Mech my day.
Starbites marks the console debut of IkinaGames, a South Korean studio founded nearly 15 years ago. Through various VR and mobile games, the team has finally pushed into the console space with their sci-fi turn-based action title, Starbites. While a strong story and endearing characters truly shine through, the excessively repetitive combat and drab environments sadly drag down this could-be classic.
While I generally talk about a game's visuals and performance later on in a review, I wanted to open the review with a discussion about my experience playing Starbites, largely since it heavily impacted my time with it and my outlook on the game itself.
Starbites was a game I experienced in two very different ways. While that experience was solely on the Nintendo Switch 2 platform, its portable and docked modes tell two very different stories.
Docked, the game is full of color, vibrancy, and runs decently smooth, with few exceptions. There were some texture issues present that I never noticed in the trailers or gameplay for the PS5 or PC versions, or even the footage I've seen of the game running on the Steam Deck, which has a stronger presence of contrast with deeper blacks and less of a washed out look.
However, portable is where Starbites suffers. Given the few titles I've played that have versions on both Switch and Switch 2, Starbites doesn't really feel optimized for Nintendo's newest piece of hardware, at least where it counts. The framerate is constantly chugging, both in battles or out exploring. Environments look like the brightness was cranked up and washed out, and there is a lag to selecting abilities that can often have you choosing the wrong option in combat. While it's not unplayable, it definitely makes for a poor experience.
In fact, the difference between docked and portable is where I opted to play the rest of the game exclusively docked. I'm hopeful that IkinaGames patches Starbites to make the portable experience as fun and visually pleasing as the docked experience, because there is something special here, albeit it being a bit rough around the edges.
The look of the game is what initially sold me on checking it out. The chunky mechs, the nicely designed characters, all of which have very appropriate personalities to their casted voice talent. For a first venture into the console space, IkinaGames gave us a pretty sizable cast instead of just limiting themselves to a smaller and bitesize collection of characters. Even apart from the main cast of six playable party members, the supporting cast is also solid, with a certain shopkeeper, mechanic, and overseer, all being great additions, and full of personality.
In fact, if this was turned into an animated series, it would translate extremely well, given the cinematic direction to the game's cutscenes that really let these characters thrive. While the game did default to Japanese voices from the get go, it wasn't until about a half hour in where I checked if there were different languages, and lo and behold, English was there, and I never looked back.
While not every conversation is fully voiced, a solid chunk is, and it really helps give this game a real personality. Given voiceover can be expensive, it really does benefit the game and its characters to have so many of its cast come to life with some great voice work, Lukida, especially.
Lukida is, afterall, the main character, so having a strong lead is crucial to making her journey feel worth it. What starts out as her working to pay off a debt inherited by her parents becomes a story that is about the survival of the planet itself.
Starbites takes place on Bitter, a once thriving tourist destination that was utterly decimated after a war, with the entire planet turning into one large decayed desert, littered with starship and satellite debris that fell to the planet's surface during the war. While life continued to exist, it did so in small settlements, one of which is the remnants of that tourist lifestyle in Delight, a crumbling haven run by a woman named Fennec, who while raised Lukida after her parents died, is a woman many on the planet fear.
The story itself has plenty of great character moments between the cast, especially with Lukida, Gwendoll, and Badger, who have known each other for quite some time. Lukida is the typical Luke Skywalker role of a scavenger and plucky hero who dreams of bigger things. Gwendoll may not look it, but she is an accomplished bounty hunter who’s aim is as good as her ability to drink anyone under the table. Badger has plenty of soldier experience and is generally the de facto father of the group, often having to take control of the situation.
Shortly into the game, you’ll meet a young gearhead named Makobo who is eager to join your cause, with a pair of mercenaries in Jerome and Marie, who provide a bit more insight into the lands around Delight. While you can only have three of these characters in your party at once, you can equip the other three as support, who pop up from time to time to attack, should you break an enemy's defenses. Regardless, I do like that the entire cast is generally all together only a few hours in.
While the story starts to pick up when Lukida’s ticket off-world gets stolen, it is tracking down that ticket where the narrative shifts into something a bit more in depth, diving into long kept secrets, and the truth behind Lukida’s past. At first, I wasn’t exactly sure where the story was going, but one single audio log changed my perception of the story and I was instantly paying more attention going forward. I was hooked.
NIS has had a great history of delivering turn-based combat games, as the Trails series is my favorite series of all time. While Starbites isn't anywhere in that league, there is still a strong sense of belonging that it has to what NIS has delivered over their varied history. And, with some refining and small changes, Starbites could become a beloved series as well.
As it is, Starbites borrows a few mechanics from other titles in the space, even if it doesn't really look to make them their own thing or refine them. The weakness systems found in something like Octopath Traveler, to even the S-crafts of the Trails series, are here in some limited or mutated capacity. Combat follows the basic elements needed to function, but lacks anything that feels unique to itself.
You'll have a turn order that can be manipulated by destroying your next attacker or building up or buffing your speed. You can perform one action, such as attacking, defending, or using items, and this can also be manipulated by equipping items that allow you to attack again.
However, you'll also have the ability to break an enemy and prevent it from attacking, or a mechanic called Driver's High that allows you to immediately take another turn. This is built up with a gauge that fills up as you perform attacks. And you'll want to use this as often as possible as it boosts the attack power of that ability.
As mentioned, the weakness system in Octopath Traveler is here, as each enemy will have a series of boxes under their health bars. Once you've attacked with a specific ability, which are tagged with their element, that attack will reveal if it is a weakness to your target. Later on, certain characters can reveal those weaknesses all at once.
Apart from that, there isn't really much else to combat. You have abilities that you can use that use up SP and you'll earn SP back as you attack enemies. Some abilities can target one or multiple enemies, and some characters can buff your team to hit harder or take harder hits. Enemy formations change from all lined up, separated to prevent AOE attacks from working, or in pairs on each side of the battlefield.
If I had to really criticize combat, it wouldn't be for the reason you would think. Each time you move to the next character in the turn order and then target an enemy, the camera swings to provide a cleaner view. I really wish I could disable this camera swing as it bounces around just too much and was incredibly distracting at first. While I did make my peace with it, it's one option I would love to see IkinaGames patch in the ability to turn off.
Combat itself is very flashy, with fun animations to each character. From Lukida's slingshot to Gwendoll leaping over her bike to get that perfect shot, the presentation to combat is outstanding. I would often change up my party of three to see all the animations to each character's abilities, and was often pleasantly surprised at the level of detail on display here. For any issues I have with Starbites, this is not one of them.
To aid in combat, you have a variety of customization, both via an upgrade system to equipping new armor and mech pieces that not only provide new stats like increased defense or attack, but visually change the mech as well, sometimes offering a completely new look. You can also equip engines that allow you to slot in stat and perk-based cores, which can be crafted via different tiers for potency. These cores are essential, as they can refill your health before each round, or your SP, allowing you to use your abilities far more. Crafting requires materials, and you’ll find them out and about, often off the beaten path.
The personal upgrade system for your characters resembles a skill tree, but sort of in that moving down lanes via Borderlands. You're not locked out of any lanes when choosing others, but higher tiers open up the more you spend points. These upgrades increase the potency of your abilities to even alter them, while also boosting the core traits of each character with increases to their health, critical damage, speed, or defense.
Weapons are unique to each mech, so when you find a certain type of weapon in a chest, you’ll only have one character that is fit for it. Weapon pacing is also rather weird in some cases. I found a sniper rifle early on that boosted Gwendoll’s attack from something like 20 to almost 300, while the next weapon I found for Lukida only increased her attack power by 30. This find for Gwendoll made her vastly overpowered for nearly two or three hours, and you won't find me complaining about that. She was doing nearly 10x the damage as Badger, who I didn’t find a new weapon for for what felt like hours. Lukida and Gwendoll were the two that I constantly found weapons for, making them two I never removed from my party. Marie was cool as well, and Makobo has her uses, but Jerome was my solid 3rd spot given his power range is intense, you just have to watch his heat level or he cannot attack for a few rounds.
Exploring Bitter is a collection of maze-like environments with bunkers that require key cards and switches that push you through their labyrinthian architecture a bit too much for my tastes. It’s mainly since every underground area operates like this and it starts to get old fast. I wasn’t a fan of having to leave Delight like ninety times and then travel all the way through the same locations again and again. While there are fast travel points, they are only for settlements and those are few and far between. Eventually, I had to say no to a ton of side quests because the trudging back and forth just became too much.
While the midway part of the game does shake things up, the maze-like format does rear its ugly head again, despite the very different change in scenery. However, up until then, most areas just felt like the same environment with a slightly tinted color change than anything substantial. Sure, some areas are different because there is more debris, but that is about it for how it shakes up most of its locations. Desert gonna desert, I guess.
Thankfully, you do get a scanner, which not only shows hidden items, but an objective trail to follow, especially since the map is pretty much useless, apart from the East area being East. While it won’t work all the time, depending if the story requires you to look around, the scanner still saved my ass a ton given the poorly designed pathing, especially as the game world lacks any sort of landmarks to aid in traversing. If a sequel is set, a varied collection of unique environments with standard pathing is an absolute must.
Starbites has the promise of being something cool, but some of its foundation just needs a bit of work. Combat needs something to remain fresh and engaging, and environments should be more than just mazes and color variants of the same biome. However, the core of Starbites; its characters and narrative, are solid, and that can often be what players are going to remember the most. Lukida and her journey to make something of herself can thankfully overshadow most of the game's flaws, but, like any hidden gem, it can also be a diamond in the rough.
Developer - Ikina Games. Publisher - NIS America. Released - May 21st, 2026. Available On - PlayStation 4, 5, Nintendo Switch 1, 2, Xbox Series X/S, PC. Rated - (T) Language, Mild Blood, Suggestive Themes, Use of Alcohol, Violence. Platform Reviewed - Nintendo Switch 2. Review Access - A review code for Starbites was provided by the publisher for the purpose of this review.