Many indie RPG (and sometimes even big studio RPGs) fall into the trap of just tacking on combat systems and numbers with no real thought.

Those devs here have, for the third time now, made a fantastic combat system, and a game database where all numbers feel calculated to make the gameplay quite tactical and interesting.

The basis of combat is pretty intuitive and interesting:

* Each different ability you use increases your Style. Style increases the effectivness of everything you do in combat.
* Most abilities, once used, cannot be used again until you use an ability with a "Rest" effect. Some basic abilities are reusable.
* Every turn, your character gain a Hyper Point. When their Hyper Bar is full, their next ability is heavily buffed - so ideally you want to make sure you have something good avaliable to use at that point.


Other systems tie everything together, like shareable items abilities, a "desperation" system that lets characters act while on the verge of dying if their Style is high enough, a good Ailment mechanics that does not involve RNG, and tight numbers that mean you need to constantly be playing defensive as well - unlike many RPGs where you just go pew pew and ignore defense and ailments.

There are no random encounters while you walk around, aside from pre-scripted ones. After you finish a map, you have the option of spawning additional enemies for battle from the menu, if you are the type of player that likes to grind. Doesn't seem to be needed so far, though.

After each battle, your HP is restaured, and your items are recharged. Each battle is an isolated tactical encounter, not a game of attrition. I like this style.

sweet and short RPG, no filler, fair share of secrets, wide choice of characters, interesting combat system with a lot of depth and customizable for any playstyle

A surprisingly polished indie RPG.

I feel like I should be lenient with my criticism because this game was made by such a small team. It really is quite an impressive game, with that perspective. That said, I've decided to share my honest thoughts. Or try to, at least.

Like many other reviews have said, the battle system is unique and interesting. It doesn't play like Magic: The Gathering, but it felt like it. To me, at least. I ended up spending many of my turns in battle managing, setting up and comboing skills. It was fun for a while, but eventually became troublesome. (I played on Heroine difficulty from start to finish. I can't speak for the other difficulty settings.)

CSH's story is paced like a summary. It seemed like Zeboyd Games was afraid of letting any single scene settle in. I would have liked to see some character drama. The story didn't draw me in. I couldn't bring myself to care about what was going on. And, the characters didn't seem to care either. The witty dialog was often funny, but that's all there was. Well, that and some brief heavy handed plot explanations. After clocking in 17 hours, I'm surprised at how empty the game's characters and story are. The setting was interesting, and all of the characters had a lot of potential. It's too bad more effort wasn't put into writing a more extensive script and adding some human themes to the game. CSH's story needed something to make it meaningful rather than just a placeholder. That said, I don't think they were going for anything serious or emotional. But, to me, melodrama is at the heart of JRPGs.

The pixel art looked fantastic and the character portaits (with all the different emotions) were great. I really liked the animated sequences. It's one of the best looking indie RPGs I've seen. Again, it's a shame there wasn't any emotional punch backing any of it up. HyperDuck SoundWorks did a great job on the music. It isn't really my style, but I can't deny it's really good stuff. It fit the game well. In fact, I'm listening to the OST as I'm writing this review. Laura Shigihara's contribution was a nice touch.

Overall, CSH showed me how hard it must be to make an indie RPG, and perhaps an indie JRPG in particular. I'm glad I played CSH, but I'm not sure I'll play it again. I wish Zeboyd Games a successful future in the indie games industry. It's clear they put in a lot of work into this game.

I almost didn't have any problems with bugs. There were a handful of graphical glitches that were no big deal. And, I did have to reset the game once toward the end, but because of the save anywhere feature it wasn't a problem at all.

Definitely worth a look if you have any interest at all in "classic" JRPG's. If you're familiar with Zeboyd Games, you know that they're very good at making turn-based combat interesting and more than the minor inconvenience you mindlessly mash through while in-between boss fights. The different characters, skills, and items work in harmony to give you a wide range of ways to handle fights and offer enough options for future playthroughs.

The gist of combat in CSH is that all attacks are limited to one use but can be recharged by defending. Items are are limited to one use per fight but are infinite. Go wild using items, item hoarders! There are also "programs" that essential act as switchable armors that also add another layer of single use skills.

Some of the new touches include a hyper mode that rotates throughout fights for each character. Whenever a character hits hyper mode, they get increased attack for that action. By smart linking of skills, items and timing, you can launch attacks that can do triple or more damage. There's also an ongoing "style" percentage that mostly plays into your characters not dying when falling below zero HP. As long as your style is over a certain amount, you can survive an attack with negative hp and can then revive yourself as long as you bring HP back into positive by the character's next turn. It's a cool feature, especially since there are offensive skills that only work while in this "desperation" mode, so it's not strictly a scramble to restore your hp scenario.

The visuals are very good and better than I expected. All the character sprites are well done and there's a lot of variations to the many NPC's. There's also a decent mix of color palettes between cyberpunk-styled areas and the more colorful nature areas. There's even a large amount of short Sega CD style cutscenes, which was a bit of a surprise.

The soundtrack is pretty catchy, especially the battle and boss themes, which is good since you'll be hearing them a lot.

The wring is...inoffensive. The previous Zeboyd games didn't hold back in making game references, and there's a lot of there, but they're generally used in a smarter manner. If video game references makes you want to make an angry forums post, you'll probably be annoyed, but like I said, they're mostly inoffensive and occasionally funny and you should know to expect them by now if you're played any Zeboyd game before CSH.

The actual story is nothing special but the game is tightly paced and constantly keeps you moving forward; CSH is the rare game that respects your time and and there's little to any filler here. If you sit down and play for an hour, you feel like you actually accomplished something and that's rather rare for most games, let alone rpg's. It evens starts up to the main menu without telling you the developer name and every piece of middleware used in the creation of the game and I thank them for that.

There are four difficulties and they're changeable at any time. I played on the third hardest difficulty and it served as a good challenge early on, though by the halfway point, I felt that I figured out the battle system enough to handle most fights without too much trouble. If I ever play CSH again, it'd probably be on the hardest difficulty, since from the little I tried of it late in the game, it came the closest to capturing the early game feel of making all your battle decisions feel important.

The only major downside I have is that the game is still somewhat buggy as of April 15th. I haven't ran into many, but I have had to reset a couple of times due to them. Luckily you can save whenever you want, so I'd recommend doing so. Other issues I have is the default movement speed is set to walk instead of run and there's no toggle to change it. Stop doing this game devs; I'm going to want to be running 99.9% of the time, make that the default so I'm not holding down a button for most of my gameplay time. The other is the character portraits are blown up too much and suffer for it, Chahn and Z'xorv in particular. They should be closer to their native resolution. Also, the game should default to continue instead of new game on the main menu once you've started a game. Last, there are some aspects of the character menu that a bit clunky.

In short, CSH is a must-play if you're interested in an updated and fresh look at the traditional JRPG experience. It claims inspiration from such games as Phantasy Star and Chrono Trigger and it successfully blends them together in a fun, tightly paced game.

EDIT: 5-9-17
There's now a run/walk toggle and a lot of the various issues have been patched. Seems to be in good shape bug-wise now.

I remember seeing the kickstarter for Cosmic Star Heroine back in 2013 during the great crowdfunding gold rush – after so long I assumed it had gone the way of many such kickstarters, stuck in development hell before being quietly dropped, so it came as something of a shock when it quietly snuck onto the front page of steam without fanfare.

Zeboyd have been in the business for a surprisingly long time, and managed to get in and make a name for themselves before steam dropped its trousers and spunted a torrent of poorly made RPG maker games right into the grimacing faces of users everywhere. I actually played both Breath of Death VII and Cthulu Saves the World back on the XBox Indie channel – at that time an irreverent pixel art RPG was actually a refreshing change, if you can believe it.

Cosmic Star Heroine is NOT an RPG maker game – everything here has obviously been lovingly drawn, animated and built from scratch, and to lump it in with such low effort fare is to do it a massive disservice. The hand drawn art is uniformly excellent and the 80s cyberpunk sci fi aesthetic is spot on. Graphically it’s somewhat reminiscent of chrono trigger (with enemies visible on screen before engaging), though the universe and story feel closer to Phantasy Star (particularly IV).

The plot and characters are also very true to that era, for better or worse – every character is drawn with a very broad brush and development is minimal, though they are appealingly designed and memorable in their simplicity. The plot itself is fun bubblegum sci fi pap, and while it has exactly zero surprises in store for anyone who has watched a film (or indeed played a videogame) in the last 30 years its brisk pace stops the player getting bored. Even though it does nothing new, there’s something to be said for doing something old as well as it does.

Where the game really shines is its combat. Enemies do not repawn and as HP and items are restored after every combat, the game has no problem with going all out with even normal enemies. Every fight is serious and engaging, and on the recommended Heroine difficulty trying to muddle your way through will result in a quick and embarrassing demise. Buffs and status effects are incredibly important, and will often be the difference between life and death. Fights in old 16 bit RPGs often felt like a way to lengthen playtime without actually offering meaningful content, and I would be quite happy to never fight a random encounter ever again.

My only real complaint is the dearth of side content. It’s pretty clear that the devs wanted the core game finished and released after so long in development, and I don’t blame them. However it’s a shame that we couldn’t have a side quest for each of your companions to flesh them out a bit and explore the universe, which we rush over at breakneck pace. There are a few short optional dungeons, as well as a couple of hurriedly truncated side quests that open up at the end game but it’s clear that there was content cut for time. I wonder if it’s time for Zeboyd to expand a little, as the enormous time in development suggests that this might have been more than two guys could handle.

In conclusion, if you’re after a lovingly crafted RPG that harkens back to that wonderful late 16 bit era, Cosmic Star Heroine will absolutely scratch that itch and I wholeheartedly recommend it – for 11 quid it’s a steal, and the devs totally deserve your support.

If this was released in 1998 it would have been a classic. We'd be talking about it like we talk about Chrono Trigger and FFIV. This game is amazing and has so many weakness of old turn based RPGs fixed up in clever systems. The style system encourages ramp up, while the refresh system forced variety. The ability system gives an easy opportunity to try new builds.

It isn't perfect. There's a lot of little UX problems like knowing what buffs and debuffs you or your enemies currently have, but the UX is still wildly better than the old RPGs i used to play :p

Pros
- Pretty solid story. Not much down time or obvious side quests (tho there are some). The story keeps ticking and making you want to progress.
- Some nice odes to other games/franchises.
- Great humor. Like...some real funny lines and references.
- Can save anywhere, any time (while not in battle). But no autosaves, so save frequently...
- Good in-between battle upkeep. Dead characters still get xp, and all characters refill HP after a battle.
- Music is pretty great for the most part.
- Lots of flexibility in builds for all characters. Finding/buying upgrades isn't burdensome either. You should easily get all options available for gear and abilities. Some low lvl shields are too good, tho, and means you'll have low defense if you wanna stick w/ them.
- Combat mechanics are interesting. I really like them, but can see some ppl not. The way you need to time your rotations and cooldowns is neat. The Burst mechanic is cool, especially w/ some buff combos. But it also seems like some abilities are either useless or just impossible to time to combo off properly (i.e. a buff for when all partymates are max health. Well...that is pretty much never except for opening attack, but the person who does it has low initiative so can't get it off right away)

Cons
- Minor tooltip inconstencies on possible definitions (using "droid/drone", "restore/heal", etc, inconsistent use of caps, says "Character 100% Style" which doesn't mean GAIN 100% Style but get set to 100% Style. FYI, Style can go over 100%) and some character stats don't seem to change/math properly when changing equipment.
- Related to point above, also seems some things dont work properly or are just bugged? I've seen plenty of +Def and +Dmg abilities not seem to really give +def or +dmg. And one ability says "next move deals double damage", but it kept doubling the damage of all the subsequent moves of an auto-attack. Maybe b/c it was an auto-attack (i.e. same "move")?
- Menus can be better in shops. Like a lot better. Shop menus do not show your inventory, so when you purchase new weapons/gear, you can't compare stats of what you already have equipped. ...or even KNOW what you have equipped.
- Sound inconsistency. Some sfx are extremely loud, some are really quiet.
- Softlocked on me once during a side quest battle.
- Mecha-Dragon (mandatory boss that forces you to have a certain team comp/build to beat).

Neutral
- Partymates mention their sidequest once and then it's up to you to remember what they said and go do the side quest. And some of this one-time dialog you aren't even aware is a sidequest, but just some idle chatter/suggestion about a place (like one character wondering if he can outdance someone on some planet). But others are pretty obvious. But again, they say it once, so pay attention if you care about side quests.
- Characters aren't super fleshed out, but they have some personality and are distinguishable enough from each other in the short time the game is.
- AoE damage is distributed equally, even if the different enemy targets have different armor/resists. Not sure if bug or some sort of intended damage calculation mechanic.

Overall, a pretty solid JRPG that'll take you about 12-15 hrs to beat. Is lacking in some areas, but a decent experience nonetheless.

First impressions after just a couple hours:
Fast-paced plot sustained by a very good and entertaining combat system keeping you fully engaged.
Good dialogue, endearing characters (with nice vaired portraits), excellent sprite art and animations (some occur when you read the dialog, make sure not to hide the one you talk to), nice & subtle references (although I was expecting a tentacle somewhere in that mutagenic jungle). Catchy music.
All that spiced with very nice (short) cutscenes.
A modern Phantasy Star on steroïds ^_^.

Inventory system is limited to 3 items (weapon, shield, accessory) per character, granting stats and some specific abilities. Items have only one use per combat but are persistent (not consumed). Abilities are accumulated fast, but available slots to access them are limited.
The strategical choices are there and during combat with de-buff/attack/rest sequences in combo with the rest of the party.

The start of the game is strong. It looks like it may be the best from Zeboyd so far - not as zany as other titles - let's see if the plot and mid-game holds up. I hope to see more world-building.
Too bad I've got to go to work tomorrow morning...

Gotta beat this dead horse:

If you enjoy RPGs from the late 16-bit era, this is a no-brainer purchase.

You've got the story tone and humor of the Lunar games, the base-building of Suikoden, Chrono-trigger inspired combat (enhanced with the depth and lessons learned from Penny Arcade 3 & 4), a Phantasy Star-esque setting, and a Sega CD/PC Engine-style of presentation - anime-style cutscenes and all.

The soundtrack (again by Hyperduck Soundworks) is stellar and is chock full of catchy tunes that ooze 80s cyberpunk, with some atmospheric tracks and pulse-pumping battle themes for good measure. The game's Indie Rock Band playable character even has a fully voiced track that would be right at home in an episode of Bubblegum Crisis. It's all great stuff, at least in my opinion.

To get to the gameplay side of things: as the bullet point on the Steam Store Page says, the pacing is brisk - areas don't outstay their welcome but aren't 100% linear, either. There's always a chest or three tucked in a hard-to-see nook or behind a switch-lowered barrier. You can save literally any time you can open the menu. There is no penalty for getting "wiped out" and losing a battle (other than the time it takes to restart/retry said battle).

You can also change the difficulty at any time you can open the menu, as well. There are 4 difficutly settings, ranging from "I'm just here for the story" to "even the devs have trouble with this one". This allows you to adjust things up or down on the fly if you find that battles are either too easy, or maybe that one fight (or Boss) keeps getting the better of you.

Combat is outstanding. Each battle is a bit like a puzzle you have to solve using character abilities that synergize with each other or exploit enemy weaknesses. But to be specific:

Turn based. A bar on the far right shows you the exact order that each combatant will act (both your own Party Members and your foes). Each character has HP, a Style level (given as a %), and Hyper squares that fill one per round.

Each character has a set of up to 8 Skills. A few of the weaker, basic attacks can be used over and over again, but most can only be used once before they are "greyed out" and become unusable. There is no MP or anything like it. The way to re-activate your disabled or used up abilities is to use your Defend command, which refreshes everything you've used.

Each character can have additional abilities gained from their equipped Shield (this game's version of Armor). These Programs are once-per-battle and do not recharge if you Defend. Items are much the same but are shared by the party as a whole - so anyone can use any item, but then it's used up and no one else can use it until the next battle.

Most abilities give you some % of Style. Style increases the amount of damage you do and allows you survive otherwise fatal blows if it's above 50% (higher for tougher difficulties).

Each round, the character gains a Hyper Point and a blue box under their HP bar fills in. When all the boxes are full, the character enters Hyper Mode for a single round; while in Hyper Mode, damage is doubled and the chance of inflicting any status ailment is greatly increased. Each character has a different set of Hyper Boxes, meaning that Hyper turns very rarely overlap and are instead spaced out somewhat evenly as combat progresses.

I'm leaving out a few bits (Desperation mode) but the gist of it is this: in each combat, the key to winning is to "line up" your best attacks (or heals) with each character's Hyper round. A character in Hyper mode who has been buffed by an ally and is exploiting an enemy weakness will deal SEVERAL TIMES as much damage as their basic attack would.

You need to "sneak in" buffs and heals and ability-recharging Defend commands during the rounds while Hyper Mode is still charging, then unleash the fury on the proper turn. This is pretty much mandatory in the 2 tougher difficulties. In any case, spamming the basic repeatable attacks won't get you much further than 6 feet under - you need to strategize and think a few turns ahead if you want to be successful, and the game rewards you if you line your abilities up properly. It's a blast and ensures that each fight feels meaningful and they never become repetitive as you are always learning new abilities and (eventually) have 10 party members in combinations of 4 combatants at a time, meaning your options are always expanding and changing.

The story, as I said above, is very much like Lunar or Lunar: Eternal Blue in that there are high stakes and a serious undercurrent, but the snappy dialogue and irreverent banter give the moment-to-moment gameplay a lighthearted feel that balances the darker aspects of the main threat and villains.

There are some ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, to be sure. No option to change key bindings, issues with the game crashing when changing resolutions, issues with battles sometimes freezing (the poison status ailment is involved somehow), but honestly it shouldn't detract much from your enjoyment as long as you remember to save often (which you can, since you can save after virtually every battle). I'm willing to bet most of this will be updated or patched out in the coming months in any case.

Kudos to Bill and Robert and the boys at Hyperduck - this is an amazing accomplishment and a hell of a lot of fun to anyone who pines for the days of Phantasy Star IV and Chrono Trigger.

So, this might seem like an incredible statement to make, but IMO Cosmic Star Heroine is one of the best JRPGs I've ever played. And before the rush of "well you didn't play many" comments, I've played nearly every Final Fantasy title, old school titles like Breath of Fire I & II, Dragon Warrior, all the way to more modern stuff like Baiten Kaitos series. So I know what I'm talking about.

Cosmic Star Heroine does a lot of things right and very little wrong. It is true there were some issues right after release where there were some bugs (never encountered any personally) and some placeholder things were still there, but a majority of those issues have been cleared up. What is left is simply glorious.

The game pays tribute to Chrono Trigger in a lot of ways, from the way the overworld map is displayed and how the characters appear, to their character sprites and even the fact that all enemy encounters happen on screen rather then transitioning to a diffferent battle screen. Also the main character can obtain an accessory that allows for double technicques as CT offered. But from there, CSH strikes out to do its own thing.

The games battle system is perhaps the best part of it. All the battle music is simply awesome to jam to, and it gets to the point where you want the battles to stretch out so you can enjoy the mechanics, even though that's totally counter intuitive to the system. The way it works is that you have a set of abilities, and you can use them all once, before you need to use your defend command to restore them. Of course you could defend any time you want. You also get a selection of up to 4 items that can be used once per battle, and then 'programs' which are special one time per battle abilities specific to the shield that the character has equipped. Plus each character will occasionally enter a 'hyper' state which makes the next attack/heal they do move devastating.

None of these abilities are identical to each other, and they all do different things. The fun part is finding how they all work together, as finding the right combination of status effect, elemental weakness, and buffs can allow you to absolutely wreck everything. As an example, if an enemy is weak to water, you would use your main character to attack with a water ability. However if you have another party member buff them up, and have someone else cause the 'vulnerable' status on said enemy which makes the next attack do more damage, then you're looking at doubling or tripling what you would do normally. If the character is hyper it increases the damage more.

Of course how you lay out your characters is up to you, as they will learn far, far more then simply eight abilities as they progress. Do you give them mainly healing/buffing abilities? Do you focus on damage? Status ailments? A mix? Not to mention the various shields in the game offer certain abilities to use, despite not being the strongest shields available stat wise. There's a LOT to sink your teeth into, especailly with a total of 11 characters, plus the acquistion of a spaceship partway through the game which you can populate with crew members that all have various passive buffs they can offer.

The story is pretty solid as well. You're a galactic spy, working for one of the biggest agencies in the galaxy. After running a mission for your boss, you find out that he actually had asked you to steal a mind control device, and that he wants to use it to mind control humanity so that all is peaceful. From here you turn tratior, steal the item back, and fight back against his plans. Your journey takes you across three planets, plus two final areas, with a fair amount of side activity in the form of extra areas and super bosses.

The game also comes with four difficulties. My playthrough was on Agent difficulty, and I feel it was perhaps too easy at times. There is a difficulty below it, but don't bother with it because you'll most likely steamroll everything. In a similar fashion, don't play on the hardest difficulty outside of what is required for the achievement (the first battle) as its been said the difficulty is so ridiculously unbalanced it isn't fun.

I only have one small complaint, and its that the game itself isn't large enough. By the time you leave the first planet, you have 7 party members, with two more on the second planet and the last two on the final planet. From there you're about 80% of the way through the game, and it could've done with a slightly longer story, especially to flesh out a couple of the characters who don't get enough time to truly shine.

Bottom line, Cosmic Star Heroine has a lot to offer, Lots of replayability, wonderful presentation, and an awesome battle system. I 100% completely recommend it to everyone.