“The most violent scavenger hunt you’ll ever participate in.”
Phantasy Star Universe (which will be referred to as PSU) is the newest game from Sonic Team, the geniuses who also spawned the forerunner to PSU, Phantasy Star Online. There are some vast differences between the two games, but this review will not be a compare and contrast article for the two games, oh no. This will be a hard, spot on review of the most violent scavenger hunt you’ll ever participate in.
There are three modes of playing in PSU, Story, Extra, and Xbox Live. In story mode, you assume the role of 17 year old Ethan Waber. A regular kid who has a regular sister, and like most JRPG protagonists, you never personally knew your father, but everyone you meet say he was a swell guy and that you act just like him! Go figure. Anyhow, you are watching the Divine Maiden give a presentation on the GUARDIANS Colony, when the SEED attack, a parasitic life form that is attracted to something in the Gurhal System in which PSU takes place. What is it? What will Ethan do when trouble rears it’s head? Find out, if you please. Extra mode is basically story mode, except you create your own character (yes, you can create a character and it’s rather deep) and play the story mode, with the main characters from Story Mode becoming sub-characters. Xbox Live mode, which is probably the reason most people will want this game, I will touch on momentarily.
For the time, let’s talk audio of PSU. The music is good. Simple, but catchy. It is heavily influenced, of course, by PSO (which had an amazing soundtrack), but doesn’t quite live up to what Sonic Team could do. Still then, the music sets good moods for the correct settings. When you’re romping through the forest, you don’t hear ominous music, you hear fitting, forest tunes for when you’re slashing creatures left and right. Thankfully, the slashing sounds good too. So do the spells you cast, and even the guns you’ll shoot. Not only that, the voices are good too. The lip-syncing in Story mode isn’t good, but the voice acting is done very well, which really surprised me. The voices on your character you create (yes, you can even modify your character’s voice) even sound good, though they are only grunts, screams, and fits of laughter.
Going from a good thing to a mediocre thing, the graphics aren’t so great. Well, not what you would expect from an Xbox 360. Since this game is basically a port of a PS2/PC game, the graphics are definitely held back, your shadow is a round blob for crying out loud! Luckily, the character models look nice, as do your weapons and clothing. Detail is there, you just have to look for it. The environments you travel in look decent, nothing spectacular, and thankfully, the enemies you’ll encounter look nice, also. The only graphics that look good in PSU are the cut-scenes you’ll encounter during Story Mode.
Now back to a good thing. The gameplay of PSU is a dungeon-crawling, hack ‘n slash, love it or hate it kind of game. There are three basic classes you can become: Hunter is the melee, sword wielding class. Ranger is the shoot everything that moves class. And Force is the spell casting class. After playing your class and leveling it up by successfully completing mission, you will be allowed to choose an expert class, which contain stronger variations of the beginning classes, and hybrids of the three. Depending on your class, the way you attack is different. If you are a hunter, you will mash the X button to do your melee attacks, and if you learn a Photon Art (a skill you purchase, learn by “using”, and then link to your weapon) that can be executed by simply pressing the Y button. Rangers are only given the option of mashing X with their gun to send a stream of lead, er, photons into their enemy. And Forces must use Photon Arts to do damage, by linking the Photon Arts to their rod or wand, pushing X, Y, RB+X, or RB+Y.
Speaking of the Right Bumper (RB) you can dual wield different weapons in this game, unlike PSO. In PSU, you can wield a one handed melee or spell casting weapon (Saber, wand, dagger) in one hand, and simultaneously wield a one handed gun (handgun, machine gun) in your other hand. Again, this is completely dependant on your class you play as. Some classes can equip some weapons that others can’t. There is a decent variety of weapons at your disposal also, ranging from Sabers and Long swords to Spell Rods and Cross Bows to Rifles and Laser Cannons.
The armor in this game doesn’t affect your appearance at all. In some games, you may find the end all of armor, equip it, and be totally disgusted by your character’s appearance. Not so in this game. There is actual clothing in this game that you can purchase and change your character’s appearance, but it can cost you a pretty penny. Some people whine that clothing shouldn’t cost more than armor, but have you compared an Armani Suit’s price to a Kevlar Vest’s lately?
While on the subject of your character, let’s touch on the character you can create in Extra mode (which isn’t available right away, you must unlock it) and Xbox Live. NOTE: The characters you may create in any game mode are only available in that game mode. The Extra mode and Story Mode characters CANNOT be transferred to Xbox Live mode or vice versa, as the characters in Xbox Live mode are saved on Sega’s servers. While on that note, the online play, since you are playing on Sega’s servers, will cost you $10 a month.
Continuing, there are 4 different races in PSU that you can be. They are Human, Newman (Magical elvish looking humanoids), Casts (robots and androids), and Beasts (Animal looking humanoids). Each one has male and female genders to choose from, which actually matters. The male characters naturally have Higher HP, Attack, and Accuracy, whilst the females have higher Magic and Defense. Once you decide on your race and gender, you can then alter your character’s appearance however you see fit. Ranging from hair style and color, eye color, and even body size. Want to be a short, fat human with a big green afro? Go for it.
The online play is great, and only has two real goals: Get stronger and get cool weapons. The online is a level grind through the same areas over and over while hunting for the coolest weapons you can find. The areas you trek though all have three different difficulties, C, B, and A, with A being the hardest, yet capable of yielding much better loot. You can have up to 6 people in a party at once, and you can all blast through the forests in Parum or the temples on Neudaiz while gaining experience and hunting for some great rares. Honestly, the online play boils down into a violent scavenger hunt. Killing enemies to find cool things, but never being boring. Addiction, thy name is PSU. This game can keep you HOOKED!
Unfortunately, the level cap is very low, currently at 50, and a lot of content is still locked in the Xbox Live mode. One entire planet is locked from the beginning, Moatoob, many weapons have yet to be added, and you can’t even switch to Expert classes yet! Sega will eventually release new content and even raise the level cap, but they had best do so soon, many gamers won’t stick around with nothing much to hunt for.
Also, the game is a bit complex for the first time gamer. Do yourself a favor and use the tutorial when the option is given. It’s a life saver. Sonic Team made the game overly complicated with Synthesizing weapons, items, and armor, and grinding (upgrading) weapons. Even finding missions to take was difficult until I took the tutorial.
Being a huge fan of PSO and really enjoying the beta that Sonic Team released on Xbox Live, I knew I would be purchasing this game. The story mode is surprisingly deep and pulls you in, and the online is good, but definitely needs some tweaking. If you are a fan of real time hack ‘n slash games with an emphasis on finding things, maybe you should pick this up. What I’m really trying to say is that if you’re not going to be playing the online portion of PSU, don’t spend $60 for the story mode alone. But if you are going to play the full package, definitely get it. It isn’t perfect, well, at least not yet.
By demosquared
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