Star Shift Origins

I really enjoyed this game, and it left me wanting more. The highlight of the experience is the story and world building. You can tell the developer put a lot of time in developing the various factions, plots and sub-plots. Due to the short length of the game, we only get to know a few of the characters and see only a small portion of the galaxy, but the foundation has been laid for so much more to be explored. The game definitely has a serious tone, but with humor sprinkled in to lighten things up at times. Now, this certainly isn't a perfect game. It would have been nice to have more variety in the enemy encounters. It was also too easy to build an overpowered crew, to just splash through the encounters. The combat system works well and is fun, but could probably use some balancing. In conclusion, I really like the game and now plan to jump into the next installment Rebellion. I'm eager to see how the developer expands on the core system they have developed.

Twas fine, fighting all enemies and getting lost a few times in mazes gave me about 5 hours of playtime. It is quite obvious that you likely wont get to keep equipment or items from this game so dont worry about that. The learnable skills have a few small issues, but on base difficulty, getting the passives and keeping up with equipment will have you be fine through battles. Be aware that a lot of the 5 hours is battling enemies, this is not a bad thing but it is something to note. Combat feels slow so it is probably best to opt into damaging options. Outside of unbelievably bad rng (3 enemies targeting 1 character in 1 round and going first sort of rng), you will likely be fine in the battles and healing items are plentiful and easy to get/use. Gives enough to want to see more and only overstays its welcome a bit. If the final large game has even some of the features teased in this game through the stat panels, then I look very forward to when it comes out.

Here I will leave the cat, friends passing by can pet it and give it likes and prizes ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀♡♡♡♡♡ 　　　　　／＞　　フ 　　　　　| 　_　 _ l 　 　　　／` ミ＿xノ 　　 　 /　　　 　 | 　　　 /　 ヽ　　 ﾉ 　 　 │　　|　|　| 　／￣|　　 |　|　| 　| (￣ヽ＿ヽ)__) 　＼二つ https://steamcommunity.com/groups/meowinima

DEcebt gane that promises to be good in its next installment, but please god don't put any more mazes in your game.

☀️

Yes.

A nice six and a half-ish hour play. While streaming this we did encounter a couple of bugs that happened after using abilities too much in one combat and another when trying to delete old saves. However, those are minor in the long run as the developer is actively working on fixing these. The first thing anyone is going to notice and speak out about is the use of AI in this game. Yes, it uses AI primarily for art when it comes to a number of characters and with making some of the javascript plugins. And while I will continue to not like the use of AI, I separated my dislike from this review and playthrough. The art style for a lot of the character portraits is inconsistent. While it is understandable that the developer was aiming to have them look different in the sense that they are aliens and of different species, the stylization of the art is the issue. Where two people of the same race look different as one has more of an anime/hand drawn look while the other is obviously AI with it's strange shiny layer. Aside from this, there is a small complaint about the lack of tutorials when it comes to skills and getting setup at first. With the developer constantly going back to fix bugs or to expand on different portions while also working on future titles, it is nice to see that they do take feedback well. Beyond this the music is good and is nice to listen to, even to just kind of vibe to with it in the background. It is definitely fitting with the more rave/sci-fi sounds for the most part, while some sections have more somber music to fit the scene. Do note, the developer loves the Nova Lighting Plugin considering how much it is used. Combat is heavily inspired by Suikoden with you having a maximum of 7 party members to work with. Each with their own specialties and some racial abilities that define them from the others. Combat itself is not overly difficult and with some careful planning on your attacks/abilities and learning the proper skills, you can get through most combats easily. It is nice to see aliens that are humanoid in some sense, but are still very far from human being primary characters. That being said, I do consider them primary characters and not main characters. Character development obviously took a back seat and is secondary to the main story. The game is short at about 6 to 6.5 hours long, developing each character in a meaningful way is not possible. However, developing at least one or two would have certainly been possible. Perhaps more backstory or defining scenes for Carol or Magnus as they appear to be main focuses. It is obvious that this is a prelude or prologue game to the next ones in the series and is more about setting up the universe that those play in. Gameplay wise it does alternate between being a traditional RPG with an ATB and your party versus the enemy party, and a tactics style game depending on what the story requires. This is an interesting twist, and does help as it flows well with what the story needs. Overall, this game gets a 4 out of 5 and a request to hire a character artist.

This game had a promising start and I hope the other games in the series are excellent. But I repeatedly encounter a crash in the last boss fight and was unable to complete it. A persistent, repeated bug at the very end of the game demands a negative review. Aside from that, the combat was fun and the setting was interesting. There were some questionable gameplay decisions in the form of tedious mazes.