The company's sound programmer Hiroya Hatsushiba formed tri-Crescendo in which has since independently developed Baten Kaitos and Eternal Sonata. The main character of the game, Jack Russel, has a suit of armor that makes him look identical to Fayt Leingod , the main protagonist from Star Ocean: Till the End of Time.
Also, Fayt can get a costume which is very similar to Claude's. There are also optional dungeons in where the optional bosses are located. In addition to the optional bosses in the optional dungeon, the normal enemies you encounter there are at least two to five time stronger than they would be in the original story.
Some who are not careful and get overconfident can get a game over on these enemies alone. Also there are no save points located in these dungeons except at the beginning, The exception being Infinite Undiscovery which there is a save point on floor seven of the Seraphic Gate. The Tria , the monotheistic goddess of the first and second Star Ocean , worshipped on multiple planets across the Milky Way Galaxy to include Nede , Roak , and Expel may also be based on this company.
In The Second Story , the flagship of the Lacourian naval warfleet bears the tri-Ace logo upon its command tower. The tri-Ace logo tri-Emblem appears as an equipable item in all of the Star Ocean games along with another item similarly named tri-Emblum but a lot less useful, the knock-off version appearing to be one of the weakest equipable items in all of the games.
The genuine one however sports many effects that will make battles far easier. The item can only be obtained by buying the item near or in some of the most challenging dungeons of the game, such as buying it from "Santa's Gift Bag" from Santa in the Maze of Tribulations in Star Ocean: Till the End of Time.
This is a extremely difficult item to afford however but in the end, for the major bonus bosses, the tri-Emblem is a must have item. Star Ocean Wiki Explore. First Departure Second Evolution. Blue Sphere Material Trader Anamnesis. Early on in company history, tri-Ace formed a close relationship with Square-Enix, the famous pioneer of the RPG genre as a whole, and since then most of tri-Ace's properties have been published by the larger and more famous brand name.
The company has produced games across nine different consoles, mixing in a mesh of original properties and ongoing series.
The company also has a close relationship with the similarly-named tri-Crescendo, founded in by former tri-Ace sound engineer Hiroya Hatsuhiba. The fame of the two RPG series is hard to compare; in my experience, one is more popular with Eastern audiences while the other is more well-known in Western circles, but my experiences may not necessarily generalize.
The latter of these two franchises is Valkyrie Profile. We'll talk at greater length about the franchise as a whole later in this list when we discuss the earlier games, but notable here is one of the company's more recent releases, Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria. Released in for the PlayStation 2, Valkyrie Profile 2 revolves around the eponymous character Silmeria, one of the three Valkyrie sisters introduced in an earlier game.
The character is actually two different people trapped in one body, battling for control and seemingly driven mad because of it. Rooted partially in Norse mythology, Valkyrie Profile 2 takes the player through the mythical lands of Midgard and Asgard on a quest to prevent all-out war between gods and men.
As with many tri-Ace games, the battle system is one of the most advanced characteristics, blending real-time and turn-based combat into a highly tactical gameplay experience. The system is complex and deep, representing an appeal only to hard-core fans of the RPG genre.
Upon its release, the game received some of the highest marks given to a tri-Ace game yet and was considered by many to be a sleeper and cult hit for the year The other of tri-Ace's most famous series is, in my experience, a more Eastern-slanted franchise with a strong following in Japan: Star Ocean. This series traces its origins to the first game tri-Ace ever developed, back in for the Japanese Super Famicom system; the game would not receive a United States release for over 10 years, eventually arriving as a port on the PSP.
Star Ocean differs from many popular RPG series at the time in many notable elements. Character recruitment, for one, is notably different as rather than a set of plot-relevant characters forced on the player, the player can pick and choose from a pool of 10 possible recruits.
There is no world map in the game, instead giving the player direct routes between different locales, interestingly similar to how more modern RPGs have been structured. The game also represents an early example of tri-Ace's interesting battle system design, expertly combining the menu prompts of turn-based battling with an actual real-time battle system. Perhaps the most interesting thing about Star Ocean, however, is the way it was responsible for the formation of tri-Ace has a company.
The company founders were originally on staff at Namco, assigned to the team that would develop the eventual release Tales of Phantasia. Creative differences between members of the team, however, led to part of the team resigning and starting their own company to create a game more in line with their own vision: that team became tri-Ace and that game became Star Ocean.
This series that started with 's Star Ocean for the Super Famicom has recently celebrated its 14th anniversary with its most recent release: Star Ocean: The Last Hope. Originally released for the Xbox and later ported to the PlayStation 3, Star Ocean: The Last Hope is tri-Ace's most recent American release and arguably its most successful, although as we will see I personally rate some other current-generation games more highly.
In keeping with tri-Ace's reputation, the most notable feature of the game is the way it packs active, engaging, real-time gameplay into an RPG system; in an age where RPGs have begun to evolve towards more active battle systems, tri-Ace is ready and waiting to show off its prowess in such development as it has demonstrated over its entire career. Star Ocean: The Last Hope is also notable for representing one of the more interesting sci-fi RPGs in recent years, giving multiple planets to explore and a ship to control.
The initial release of Star Ocean: The Last Hope met a somewhat lukewarm commercial reception, possibly in part because the audience to which it most appealed generally favored alternate consoles the game first appeared on the Xbox , but the franchise most strongly appeals to Japanese audiences who favor the PlayStation 3 and Nintendo Wii.
The later PlayStation 3 port, dubbed the "International" release even though the game had already been released internationally for the Xbox received a much warmer reception, both due to a closer alignment of audience and console and due to fixes to certain annoyances in the game's original release. In my opinion, tri-Ace's release Infinite Undiscovery is the very definition of a game ahead of its time. Many of the innovations characteristic of Infinite Undiscovery have since worked their way into some of the most popular RPGs released in recent years, although these features did not receive critical acclaim in this particular release.
The game as a whole bills itself almost entirely on how active, engaging, and dynamic its world is; the defining feature of the game is how the player's decisions and actions can have far-reaching implications on the occurrences and discoveries that will follow later in the game. In keeping with this dynamic presentation, things can happen even when the player is just waiting around or browsing menu screens.
Battles are intentionally more strategic, forcing the player to come up with complex strategies to solve different enemies. Among the most notable innovations of the game that has since become something of a mainstay in modern RPG design is that, while the player's party is made of four characters, the game AI typically controls three of them. Despite these innovations, though, the game received only a mixed reception, in large part because although the ideas underlying many of these innovations were revolutionary, the execution at this particular time was lacking; such is the definition, in my opinion, of a game ahead of its time, one that possessed all the ideas that later would define a genre but simply failed to execute them.
Staying with their focus on new intellectual properties in the latest console generation, another of tri-Ace's recent releases is the cross-platform game Resonance of Fate. The game was still an RPG, however, keeping with tri-Ace's wheelhouse. Like most of tri-Ace's most popular releases, the most notable element of Resonance of Fate is its battle system, once again brilliantly unifying turn-based and real-time combat, in addition to an interesting real-time strategy twist.
Again, like many tri-Ace releases, the battle system, and accompanying equipment and leveling systems, is so complex that it may turn off some more casual or inexperienced RPG players; however, those accustomed to the genre and the strategic demands it places on character equipment and preparation will surely enjoy the depth and customizability of the system.
Like Infinite Undiscovery, Resonance of Fate encountered a moderately positive reception upon its release. In many ways, the criticisms reflected exactly the dichotomy referenced above: most large video game outlets gave it lukewarm reviews, commenting on the meager storytelling and overcomplicated combat system, but outlets more dedicated and experienced with the genre praised its more subtle plot elements and its deep gameplay innovations.
Like Infinite Undiscovery, Resonance of Fate is partially responsible for reinventing the turn-based battle system into a visual spectacle rather than just an exercise in straight information visualization. Aside from the grammatically offensive phrasing of the game's title, Star Ocean: Till the End of Time represents an interesting entry in the franchise's history. Among all the Star Ocean games and even among all of tri-Ace's releases , Star Ocean: Till the End of Time met perhaps the most cold initial release, largely in part to a series of glitches and bugs due to some last-minute changes by Sony.
A later Director's Cut release, however, solved many of these issues, and it was this version that made its way over to the United States eight months later 18 months after the game's initial release in Japan. That version, in turn, received a very strong reception. Star Ocean: Till the End of Time marks perhaps one of tri-Ace's greatest achievements with regards to its battle system, moving as far across the spectrum as it had to date between turn-based and active battle. The combat was much more similar to systems seen in Rogue Galaxy and other similar RPGs of the time, around the time that hardware had advanced enough to render traditional turn-based combat sorely and blatantly outdated.
Like the other games from the developer, the various systems in the game are remarkably deep, although in the case of Star Ocean: Till the End of Time, they remain a bit more accessible to newbies to the genre or series. As part of that, it perhaps should be no surprise that one of the greatest games they've developed in my entirely subjective opinion, of course is a game that, to date, has yet to see an American release: Beyond the Labyrinth, or Rabirinsu no Kanata in Japan.
The game is still an RPG, although it is framed significantly differently, focusing more on dungeon crawler elements than the sweeping RPGs we've seen in the past. The game is notoriously unforgiving, belying its somewhat colorful framing and bubbly protagonist; like most dungeon crawlers, death is always right around the corner. The battle system involves a unique color rotation, and overall represents an amazing reinvention by a company that seemingly reinvents its combat systems as regularly as you or I change our socks.
The remarkable thing about Beyond the Labyrinth, aside from tri-Ace's demonstrated ability to develop a brilliant game decently outside their normal wheelhouse, is its breathtaking beauty. Although all of tri-Ace's games have had a unique and engrossing visual style, it has never been the major selling point for any one game — until now.
Beyond the Labyrinth is the most beautiful game developed for the 3DS to date, with lush landscapes and soaring templates that would be brilliant on the most powerful consoles, let alone on Nintendo's humble little portable console.
We should all hope for an American release soon because if one game could save the 3DS from itself, it's Beyond the Labyrinth.
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