The very first thing I did after finishing Baldur’s Gate 3 was start playing Armored Core 6. The second thing I did was stop playing Armored Core 6 and start playing Sea of Stars. Armored Core was fun, but it was more intense that I was up for in the first full week of September since it had been just over twenty-four hours since I learned my grandmother was fading and I just did not have a grindy, punishing game in me. I’ve since learned that AC6 is a lot easier to play if you do it super aggresively, with a heavy emphasis on melee combat, so I think I’ll have a better time when I go back to it, but I needed something calming and Sea of Stars seemed like a better bet. Plus, since I bought it on my Switch, I’d be able to take it with me anywhere I needed to go. This turned out to be the right decision, though I suspect my sleep schedule would be in better shape if I was playing AC6 since I doubt I’d want to stay up super late playing that. Sea of Stars had been described online (mostly by people posting on forums and not at all by any advertisement coming from the game’s creators) as being similar to Chained Echoes and while I think the comparison was useful since it got my attention, I think it really does both games a disservice. Sea of Stars is wonderful and a joy to play in its own ways that have absolutely nothing to do with what makes Chained Echoes one of my top recent games.

Sea of Star shines when it comes to the characterization, music, and dialogue. I knew the game was going to be a delight when I booted it up and heard the first of the game’s many songs playing from my stereo system. It fit the visuals of the game perfectly as I ran the lead character I’d picked, a young woman named Valere, through the level in pursuit of my first goal. When I had my first combat encounter, doing my best to figure out the timing for the various blocks and attacks that someone in one of the discords I frequently inhabit mentioned, the music transported me. It disrupted the fairly calm music of the area I was in without taking me out of the experience.

Thanks to that first battle, which took less than a minute of game time, I already knew that I would never get tired of the combat music. When it ended and the background audio of the world around me flooded back in, it seamlessly shifted my attention back to the seaside cliffs I was exploring, doing so with a mix of excellent music, the sound of waves crashing on the rocks, and distant gulls in the air. As every scene and stage unfolded after that, from the flashbacks showing the origin of the first three characters of the game to the fightening and intense battles against a local necromancer in pursuit of a stone she held, the transition from battle to exploration was done swiftly and seemlessly by the soundscape. Even as I’m nearing the end of the game, I’m still enjoying each new track as it sweeps me from battle to puzzles to tense dialogue in a way that feels incredibly natural.

While the characterization is incredibly strong on its own (each character is given their own voice and style of speach in dialogue that makes it easy to tell who is speaking even when we can’t see their picture next to the text), the characters’ themes tell you so much about each of them. Each track gives you an idea of not only what the featured character is about and what they’re like, but how they’re going to influence the world and people around them through their actions. Beyond the basic themes, some entire songs are so tied to characters that I’m genuinely not sure if it’s supposed to be the character’s song or if it’s just a reflection of the character’s words and actions influencing the emotional content of a scene in a way that matches the music assigned. Ultimately, I decided it doesn’t really matter because even when those characters aren’t present, any time I hear their song I will be thinking of them. Each of them is so unique in attitude and expressions (the character portraits shift to show emotion, with enough variety that there are even portraits that only show up after certain plot points to show the change in the emotional state and maturity of some of the characters) that any of them being silent for a scene is notable. Even now, as my party has shifted and some things have changed in ways that effect the dialogue (no spoilers in this review!), some silences and the lack of a characters voice when I’d normally expect to hear it hits incredibly hard.

Unlike Chained Echoes, which is a fairly mechanically complex game with very technical battle mechanics, Sea of Stars is a smooth and relatively simple experience. Battle can seem intimidating at times, when a particularly tough enemy appears, but most of the combat mechanics come down to matching damage types against either enemy weaknesses or against the “lock” system that governs how enemies use their more powerful moves. These locks, a series of icons representing each of the damage types with an attached counter to indicate how long you have before the enemy unleashes their move, are easy to read and fairly straight-forward to resolve (you just need to strike the enemy with the shown types of damage, one time per icon). Only a few enemies, mostly mid to late game bosses or the occasional optional battle, have incredibly complex sets that require not only the right combination of damage types, but also the right application of skills in order to delay the move long enough for you to break all their locks.

While breaking the locks and preventing your enemy from unleashing powerful moves is a core aspect of combat, it is rare that an enemy pulls off a move that could put your party in mortal peril on its own. In combination with other enemies, it definitely becomes more risky, but you can usually take a couple of even the worst hits before you’re in danger of dying, so it really isn’t the end of the world if you’re unable to stop a move from going off or you mistime your block. The upside to this entire system is that it’s usually worth swinging at any set of locks that shows up, even if you can’t break it entirely, since even partially disabling it will reduce the move’s effectiveness. Once you get this pattern down, you’re set for all combat in the game. Occasionally enemies will show up with lock sets that don’t seem breakable, but that’s usually a sign that you’re about to get a new companion character with a different damage type, a new move for an existing character, or a new multi-character combo move that combines different damage types in a new way. Honestly, it’s all a lot of fun and the game does a good job of introducing the system as it comes up.

I’ll admit I’m still not super sure about the story overall, though. I mean, it’s definitely fun, but most of the unexpected twists have little to do with the overarching plot and more to do with the individual beats of it (as in the way that the beats of the game’s plot begin and resolve as pieces of a larger story) as played out by the various character arcs that help move the larger plot forward. I still haven’t beaten the game and what little internet research I’ve done implies a fairly hefty amount of “post game” story content (at this point, I’m not sure the phrase applies since it seems like I’m supposed to beat the game at least twice to get the full experience, something supported by “beating” the game the first time last night and immediately getting a prompt to go investigate something that arrived the instant the game’s “ending” had concluded), so I’m hoping that things will eventually materialize in a way that pushes beyond the rather simplistic “good versus evil” narrative I’ve found so far. I would be surprised if it didn’t, given the way that there being more to life and the choices we make than just “good or evil” is a central part of a lot of the background stories and smaller character plots, but I’m willing to accept that I might just be reading too much into it.

Maybe there will be a moment where things are revealed to me in a way that helps add some nuance to the rather simplistic plot, or that even makes the story about something other than “evil is bad and good bears a responsibility to bring it to an end,” but it has yet to materialize in any concrete way. A lot has happened that makes me thing it will, but I’ve been disappointed before. I genuinely don’t think I’ve gotten this deep into a story without knowing if it will stay basic and simple or finally reveal the complexity it has been hinting at this whole time. I’m literally approaching the “end game” period and while there is plenty more to do after my first clear of the story, I’m really nervous that it might just be extra battles and various collectibles rather than anything substantial. The music, characterization, and fun combat are enough to carry me through the game regardless, but this game will lose esteem in my eyes if it never truly resolves into something more complex than a rather bland conflict between good and evil. To be ABSOLUTELY clear, this is my anxiety speaking here. The game has set up a lot that it has yet to pay off, so I’m reasonably certain it’ll continue to do a great job telling its story, but I can’t shake the worry that it will stumble as it approaches the finish line. Amazing games are rare and it would feel so strange to have played two in the same calendar year.

All in all, Sea of Stars is a great game that I’m thoroughly enjoying. I hope it will live up to my high expectations and that I’ll be able to say I found a second game that was as excellent and enjoyable as Chained Echoes was. I should have it finished sometime in the next week or so, since I’ve had to delay finishing it so I’d stop staying up way too late on work nights. Either way, you can look forward to my final thoughts sometime soon! Regardless of all that, though, I’d definitely recommend Sea of Stars if you’ve got twenty to fourty hours to kill and want to have a fun gaming experience with memorable characters, stellar music, and smooth combat. You really can’t go wrong here.