Note: As per wiki policy, Fridge pages are Spoilers Off. You have been warned!
Fridge Brilliance:
- Given what the third game reveals about Star Ocean's universe? The Nedians were able to load a restore point of Expel.
- No wonder Claude is a more efficient character versus his father's infamous status as the Master of None in the previous game; he's not only trying to prove himself to be someone independent of his father's shadow which gives him good incentive to improve, but he outright does not have the privilege of firearms like Ronyx readily brought with him because Claude actually respects the UP3 (Gameplay and Story Segregation aside with skills), even using some Good Old Fisticuffs from his mother instead of the emergency gun he landed on Expel with. Through this, it means he's got the physical capabilities to match rather than getting complacent as a spellcaster or gunman.
Fridge Horror
- Expel and Energy Nede are each home to about one billion mostly peaceful sentient beings. Every single one of them dies, and half of them stay dead.
- You are not forced to recruit any characters other than the two protagonists, but you are forced to choose between recruiting some characters. Watching the Calnus explode makes you feel hopeless, because nothing you do can stop Indalecio from doing it. Watching the annihilations of first Expel, and then Energy Nede, you might later realize playing again that any character you don't recruit goes up with their respective homeworld. You may save some of them by recruiting them into your active party, but you can never save all possible playable characters. The game is forcing you to choose which ones you can save from death.
- At the least Expel is brought back so those not recruited are safe and sound. Even so... millions of lives are still lost due to Energy Nede's destruction and the most the player can save are Chisato and Noel. And Ashton never gets those dragons on his back, only if he is not encountered so probably a Happy Moment for him but not for the Dragons if he slayed them. But what if he lost his duel against the Dragons? Also, Opera will eventually find Ernest and vice versa on their own if they are not recruited. But what if they did not or could not succeed? A lot of moments to ponder there.
- You are not forced to recruit any characters other than the two protagonists, but you are forced to choose between recruiting some characters. Watching the Calnus explode makes you feel hopeless, because nothing you do can stop Indalecio from doing it. Watching the annihilations of first Expel, and then Energy Nede, you might later realize playing again that any character you don't recruit goes up with their respective homeworld. You may save some of them by recruiting them into your active party, but you can never save all possible playable characters. The game is forcing you to choose which ones you can save from death.
- If you recruited Chisato and/or Noel, the ending mentions that they knew ALL ALONG that Energy Nede was to be destroyed. This can be pretty heartbreaking in hindsight if you told Noel and/or Chisato to wait... they wanted to go with you because they were that afraid of dying with Energy Nede. And imagine if they were the only ones allowed to survive - meaning that their one chance at survival was turned away.
- Which makes you wonder about the rest of the Energy Nede populace. The mayor mentioned that this was a way for Nede to atone but did everyone really felt that way or did everyone even know that Nede would be destroyed? It is kind of hard to imagine that everyone on the planet will know the planet would be destroyed and/or had accepted their fate. The choice was basically taken out of their hands.
- Not just that, but none of the Nedians that were alive had anything to do with the destruction of Expel. Or any of Nede's past sins. So imagine if you were in their shoes.
- Which makes you wonder about the rest of the Energy Nede populace. The mayor mentioned that this was a way for Nede to atone but did everyone really felt that way or did everyone even know that Nede would be destroyed? It is kind of hard to imagine that everyone on the planet will know the planet would be destroyed and/or had accepted their fate. The choice was basically taken out of their hands.
- Leon and his family are essentially being forced to design a Doomsday Device for the Lacour Kingdom. This begs a disturbing question: Even without the Sorcery Globe landing on it, how long would Expel have lasted with a country's military making people like Precise and Bowman fast-forward technology and medicine on the planet? Imagine Precis changing the very nature of terrestial warfare if she and her dad started building giant battle mechs and laser cannons, leading to A.I. Is a Crapshoot and Robot War. Not scary enough? Bowman's knowledge of pharmacology could become involved in a Super Breeding Program, accidentally create a Botanical Abomination or (perhaps worst of all) be used to engineer a Synthetic Plague...
- On the last floor of the Cave of Trials, Gabrie Celesta is found hovering over a platform suspended in what appears to be a lake of blood. Not only is the imagery by itself creepy, but just the idea that this homicidal angelic being has been murdering everything that manages to get into the room for several millenia, if not eons.
- Claude awkwardly having to avoid the topic of Expel getting destroyed gets worse if you're on his route due to Leon: Recruited him? Claude got Leon out of his Despair Event Horizon by reassuring him that his parents were still alive... but they definitely aren't anymore. Didn't recruit him? Then Claude pretty much inadvertently left him to his death. Not helping is Claude's reassurance that it would be better for him in the case of the latter.
- Precis' ending suggests that the events of the game, at least from the point that she joins, takes several months. During the game, Claude is teleported to an unknown planet and presumed dead after its destruction. Then, shortly after, Ronyx is killed in seemingly mysterious circumstances. One would sure hope that it takes some time for the Pangalactic Federation to verify everything lest Ilia spend time thinking that her family was dead.
