Star Ocean 4 Coming to PS3

[Andromeda]

Well this was announced just this last week, well its Sunday now so its last week at this point. But it was announced that it would be coming to the PS3. And to top things off they have announced that there are going to be doing a worldwide release as well. The release date for Star Ocean 4 The Last Hope International will be the first/second week of February. I believe the JP date is 4th and the US date is the 9th and I think the EU date is like 12th or something, but they are all pretty much together.

Whatever the exact dates are the interesting thing is that this will be the first "International" edition from Square that the US will be getting since the International version is usually a PAL version or updated Japanese release. It is going to have Japanese, English, French, German, Spanish and one other dubbed language for the game. Six languages is pretty unheard of for game, but it seems that they are just making one version and shipping it everywhere rather than localizing specific regions. Seeing that it was already localized for the 360 version I'm guess there is almost no localization required apart from replacing 360 terms with PS3/Sony terms.

Always questioned Squares putting it on the 360 when it had been Sony since the beginning I think. They'll get better sales. But the International version is said to have a new playable character, but I don't believe that they've announced what character.

An odd rumor I heard is that Japanese studios are making games on the 360 knowing that are going to lose money since Microsoft gives them money for development. And then they just port over to the PS3 at almost no cost with some additional content to a console where they will be able to get a return on. Strange rumor, but it might explain the odd case of developers making games for the 360 even though they are only hurting their profits because of the lack of an install base in Japan.

Star Ocean 4 is in the Top 5 of best selling 360 games in Japan sitting around 200,000 I think it was. Seeing how the Slim is selling fast and more units out there soon. SO4 will probably do far better on the PS3. Tales of Vesperia only did 70,000 first day on the 360 and it did 140,000-150,000 first day on the PS3. Should be interesting.

I know I can't wait to play SO4. I was really frustrated not being able to play it. PS3 owners only need wait a few months for it. So many RPGs coming for us soon. FFXIII, SO4 and Tales of Vesperia.

[Zargabaath]

I'm glad that Square is finally deciding to release their first International version of a game worldwide.

That rumor could be true. Before their games came out they were talking about getting the most money and having a bigger user base to possibly buy their product. Yet, they would release only (if at first) on the 360 which did not have a huge following in Japan and is not known for JRPGs (at least the Microsoft brand). I found it quite stupid that they talked about that yet were actually hurting their sales. If you look at vgchartz.com, all the JRPGs that I know that are on the 360 have not sold over 1 million copies. This is how their sales look from the available data vgchartz has collected:

Lost Odyssey - Japan 110,000; Americas 450,000; Others 250,000
Tales of Vesperia - Japan 170,000; Americas 180,000; Others 40,000
Star Ocean 4 - Japan 210,000; Americas 220,000; Others 100,000
Blue Dragon - Japan 210,000; Americas 260,000; Others 60,000
Eternal Sonata - Japan 80,000; Americas 150,000; Others N/A
Last Remnant - Japan 180,000; Americas 210,000; Others 190,000
Infintite Undiscovery - Japan 120,000; Americas 260,000; Others 140,000
Operation Darkness - Japan N/A; Americas 10,000; Others N/A

There are some other JRPGs but they don't make it to at least 500k. Now would the games have done better on the PS3, that will not be know, but the PS3 has a bigger user base in Japan and is known for JRPGs around the world. I'm not so sure that Tales of Vesperia for the PS3 will be released outside Japan; there has been no news about a release outside Japan. Which is sad because the 360 sales were horrible. And the companies may not lose much if any at all because of Microsoft paying well for some sort of exclusivity, but I don't like the practice MS is using - buying your way into a market and deciding that you are going to stay there not matter what b/c you have the money to pour into that department is not good. One is they won't care about their product as they could pump vast amounts of money to fix it (360) and they buy their games and provide cheap development costs because they can take the 'hit' - they don't worry about building a product companies want to develop for but a product that is cheaper and easier.

[WilsonDean1990]

I haven't really played star ocean, but would you reccomend it since like FFXIV is coming out

[Ralz]

Ah, finally! My chance at SO4 for real! That will go nicely with FFXIII. The fact that the US gets an International game(HUGE shock! =O) is all the more exciting! I'm really getting hyped for this, but I've also got 358/2 Days coming in four days from now! I have a feeling my wallet will be in trouble after all this... -_-

[Messiah]

EXCELLENT! thats exactly what i needed to hear, Tales of Vesperia is going to be awesome too!
Not forgetting FFXIII, that will be the highlight of my gaming year!
Thanks Andromeda!

[Andromeda]

Wilson do you like Action RPGs? If you like action RPGs then you will probably enjoy Star Ocean 4. If you have played any of the last few Tales of games then you will have a good idea of what to expect.

[WilsonDean1990]

Ah, finally! My chance at SO4 for real! That will go nicely with FFXIII. The fact that the US gets an International game(HUGE shock! =O) is all the more exciting! I'm really getting hyped for this, but I've also got 358/2 Days coming in four days from now! I have a feeling my wallet will be in trouble after all this... -_-

lol Damn right, especially with the subscriptions every month

[Ralz]

lol Damn right, especially with the subscriptions every month

Not that it isn't worth it!

And this really makes my day!

[WilsonDean1990]

Yeah I like all kinds of RPG, I've seen my friend play a few of them buti don't really know the story but i'll pick it up

[DragonHeart]

That's fantastic news, I was quite disappointed when it was XBOX exclusive. I liked SO3, it was fun. It's good that some RPGs are finally starting to trickle over to Playstation. I like the games I have for it well enough but I'll always be an RPGer at heart. Even better that it's an international version. I've always wanted to try playing a game in German lol, just because I can. XD

~DragonHeart~

[Jin]

An odd rumor I heard is that Japanese studios are making games on the 360 knowing that are going to lose money since Microsoft gives them money for development. And then they just port over to the PS3 at almost no cost with some additional content to a console where they will be able to get a return on. Strange rumor, but it might explain the odd case of developers making games for the 360 even though they are only hurting their profits because of the lack of an install base in Japan.

That's an interesting rumour. Do you by chance have a source on this? I'm not asking because I doubt you or anything, I just would like some more information on it because it has always baffled me why so many JRPGs turn up on the 360 when the largest (as far as I know) market for it is a country that mostly owns PS3s and Wiis. I always assumed it was because the 360 is so much easier to program for than the PS3 and the developers were just lazy, but that never explained why they didn't just do a bad PS3 porn like so many other companies.

As for Star Ocean, I really couldn't care less about it. JRPGs have begun to bore me terribly. We need more Valkyria Chronicles. Innovation, people.

[Rocky]

Too bad that the Star Ocean series started doing not so great after the Second Story.

I'm not suprised to see copies of JRPGS sell more copies on the PS3 than the360, in both Japan and the US. The thing is, in Japan, hardly anyone owns a 360 and most people have a PS3, and in US it's the polar opposite. In order for companies to sell well in both countries, they have to make it for both systems, and if Microsoft is putting money in their pockets, then they might as well go with them first. Besides, I'm pretty sure that any extra content for the games can just be released on the Xbox Live Dashboard to be downloaded. That way everyone gets their fair share of the pie. If anything it sucks for PS3-exclusive North Americans because of the wait for games that have been released months ago.