This is my personal ranking on the 5 main titles in this forgotten series. Intro theme by The Legendary Zoltan: / @thelegendaryzoltan9628 Support my channel: / ericklandon Star Ocean 2 gameplay: CGRUndetow.
Second Story had EVERYTHING we loved: memorable characters with development, long but entrancing story, multiple endings, a super dungeon, a last boss that could have its difficulty boosted insanely, great music, great graphics, humor.
Man, Star Ocean 2 was life for me. Every game after 2 have been kinda a disappointment for me. I would really love to see this franchise come back to the high standard it set.
I believe I have a save file with over 300 hours on it for star ocean 2. I spent days grinding in the final secret dungeon and the battle area just to see what max level was.
@@SolMrBadGuy I would say other wise. I played star ocean the second story earlier in the year and the game is still amazing. I will say it was much shorter then I remembered it being.
Second Story is by far my favorite of the series as well. Aside from Dual Protagonists you have a HUGE cast of characters to choose from in order to create your ideal party and each of them has their own backstory and fleshed out character. One of my favorite couple endings involved Precis and Ashton. I've only beaten the game once but what a ride it was.
Still remember playing Star Ocean 2 and Valkyrie Profile on the same year. it's so surprising that, 20 years later, these games are still top of the list RPG quality games.
Your content is always top notch... Getting better and better each video.. I appreciate the Easter egg at the end and putting the games in chronological order for us. Star Ocean is a series that I own every title for, but have never jumped into the series yet..
The first Star Ocean game I've ever played was "Star Ocean Till End Of Time" its hands down one of the best jrpg games that I have ever played. I haven't touched that game in years and maybe it's the nostalgia, but I still love that game and hold in high regard. P.S. I used all caps in the title of the game because it deserves to have captions!
@@daemonisedone4256 Yeah I love SO3 but it's easy to see where it goes wrong in the plot. The game was great up until the point they shifted from Vendeeni to Executioners, had they just kept on the plot of the Vendeeni as the main baddies then threw in an end-game plot twist that the Aldian Empire was manipulating everything behind the scenes at the end, Federation liberates Vendeen, they join the Fed, roll credits. Room for more games and continual expansion.
@@daemonisedone4256 you could also kill enemies this way though it wasn't only a detriment to you. Fait could easily kill the solider outside aerygliph or w.e with fire sword by eating all their mana and power lvl. Then the porcupines near dragon with ice. System also made Maria at absolute tank synth mana on her along side the other op post game stuff give convert hp dmg to mp and she's neigh unkillable unless ur afk.
@@WiiSage try the reloading when making those exp bar's cheat hack that allowed you to duplicate exp and make tons of it to speed level a character or spend ages and do all your characters lol
@@WiiSage Its not really a hack it was left in game but they didn't realise players could re load up their save until they get duplicate exp bars through copy skill, part of the gameplay itself, i remember long time ago it took me hours upon hours to make enough to max one character's level out. That was enough to battle through enemies with ease to help the others level faster lol
I'll be the one and say Star Ocean til the End of time remains one of my favorite games of all time. It was very long and extensive and the battle trophies were no joke, but the story and development of characters really moved me.
it did me too until the end of the game, then it was the end of time for me, pun intended that storyline end I didn't like the direction it went but rest of game is great.
Or at least make "Till The End of Time" longer with exploration of Greeton and a journey to Roak after you defeat the final boss. If there is a sequel to "Till The End of Time", the game would be set in Roak or Expel where human colonists are starting a new life after the Creator and the Executioners destroyed their home world, Earth. That would be similar to the Eldarian survivors whom abandoned their advanced technology, colonize Lemuris, and start a new life after the Missing Procedure destroyed their home world, Eldar, in "The Last Hope". It would make the game sound similar to Phantasy Star II when the Parmanians were forced to leave their planet after the humans destroyed it, colonize other worlds in the Algol System like Motavia and Dezolis, or some of them colonized other star systems.
@@NotCharAznable Depends on how you perceive the ending, I imagine that each characters individual ending is probably canon. The Fayt-Sophia ending where they meet with Ryoko on Expel would be plausably canon as well, its their most likely eventual paths. I was thinking since the Eternal Sphere/3rd Dimension broke free from the influence of the 4th Dimensionals, it doesn't eliminate the possibility of dimensional interlopers. Im sure Luther wasn't the only one who would be concerned with the threat of being attacked anywhere at any given moment. The populace would quickly be swept by fear once word got out that major security figures, Sphere executives and the President/CEO of Sphere were critically injured and/or killed. It wouldnt be a stretch to imagine there would be some Eternal Sphere developers that shared the same outlook and made some type of device to reconnect the two dimensions and go after Fayt, Maria, and Sophia along with the other members of the party. Not to mention the possibility of going back to Elicoor II to explore Greeton or other locations, potential new planets would be cool too, a temporary treaty with the Vendeeni and a short trip to Vendeen might be pretty cool. Given their dictonary entry said they evolved from shark-type creatures, they probably have a hyper advanced Atlantean society. One thing that Star Ocean always excelled at was creating beautiful environments, that combined with the storytelling created a magic that still hasnt been beaten to this day in my opinion. Star Ocean 3 has plenty of potential for a sequel, if Star Ocean 2 got a sequel, I dont see why 3 couldnt as well.
Love this series. I only played 2nd story which is one of my favorite jrpg ever; and first departure which is kinda similar. What I really love about 2nd story is that there is "item creation" and also the fair was a really neat place to visit and have fun.
I missed like half the ending. A church group came knocking at my door so I talked to them for a bit then went back to see the ending was still playing. Wouldn't mind if star ocean 6 takes place some time after 3.
I am wondering how they would make a solid sequel to star ocean 3. Since in part 3 you defeat the big bad 4th dimensional ruler or boss, which was pretty much like the creator of the entire star ocean universe after all those years.
@@TheMixedPlateFrequency the plot twist is just the usual JRPG twists about killing the Gods/Creator but with the sci-fi flavor as opposed to fantasy and religion. Going forward just like any jrpg before it after defeating the creators/gods the people just regained their independence.
star ocean the second is one of my favorites , so many good memories , such a deep game with so many features most game could not handle, relationship , you action changing game scenes , you can make the ending you want , also gave me one character i will never forget , Ashton Anchors , god how i loved to play as him , so many good skills , scenes and all.
SO: Second Evolution was my first Star Ocean game, which in some ways ruined the rest of the games for me. LOL. I loved it so much that after I completed both sides of the game, I bought an official guide to find all of the tiny things that I hadn't found myself. That extra dungeon in the remake is wonderful as well.
Very cool list! I liked how you included the timeline. Nice touch! To be honest, I've only play 2nd Story but loved it a ton! I bought Til The End of Time but never had time. Been eyeballing the first one on the Nintendo Switch eShop though!
My top 5 1. Star Ocean 2nd Evolution 2. Star Ocean First Departure 3. Star Ocean Til the End of Time 4. Star Ocean the Last Hope 5. Star Ocean Integrity and Faithlessness
I never saw Second Story, I like those graphics and the background too, and your video is another video that states how good that game is, so now I am intrigued by it. Time to do some research, thank you.
Star Ocean is one of those series that deserves more attention. And I really hope they'll manage to find a way past the timeline of Till the End of Time (which is one of my TOP 5 games of all time) and stop making prequels only.
@@decusq seriously. That 4D bullshit was disrespectful to the events of SO1 and 2. It pretty much negated all of the significance, and it made it impossible for me to get back into any sequel. Can't suspend my disbelief enough after that game. Omit it. It's a terrible, terrible story.
@@decusq yeah i'd scrap it from the canon> i'd like see a direct sequel from SO2 and not like SO3 but basically something that's like 10 or so years after SO2 so that we still see most if not all of SO2's casts and maybe SO1's too.
Agree 100% with the order. Star Ocean 2 is not just the best SO game, but also one of my favorite JRPGs ever. Ashton & Opera are a couple of the most fun characters in battle of any game IMO.
Buck Roger yeah I’ve beaten it multiple times and used each in different playthroughs and love both. Never really used Bowman, though. Guess I need to revisit SO2!
@@brndn31107 you only got bowman if you played as Claude. Hopefully one day tri ace will be giving the chance to make another star ocean game on the level of the second story.
Awesome video man! I really love the Star Ocean series. There is something about this JRPG series that has a charm to it. I have not played SO1 nor SO2 due to the rarity of those games but I have played the rest. Here's my list 1. Star Ocean 4 2. Star Ocean 3 3. Star Ocean 5 I was torn between SO3 and SO4. Maria and Reimi are my two favorite female protagonists in those games and the combat in both games are good in their own respect. But there is something about S04's story that really stuck to me. I love the setting and the different planet exploration in SO4 as well. The plot in SO3 didn't bother me like most people, but my biggest problem is the character development seemed to completely stop in that game after a certain point in the story. Thanks again for your honest review and here's hoping the series continues to strive with Star Ocean 6 hopefully in the near future.
I've only played 3,4 and 5 but I really love 3 and 4. Never really had an issue with the twist in 3, and the post game content is amazing. I've beat each of them around 6 times. Nel over Maria any day lol
I saw Star Ocean 2 at a pawn shop back in 2002. A purchase I will never regret, that game was fantastic, the best star ocean of all. Ashton was the best character out of already amazing characters, the music was incomparable to many other RPG songs. That game was fantastic, the only bad thing was it wasn't longer.
Star Ocean Till the End of Time was my first Star Ocean game. Till now, it's still one of the best JRPGs I have played in my life. I played this several times till I remember the exact plot sequence happened in Disc 1. But only once I reached the ending. I really love the song and soundtracks used in this game.
This made the game more confusing than anything. It's nice from the developers to try a more "realistic" approach but if this has a negative impact on the gameplay this is useless.
Playing blue sphere is a motivation to learn Japanese tbh. Also I don't think Blue Sphere is a spinoff since it's a direct sequel to Star Ocean 2. At least I thought it was canon
My brother was so obsessed with Star Ocean 2 growing up that he would actually only do some playthroughs by only playing them during the time of the day/night that were equivalent to the game.
Only played 3, 4 and 5 but my order is 4, 3, 5. Enjoyed 4 so much I platted it twice. 3 has an amazing twist and Maria is pretty nice. 5 was kinda meh but I didn't hate it like everyone else in the world. Could've been longer as well.
My favorite is Star Ocean 3 but not for the reason you think. This game has a whole bunch of cheesy and awkward moments that it wants you take seriously but it just comes off as hilarious. My favorite moment is when this serious moment happens where someone dies, and so our heroes fight the muderer to avenge they're death. And I kid you not, there's this groovy techno song that plays during the fight that has lyrics that go "WORK THAT BODY! WORK THAT BODY! MAKE SURE YOU DON'T HURT NOBODY!" By the way the composer to the Star Ocean series is the same one who composed for all Tales games and the Dark Souls games. I guess he was a really big fan of space jam. But yeah, I love Star Ocean 3 mostly because it's unintentionally hilarious. EDIT: The song is called Bitter Dance. Just it look up alongside Star Ocean 3 ost. Do not look at the comment section tho because you will be spoiled!
@@ErickLandonRPG I know! It's hilariously amazing! It was apparently a lyric from the Space Jam theme. The one that goes "COME ON AND SLAM, AND WELCOME TO THE JAM!" I love Star Ocean 3.
Lmfaoooo star ocean 3 is definitely in my top 5 favorites, I’ve replayed it several times throughout the years. But I know exactly what you mean! Lol and the emotional reaction times are delayed and have a lag and it makes me roll my eyes and chuckle every time. How many times does Fayt say “No!.... NOOOOO” lmao
In the English dub, some of the enemies say funny things. Like that fat merchant looking one you find in the first two planets. He would go "AHHH MY MONEY MY MONEY AAAAAAAAAAAH" and says so repeatedly while breaking the quote when tripping itself.
After having the series sit on my shelf ever since buying them, I finally figured I'd try out the series starting with Till the End of Time reci. The battle controls and difficulty can be frustrating, but I'm really enjoying the story so far and am about 30 hours in now. Considering how much I enjoy the game, I have no idea why it has taken me so long to try it (I've literally owned Till the End of Time and Last Hope International for years, and recently bought Integrity and Faithlessness... Still missing the first two though).
For me. 1.2nd story - hands down the best and I still play this one from time to time. 2.till the end of time - Pretty solid game but still not as good as 2nd story. 3.first departure - Story and chars is a bit forgettable for me but still an ok game overall. 4.last hope - I have a love and hate relationship with this game. An ok game but doesn't really have the charm of past star oceans. 5.integrity and faithlessness - what an incomplete mess and stinker this game was.
2nd story is one of my top 10 games of all time, me and my brother rented it and i watched my brother play, and when he went to bed i stayed up all night playing it, for a week. i tried playing the ps2 one but i couldn't figure out the stupid bonus exp meter so i said fuck it, i gave it a go. the ps3 one i couldn't even start the game i couldn't figure out how to leave the beach so fuck that game
Maybe it's because one is a harbinger of death with energy beam every1 used and the other ones playing Naruto and kinda sucked in comparison. That's how it was for me.
This was my experience with Star Ocean 3. It was quite a ride: 1. Too slow. Too much yapping. Not enough action. 2. Things are finally moving. This game seems pretty cool. 3. A new planet to check out. 4. OK. Am I done here? When do I move on? 5. Am I EVER going to get off this $*^&ing planet?? 6. Okay. things are finally getting interesting. 7. WOW!! This is COOL! I can't wait to see what happens next! 8. WTF?????
"If we're going to leave here, we might as well leave with that hot chick over there!" - Cliff Fittir "I appreciate you calling me 'hot', though 'chick' I could live without." - Nel Zelpher "Hey, she heard us." - Fayt Leingod "Scarrry!" - Cliff
I dont know but from the moment I started that game but it felt special the story hooked on to me fast. Just like when you picked up a good book. That feeling. Everglow
In Till the end of Time I played through the whole game without realizing there was a way to mute the voices in battles. I heard the protagonist scream "Sidekick!" about 487,000 times before the credits rolled. Was blown away when I realized I could turn those voices off. Played the game through twice more after that.
Erick they just brought back the Star Ocean event in Final Fantasy Brave Exvius. LOL I actually downloaded the Star Ocean Anamnesis for mobile. its ok.
For me it is: 5. SO5 4. SO1 3. SO2 2. SO4 1. SO3 SO3 Director Cut is actually one of the best JRPGs i have ever played, it's in my top 3 for sure, i loved every second of it every time i replayed it. Amazing cast, great story, superior combat, lot of content
Absolutely, i thought it was very well done and changed pretty much the whole SO universe which yeah, lot of people had problems coping with Also, there’s Cliff :D
@@darkfyraproductions7958 Yes, Director's Cut was the only version released in the west, i have the PSN version so i can confirm it. Enjoy, it is truly a masterpiece
Nice Vid... 1st Star Ocean i played was Til d end of time but rage quit in no time, then 2nd evo for psp was awesome then was last hope i liked d battle system with d blue etc jems hard to understand at 1st but later on in d game turned out kool.
I’m eagerly and anxiously awaiting the 2022 Star Ocean game! With Atelier Sophie 2 and FFXVI releasing that year as well, 2022 looks like it’s gonna be a great year for JRPGs :)
Till the End of Time was the first JRPG I ever finished, I was just so enthralled with it I couldn't stop playing it. So, here we go: 5- Integrity, 4- Second Story, 3- First Departure R, 2- The Last Hope, 1- Till the End of Time. Currently Playing Last Hope again on PC and First Departure R for my second run on Switch.
Never played a Star Ocean game before (except a tiny bit of Till the End of Time that I don't remember many years ago). I'm thinking of getting First Departure R if it ever goes on sale.
i loved star ocean 2 i remember breaking it due to some private actions in which you could steal from people and get some items WAAAY before your supposed to and use the camera to copy a gem that levels you up so you can level up to lvl 100 really early in the game and crush most of the game and be way over leveled even in the end game and even beat the arena fight you are supposed to lose (it still counts as a lose though LOL)
I'll agree with your choices for the top two. I was actually right with guessing your top 3. I kinda knew The Last Hope would fall 3rd place as it's good but I kind of hoped it was as good as The Second Story. I could say, I'd put the last three titles into a close tie.
Loved the video. We rated the games the same, except I would have placed last hope above end of time for story reasons but still a tie. My first time playing all the way through second story, i screwed myself by being a completionist and made last boss harder without knowing it
When I seen this video at a glance, I knew what would come fifth. Infact your rankings are the same as mine. I loved the Second story for a long time. Its influenced me to use this handle which was taken from this game. (if you played the PS2 version).
i truly hope the second story which was my 1st SO game comes out for the ps4 as well since they release first departure R, playstation will have the whole collection on the ps4 cant wait to see that happen.
I played Till the End of Time, then First Departure, Second Evolution and lastly Last Hope International. I've yet to play Integrity and Faithlessness, which I bought at release even after trying a demo which I didn't particularly enjoy, but I've yet to play it probably because I was put off by the demo. Last Hope is the one I enjoyed most of the 4 I've played, very closely followed by TteoT - I just enjoyed their fast, visually spectacular combat so much.
Till the end of time will always hold a special place as number 1 for me being my first star ocean game ever... It's got everything you could want In a RPG
I've only ever played til the end of time and last hope....i LOVED till the end of time and really really really liked the last hope....so should i play all the others....is 5 really only a 17 hour story like you said? is first departure R going to be priced like a new release ps4 game? how would i play the 2nd story? i'm sure it's hard to find online for a reasonable price.
Cool video. I'll admit, the only Star Ocean game I've played and finished is Star Ocean: The Last Hope. While it had its flaws, it was a decent game. I hope I can play the other titles someday.
My favorite is TTEOT probably because it was the 1st Star Ocean I ever played. It seems to be a polarizing entry in the series as people seem to either love it or hate it with no in between.
I think people who were introduced to the series through playing SO3, have no problem with the plot twist. But those who played 1 and 2 first, hate SO3 for the plot twist.
The Super Famicom version of Star Ocean has better art design and music than the remake IMO. Plus the original game kinda made you sympathize with the villain more, the remake just made him pure evil.
