eneyla
02-21-2006, 02:08 AM
The supposed cover art:
http://www.burningjustice.net/PSU/cover.jpg
For anybody absolutely new to the Phantasy Star franchise; if you know your stuff just skip this part:
Phantasy Star is Sega's biggest RPG franchise. The first Phantasy Star was released in roughly the same era as the first or second Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest games. What set it apart, above all else, was the amazing design of the world. Phantasy Star was, and is, primarily a sci-fi RPG, with fantasy elements. The original Phantasy Star series took place across three different planets in the Algo solar system. It's far more Star Wars and less Tolkien, except with far fewer retarded looking aliens. Also, unlike Final Fantasy, the four games were interconnected, with each taking place hundreds of years apart from each other in the same continuity. There was at least one game released as a sidestory, and the third game is out of order and has a different tone than the others, but that's mostly stuff for the fanboys to argue about. But in 1994, Phantasy Star IV was released, and was meant to be a conclusion to the whole saga.
In 2000/2001, though, Sega brought back the franchise on the Dreamcast, with Phantasy Star Online. It was created in basically a new continuity, having no direct plot linking with the original series (there are some, but they're more just some things for the fans to notice and think about, kind of like ShinRa in FFX-2). It was like Diablo for consoles, except with a much cooler setting and a more arcade-like battle system. It wasn't all that advanced, even for its time, but it was damn fun to play at the time. Unfortunately, it had some pretty major problems. First, security on the game was a pile of shit. A big pile of shit. There could be pages written on all the things that were wrong with it, so I'll leave it at that. A lot of the bugs and cheats persisted from the original Dreamcast release through every iteration of the game: Dreamcast's v2, PC's v2, GameCube's Episode I & II, Xbox's Episode I & II, and even GameCube's Episode I & II Plus. From what I've heard, some things are even still around in PSO: Blue Burst on the PC, although it's a lot better. Regardless, despite the basic PSO engine being so full of holes that even five years of patching them isn't quite enough, there was some really good stuff in PSO. The plot was not handed to you at all at first, and you had to infer a lot of things yourself, but it was quite interesting. The fantasy elements of the series were all but gone, replaced by a colonization starship called Pioneer 2, and lightsabers and beam rifles were the weapons of choice. To date, there are four Episodes in PSO. 1, 2, and 4 are in sequence, and tell a story about Pioneer 2, coming from a dying planet, trying to establish a civilization on the planet Ragol, solving just what exactly happened to Pioneer 1, and dealing with some ancient unsealed gene-tampering evil thing. Episode 3 takes place after that, and was an SRPG using a card system. The plot of PSO as a whole is good, and well worth playing through if the very dated mechanics don't put you off.
Now, since they're finally jettisoning the PSO engine and all of its flaws, Phantasy Star Universe is being released five years after PSO, eleven years after the last single player PS game, and nearly twenty years since the first Phantasy Star game was released. A new engine, a new universe, and what appears to be a good chance to learn from the mistakes they made with PSO and make something really great.
History lesson aside, a general introduction of the game:
There is a battle system trailer right here (http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/battleofpsu.wmv) and it is FUCKING AWESOME.
If you have any interest in this game at all (and even if you don't), watch this trailer. It looks goddamned awesome, and I'm now twice as excited about this game as I was before.
Here is the last couple weeks worth of new information:
First, there's a new character up on the official site. The guy with the ridiculous pants is Kou Taragi, he's a Photon Engineer, and supposedly he taught Maya at some point.
http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/kou.jpg
Much more importantly, a lot of information has been released on Photon Arts. As you may recall, the weapons have a set amount of photon 'ammunition'. Photon Arts are the things that use these. For melee weapons, there are a variety of different attacks, depending on the weapon type. Some of the ones that have been shown in screenshots are "Cross Rush", "Rising Slash", and "Haatsu (?) Slash".
For guns, in addition to 'basic' shots that just use one Photon point, they've also got some Photon Arts. So far the only ones shown have been elemental shots, "Burning Bullet" and "Frozen Bullet".
For 'Hou' weapons (ie: Canes and Rods), the Photon Arts seem to be just techniques. The Foie, Barta, and Zonde lines have been spotted, as well as Resta. Any others are unknown.
Here are some small screenshots of Photon Arts from the official site. The first four are various melee Photon Arts, the next two are Techniques, and the last two are the Gun Arts. Looks like Frozen Bullet actually freezes the enemy, which is pretty cool.
http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/photonarts.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/photonarts2.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/photonarts3.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/photonarts4.jpg
Basically, it looks like you can go into a menu with your weapon, and link Photon Arts to it. For melee weapons, it looks like you only link one, and for Technique weapons you can definitely link at least two. The exact details aren't really known yet as far as I know.
Page 1 (http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/PSUscan1.jpg)
Page 2 (http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/PSUscan2.jpg)
These are two magazine scans showing off a little about Photon Arts, and also some of the various weapon types in the game. Some of those look pretty awesome. On page 1, from the top, and left to right, they've got Sabers, Swords, Daggers, Double Sabers, Twin Daggers, Claws, Twin Claws (hell yes), and Knuckles (hand-to-hand weapons that don't suck? Sign me up).
Page 2 is about Photon Arts, and part of it seems to be saying that you can actually level up your Photon Arts, which could be interesting.
There's a little bit on the official site about the weird face-chat thing. Apparently it's called 'Cut-in Chat', and basically is pretty self-explanatory. Also, unlike in PSO where you could kind of summon that weird floaty bean-bag in the lobbies, in PSU you can just sit on the ground. I guess that's kind of neat.
http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/cutinchat.jpg
Finally, I don't know if this shot actually shows it, but a bit of the mystery behind the Partner Machinery holding weapons has been explained. Online, when you form a party, if there are free spaces out of the available six, you can bring your Partner Machinery along as an AI-controlled ally. That sounds really cool, especially if you just want to play with a friend. That way, with both of your Partner Machineries, you'd have 4/6 party slots filled instead of being really gimped by running at only 2/6 people.
http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/party.jpg
--------------------------------------------------------------
First, Phantasy Star Universe is being developed for PS2 and PC. The Japanese release date is December 29/30. The North American release is set for early 2006. I heard February for quite a while, but lately I've been hearing that it might be delayed until April or May. I've no idea on the European dates; they might be the same as the North American ones, but are probably not. As far as I know, the PS2 hard drive is not required.
Phantasy Star Online was extremely import-friendly - every version except for Blue Burst was released in Japan with full translations to English, Japanese, French, German, and Spanish, if I recall correctly. The earlier versions of PSO were also internationally linked - NA players could jump to JP or EU servers and vice versa. I don't know if this is going to be carried over to PSU or not. There is some footage with English-subtitled cutscenes, but those are generally meant to be part of Sega's showing for an event, so it's hard to say if that's actually a part of the game or not. I'll be importing it even if I have to struggle every step of the way with pretty pathetically limited Japanese skills, but I guess I'm strange that way.
The requirements for the PC version have been released:
Or from what I can tell:
Some of that might be slightly off but most of it is pretty straightforward. I'm not sure if the Japanese edition of WinXP is actually required or if you just need support for Japanese characters and the like. PSO:BB said the same thing under requirements as far as I know, and I was able to install the client, but I've had other things refuse to install on the exact same Windows installation.
This is all coming from the Sega Direct order page (http://segadirect.jp/Catalog/CustomPages/CustomDetail2.aspx?File=psu.htm), where the price is also announced. Preordering will get you an artbook and a mini-soundtrack, and paying a little extra for the "Sega Direct" version gets you another additional bonus which hasn't been announced yet.
Sadly, I don't think they ship outside of Japan :cry:. Hopefully there'll be some place I can preorder from that can give me all of the neato extra goodies.
There's also some information about registering with SegaLink (http://segalink.jp/campaign/psu/) which is a free registration you'll need to sign up for to get an account (or at least that's what everybody else has said; I haven't tried to tackle the page out of being mostly illiterate). Registering early apparently gets you some special prizes; an in-game item, a screensaver, and a chance to win something called a "Net Cash" card.
Second, the game is divided into two seperate modes, online and offline. In PSO's offline mode, everything was basically the same as online, except with less monsters, less players, and less fun. There hasn't been a standard, offline Phantasy Star game since Phantasy Star IV, in 1994. Phantasy Star Universe is meant to provide the best of both worlds.
The offline portion is a standard 40-50 hour single player RPG. There are specific characters, a set plot to progress through, with a healthy amount of cutscenes and, from the looks of things, a pretty damn expansive world for you to play in. More on the specifics of that later.
The online mode can basically be summed up as "PSO, except better and more advanced in just about every conceivable way." Anything done in the offline mode has absolutely no bearing on anything done in the online mode. Your character online stays online, and the story behind the online mode takes place directly after the events of the offline game. Again, details later, but I'll say that I'm very impressed with what I've seen so far.
Offline Mode - The Singleplayer RPG:
(This part shouldn't contain any real spoilers since this is all information posted on the official site (http://phantasystaruniverse.com) or shown as trailers at various shows and events that Sega has attended, but if you need everything to be a surprise, be forewarned that anything I can find about it is going here.)
The setup for the story, from what I've read:
The Graal system was unstable for a long time, with wars between the planets and the races in the planets. Eventually, though, peace was reached with a treaty between the planets, and there was a hundred years of (at least relative) peace. Cut to one hundred years later, Ethan Waber and his little sister Lumia are attending a ceremony marking the centennial anniversary of the treaty, when the planet suddenly comes under attack by something called the SEED. After this, it seems that Ethan joins the Guardians, which is about when the game really begins.
It's a bit sketchy but that's the best I've been able to come up with for an exact outline of the opening of the game.
The Graal System
The story takes place in the Graal system. There are three planets:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/graal.jpg
From left to right, Parum, Neudaiz, and Mortoob.
Parum is the standard 'earth-like' planet. It's mainly populated by Humans, with Casts making up a small percent (~5% of the population) and Numans and Beasts presumably making up an insignifigant part. The two major cities are supposedly Talcus ("Tarukasu"; I don't know if "Talcus" is an official romanization), the capital, and Hortess ("Horutesu"). The Guardians and the AMF are supposedly based in those cities.
Neudaiz seems to be a water-covered planet (As opposed to the original series which had a snow-covered planet). Pictures of the city show something of a cross between traditional Asian architecture and a bunch of Venice-ish canals. The main population of Neudaiz is the Numan race. The main city mentioned by name is Ohtoku ("Outoku"), and I believe there's something else mentioned about a Mt. Ohtoku, which I guess makes sense as a natural high-ground above the surface of a worldwide ocean would be pretty important. The other thing mentioned by name on the official site is "Youmei", from what I can gather a weapons or mechanical production organization. Neudaiz is also the most religious of the planets, and the head of the "Communion of Graal" is situated here.
Mortoob is a desert-like planet, seemingly quite harsh environmentally, and rich in natural resources. The people of Mortoob are mostly Beasts. The main on-planet locations I can pick out are a "Daguora City" and a "Tenora Works". Tenora Works seems to be in the same business as Youmei. However, Mortoob is also surrounded by a belt of debris forming rings, much like Saturn. Among those rings it's generally dangerous for ships to go, so that's where you'll find the Rogues making their bases.
The last location named in the system is the Guardians Colony:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/gcolony.jpg
I'm assuming that the Guardians being based on Parum just refers to their planet side head, because having a giant orbital colony to run things from is much, much cooler. There isn't really much specific that I can decipher about it, unfortunately, other than something about "Vector Tracks" and "Rings". I'm assuming that it operates on an orbit independant of the three planets, and acts as a headquarters for Guardians to get to any of the planets from. This is where Ethan lives, so you'll probably be coming back here a lot in between missions and whatnot.
Races
There are four races in Phantasy Star Universe.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/human.jpg
Humans are humans. If you've played any game at all with multiple races, ever, you know the basic deal behind humans. Well-rounded gameplay-wise, and they make up a majority of Graal's population.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/numan.jpg
Numans are the PSU equivalent to elves. In the old Phantasy Star games they were the product of mixing human and monster genes; in PSO and PSU they're just genetically modified humans. They're more frail than humans, have greater aptitude for techniques, etc. In previous games, Numans aged extremely quickly, and/or had unstable life expectancies. I'm not sure if that's the case in PSU.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cast.jpg
PSO terminology is sticking around for "Casts". Older games called them Androids. Either way, they're robots. In PSU, humans created them to do work, but eventually they became self-aware, and rebelled. The translations are a bit vague that I can find, but they are either trying to take over human life now, or they already have taken over control to some extent. It's interesting that they say that, but there are several Casts who are your allies in the story, and you can make a Cast for online play. So either the ones trying to take over everything are some radical extremist group, or they've just done it and actually have managed to prevent everything from turning into some sort of oppressive futuristic overlord situation. Design-wise, Casts are way cooler than they were in PSO. Whereas in PSO they all looked like robots, PSU also has options for creating a more humanoid looking character. One of the biggest disappointments in PSO was that none of the Androids were even remotely like Wren or Demi from PSIV, and it looks like they fixed that this time around. Gameplay-wise, Androids are really strong and accurate, but are very lacking in technique aptitude. Interestingly enough, though, Androids can use SOME techniques in PSU (They couldn't in both the old Phantasy Star games or PSO), albeit with a low degree of effectiveness. In-game, they have some ability, which seems to involve calling down weaponry from satellites or something. In one trailer a little girl Cast calls down a pretty impressive array of missiles and lasers and lets loose a salvo on some enemies.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/beast.jpg
Beasts are a new race to PSU. They are, shockingly enough, more animal-like than humans. They're hairier than humans, and most seem to have animal style ears; some have kind of a cat/dog nose thing going on. Like Numans, they were created by genetically modifying humans; this time to create a more durable worker-class who could more effectively mine Mortoob. Obviously, after a while that wasn't going to fly and there was some tension and animosity toward being regarded as just a bunch of simple labourers. In game terms, Beasts seem like they're somewhere in between Casts and Humans. Stronger than humans, but not as strong as Casts; worse than Humans at techniques but not as bad as Casts, etc. Beasts also seem to have the ability to temporarily assume kind of a Were-form where they get stronger and more animal-like.
Main Characters
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/01.jpg
From left to right: Ethan Waber, Karen Erra, Hyuga Ryght.
Ethan Waber, 17
Human, affiliated with the Guardians
Ethan is the main character of the game. As the game begins, he's a beginner/trainee Guardian. He acts pretty much like you'd expect him to as the main character of a Japanese console RPG. Ethan is voiced by Seki Tomokazu.
Karen Erra, 17
Numan, affiliated with the Guardians
Karen is the main heroine of the game. She's had three years battle experience, and is assigned to Ethan (and, I assume, Hyuga) to act as somewhat of a mentor/team captain. I think that for some reason she can't use techniques even though she's a Numan, but I don't remember very well so I might be making that up. Karen is voiced by Rie Tanaka.
Hyuga Ryght, 17
Human, affiliated with the Guardians
Hyuga serves as the friend/rival counterpart to Ethan that seems to be a required position to fill in anime and sometimes games. He's also a rookie, and I think Ethan and Hyuga compete somewhat for the top ranking among rookies or something like that. Hyuga is voiced by Akira Ishida.
(Just as a note, I put the voice actors for these characters. Unless you're a big nerd like me, you probably don't really care much about Japanese voice actors, but I figured I'd mention it anyway. To me, it's a good sign that there are some voices that are recognizable enough that I can place them by hearing them. The fact that they are fairly well-known in anime/game voice acting is a good sign that Sega isn't half-assing the production of the story, or at least that's the way it seems to me.)
Organizations:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/guardians.jpg
The Guardians seem to be roughly comparable to the Hunters from the other Phantasy Star series. It doesn't seem that they're actually affiliated directly with the military, but they do have their own interplanetary network, the space colony, and a trained fighting force. I can't gather much from the site on my own, but I'm going to hazard a guess and say that they're probably like the Hunter's Guild, except less mercenary-like and more devoted toward protecting/helping people. They seem to be the "good guys", at least unless there is a shocking plot twist.
Some Guardians:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/nav.jpg
Ohbel Dallgun, 46
Human
Dallgun is the leader of the Guardians. There's not much more than that I can find. In some of the trailers he's shown making a big address to like a whole planet, so he's got some pull, and obviously you'll be taking orders from him for at least the first part of the game.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/dallgun.jpg
Lucaim Nav, 178
Cast
Nav has supposedly been working with the Guardians for more than 150 years. He's kind of like an old kung fu master, and supposedly he trained/trains Ethan at some point.
Leogini Santosa Berafort, 31
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/amf.jpg
The AMF stands for Allied Military Force, and seems to bee the official military. Unlike in PSO, however, it seems like they're going to have a larger presence in this game than two guys perpetually standing next to a teleporter. Whether the AMF itself is with your or against you I'm not sure, but it seems like the AMF as a whole will probably be neutral at best. I'm really not too sure with this one though. The main focus seems to be on the next group, a smaller element of the AMF.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/endrum.jpg
The Endrum Collective is a special task force of the AMF, supposedly dedicated to the preservation of "Relics". These guys are almost definitely evil. The leader's name is Endrum Harness("Endoramu Haanesu"), and supposedly they're pulling a "nothing else is known about him" with that guy. The most visible member is Renvolt Magashi, who seems to be the game's main antagonist. There's some stuff about how they're really secret and there used to be a different version 30 years before the SEED, etc, but even if I knew exactly what the site said it's pretty clear that it's meant to be an enigma.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/curtz.jpg
Fullyen Curtz, 27
Cast
I don't honestly know much about Curtz, but he's one of only two AMF characters actually shown. I don't think he's actually part of the Endrum Collective and is more than likely with the main AMF.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/magashi.jpg
Renvolt Magashi, 67
Cast
This evil Gundam-looking motherfucker is being made out to be the main antagonist of the game. He's part of the Endrum Collective, looks like pure Robot Evil, and in a few trailers he's shown fighting various hero characters, and broadcasting much like Dallgun does.
The Rogues don't have an official emblem, although you can probably fill in the blanks with a Space Jolly Roger. The Rogues are a loose collection of outlaws, gangsters, and space pirates. There's no official head of power or anything, but there are several Mafia-like "families" at the top of the Rogues, with predictably also a lot of in-fighting and the like. It looks like some of these guys will be standard criminal evil guys, but there are also some who will be allies.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/vol.jpg
Vol Brothers: Hiru Vol (26), No Vol (21), and Do Vol (18)
Numan, Human, and Beast
Looks like these guys are mostly comic relief. The Vol Brothers are some sort of pirate trio. Hiru is the brains, Do is the brawn, and No is... I don't know, a gay Mexican dancer I guess.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/tylor.jpg
Alfort Tylor, 29
Beast
Tylor is the badass character. Normally, I don't like this stereotype, but he's the captain of a Rogue ship called the Landale. Landale? Fuck yeah. I don't even need to know anything else.
There's an emblem for the Communion of Graal but I can't grab it out easily. This is basically the biggest religious presence in Graal. Most practitioners are Numen, although there are also some members of other races. Apparently it's lead by four figures, each in charge of a different area - Religious ceremonies, Politics, Literature, and Defense. The basic idea behind the religion seems to be that photons are sort of a planetary spirit rather than just a naturally occuring power (Hi Mako energy), and they worship around that.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/lutz.jpg
Izuma Rutsu, 28
Numan
Well, the site romanizes it as "Rutsu", but an astute observer will notice that it really probably should be Lutz. Anyway, he's part of the Top 4 of the Communion of Graal.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/mirei.jpg
Mirei Mikuna, 17
Numan
I'm not sure if she's actually part of the Top 4, but if she isn't, her father is. She has a few scenes shown in trailers where she talks with Ethan a bit. The first time I think she heals him after he hurts his leg, and in the second I think she's saying that he just saved her life. Probably kind of a damsel-in-distress-eventually-turned-healer character.
Aside from the characters affiliated with the various organizations, there are some others on the site. It's mostly stuff like Ethan's sister, or a doctor who hires Ethan's group to help him with research. This one is kind of funny though:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/hal.jpg
Hal, 19
Human
Hal is an Idol, on... Wait for it... Graal Channel 5! I don't know why they wanted to work a Space Channel 5 reference/parody into the game, but damnit, it was an awesome idea.
Gameplay
There isn't a perfect picture of the gameplay I can make from what's been released, but at the core it seems to be somewhat similar to PSO. Moving around dungeons and fighting is all done without any transitions (ie: All enemies just show up on the map rather than going to a special battle screen). Of course, offline there are console RPG style breaks for cutscenes, but aside from that it's mostly unbroken.
In battle, things so far seem to be a streamlined/modified version of PSO's combat system. The first thing you'll probably notice is that your character does not walk for one second before they run. As a result, everything should seem more fast paced. Second, attack chains now go up to six instead of only three. The animations are also improved a lot, so swinging a sword around in a combo doesn't look so boring. By holding L1, you can also lock onto a target. That keeps you facing a target, so you can strafe and walk around them without losing your target.
In offline mode, there are around ten characters that you'll have in your party over the course of the game; up to four (I think) will be with you at once. You control Ethan, and the AI controls the other members. I haven't seen anything about being able to give orders to your partners, but thankfully unlike PSO your NPC helpers are not completely fucking braindead, and actually seem to be able to hold their own most of the time.
Pressing Circle in-game brings up a quick-switch menu of the various loadouts that you can make out of the weapons you've got on-hand:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/loadouts.jpg
(The picture is pretty self-explanatory; the text is just "Handgun, Dagger", "Handgun, Saber", "Sword", "Rod", "Twin Dagger")
There are three basic weapon types, with specific weapons in each category:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/weapons.jpg
For melee weapons, you have Daggers, Sabers, and Swords as the basic types. For guns, there are Handguns, Machine Guns, and Rifles. For Technique type weapons, there are Canes and Rods.
As for what you can do with different weapon types, you have two hands. If you're using one-handed weapons, you'll generall have a close-range weapon in your main hand, and then a long-range weapon in your off hand. Pressing R will switch from your main hand to offhand.
Some weapons are two-handed, though. Swords, and dual-wielding Daggers will use both hands, Rifles are the same, and Rods are the two-handed Technique weapons. I'm honestly not sure what R switches you to with those weapons.
For your main weapon, Square is a normal attack, and Triangle is a stronger attack specific to that weapon. Sabers have "Cross Rush", and Swords have "Shield Breaker". So far, those attacks have just been shown as stronger swings, but they might also have some special properties of their own (Particularly Shield Breaker).
Guns work much differently than in PSO. Instead of just being ranged weapons with their own combos, you can just shoot a gun repeatedly. You can shoot manually, you can lock on and shoot, and, new to PSU, you can switch into a first-person mode where you can aim your shots wherever you want, including at the weak points of enemies. Note that you can't really move when in first-person, so it's not going to turn into First Person Shooter Universe, but it's still a welcome addition, especially if they implement weak points on monsters correctly.
Rods, Canes, and other Technique weapons are also quite different then in previous games. It seems that characters themselves don't have TP like they do in previous games, nor can you just learn and cast Techniques. The Techs are embedded into the weapons, and you use them by pressing the assigned buttons, just like various attack types with melee weapons. In the demo that Sega has set up at various events, Ethan has a Rod which has Resta (healing spell) and Gifoie (PBAoE fire spell) bound to it. Supposedly you can bind your own Techniques and things like that, but I haven't found any specific details.
Each weapon also has a certain amount of Photon Energy. This works as ammunition for Gun-type weapons (ie: You can fire until you run out of Photons), replaces TP for Technique weapons, and also powers the stronger attacks with melee weapons. The exact workings of the system haven't really been deciphered yet to the best of my knowledge. Some guesses are that Mono/Di/Trifluids will recharge the Photons in a weapon instead of giving you TP, but nobody seems to really be sure.
As a side note, rumours are that there are some new (old) techniques being brought back into PSU that were in the old games but not PSO. In particular, I've heard somebody say that they saw Ethan cast some variant of Gra on an enemy. PSU goddamn better have Dimensworms.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/special.jpg
As I mentioned before, Androids and Beasts have special attacks somewhat reminiscent of Photon Blasts from PSO (It's unknown whether Humans and Numans have some equivalent abilities or whether they just have some advantageous stats to make up for it; one guess is that Numans can cast Techniques without a special piece of equipment).
Above, the first is a picture of a Beast's transformation, called a Nanoblast. Nothing too shocking; a temporary transformation where they go all Hulk. Sounds like some good fun. One thing that I'm not sure about is how the Nanoblast affects different looking Beasts. It would be kind of silly for all of them to look the same, but then I guess they can't really come up with a unique look for every single combination of characters. That's more to do with the online mode than the offline one, though.
The next two pictures are of a Cast (Lou) using her special ability, called "SUV-Weapon". Most people think that that's a typo on "Sub-Weapon", but I'm not really sure either way. SUV could work as an acronym, since it supposedly involves calling down weaponry from satellites above the planet, but either way, the effect of it is that she calls down those missiles and laser thingies and just lets loose on the enemies. Neato.
Partner Machinery
PSU does not have MAGs, the way that PSO did. This time around, you've still got a little robotic buddy, but they're more of a robotic buddy and less of a piece of equipment that takes hours and hours to level up and can be forever ruined by the mistake of feeding one wrong item, meaning you have to do the whole thing over...
Anyway, in PSU, you get Partner Machinery as a replacement. Specifically, in the offline story portion, Ethan gets Pete, this charming looking ball fellow. Supposedly Pete gives you mission briefings and the like:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/pete.jpg
Partner Machinery acts somewhat like MAGs from PSO in that you can give them items and they'll evolve and grow as they level up. However, it looks like they don't increase your stats based on what you give them; rather they'll create and give you back items. Again, not too many details about the finer points of this system, but it could range from anywhere between being a helpful but optional boost for people who like raising their little robot, or it could be part of a pseudo-crafting system. However, it looks like that's not all they do. Screenshots of various forms that your Partner Machinery can take are up on the site, ranging from a blue version of Pete, to a small blue flying robot-dragon, to a little pink doll thing, and finally, a tiny robotic maid who will do battle at your bidding.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/partnermachinery.jpg
I'm crossing my fingers for an arena where you can pit your tiny maid against another person's tiny maid and watch them fight to the death.
That's the gist of what I've found as far as information on the offline mode of the game goes. If I find anything else that's interesting I'll update the post.
There's also a couple of videos some guy took with a cam of playing through the two levels that are part of the playable demo Sega set up at some event here (http://hosted.filefront.com/ecchichuu/). I found these from a post on PSO-World (http://www.planetdreamcast.com/psoworld/index.php).
However, I wouldn't take these as a really good indication of how the game will play, because I don't think this is completely up to date or full-featured, and also the guy playing it must have been holding the camcorder in one hand and playing with the other, because otherwise, from the way he jerks the camera arouns, he has no business playing video games. The camera looks really bad in this clip, but in all the other videos I've seen of in-game footage it's pretty decent, so I wouldn't let this bother you as far as that's concerned.
Online Mode
Sure to be the life of the game long after everybody's beaten the singleplayer portion, the online mode also looks like it's a huge jump up from PSO.
The online mode also will have a story, although it takes place after the events of the single-player game. There aren't many details about the online story floating around, other than some cool stuff like that you're probably going to run into Ethan as an NPC once you start playing online, at some point.
First, the character creation is very expanded, and looks absolutely awesome. The first difference that you'll notice is there are no classes. There are only the four different races, and you can do whatever you want with any race, although obviously some are much more suited toward particular roles than others. Presumably this means that you'll have some more control over the advancement of your character's attributes, like in Diablo, instead of a fixed growth like PSO, but there's nothing concrete about that so far.
First, you choose your race and gender:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc01.jpghttp://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc02.jpg
Then you can choose your Face type. There are three for female characters, and sixteen for male characters (the males have various options for facial hair). The face shape is also adjustable via a slider, so you can change the proportions of the face. Want to make a big-eyed anime character to let people know that you've never touched a girl? Want to make a big squinty looking badass in the vain hope that you will somehow come across as more socially proficient than the anime guy? Go right ahead.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc03.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc04.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc05.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc06.jpg
There are six types of eye designs for each gender, and the colour of the eyes is adjustable by a slider so you should be able to get whatever colour and shade you want.
There are nineteen kinds of eyebrows, which seems to be the same for both genders.
Supposedly the next option is eyelashes, although that might be a weird translation. It's not shown in the trailer and there are 13 options for females, 3 for males.
For Numen (and probably Beasts), there are three different Ear styles:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc07.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc08.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc09.jpg
You've got your old school Nei-style 'straight up' ears, a more elf-like pointy type sticking out at a 45 degree angle, and then you've got those stupid looking goat ear things where they flop out in a straight line from your head.
The next option is Hairstyle; there are sixteen for each gender. Obviously, the colour is adjusted on a slider.
You also have five different choices for Underwear for both males and females. I'm not even going to speculate on this one.
The next is skin colour. It's adjusted by a slider this time instead of having five specific values. It's not an RGB slider so you can't make your fantastic purple man, but it does give a nice variation in skin tones.
The last option on that screen is Proportions, which is much like the slider from PSO. You can make your character short, tall, fat, skinny, inflate her breasts like a horrible pervert, or get rid of her breasts entirely like an even worse pervert.
The next screen is for clothing. The options are Jacket, Pants, Shoes, and Voice Type. Voice type is assumedly just the battle cries and grunts your character will give off. For the others, there are 50 options for each for male characters, and 60 each for female characters. A lot of the options are just reskins of the same model, but there are still probably 5~6 distinct models for each option, and that's a lot better than PSO's one model.
One thing that I really like about the character design in PSU is that the clothes look a lot less like weird space outfits, and more like clothes that people might actually wear. Granted, they only work in the future because they're covered with random bright glowing strips and have funny colours, but the characters look like they're wearing street clothes, for the most part, which is awesome.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc10.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc11.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc12.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc13.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc14.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc15.jpg
You can expect at least 75% of the playerbase to be using one of those long jackets on a male character, in black, with white/grey hair.
The Cast screen is quite a bit different from the others. The first option is Face type. Note that the customization is a lot better for Androids this time around - "Face Type" is seperate from "Head type". The first two are humanoid faces, and the others are like PSO's Casts.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc16.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc17.jpg
The option under that is "Robo eyes" or something. It's a sliding scale, so it must control colour. If you pick a humanoid face, this becomes "Eyes", and there are three options, probably like the other races' eye options. The options under that are "Eyebrows" and "Eyelash" from the other customization screens, and those only light up when a humanoid face is chosen.
The next option is "Helmet", where you can adjust the actual shape of their head. There are five different options, ranging from Samurai helmets to just sort of a single horn thing.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc18.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc19.jpg
The next option I haven't found a translation for, but it's a sliding scale. Next is the main colour of the Cast. Interestingly, not done on a sliding scale but with just eight options. The next option though is the secondary colour, which is on a sliding scale and controls the colour of the dark parts in between the plates of metal covering the Cast.
The last option is again Proportion.
The next screen for Casts is their outfits, which are just fucking awesome. The first option is Arm. No changing options are shown, but it looks like you can change things like the shoulderpieces on your Cast. There are four options, and I'm pretty sure that at least one of them is the Nu-Gundam style 'wings' that Magashi has.
Under that is Torso. Pretty self-explanatory. Four different options:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc20.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc21.jpg
The last option is Voice Type.
After character creation, you get sent out into the Lobbies. These are not the lobbies of PSO, which were basically just a boring room that had no purpose aside from spamming and running directly into a private game where you're safe from all the other people. These lobbies are huge and kind of organized like an indoor shopping mall (It seems like there are lobbies set on the Guardians Colony as well as each of the planets). There are stores, a central fountain, and a lot of area to run around in. They also house hundreds of players at one time. They look like a lot of fun.
Instead of Symbol Chat from PSO, which was never used for any purpose beyond trying to build pictures of Goatse to spam in the lobbies, the stuff you can bind is basically just a text phrase, except you'll make an anime-style pop-up insert of your character's face displaying some emotion, with a little light-show behind you.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc22.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc23.jpg
All of the screenshots for character creation were taken from this video at GameTrailers.com (http://www.gametrailers.com/player.php?id=7714&type=wmv). There's also some footage of just wandering around the lobby, having dance parties, etc. There's a little bit shown about the room system, but nothing specific.
The room system seems pretty neat. You're going to have your own room in Network mode to act as somewhat of a home base. Your Partner Machinery will be there, presumably you use it as item storage, etc. You can customize the appearance of it; it looks like there's a decent level of personalization there:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/rooms.jpg
Also, word is that you can invite other players into your room to hang out or whatever. A small feature, but kind of a nice one.
Once you decide that it's time to actually play, you form up a party in the lobby. In PSU, the party limit is expanded from four players to six players in a party. After you've formed up, you leave the lobby and go to one of the planets you want to play on.
Information on this is vague at best, but the rumour seems to be that each planet is going to have its own sizable overworld. The game is also advertising player vehicles to get around, so hopefully those will be pretty fun and the world itself will be pretty big. There are also going to be around 20 dungeons, each with its own boss. Online, the dungeons are going to be at least partially randomly generated, so it won't get really boring as fast as PSO's kind of crappy four dungeons did, playing the same things over and over again.
The design of everything is also much nicer. The outdoor areas actually look and feel like open fields, instead of rooms where the walls were just made of poorly-textures green lumps. The indoor areas are actually kind of varied, and not just room-door-room-door-room-corridor-room. I think that functionally, a lot of it will still be 'kill the monsters to proceed', but this time the monsters look smarter, the rooms look less alike, and there are more options to choose from.
These shots are from the single-player portion, but chances are the overall design is going to be the same
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/18small.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/42small.jpg
That's about all of the information I can find on the game right now. If there's actually any interest in the game, I'll keep this thread updated; if not I guess I'll just let it die :(
For anybody who is interested, there are screenshots on the official site. Unfortunately they use this ass-backwards Flash interface to view them so it can be a pain in the ass. I put all of them up on my webspace here (http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/OfficialScreenshots/).
There are also some magazine scans about the game floating around that aren't too old; I put those up here (http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/Scans/).
There's a video from TGS around too; it shows off fighting the Dragon in Network mode and has some other information that's all in Japanese. Unfortunately, they also decided to bring in Rie Tanaka, the voice actor for Karen, as a special guest, cosplaying as Karen. As a result, when they went to actually play, the cameraman kept it on a picture of her face for like five minutes and you could only really hear the game being played until they got to the Dragon. The video is here (http://www.planetdreamcast.com/psoworld/downloads/psu/trailers/psu_tgs_bb.zip), hosted by PSO-World.
The official site is here (http://phantasystaruniverse.com).
PSO-World (http://www.planetdreamcast.com/psoworld/index.php) is a decent fansite.
Ragol.co.uk (http://ragol.co.uk/) also has quite a bit of information.
This is just some guy's personal forum, but he's got a thread (http://p081.ezboard.com/fespiokaosmessageboardfrm1.showMessage?topicID=148 9.topic) up on it where he's discussing the game, and he's translated a good chunk of the official site's content.
New: I found an interview at IGN about the game here (http://ps2.ign.com/articles/650/650101p1.html), from early September. It's got some interesting stuff.
quote:
This enormous game offers two complete RPG experiences - a single-player action-adventure spanning multiple planets, and a robust online multi-player component. In offline mode, this action-RPG offers more than 40 hours of gameplay, an emotionally engaging story, traditional cut scenes, and strong character development. In online mode, players are given the opportunity to travel with a squad of other adventurers, enter urban sprawls teeming with hundreds of players, and build their unique avatars into powerful warriors
quote:
Published by: SEGA
Developed by: Sonic Team / Total Entertainment Software
Genre: Persistent Online RPG
Number of Players: 1-16
Release Date:
US: Q3 2006
Japan: March 30, 2006
Also Available On: PC, PS2
Features: Dual Shock, Memory Card, Online, Stereo Surround, Vibration
Media Size: 1 DVD
More infomation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantasy_Star_Universe (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantasy_Star_Universe)
http://www.pso-world.com/psu.php (http://www.pso-world.com/psu.php)
Since this game is out in japan next month i just wanted to know if anyone else was getting in on ordering the japanese version, because from what i hear it has english settings but no english dub.
http://www.burningjustice.net/PSU/cover.jpg
For anybody absolutely new to the Phantasy Star franchise; if you know your stuff just skip this part:
Phantasy Star is Sega's biggest RPG franchise. The first Phantasy Star was released in roughly the same era as the first or second Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest games. What set it apart, above all else, was the amazing design of the world. Phantasy Star was, and is, primarily a sci-fi RPG, with fantasy elements. The original Phantasy Star series took place across three different planets in the Algo solar system. It's far more Star Wars and less Tolkien, except with far fewer retarded looking aliens. Also, unlike Final Fantasy, the four games were interconnected, with each taking place hundreds of years apart from each other in the same continuity. There was at least one game released as a sidestory, and the third game is out of order and has a different tone than the others, but that's mostly stuff for the fanboys to argue about. But in 1994, Phantasy Star IV was released, and was meant to be a conclusion to the whole saga.
In 2000/2001, though, Sega brought back the franchise on the Dreamcast, with Phantasy Star Online. It was created in basically a new continuity, having no direct plot linking with the original series (there are some, but they're more just some things for the fans to notice and think about, kind of like ShinRa in FFX-2). It was like Diablo for consoles, except with a much cooler setting and a more arcade-like battle system. It wasn't all that advanced, even for its time, but it was damn fun to play at the time. Unfortunately, it had some pretty major problems. First, security on the game was a pile of shit. A big pile of shit. There could be pages written on all the things that were wrong with it, so I'll leave it at that. A lot of the bugs and cheats persisted from the original Dreamcast release through every iteration of the game: Dreamcast's v2, PC's v2, GameCube's Episode I & II, Xbox's Episode I & II, and even GameCube's Episode I & II Plus. From what I've heard, some things are even still around in PSO: Blue Burst on the PC, although it's a lot better. Regardless, despite the basic PSO engine being so full of holes that even five years of patching them isn't quite enough, there was some really good stuff in PSO. The plot was not handed to you at all at first, and you had to infer a lot of things yourself, but it was quite interesting. The fantasy elements of the series were all but gone, replaced by a colonization starship called Pioneer 2, and lightsabers and beam rifles were the weapons of choice. To date, there are four Episodes in PSO. 1, 2, and 4 are in sequence, and tell a story about Pioneer 2, coming from a dying planet, trying to establish a civilization on the planet Ragol, solving just what exactly happened to Pioneer 1, and dealing with some ancient unsealed gene-tampering evil thing. Episode 3 takes place after that, and was an SRPG using a card system. The plot of PSO as a whole is good, and well worth playing through if the very dated mechanics don't put you off.
Now, since they're finally jettisoning the PSO engine and all of its flaws, Phantasy Star Universe is being released five years after PSO, eleven years after the last single player PS game, and nearly twenty years since the first Phantasy Star game was released. A new engine, a new universe, and what appears to be a good chance to learn from the mistakes they made with PSO and make something really great.
History lesson aside, a general introduction of the game:
There is a battle system trailer right here (http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/battleofpsu.wmv) and it is FUCKING AWESOME.
If you have any interest in this game at all (and even if you don't), watch this trailer. It looks goddamned awesome, and I'm now twice as excited about this game as I was before.
Here is the last couple weeks worth of new information:
First, there's a new character up on the official site. The guy with the ridiculous pants is Kou Taragi, he's a Photon Engineer, and supposedly he taught Maya at some point.
http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/kou.jpg
Much more importantly, a lot of information has been released on Photon Arts. As you may recall, the weapons have a set amount of photon 'ammunition'. Photon Arts are the things that use these. For melee weapons, there are a variety of different attacks, depending on the weapon type. Some of the ones that have been shown in screenshots are "Cross Rush", "Rising Slash", and "Haatsu (?) Slash".
For guns, in addition to 'basic' shots that just use one Photon point, they've also got some Photon Arts. So far the only ones shown have been elemental shots, "Burning Bullet" and "Frozen Bullet".
For 'Hou' weapons (ie: Canes and Rods), the Photon Arts seem to be just techniques. The Foie, Barta, and Zonde lines have been spotted, as well as Resta. Any others are unknown.
Here are some small screenshots of Photon Arts from the official site. The first four are various melee Photon Arts, the next two are Techniques, and the last two are the Gun Arts. Looks like Frozen Bullet actually freezes the enemy, which is pretty cool.
http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/photonarts.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/photonarts2.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/photonarts3.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/photonarts4.jpg
Basically, it looks like you can go into a menu with your weapon, and link Photon Arts to it. For melee weapons, it looks like you only link one, and for Technique weapons you can definitely link at least two. The exact details aren't really known yet as far as I know.
Page 1 (http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/PSUscan1.jpg)
Page 2 (http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/PSUscan2.jpg)
These are two magazine scans showing off a little about Photon Arts, and also some of the various weapon types in the game. Some of those look pretty awesome. On page 1, from the top, and left to right, they've got Sabers, Swords, Daggers, Double Sabers, Twin Daggers, Claws, Twin Claws (hell yes), and Knuckles (hand-to-hand weapons that don't suck? Sign me up).
Page 2 is about Photon Arts, and part of it seems to be saying that you can actually level up your Photon Arts, which could be interesting.
There's a little bit on the official site about the weird face-chat thing. Apparently it's called 'Cut-in Chat', and basically is pretty self-explanatory. Also, unlike in PSO where you could kind of summon that weird floaty bean-bag in the lobbies, in PSU you can just sit on the ground. I guess that's kind of neat.
http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/cutinchat.jpg
Finally, I don't know if this shot actually shows it, but a bit of the mystery behind the Partner Machinery holding weapons has been explained. Online, when you form a party, if there are free spaces out of the available six, you can bring your Partner Machinery along as an AI-controlled ally. That sounds really cool, especially if you just want to play with a friend. That way, with both of your Partner Machineries, you'd have 4/6 party slots filled instead of being really gimped by running at only 2/6 people.
http://members.shaw.ca/plutokiss/PSU/party.jpg
--------------------------------------------------------------
First, Phantasy Star Universe is being developed for PS2 and PC. The Japanese release date is December 29/30. The North American release is set for early 2006. I heard February for quite a while, but lately I've been hearing that it might be delayed until April or May. I've no idea on the European dates; they might be the same as the North American ones, but are probably not. As far as I know, the PS2 hard drive is not required.
Phantasy Star Online was extremely import-friendly - every version except for Blue Burst was released in Japan with full translations to English, Japanese, French, German, and Spanish, if I recall correctly. The earlier versions of PSO were also internationally linked - NA players could jump to JP or EU servers and vice versa. I don't know if this is going to be carried over to PSU or not. There is some footage with English-subtitled cutscenes, but those are generally meant to be part of Sega's showing for an event, so it's hard to say if that's actually a part of the game or not. I'll be importing it even if I have to struggle every step of the way with pretty pathetically limited Japanese skills, but I guess I'm strange that way.
The requirements for the PC version have been released:
Or from what I can tell:
Some of that might be slightly off but most of it is pretty straightforward. I'm not sure if the Japanese edition of WinXP is actually required or if you just need support for Japanese characters and the like. PSO:BB said the same thing under requirements as far as I know, and I was able to install the client, but I've had other things refuse to install on the exact same Windows installation.
This is all coming from the Sega Direct order page (http://segadirect.jp/Catalog/CustomPages/CustomDetail2.aspx?File=psu.htm), where the price is also announced. Preordering will get you an artbook and a mini-soundtrack, and paying a little extra for the "Sega Direct" version gets you another additional bonus which hasn't been announced yet.
Sadly, I don't think they ship outside of Japan :cry:. Hopefully there'll be some place I can preorder from that can give me all of the neato extra goodies.
There's also some information about registering with SegaLink (http://segalink.jp/campaign/psu/) which is a free registration you'll need to sign up for to get an account (or at least that's what everybody else has said; I haven't tried to tackle the page out of being mostly illiterate). Registering early apparently gets you some special prizes; an in-game item, a screensaver, and a chance to win something called a "Net Cash" card.
Second, the game is divided into two seperate modes, online and offline. In PSO's offline mode, everything was basically the same as online, except with less monsters, less players, and less fun. There hasn't been a standard, offline Phantasy Star game since Phantasy Star IV, in 1994. Phantasy Star Universe is meant to provide the best of both worlds.
The offline portion is a standard 40-50 hour single player RPG. There are specific characters, a set plot to progress through, with a healthy amount of cutscenes and, from the looks of things, a pretty damn expansive world for you to play in. More on the specifics of that later.
The online mode can basically be summed up as "PSO, except better and more advanced in just about every conceivable way." Anything done in the offline mode has absolutely no bearing on anything done in the online mode. Your character online stays online, and the story behind the online mode takes place directly after the events of the offline game. Again, details later, but I'll say that I'm very impressed with what I've seen so far.
Offline Mode - The Singleplayer RPG:
(This part shouldn't contain any real spoilers since this is all information posted on the official site (http://phantasystaruniverse.com) or shown as trailers at various shows and events that Sega has attended, but if you need everything to be a surprise, be forewarned that anything I can find about it is going here.)
The setup for the story, from what I've read:
The Graal system was unstable for a long time, with wars between the planets and the races in the planets. Eventually, though, peace was reached with a treaty between the planets, and there was a hundred years of (at least relative) peace. Cut to one hundred years later, Ethan Waber and his little sister Lumia are attending a ceremony marking the centennial anniversary of the treaty, when the planet suddenly comes under attack by something called the SEED. After this, it seems that Ethan joins the Guardians, which is about when the game really begins.
It's a bit sketchy but that's the best I've been able to come up with for an exact outline of the opening of the game.
The Graal System
The story takes place in the Graal system. There are three planets:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/graal.jpg
From left to right, Parum, Neudaiz, and Mortoob.
Parum is the standard 'earth-like' planet. It's mainly populated by Humans, with Casts making up a small percent (~5% of the population) and Numans and Beasts presumably making up an insignifigant part. The two major cities are supposedly Talcus ("Tarukasu"; I don't know if "Talcus" is an official romanization), the capital, and Hortess ("Horutesu"). The Guardians and the AMF are supposedly based in those cities.
Neudaiz seems to be a water-covered planet (As opposed to the original series which had a snow-covered planet). Pictures of the city show something of a cross between traditional Asian architecture and a bunch of Venice-ish canals. The main population of Neudaiz is the Numan race. The main city mentioned by name is Ohtoku ("Outoku"), and I believe there's something else mentioned about a Mt. Ohtoku, which I guess makes sense as a natural high-ground above the surface of a worldwide ocean would be pretty important. The other thing mentioned by name on the official site is "Youmei", from what I can gather a weapons or mechanical production organization. Neudaiz is also the most religious of the planets, and the head of the "Communion of Graal" is situated here.
Mortoob is a desert-like planet, seemingly quite harsh environmentally, and rich in natural resources. The people of Mortoob are mostly Beasts. The main on-planet locations I can pick out are a "Daguora City" and a "Tenora Works". Tenora Works seems to be in the same business as Youmei. However, Mortoob is also surrounded by a belt of debris forming rings, much like Saturn. Among those rings it's generally dangerous for ships to go, so that's where you'll find the Rogues making their bases.
The last location named in the system is the Guardians Colony:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/gcolony.jpg
I'm assuming that the Guardians being based on Parum just refers to their planet side head, because having a giant orbital colony to run things from is much, much cooler. There isn't really much specific that I can decipher about it, unfortunately, other than something about "Vector Tracks" and "Rings". I'm assuming that it operates on an orbit independant of the three planets, and acts as a headquarters for Guardians to get to any of the planets from. This is where Ethan lives, so you'll probably be coming back here a lot in between missions and whatnot.
Races
There are four races in Phantasy Star Universe.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/human.jpg
Humans are humans. If you've played any game at all with multiple races, ever, you know the basic deal behind humans. Well-rounded gameplay-wise, and they make up a majority of Graal's population.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/numan.jpg
Numans are the PSU equivalent to elves. In the old Phantasy Star games they were the product of mixing human and monster genes; in PSO and PSU they're just genetically modified humans. They're more frail than humans, have greater aptitude for techniques, etc. In previous games, Numans aged extremely quickly, and/or had unstable life expectancies. I'm not sure if that's the case in PSU.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cast.jpg
PSO terminology is sticking around for "Casts". Older games called them Androids. Either way, they're robots. In PSU, humans created them to do work, but eventually they became self-aware, and rebelled. The translations are a bit vague that I can find, but they are either trying to take over human life now, or they already have taken over control to some extent. It's interesting that they say that, but there are several Casts who are your allies in the story, and you can make a Cast for online play. So either the ones trying to take over everything are some radical extremist group, or they've just done it and actually have managed to prevent everything from turning into some sort of oppressive futuristic overlord situation. Design-wise, Casts are way cooler than they were in PSO. Whereas in PSO they all looked like robots, PSU also has options for creating a more humanoid looking character. One of the biggest disappointments in PSO was that none of the Androids were even remotely like Wren or Demi from PSIV, and it looks like they fixed that this time around. Gameplay-wise, Androids are really strong and accurate, but are very lacking in technique aptitude. Interestingly enough, though, Androids can use SOME techniques in PSU (They couldn't in both the old Phantasy Star games or PSO), albeit with a low degree of effectiveness. In-game, they have some ability, which seems to involve calling down weaponry from satellites or something. In one trailer a little girl Cast calls down a pretty impressive array of missiles and lasers and lets loose a salvo on some enemies.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/beast.jpg
Beasts are a new race to PSU. They are, shockingly enough, more animal-like than humans. They're hairier than humans, and most seem to have animal style ears; some have kind of a cat/dog nose thing going on. Like Numans, they were created by genetically modifying humans; this time to create a more durable worker-class who could more effectively mine Mortoob. Obviously, after a while that wasn't going to fly and there was some tension and animosity toward being regarded as just a bunch of simple labourers. In game terms, Beasts seem like they're somewhere in between Casts and Humans. Stronger than humans, but not as strong as Casts; worse than Humans at techniques but not as bad as Casts, etc. Beasts also seem to have the ability to temporarily assume kind of a Were-form where they get stronger and more animal-like.
Main Characters
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/01.jpg
From left to right: Ethan Waber, Karen Erra, Hyuga Ryght.
Ethan Waber, 17
Human, affiliated with the Guardians
Ethan is the main character of the game. As the game begins, he's a beginner/trainee Guardian. He acts pretty much like you'd expect him to as the main character of a Japanese console RPG. Ethan is voiced by Seki Tomokazu.
Karen Erra, 17
Numan, affiliated with the Guardians
Karen is the main heroine of the game. She's had three years battle experience, and is assigned to Ethan (and, I assume, Hyuga) to act as somewhat of a mentor/team captain. I think that for some reason she can't use techniques even though she's a Numan, but I don't remember very well so I might be making that up. Karen is voiced by Rie Tanaka.
Hyuga Ryght, 17
Human, affiliated with the Guardians
Hyuga serves as the friend/rival counterpart to Ethan that seems to be a required position to fill in anime and sometimes games. He's also a rookie, and I think Ethan and Hyuga compete somewhat for the top ranking among rookies or something like that. Hyuga is voiced by Akira Ishida.
(Just as a note, I put the voice actors for these characters. Unless you're a big nerd like me, you probably don't really care much about Japanese voice actors, but I figured I'd mention it anyway. To me, it's a good sign that there are some voices that are recognizable enough that I can place them by hearing them. The fact that they are fairly well-known in anime/game voice acting is a good sign that Sega isn't half-assing the production of the story, or at least that's the way it seems to me.)
Organizations:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/guardians.jpg
The Guardians seem to be roughly comparable to the Hunters from the other Phantasy Star series. It doesn't seem that they're actually affiliated directly with the military, but they do have their own interplanetary network, the space colony, and a trained fighting force. I can't gather much from the site on my own, but I'm going to hazard a guess and say that they're probably like the Hunter's Guild, except less mercenary-like and more devoted toward protecting/helping people. They seem to be the "good guys", at least unless there is a shocking plot twist.
Some Guardians:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/nav.jpg
Ohbel Dallgun, 46
Human
Dallgun is the leader of the Guardians. There's not much more than that I can find. In some of the trailers he's shown making a big address to like a whole planet, so he's got some pull, and obviously you'll be taking orders from him for at least the first part of the game.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/dallgun.jpg
Lucaim Nav, 178
Cast
Nav has supposedly been working with the Guardians for more than 150 years. He's kind of like an old kung fu master, and supposedly he trained/trains Ethan at some point.
Leogini Santosa Berafort, 31
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/amf.jpg
The AMF stands for Allied Military Force, and seems to bee the official military. Unlike in PSO, however, it seems like they're going to have a larger presence in this game than two guys perpetually standing next to a teleporter. Whether the AMF itself is with your or against you I'm not sure, but it seems like the AMF as a whole will probably be neutral at best. I'm really not too sure with this one though. The main focus seems to be on the next group, a smaller element of the AMF.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/endrum.jpg
The Endrum Collective is a special task force of the AMF, supposedly dedicated to the preservation of "Relics". These guys are almost definitely evil. The leader's name is Endrum Harness("Endoramu Haanesu"), and supposedly they're pulling a "nothing else is known about him" with that guy. The most visible member is Renvolt Magashi, who seems to be the game's main antagonist. There's some stuff about how they're really secret and there used to be a different version 30 years before the SEED, etc, but even if I knew exactly what the site said it's pretty clear that it's meant to be an enigma.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/curtz.jpg
Fullyen Curtz, 27
Cast
I don't honestly know much about Curtz, but he's one of only two AMF characters actually shown. I don't think he's actually part of the Endrum Collective and is more than likely with the main AMF.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/magashi.jpg
Renvolt Magashi, 67
Cast
This evil Gundam-looking motherfucker is being made out to be the main antagonist of the game. He's part of the Endrum Collective, looks like pure Robot Evil, and in a few trailers he's shown fighting various hero characters, and broadcasting much like Dallgun does.
The Rogues don't have an official emblem, although you can probably fill in the blanks with a Space Jolly Roger. The Rogues are a loose collection of outlaws, gangsters, and space pirates. There's no official head of power or anything, but there are several Mafia-like "families" at the top of the Rogues, with predictably also a lot of in-fighting and the like. It looks like some of these guys will be standard criminal evil guys, but there are also some who will be allies.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/vol.jpg
Vol Brothers: Hiru Vol (26), No Vol (21), and Do Vol (18)
Numan, Human, and Beast
Looks like these guys are mostly comic relief. The Vol Brothers are some sort of pirate trio. Hiru is the brains, Do is the brawn, and No is... I don't know, a gay Mexican dancer I guess.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/tylor.jpg
Alfort Tylor, 29
Beast
Tylor is the badass character. Normally, I don't like this stereotype, but he's the captain of a Rogue ship called the Landale. Landale? Fuck yeah. I don't even need to know anything else.
There's an emblem for the Communion of Graal but I can't grab it out easily. This is basically the biggest religious presence in Graal. Most practitioners are Numen, although there are also some members of other races. Apparently it's lead by four figures, each in charge of a different area - Religious ceremonies, Politics, Literature, and Defense. The basic idea behind the religion seems to be that photons are sort of a planetary spirit rather than just a naturally occuring power (Hi Mako energy), and they worship around that.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/lutz.jpg
Izuma Rutsu, 28
Numan
Well, the site romanizes it as "Rutsu", but an astute observer will notice that it really probably should be Lutz. Anyway, he's part of the Top 4 of the Communion of Graal.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/mirei.jpg
Mirei Mikuna, 17
Numan
I'm not sure if she's actually part of the Top 4, but if she isn't, her father is. She has a few scenes shown in trailers where she talks with Ethan a bit. The first time I think she heals him after he hurts his leg, and in the second I think she's saying that he just saved her life. Probably kind of a damsel-in-distress-eventually-turned-healer character.
Aside from the characters affiliated with the various organizations, there are some others on the site. It's mostly stuff like Ethan's sister, or a doctor who hires Ethan's group to help him with research. This one is kind of funny though:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/hal.jpg
Hal, 19
Human
Hal is an Idol, on... Wait for it... Graal Channel 5! I don't know why they wanted to work a Space Channel 5 reference/parody into the game, but damnit, it was an awesome idea.
Gameplay
There isn't a perfect picture of the gameplay I can make from what's been released, but at the core it seems to be somewhat similar to PSO. Moving around dungeons and fighting is all done without any transitions (ie: All enemies just show up on the map rather than going to a special battle screen). Of course, offline there are console RPG style breaks for cutscenes, but aside from that it's mostly unbroken.
In battle, things so far seem to be a streamlined/modified version of PSO's combat system. The first thing you'll probably notice is that your character does not walk for one second before they run. As a result, everything should seem more fast paced. Second, attack chains now go up to six instead of only three. The animations are also improved a lot, so swinging a sword around in a combo doesn't look so boring. By holding L1, you can also lock onto a target. That keeps you facing a target, so you can strafe and walk around them without losing your target.
In offline mode, there are around ten characters that you'll have in your party over the course of the game; up to four (I think) will be with you at once. You control Ethan, and the AI controls the other members. I haven't seen anything about being able to give orders to your partners, but thankfully unlike PSO your NPC helpers are not completely fucking braindead, and actually seem to be able to hold their own most of the time.
Pressing Circle in-game brings up a quick-switch menu of the various loadouts that you can make out of the weapons you've got on-hand:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/loadouts.jpg
(The picture is pretty self-explanatory; the text is just "Handgun, Dagger", "Handgun, Saber", "Sword", "Rod", "Twin Dagger")
There are three basic weapon types, with specific weapons in each category:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/weapons.jpg
For melee weapons, you have Daggers, Sabers, and Swords as the basic types. For guns, there are Handguns, Machine Guns, and Rifles. For Technique type weapons, there are Canes and Rods.
As for what you can do with different weapon types, you have two hands. If you're using one-handed weapons, you'll generall have a close-range weapon in your main hand, and then a long-range weapon in your off hand. Pressing R will switch from your main hand to offhand.
Some weapons are two-handed, though. Swords, and dual-wielding Daggers will use both hands, Rifles are the same, and Rods are the two-handed Technique weapons. I'm honestly not sure what R switches you to with those weapons.
For your main weapon, Square is a normal attack, and Triangle is a stronger attack specific to that weapon. Sabers have "Cross Rush", and Swords have "Shield Breaker". So far, those attacks have just been shown as stronger swings, but they might also have some special properties of their own (Particularly Shield Breaker).
Guns work much differently than in PSO. Instead of just being ranged weapons with their own combos, you can just shoot a gun repeatedly. You can shoot manually, you can lock on and shoot, and, new to PSU, you can switch into a first-person mode where you can aim your shots wherever you want, including at the weak points of enemies. Note that you can't really move when in first-person, so it's not going to turn into First Person Shooter Universe, but it's still a welcome addition, especially if they implement weak points on monsters correctly.
Rods, Canes, and other Technique weapons are also quite different then in previous games. It seems that characters themselves don't have TP like they do in previous games, nor can you just learn and cast Techniques. The Techs are embedded into the weapons, and you use them by pressing the assigned buttons, just like various attack types with melee weapons. In the demo that Sega has set up at various events, Ethan has a Rod which has Resta (healing spell) and Gifoie (PBAoE fire spell) bound to it. Supposedly you can bind your own Techniques and things like that, but I haven't found any specific details.
Each weapon also has a certain amount of Photon Energy. This works as ammunition for Gun-type weapons (ie: You can fire until you run out of Photons), replaces TP for Technique weapons, and also powers the stronger attacks with melee weapons. The exact workings of the system haven't really been deciphered yet to the best of my knowledge. Some guesses are that Mono/Di/Trifluids will recharge the Photons in a weapon instead of giving you TP, but nobody seems to really be sure.
As a side note, rumours are that there are some new (old) techniques being brought back into PSU that were in the old games but not PSO. In particular, I've heard somebody say that they saw Ethan cast some variant of Gra on an enemy. PSU goddamn better have Dimensworms.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/special.jpg
As I mentioned before, Androids and Beasts have special attacks somewhat reminiscent of Photon Blasts from PSO (It's unknown whether Humans and Numans have some equivalent abilities or whether they just have some advantageous stats to make up for it; one guess is that Numans can cast Techniques without a special piece of equipment).
Above, the first is a picture of a Beast's transformation, called a Nanoblast. Nothing too shocking; a temporary transformation where they go all Hulk. Sounds like some good fun. One thing that I'm not sure about is how the Nanoblast affects different looking Beasts. It would be kind of silly for all of them to look the same, but then I guess they can't really come up with a unique look for every single combination of characters. That's more to do with the online mode than the offline one, though.
The next two pictures are of a Cast (Lou) using her special ability, called "SUV-Weapon". Most people think that that's a typo on "Sub-Weapon", but I'm not really sure either way. SUV could work as an acronym, since it supposedly involves calling down weaponry from satellites above the planet, but either way, the effect of it is that she calls down those missiles and laser thingies and just lets loose on the enemies. Neato.
Partner Machinery
PSU does not have MAGs, the way that PSO did. This time around, you've still got a little robotic buddy, but they're more of a robotic buddy and less of a piece of equipment that takes hours and hours to level up and can be forever ruined by the mistake of feeding one wrong item, meaning you have to do the whole thing over...
Anyway, in PSU, you get Partner Machinery as a replacement. Specifically, in the offline story portion, Ethan gets Pete, this charming looking ball fellow. Supposedly Pete gives you mission briefings and the like:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/pete.jpg
Partner Machinery acts somewhat like MAGs from PSO in that you can give them items and they'll evolve and grow as they level up. However, it looks like they don't increase your stats based on what you give them; rather they'll create and give you back items. Again, not too many details about the finer points of this system, but it could range from anywhere between being a helpful but optional boost for people who like raising their little robot, or it could be part of a pseudo-crafting system. However, it looks like that's not all they do. Screenshots of various forms that your Partner Machinery can take are up on the site, ranging from a blue version of Pete, to a small blue flying robot-dragon, to a little pink doll thing, and finally, a tiny robotic maid who will do battle at your bidding.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/partnermachinery.jpg
I'm crossing my fingers for an arena where you can pit your tiny maid against another person's tiny maid and watch them fight to the death.
That's the gist of what I've found as far as information on the offline mode of the game goes. If I find anything else that's interesting I'll update the post.
There's also a couple of videos some guy took with a cam of playing through the two levels that are part of the playable demo Sega set up at some event here (http://hosted.filefront.com/ecchichuu/). I found these from a post on PSO-World (http://www.planetdreamcast.com/psoworld/index.php).
However, I wouldn't take these as a really good indication of how the game will play, because I don't think this is completely up to date or full-featured, and also the guy playing it must have been holding the camcorder in one hand and playing with the other, because otherwise, from the way he jerks the camera arouns, he has no business playing video games. The camera looks really bad in this clip, but in all the other videos I've seen of in-game footage it's pretty decent, so I wouldn't let this bother you as far as that's concerned.
Online Mode
Sure to be the life of the game long after everybody's beaten the singleplayer portion, the online mode also looks like it's a huge jump up from PSO.
The online mode also will have a story, although it takes place after the events of the single-player game. There aren't many details about the online story floating around, other than some cool stuff like that you're probably going to run into Ethan as an NPC once you start playing online, at some point.
First, the character creation is very expanded, and looks absolutely awesome. The first difference that you'll notice is there are no classes. There are only the four different races, and you can do whatever you want with any race, although obviously some are much more suited toward particular roles than others. Presumably this means that you'll have some more control over the advancement of your character's attributes, like in Diablo, instead of a fixed growth like PSO, but there's nothing concrete about that so far.
First, you choose your race and gender:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc01.jpghttp://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc02.jpg
Then you can choose your Face type. There are three for female characters, and sixteen for male characters (the males have various options for facial hair). The face shape is also adjustable via a slider, so you can change the proportions of the face. Want to make a big-eyed anime character to let people know that you've never touched a girl? Want to make a big squinty looking badass in the vain hope that you will somehow come across as more socially proficient than the anime guy? Go right ahead.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc03.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc04.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc05.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc06.jpg
There are six types of eye designs for each gender, and the colour of the eyes is adjustable by a slider so you should be able to get whatever colour and shade you want.
There are nineteen kinds of eyebrows, which seems to be the same for both genders.
Supposedly the next option is eyelashes, although that might be a weird translation. It's not shown in the trailer and there are 13 options for females, 3 for males.
For Numen (and probably Beasts), there are three different Ear styles:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc07.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc08.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc09.jpg
You've got your old school Nei-style 'straight up' ears, a more elf-like pointy type sticking out at a 45 degree angle, and then you've got those stupid looking goat ear things where they flop out in a straight line from your head.
The next option is Hairstyle; there are sixteen for each gender. Obviously, the colour is adjusted on a slider.
You also have five different choices for Underwear for both males and females. I'm not even going to speculate on this one.
The next is skin colour. It's adjusted by a slider this time instead of having five specific values. It's not an RGB slider so you can't make your fantastic purple man, but it does give a nice variation in skin tones.
The last option on that screen is Proportions, which is much like the slider from PSO. You can make your character short, tall, fat, skinny, inflate her breasts like a horrible pervert, or get rid of her breasts entirely like an even worse pervert.
The next screen is for clothing. The options are Jacket, Pants, Shoes, and Voice Type. Voice type is assumedly just the battle cries and grunts your character will give off. For the others, there are 50 options for each for male characters, and 60 each for female characters. A lot of the options are just reskins of the same model, but there are still probably 5~6 distinct models for each option, and that's a lot better than PSO's one model.
One thing that I really like about the character design in PSU is that the clothes look a lot less like weird space outfits, and more like clothes that people might actually wear. Granted, they only work in the future because they're covered with random bright glowing strips and have funny colours, but the characters look like they're wearing street clothes, for the most part, which is awesome.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc10.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc11.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc12.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc13.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc14.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc15.jpg
You can expect at least 75% of the playerbase to be using one of those long jackets on a male character, in black, with white/grey hair.
The Cast screen is quite a bit different from the others. The first option is Face type. Note that the customization is a lot better for Androids this time around - "Face Type" is seperate from "Head type". The first two are humanoid faces, and the others are like PSO's Casts.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc16.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc17.jpg
The option under that is "Robo eyes" or something. It's a sliding scale, so it must control colour. If you pick a humanoid face, this becomes "Eyes", and there are three options, probably like the other races' eye options. The options under that are "Eyebrows" and "Eyelash" from the other customization screens, and those only light up when a humanoid face is chosen.
The next option is "Helmet", where you can adjust the actual shape of their head. There are five different options, ranging from Samurai helmets to just sort of a single horn thing.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc18.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc19.jpg
The next option I haven't found a translation for, but it's a sliding scale. Next is the main colour of the Cast. Interestingly, not done on a sliding scale but with just eight options. The next option though is the secondary colour, which is on a sliding scale and controls the colour of the dark parts in between the plates of metal covering the Cast.
The last option is again Proportion.
The next screen for Casts is their outfits, which are just fucking awesome. The first option is Arm. No changing options are shown, but it looks like you can change things like the shoulderpieces on your Cast. There are four options, and I'm pretty sure that at least one of them is the Nu-Gundam style 'wings' that Magashi has.
Under that is Torso. Pretty self-explanatory. Four different options:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc20.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc21.jpg
The last option is Voice Type.
After character creation, you get sent out into the Lobbies. These are not the lobbies of PSO, which were basically just a boring room that had no purpose aside from spamming and running directly into a private game where you're safe from all the other people. These lobbies are huge and kind of organized like an indoor shopping mall (It seems like there are lobbies set on the Guardians Colony as well as each of the planets). There are stores, a central fountain, and a lot of area to run around in. They also house hundreds of players at one time. They look like a lot of fun.
Instead of Symbol Chat from PSO, which was never used for any purpose beyond trying to build pictures of Goatse to spam in the lobbies, the stuff you can bind is basically just a text phrase, except you'll make an anime-style pop-up insert of your character's face displaying some emotion, with a little light-show behind you.
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc22.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/cc23.jpg
All of the screenshots for character creation were taken from this video at GameTrailers.com (http://www.gametrailers.com/player.php?id=7714&type=wmv). There's also some footage of just wandering around the lobby, having dance parties, etc. There's a little bit shown about the room system, but nothing specific.
The room system seems pretty neat. You're going to have your own room in Network mode to act as somewhat of a home base. Your Partner Machinery will be there, presumably you use it as item storage, etc. You can customize the appearance of it; it looks like there's a decent level of personalization there:
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/rooms.jpg
Also, word is that you can invite other players into your room to hang out or whatever. A small feature, but kind of a nice one.
Once you decide that it's time to actually play, you form up a party in the lobby. In PSU, the party limit is expanded from four players to six players in a party. After you've formed up, you leave the lobby and go to one of the planets you want to play on.
Information on this is vague at best, but the rumour seems to be that each planet is going to have its own sizable overworld. The game is also advertising player vehicles to get around, so hopefully those will be pretty fun and the world itself will be pretty big. There are also going to be around 20 dungeons, each with its own boss. Online, the dungeons are going to be at least partially randomly generated, so it won't get really boring as fast as PSO's kind of crappy four dungeons did, playing the same things over and over again.
The design of everything is also much nicer. The outdoor areas actually look and feel like open fields, instead of rooms where the walls were just made of poorly-textures green lumps. The indoor areas are actually kind of varied, and not just room-door-room-door-room-corridor-room. I think that functionally, a lot of it will still be 'kill the monsters to proceed', but this time the monsters look smarter, the rooms look less alike, and there are more options to choose from.
These shots are from the single-player portion, but chances are the overall design is going to be the same
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/18small.jpg
http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/42small.jpg
That's about all of the information I can find on the game right now. If there's actually any interest in the game, I'll keep this thread updated; if not I guess I'll just let it die :(
For anybody who is interested, there are screenshots on the official site. Unfortunately they use this ass-backwards Flash interface to view them so it can be a pain in the ass. I put all of them up on my webspace here (http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/OfficialScreenshots/).
There are also some magazine scans about the game floating around that aren't too old; I put those up here (http://members.shaw.ca/endjoy/PSU/Scans/).
There's a video from TGS around too; it shows off fighting the Dragon in Network mode and has some other information that's all in Japanese. Unfortunately, they also decided to bring in Rie Tanaka, the voice actor for Karen, as a special guest, cosplaying as Karen. As a result, when they went to actually play, the cameraman kept it on a picture of her face for like five minutes and you could only really hear the game being played until they got to the Dragon. The video is here (http://www.planetdreamcast.com/psoworld/downloads/psu/trailers/psu_tgs_bb.zip), hosted by PSO-World.
The official site is here (http://phantasystaruniverse.com).
PSO-World (http://www.planetdreamcast.com/psoworld/index.php) is a decent fansite.
Ragol.co.uk (http://ragol.co.uk/) also has quite a bit of information.
This is just some guy's personal forum, but he's got a thread (http://p081.ezboard.com/fespiokaosmessageboardfrm1.showMessage?topicID=148 9.topic) up on it where he's discussing the game, and he's translated a good chunk of the official site's content.
New: I found an interview at IGN about the game here (http://ps2.ign.com/articles/650/650101p1.html), from early September. It's got some interesting stuff.
quote:
This enormous game offers two complete RPG experiences - a single-player action-adventure spanning multiple planets, and a robust online multi-player component. In offline mode, this action-RPG offers more than 40 hours of gameplay, an emotionally engaging story, traditional cut scenes, and strong character development. In online mode, players are given the opportunity to travel with a squad of other adventurers, enter urban sprawls teeming with hundreds of players, and build their unique avatars into powerful warriors
quote:
Published by: SEGA
Developed by: Sonic Team / Total Entertainment Software
Genre: Persistent Online RPG
Number of Players: 1-16
Release Date:
US: Q3 2006
Japan: March 30, 2006
Also Available On: PC, PS2
Features: Dual Shock, Memory Card, Online, Stereo Surround, Vibration
Media Size: 1 DVD
More infomation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantasy_Star_Universe (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantasy_Star_Universe)
http://www.pso-world.com/psu.php (http://www.pso-world.com/psu.php)
Since this game is out in japan next month i just wanted to know if anyone else was getting in on ordering the japanese version, because from what i hear it has english settings but no english dub.