Sea of Stars was a uniquely mediocre experience, mainly because I was almost fooled into thinking it was great simply because of its visual presentation.
I enjoyed the art direction and music from beginning to end, but just about everything else fell apart further and further as the game went on. And in hindsight, it wasn’t really put together all that well to begin with. Puzzles were so easy that they felt burdensome rather than rewarding. The tools and mechanics presented to me were pretty fun, but overly simple and rarely utilized. I would have preferred more complex puzzles in place of some of the filler battles that seemingly existed only to increase my playtime.
The characters were likable, if not a little bland, and there were definitely some moments that made me smile and laugh, but ultimately the storyline they were a part of dragged on for so long I just didn’t care anymore. I really liked Seraï however, and her character and twist was definitely a highlight of the game for me.
During the first few hours after escaping flashback hell, I happily coasted through repetitive dungeons with 2 moves per character, solving the same styles of puzzles to get from one level to another, because I really wanted to see how good it got.
It never got good.
You essentially hop from small lifeless town to small lifeless town, split up by slogging through 3 or more consecutive dungeon levels, filled with time consuming fights that impede on you trying to rush a piss easy puzzle just to get the hell out of there.
You do this for 20 hours. No downtime for side-quests, fun puzzles, or NPCs that repeat more than 1 line to you. It feels like a near-empty world with roughly 10 good guys and 10 bad guys, like a matchmade game of ground war turned into an RPG. Everytime I spoke to anyone outside of the main cast I felt like Tom Hanks in Cast Away talking to Wilson.
Credit where credit is due though, it is really beautiful, even if the colours and red-tinted black point can be a bit jarring at times. But it's just not beautiful enough for me to disregard its glaring issues.
I’m going to uninstall this and download a real JRPG and experience PEAK rather than weak.
I enjoyed the art direction and music from beginning to end, but just about everything else fell apart further and further as the game went on. And in hindsight, it wasn’t really put together all that well to begin with. Puzzles were so easy that they felt burdensome rather than rewarding. The tools and mechanics presented to me were pretty fun, but overly simple and rarely utilized. I would have preferred more complex puzzles in place of some of the filler battles that seemingly existed only to increase my playtime.
The characters were likable, if not a little bland, and there were definitely some moments that made me smile and laugh, but ultimately the storyline they were a part of dragged on for so long I just didn’t care anymore. I really liked Seraï however, and her character and twist was definitely a highlight of the game for me.
During the first few hours after escaping flashback hell, I happily coasted through repetitive dungeons with 2 moves per character, solving the same styles of puzzles to get from one level to another, because I really wanted to see how good it got.
It never got good.
You essentially hop from small lifeless town to small lifeless town, split up by slogging through 3 or more consecutive dungeon levels, filled with time consuming fights that impede on you trying to rush a piss easy puzzle just to get the hell out of there.
You do this for 20 hours. No downtime for side-quests, fun puzzles, or NPCs that repeat more than 1 line to you. It feels like a near-empty world with roughly 10 good guys and 10 bad guys, like a matchmade game of ground war turned into an RPG. Everytime I spoke to anyone outside of the main cast I felt like Tom Hanks in Cast Away talking to Wilson.
Credit where credit is due though, it is really beautiful, even if the colours and red-tinted black point can be a bit jarring at times. But it's just not beautiful enough for me to disregard its glaring issues.
I’m going to uninstall this and download a real JRPG and experience PEAK rather than weak.
itsavient
1 month ago