Star Ocean - Till the End of Time

[Bleeders]

How many hours have you sunk into this Prof?

[Prof Frink]

About 28 hours at the minute i'm exploring and leveling at the minute.

[scarredbyvideogames]

Adam - about the bonus gauge.It breaks in three ways.By being attacked - Im assuming a strong attack from what I can observe (and also I guess whether or not its enough to break the gauge will depend on your defence).By running from battle.And also - and most annoyingly,by loading a game.

Especially annoying because one of the trophies is obtained by fighting 500 consecutive battles with the gauge unbroken - I only recently found this out and restarted my game (besides which,I find it so enjoyable I dont want it to end) and am now up to 211 bonus chain battles.Its a nightmare - its the most tedious thing imaginable and of course Im unable to save,turn off the PS2 and reload later as the gauge will be reset so it may have to stay on for days !

I think the battle trophy thing is a brilliant idea - its really satisfying when a new trophy condition is met during battle,especially when (as mostly happens) the conditions have been met without you even conciously trying to.In a fight earlier I got 4 trophies at once - I wonder how may its possible to obtain in a single battle?I looked up the list and some of them are incredibly difficult to get (as is to be expected) - either because of the tediousness involved or just because,well - theyre just bloody hard!

Im going to go for 100% but it'l take at least 2 games - or two years more realistically

Oh well,this is where having a stubborn streak and obsessive-compulsive tendencies comes in handy

Edit:Ok I wanted to make sure what my above observations on the battle gauge breaking were correct so I bravely threw myself into the abyss of the Gamefaqs Star Ocean message boards *shiver* - I didnt actually ask:Im not that brave....but I did find out that as far as being hit by enemies goes it seems that it is when they manage to land a critical hit on you that the gauge breaks - it seems it will break even if your character suffers no damage.I still wish that it was possible to save though and reload later with the gauge intact - a bit mean that it should be reduced to zero i think! - especially since I often have to play in short bursts.

[gossi the dog]

My copy arrived today. I'm not sure why the game had to come with an outer cardboard box as there's plenty of room for the manual in the game case.

I'm about 2 hours in now. Slightly bored to be honest but things are seeemingly picking up. So far I think the characters lack the charm of those found in SO2, but it's still early days. Nice to see you can turn off character voices (something that I did within 5 minutes ). There do seem to be bugs though. My game just crashed while I was talking to some Dick Turpin look alike. I wasn't far from my last save but still annoying. Anyhow hopefully it'll improve but I do miss the cry of 'Claude has advanced forward'.

[Adam]

Cheers scarredbyvideogames

The voices are **** tbh and to top it off you can barely hear them most times. Does Fayt sound like Raiden (metal gear solid 2) to anyone?

[jimtendo]

He sounds more like the voice actor who played Tidus in FFX

I found the first few hours (around 5) to be pretty slow going, but the battles are quite nice to fool around with.

Gutted i have to start it all again, because i didn't initiate the Battle Trophy save when i first started the game >:|

[MartyG]

I bought this the same time as Phantom Brave ( did someone say something about a game overloaded month? ) and now that's completed I took a look at this.

An hour in and I'm liking this. Good things: the characters seem likable and are so far interesting to listen to, the story has set a seed of intrigue. The look to the game is really nice, it's like FF8 in anime.

Bad things: The controls, the analogue stick seems to be digital despite all attempts to walk. The music: so far sounds like something I'd listen to in a lift. The combat: I'm not all keen on it at the moment, like Sudeki, the real time stuff seems disjointed, you press a button and it's not responsive. I guess I'm expecting it to work like a fighter and it just doesn't. I eventually got use to the Sudeki combat and I'm sure I will in this, I just need to work with it a bit more.

Overall though I'm liking it, having played mostly TRPGs recently, a story led game is quite refreshing.

[scarredbyvideogames]

Cheers scarredbyvideogames

The voices are **** tbh and to top it off you can barely hear them most times. Does Fayt sound like Raiden (metal gear solid 2) to anyone?

What do ya mean '****'?! i thought they were ok - mostly....well,some were ok and some....not so much.I mean,some of them sound completely overblown,amateurish,hammy and teeth-grindingly annoying yes but,well - this is just par for the course for a game of this genre and origin - its unlikely to ever improve because they all use the same actors so we either have to get used to it or just grin and bear it!

I understand that the guy who did Fayts VA is Steve Staley/Cannon - does he sound like Raiden?I cant recall tbo.Its not him though is it?Heres a list of his work anyway:

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0134269/

Now tell me - why is he '****',now thats just mean!.He's quite good really I think.Better him than that guy who played the lead male characters in both Dark Cloud 2 and Tales of Symphonia - now THATS an annoying voice!

'Pepitta' also did the VA for 'MOMO' in Xenosaga - which comes as NO surprise.

What did surprise me was that 'Cliff' is 'Allen Ridgely' - also from Xenosaga (the wimp).Now theres a voice that 'mute' buttons were made for! - "Know your enemy before you strike the first blow!" - Aaaaarrrrggggghhh!!!

Lots of the VA's were in Xenosaga in fact (also .hack,Drakenguard etc) - and stuff like Cowboy Bebop,Gundam,Digimon and so on

And one of them was in 'Disgaea'.
Also Albel is in fact also Regal from TOS.

It doesnt seem like theres a huge pool of voice actors to choose from since they all seem to use a lot of the same people.These all come from Ani-Maze I think,highly esteemed in the business which is why they turn up in every bloody RPG.

[Adam]

What do ya mean '****'?! i thought they were ok - mostly....well,some were ok and some....not so much.I mean,some of them sound completely overblown,amateurish,hammy and teeth-grindingly annoying yes but,well - this is just par for the course for a game of this genre and origin - its unlikely to ever improve because they all use the same actors so we either have to get used to it or just grin and bear it!

Heh I know this, look at my avatar I'm a Shenmue fan I actually don't mind Fayts voice but in some instances, characters are destroyed by the voice actor/actress. I'm up to a bit where I'm riding in some carraige and there's 2 girls who sacrifice themselves so that my party can get away, one of the girls are introduced as 'shady looking girl' or something similiar, then the other is known at first as 'even shadier looking girl' they look shady indeed, but then they talk. They sounded like 12 year old american boys on counter strike :P

[gossi the dog]

Played this some more now and after the first couple hours things definitely improve. The battle system does seem rather disjointed (I really don't think it's as good as SO2's) but the battle bonus gauge is a nice inclusion and the idea behind battle trophies is great. Very good so far

[Prof Frink]

Well finally finished it took me 45 hours in total overall the storyline is good but the ending is nothing spectaular. I really enjoyed this game and think it one of the best RPGs I've played with this and tales of symphonia I've been spoiled on the RPG front this summer. I'm going to try and get as many battle trophies as possible now plus when you finish the game your save data is marked as clear and it unlocks two extra dungeons for you two complete unfortunatly there is no new game plus mode but you can load your battle trophy data into a new game so certain things do carry over.

[SunLolly]

Im starting to get into the game now but what are these battle trophies ?? how do you get them ?

Im about 16 hours in.


Edit:

O_o OMG I cant beleive I have missed the battle trophy thingy at the begining. What genuis thought this was a good idea ??????????
Is it really worth starting again for these BT, do they do anything for the combat system ?

Stupid Tri-ace >:

[Prof Frink]

You have not activated the battle trophies at the start of the game in the battle simulator I have been told of a way to turn them on without starting again but have not tried it myself so I don't know if it works.

Save your existing game. Start a new game get into the battle simulator and when you get the tutorial menu select battle trophies-->Initialise Battle Trophy Data this should create battle trophy data on your memory card you need 1200kb of space so make sure you have room first, also make sure your PS2 clock is correct. Once this is done load your 16 hour save goto in the config on the main menu and make sure battle trophies is set to collect then try fighting a few battles and hopefully you should get some battle trophies.

I will reiterate you are supposed to turn battle trophies on at the beginning this is just a work around someone told me I have not tried it myself sorry if it does not work.

[SunLolly]

You have not activated the battle trophies at the start of the game in the battle simulator I have been told of a way to turn them on without starting again but have not tried it myself so I don't know if it works.

Save your existing game. Start a new game get into the battle simulator and when you get the tutorial menu select battle trophies-->Initialise Battle Trophy Data this should create battle trophy data on your memory card you need 1200kb of space so make sure you have room first, also make sure your PS2 clock is correct. Once this is done load your 16 hour save goto in the config on the main menu and make sure battle trophies is set to collect then try fighting a few battles and hopefully you should get some battle trophies.

I will reiterate you are supposed to turn battle trophies on at the beginning this is just a work around someone told me I have not tried it myself sorry if it does not work.

Thanks mate

I will give this a go. God, I can't beleive I missed it :cries:


Edit:

Woooohooooo

Tried it and it works Just gained 10 trophies in 1 battle

Thanks prof

[Prof Frink]

Glad it worked, currently trying to complete the maze of tribulations one of the secret dungeons all I can say is get to grips with the invention system because you need to make your equipment the best you can or your dead. I also unlocked versus mode which is a nice little diversion, currently have 77 battle trophies and have unlocked the universe difficulty.