Apparently, gaming magazines of the 90’s were advertising Star Odyssey for the Sega Genesis. Unfortunately this game was somehow lost in the shuffle and was never released. Fast forward a couple of decades and the Super Fighter team came into existence. According to their website, www.superfighter.com:

I recommend visiting their site. They have an interesting portfolio of work that tickles the imagination. I did not know that this game was saved from obscurity before I played it but on the title screen I did notice a copyright of 2011, which initially puzzled me. It’s interesting to note that this game is available to purchase as a Sega Genesis cartridge.

The in-game back story was kind of deep and I’m not sure exactly what I was supposed to gain from it. There will probably be a light bulb moment for a gamer later in the game as the story unfolds. A spice trader named Yan opens a book and begins telling a story about watching space seeds 16 years earlier and also witnessing an unexpected event. A terrarian ship appeared that was being chased by a group of Radonian ships. He didn’t expect that this one event would plunge the galaxy into war.

After pressing start the gamer is allowed to name his primary character. Next, there is a cut scene showing the main character’s parents 16 years earlier settling down on the planet the adventure starts out.

I’m restructuring the review slightly to put addictiveness first because it has a bearing on all future sub-ratings. I don’t know if maybe my gaming passions have changed over time or if it’s akin to what fellow Vizzed member watznurewallet said “The grinding is a bit monotonous”, but I got bored with this game in just a few hours. It seemed to take too long to level up and/or collect money. I never met any other party members either or were there any that were hinted to. I suppose I expected more to happen during 3 hours of game play. The thought of playing it again reminds me of balancing a check book or doing house work. Tedious. I would rate the addictiveness at a 5, indicating that I’m torn between whether the problem lies with me or the game. But I’m going to rate it a 4 because watznurewallet’s comment makes me doubt that it’s solely my difficulty.

An RPG that I absolutely loved on the Genesis was Shining Force II and when I compare it with Star Odyssey some major graphical differences are noted. One game being different from another is never a bad thing but in this case all the non-player characters look alike and that wasn’t the case in SF2. Also, the NPC’s in S.O. are not as cartoon like as SF2 and that’s ok but there aren’t any close ups of their faces. The design of the cities seemed bland. The main intro had some well designed animations and a broad pallet but nothing after that is really that memorable to me. I am choosing to rate the graphics (for 3 hours of game play) at a 7.

The sound in the game was actually humorous at times. I was amused because there were at least 2 of the music scores that, when they started, reminded me of the beginning of some songs from the 70’s or 80’s. However, compositions were nothing that I’d care to listen to for days on end while I complete the game. Maybe there were other songs but, if so, the developer should’ve opened with their best stuff. During the intro Yan talks but its subtitled; his voice is creative. I would’ve gone down the middle with a 5 for the sound but I’ll give it a 6 because of Yan’s mewing.

It may be great further along in the game but the story just failed to move fast enough. Maybe an early twist or group members to recruit or any kind of attention-getter could have helped keep me hooked. I kind of feel guilty even rating this section and am very tempted to opt out but it was the developers responsibility to keep me coming back for more and they did not. It’s a 5, I guess. (I refuse to balance the check book again!)

Maybe this RPG was slowly building towards a huge expanse of a game. Maybe there were massive battles and killer upgrades. Maybe. Maybe not. I’m struggling at 5 here again. I could add a couple of points because the game obviously takes a while to beat. I could take away a couple of points because it took too long to offer some details. But I think I’ll just stick with 5 for depth.

Vizzed instructs their reviewers “if the game is hard to play, hard to learn or the controls are irritating, rate this high”. I don’t want to rate it high but I have an overwhelming boredom feeling when thinking of the game play. Does this mean the game was “hard to play”? It was extremely simple to learn; like any other RPG. The controls were the opposite of irritating, maybe I’d call them mind-numbing. So, to figure the score, I’ll give “game is hard to play” a 10, “hard to learn” is a 1 and “controls are irritating” a 1. Average these out and I come up with a 4.

My calculator tells me that the overall score is a 5.2. With all of the 5 point ratings and middle-of-the-river indecisiveness that is rampant in my review, the final tally is not much of a surprise. Some my fellow players might not agree with this account but in conclusion, I must point out that if reviews were only made by people who enjoyed a particular game then all ratings would be 9 or better.

thephantombrain : Another nice detailed
review from you!  Star Odyssey sounds like an interesting game.  I didn't have a Sega Genesis growing up, so most of the Sega games are totally new to me   Great job!