The control scheme is easy to use, almost button-mashing in a sense. To preform special combination moves requires using magic points (which can be replenished using blackberries or other means). Once you run out of MP, you’re stuck with regular attacks and other ways of doing damage. While I will say that the regular attacks are somewhat uninspiring, it’s easy to pull off the special attacks and upgrade weapons. Regardless, the first 7-10 hours of the game are filled with easy-to-use controls that don’t get in the way of the gameplay. I will take that experience over the opposite any day of the week.
Staying with controls, I didn’t care much for the camera. It was a sensitive portion of the control scheme that needed to be a bit smoother on its movement. It tended to have a mind of its own when left to its own devices and also wanted to shake a bit when characters progressed through rocky terrain. It was sensitive on thumbstick touch, sometimes moving in a jerking motion when moved around. It was a shaky cam in a sense, without intending on it. It got in the way quite a bit and was a visually uncomfortable distraction when trying to move from point A to point B.
Now, before we completely dive into the negative items of the gameplay, let me add a few other positive notes.
The environments are enormous and gorgeous in Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness. Tri-Ace did a superb job with building this world up and providing some intricate details that most RPG developers tend to leave out. For example, you’ll notice right from the start how much visual love the devs gave the game. The village where our hero comes out of and the story begins is set on the coast in a port town. The windmills catching the ocean breeze, the rolling waves are gorgeously pushing up to the coast and the village that really does a great job of providing some true foreground to background depth provides some much needed added value to the overall package. There are some great textures, though rendering is obvious here and there, fantastic shading and shadows, as well as vibrant colors broken out everywhere. It’s a pretty game that shows the labor of love put into the final product, at least in terms of visual presentation. Included in that presentation is a beautiful orchestrated soundtrack and some solid voice work that breaks out some good story. It’s a full package for the eyes and ears.
Having said all this, there are some real issues that hurt the overall gameplay experience, nearly crippling it at some points. The first and most glaring issue is the difficulty.
The gameplay difficulty is inconsistent at best. The first seven hours or so of gameplay will lead you to believe that you’re steadily going up on a smooth arc of difficulty that is typical for a standard RPG. The game shifts when you start into the crux of the adventure and you are sent into an impossible scenario that will trap and frustrate your gaming abilities. For example, as I left the main city at the beginning of the story, having disposed of a terrorist that was plaguing my seaport village, I found myself in a time warp (of sorts) that trapped me inside of a church/temple filled with multiple groups of enemies. Every time I disposed of a group, I would warp to another section of the same level, kind of like in usual RPG dungeon style, until I found myself face-to-face with a boss. That boss was an impossible task that my group had not prepared for and it quickly disposed of my party. The game goes from two to eleven in a heartbeat without properly preparing the player for any of the final battle. As I was laying into the boss, with everything I could muster, I found little damage was being done, while he/she was doing incredible damage. It took about 30 seconds for my entire party to die. To avoid such a situation, you would literally have to hang outside of the dungeon leveling up your character for at least 5-7 more hours before ever standing a chance against the boss. It was infuriating for a lot of reasons, none more important than unprepared leveling. In a standard RPG there is a small arc when it comes to going up against the first boss, but this arc shot straight up with no arc in sight. This is a Superman leap from ground to the Empire State building. It’s huge and there is no way anyone playing this game could prepare or expect such a big jump.
Related to this problem is the inconsistent save points. You get a single save point in most lands you visit. In most kingdoms you visit there is a single save point. You will visit some places that don’t have save points, which are valuable when you run into the previous paragraph’s situation. Also, this was the case with the above situation, as there was not a save point at the beginning of the church/temple, nor could I find a save point in the kingdom before I went into the temple (I assumed there would be one in the temple). Why the ‘save’ couldn’t be included in the menu system is beyond me, as that is standard practice these days with games (see Skyrim for details). When you don’t save properly, you’re going to regret it. When you’re not completely guaranteed a save point, you’re going to hate the gameplay and it will be a quest to find the save point before taking chances, which could lead to a lot of wasted hours by the end of the game. This game is huge, there’s a lot of land to visit and a lot of unseen enemies to go up against, so having NOT to worry about a save point is a must. Sadly, that notion takes over a lot of enjoyment that the game could have provided.
While the above paragraphs might seem like minor complaints, please let me assure you that they’re not minor. They’re huge problems in the game that create a lot of unnecessary worry and a lot of gameplay imbalance that shed all of the positiveness the game brings to the table. Ultimately, the game just feels incredibly incomplete because of the above problems. Those two main issues are roadblocks to potential epic enjoyment for this game. When you have such unpredictable consistency in difficulty, you have a hard time preparing your character for the battle/combat moments. Additionally, when you can’t save on your own schedule and on your own time, this just furthers the lack of enjoyment for the title.
With all of this said, there is some redeeming challenge to the game that could make it fun for those sick bastards who love a title like Dark Souls. Much like that game, which is intended to push you to the limits purposely, there are some creative creatures that could garnish enough interest for gamers to keep going. There are some interesting locations and lands that crop up that might make the hardcore gamers out there want to scurry through this difficult and unpredictable adventure. There are some people this game will speak to, but for fans of the series you might be somewhat disappointed as I was when the wheels started to really churn on this title. I will leave you to decide whether you want to financial commit to the game, but I will say there is small fun to be had out of the title, which is sadly overshadowed by frustrating moments.
On that note, I will stop there.
