What is Star Ocean: The Second Story R?

The 1998 sprites, kept exactly as they were, walking through a world rebuilt in three dimensions.

Star Ocean: The Second Story R is a full remake of the 1998 PlayStation game, developed by Gemdrops and released worldwide on November 2, 2023 for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5 and Windows. It is the third distinct version of The Second Story, after the 1998 original and the PSP’s Second Evolution, and it takes a deliberately opposite path to both: where Second Evolution redrew and re-animated the game, R keeps the original’s identity and rebuilds everything around it.

The signature decision is the art style, a 2.5D presentation in which the characters remain two-dimensional pixel sprites, in the manner of the original, while the environments are fully three-dimensional, relit and re-staged. Square Enix itself invites the comparison to its HD-2D family of remakes. A Switch 2 version followed on July 15, 2026.

WHAT IS NEW

Voice, art and battle systems

New illustrations by Kajimoto

Long-time series artist Yukihiro Kajimoto, who drew the PSP version’s cast, created new character illustrations for R. His portraits carry the game’s menus and dialogue, giving the remake a consistent face the 1998 original never had.

Fully voiced, twice over

Every event scene is voiced in Japanese and English. The Japanese track reunites the original 1998 voice cast, and the dialogue recorded for Second Evolution in 2008 is included as a selectable alternative, three generations of the same scenes in one package.

Breaks and Assault Actions

Combat gains a Break system for staggering enemies and Assault Actions, in which reserve party members, and guests from across the series, leap in for a single heavy strike. Fast travel and three difficulty settings, Earth, Galaxy and Universe, round out the modernizations.

Sakuraba, arranged

Motoi Sakuraba re-composed the whole score with full-band and string performances, and the game carries both his arrangements and the 1998 originals, switchable at will.

THE THREE VERSIONS

1998 · 2008 · 2023

The original, 1998

Pre-rendered backgrounds, sprite characters, partial voice. The version that sold 1.094 million copies and made the series international.

Second Evolution, 2008

The PSP remake by Tose: new animated cutscenes by Production I.G, a new playable character in Welch, new endings, and a fresh voice cast. Its PlayStation 4 and Vita ports stayed in Japan, the one modern version of the game the West never got.

R, 2023

The remake as preservation: original sprites and original Japanese voices, modern structure and presentation. Reception was the warmest the series had seen in years, with the PlayStation 5 version scoring notably higher with critics than either earlier edition.

The History of The Second Story Motoi Sakuraba

What is Star Ocean: The Second Story R?

WHAT IS NEW

THE THREE VERSIONS

THE FIRST WORD