Star Ocean 3: Till the End of Time

 PlayStation 4
User Score
7.8

Generally favorable reviews- based on 42 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 30 out of 42
  2. Mixed: 6 out of 42
  3. Negative: 6 out of 42

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  1. artificeprime
    Jul 15, 2017
    6
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Star Ocean 3 is a pretty mediocre JRPG. While it isn't a bad game and offers a long decent quest with some good ideas, almost nothing about it stands out to me as exceptional. The combat is enjoyable enough but inferior to similar styles of action RPGs like the Tales games. The story starts out promising but is ultimately a major disappointment. The game has, in my opinion, one of the worst twists in an RPG because it makes almost everything that you have done up to that point seem meaningless. On the plus side it is foreshadowed but it is still disappointing. Another problem I had with the game is that several sections needlessly drag. There is a lot of content but a fair amount of it I didn't care about so I was often demotivated from playing.

    The gameplay is decent fun but I have played so many RPGs with better combat. I quickly found that it got repetitive and while there were some cool abilities there weren't nearly enough for such a long game. The menus and such are functional but once again they just seemed standard to me. There were a few good boss battles but the final boss is disappointing. The game taking place across multiple worlds offers a good variety of enemy types though. The crafting is decent but I found it needlessly complicated compared to other RPGs.

    The story started off quite intriguing, the idea of someone from an advanced civilization crashing on a medieval world creates some really interesting possibilities. Some of the early interactions were pretty enjoyable but as the game goes on the story gets progressively more bizarre and less inspired. The main problem that your characters are facing, which initially intrigued me, is eventually revealed to be something entirely different and not in a good way. The plot twist made almost all the details of the story seem irrelevant.

    There are a good variety of characters but few of them seemed to be very well developed. Fayt is a pretty standard protagonist without much about his identity that felt inspired. The characters overall seemed inferior when compared to the Tales games, Final Fantasy games, or the Xenosaga games.

    Visual Design is pretty good in some areas but I found that many of the characters had an unappealing look. They were clearly going for an anime style but for some reason many of the characters have big foreheads and small lower faces, the proportions just don't look appealing. Other than that most of the environments and monsters look pretty good. There are some really interesting environments.

    The sound design is pretty mediocre. The voice acting is below average. The music is pretty good but sometimes I found that it didn't match with the scenes as well as it could have. Still it gets some points for at least having a lot of spoken dialog and the sound track does have some good songs.

    Overall, I liked this game fine, I spent over 50 hours playing it and I enjoyed it well enough, I just think that there are many far better RPGs.

    I give it 61%

    Gameplay - 5
    Story - 6
    World - 6
    Characters - 6
    Visual Style - 7
    Sound Design - 6
    Uniqueness/Ideas - 7
    Length/Amount of Content - 8
    Immersion - 5
    X-Factor 5    … Expand
  2. TheDestroyer
    Feb 2, 2018
    5
    The legendary game that I would have given a full 10 out of 10 too on the PS2 version back then, but can't do that here on PS4. No 10 out of 10 to be found here. Why? You ask? Because it crashed on me 4 times in less than an hour! Other players are having it just as bad. This burden alone overshadows anything excellent it would have had. Forget the story! Forget the graphics! Forget theThe legendary game that I would have given a full 10 out of 10 too on the PS2 version back then, but can't do that here on PS4. No 10 out of 10 to be found here. Why? You ask? Because it crashed on me 4 times in less than an hour! Other players are having it just as bad. This burden alone overshadows anything excellent it would have had. Forget the story! Forget the graphics! Forget the gameplay! Infact, forget everything. Don't buy it until Tri-Ace decides to patch the bloody thing.… Expand

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
72

Mixed or average reviews - based on 5 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 2 out of 5
  2. Mixed: 3 out of 5
  3. Negative: 0 out of 5
  1. Worth Playing
    Aug 15, 2017
    70
    All in all, Star Ocean: Till the End of Time is an adequate and enjoyable JRPG. Nothing about the game or the port is particularly exceptional, but aside from one particularly controversial plot twist, it doesn't do anything particularly wrong, either. It's a fun JRPG with a lot of replay value, and anyone looking for a nostalgic trip or to experience a somewhat obscure game will have a good time. A higher-quality remaster or port could've done a lot to elevate the game to the next level.
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  2. The Digital Fix
    Jun 15, 2017
    60
    If you’re a fan of the series and didn’t get to experience it on PS2, you’ll want to pick up Till The End Of Time purely due to it being the series’ highlight. Otherwise, this third entry will be a divisive one, even amongst those who love JRPGs. Its combat is good, but everything else is simply unremarkable, and a basic port only serves to highlight how far game design has come since its release.
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  3. SpazioGames
    Jun 8, 2017
    80
    Even with its issues, Star Ocean: Till the End of Time is still a great and enjoyable jrpg, and also one of the most revolutionary ones, even by today's standards.
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