Let's Play: Star Ocean The Last Hope International

[Sephiroth]

My playthrough of Star Ocean is the last one to Platinum, the Chaos Mode run.


For those who are interested in the story and what I do during that, enjoy this thread.





Chapter I: Aeos








After their mission has begun an anomaly has occured that threw Edge and Reimi, the protagonists and members of the military unit, SRF, out of their Warp Phase. Fortunately they still got to Aeos. However the Calnus, their space ship, was heavily damaged. Three of the other four ships managed to get to Aeos, also with some problems, last one, Crowe's ship, that of Edge's best friend and rival is missing.


When the first exploration started and the ship was about to be repaired, unknown life has been detected:




Aeos is inhabitated by gigantic bug creatures.

They attacked the crew and Edge barely managed to defeat them alone.

His captain, Grafton ordered him to explore the planet and search for one of the three ships, the Eremia, which no longer could be detected with a signal and find it.




Edge's other best and childhood friend Reimi followed him.

The area is one big jungle-like, rocky location with much water around and plants everywhere. Giant spiders and bees do not hesitate to attack in groups and flowers contain helpful items as well as there is much to harvest from such a lively planet.

When they reached the Cave of the Urd Falls they discovered other beings, bats and self-cloning plants gelee creatures. Here there were also some items as iron, berries and sage that recovers their health and restores consciousness when the characters are down.

Outside of the cave the next sort of bugs has been encountered, the greatest of of them on that side. They have a large back and love to attack with a ram attack while flying.

When the heroes arrived at the beach they found the wreck of the Eremia and a dying crew member. He told them about an unknown force, a being that was the cause for the Eremia and crew's fate.

He died in Edge's arms.

A young man arrived. He has green hair and is not human. While he tried to explain the current situation the force that wrecked the Eremia materialized and attacked the heroes.






The man joined them and fought the creature - a thing with a solid shell to protect its core and tentacles.





After a hard battle in which the shell was broken to quickly attack the core with Blindsides, attacks from behind while the enemy is confused, the being Armaros has been destroyed.



The young man introduces himself as Faize, an Alien from the Eldarian race, the Space Elves. He goes with them through the caves and the outside area back to the Calnus where an Eldarian station has been built for further planning.






Next Episode: Saturday, January 18th 2014

[Pumpkin]

Oh this is exciting! I have the game but I've never finished it. I didn't get that far :x. I keep meaning to go back and play it. I'm looking forward to seeing more

[Sephiroth]

As they arrived in the Eldarian station where they had the chance to recover, visit two shops, help some Eldarian and Human people and in general get some information about the current situation while the Calnus was repaired.
Grafton introduced them to one of Faize's superiors, he cooperated with.
Edge and Reimi learned that there is a bond between both races for a long time now and just a few instances knew it.



When they were done, they ran into Arumat, an Eldarian soldier that did not seem very sociable at first glance – and the second one.



After realizing that the Eldarians built a bridge to explore the a smaller part of the planet a bit more.



Then Faize left his ship, the Sol, at the station and gladly joined the heroes to follow them to the Calnus.






After being promoted to the ranks of a Captain by Grafton, Edge took off with the Calnus.

Edge: „Star Ocean, here we come!“



While flying in warp speed a quick call from Shimada, the Deputy Officer of the SRF that left more of a bad atmosphere, Edge talked with his two friends about Crowe and his own father, who was the reason for him to fight with swords as a traumatic experience where he could not save his father initiated it. He also assured Reimi that no matter how lonely and unsure she might feel, she can always count on him.



Then they arrived on a newly found planet. It is similiar to Earth but also pretty cold. When they found a village called "Triom" where some people lived that were a bit more inexperienced when it comes to technology and an advanced way of living as well as general inventions, they were mistaken as gods who arrived with their celestial ship.




Once the Elder of the village showed them that the planet suffers from many problems, such as the Bacculus illness that infects people and turns them to stone and unknown monsters appeared, the heroes decided to guide his granddaughter Lymle, a 15-year old but very young looking girl who can also use magic as Faize and go with her to the Alanaire Citadel where the oracle might have a symbol to cure the sickness.







Lymle and Faize already showed to begin a very special relationship as he doubted her skills for a moment and she, as a result of that, did not gave him as the only one a nickname and also did not allow him to call her „Lym“ while Edge and Reimi, Edgie and Reirei, were allowed to.




Then they left the small village and headed north, confronting some lizardmen, mushrooms and birds as well as Mandragoras until the stood in front of the mighty Citadel.






Story continues: Monday, January 20^th 2014

[Spuuky]

I notice you've completely left out everyone's favorite character.

[Sephiroth]

I notice you've completely left out everyone's favorite character.

Who would that be? Welch? I have 100% of all her items and so I don't need to see her any longer. Main story-wise she only appears when they start. The other scenes are not obligatory.

[Spuuky]

It isn't you who needs to see her, it is everyone who has never played this game.

[Sephiroth]

I even screenshotted Welch now. And I forgot she also appears later in the obligatory story again but that is not important as I see some character scenes with her anyway because I go for the character endings again.


Alanaire Citadel, Woodley, Triom & Celestial Ship


When the characters finally arrived at the gate of the citadel, Edge's hidden magical potential awoke. Then the gate opened. The inside looks just like one big circular room up to the ceiling with some extra rooms on its edges. Pretty much completely ignoring Stone Golems, those weird Lizardmen, Skeletons and Kobolds they showed more interest in some big stones that began to float up some levels once a glowing gem attached to them was touched. However, not every stone had one, so they searched for the rest and emptied all accessible treasure chests for them and other items. To get to the higher level they even took some stairs that let to the outside again. There some more battles were proven because of the damaged part.

When the stones were all activated, the elevator to the oracle's chamber was used and the chamber entered.


However, Edge and his friends could not believe what they saw. The oracle was attacked by one greater Lizardman and its minions.




To help her they quickly defeated the ghastly creatures but sadly the destruction resulted in some parts of the ceiling coming down, ultimately causing the oracle's death.
Lymle had the idea to visit the next village, where the oracle-to-be lives. So they exited the citadel from the other side, with Reimi first sliding down a curtain as she feared Edge would look at her butt from below while he didn't even get her complaint and ran through the snowy fields where Woodley, the home of Lutea is.



Lutea had a quick talk about how the sickness might be cured. To do so she gave them a symbol stone as the cause of the illness needs to be sealed within it to create a healing symbol like the one needed. She showed her belief in the group, especially Lymle, agreed that the heroes should ask Lym's grandfather for further help and after shopping they left again.



Running at the lake's shore, close to Woodley, they picked up a Fairy Orchid and used it in a small forest nearby as it dispelled a wall of magical obstacles and went back to Ghimdo, Lym's grandfather.

Talking to Ghimdo he told the heroes about another spaceship that arrived on Lemuris monts ago. As Faize explained it could be Crowe's Aquila because of an anomaly of time that makes it possible for them to arrive way earlier even though months since the warp accident did not pass according to Edge. So they decided to cross the snowy plains where the other celestial ship should be and from where the lizardmen-monsters started to appear as the cause of the sickness was supposed to be there.

With a Fire Ring given from Ghimdo and it being charged by a symbologist lady in the village the heroes continued their journey to the ship. First, however, they returned to the Calnus, where they made use of a second monster jewel given by Faize and a newly forged Flame Sword form Edge with the help of Faize and Welch. Reimi and Lymle also decided to put on two fire weapons they bought newly and equipped everything new and useful they had found.



When going through the Rinoa mountains they melted away some ice barriers with the ring and finally stood in front of the wrecked ship.
It was not the Aquila, however that was no reason to turn around and go home so they entered.

Except the ordinary lizardmen, harpys and were squirrels waited for them in the area. The ship itself looked, apart from completely red and black, very technologically advanced with machinery everywhere. They even had bombs to collect that were useful to open some closed doors. However no living crew member showed up.



When they found one computer in a room close to the cockpit they did not just get a code for the next door but also were able to witness what the computer has recorded:
The lizardmen themselves were the crew of the ship. Unfortunately and without the heroes knowing at that time why, they transformed from normal lizardmen from the Cardianon race into those instinctively acting lizard monsters one after another.



After hurrying Edge and the others too the elevator in the next room which led to the cockpit and went into the next room.

There a great stone or crystal-like looking material of unknown origin waited for them.

Understanding that this was the reason for all the suffering, Edge tried out the symbol stone. In vain.
The crystal absorbed a Cardianon body and formed a new, monster-like body which it used to attack the heroes as the monster Barachiel.



Barachiel put up a good fight as it floated around, trying to attack as many of the heroes as possible at once with some shockwaves and ice waves while sometimes trying to be effective against only one with an uppercut or an ice breath. However, everytime it tried to attack the characters with a shockwave attack, Edge and the others could focus on dodging, mostly with Blindsides and attack its core, were it was weak. As it was also weak to fire as most of the monsters around the ship, it was destroyed fast enough with Edge's sword, Reimi's burning arrows and Lym's Fire Bolt magic while Faize helped with other attacks.

With the destruction of Barachiel a giant light pillar rose, petrifying every lizard monster on the planet.

However, as the heroes unortunately needed to see, it also turned other people into monsters, that attacked many of the villagers, before they also turned into stone. Only a few of the people in Triom, Lym's home remained.

Ghimdo, Lym's grandpa sadly turned into stone in the center of the village, still holding the flower Lymle gave to him …

Lutea explained the heroes the situations and that a few people in Woodley had the same fate which was the reason for her to come here. Edge is mad at himself as he thought they failed, however they tried to comvince him that even without finding a cure they ended the suffering as no more people could get sick from the entity.

With Faize's help they decided to go to Arcturus VIII, the home planet of the Cardianon, where some answers and maybe more of those entities to destroy could be found.

Lutea and Lymle agree about the idea of Lym following them, so she went with Edge and his friends to the Calnus and left the planet for now.

In the Calnus they get to know the planet's name, Lemuris and Lymle's full name, Lymle Lemuri Phi, as she has been named after the planet.

[Mirage]

You know I'm going to be pretty impressed if you platinum SO4. That's a lot of work.

[Sephiroth]

You know I'm going to be pretty impressed if you platinum SO4. That's a lot of work.

Cetra29's STAR OCEAN THE LAST HOPE -INTERNATIONAL- Trophies - PSNProfiles.com

My playthrough of Star Ocean is the last one to Platinum, the Chaos Mode run.

[Mirage]

Yes, so all you need to do is to finish this run and you've got it.

[Sephiroth]

And I am halfway through as I arrived on Roak.

[Sephiroth]

Arcturus VIII – The Cardianon Mothership


The flight itself was refreshing. While Welch was introduced to Lymle and tried to annoy her a bit, Reimi had her birthday, they spoke about how awesome Crowe is and Lymle and Faize showed a bit more of their very special relationship when Lym no longer wanted Reimi's cookies after Faize said he also liked them, Faize's hand was almost bit into by Cerberus which Lym did not expect and such.



Arcturus VIII was a surprise once found as it was no planet but one gigantic space station, the Cardianon Mothership. Nevertheless the heroes wanted to enter it, then they were caught with the tracking beam, however and forced to come in. And stay there. With a really bad feeling they made their first steps outside of the Calnus just to be attacked by Cardianon soldiers that waited behind the first door.
Also the pink-haired lady Myuria was shown for the first time.





Beside lizardmen the ship was full of mechs such as great floating robots or other junkbots that waited for the heroes in other rooms. Before that Edge needed to find a Thunder Ring in a room as he needed to charge it with Plasma since some doors only opened this way.
The first computer reached, Faize did not get that much information but another code to open the next door, similiar to the celesial ship.
Soon after a chamber was found which was ominous: It was very cool in there and except some dead lizardmen on the floor there were capsules in the chamber that contained Cardianons. When Edge changed the temperature of the chamber the capsules opened and the next mutated Cardianons awoke, searching for a target to attack.
With just another ID card grabbed from one dead body they headed back to a room nearby that was also unlocked with the ring and registered the card with the next computer.
Faize experienced some new information about the "epiphanies of guidance" and such, which seemed to be the strange crystal-like entities that caused so much trouble.
Afterwards a Lil Vending Machine was found that was very convenient as it was a machine that could be used within the Calnus to buy things and just a few moments after the next door was passed the crew was captured and teleported into a room with no way out.



Some Cardianon orderered Edge to do as he wished and speak to the so called „Steel Giant“ who the crew also already heard rampaging in the ship. The lizardmen also called Edge and Reimi „descendants of the Muah“, however Edge could not really understand what that means.
Still he did not follow his command and told the Steel Giant to destroy more instead.

Just a few moments later, while the pink-haired lady was seen sneaking through the ship, the Steel Giant saved the heroes. He called himself „Bacchus“, a cyborg with a huge, green metallic body and joined the group.





As the central controltower was where they needed to go to, they invaded even farther into the ship, now meeting some other mechs like „dragoons“, enormous robots that love to throw people around and attack them with missiles then. Bacchus however, did something similiar. He also was able to shoot missiles that attacked multiple enemies and both his strength and stamina was exactly what the heroes needed. As a scientist he also provided useful information all the time, being pretty much irreplacable.



In the tower some barriers needed to be got through and even some dragons, not only dragoons, fought. None of them was an actual problem, however.
Then the elevator to the generator room was reached and Bacchus explained a bit more about himself being from the Morphus race and what he did in the ship as well as that he cooperated with Crowe until he left.

Afterwards they found another crystal entity, which Bacchus called a „Grigori“. He had no problem to destroy it but when that Cardianon from before came in and became angry what was left of the Grigori absorbed it and mutated to Sahariel, the next unfriendly thing.


While Sahariel looked like a mecha dragon with some missile launchers on its back, flame throwers and some bolt discharger it had then same weakness as all Grigori: A core. On its torso, whenever it tried to attack with a volt beam or volt ball it exposed its weak spot, which made it relatively easy to destroy it as most of its attacks could be dodged pretty easily by just running away, to its back to attacking the core, the last one always interrupts Grigori attacks if done fast enough.



Bacchus saved the heroes a second time as the Cardianon in its original form used a grenade and for them to not get hurt he covered it with his steel body. His arm and leg was damaged but except that there was no problem so Edge and Faize helped him to move.



The room with the central computer was finally reached so the tracking beam could be deactivated.However, Bacchus noticed the ship already readied warping to an unknown place in the universe so they needed to hurry and get out before that happened. As there was not much time left, the honorable scientist told them to leave him behind but that was no option for Edge who would never think of abandoning his friends so they all together moved Bacchus through the slowly closing doors until the got to the last one. It was magically held open with the power of Myuria. Once she noticed the „red-haired man“, so Crowe, was not with them, she left again.





Then they got to the Calnus and left just in time.

[Pumpkin]

Already further than I got :P

[Sephiroth]

Alternate Earth – "Area 51", the Military Station

With the mothership left behind the next planet to stop was planned to be EN II, Bacchus home.

The warp was quite funny, as Faize and Lym grewe even closer as they intended at that time Lym's jokes which accidentally ended in a kiss.

Edge also played some chess-like game with Bacchus, which he lost, even though he fought quite well ann impressed Bacchus with his fast learning skills and when entering the woman's bathroom he received some beating from Reimi.

The flight itself did not end as accepted, however. They needed to end the warp earlier as thought as they confronted a Black Hole.

Without any chance to escape they were sucked into it.

To their own surprise, they survived it.


And even more of a surprise was for them that they found Earth.


Something was not right about it, however, so they landed in a desert area to explore it.


Reimi and Lymle were chosen to stay inside of the Calnus. Then when the three men checked a magazine inside of a house of the seemingly abandoned ghost town, they found out about one possible effect of the Black Hole as it seemed to forced them to travel back to the past of 1957.
Outside they suddenly saw some soldiers examining the Calnus. As they could not just confront them they followed a man named Klaus Bachtein who offered them to help and to come to his house.



Lymle who succeeded in running away, joined them again but as Reimi was forced to go with the unknown men Klaus gave the heroes the advice to follow them and make up some charade about themselves being caught by him. He explained them that he had some moral doubts about what mankind did withn their knowledge about aliens and their technology and that humans would need to make their own experience instead of just abusing situations like Edge and the other's arrival, which made him reject that „silver plate“ with that future technology.


Additionally he also asked them to save another alien girl, called Meracle, in the military basis once he activated the alarm inside.


They agreed and followed him them.


Once imprisoned only a few minutes were to wait until Klaus helped them to get free. As a result of that he was caught and beaten up by soldiers.
During that process other aliens and experiments had also been released, such as mini aliens, mecha sasquatches and soldier zombies.
Finally they ran into the Feloid girl Meracle who ran away. Right before she was attacked by a Chimera the others helped her. At that moment, when she looked in Edge's face, she fell in love with him.






The battle against that wild beast with multiple heads was fininished pretty easily, despite some rushing or poisonous gas whirlwind attacks.



Since they wanted to save Reimi they got farther into the station where the Calnus was brought to.



Klaus wife waited for them then. She convinced Edge to help her by giving her the Exalith Crystal of the Calnus as the results would lead to a world without pollution and problems as Edge knew it from Earth. However, she lied to them as she did not tell them about her otehr evil intentions of, while the Earth shall be a better one, mankind should be the superior race in the universe with that knowledge gotten that early, being able to destroy their enemies and rule over the other races.
At that time Edge began to doubt himself and his decisions, as he thought it was all his fault.
When reunited with Reimi who was naked because of some examinations, Edge got another slap from her and they faced Earth's inevitable fate:


As the reactor could never actually cope with the physical phenomenon caused by the crystal, Earth was about to be converted into a formless mass of energy.


Bacchus coudl not help them to get out of the cell but Klaus came in time to bring them out.
Meracle wanted him to join but he decided to stay with his wife, so she unwillingly went with Edge to the Calnus.


Klaus hugged his wife for the last time as she has lost sanity and hope in lifem when they lost their child.


Together then, holding each other tightly, they died …






When the heroes got to the Calnus, Meracle felt all alone and wanted to stay here but then she was reminded of the professor, of Klaus, when she saw Edge and he told her that they were her new friends. Thinking about her friendship with Klaus she jumped towards her new friends before the platforms collapsed and followed them.









With the crystal missing the Calnus was unable to escape the wave but Meracle's pendant, given to her by Klaus, was an even stronger Exalith crystal so they got out of the mess right before Earth vanished.



During the process they where thrown back to their own dimension.


Bacchus realized, as the paradox of Edge and Reimi no longer existing has not occured (which is impossible anyway) but instead them as being Earthlings still being here and everything that was connected with them in general still being here it could not have been mere time travelling but an alternative dimension that was not time-wise dependent of their own.


However, Edge saw no difference in what happened as, no matter if their own Earth still existed, an Earth was destroyed and he thought it was all just because of him …


Meracle, as sad as she was about what happened, still saw meaning in it, as she was saved and able to go with them and his other friends also tried to convince him. He however was emotionally wrecked …

[Sephiroth]

The Middle Ages? Edge's Inner Fears

When they arrived on Roak they were saved by Arumat who destroyed some unknown ship which went after them. The planet itself looked all natury, less futuristic and more like the middle ages.
As Edge did not want to decide anything Reimi took command and lead the group for a while until his doubts and self-critical feelings would be gone.
The first town on Roak they have visited was not all that great for a start as they needed to help some girl with wings called Sarah which was about to get kidnapped.

Edge did not want them to get involved in more affairs of the planet's habitant's but as they needed some help they asked for a bunny, a mount which could lead them through the desert. Sarah told them to ask the nomads outside of the town.



Faize was very pleased to meet one of the nomad girls. She told them about the bunnies and teleported her own to them with her magic. Then she said they could get one in the forest and gave a cloak to Faize which Lymle did not seem to like very much for obvious reasons.



Their moments of joy, whether it being Meracle's hunger for those pink little furballs or just riding them to get through the desert was harshly interrupted by the sickness of Reimi. With some petrification beginning at hands and feet, they had to find a cure as soon as possible.



The king of Astral was supposed to help them. With the help of Sarah of the Featherfolk who was much respected by his highness they had no problems to enter the castle were there call for help was heard and understood. The time for Edge to show the worth of his friendship with Reimi was about to approach again as some ominous guy, the Black Eagle stole the medicine.



Edge's anger has had awoken again. He hesitated for a moment to face the robber in the coliseum but after Faize accepted to go instead he decided to do it.

For Reimi.