Star Ocean: First Departure

[Darkwaver]

Hello! I have this issue too. After some mucking about, I've come to the conclusion that any black screen issues involve a glitch with dialogue boxes. The initial black screen after the into video is avoidable by making a mad dash to the exit before it darkens. However, after that point any closed dialogue boxes, be it from item gets or npc chat, causes the screen to go black everywhere but where the dialogue box had closed (What you described as the "little bar of screen visible").

http://i.imgur.com/SQ838xQ.png
http://i.imgur.com/uddx8Xj.png

Any progress on this? I too am suffering from this.