my first entry into the star ocean series, started this because 2nd story R looked really cool but this game was plenty cool too, it had like the usual jrpg jank and annoying random encounters but the very simple but still fun combat and the specialty system actually gave me quite a bit of gameplay elements to get invested in, ive leveled and used so many of them that my party was just OP as fuck by the end of the game but surprisingly the final boss still gave me some trouble (not much but still)
the story was good, not great, not awful but good and it as well as the characters had soul and thats what matters the most to me in the end, i do wish both were a bit more fleshed out but this game came out in 96 so i can forgive that
another thing that kinda disappointed me was that i expected this game to take place in space way more but like 80% of it was on the same planet , i guess thats my bad on expecting something that star ocean is clearly not

conclusion is, i liked this game and i can't wait to get on 2nd story now :)