Because I don't have a decent dodge and I'm fairly locked-in for my attacks, I need to make sure I won't get stuffed in the middle of my combo. This led to me clicking in the right stick in the beginning of every battle for a higher up camera view of the battlefield and acting very carefully. Paired with the fact that there isn't a proper dodge (a "jump" that's too slow for reaction-based play) and you're left with a game all about positioning. You have a single regular attack button that's the same, rather slow combo animation that doesn't really allow for a single swipe + run away. Mob enemies are a lot of fun to fight! Despite some whacky controls (Start to swap locked-on target? What is this, a SNES game?) it works well enough for most of the fighting you do throughout the game. And while this was exciting at first, I slowly came to find a lot of flaws in it. If ya don't know, Star Ocean is a third person hack n' slash action game, not turn based, with semi-random encounters (enemies patrol the field and once engaged a screen wipe takes you to a battlefield). What mostly follows this is a critique of the combat system, the only element of the game I've seen consistent praise for over the years that I've found to be all over the place in terms of its quality. I've chalked it up to the game fulfilling that aforementioned, somewhat niche desire for a game. There's a lot of issues I have with the game but I was surprised at how much I played despite wanting to stop at a couple points. Now with 11.5 hours logged and the third boss slain, I'm putting it down. So after suffering through Star Ocean (5): Integrity & Faithlessness I grabbed this game on sale and waited for the game to pique my interest, which happened with the announcement of Star Ocean: The Divine Force. I've always wanted a space opera JRPG (think Mass Effect/KOTOR) and while there's no shortage of sci-fi in general in JRPGs, there's little of that specifically.
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