Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness

 PlayStation 4
User Score
6.3

Mixed or average reviews- based on 287 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 139 out of 287
  2. Mixed: 62 out of 287
  3. Negative: 86 out of 287
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  1. vahn
    Mar 7, 2019
    4
    Another disappointment from SE: I'm not even surprised at this point and if anything I have myself to blame for this. I KNEW this was going to suck and I didn't try to listen. And here I am, with a game that I CANNOT continue due to being so bad, so boring, I can't even get past hour 13 - in a game supposedly 20 hours long.

    And this is truly a shame because I believe that with more    Another disappointment from SE: I'm not even surprised at this point and if anything I have myself to blame for this. I KNEW this was going to suck and I didn't try to listen. And here I am, with a game that I CANNOT continue due to being so bad, so boring, I can't even get past hour 13 - in a game supposedly 20 hours long.

    And this is truly a shame because I believe that with more polish this game could've been even better than SO4, which was considered one of the worse installment. Sure SO4 had crappy plots - which SO doesn't have crappy plots? - but it had a charming kind of crappy and the combat was simply wonderful and fun: I definitely enjoyed that game far more than I imagined.

    But before we get to the bad stuff, what's good in it?
    Well, the characters are decently good, even better than SO4: Fidel is not a terrible MC, Miki is annoying but okay, Relia is mysterious but not annoying, and Fiore is surprisingly less **** than she makes it appear, Emerson is more skilled than he makes it look, Anne is okay and Victor is too. I mean it's not Oscar worthy but it's not "Lymle" or "Phaze" levels of bad either. And the story isn't that bad too - at least to the point I was in I got interested - and I could try to go further once I get beyond the suckiness.

    Other good things are the large amounts of good voice acting, interactions with your companions, smooth but barebone graphics that at least remain at a stable 60 fps, combat with 7 people which is a nice difference and the usual mix of sci-fi and fantasy where we can play the fantasy side first - I think only star ocean 1 and 2 made you play from the part of the fantasy dwellers first, and in 2 you could choose which characters to go with first.

    Anyway, that's the good stuff so let's talk about bad because there are plenty!

    Star Ocean has always been fast-paced action combat by using 2 buttons in different ranges and that's it: there wasn't much else to learn and it worked pretty fun. It's still the same now but with a difference: skills take a century and a half to cast or perform and this makes combat less fluid than you might think. Even the first skill you use, Double Slash, is extremely slow at performing and it's a 2hit combo!

    There are 7 people in combat, which is nice, but one will never fight so you actually have 6 people fighting and one buffing all the time. I feel that if they looked at Suikoden they would've learned a lot more in making passive fighters but instead, Relia is a character you'll be pumping with passive roles.

    Oh right, the roles: instead of giving your characters orders now you can only give them roles, which are actual buffs and passives that you level up...I fail to see the point of this: why not just give them actual orders? Why square does have to overcomplicate everything?!

    Speaking of overcomplicated: quests are needed if you want to learn new abilities and skills. Yes, you heard it right: abilities (like compounding, smithing, gathering, emoting, etc) and skills (the ones you use in combat) are learned from books and said books can come from quests or chests. I wouldn't complain if quests weren't a pain to complete...but of course they are sucky and requires a lot of backtracking and they knew nobody would do them. So they ended up locking important stuff behind it. I can't say it's not brilliant manipulation at least!

    Also, at least to the point, I'm in (13 hours) I could NOT teleport or move anywhere freely which means backtracking on foot and let me tell you that you run so slow you NEED to hold the sprint button to make it more bearable. Problem with sprint? It's on the circle button which means you cannot reposition your camera while you sprint - in SO4 the sprint was a dash that you couldn't control, which made sense. Again, more chores to a game full of chores.

    Another issue with combat is that you can switch control to anyone you desire but outside of combat you will always return to Fidel, which is not the problem: the problem is that you enter combat without loading and this means that whenever you start a fight the camera will jerk around from Fidel to X then X to Fidel: this is really stressing on your eyes as you can feel motion sick and even eye strain!
    In addition, since I like using long ranged fighters, I ALWAYS have to move because as soon as I get into combat I'm beyond the edge and an escape meter appears as if I want to escape.
    They didn't even properly test this game.

    I just can't even...seriously just forget this game: it's clear as day they cut the funds and made it barely work just for the sake of it. Square only cares for Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts and Dragon Quest, and it shows - actually not really because FF15 and KH3 are also rushed but whatever.

    If anything this means SO4 is no longer the worst one so go ahead and pick that one up: I'll take Lymle's M'kay and Phaze bootlicking every day if it means to play a better game.    … Expand
  2. DeLeon
    Jun 28, 2016
    4
    The game is actually good. Yes it may not be the kind of RPG everyone could enjoy like FF VII, the Witcher or Xenoblade but it's worth it. Critics have been too harsh
  3. TsukasaHiiragi
    Jun 28, 2016
    4
    Strictly for SO fans only, even the fans will have to try really hard to like Integrity and Faithlessness, the entire game feels rushed, and feels like Squeenix axed a huge chunk of the game because its short, really short- overall, its disappointing.
  4. Vanillabear
    Jul 5, 2016
    4
    First of all this game is nowhere near a 10 and this is coming from a big fan of the series.

    Nothing about this game is very special, the world is actually tiny (maybe 10 zones if i'm being generous) and the games length for me was 16 hours with 70% of side quests complete. There is little to no character development, Story is very rushed, Combat is extremely easy when you unlock    First of all this game is nowhere near a 10 and this is coming from a big fan of the series.

    Nothing about this game is very special, the world is actually tiny (maybe 10 zones if i'm being generous) and the games length for me was 16 hours with 70% of side quests complete.

    There is little to no character development, Story is very rushed, Combat is extremely easy when you unlock something called "berserker" as all you have to do on hard is spam circle and the side quests are VERY uninspired.

    Music is not memorable and the camera is your biggest enemy in the entire game with it's constant jolting and random zooming in and out, You can't do anything to stop this so be warned.

    If you do take this bullet to the heart then i warn you to save often as it does crash when you use a certain item (Communicator)

    Grab the game second hand and it will probably be worth it, Don't buy it at full price as it does NOT deliver as a jrpg.    … Expand
  5. stevRaJah
    Jul 12, 2020
    4
    It’s just not nothing going for it. Bland locales, an endless supply of ‘kill this’ or ‘collect this’ side missions, bland characters, a bad story, etc etc. Worst of all however: it’s good enough to introduce seamless battles, but still dumb enough to allow six party members on screen at one time. The endless parade of grind kills are annoying enough, but this game will throw endlessIt’s just not nothing going for it. Bland locales, an endless supply of ‘kill this’ or ‘collect this’ side missions, bland characters, a bad story, etc etc. Worst of all however: it’s good enough to introduce seamless battles, but still dumb enough to allow six party members on screen at one time. The endless parade of grind kills are annoying enough, but this game will throw endless spawning enemy sections, and ‘protect this person’ sections at you whenever justifiable. You’ll have zero clue as to what’s happening for the majority of the scripted battles as all 5 of you’re party members will be spamming special moves and yelling over each other while you either stomp the baddies into dust, or slowly die one at a time from one supremely overpowered enemy.… Expand
  6. Prrgangsta
    Jun 28, 2016
    4
    This game is a hazard buy even if you are a fan of the series it was as if the creators are slowly turning this game into an mmo from the lack of narrative and cutscenes to the insane battle system. The story is uninteresting and the maps are big but lifeless and empty. Enemy placement is predictable and missions are mostly fetch quests that are tedious and boring. The only good i couldThis game is a hazard buy even if you are a fan of the series it was as if the creators are slowly turning this game into an mmo from the lack of narrative and cutscenes to the insane battle system. The story is uninteresting and the maps are big but lifeless and empty. Enemy placement is predictable and missions are mostly fetch quests that are tedious and boring. The only good i could see was building up my characters skills and abilities my own way.… Expand
  7. peropify
    Mar 15, 2017
    4
    The most disappointing game of 2016. As a lover of JRPGs, and a fan of "The Last Hope", I was keen to pick this up day one. Unfortunately, the game reeks of poor effort on the dev side, with an empty game world that did not match the character models, and bleak story. The battle system had great potential, but was mired with skill exploitations, The game feels like it was unfinished to beThe most disappointing game of 2016. As a lover of JRPGs, and a fan of "The Last Hope", I was keen to pick this up day one. Unfortunately, the game reeks of poor effort on the dev side, with an empty game world that did not match the character models, and bleak story. The battle system had great potential, but was mired with skill exploitations, The game feels like it was unfinished to be honest - a beta game. Wondering if something happened. But there is no doubt the polish was lacking, and you should not waste your time picking this one up at all.… Expand
  8. Huntaku
    Jun 30, 2016
    4
    Oh boy, where should I start. As someone who really loved the last hope on the 360 I had very mixed feelings with this one. Aside from the combat and anything that is linked to it (character building, AI, etc.) everything else is wrong in this game.

    Story: Story is laughable, its soo basic that even the developers couldnt stretch it out to last more than 25 hours. None of the    Oh boy, where should I start. As someone who really loved the last hope on the 360 I had very mixed feelings with this one. Aside from the combat and anything that is linked to it (character building, AI, etc.) everything else is wrong in this game.

    Story: Story is laughable, its soo basic that even the developers couldnt stretch it out to last more than 25 hours. None of the characters are memorable, they all have a single trait. Worse is the actual main character who doesnt even have 1. He rarely speaks and if he does its just bare bone generic reactions to another character or an event. You barely have any cutscenes because its replaced with in game active cutscenes where you can move around, while the other characters going blah blah blah. Also since you are in control, in order to see some bare bone facial reactions, you have to pose and move the camera so you can see that one character, buy you dont want to do that because the lipsinching is horrible no matter if you roll with the english or the japanese language.

    Graphics: I usually dont really care much about the graphics. It's a mix bagged to be honest. When its battle time and you have more than 6 characters in your party the game looks awesome, with all the magic effects and other effects going on. Outside of combat however, the game looks nowhere near as good.

    Gameplay: Now with all that bad out of the way, as I mentioned at the beginning, the combat it self is pretty awesome, especially when you go up against a boss fight in the RAID like Cathedral missions. Your partner AI is pretty good over all, depending on the roles you give them, which you have a TON to choose from btw so building a good DPS, or a deceant healer can make the fights much easier. For example Mage DPS characters will keep their distances from the enemy and not just mindlessly cast spells till they die, healers prioritize characters under attack or ones with the lowest hp. If you give your characters a descent set up, than they can even handle the battle alone without even you doing anything. Really the only complain I have is that holding aggro is impossible because when a character hits a blocking enemy with a light attack, the enemy automatically starts attacking that character no matter if he/she only attacked that one time (or is a mile away), and tanks have no way to hold aggro they have to follow and deal enough damage to that enemy again to get aggro off of the other character. Also while battles are fun, they can be pretty easy unless you handicap your self.

    Overall, with the horrible story, generic stereotipical characters, and mediocre graphics its really hard to recommend at full price. The only reason why it gets a 4 out of 10 is the enjoyable battles you can have which is surprisingly enough to keep you playing while you torture yourself with the abysmally short and horribly written 20-25 hour "story"    … Expand
  9. Dubeau
    Apr 6, 2018
    4
    SOIF is a cheap rpg game. I say cheap because it is truffle with bad decisions and lower production value everywhere. The overall UI is good. The crafting is average and almost useless. The fighting is rather decent when it is done in sufficient spaces. There is a flagrant problem with the vertical shaky camera when exploring. The save point are just so badly place. The story does theSOIF is a cheap rpg game. I say cheap because it is truffle with bad decisions and lower production value everywhere. The overall UI is good. The crafting is average and almost useless. The fighting is rather decent when it is done in sufficient spaces. There is a flagrant problem with the vertical shaky camera when exploring. The save point are just so badly place. The story does the space scenes with tactical jargon and conversations. they are long and horrible to watch. So forget any planets exploration, space scenes. All the villains are ridiculous in appearance and dubbed with atrocious voice overs. The missions where you have to protect Anne or anyone, don't work well. Most of the time you have to fight the camera position in fights. It swings widely and you loose the view on your character. The story itself is devoid of emotions because of the robotic facial animations. There is very little positive to go on about this RPG. The main characters have good voice, the mechanics behind the game is present and working. But is it worth the frustrations ? I give it a 45%...and I feel generous because I am in denial of having payed 40$ for this cr...… Expand
  10. Droplesgantsfgc
    Jan 28, 2021
    4
    For fans of the series, this installment is nothing short of a massive dissapointment. Most of the combat mechanics (and character archetype, right down to the moveset) are reused assets from Till the end of time. So even if the mechanics and moves are reused, Star Ocean shines on its storytelling prowess,I hear you say.

    well, the story has been drasticaly scaled down to a rather    For fans of the series, this installment is nothing short of a massive dissapointment. Most of the combat mechanics (and character archetype, right down to the moveset) are reused assets from Till the end of time. So even if the mechanics and moves are reused, Star Ocean shines on its storytelling prowess,I hear you say.

    well, the story has been drasticaly scaled down to a rather personal story of 6 cardboard cutouts and one little girl (oh wait 2) who constantly gets captured so you have to rescue her. no kidding this story beat is repeated 3 times in a short 30-40 hours rpg. Hell, your princess is in another castle. Villains motivations are non-sensical, heroes are pale shonen anime clichés(you got the bland protag, childhood friend who has a crush on protag to his obliviousness, sexy mage girl, womanizing booze swindling gruff military man, beautyfull stoic science lady, even blander rival and mistycal weapon misterious little girl)and there are no innovations in the core mechanics known to the series. add in unskipable cutscenes and cheap battles (protect Anne anyones?) and you got yourself a recipe for a mediocre,series killing RPG.

    faithlessness wmeans to believe in something with faith or having no faith in something.

    this might be a cheeky message from the dev team, letting us know they had no integrity while developping this game and had no faith in its quality.    … Expand
  11. Vachekiri
    Mar 5, 2021
    4
    Ce jeu est une purge. Tu passes 95% du temps à spammer une touche comme un idiot. La plus part des combats sont bidons puis d'un coup tu tombes sur des mobs surpuissants qui te démontent en 30sec. Et l'IA autant pas en parler c'est pas mieux. Bref les bons rpg deviennent de plus en plus rares... Ah oui aussi, aucune carte du monde. Pour un rpg c'est le top du top
  12. Juliosouza1988
    Oct 26, 2022
    4
    Decepção é a palavra chave nesse jogo. Cheio de bugs , história ridícula de chata e uma campanha de um pouco mais de 20 horas. Pontos possitivos ? O gráfico.
  13. Tintler
    Jul 21, 2023
    4
    Uzun zamandır bir oyunda gördüğüm en kötü kamera kontrolüne sahip, kamera ana karakterin görüş açısına paralel gitmeye çalışıyor fakat hareket ettiğiniz alan engebeliyse bir aşağı bir yukarı mide bulantısına yol açıyor. Çok kolay çözülebilecek bir sorun, internette bakarsanız başkalarının da bu konu hakkında rahatsız olduğunu görebilirsiniz. Diğer bir konu ise, biraz deneysel gidipUzun zamandır bir oyunda gördüğüm en kötü kamera kontrolüne sahip, kamera ana karakterin görüş açısına paralel gitmeye çalışıyor fakat hareket ettiğiniz alan engebeliyse bir aşağı bir yukarı mide bulantısına yol açıyor. Çok kolay çözülebilecek bir sorun, internette bakarsanız başkalarının da bu konu hakkında rahatsız olduğunu görebilirsiniz. Diğer bir konu ise, biraz deneysel gidip ara-sahne koymak yerine bu sahneleri oyun devam ederken koymayı tercih etmişler, keşke böyle yapmak yerine ara sahne koysalarmış. Bu iki nedenden dolayı kırıyorum puanın. Bunun dışında hikayesi, seslendirmeleri, grafikleri klasik AA action jrpg bunları ne iyi ne de kötü yapıyor. Beğendiğim nokta ise savaşlarda tüm parti üyelerinin kullanılabilir olması, sadece 3-4 kişi ile kısıtlamıyor ve ekranda 7 kişiyi de görüyorsunuz. Bunun dışında role sistemi de çok güzel olmuş, role sistemi sayesinde oyunun ortalarına doğru resmen oyunu bozan bir build yaptım ve hiç zorlanmadan bitirdim.… Expand
  14. Azeriel
    Jun 28, 2016
    3
    Let me preface this as a long time fan of the Star Ocean series and JRPG in general - which means I'm used to whatever spectacle any JRPG titles is going to throw my way, grinding, impossible boss fight, you name it).

    You know you messed up this series when you introduce space travel in the last 30% of your game, when the game itself was about space travel in the first place. 8    Let me preface this as a long time fan of the Star Ocean series and JRPG in general - which means I'm used to whatever spectacle any JRPG titles is going to throw my way, grinding, impossible boss fight, you name it).

    You know you messed up this series when you introduce space travel in the last 30% of your game, when the game itself was about space travel in the first place.

    8 hours in, and the first thing I have to say is this: Activate the Japanese voice actors right away because whoever is doing the North American VA apparently has lost their souls. This does not help the fact that the first two heroes in the game (Miki and Fidel) are as bland as a sack of potato. Previous gen graphic, mediocre combat, soulless acting, average story, empty map and a lot of pointless travelling that falsely pushed this game for 20 hours+ of game play.

    This game feels like they had a lot of experimental ideas but felt rushed to completion without properly fulfilling those ideas. What a shame because it could have been great.

    As a fan of previous Star Ocean series, I had high hopes for this. But this is a swing and a miss, wait for a sale.    … Expand
  15. tomvs123
    Feb 27, 2019
    3
    Yeah, it's bad, but it's a different sort of bad than I'm used to, which at least makes it interesting.

    I'll get to the good first: - The character models and overall graphical fidelity is great, compared to other JRPGs. - The story only has small plot holes and a low amount of unbelievability, compared to some recent high-profile JRPGs (Persona) that have huge plot holes and    Yeah, it's bad, but it's a different sort of bad than I'm used to, which at least makes it interesting.

    I'll get to the good first:

    - The character models and overall graphical fidelity is great, compared to other JRPGs.
    - The story only has small plot holes and a low amount of unbelievability, compared to some recent high-profile JRPGs (Persona) that have huge plot holes and completely unbelievable character motivations.
    - You only have to put up with the generic story and bad combat for ~20 hours before it's over.

    I play JRPGs for their stories and this is one of the lowest effort stories I've experienced. Most SNES JRPGs have more interesting and involved stories than this one. Character backgrounds are nearly nonexistent. Worldbuilding (through gameplay and cut scenes) is thread-bare and seems to assume that you know how generic JRPG worlds are supposed to work.

    Your main goal in the game is to rescue a magical girl, that you just happened to stumble upon, and who subsequently got kidnapped. The magical girl is of course being used by the big bad guy who wants to rule the universe and you eventually have to kill him. That's really it and you're fast-tracked along this path and given great authority within the universe, even though you're a country bumpkin from a planet that doesn't even know that other planets exist.

    Your dealings with the people and governments on your planet and on other planets is limited, so you never get a full sense of the scale of your world or the universe. The aliens you meet are essentially humans with the same societal structure and moral guidelines as you, which is strange. You also spend 90% of the game exploring your own planet. The other 10% is spent on a spaceship and an asteroid. There's no other planets to explore.

    The story isn't bad. It's just incredibly basic, and might only be interesting if you've never played a JRPG before.

    The combat, on normal difficulty, is a mess. At 5 hours in, I realized that the combat is geared towards leveling your character. If you don't do each and every one of the optional side quests, you'll be under-leveled and will be constantly one-shot by regular enemies. The side quests consist only of killing certain monsters or getting monster drops and turning them in to a bulletin board. If that doesn't sound interesting to you, then choose Easy mode - You can't change difficulty levels after the game starts.

    Additionally, if you don't buy upgraded weapons and armor at every opportunity, you'll have a bad time. At one point, I didn't realize that a shop had new weapons (a shop that I had just bought new weapons from 30 minutes prior), so I had a very difficult time with the next hour of gameplay, where I was locked into completing the section and couldn't go back.

    Your party's battle AI is horrid. While playing, I had flashbacks from when I used to play MMORPGs, where I would be the healer and would be in a group full of damage dealers who couldn't maintain monster aggro. They'd all constantly die and I'd spend my time resurrecting and healing, while kiting monsters around. That's exactly how I played this game, and was actually the best strategy I found for boss fights. In short, your AI party members will bunch up, all die from the same attack, and will almost never guard. Healers also like to stand around occasionally instead of heal. Unless you're over-leveled, you'll need to manually take control of your main damage dealers and healers to make sure they're not doing something stupid.

    That's all I've got. There's not much else to the game. It definitely feels like a start-up indie developer effort, but with high graphical production values.    … Expand
  16. EdBaker
    Jul 3, 2016
    3
    I am a huge fan of the star ocean franchise, while slightly disappointed in the last entry I still enjoyed it and hoped this newest title would be a return to form. Unfortunately this half assed production is the final nail in the coffin for me.

    Lets go down the list. From the very beginning you'll notice star ocean's lack of traditional cutscenes, instead opting for a system where    I am a huge fan of the star ocean franchise, while slightly disappointed in the last entry I still enjoyed it and hoped this newest title would be a return to form. Unfortunately this half assed production is the final nail in the coffin for me.

    Lets go down the list.

    From the very beginning you'll notice star ocean's lack of traditional cutscenes, instead opting for a system where the player can still move around while characters talk around him. While I understand the need to try to innovate here, all this does is create problems. The worst problem by far is that you cannot skip any dialogue, which you will want to do rather quickly after subjecting yourself to the poor english voice acting, thankfully the game includes japanese voiceovers to help mitigate this.

    The second problem is this third person perspective during "cutscenes" makes it impossible to see any details on anyone's face, which kills any sense of immersion. Often times your protagonist will be facing the wrong direction while people talk to him, and the animations become disjointed during the dialogue. I assume the traditional camera cutscenes were removed in order to hide the ugly character models, as the squinty gnome like faces are a stark contrast to the bright wide eyed traditional anime style.

    Next the combat system, in the very first tutorial battle this combat system shows some promise. The rock paper scissors design of light attacks, heavy attacks and counter attacks seems flawless on paper, and in this tutorial battle seems to work very well giving this that simple but difficult to master feel. However it takes very few battles to realize that in the chaos of combat you can hardly see what the hell is going on with all the spell effects monsters and party members flying around. The camera flies around zooming in and out, often obscuring vision of the character you're controlling, and attack animations all feel sluggish and unresponsive.

    The combat in this game eventually devolves into a situation where you spam your heavy attack assigned combat skill until the battles end, since you only ever get punished for when they block light attacks. There is no challenge whatsoever to encounters as the enemies eventually just feel like damage sponges. While this system is similar to the mechanics of older star ocean titles, it presents no challenge whatsoever nor any motivation to master the system in place. While other JRPG franchises have expanded their combat systems, this step backwards in design is a huge failing. In the older generation of JRPG's dominated with turn based combat it worked, but in a world with incredible fighting mechanics like the "Tales of " series this combat is brain-dead and lifeless in comparison.

    Finally even the story cannot save this game. Classic star ocean titles have always mixed the sci fi and fantasy genre, some more successful than others. Star Ocean 5 puts a spin on the classic formula of having the protagonist stranded on a unknown fantasy world, and instead puts you in the shoes of an inhabitant of these fantasy worlds being manipulated by unknown enemies with advanced technology. While an interesting set up the story is muddied by it's fast pace, which has you backtracking between a handful of locations. For example when i was told to head to the front lines of the war i expected this to be the beginning of a journey as most fantasy rpg's do where you get to learn about the world and your companions, as you visit the different locations and meet people, but here you just walk west for 10 seconds of a map you've explored three times already.

    The game takes no risks with its character and game elements either. It has a protagonist swordsman, childhood friend magic user, little girl who's attached to the protagonist, busty witch magic user, and more uninteresting archetypes who try to capture your nostalgia. It even has the "free time" mechanic in which you and your party members split up in town allowing you to interact with them individually to learn more about them. However these interactions take the form of dialogue bubbles over their heads with no emotional impact, from a third person view, no facial expressions, nothing just blurbs of text over their heads. The nostalgic elements of this game only serve to remind me that Tri Ace can do better.

    The best thing i can say about this game is that it is playable, unless the third person camera's constant stuttering makes you motion sick. How they have the gall to charge $60 for their 20-30 hour campaign when other titles in this space generally run about 40-60 is a testament to the kind of game this is, one focused on taxing fans of the franchise while putting in as little work as possible.

    Compared to other games in the genre Star Ocean V is well below average and completely shatters any faith i had for the studio to create a premium JRPG experience. At it's very best it simply exists to help you scratch an itch, a true bargain bin title.    … Expand
  17. rpgmaster28
    Feb 9, 2017
    3
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. I'm giving this game a 3 because the combat AND the story are just....bad. How many people have to get shot before SOMEONE puts on some armor? The combat is a mess. You've got SEVEN characters on the field, and there's a manual option for some reason! WHY!? They thought of that, but there is NO WAY to mark the enemy I want to kill! Your party attacks whatever enemy they want. That's just unforgivable. There's so many BETTER RPGs for the playstation and playstation 2 that gave you a way to tell all of your party members to attack ONE enemy.
    Here's the spoilers, the story is cliched as heck. "You killed my father!" was a cliche back in the 1960s. Yes, the father dies. The father always dies. I don't know why that's a spoiler. What's worse is, he gets shot. The main love interest girl, ALSO gets shot earlier. But NO ONE decided, "Hey, Let's put on some armor!" How did the dad even make it to 40 or 50 as a soldier without getting killed!? I could see if he had armor on, and he got killed by magic missiles. Nope, it was one bullet.    … Expand
  18. ObsidianLion
    May 29, 2018
    3
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. The good about this game. Music. Characters Emmerson and Anne. The end.

    The bad.

    The plot.

    You find a girl in a crashed spaceship and save her, effectively stealing her from a mysterious enemy. Enemy steals her from you. You steal her from them. They steal her from you. You steal her from them. They take the girls twin sister and you keep yours. You embark to get the twin. 18 hours later, the game ends. This is one of the worst RPG stories I have played in my 25 years of gaming.

    You wanna know how bad the writing is? At one point the girl is being shot at by an enemy using magic. The protagonist's father blocks the shot by getting shot in the back. He and the girl are kidnapped. RIGHT AFTER THAT you go to rescue them. You find the girl and dad, enemy appears, tells his lackeys to shoot your team, the girl is AGAIN PROTECTED BY THE SAME GUY IN THE SAME WAY AND GETS SHOT IN THE BACK AGAIN!

    Dropped plot points all over the place.
    1. There is a war your country is facing? Who cares, go find out why the mysterious girl has powers. Mid game at a crucial point of the war, you never hear about the war again.
    2. You are introduced to the continent with 3 countries. You never see the leader of any of them. Your country is lead by your father who dies later on. The man who is his pupil and most qualified replacement joins your team. Who leads the country in this crisis where the country doesn't have a capable military leader anymore? No one. Why would you care.
    3. The game introduces you to the main character and his best friend Ted. The best friend never does anything. He keeps saying the same sentence after you leave the first town. He is voiced but his character leads nowhere but giving you 3 quests not related to him.
    4. The country allied with yours is super advanced to the point that it is immersion breaking. Imagine, your kingdom is middle aged castles, allied country has a crashed space ship with automatic opening doors, biometric scanners, magical runes, floating statues. Where did this come from? Who cares. Play the game.

    Bad game design.

    1. The game has a item creation option. It's grayed out at the beginning of the game, in the menu. I finished the game never found out how to unlock item creation. So much for that. Never felt I needed it.
    2. You can unlock mining. Never found out how to unlock it, never needed it. There are around 40 specialties (skills in the game). I unlocked maybe 10 and finished the game. You get these from side quests only. No one ever mentions that. You can literally finish the game not unlocking anything due to this.
    3. The game has a super move gauge that you can fill up and use up to deal huge damage. I needed it only twice. I have not even seen the ultimate moves of all of my characters. As the gauge fills, you increase exp gained at the end of the game. 450% exp boost for every won battle is so good that it is not worth wasting it to damage some enemies in one battle and refill it again (which can take a long time late game when you destroy enemies).
    4. The game has the option to switch between your 6 controllable characters in battle. I only used this in the last hour and a half of the game. Not needed before that.
    5. The game has battle skills. I finished 80% of the game using my first basic skill which knocks the enemy in the air.
    6. There are items to remove status effects. I never saw more than 3 status effects, poison, fog and silence.
    7. The game has single use magic cards that you can use to do a magic spell in game. Never needed them.
    8. The characters look the same no matter what you equip, BUT, every armor and weapon in the menu has a unique look.
    9. The game has a social aspect where the group would scatter in a town with some dialogue options. This lead nowhere.
    10. There game has an encyclopedia, a glossary, a quest list, a synopsis, yet you can not look up enemies. I can look up weapons and armor, items and crafting items, but not enemies.
    11. The game has around 25 different looking enemy types (bosses included). They cycle colors as they get more difficult. Effort.
    12. There are a total of 12 locations though the story. A dessert, a grassy field, a beach, a coastal path, a icy mountain path, a normal mountain path and 3 cities and 3 underground labs that look the same. This is in a game called Star Ocean, which offered other planets to visit in previous games.
    13. Game has a rock-paper-scissors battle mechanic. Guard, light attack and strong attack. The game has so many effects you will not be able to see what the enemy is doing, you end up pressing light attack and using special moves.
    14. Literally all 3 major villains are crazy.
    15. Party emotional progression. From being friends when game starts to asking for marriage with zero cutscenes in between. No buildup. It looked forced. Nuff said    … Expand
  19. Sharingan1
    Jun 28, 2023
    3
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Every New Star ocean Getting Worse ,,
    This One Is Nightmare ..
    - Worse Story
    - Bad Charecters
    - Boring Cutscenes Ever
    - Big Monsters Not Stopping Atk You what ever you attack / Conter Them ,, They will keep atack you and Break you Bouns ,,,
    and now i'm having a Worse Nightmare for trying to get Platinum ,, Thanks to Square Enix For That ...
    If you really want to Realize How Bad this game is ,, Just Start Getting Platinum    … Expand
  20. pypes
    Jul 30, 2017
    2
    This isn't my first star ocean game but it may well be my last.

    An attempt to "update" what has always been the poor relation in the Squenix RPG stable, which has left behind all of the bugbears of RPGs past and added nothing of worth. The combat attempts to blend seamlessly with general running around, except it is still more than a little jarring, and while it can occasionally be    This isn't my first star ocean game but it may well be my last.

    An attempt to "update" what has always been the poor relation in the Squenix RPG stable, which has left behind all of the bugbears of RPGs past and added nothing of worth.

    The combat attempts to blend seamlessly with general running around, except it is still more than a little jarring, and while it can occasionally be fun for the most part it's mindless and a far cry from what a real action RPG has to offer.

    The overarching story isn't terrible, but with cookie cutter characters, weird pacing, a certain someone being kidnapped every 5 minutes, and a whole daddy issues subplot being foisted in and then resolved in the space of 20 minutes it's far from good.

    My main gripe however is with some fundamentally broken mechanics. All cutscenes are un-skippable, especially the long ones before boss fights. Saves take place at save points, which are frequently blocked and you'll often be expected to complete 2 consecutive boss (or otherwise instant fail) fights between saves. There's a role system that lets you create some extremely broken (in a good way) builds, but it's never properly explained, and certain bosses will resort to spamming massive AoE attacks every 5 seconds if the AI decides this is a good idea.

    I honestly can;t bring myself to finish it at this point. It's the old sunk time / cost trap, a platinum will cost you 3 play-throughs and 100 hours +, very little of it is fun.

    I can honestly say the thing I enjoyed the most was the costume design, the rest is somewhere between passable and infuriating. Don't kids yourself that this is just a "hard" game, or that I'm whinging about JRPG staples, this is honestly a really really bad game.    … Expand
  21. fallouts
    Jul 1, 2016
    2
    This is a very low grade JRPG from an industry that has failed to innovate. The writing and character development is juvenile and lacking when compared to games like Witcher 3 and Dragon Age. The game play is a complete joke compared to games that offer tons of choices and open ended approach to situations like Divinity the original sin. The graphics are nice so it gets a 2 in that area.This is a very low grade JRPG from an industry that has failed to innovate. The writing and character development is juvenile and lacking when compared to games like Witcher 3 and Dragon Age. The game play is a complete joke compared to games that offer tons of choices and open ended approach to situations like Divinity the original sin. The graphics are nice so it gets a 2 in that area. Skip this and save your 60 bucks.

    Note: Please hit my username and see my other reviews and like if you find them useful.    … Expand
  22. Brandon_Harris
    Jul 3, 2016
    2
    I played through this game and simply asked myself, "Why did they do this?" There's just too many poor decisions from the developers of this title that really made me shake my head in disgust.

    I've played through Star Ocean since its second game. This game runs well on my PS4. I didn't observe any dips in my framerate. Cut scenes in this game mostly occur while you're in control of your    I played through this game and simply asked myself, "Why did they do this?" There's just too many poor decisions from the developers of this title that really made me shake my head in disgust.

    I've played through Star Ocean since its second game. This game runs well on my PS4. I didn't observe any dips in my framerate. Cut scenes in this game mostly occur while you're in control of your character, kind of like a third-person version of Half-Life 2.

    One shortcoming is that the game is just too short. It's not like a typical JRPG. Sometimes, I'd have my characters level up 10 times within a single dungeon. The storyline is very short, being only 20 hours. It's approximate to the length of The Last Story for the Wii, if you've played that title.

    Due to all battles occurring in the open world, the camera does have issues in certain places, somewhat like in Tales of Zestiria. The save points are acceptable in number, but they become locked during cut scenes. This is bad because there are instances where there's a boss, then a lengthy cut scene, then another boss, and you won't be able to save your game even though you see the save point.

    Compared to the previous title, this world is extremely linear. There is a fast travel system, but it's unlocked near the ending of the game. It's sad because there are plenty of side quests with optional mini-boss enemies, but it becomes annoying to run through the areas you previously visited to get there. Before you unlock fast travel, it's annoying because you may need to go through 4 or 5 maps to get from one city to another. There is an item creation system, but if the town you're in doesn't have the item you need, you'll need to spend a while going across the world to get to the city selling that item.

    There are "private actions", which are optional cut scenes where you can observe the protagonists interacting with each other. They're handled abysmally, with most of them not even being relevant to the story. There are about 300 - 400 private actions, and you need to run in and out of a building to unlock them because only one or two will show up at a time. Can you imagine running in and out of a building hundreds of times? One of the private actions had one character, standing alone, simply uttering the word, "kitty". Compared to the previous title, private actions are handled horribly. The previous title had only a dozen private actions, but each one there was actually a complete 5 - 10 minute cut scene that would be extremely relevant to the plot.

    People were very disappointed by this title, myself included. Often I see on message boards, "How far am I? I'm on the first planet," to which people would sadly respond, "There's only one planet", which is disappointing for a science fiction series of this calibre.

    The new game plus feature also could've been better. There are lore entries that are interesting to read, and the game records all enemies and items into the menus for you. But, although those records are kept when you make a new game, you need to pretty much collect everything else again. This title would've benefitted if they borrowed ideas on how the Tales series implemented the new game plus feature. Since most cut scenes are done while in control of your character, you'll have to spend hours waiting on scenes you've already seen if you want to replay the game. I would've liked to play the game on the hardest difficulty immediately, rather than having to go through two complete playthroughs just to unlock the hardest difficulty.

    There are several escort missions in the game, where you'll instantly lose and be forced to reload your save if one particular character dies. It becomes very frustrating because all of the enemies will instantly only target that one particular character and you'll be forced to find ways to "break" the game. Often you'll find minibosses during these escort sequences. This game actually has difficult/long boss battles, but very easy regular battles, somewhat like in the game Arc Rise Fantasia. It's just poor game design. You'll see random difficulty spikes throughout the game because of it and often you'll need to look up information online to find a way to beat the game.

    If you're a fan of JRPGs and the Star Ocean franchise, buy it when it goes down in price. At first I thought all the hate was unwarranted, but even as I played through the game I felt bored, to the point where I'd bring my laptop and watch a show while running through an old dungeon again to get to the city due to no fast travel for the majority of the game.

    Looking ahead, it seems this title confirmed that both the Star Ocean and the Valkyrie Profile series are dead. To be fair, Star Ocean was pretty much dead from its fourth game's poor reception anyways. It's an utter shame, since the majority of the JRPG IP's from my youth have been laid to rest. Another one bites the dust.    … Expand
  23. accessaccess
    Jul 16, 2016
    2
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. The game deserves a 2.

    I'll grant it 2 points for it's battle system which is seamlessly tied into the world and was refreshing because you didn't have to stow or manage character participants. Everyone participated 100% of the time which means that there were no "wasted builds" or situational regrets for not having someone in the party due to simply being a first-time player. The SP system allowed for adequate grinding and the option to trade exp. for other elements was a good move plus the title system felt intuitive and it made sense to build certain roles and gave expected results.

    I'll deduct 2 points for the story which was rushed and the pacing was poor. The beginning of the game was fine, very standard pacing, but the middle of the game really felt dry regarding the whole "daddy" element and going ten minutes in game play between the beginning of that conflict and the end including the revenge which felt awkward at best. Same with the whole final dungeon; it just never felt like a final dungeon and when I played it I felt let down to say the least.

    I'll deduct 2 points for the music. Some of it was in previous games for the dungeons and obviously so. It felt lazy to me and the original tracks were just not good to begin with. Unacceptable.

    I'll deduct 2 points for the Characterization. They characters had awkward depths and massive inconsistencies. It never panned out correctly. Fidel and daddy for instance was just not good for an In Media Res type relationship and nothing really came of the whole system of individuals. Nothing felt too terribly compelling.

    I'll deduct 2 points for the environments. Again, beginning of the game, it was standard and semi-interesting but soon it becomes clear there are no maps. The number of areas in the game is fewer than any of the previous games and even if "larger" that size difference doesn't make up for the diversity problem. You went from field to field. You had four or so legitimate dungeons on Faykreed: Signescila, Slaughtery, Kronos 1 and 2. That's it. There are actually no other dungeons in the game. All other areas are throughports including W. Dekaav Tunnel.

    Overall there was no glue to the game to make it an RPG. I still love the game's seamless battle system and I almost rated it higher because of the weight it has in my enjoyment but being fair and keeping things even I realized rather swiftly that I wish I had just Gamefly'd it and sent it back.    … Expand
  24. Gaudy
    Jan 7, 2021
    2
    Muy aburrido. De lo peor de la Saga Star Ocean, decepcionante para los seguidores. Graficamente obsoleto, parece de PS2. El diseño de los personajes es mediocre y son puros estereotipos. El mundo a investigar, muy aburrido y sin encanto ninguno, vacio. No apetece explorar, se hace pesado. El sistema de combate se hace repetitivo, totalmente roto y mal nivelado. Enemigos randon muyMuy aburrido. De lo peor de la Saga Star Ocean, decepcionante para los seguidores. Graficamente obsoleto, parece de PS2. El diseño de los personajes es mediocre y son puros estereotipos. El mundo a investigar, muy aburrido y sin encanto ninguno, vacio. No apetece explorar, se hace pesado. El sistema de combate se hace repetitivo, totalmente roto y mal nivelado. Enemigos randon muy faciles y jefes de repente imposibles, totalmente descompensado. Traduccion en ingles, sin español. De los peores J-RPJs que he jugado.… Expand
  25. Melopahn
    Jul 2, 2016
    1
    Do Not purchase this game for more than $20.

    Easily the shortest JRPG I've ever encountered, if you count the revisitable screens its 11, towns is 3, there are like 2 or 3 dungeons that you only get to be in while you are in that part of the story. The majority of the main story could be accomplished in 10 hours less if you could skip the boring cutscenes. They do an entire space    Do Not purchase this game for more than $20.

    Easily the shortest JRPG I've ever encountered, if you count the revisitable screens its 11, towns is 3, there are like 2 or 3 dungeons that you only get to be in while you are in that part of the story. The majority of the main story could be accomplished in 10 hours less if you could skip the boring cutscenes. They do an entire space battle through the cunning use of dialogue.
    "Fire torpedoes, we've taken down the enemy." I hope you enjoyed your amazing space battle that visually was a wall of a ship."

    This alone makes it the worst star ocean game ive ever played, the worst JRPG ive ever played, and the worst PS4 game. You couldn't **** animate a space battle for us to watch... really? **** REALLY? why do i sit in a **** room doing nothing, where is my space battle this is star **** ocean.

    The game never gets any better, ever. Honestly they should be hung for making and releasing this game.    … Expand
  26. rhansonn
    Jul 10, 2016
    1
    Maybe TriAce set the bar high with Star Ocean: The Last Hope (which was absolutely phenomenal), but this game seems like just a quick-n-dirty installment to what is normally a great series.

    The majority of your time will be running back-and-fourth between the same handful of cities doing mindless fetch-quests and listening to what seems like meaningless chit-chat between your    Maybe TriAce set the bar high with Star Ocean: The Last Hope (which was absolutely phenomenal), but this game seems like just a quick-n-dirty installment to what is normally a great series.

    The majority of your time will be running back-and-fourth between the same handful of cities doing mindless fetch-quests and listening to what seems like meaningless chit-chat between your characters; from a game mechanic perspective, it felt like it was they're way of portraying your teammates back-story (which was rather weak considering the previous Star Ocean).

    Considering this is the first of the installment for the new game console generation, the game engine itself was majorly lacking. In fact the graphical quality seems pretty much the same as The Last Hope; maybe it's just being a graphics and front-end enthusiast, but I for one was hoping for better with the latest processing power of the new consoles. Also, the game's camera work can seriously use refinement, most of the time I found myself fussing with the bouncy unreasonable-re-setting camera so much that I found the game easier to play while staring at the small mini-map the whole time instead (UX team, hello!?).

    The battle mechanics was also a degradation from The Last Hope - having spent hours doing nothing but focusing on counter-attacks for the SP-boost, then seeing it all lost at the next boss fight was just depressing. Since the camera is unreasonably tough to control during a battle, and their Rock-Paper-Scissors mechanic relies on you concentrating on your opponents (through the random flashes of color and effects taking up the whole screen); I seemed better off forgetting about the battle mechanics all together and just hitting my strongest moves over and over. (At this point I gave up thinking this might be a good game - all game mechanics have proved either un-usable or just plain and simple time-wasters, being there only to extend the duration of the game [aka: Boring!]).

    When I finally came to the end of the game and reflected what just happened to one of my favorite RPG series, it saddens me to see such a beautiful series succumb to the mindless ethics of the AAA game industry; This one was really nothing more than a quick buck.    … Expand
  27. LucianoBAKA
    Jul 4, 2016
    1
    I've just created an account here because I am too pissed off with this game...

    This is nothing like an Old School RPG, nor like a current gen RPG. It tries to mix those two styles but dies in the middle. I just can't see anything memorable nor enjoyable in this tittle. Story is not existent, graphics are meh, camera is clunky, acting has no soul, characters are generic, lot of    I've just created an account here because I am too pissed off with this game...

    This is nothing like an Old School RPG, nor like a current gen RPG.
    It tries to mix those two styles but dies in the middle.
    I just can't see anything memorable nor enjoyable in this tittle.
    Story is not existent, graphics are meh, camera is clunky, acting has no soul, characters are generic, lot of loading screens... and I could go on forever...
    The developers didn't even try.
    Even they used the PS4 system save to save the progress.
    This game is a pile of crap...sorry...
    And don't say the "IT'S AND OLD SCHOOL" bulls***.

    I have to learn to not preorder anymore...    … Expand
  28. Jamesshen
    Nov 16, 2016
    1
    This is one of the worst RPG i ever played. The gaming system was very bad and the same thing goes to the characters. The only points that i give to this game is the beautiful scenery that it gives. Wont even bother to complete it. Completely waste of money
  29. Editman3
    Feb 25, 2017
    1
    Hello this is my first Star Ocean game hearing that this is a good series from Square after FF15 Disappointed us my brother decided to play Star Ocean 5 and boy was this WORSE than FF15 I mean in a nutshell

    -Bland Straightforward story with little to no twist or great moments -Lacks traditional star ocean mechanics (or that's what I heard) -Bland Characters -Escort Missions    Hello this is my first Star Ocean game hearing that this is a good series from Square after FF15 Disappointed us my brother decided to play Star Ocean 5 and boy was this WORSE than FF15 I mean in a nutshell

    -Bland Straightforward story with little to no twist or great moments
    -Lacks traditional star ocean mechanics (or that's what I heard)
    -Bland Characters
    -Escort Missions SUCCCCKKKKSSS!!!!!!
    -Combat Tales of series RIPOFF a two button masher combo
    -Lackluster environment
    -Little to no side quest
    -Annoying gameplay cutscenes OH THIS ONE I HAVE TO RANT ABOUT THIS
    THIS ONE SUCKS SO BAD MY BROTHER AND I WERE ANNOYED BY THIS PRACTICE YOU CAN'T SKIP GAMEPLAY CUTSCENES ESPECIALLY THOSE ESCORT MISSIONS which some last a minute or 5 and everytime we fail we have to watch the cutscene again fail watch the cut scene again wash rinse and repeat yeah someone at Square thought it was a great idea to sell this piece of junk for 60$ at launch good thing we got it at the Christmas sale :3 What really makes me hate this MECHANIC THE MOST SOMEONE AT SQUAREENIX THOUGH IT WAS A GREAT IDEA TO HAVE CUTSCENES AT THE SAVEPOINTS THE SECOND YOU SEE IT CAUSE GUESS WHAT ONCE YOU'RE CLOSE TO THE SAVEPOINT A GAMEPLAY CUTSCENE POPS UP AND YOU CAN'T GO AND SAVE YOU'RE GAME EVEN THOUGH THE SAVE POINT IS RIGHT UP CLOSE TO YOU BUT YET IT GOES RED AND YOU HAVE TO SIT IN A 5 MIN CUTSCENE TO DRAIN A PLAYERS EXPERIENCE WHAT'S REALLY A KICK IN THE NUTZ IS HOW SHALLOW THE TOWNS AND CITIES ARE THEIR LIFELESS :-'( I'm only giving it a 1 because of the job system that's it :(    … Expand
  30. Melkiades
    Apr 6, 2023
    1
    If you're a fan of JRPGs, it's hard not to be drawn to the genuine aesthetic and gameplay of Star Ocean Integrity and Faithlessness.

    However, it's not the low-budget graphics or the narrative that weighs this game down, but serious programming flaws. To illustrate it with an example, I had to stop my game in the middle because in combat, the game is programmed so that all the enemies    If you're a fan of JRPGs, it's hard not to be drawn to the genuine aesthetic and gameplay of Star Ocean Integrity and Faithlessness.

    However, it's not the low-budget graphics or the narrative that weighs this game down, but serious programming flaws.

    To illustrate it with an example, I had to stop my game in the middle because in combat, the game is programmed so that all the enemies attack the same character, whom the rest must protect. There is no way around this and I am aware that a large number of players have had to leave the game due to this issue.

    The result is a crappy JRPG, which should have been tested much more before launching it for sale. A big disappointment.    … Expand
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Awards & Rankings

46
#46 Most Discussed PS4 Game of 2016
47
#47 Most Shared PS4 Game of 2016

Critic Reviews

All reviews »
Metascore
58

Mixed or average reviews - based on 67 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 9 out of 67
  2. Mixed: 50 out of 67
  3. Negative: 8 out of 67
  1. Easy Allies
    Dec 1, 2016
    50
    Despite having nearly seven years to figure out a way to improve upon The Last Hope, Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness is lacking in just about every department. Not even a solid soundtrack is enough to salvage this wreck. There’s nothing special about this below average RPG, and it completely misses the mark.
    Read full review
  2. Pelit (Finland)
    Oct 12, 2016
    20
    A washout. Somebody let the vampire in at Tri-Ace and it sucked all the life and personality from the once weird and funny JRPG series. Bring EDGE MAVERICK back. [Sept 2016]
  3. Games Master UK
    Sep 6, 2016
    48
    A lacklustre offering in a long-running series of great games. A huge shame. [Sept 2016, p.80]
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