Sea Of Stars is a retro-inspired RPG game from Sabotage Studios, known widely for their work on the game “The Messenger”.

Sea of Stars
Developer: Sabotage Studios
Price: $34.99
Platform: PC, Switch, Xbox, PlayStation
MonsterVine was supplied with a PC code for review

This game is technically a prequel, set in the same world as the game just 1000’s years before it, but no prior knowledge is required to enjoy this (I have not played The Messenger, but I certainly intend to after this experience). Sea Of Stars had a wildly successful Kickstarter campaign to start with, hitting its initial goal within 7 hours, and continued on to make over ten times that goal by the end ending at CA$ 1,628,126 total.

I think these people are going to be beyond happy with this because this happily sits on the very high end of the “Retro-Inspired RPG” indie game pyramid.  With a battle system evoking Chrono Trigger, beautiful pixel graphics, guest tracks by the legendary Yasunori Mitsuda on the soundtrack, and MANY more ideas behind it, the stage was set for something special to be made, and Sabotage Studios absolutely knocked that opportunity out of the park.

The story revolves around our two heroes who are Solstice Warriors, Zale and Valere, wielders of moon and sun magic. Only those who can use those powers are capable of fighting back the Dwellers, minions of the Fleshmancer.  That guy is some REAL bad news, and recently nearly the entire order of Solstice Warriors were killed in the process of driving back the strongest dweller.  At this point, only one dweller remains and the Fleshmancer hasn’t been seen in years and years.  We have a whole lot of training for our young heroes before that happens, however, and this story reaches heights they would never guess they would experience.

The visuals are stunning, with huge, super detailed pixel art for big set pieces and bosses, while never neglecting how great the character-sized sprites look. Environments are packed full of secrets, and due to your ability to jump, climb, and otherwise navigate the areas, you will always be taking a close look at it. I think one of the biggest stand-outs is the lighting engine is absolutely beautiful.  They easily could have gone for something HD2D-adjacent, but instead, they opted to forge their own visual identity and it was the right choice.  Animated cutscenes at some points were a really great surprise (I never saw the stretch goals for the Kickstarter, the cutscenes being one of them) for me, and they looked great as well.  Some seriously nice bio-horror stuff at some points too. There is a really wide variety of things to look at, never once sticking too long around one style of area.

I think there was a lot of talk about inspiration from Chrono Trigger, or Super Mario RPG with the timed hits (we will talk about those more later!), but what really seemed to shine in the forefront was a whole lot of Golden Sun in the presentation, music and storytelling!  It was a pleasant surprise as a big fan of those games, and Sabotage saw the sizzle of why.  The fact that encounters are fixed, and not random lets them give you big puzzles that would sour with the inclusion of too many random battles.

Something that never ceased to impress me was how TIGHT the game balancing is.  You never are really just steamrolling enemies or bosses, you are always strategizing and on your back foot a bit.  They really took great care in that and it results in very satisfying moment-to-moment gameplay where every campfire is a rush of dopamine, and every fight could go a little wrong conceivably.

Battles play out on the field where you encounter an enemy, and the game has 6 unique characters that have their own attacks, special moves, and combo attacks with other party members. Nearly every battle action has a moment where you can press the button again to increase the effect of the attack, be it added hits, more damage, or healing.  No idly pressing the confirm button to spam attacks in this one, your attention is in demand on this adventure! Normal melee attacks will spread mana on the field, which characters can absorb up to 3 of them to power up their actions and add their innate element to their normal attack.

Another major mechanic of battle is interrupting enemy abilities by breaking their “locks”.  When an enemy begins performing a special action, they will display multiple icons representing the different attack affinities and a countdown and a percentage. Your best-case scenario is to knock all of them out before the countdown ends, but every lock you break decreases the damage the attack will do if you don’t break all of them. It gets REALLY dicey when multiple enemies roll up locks, and you have to see if you even have the resources to cancel them all. It makes you stop and really think for a second, and weigh potential damage to your party.

Rounding out the combat is combo points and ultimate moves.  You fill the combo point gauge by performing most actions, but you get the most by being successful at timed button presses and breaking locks.  When it fills, you get a combo point maxing out at 3.  Chrono Trigger’s Dual and Triple Techs are beloved, but they made it so that’s all you did in combat for the most part.  This system makes them feel a lot more meaningful and impactful in battle in comparison. When you use a team-up attack you also fill up the ultimate gauge a little bit as you spend combo points and once it is filled, each character has their own big ultimate attack that does massive damage!

All of this comes together to truly feel like something special. I laughed, I cried, and I got invested in this world and the characters that inhabit it while being enthralled by this battle system that felt like a fusion of some of my favorites, but elevated.  Sabotage Studios has once again managed to elevate a classic favorite from the yesteryear of gaming, and in the process of that created something that feels like a celebration of all of those parts, while still carving out its own unique identity!

The Final Word
If you have any love for RPGs or are even maybe even looking to get into them, please check out Sea Of Stars, it really feels like a labor of love that delivers on everything it sets out to do.  All of the pieces of the puzzle come together in a big way that you won’t want to miss!

– MonsterVine Rating: 5 out of 5 – Excellent

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• Source: https://monstervine.com/2023/08/sea-of-stars-review-sabotage-elevates-another-retro-genre/