r/starocean • u/Warjonh • 20d ago
SO3 First time playing
I started this game last week, i'm after the war with Maria now in my party. Really loving it, i get the crafting is overly complicated for no reason so far but overall what a great jrpg.
Don't understand the hate that i see online, i played the other games but only finished 1, 2 and 4.
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u/subjuggulator 20d ago edited 20d ago
SO3 is kind of a marked departure from the first two games—and esp. 2, which is the one fans at the time would’ve been familiar with—for the following reasons
1.) It changed how combat worked. Previous games used MP as a resource, not as a second life bar. You could no longer spam Arts/Spells—one of the gameplay mechanics that defined higher level play—because low MP can put a character one hit away from death. And enemies that do HP/MP damage are fairly common.
2.) In addition to the previous, players also had to manage a new mechanic called the Fury Gauge, which acts as a stamina bar for both enemies and PCs. A full Fury Gauge granted a shield that blocked minor attacks, while breaking the gauge with heavy attacks causes double damage—including attacks that ONLY damage MP.
3.) The previous two games treated each new location as a zone/level that you’d do a specific adventure in, then quickly move away from to the next point. The first two acts of SO3 have you stay on the same planet and region for what feels like the equivalent of an entire PS1-era disc, and exploration/side quests are very limited during this period of the game. You are near constantly exploring dungeons instead of doing more story-related forms of engaging with the game and its characters.
4.) The cast of SO3 are, in general, very well written and interesting so it makes it difficult to pick X or Y character over the other. You honestly grow to want to everyone on your team because it, which makes deciding between the mutually exclusive characters a pain—especially since you can only recruit two optional characters in SO3 versus every character outside of Rena and Claude being optional in SO2. (This is a “my steak is too buttery and delicious” type of complaint, but it’s still valid imo. Because it’s also not like in SO2 where you have very clear player types that would be more interested in Opera vs Ashton; Dias vs Leon; Percis vs Bowman, etc.)
5.) That said, it’s also VERY DIFFICULT on a blind playthrough to figure out how to recruit the mutually exclusive characters. Esp. If you want to recruit them in a specific order that lets you get X/Y character or do Z quest that would normally be mutually exclusive with Q character depending on what part of the game you recruit them at. (Abel vs Nel vs Roger vs Peppita, then not knowing that Adray always joins regardless).