2007’s Star Ocean: First Departure for the PlayStation Portable is a well-done remake of a SNES classic, but the bones of a SNES JRPG are still there, with all the associated good and bad. If you can adapt to the eccentricities that come with that era of gaming, you’ll have a fantastic time with this remake. If you’ve grown out of random encounters, fetch quests, and backtracking, you might be better off leaving this one on the shelf.

Star Ocean is a franchise I have wanted to get into forever, and I finally made that happen by picking up the PSP remake of the very first game. This 2007 release was the first time the English-speaking audience had a chance to play an official translation of the first game in the series, as the SNES title never made it out of Japan. This remake uses the engine from Star Ocean: Second Evolution to retell the origin point of the fantasy-sci fi series.

There is a lot to like here. I love Star Ocean’s action combat, it feels fast, frenetic, and fun. The absolute breadth of character customization is also a sight to behold, I’ve never experienced anything like it outside of more stat-heavy Western CRPGs. The worldbuilding is fantastic and has me eager to experience the rest of the series, which is about as high praise as I can give. This is aided by a genuinely likeable cast of characters who have interesting reactions to said worldbuilding. First Departure has a strong foundation.

Unfortunately, it is also very flawed. While combat is fun, it is also extremely easy. That low difficulty made the incredible breadth of the customization feel somewhat pointless, which was deflating. The worldbuilding is great, but the story being told in that world was extremely dull, and this fun cast of characters is woefully underutilized. This is in addition to a number of things that may or may not be issues for you based on your tolerance for SNES-era JRPG design.

Altogether we have a game that has a lot bogging it down, but ultimately still ends up on the better side. Star Ocean: First Departure is very flawed, but it is also very fun. If you have any sort of tolerance for SNES JRPG tomfoolery, I certainly recommend it.

NOTE! This review is based on the original 2007 PSP release of the title, but a remastered version was released under the title of Star Ocean: First Departure R. This comes with a number of quality of life improvements over the original, some of which directly address complaints I have in this review. If you are to experience this title, it is almost certainly worth picking up the remaster over the original. It was reviewed by our very own Josh Martinez here, who ultimately found it to be flawed yet enjoyable, matching my own experience with the original.

Presentation

Visuals

Star Ocean: First Departure has moments of beauty to be sure, but I found it to mostly be a rather bland experience, visually. I’ll be honest and admit that I’ve always been somewhat averse to the “2D sprites in a 3D world” aesthetic until it was revolutionized with Octopath Traveler, and my distaste applies here as well. The sprite work in First Departure is nice, the characters are expressive and the animations are pleasant. However seeing these pretty sprites wander through a tremendously bland, textureless overworld, is not a contrast I’m particularly fond of. I can think of a number of earlier PSP game overworlds that look significantly nicer.

It isn’t all bad though. The spell effects look great, and above else, I really enjoyed the cities. To some degree, I was a bit taken aback by just how much I loved them. Cities in most JRPGs feel like something of an afterthought, but these really felt like destinations. Each city had a strong, unique design and architectural style. Even cities within the same kingdom felt tremendously distinct, while having enough cohesion to feel like the same culture. They were a joy to explore, and one aspect where the visuals absolutely excelled.

Unfortunately, everything outside the cities were just a bit too bland even on the tiny PSP screen, and I can imagine blowing the overworld up to 1080p in the remaster may exacerbate the issue more. Star Ocean: First Departure is not an ugly game, but it is far from being one of the handheld’s best looking outputs.

Audio

The audio experience fares a lot better, the music for Star Ocean: First Departure is fantastic. Motoi Sakuraba absolutely knocked it out of the park here. It is probably harder to pick individual songs that aren’t catchy as hell. Star Ocean is a mixture of sci-fi and fantasy, and the soundtrack perfectly exemplifies that with traces of each setting in all of the music. The fantasy songs sometimes have synths that sound pleasantly anachronistic, and the sci-fi tracks often have wind instruments that remind you of our protagonist’s fantasy roots. Adding to their visual pleasure, the city instrumentals are often real earworms that I found myself humming between play sessions. I have nothing but positive things to say about the soundtrack.

The voice acting is a bit spottier, but I certainly don’t think it is unbearable. To some degree I appreciate that characters like Millie have line reads that feel uncharacteristically non-anime, though I definitely think just about everybody could have spent a bit more time in the booth, giving a few more line reads. The tertiary nameless NPCs have some truly atrocious voice acting, though I found it more amusing than anything.

Overall I consider the passable voice acting and the fantastic soundtrack to even out to a very satisfying overall audio experience, even via the PSP’s sometimes strained speakers.

Story

The Star Ocean franchise is a mixture of sci-fi and fantasy, and that is very much the case here.

Our two heroes, Roddick and Millie, find their sleepy medieval fantasy village caught up in an interplanetary war between ta number of intergalactic factions, as a virus is unleashed upon their planet of Roake, that turns people to stone. Two spacefaring adventurers from Earth, Ronyx and Ilia, venture to Roddick’s village. They take Roddick and Millie away from their primitive backwater town, and onto a spaceship, where their lives are irrevocably changed. The four of them search for a cure to the virus. The key is to travel back 300 years into Roake’s past to slay a demon, the blood of which can create a cure. Ronyx and Ilia must set aside their blasters and laser swords for steel and platemail, as they travel to the past with Roddick and Millie to slay Asmodeus, the Demon King.

Worldbuilding

Star Ocean: First Departure’s worldbuilding (or… universe-building?) is excellent. As a newcomer to the franchise, it immediately hooked me, and left me eager to play future games, and learn more about this setting.

Most of the game is spent on the planet Roak, which is standard fantasy fare. You have four kingdoms, each based out of a different environmental biome, and they are being threatened by a demon. In order to stop them, one must collect a number of macguffins from across the land, take them to a temple, and receive enlightenment. I just described the setup of a hundred JRPGs, but what makes First Departure interesting isn’t Roake, but rather everything around it.

Most of the game is on Roake, but we don’t start there. Rather, we start way, way above Roake, in space. There is an entire intergalactic society the Roakians are entirely ignorant to, being considered an “underdeveloped planet” that spacefaring societies are mandated to leave be. Roake’s generic fantasy nature is almost the point. It is deliberately vanilla fantasy to make its place in an interplanetary setting more interesting. There is compelling tension in how these advanced space empires tiptoe around saving Roake from a virus while retaining a small footprint, and it is very interesting to watch unfold.

For me, the biggest weakness in the worldbuilding is the lack of sci-fi. There is a lot of compelling interplanetary plot development, but it bookends the story, and in reality First Departure is about 85% fantasy, 15% space. The sci-fi elements are really cool, but I wish they weren’t merely relegated to the sidelines. I understand “space man in a fantasty land” is basically the idea here, but when you strip everything technological away from said space man, it starts to just feel like a fantasy land.

Nevertheless I thought the world building was overall fantastic, and I can’t wait to further explore the series.

Characters

Also a highlight were the characters. I want to be clear, we are not dealing with deep introspection or significant character growth, we’re not talking about a Final Fantasy 6 here. What I mean is that First Departure does a wonderful job of introducing a cast of characters that are just very likeable.

Roddick and Millie in particular are a bit generic. “Brave fantasy swordsman and his childhood best friend healer” is certainly well-trodden territory. However, much like the fantasy world of Roake, their genericity serves to successfully contrast them with Ronyx and Ilia, who feel right out of a much more mature RPG. It creates this delightful tonal clash, with Roddick and Millie frequently showcasing that boundless “power of friendship” style optimism we’ve come to expect from JRPG leads, contrasted with the grizzled and serious nature of Ronyx and Ilia, who at times are willing to make tough decisions very unlike typical JRPG characters. It makes for a compelling dynamic.

The other characters you can recruit along the way are mostly well-written as well, but suffer from being optional. This means that when you finish with their story arc, they are mostly relegated to the narrative sidelines, occasionally giving peanut gallery comments that never provoke meaningful responses from Roddick and Ilia. The amount of attention donated to each character also varies wildly, as the Astral warrior Cyuss is given a hearty amount of attention, compared to the lycanthropic martial artist T’nique Arcana, who is given almost nothing aside from his personal events. I do hope that future games in the series do a better job working the optional characters into the story a bit more.

All the same though, the characters are very fun. Even if a bit generic, Roddick and Millie are a delight to spend time with, and their contrast with the worldly and serious Ronyx and Ilia is very interesting. While the side characters could use more attention, I really did enjoy the characters in First Departure.

Plot

The biggest weakness when considering First Departure’s story, is the plot itself. The game has fantastic worldbuilding, and a great roster of characters, but the plot presented to have those great characters interact with the interesting worldbuilding, is excessively dull.

The intergalactic bookends are interesting, but the bulk of the story is spent on a generic fantasy quest. While I’ve highlighted this genericity as an intentional choice to highlight the sci-fi/fantasy contrast, it unfortunately results in a story that is tremendously boring. Mind you, this is a remake of a SNES game, so to some degree this is to be expected. But not matter which way you slice it, “collect four seals from the four kingdoms, to get a special item needed to defeat the demon king” is about as trite as a JRPG story comes. The Demon King Asmodeus suffers from classic JRPG “lives in the final boss room” syndrome so I felt absolutely no positive or negative feelings towards him when I finally reached him. “Going through the motions” feels like a good phrase to use here. The end of the game takes a strong sci-fi left turn (which I will not spoil), though the ultimate climax suffers from similar issues.

There are the occasional twists and turns, and one moment that genuinely added some weight to the narrative, but they are so far and few between that it is often hard to remember why exactly you are fighting Asmodeus.

The universe established by Star Ocean: First Departure is fascinating, and is a thrilling introduction to the Star Ocean series. It is one I am excited to learn more about, and every scene that built upon the galactic political scene was enthralling. The characters are similarly enjoyable, and although the optional party members could use much better integration, it was a cast I was pleased to spend time with. It is just unfortunate that the plot serves as such poor connective tissue, being dull to the point of fading in the background. This world and these characters deserve better. Nevertheless, the strength of the worldbuilding and the likability of the characters is enough to carry through to the credits.

Gameplay

Really, the core of what makes Star Ocean: First Departure a recommendation, is how it feels to play. The world’s biggest caveat here: This is a SNES JRPG through-and-through. You’ll be backtracking, fetch-questing, and dealing with excessive random encounters. But, if you don’t mind that stuff (or can push past it), you are rewarded with a gameplay system that is shockingly deep, and combat that is very engaging. It is a shame that everything between those battles is a bit of a drag, but when you are in combat, you’ll have a good time.

Exploration

Roddick’s journey sees him questing to collect a royal crest from each kingdom, and unfortunately, exploring Roake to get those four emblems can be a bit of a drag.

Roake is a big place, and there is a lot of room between each town. With not much to do between destinations and an excessively high random encounter rate, travel from town to town can start to feel a little bit torturous. What makes matters worse is the amount of backtracking you have to do. There is a particular town that serves as the central hub of the story, and you will be making frequent trips to it, made agonizing by the fact it is one of the few cities without a port and thus must be reached manually, every single time. I have heard many players dropped First Departure during the backtrack-heavy midgame, and I was not surprised to hear it. There was a point where the game had the gall to ask me to walk all the way back to the starting area for a 2-minute cutscene, and I came close to dropping the game myself. There is an alternate travel option that speeds up progress, but it is locked behind the end of an optional character’s storyline for whatever baffling reason, and it was a character I did not bring. Some questionable decision-making, there.

Thankfully exploring the towns is a lot more enjoyable. Not simply because of how well-designed and interesting they are as I mentioned before, but also because towns are where Star Ocean’s social systems take place, called “Private Actions.” When entering a town, Roddick can enter “private action” mode to explore the location by himself, and find the other party members occupying themselves on leave. This may trigger special cutscenes between Roddick and the party members, in which something humorous, interesting, or character-relevant may happen. Most events increase Roddick’s relationship with the cast, and can sometimes involve input from the player with the potential of more affection. These private actions can also lead to developing storylines and mini-quests, and it also influences the ending.

I think that private actions are First Departure at its best and worst. I love the events themselves, they are so charming and fun. It is an absolute joy to reach a new city and know you have a whole new slate of fun character-building cutscenes. They are well-written, and in particular give the optional characters a chance to be mildly relevant. On the other hand, some of the private actions can be utterly obtuse to unlock. Some require backtracking to previous towns that you would never have reason otherwise to return to, and the conditions to experience the multi-event storylines can be wildly frustrating to meet. Made worst is that entire game mechanics, like the alternate travel method, are locked behind this obtuse system. I am generally not a type of player to use a guide, but I HIGHLY recommend using a private action guide for your playthrough of First Departure.

All in all, exploration is a bit of a sore spot for First Departure. The world map is bland, boring, and the random encounter rate ensures travel is slow. Add to that a penchant for backtracking, and working your way through the story can be a drag. This is made slightly better by the extremely enjoyable private action system, though it is unfortunately too obtuse to fully enjoy. Exploration is definitely something of a missed opportunity here.

Combat

If you are familiar with the combat in the Tales of games, you will be right at home here. Combat takes place on an isometric plane in which you can freely move around, as you control one character amongst a party of 4, with the ability to freely swap at will. Each character has a basic melee combo, and two spots for special attacks (“arts” for melee users and spells for casters) to be mapped. When an enemy attacks a character who isn’t moving, there is a percentage chance they block the attack. Whail on enemies with basic attacks, and use special attacks for big damage. That is about it, combat is extremely simple.

Not to say simple is bad, however. As with the Tales of series, I find this style of combat to be a delight. It feels nice to be so mobile, and able to freely move around the battlefield. While a more reliable block would be a great addition, the lack of one makes positional awareness a lot more important. Especially as a melee character, considering battlefield position adds a whole new dimension to picking which arts to use, many of which can be used as makeshift dodges, or to close large gaps. It feels fast and fun, and it went a long ways towards making the incessant random encounters a bit more easy to parse.

It is a great system, and while I look forward to seeing how it is built upon in later titles, I think it is pretty fantastic as-is.

Customization

The absolute pride and joy of the Star Ocean series though, and in spectacular form in the first entry, is the character progression system. For somebody experiencing the series for the first time through First Departure, even if the skill system is not as good as it is in later games, it is nevertheless miles ahead of anything else I have ever played. The power Star Ocean gives you over your character is mind-boggling.

As you defeat monsters and gain XP, your characters will level up as per a standard RPG, gaining token improvements to their stats. However the real juice is in the Skill Points (SP) earned alongside them, which can be spent in the Skill Menu, to teach your character new skills. While on paper this is not novel, the uniqueness comes from the sheer number of skills there are for your character to learn.

There are 9 “Knowledge” skills, such as Minerology, Item Knowledge, or even Music Knowledge. 11 skills make up the “Sense” category, including Poker Face, Aesthetic Design, and Determination. There are 12 “Technical” skills, such as Penmanship, Animal Training, and Machinery. That is a massive array of skills over which you can allocate your SP.

Taking ranks in certain skills can combine to unlock a new gameplay feature. For example ranks in Knife, Recipe, and Keen Eye allows the player to cook ingredients into meals that can heal and buff the party. Ranks in Performance and Music Knowledge will allow you to write and perform songs, which will activate passive buffs for the duration of the song. Item Knowledge, Mineralogy, and Herbology allows you to appraise unknown items, and so on. Through skills you can craft and upgrade new weapons and armour, duplicate items, and countless other abilities.

The skill system is truly comprehensive, and it can allow you to absolutely shred the game apart. First Departure has almost no interest in limiting the player, and a savvy skill user can access powerful equipment way ahead of time, quadruple their XP game, create an infinite amount of currency, and so much more. If you can imagine a way to break Star Ocean’s systems, there is probably a way to do it via leveling the correct skills. All this, in addition to a suite of skills meant to increase your combat prowess, books that can unlock special arts to level, and skills that directly increase your stats. The amount of customization is staggering, and it is an unequivocal highlight of Star Ocean: First Departure.

The Biggest Drawback

The biggest issue with First Departure’s gameplay is the lack of difficulty. It is just too easy. It is so easy, that it undercuts the areas of the gameplay that I enjoy, and diminishes the experience by quite a bit. The game was badly in need of a difficulty selection.

The problem is that you simply get too powerful too quickly, even without breaking the game through skills. I did not go out of my way to grind at any point in my time with First Departure, I didn’t abuse skills to get powerful equipment, and I still absolutely cruised through the game all the way to the end. I don’t think I even died until the final boss.

Each character has a skill that can be spammed to make short work of enemies, Roddick’s “Dragon Roar” ability is so powerful that I stunlocked an endgame boss to death before they had a chance to make an attack. It is to the degree that you have to avoid using certain arts if you want any sort of difficulty.

The exception here is an endgame dungeon which offers a meaty challenge, but it is disappointing to have to wait until the end of your time with the game to experience any sort of difficulty.

The relative ease massively undercuts the two aspects of the game I am very fond of. Combat is a lot of fun, and it would be a lot more fun if I had to actually use my brain a little more often. After you get to a certain level of strength, it becomes a completely mindless autopilot affair. Likewise the easiness makes the skill system feel somewhat weak. It is fun to break the game and make a godlike character, but it doesn’t feel very rewarding, because even a perfectly mortal character is already capable of mollywhopping the majority of the game. It really takes the gusto out of the two best parts of the game.

Nevertheless, even though the lack of challenge takes a lot of the bite out of the experience, Star Ocean’s gameplay is still a good time. Wandering the overworld is boring and tedious, but the combat is enjoyable and the skill system is phenomenal. I just wish it felt more rewarding to engage with.

Final Score

Star Ocean: First Departure is a good game, but it isn’t a great one. The framework for a masterpiece is here, and I look forward to seeing if any future games in the series take that step, but First Departure is assuredly not that. It is sometimes visually unpleasant, exploration is tedious, the plot is boring, and it is easy to the point of trivializing the experience. There is a gulf of room for improvement.

However I cannot give it anything lower than 3.5/5 because the areas that First Departure get right, do ultimately overcome the flaws. The visuals are ugly in the overworld, but in the cities they are beautiful. Exploration is hugely tedious and the quests can be obtuse, but exploring the new locations and enjoying private actions with your party members is worth the tedium. The plot is boring but the characters and worldbuilding are excellent. The game is too easy, but combat is a lot of fun and the skill system is a work of art. For every negative, there is a positive. And ultimately, the positives do outweigh the negatives, even if they are substantial.

I do wonder how the SNES original is to play, but considering the number of problems I have with this remake, perhaps I am best not finding out. I may not be in a rush to replay Star Ocean: First Departure, but it is a good enough game to get me interested in the series, and to some degree, that is the role it is meant to serve.

Featured Image Credit: tri-Ace

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