Star Ocean: The Divine Force
Developer: tri-Ace
Publisher: Square Enix
Platforms: Xbox Series X (Reviewed), Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, PC
Release Date: Available Now
Price: $59.99 USD – Available Here $99.95 AUD – Available Here
Overview
Those familiar with the Star Ocean series have grown accustomed to waiting for a new entry as this tri-Ace developed series generally takes around six years between releases but after the previous game arrived back in 2016 many wondered if we would even see another Star Ocean game. Luckily, this unique take on the JRPG genre that blends fantasy and sci-fi has managed to continue and almost right on schedule tri-Ace and Square Enix have released Star Ocean: The Divine Force. By taking numerous steps forward in some ways while letting a few other elements lag a bit behind, Star Ocean: The Divine Force manages to deliver in a pleasing way sure to satisfy fans of the series.
Story
Ray Lawrence, the captain of the logistics ship Ydas and transporting a mysterious device known as D.U.M.A. finds himself crash landing on an underdeveloped planet by the name of Aster IV. Two residents of this planet, one of whom is Princess Laeticia from the Kingdom of Aucerius, happen to witness his escape pod coming in for a landing. Living on a world still relying on swords and magic for survival against monsters, Laeticia travels to the escape pod only to be shocked when Ray appears from within and utilizes technology far beyond anything she can comprehend.
With the fate of some of his crew still unknown, Ray agrees to travel with Laeticia who in turn reveals that she is on a special mission to try and prevent her kingdom from falling into a massive war. To go much further this would begin to reveal a bit too much about the plot but it must be said that although Star Ocean: The Divine Force starts on a smaller scale than one would expect for the series it quickly escalates to the galactic dangers and unique interactions that come from mixing medieval and sci-fi that fans have come to expect. The title also implements a feature not found in the series since Star Ocean: The Second Story by telling the storyline from two separate perspectives.
When beginning the game players will have the choice of selecting either Ray or Laeticia as their main character and although the core storyline will remain the same regardless of who the player chooses as their main character, it will affect a number of things. Not only will players watch a slightly different introduction to the characters but the game will also present a number of different routes that split the party and have certain events happen to each group. Players will still be able to hear a bit about what happened to the other characters but they will be only hearing it second-hand once they get back together. It is also worth noting that there are specific route exclusive characters that will only join the party depending on this choice. It is a bit unfortunate that while the game isn’t exceedingly long for a JRPG, there is no way to actually see what happens on these other routes or see how different interactions play out without simply starting from the very beginning of the game from scratch. While this does work well for replayability, the fact that there is no New Game+ is a very strange choice considering the title pushes for players to play through at least twice if they want to see everything on offer.
With the core storyline telling a solid gripping tale with great storytelling methods found only within the Star Ocean series it is a nice bonus that the cast of characters is handled well. Sure, they are fairly stereotypical for a JRPG at times but even then most of the cast does see some satisfying development throughout the story. This is helped by the return of Private Actions that players can trigger while traveling around towns. These Private Actions not only give players a great look at the personalities of the cast but also provide some unique interactions between the group as players learn more about them and see that, although they may be a bit trope-filled on the surface, that there is depth to most of the cast.
Gameplay
As players travel through the world in Star Ocean: The Divine Force they will encounter a wide array of enemies and every one of these foes will be fought instantly on the map with players being able to jump in quickly to catch a foe by surprise or simply approaching an enemy and beginning a battle. All fights take place in real time with the player’s party acting on their own while their chosen character can make use of three face buttons to unleash skills that they have assigned to said buttons in various combo chains. Every action in a fight takes AP (action points) with stronger attacks requiring more AP and while players are encouraged to keep the pressure on enemies with combo attacks, AP only regenerates once players disengage from an enemy and take a brief pause.
Should players wish they can change the character that they are controlling in a fight at the press of a button and there is the option to pause combat and use an item, swap targets, or even take a brief look at the battlefield which can be quite useful in some longer encounters or boss battles, especially when many foes have multiple points on their body that can be targeted to deal extra damage. Perhaps one of the strongest abilities that players can use in a fight involves the D.U.M.A. robot companion that players will meet shortly after starting the game. When used in combat, the party member that players are controlling will be incredibly quick, allowing them to close the gap on enemies and strike at them fast or even target them from the side for a “Blindside” blow that deals a lot of damage and can stun foes that aren’t immediately killed. Using D.U.M.A. makes for an exhilarating experience when on offense but also has a number of uses for defense as it can also be used to shield party members and reduce any damage they take as well as provide party wide buffs at the cost of not being active for the controlled fighter.
In a bit of a surprising twist on leveling up, rather than simply growing stronger by gaining levels characters will instead gain SP for every level they gain. These points can, in-turn, be used to unlock various blocks on every characters’ unique skill tree. These unlocks range from simply increasing various stats for a character to unlocking new moves that can be used in combat. This allows for players to build characters in a manner that they prefer, choosing to focus entirely on only a few stats or being a jack-of-all-trades if they so please.
When not fighting players will be exploring large open areas of the world and it is here that D.U.M.A. can also serve as a helpful tool. The machine can work as something similar to a jetpack allowing players to boost their characters up to previously unreachable areas, making every environment even larger than it already is as players are encouraged to explore every nook and cranny to try and find upgrade crystals for D.U.M.A. and more. Unfortunately a lot of these large areas are well… large for the sake of it rather than actually enjoyable to explore. Many feature either incredibly simple designs or lack noticeable landmarks making them feel like a chore to explore even when the areas themselves may look gorgeous on the surface.
It is also worth noting that while players will have the ability to craft and forge various items in the game, doing so is not required for the most part until players start to delve into the challenging post-game content. Unfortunately crafting places players into one of the worst parts of Star Ocean: The Divine Force, the menu system. Not only are the menus in the game incredibly bland looking, they also happen to feature perhaps the smallest text that has been offered in a video game in over a decade. Where most titles are offering accessibility options that increase text size, Star Ocean: The Divine Force’s text in menu and even subtitles makes even the glitched text from the original release of Dead Rising look normal by comparison. This drags down anything having to deal with the game’s user interface and actually can cause some eye strain even on the largest televisions.
Visuals & Audio
Star Ocean: The Divine Force is a rather odd looking game at times as it features some gorgeous looking environments that lack a certain level of detail that make them feel empty when exploring them and while monster designs and combat animations are wonderful to look at, the actual character models for the characters leave a lot to be desired. Despite emotional scenes happening around them, the doll-like designs of the characters’ faces simply don’t match up at all, which is a fairly big disappointment during a number of scenes.
This release of Star Ocean: The Divine Force offers players the option to play either using the English dub or the Japanese voice track featuring English subtitles. As mentioned before, thanks to the game’s text being laughably small, playing in English is almost required as a result but thankfully the English cast has handled their characters incredibly well with some solid voice acting all around, even during exploration where characters will talk to each other from time to time to keep things interesting. The soundtrack features a great collection of music with a number of outstanding tracks that kick in during battles and it must be said that the game also features a rather surprising choice for opening music.
Overall
Star Ocean: The Divine Force takes advantage of its strong storytelling and unique scenarios to tell an engrossing tale that Star Ocean fans will love, especially since it is filled with an enjoyable cast of characters and some fast paced combat that allows for plenty of player customization. Unfortunately these improvements and enhancements come with the drawback of some odd looking character designs, an often bland looking world, and the worst user interface in years.
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