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Star Ocean Part II: The Second Story

  • Writer: Cassie McKeever
    Cassie McKeever
  • Aug 6, 2019
  • 7 min read

Updated: Aug 8, 2019


For many my age, Final Fantasy VII was the first RPG they ever played. While Final Fantasy VII holds a very special place in my heart, my introduction to the JRPG genre was through Star Ocean: The Second Story. I vividly remember being intrigued by the beautiful box art at my local Hollywood Video. I went home with a copy, a box of Nerds, and my new found obsession. After a few days playing, I was begging my parents to buy me the game. Without it, I'm not sure I would even be into video games to the same extent as I am today. Basics Star Ocean: The Second Story is an action JRPG published by Sony and developed by tri-Ace. The Second Story was the first Star Ocean game to be released outside of Japan. The story follows Claude Kenni, a member of the Earth Federation. While investigating a mysterious energy on a distant planet, he gets separated from his father by falling through a portal. On the other side he meets Rena Lanford, the other protagonist. From there they continue their journey together, meeting numerous people along the way.

The Second Story was released on July 30 1998 for Japan and on April 12 2000 in Europe. It is less clear when it was released state-side. I've seen dates for April, May, and August 1999. Since I found an IGN article dated June 16th, where they had a copy of the game that was ready for release, it would seem that the April and May dates are inaccurate. I'm imagining it was closer to August, around the time I rented and bought the game for my birthday.

Development For those unfamiliar with the story behind tri-Ace and Star Ocean, I recommend reading part one in this series. To summarize: the three creators of Star Ocean were working for Namco and helping develop Tales of Phantasia. After becoming frustrated by the limitations put on them, they left to create Star Ocean and, therefor, tri-Ace, taking several elements from Tales in the process.

In a 1998 interview with the three founders of tri-Ace, as well as three programmers, they describe the development process for The Second Story. The game entered development in late 1995/early 1996, which means they were thinking of a sequel before wrapping up the first game.

Asking what challenges they faced during development produced answers from all six. Most of the issues were the opposite of what they faced with the first game. Instead of having too little space to create what they wanted, they now had too much space on a system they had no experience developing for. They had so many ideas, some of which had to be scrapped. If you are interested in exactly what was cut, I recommend heading to The Cutting Room Floor for a debug list and screenshots. Most thing were just items, although they note that they had to cut certain parts to side stories. I recommend reading the full interview, which can, as always, be found in the sources below.

Previews

A very lengthy advertisement for The Second Story.

The first preview I could find was by IGN, published in 1998. As of that article's writing, no one was completely sure who the publisher would be. I imagine this has to do with Enix previously closing down its American division. Several weeks after the first article, IGN released another; this time calling into question whether the game would even be released stateside. This anxiety was, once again, due to the game being a year from release with no publisher in sight. In March 1999, the worrying was over; Sony announced they were publishing and The Second Story would be out by June. I'm imagining they picked up the game after they failed to secure an American publisher. Doing so was a risk for Sony, although the success and growing popularity of JRPGs (largely due to FFVII) may have alleviated some of their concerns. Official PlayStation Magazine previewed the game twice. In April 1999 their preview was listed alongside other JRPGs coming to America. In it, they cover the very basics about the story and gameplay. They also gushed over the mix of old and new school graphics.

Their second preview that month was more in depth. They felt what the story lacked in originality, it made up for with the sheer amount of things to do. The look and feel of the world was impressive and could "...challenge Final Fantasy VII in quality." Speaking of, they also mention the company that pre-rendered FFVII's backgrounds, Links, would be doing the same for The Second Story. PlayStation Magazine also previewed the game in May '99. While they were dazzled by the graphics, they were more impressed by the battle system. They were intrigued by the action oriented fights and the character customization. While here, I must note the terrible mistranslation of the male protagonists name. In English it is meant to be "Claude", but instead PSM did a phonetic translation: Crawd. Oh PSM, you're silly and I miss you. Reviews The gameplay was well loved by all the reviewers I could find. Official PlayStation Magazine described The Second Story as "immense", presenting "overwhelming options." While they felt the story was too linear in the beginning, it opens up later. The only issue they noted was the frustrating translation.

In the same vein, IGN's only complaints were the lackluster writing and translation. That said, they loved everything else. The story was wonderful and they quickly grew attached to the characters. The game's "greatest aspect", however, was the item creation and character customization.

GameSpot felt similarly. The battle system and overall customization really held up The Second Story. The ability to cater the battles to your skill level was a real plus. The only negative thing they had to say, along with everyone else, was how terrible the translations were.

The sound was also lauded by all three reviewers. OPSM called the music "excellent" and "stirring." Paired with the graphics, it gave the world a unique atmosphere.

IGN said of the music:

"I loved the music for Star Ocean. It's vast and epic in its reach, and the long, slow changes in tempo are perfect for an RPG of this kind. I liked the music so much that if there were a CD of it, I would listen to the music on its own."

The voices on the other hand were "laughable." Luckily the voices are only available in battles. GameSpot was also crazy about the music. They called it "one of the more incredible soundtracks composed for a video game." Of the visuals, IGN stated that they were a bit of a"...mixed bag of polarized graphics." The old-school sprites, beautiful (and too infrequent) cutscenes, and pre-rendered backgrounds were all gorgeous. The only downside was the transition between them. OPSM agreed and wished there had been more cutscenes. They also felt that the backgrounds were well done. Despite a little bit of a hiccup with the graphics and translation, The Second Story was not only liked by reviewers, but loved

Re-release In 2008, just like the original Star Ocean, The Second Story received a make over in the form of a remake/re-release for the PSP. This eventually got ported to the PS Vita as well, although that version was never released state-side. Also like First Departure, The Second Story was renamed Second Evolution and given a special PSP bundle. The game was well received by reviewers. Since the general consensus about the original features was unchanged, I'll be discussing the reviews that note differences, as well as overall ratings. Siliconera felt that despite the graphical overhaul and 13 new endings (bringing the total to 99), it was still too similar to First Departure. RPG Site also felt the game wasn't much different than the original. That said, they believed it to be better than the original Star Ocean. While Kotaku felt similarly, they thought Second Evolution had been made easier, which wasn't a good thing.

IGN enjoyed all the updates and felt the game was still superior to First Departure, despite having a very similar feel. Venture Beat also described the game as being better than the original Star Ocean and The Second Story. They also note that the dialogue and translations had been fixed this time around.

As you can see, once again all reviewers were on the same page. In fact, the scores I found only ranged from 7.5 to 9 out of 10. Overall, it's a great update to the original Second Story. The only issue now is how expensive it is 11 years later.

Modern Reception While everyone agreed on the quality of the gameplay, the reviews on music and voice acting were, again, a bit mixed. This was mainly due to the soundtrack being great while the battle voices were subpar. Hardcore Gaming 101 hits the nail on the head with their review. They state that the music sounds fantastic and Second Evolution barely has a bad song, with 70 tracks to choose from. The speech in battle, on the other hand, is "spectacularly bad." The actors are amateurs and the sound quality is low. They also note that these issues are mainly fixed in the re-release.

Destrutoid agreed the music "...from Star Ocean is wonderful." They feel that Motoi Sakuraba really did a "fantastic job." RPG Fan concurs with the other reviewers and says the game is "...a pure joy to listen to." They go so far as to say that the soundtrack is the best of any PlayStation RPG. The mood of the game is perfectly represented by the music. They elaborate that their article doesn't justify just how good the soundtrack is.


First Hour, a site that reviews the first hour of games, says at minute 12 that the music had been typical RPG fare up to that point. However, they were only able to hear a couple of tracks in the time they had played. They state that what they heard was "...good enough." They felt similarly about the in battle voice acting. Decades later, it seems this games beautiful graphics are being taken for granted as almost no one mentioned them. First Hour was appreciative though. They gave the graphics an 8 out of 10, saying they were lush and bright. The sprites "looked awesome" and the "animations were excellent."

RPG Fan was less enthusiastic, as they stated they had seen better graphics in RPGs, but that "...most of the designs were nice." Overall, by the writers own admission, they didn't care one way or the other, so long as the game is playable.

Conclusion Star Ocean: The Second Story is a fantastic, some argue the best, entry in the series. The gameplay, music, and graphics make for a unique experience. If you're into RPGs and have never played it, what the hell are you doing? Grab a copy from Ebay and start playing!

- https://www.ign.com/articles/1999/03/27/grandia-star-ocean-2-emerge-at-babbages - Star Ocean advertisement (1999) - Official PlayStation Magazine April 1999, pages 46-47 - Official PlayStation Magazine May 1999, page 46 - PSM May 1999, page 60 - https://www.ign.com/articles/1999/06/17/star-ocean-the-second-story-2 Reviews - Official PlayStation Magazine July 1999, page 58 - https://www.ign.com/articles/1999/06/18/star-ocean-the-second-story - https://www.gamespot.com/reviews/star-ocean-the-second-story-review/1900-2549498/ Re-release - https://www.siliconera.com/2016/07/05/square-enix-no-plans-bring-star-ocean-second-evolution-ps4-vita-west/ - https://gematsu.com/2015/10/star-ocean-second-evolution-ps4-ps-vita-now-available-japan - http://release.square-enix.com/na/2008/11/star_ocean_second_evolution_ship_date_updated.html - http://rpgland.com/2008/03/19/star-ocean-second-evolution-special-psp-bundle-trailer-revealed/ - https://www.siliconera.com/2008/05/21/the-evolution-in-star-ocean-second-evolution/ - https://kotaku.com/star-ocean-second-evolution-review-calm-seas-ahead-5142215 - https://www.ign.com/articles/2009/01/15/star-ocean-second-evolution-review - https://venturebeat.com/2009/05/23/star-ocean-second-evolution-review-psp/ - https://www.rpgsite.net/review/2836-star-ocean-second-evolution-review Modern Reception - http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/star-ocean-the-second-story/ - http://www.honestgamers.com/3907/playstation/star-ocean-the-second-story/review.html - https://www.destructoid.com/instant-replay-star-ocean-the-second-story-98559.phtml - http://firsthour.net/first-hour-review/star-ocean-2-second-story - https://www.rpgfan.com/reviews/starocean2/Star_Ocean_2.html - https://kotaku.com/lets-talk-about-star-ocean-2-1625659786

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