First Thoughts on the Sea of Stars demo

 Sea of Stars (Demo)

    I'm a bit late on the draw for this one, as the demo for this has been out for a month or 2 now but this weekend I finally got around to checking out the demo for the upcoming RPG Sea of Stars. Developed by by Sabotage Studio, the same people behind The Messenger, is a prequel set in the same universe but centuries before hand. I didn't know any of this going into the demo and now that I'm finding this out I see why the game is like it is quality-wise. The thing that originally attracted me to the game like most indie games I find today was the art style. Most indie games are going for this "retro" pixel art style which I enjoy but I feel like can be a little overdone now. Sea of Stars hits that sweet spot for me where it doesn't try to mimic older hardware, but embraces newer techniques and hardware to make something unique. The more I looked into Sea of Stars, the more hyped I got for this game. Combat looked very similar to Chrono Trigger as well, where enemies were visible on the field, and when you run into them the battle takes place right there. Another concept carried over from Chrono Trigger was depending on how enemies were placed on the field, AOE attacks would strike targets differently if they're closer or further away from each other. So already I knew this would be a game that's officially on the Teeezy radar for cool games, but then they hit me with the real dinger. Yasunori Mitsuda of Chrono Trigger and Xenoblade Chronicles 3 fame was going to be a guest composer on the game! With all this in mind, why I didn't play the demo sooner I have no idea. I can confidently say now that come August, this will be my most hyped game of the year. Wow, this demo was perfect in giving just a taste of what's to come.

    Alright so let's start with the story. Not much overall has been revealed of the story thus far, as you're thrown into the middle of it. You won't have to worry much about spoilers either, because parts of the game have been [REDACTED] and areas cut off by some NPC's to make it a guided experience. They do let you however interact with characters from the local town and this gives a chance for the writers to flex their chops in this department. Some characters give that standard JRPG dialogue, where others are wittier and show much more personality. My favorite character so far is definitely Garl the Warrior-Cook, who is a ton of fun with lots of smiles and is light-hearted. Walking around the town also just confirmed how beautiful the game looks. Colors are vibrant and details sometimes are so minute that they make you appreciate them even more when you do notice them. The parts that got me the most excited were the music and the combat. Over the past few years I really started to appreciate video game soundtracks and music more and more, as a memorable track over a key moment really hammers home importance and emotion over scenes that make you remember them years after you've played the game. Mitsuda also being on the composer list also got me excited as he's composed some of my favorite tracks in games. The feelings I got when I first entered the overworld and this epic track starts playing have only been matched by the Wind Scene in Chrono Trigger after you first get sent back in time. I literally got chills and just sat on that screen for like 5 minutes. It's not just that one track either, the battle music is catchy too, and I didn't really get tired of it like I thought I would after the 10-15 battles I had. Nothing I heard I would consider bad or repetitive and I can't wait to hear every area of the game. Now for the part that I was the most skeptical on from watching trailers was the combat. In any JRPG combat should be one of the top priorities for the developer, as it's what you're going to be doing a majority of the time. Sea of Stars not only makes combat fun and engaging by bringing back older ideas, but also by incorporating new ones as well. Like I mentioned earlier, battle takes place on the field similar to Chrono Trigger, and placement of enemies can help determine your strategies. The battle system itself isn't an active time battle like most Final Fantasy games, it is strictly turn by turn. You can change what character you want to attack on which turn and you aren't limited to it being one characters turn per se as it gives you the freedom to choose. Another part of the combat that I was happy was there was timing your hits and defending against attacks. If you press the action button at specific times you'll either do more damage when you're attacking, or take less damage from incoming attacks. This concept is nothing new, the Mario RPGs have been doing that for years. However, they don't try to shove that down your throat and just have the timed hits as something that adds a little extra to combat which is always appreciated. When you do time hits however, they build up into a combo meter allowing you to do big attacks with multiple party members at one time so its well worth your time. Lastly, one of the coolest concepts I found was boosting your special moves or attacks. After attacking enemies on the field they drop little orbs that stay on the field during battle. During your turn, you have the option to boost your attack, and the orbs converge up to 3 larger orbs that will power up your next move. Its a clever way to power up your moves without having to spend a turn and use a power-up item or spell, and comes very naturally as you're always going to be attacking enemies. 

TL;DR

    Sea of Stars is shaping up to be one of the best traditional RPGs in recent memory. In almost every aspect Sea of Stars is hitting dingers in its presentation, combat, dialogue and characters. It combines old standard ideas with some fresh concepts for a mish-mash of excellence. The world looks diverse and I'm pumped to learn more about the lore and characters that live in it. Combat and music are the major highlights for me, with the music making me feel how I did playing some of my favorite games, and combat staying engaging and diverse letting me strategize how I want to go about things freely. My only regret was playing the demo so early, because now I have to wait 3 months for the game to come out! If Sea of Stars isn't on your radar, it needs to be as its shaping up to be one of the best games this year. I played the demo on my Switch, I'm unsure if the demo is out on all platforms, but the game is coming out August 29th, 2023 on Steam, Switch, Xbox and PlayStation, so keep your eye out for this one! 

Here is a link to their website for the game where you can Wishlist and view the store listings for the game. All artwork used in this post was sourced from this site. https://seaofstarsgame.co/