Cosmic Star Heroine

Cosmic Star Heroine is, without a doubt, a great RPG reminiscent of the classic JRPGs I used to play as a kid, and it still manages to feel fresh in its own way, with a great cast of characters and many interesting locations.
The story is set in the Zevanii system, a planetary system in the far distant future, in which the different planets maintain a relative peace. You start playing as Alyssa L'Salle, an agent for the Agency of Peace and Intelligence (API), from the human planet of Araenu. After what seems to be an ordinary mission against the terrorist organization known as Astraea, you and your friends discover a conspiracy that threatens the whole system, and it's up to Alyssa and her team to stop it.
As the story progresses, you'll get to travel to other two planets from the system. The first of them, Rhomu, suffered a heavy bombardent of biological weapons long ago, making the surface inhospitable for humans, who built cities in the underground; however, the Scimerex, friendly bug-like creatures, thrived on the surface, building their Hive on it. Then there's Nuluup, a planet of human-like creatures, who after their first death, live on in robotic suits controlled by their souls.
The gameplay is turn-based; you get to build a team of four characters, with Alyssa always being the leader, and one support character. Each character has their own abilities, though you can also use items you find, and programs, which depend on your character's shield. As with any JRPG, you get to buy new weapons and shields from stores found in the different planets.
The art style reminds me of classic 16-bit games, even though it manages to feel fresh and modern on its own way. All main characters (and several side charactersdtra) are recognizable from each other, and the interactions you can have are pretty good; from simple lines of funny dialogues, to sidequests that can give you great rewards. The soundtrack is another great point, full of catchy tunes, and while there is practically no spoken dialogue throughout the game, Laura Shigihara provides the vocals for Lauren's song (Lauren being one of the characters that joins you in your quest); a great song I might add.
Personally, I had a lot of fun with this game, and I can easily recommend it.

Cosmic Star Heroine started as a Kickstarter all the way back in 2013. The fully realized game, however, didn't appear until April 2017 on PS4 and Windows. It's a turn-based RPG, and for the most part, it's structured in the style of games like Chrono Trigger and Phantasy Star IV. And yeah, I know what some of you are thinking -- there seems to be a LOT of games like this on Steam, games that may or may not be preying on Joe Blow Gamer's nostalgia for games that looked and played just like this, way back in the day. So, the question I want to answer right away is, does Cosmic Star Heroine have real substance, or is it just a shameless transparent nostalgia bomb?
The answer is that it's a perfectly good game with a decent amount of substance, but not quite enough meat on the bone, so to speak. But I would definitely say that this game is more than just a nostalgic cash grab.
I'll start with the story: you play as Alyssa L'Salle, who leads a group of Special Ops agents that slowly uncover a conspiracy within their own agency, and decide to take matters into their own hands. There's mutants, androids, mind control, and all that good science fiction stuff. That's one MAJOR thing this game has going for it -- there's a bigtime Cowboy Bebop vibe here, with quick one-liners, funny gags, and fantastic music, all set within spectacular looking environments. It is legitimately cool to see a game that looks like it was pulled straight from the PC Engine or late SNES catalog, but given a high-def wide-screen treatment. The pixel art here is jaw dropping, and the color palette here is just perfect. Clearly a lot of work went into this game look as good as it does.
The music is also impressive -- it switches from a rollicking, sci-fi anime vibe, to more of a laid back feel that's reminiscent of Blade Runner. It can be a risky choice to go with modern sounding music with throwback visuals, because those two aspects don't always mesh well. It would have been cool to hear this music in 16-bit form, but as it is, it works perfectly okay. The main takeaway here is that the battle theme here isn't annoying, even after several dozen battles. And my starting point when it comes to ranking and RPG soundtrack is, do I want to hit the mute button after a few battles? I don't with this game, so there ya go.
Speaking of battles, what makes Cosmic Star Heroine fun is the battle system. Sure, there's the usual collection of equippable weapons, armor and items, and all that good stuff, but there's quite a bit more here. First off, there's not *totally* random battles here, but you see the enemies on-screen before you fight them. (It's pretty much the same as Chrono Trigger in that regard)
Each character has their spells neatly divided up into 8 icons, which is kinda nice -- I think I'd rather have that than a giant list you have to scroll through every time. You can swap out certain spells for others anytime you're not in a battle. The catch here is that items, programs, and most spells can only be used ONCE per battle. At that point, you have up a turn to recharge, so to speak, although the most powerful spells you learn later in the game can still only be used once per battle.
The combat system is set up for the player to use smaller spells/programs to build up to using bigger, more damage-dealing spells. The game does this by using "style points" and "hyper points." Style points reset before every battle but accumulate as you start using your attacks. The higher your style percentage, the more effective your attacks. This gives you an incentive to save your bigger attacks, as opposed to shooting your wad from the get-go. I should mention that even when you use these bigger attacks, you still have plenty of opportunities to build your style points back up, from regular attacks or from buffs and status spells.
Hyper points accumulate throughout the game (instead of resetting each battle) and your character will glow with a yellow light around them once they're eligible to use a hyper spell. If you're careful enough, you'll be able to time your turn appropriately when your style percentage is high, and be able to do some major damage. This is all just a long way of explaining that, the combat here is more than just leaning on one button, and to progress through this game, you have to thoughtfully pick and choose your attacks to build up your strength accordingly.
I also have to mention that your attacks, programs, items and even your health ALL replenish after you win a battle. You might think that makes this game somewhat easy, but that brings me to the difficulty settings. There's four different settings, and you can switch between them anytime you'd like (as long as it's between battles), so you can make the game super forgiving, or really difficult. I'd recommend starting at the 2nd difficulty setting to give yourself a chance to get used to the combat system, and then switch to the 3rd setting where things get a little more interesting. (The 4th setting however is just friggin ridiculous, I wouldn't recommend that setting to anyone.)
If there's anything holding Cosmic Star Heroine back, it's the way the story is told. It's only about a 10-12 hour game, and that's fine, but the story felt rushed, and the characters barely had any depth to them. Some felt like they were there merely for the sake of being there, like the dancing robot or the alien lawyer. Some characters like Sue have some backstory to them, with a sidequest where you can help his son, but the game really could have used a lot more of that. There just wasn't nearly enough depth here for my liking. So if you go into this one expecting something along the lines of Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy 4 or 6, or even something like Lufia 2, you may come away disappointed.
Still, with a game like Cosmic Star Heroine, it's a little silly to dislike a game for what it's not, rather than just enjoy it for what it is. And what for what it is, it's a very solid game with some distinct strengths, like the visuals, the art direction and the combat system. Yes it's a short game, and the story may lack depth, but it's still a worthwhile playthrough.

Honestly this game does so many little things wrong and yet I did actually enjoy it and want to finish it. Firstly, the music is fantastic, the combat music will play in your head for a while after playing and that's good because you're going to hear it ALOT. Which is good because the plot and characters are just plain stale, there's a few good bits here and there but overall underdeveloped characters are the norm here. Still though the combat will keep you coming back, it has two great gimmicks that work well together. Being only able to use abilities once and having to recharge them by defending when you decide; and having special/critical attacks on a predictable timer makes for some good puzzle like combat trying to get everything timed up for the perfect attack.
TL;DR recommended for the combat and music, not for the plot and characters.

That's "heroine" with an "e" on the end, by the way. Although in this case I could understand the confusion.
I heard a lot of people comparing this to Chrono Trigger, which is what made me want to play it in the first place. You never know with these things, but it turns out that really is a good comparison.

Even on the surface you can see the similarities. Same look. Basically the same turn-based battle system. The little pixelly characters march around in single file just like Crono & Company and unite for the same sort of combo attacks. Chrono Trigger had a fantasy/time travel plot, whereas this is more sci-fi, with aliens, spaceships and all that, but in many ways it's the same sort of story. That's probably the most impressive part.
I can't think of another RPG in the last 25 years that managed to nail the Chrono Trigger vibe quite so well. It's light-hearted overall, but not so silly that it breaks the immersion and makes playing it feel meaningless. It has its dark moments, but never too much. The characters have their distinct quirks, but it's not that cloying, forced quirkiness that some games have. They always maintain a can-do sort of attitude that keeps your spirits high. Of course you know the good guys are going to win in something like this, but you'll still want to stick around to find out how.
It's all wrapped in a compact (that's a nice way of saying short), well-paced experience. In fact, they really go the extra mile with the design. You know all those things that we've just come to tolerate as an unalterable part of the landscape in RPGs like this?

Things like items piling up in your inventory that you don't want to use because you never know if you'll need them later, and then you just binge like a madman on the last boss. Or having a whole bunch of spells that you keep on the shelf in order to conserve mana. Or most of your team being useless because there are a couple of characters that are obviously the best, and so you just ride them to victory? Or battles turning into a drag because you're forced to play extra-conservatively in order to manage your health between save points?
They're like that stack of old junk that sits in your basement, and every time you walk past it you think you really ought to clean it up but you never do. These guys probably could have just phoned it in and got away with ignoring it too, but instead they actually sat down and took the time to rethink some of this stuff.

Generally what they do is tone down the the logistics side of things so you don't have to manage items, health or mana like they're resources. For example, items aren't treated as consumables, but rather once-per-battle abilities that you can equip and use as the situation dictates. It's really kind of nice. You get to focus completely on the battle in front of you instead of worrying more about the next one.

That sort of streamlining might not be appropriate for every game, but in an upbeat, breezy little adventure like this it really fits. The smile on your face as the credits roll will tell you everything you need to know. It's too bad there's not a New Game + mode like Chrono Trigger's. This is one of the rare games where I actually might have used it.
Oh, and if you've read this whole thing and you still don't know what Chrono Trigger is and you're wondering why I'm talking about it so much, go play that, too. You'll thank me.
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