Star Ocean EX

Origins

This is a Japanese anime based off of a two disk video game for the Sony Playstation console called Star Ocean: The Second Story released in the US May 31, 1999. It was a big thing for a video game to have two-disk back in 1999 because it meant the game was supposed to be epic. This, unfortunately, wasn’t always the case in with some games but Star Ocean came through for the most part. Disk one was epic and made the user feel as if the game would never end. Disk two, however, much shorter than one and was slightly disappointing.

The Game

The game allowed you to play as either Claude (blond haired guy on the far right) or Rena (blue haired girl on the far left); although, it didn't matter who you chose because Claude would still save Rena from the monsters at some point in the game. Rena was a weaker healer type, but could still defeat the monsters while Claude was easier to play with, for this first fight, because he had a ray gun that you could blast the monsters with.

After this fight, the ray gun looses power and you have to relay on a sword from that point on. Through your journey you meet all sorts of characters that have their own little story and lives that you can play a part in. The thing is…. your choices mattered. If you talked to a character a lot and healed them during battle, if they got badly hurt, your stats would go up. If you chose to do one thing over another, you can earn a really power or unique character to your party.

This action anime game didn’t allow you to have every possible playable character in the game. You had to be enterprising enough to find them. That is to say, you had to go to towns and dungeons and be friendly enough to talk to everyone you saw and say the right things. Again, however, there was no way to get all the characters. You just had to make the right choices to get who you wanted. So it’ll be interesting to see how the show handles the characters.

The Show

The sound track appears to be similar or the same one from the game so it adds a special flavor to the fans. The show has Claude accidentally transported to the planet Expel and he saves Rena from the monsters. The thing is, the game had three monsters attack but the show only had one. The show, however, did a good job on taking away Claude’s “sword of light” (ray gun): a monster hits it later on disabling it.

Also Rena is made to be weak because in the first episode she doesn't fight at all and the second episode she at least uses her healing abilities while in the game Rena fights alongside Claude right away. Also, the designers did well designing the town of Arlia (Rena’s home town), but it does seem a little bigger. Another strange thing is that the second episode introduces shows the town bustling with people, but doesn’t introduce Rena’s mother (but does show her holding a sword for Claude). I suppose the creators decided to not include her since she is a minor character. The show does, however, mention the Sorcery Globe, the target of your quest throughout most of the game, and Claude’s responsibility as “the warrior” to help save them from it.

This trend follows the series for the most part. I haven’t completed it yet, but so far it seems like the basically the same things happen, but in different ways. The show also puts importance on minor characters in the game. Although, ironically the game takes importance away from some characters that were really important in the game.

Strong Women Characters

Although Japanese anime is notorious for dressing their women characters in provocative clothing they are also known for making some powerful ones. This is the case with Celine Jules. She’s a powerful sorceress

who meets our heroes in Cross City and shows herself to be a power to be reckoned with and she has more power in the show at the start than she does in the game. If you can ignore her constant passes at Claude, she represents woman at her best! Get ready to hear her roar!

(to be continued)