I have to admit, Star Ocean: The Last Hope is the first JRPG I have ever bought. I'm talking in all of the years I have owned consoles and gaming PCs (most of my life), I have never once bought a JRPG, not even so much as one Final Fantasy game.

Well, last night I picked up Star Ocean solely based on how cool the trailers looked. I was hooked the second the opening scene started up. As soon as I got the gist of the storyline and heard the awesome theme music, I thought to myself, "I think I have a very big adventure ahead of me in this game."

So far, I'm very impressed. As someone else posted, I see a lot of parallels to Mass Effect, however combat in Mass Effect felt like more of a chore than it does in Star Ocean. I think the combat is a lot of fun because the enemies are more interesting and there is some variation in the ways you can defeat them. I'm also pretty impressed by the graphics. I still think Gears 2 is the graphical wonder of the 360 to date, but for an RPG the size of Star Ocean, those graphics are nothing to sneeze at either.

Only two things annoyed me from the get go: One was the right=left, left=right configuration of the side to side camera positioning. I changed this in my controller set up so that it wasn't that way anymore, but it took me awhile to figure out where that option was. No biggie, and definitely not a deal breaker. The other thing I hate is the lack of save points when you really need them. I really wish you could save whenever you want. Again, not a deal breaker, but annoying.

Other than that, it seems like a terrific game so far. I can't wait to jump back into it tonight.

I picked it up, but won't be playing it for awhile. Still playing Lost Odyssey and Tales of Vesperia. I would have been finished with both of these games by now if I did't start playing NBA 2K9 and NBA Live 2K8. I also picked up Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection and started playing Shining in the Darkness (don't ask why). Game is repetitive like no other.

4 more days till i can play star ocean 4, im still on vacation so meh. please no spoilers anyone.

picked it up and im loving it.

Some major improvements over star ocean 3, yet some things i dont like.

improvements would be graphics, sounds, voice acting, and in some areas story such as character development. Also improvements in combat such as blindside (which is sick if used right) and the rush combos. Also i like how they set up the combos in the game. Switching characters in and out of battle is a huge plus and the options in middle of battle are a awsome feature. Different battle systems allow u to take different approaches for each character and choose base on what u want.

the bad: game starts off a little more boring then in star ocean 3 but picks up, i dont like how special moves are now based on MP which means u get to use them less. Attacks are a little bit harder to get used to instead of having two buttons u have no for main attack (different for combo). There needs to be more special moves early on (im lvl 29 and only have 3 different ones for edge).

thats my take so far

i would give the game a 8.7 so far its a good game tho not legendary. but im sure later gameplay will become alot more intense and i cannot wait. Im 14 hours in and still missing two characters!

Fuck man, I'm slow.

I'm 14 hours in and only have 4.

Same here.  I'm intentionally taking my time on this game.  My levels are really high for where I'm at in the game so I just slice through all the enemies.  I sort of wish I could start with the 2nd highest difficulty level (I forgot the name as I'm posting).

2 more days left till i head home with my copy of so4..... and i now have xbox live as a bonus! yay!!!

I'm lovin it
The game is amaizing and can't stop playing it

I just beat the first boss, and I must say, it's hard to keep focused on essay writing when I've got the game sitting in my 360.

Although I miss the MP kill system, I love Blindsides.

28 hours in. Its like a drug....JRPG ecstasy if you will...I have all the characters and just got to disc 3. The story is fantastic, and all the cutscenes you can watch in the ship are absolutely great, from Edge peeping on Reimi taking a shower(multiple times) to Edge and Meracle being caught in some "compromising positions", and of course the romantic portions of the ship cutscenes(which are getting pretty intimate now)