Star Ocean Discussion (skills and talents)

[HunterKiller_]

I've only just started playing Star Ocean. Man, what a great game!
It's so intricate with the character interactions and skills.

The skills and talents, however, have proven to be pretty mind boggling for me. I've looked up FAQs, but they all use the Japanese terms so it's a but confusing.

As I understand it, SP is used to level up skills, and by leveling up certain combinations of skills, the associated ability is unlocked.
Furthermore, only characters with suitable talents can use those abilities well.

I probably have never had to learn this much stuff to play a game.

Any tips for me would be welcome.

[indignation]

I probably have never had to learn this much stuff to play a game.

You must not play very many good games

You've pretty much got the idea. For example, if you want to start making food, you've got to have someone level up the right skills (can't remember which right now), so you can unlock the ability. To level up the ability, you have to keep leveling up those skills. If it's low level, your food is going to suck. Also, if the ability is high level, but if the character has no talent, the food is still going to suck.

Now correct me if I'm wrong, but characters who don't appear to have any cooking talent can actually discover cooking talent if they cook enough. So the idea is to experiment.

There are also combat skills, which let your character occasionally perform the action described during battle

[HunterKiller_]

I probably have never had to learn this much stuff to play a game.

You must not play very many good games

Well, I've played pretty much all the good RPGs on SNES. None of them have any systems has complex as this.

Now correct me if I'm wrong, but characters who don't appear to have any cooking talent can actually discover cooking talent if they cook enough. So the idea is to experiment.

Fortunately, I found some properly translated FAQs, and yes, the characters can learn talents, but it's ridiculously hard.
The best way to go about it - according to FAQs - is to save the game before getting a new character and keep resetting until they come up with the right talents.

[grinvader]

The best way to go about it - according to FAQs - is to save the game before getting a new character and keep resetting until they come up with the right talents.

That's the most optimised way, if you want to keep the timer low.
I just keep the talents that are hardest to unlock for each character else you're in for hours and hours of repetitive stuff. Getting everyone's hardest talents to unlock takes a lot less time, believe me on that (I tried).
So... Ratix should try to get 6th sense and love of animals.
Milly should try for originality in priority, 6th sense/love of animals are nice but if you have originality KEEP IT. Fucking nightmare to unlock.
Iria has nothing hard to get, whew. Same for Ronixis, but ffs hope he gets originality on the first go. That scene... I saw it way too much. Way. too. much. I didn't see the intro to FFT and LoM combined that much (and geeze, did I see them).
Cius should try for originality (seeing a pattern here ?), writing and design sense. Only if you keep him, that is.
Ashlay always gets all he can.
Joshua needs love of animals and 6th sense, if you grab him.
Marvel needs originality. In bold, italic letters. That orb isn't gonna make itself if you don't have it, and trying to unlock it is just incredibly tough and worth any amount of resetting/reloading.
Fear, Tinek and Perisie want originality, the rest is pretty ok to unlock later.

Late in the game you can unlock all the talents thanks to violin tunes, but beware the talent unlocking freezing bug. Also violin doesn't help unlocking originality being a bitch.

Now for skills... Honestly... you don't need much.
First thing is to get one level of Dash on Ratix to speed things up.
If you suck in battles, get some Anatomy (or Biology, don't remember the dejap translation) levels to pump HP, Endurance to pump constitution, Dash and Will to pump stamina & guts (post-battle regen is a big plus).
Never learn stuff too expensive early, for there is Effort. Max that one first. Yes, you get it late, but it's worth the wait. It practically pays for itself.

For power levelling, I usually make the pit stop at Ionis.
You want an author (writing), a musician (pitch and rythm), and an artist (design).
Get the rainbow diamond from the Belcrant pirate cave and the trumpet from Tatroy's arena.
Invest in magic colours (Ecdart), artist duplicates trumpet/rainbow diamond, sell all but one, rince, repeat. Buy more expensive intrument when available. 99% of my cash comes from Violin sales.
Invest in research pens (Ionis), make your guys skilled at what they have to do.
Invest in creator pens, compose clarinet 1&2 (violin 2 while you're at it). Get 7-star ougi for Ratix from Tatroy's arena. Unlock 7-star twin slash.
Warm up on black slimes from clarinet 1.
Then get busy harvesting Gabriel fights from clarinet 2.
...

Yea I kinda always do this, I haven't made a single 'normal' game. :p

[Gil_Hamilton]

I've only just started playing Star Ocean. Man, what a great game!
It's so intricate with the character interactions and skills.

The skills and talents, however, have proven to be pretty mind boggling for me. I've looked up FAQs, but they all use the Japanese terms so it's a but confusing.

As I understand it, SP is used to level up skills, and by leveling up certain combinations of skills, the associated ability is unlocked.
Furthermore, only characters with suitable talents can use those abilities well.

I probably have never had to learn this much stuff to play a game.

Welcome to gaming the tri-Ace way.

[HunterKiller_]

grinvader: Sweet, thanks. That's a lot of good info.
I've managed to get Ratix and Milly both with a good set of talents, unfortunately, Cius got the short stick (only Animal Love and Sixth Sense).
Iria is pretty standard.

I'll definitely keep Marvel in mind.

[Gil_Hamilton]

grinvader: Sweet, thanks. That's a lot of good info.
I've managed to get Ratix and Milly both with a good set of talents, unfortunately, Cius got the short stick (only Animal Love and Sixth Sense).
Iria is pretty standard.

I'll definitely keep Marvel in mind.

Could be worse.
You COULD be playing Star Ocean 2.

Ashton, if I recall, has almost no chance to start with most talents, and even worse odds for learning them after the fact.

[odditude]

Did anyone else have an issue with SO2 in that balls-deep hidden dungeon at the end? My game had a roughly 10% chance of locking when exiting a battle. Never happened to me anywhere else in the game, so I always assumed it was a bug in the game itself instead of a disc issue.

[Gil_Hamilton]

Did anyone else have an issue with SO2 in that balls-deep hidden dungeon at the end? My game had a roughly 10% chance of locking when exiting a battle. Never happened to me anywhere else in the game, so I always assumed it was a bug in the game itself instead of a disc issue.

I had a few crash issues.
Very rarely.

I gather it depends on PS revision.
Or possibly just how good a shape the drive mech/disk is in. SO2 does some (relatively) fancy tricks, like pre-loading fight data(Listen next time. The drive starts whirring like 5 seconds before you get in a fight. Every time.). It's conceivable that a flaky drive might not get it loaded up in time, and... ker-blewie.

[Cyrus]

Did anyone else have an issue with SO2 in that balls-deep hidden dungeon at the end? My game had a roughly 10% chance of locking when exiting a battle. Never happened to me anywhere else in the game, so I always assumed it was a bug in the game itself instead of a disc issue.

I had few problems with it locking up after exiting a battle in the hidden dungeon but not 10% of the time, 3% at most. This was way back on the original PS1 not emulated though so if you're emulating it that may be the problem. Then again as Gil pointed out it may have had to do with the PS1's CD drive.

[Panzer88]

I probably have never had to learn this much stuff to play a game.

You must not play very many good games

Well, I've played pretty much all the good RPGs on SNES. None of them have any systems has complex as this.

Final Fantasy V? Tales of Phantasia? Treasure of the Rudras? Bahamut Lagoon? Treasure Hunter G?

none of these are as complex as Star Ocean? Ironically I power leveled early in Star Ocean and so ended up just "A tapping" through most of the battles.

[HunterKiller_]

Final Fantasy V? Tales of Phantasia? Treasure of the Rudras? Bahamut Lagoon? Treasure Hunter G?

Check. Check. Don't know that one. Check. Don't know that one.

FF V's job system is pretty straight forward, I thought. The only reason to look up an FAQ for that is to see what they would learn, so you wouldn't waste time leveling up crappy stuff.

I reckon Tales of Phantasia is a watered down version of SO, not saying it's an less awesome, though.

Bahamut Lagoon... It started off good, but I stopped playing that because it was like the same thing over and over and over, forever and ever, Amen.

none of these are as complex as Star Ocean? Ironically I power leveled early in Star Ocean and so ended up just "A tapping" through most of the battles.

That's what happens in most RPGs when you power level.

[Gil_Hamilton]

I reckon Tales of Phantasia is a watered down version of SO, not saying it's an less awesome, though.

Good perception.
The Tales of Phantasia team left Namco to form tri-Ace.

[Panzer88]

yeah, I was aware of this too, and know that Star Ocean has far more developement of character skills, the two battle systems stand apart and I'd be hard pressed to call one more complex than the other, both you can just mash A, and both you can strategize in. Whatever, That is very cool that you are messing with the Star Ocean system, I also found it very cool the first time I played it. I just find statements like

"I've played pretty much all the good RPGs on SNES" kind of naive.

P.S. check out the games I mentioned that you don't know, you may not like them but they are pretty decent stuff anyhow.

[HunterKiller_]

"I've played pretty much all the good RPGs on SNES" kind of naive.

Hey, what? Come on. I've played FF V, FF VI, Chronotrigger, Bahamut Lagoon, Mario RPG, Tales of Phantasia, Zelda, Earthbound, Secret of Mana, Seiken Densetsu 3. That's more than a lot of good RPGs on the SNES.

P.S. check out the games I mentioned that you don't know, you may not like them but they are pretty decent stuff anyhow.

Treasure Hunter doesn't look so hot to me. Not into turn based strategy anymore - too slow.
However, Treasures of Rudras sounds awesome! I've never heard of such magic system, especially surprising for a SNES game.
I'll get to this after Star Ocean.

[HunterKiller_]

I've finished Starocean. Short game.
I have to say, unfortunately, I was pretty disappointed by the ending portion of the game. Rather anti-climatic.

Panzer88: Thanks for telling about Treasures of Rudras. Playing it now. It's awesome so far.
The magic system is great fun, and the thing that surprised me that most is the graphics! I was expecting very little, but the it's actually very good, especially the battle animations, which are similar to that of Bahamut Lagoon.

[Panzer88]

yeah, they were done by the same team I believe, very fluid battle animation. If strategy RPGs aren't your thing then yeah, no biggie, to be honest they aren't my hugest thing either.

and yeah, you have hit most of the big boys on SNES, it's just the general thought that there is almost always something else you don't know about, and not to praise a game too much before you finish it (like star ocean) but you were really receptive so good job, I hope you find many more great games, good luck!

do you like kind of action/shooting/platforming games at all? you should at least play ten minutes of Front Mission: Gunhazard, it is NOT a front mission game (aka not a strategy RPG) but is a platforming game with RPG elements, sure you're more into RPGs, but I suggest Front Mission: gunhazard for a good time too.

I believe Gideon made a translation IIRC, and it should be hosted on RHDN also.

maybe you can share with me some of your favorites too?

[HunterKiller_]

Oh, I didn't realize Gun Hazard was a mech game. Mech games are sweet.
Looks a lot like Cybernator, which I found really challenging.

My favourites on SNES are pretty much just the ones I mentioned above, although I did miss Terranigma, which I've yet to complete.

[Panzer88]

yeah, the same team was involved I'm pretty sure, first there was

Assault Suits: Leynos/ Target Earth (sega genesis)
Assault Suits: Valken/ Cybernator (SNES)
Metal Warriors good game by lucas arts and konami (not official) (SNES) Play this one too!
Front Mission: Gunhazard nice RPG touch by square (not official) (SNES)

Assault Suits: Leynos 2 (sega saturn)
Assault Suits: Valken 2 (sony playstation)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assault_Suits_series

also check out The magical land of WOZZ

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chō_M ... iriku_WOZZ

also with terranigma there is

soul blazer (SNES)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soul_Blazer

Illusion of Gaia (SNES) then Terranigma was 3rd

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illusion_of_Gaia

and The Granstream Saga (sony playstation)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Granstream_Saga

hope that helps Romancing Saga III is also... interesting, not the best game in the world, but interesting