A few months ago I played all the way through Star Ocean 4, and had mixed emotions about it.  It was the first JRPG I have ever played in my life, so I was going in a little green, but that was kind of part of the excitement for me.  I was all geared up for an epic RPG with awesome graphics, a great story, and interesting characters. 

Well, I got it a little wrong.

The story is ok.  Good enough to care what happens at the end.  Nothing great.  I think anyone who has played the game will agree that 90% of the characters are ANNOYING AS HELL.  The dialogue is childish and melodramatic.  Everyone is obsessed with friendship.  "Will you be my friend?"  "Are we still friends?"  "We're all friends, right?"  blah blah blah.  The graphics are pretty cool during the cutscenes, but during actual gameplay things seem pixelated and clunky.  Oh, and the crashing.  This game crashed like crazy on me.  Usually this happened after about two hours of leveling up and not saving.  (Saying that save spots are few and far between in SO4 is a huge understatement.)  I was just starting disc 3 of the game when I finally found a solution (at least one that actually works) to the crashing on some random web forum--you have to lower the resolution output on your 360 to get this game to not crash.  The game is designed to run at 720, not 1080, and that is apparantly what causes the problem.  To whoever that was who actually posted a helpful solution to the problem rather than tell me my 360 was about to RRoD----Thank you.  All that being said, I didn't HATE Star Ocean.  I just didn't love it.  I will probably never play through it again, because in the end it felt more like a chore than a game.  Beating the final boss is an hour long process.  I'm glad I finally succeeded on the second try, because it takes you quite aways back in the game every time he kills you. 

Now fast forward a few months to the $10 game sale at Best Buy.  I picked up Infinite Undiscovery, because it was pretty much the only game in the sale worth $10.  I expected to hate it, but I'll play through anything for $10.  However, I've been pleasantly surprised.  In general, the style and quality of graphics is better than in Star Ocean by a long shot, even during gameplay.  The dialogue is still dumb, but not nearly as annoying as SO4.  The characters are way more mellow, though still proned to a melodramatic outburst here and there.  The battles are not quite as fun as they were in SO4, but I also don't have to sit through a miniature cut scene at the end of each one, meaning I don't have to watch the same little victory dances over and over.  And the biggest thing.......the story is cool.  Somebody actually put some thought into it. 

I hear way more complaining about IU than I do about SO4, but IU seems to be a much more polished game, and definitely much more enjoyable.  As it stands now, SO4 will probably be on the chopping block for a trade in at Gamestop, while IU may be worth another play through someday.  Anyone have any thoughts on this?

I haven't yet played Infinite Undiscovery, but Star Ocean 4, I thought, was terrible. The characters were among the worst in a JRPG in immediate memory and, as you said, the dialogue was just dreadful.

You won't be hard pressed to find a JRPG better than SO4. If you own only a 360, Tales of Vesperia and Lost Odyssey are much, much better offerings. I'm also enjoying Blue Dragon somewhat (and it's very cheap!), although it seemingly isn't as good as the two previous games I'd mentioned.

I can't offer anything in terms of comparing IU and SO4, but I can say that SO4 is among my least favoured JRPGs... just terrible. I don't blame you for thinking about trading it in, it may still be worth quite a bit.

Haven't played SO4 yet so I can't compare the two. Bought IU at the $9.99 Best Buy sale also and think its a pretty decent game. I usually keep all my games but if I where the selling type IU would be a keeper.

Well, i played both (but only tried SO4, a friend owns one) and I definitively prefer Infinite Undiscovery. Love the combat, the graphics, and the story is not excellent but well thinked

I happen to disagree with the OP on just about everything with S04. But alot of people feel the same way as you I guess. I really liked S04, it wasn't anything revolutionary but for some reason everygame nowadays has to or it sucks.

The story was good for me, the characters were alright....except for Sarah OMG! Now that ones voice actor, made me want to blow my brains out. Gameplay was fun, but I wish it would have been a little bit more like S0TeoT. That is my 2nd fav game of all time by the way. :P

But I own both IU and S04 and I can say that while I did enjoy IU, S04 is the MUCH better game. Both games have their flaws, but decent games.

Try The Last Remnant if you can. Good game, has some lag issues but just install it and you'll get over it like I did. ^^

Also you can probably find IU on amazon or ebay for 20 bucks now. Definitely worth the purchase.

I own and have played both games, and I must concur with your assessment. While both games are working from the same formula I couldn't help but feel that Star Ocean took the formula for the most part in the wrong direction. The formula itself wasn't very great to begin with. Basically it was based on a structure of massive add on with no real implementation. All the aspects of the games such as crafting, collecting, upgrading, equipment, and the inventory are almost entirely irrelevant to the game. They are there, but they are hardly worth the time to play with.

The difference between the games is that while both have mountains of this content to interact with, and mechanics to tweak for modest or no real gain. Infinite Undiscovery was actually bothered to have an objective based game underneath. Which left the game being more or less coherent. The story meshed with the game, and the experience was always changing through the entire game. The fact that the story was not overdone, and the dialogue wasn't so terribly cheesy helped a lot.

Star Ocean suffers from redundancy on the other hand. While it is true the combat is much more complex it is not complex enough to avoid being a case of been here done this a hundred times. The combat it just not dynamic enough, and it rarely changes up the situation. Even more of a let down is the fact that for everything the game funnels you right back into instanced combat. There just isn't any variety. Even unlocking blocked chests is a chore as you have to take up to thirty or forty minutes to backtrack through the same areas only to accidentally get sucked into instanced combat with enemies that are far to inferior for you to fight.

Bottom line Infinite Undiscovery can remain fresh throughout. Star Ocean is getting really stale after a dozen hours. You are right about Infinite Undiscovery it does have far more replay then Star Ocean. Though I might also want to recommend Lost Odyssey if your looking for some good dialogue, story, and writing. I would recommend Blue Dragon for its very cerebral character building. So those are two ends of the spectrum for you to refine your taste from.

I pretty much agree with everything the OP said. I even think that in certain instances, the gameplay of IU trumps SO4, due to the crappy targeting system. The multi-team dungeon parts of Infinite Undiscovery were really fun.

Try LO its better than both.

I liked SO4. It was pretty much the average JRPG with above-above-average gameplay and painfully annoying characters. It wasn't as extroadinary as say Tales of Vesperia or Lost Odyssey, but it was miles better then SO3 was in every single asset. haven't played IU yet, but now i'm interested in it.

i'm still waitin for a price drop on Star Ocean :(