Phantasy Star Universe Review - Xbox 360

Some parts of Phantasy Star Universe are fun, other parts are not. What’s troubling is the impression that Sonic Team might not know which parts are which. A lot of the effort that went into this game was expended in service of patently bad ideas. The end result is still a good online hack-and-slash, but you have to wonder what it could have been with some smarter planning.

One of Universe’s selling points is a story-driven single-player mode. That was a bad idea. Like Phantasy Star Online before it, this is not worth playing alone – in terms of the entertainment potential involved, it’s like comparing Klondike solitaire to Texas Hold ‘Em.

Multiplayer, too, is marred by some strange decisions, but they’re not enough to wipe out the fun of a first-rate dungeon crawl. With the right crew of friends, this is a great online experience.

Alone in a Crowd

Sega’s new-school Phantasy Star games are cooperative action-RPGs, jazzing up simple combat and loot-grabbing with the chance to socialize online. That social aspect is critical to both atmosphere and gameplay. Besides the fun of meeting and chatting, other players round out a party’s tactical options.

That’s the main reason the story mode doesn’t work. PSU’s version of realtime 3D combat was built for an online multiplayer game. It’s designed and paced to deal with some of hindrances that involves – minor network lag, communication between players. As a side effect of that design imperative, it makes for a slow and repetitive solo game. Compare it to .hack//G.U., a similar system purpose-built for a single player, and it’s badly lacking in speed, intensity, and tactical depth.

Besides that, the story itself is deeply uninteresting – it stars a loud-mouthed twit of a hero and a supporting cast brought to “life” by terrible English voice acting. Between that and a pair of awful vocal theme songs, it’s no fun to play and even worse to listen to.

Join the Army

Online, of course, those weaknesses in the game system become strengths. With a party of up to six players working together, combat is involved enough to hold everyone’s interest, but slow enough that it doesn’t become too hectic to follow.

While Universe doesn’t look substantially different from Phantasy Star Online, there are many mechanical differences, big ones and small. Most of them are changes for the better, streamlining some aspects of gameplay while providing more options to keep the experience interesting.

The same three character classes are available – close-combat Hunters, Rangers with sniping skills, and Forces that use magic to back up their allies. A wider range of character races adds more variety, though, and players can swap classes at will as they progress. There’s a separate experience system that totes up class development – picking a new class preserves the skills from the old class to create a more well-rounded character.

Hunters and Rangers get a break in the form of more skills that level up with use, while Forces benefit even more from a similar magic system. Instead of buying a mess of progressively more powerful spells, Forces acquire a smaller collection of magic that also powers up as they use it, developing stronger effects and longer range. That makes managing their arsenal much easier.

New Universe

The tutorial mode does a good job of showing new players around somewhat complicated lobby areas, and after that it’s easy to join a party and go to town. At this point, even less crowded servers don’t lack for company, and the mission selection counters make the action just a couple of clicks away.

A few little tweaks make party management easier and more efficient, particularly the automatic item distribution. You can toggle it to randomly pass out the treasure or hand it to party members in order. Either option kills any drama that might result from one or two players hogging the loot.

The nature of that loot is very different now. PSU has a new item synthesis system – you can buy some equipment, and find more hidden in dungeons, but most of the treasures you’ll grab are raw materials to cook up into useful items later. This lends flexibility to what you can use the loot for (nearly any character type can eventually find something to synthesize with most items), but it lacks some of the instant-gratification appeal of getting lucky and snagging a weapon to use right away.

In general, the game takes a while to ramp up to the real fun. For whatever reason, Sega chose to hit new players with the ugliest, most boring levels at first. The graphics improve considerably later in the game, and the third planet’s environments are a lovely take on rural Japan in the fall, but it would have been smarter to hook the newbies with something nicer to look at. The early going also involves repeating a lot of basic missions, although the game randomly mixes up different dungeon layouts to make the same levels a little bit different during multiple playthroughs.

To the Unknown Future

In the long run, once those newbie adventures are far behind us, it’s a bit hard to predict where the game will go. Sega’s keeping the final area (of four all told) locked for later, despite the fact that it’s technically all there on the PS2 disc. While players of the Japanese version have raved about the late-game content, the American jury is going to have to stay out.

For now, though, PSU’s online half gets a thumbs-up. What made the original PSO a hit is still there – fun cooperative combat, smooth social interaction, and lots of loot to grab. Enjoy what the game has to offer for now, and we’ll hope Sonic Team can stay focused down the line.

Article by:  D. F. Smith
Video produced by: Michael Benson