izigame.me

I was look forward to this game for years, a throwback to the old school of JRPGs like Chrono Trigger, one of its main influences and inspirations. Luckily, these kind of games have seen a renaissance in recent years with more to come. And the love and effort for the genre and predecessors is evident in every aspect — the look, the feel, the sound. The developers went above and beyond to do it justice.
Makes it all the more frustrating that I cannot enjoy this game.
Now this may surprise you, given that I recommend the game as indicated by the thumbs-up. What gives, no? Well, I could give a TL;DR, but I really want this to be taken with context and this review is more about “getting it off my chest” and for the developers (if they care) than anyone else. Wall of text and potential (minor) spoilers incoming, you have been warned!
There are two primary reasons that prevent me from continuing after about 25 hours, which brought me just to the cusp of the main plot to actually kicking off. I have not spoilered myself, but I can take an educated guess at how the game will proceed. And I’m all for it, this is not one of my problems.
1) The main protagonists are boring
This is mostly personal taste and a matter of perspective, not something I would objectively see as a crucial flaw. Valere and Zale are by no means bad protagonists, they are just not interesting. Both are likable enough and I do not mind playing and following them. At the same time, they could also suddenly die and be replaced and I honestly would not care.
While I applaud having protagonists who are not motivated by avenging their family or town or whatever, and their status as “chosen warriors” still makes them neither unique nor quintessential to the universe (at large). But they also lack any conflict or goal beyond the destiny they were handed at birth — which they embrace. Again, glad you avoided that rebellion trope for those two. Yet they lack any intrinsic motivation beyond duty and their personal prophecy quest. Good save, but only a stopgap solution.
Of course, they might develop further down the line, I cannot tell from my game state. I certainly hope so. But I need them to be interesting from the start and not just after 50 hours playtime. So far, they are eclipsed by almost every other character that is more than a two-line NPC.
Garl has his passion for adventure and cooking. Serai seems to have some edgy dark past going on… which is not particularly novel but more than our two heroes have. Did not meet the other playable characters, but I can guess they got their personal quests as well. Heck, my favorite character is Teaks, and she is not even playable! Her quest to collect stories and document history, bringing back her ancient order of historians is so damn cool that I would love to have a full game just about that.
I just… do not care about Valere and Zale. I wish I could play Teaks' story instead.
2) The combat system is a chore
I could have lived with the previous issue, but this is what ultimately made me drop the game (for now). And again, this is a matter of taste and preference. But when I play a turn-based game, I do not want to have my reflexes tested with timing puzzles. I want to sit back on my couch and relax, idly grinding through scores of trash mobs until I’m overleveled before continue the plot. Even if I have to revisit the same location 40 times to hit the next exponential experience threshold. And I did.
If your gameplay is primarily about combat, your combat system must be fun. Players must look forward to the next engagement. But the longer I played and grinded, as is my MO, the more annoyed I grew. Until the thought of suffering another round of combat prevented me from booting up the game. And I hate that I hate the combat. I want to love this game so much; I appreciate the work, I do not regret paying full price for it and hope others enjoy and support it. But I cannot enjoy it.
I would probably not have played beyond the first combat tutorial if a quick Internet search did not assure me I could automate the double-hit mechanic for a damage penalty. Whoever came up with that relic, you are the real MVP. Because the game blatantly lies to you when it claims the double-hit to be an optional bonus — in a combat system focused on breaking an enemy’s stride by hitting affinity combos, thus making the double-hit extremely important.
I never figured out when to press to defend or attack either, because there is no visual clue. You have to hit the split-second of the right animation frame. I just surrendered myself to the automatic attack and getting my head bashed in for full damage, because every successful crit or counter was just pure luck. I did not care to practice either, because I frigging hate the mechanic. I want to relax, not be stressed out by every single action in a turn-based combat system.
This alone could still be forgiven. Thanks to Adamant Shard, you can mostly ignore the issue at the cost of reduced damage dealt and more taken. Fair tradeoff. Unfortunately, these are not the only timing puzzles. Not even remotely, as the whole combat challenge is built around the things.
Now, Valere’s Moonerang or Serai’s Venom Flurry start with generous reaction times. Although the latter has less of a visual clue compared to a flying blue object and can end off screen in some encounters. But they are not difficult to pull off and maximize, I even got the achievement for the Moonerang — by button mashing against a single enemy. Others, like the Sunball, are a joke to pull off perfectly but technically less powerful. Compared to Phase Shiv, which I only ever managed to time right once.
So this is not a skill issue; you would need a severe dexterity impairment to completely fail here. But that is not my point. I do not enjoy having to watch every action and continuously test my reflexes. I’m not having fun doing that, I’m stressed out. I do not feel rewarded for pulling off a 30+ combo, I feel my time wasted.
It’s like playing a tabletop role-playing game, like Savage Worlds or D&D, and every time my character does something, I get handed a sheet of 4th grade math equations to solve by my gamemaster, which I need to do in 10 seconds and the more I solve, the stronger my attack becomes. Eminently doable, but not fun. And this is what Sea of Star’s combat feels like to me. It feels like a chore.
And this is not something you could just fix with another relic, either. Because combat is balanced around this mechanic, so if you remove it or average the hits, you would make many encounters unchallenging. But as it stands, I cannot bring myself to continue the game with this. At that sucks.
I’m also not the only one with this particular issue. I do not have statistics on the number of people alienated from the game like myself, and if everyone quits after playing 25 hours it doesn’t matter anyway. We already payed, after all. I’m not mad or disappointed, and I see my money spent well despite my grievances. But I’m curious how many people quit like for this reason.
Also, a question for the developers. Did you consider this when you designed the combat? Obviously, with the Adamant Shard, someone must have raised some concerns. But did you deliberate choose to, for lack of a better word, alienate players not enjoying timing puzzles or did that not occur to you? I don’t want to be mean and it does not change anything, but I would really like to know.