Release Date: December 21, 2000
Developer: Sonic Team
Publisher: SEGA Corporation
The SEGA Dreamcast was a snake-bitten console. It was their most technologically-advanced console, but it was released at a time when gamers were openly hostile with the company. Stateside, all of the goodwill SEGA of America garnered for the 16-bit Genesis was washed away with SEGA of Japan’s meddling, forcing such wonderful things as the 32x (a bastard add-on that promised to extend the Genesis’ life but became a laughingstock) and the neutered Saturn (released months early with no marketing to beat Sony’s then-new PlayStation to stores) on us.
The Dreamcast was a mild success at first and a nice respite from the organized hatred for SEGA, but it didn’t last very long. SEGA of Japan didn’t help; its tone deaf management bungled every opportunity it had to regain the good graces of gamers. SEGA’s brilliant 9/9/99 launch was squandered by an almost milquetoast marketing push by SEGA of Japan, and its hope of gaining traction before Sony’s release of the console-killer PlayStation 2 was squandered. There were many awesome games for the Dreamcast that people never got to play or never heard of. Chu Chu Rocket, the Power Stone series, and the utterly superior Soul Calibur were phenomenal games, and they would have been system sellers if they were marketed worth a damn.
Of all the mishandled games on SEGA’s last console, Phantasy Star Online hurts the most. I honestly believe to this day that it would have saved SEGA and completely rejuvenated their console division if only they had marketed it properly. It was by no means a perfect game – by today’s standards, it’s not even average – but it was the right game for the time, and could have been the game that saved SEGA.
One of the reasons why the Dreamcast is so beloved by its fans (your humble narrator included) is that it was so forward-thinking. One of its innovations was the inclusion of a 56k modem, a first for a console at the time. Originally meant to allow gamers to surf the World Wide Web on the console, it slowly began to embrace online gaming.
The first game to take advantage of online on the Dreamcast was the aforementioned Chu Chu Rocket, but many games followed, like Unreal Tournament, Quake III, and NFL2K1. It wasn’t until late 2000 that SEGA took a shot at the Massively-Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game (MMORPG), a genre that was still in its infancy but gaining traction in the PC community. The title was Phantasy Star Online, developed by Yuji Naka and the folks at Sonic Team. And it was the closest most gamers ever got to smoking crack.
The game takes place after the events of Phantasy Star IV, the last Phantasy Star RPG SEGA had released up to that time. Your homeworld is dying, and Project Pioneer has been set up in an attempt to save your people. Probes are sent all across the galaxy searching for a planet that can support life. Once a suitable planet was found, Pioneer 1, a colony ship, was launched. It reached the planet and its passengers began to colonize the planet. Seven years later, Pioneer 2 reaches the planet. While landing on the planet and in contact with the existing colonists, the colony mysteriously explodes. You are a hunter aboard the Pioneer 2. It’s your job to land on the planet and attempt to find out what happened to the members of Pioneer 1.
Unfortunately, that’s about it for the story. Phantasy Star Online dawdles on with no storyline, major plot threads, or even serious progress on that the hell it is you’re supposed to do. You’ll get text messages in-game, but they’re mostly hints on fighting monsters. Side quests barely consist of filler content. And the game’s ending – at least what I could remember from my time playing – is weaksauce. For a person who has slogged through the game, grinding mobs for hours, the game’s conclusion is almost infuriating.
So if the campaign was so shit, why did I heap praise on the game earlier? There’s a reason the more popular MMORPGs get names like Evercrack and World of Warcrack…
Phantasy Star Online could be played either offline or online, and the game seriously suffers when it’s played offline. It’s when you take the game online that every complaint lobbed at the game takes a back seat. No, the story doesn’t get any better, but the gameplay sure as hell does.
It starts with the character customization. Players can select from one of three different character races and classes. Like typical RPGs, your selection of race and class determines your strengths and weaknesses. There are tons of customization options during character selection.
Your character is not alone in this game. He or she is accompanied by a MAG, a creature that aids you during exploration and combat. MAGs are kind of like cooler Tamagotchis, and believe me when I tell you that you will spend countless hours feeding, upgrading, and caring for the thing.
Once in combat, everything is done in real-time. It’s a departure from the turn-based combat in the traditional Phantasy Star series, but it works well here. Combat consists of a few well-timed button presses that feel like combos in fighting games. Parties consist of four people, and things can get frenetic while in combat, especially with MAGs jumping in to trade blasts. Fortunately, the game allows players to map certain commands or phrases to either the gamepad’s buttons and d-pad or to keyboard keys (yes, the Dreamcast had a keyboard accessory!) Since it allowed play with people worldwide, common phrases are translated based on language automatically. For harder-to-say phrases, the game allowed players to make custom symbols.
It is during online play, with four players and their MAGs decimating enemy hordes and exploring the area, that the addiction would set in. I managed to get my human warrior to level 75 and kept pushing on, trying harder and harder content. Phantasy Star Online used a lobby system to allow players to find people who wanted to group up. You chatted with them; traded Guild cards to add them to a sort of friends list; and partnered up. Once your team ported down, they were free to go wherever they wished. Considering the strength of the opposition – and the fact that enemies scale based on number of party members and party strength – it’s best to stay grouped together. The lobby also had shops that would allow players to stock up on health items and buy or sell weapons and armor.
Visually, this game really showed off the Dreamcast’s hardware abilities. Most MMORPGs have to sacrifice some polygons in order to run smoothly, and Phantasy Star Online is no exception. Even with that, however, the game is GORGEOUS for that era. All the areas are beautifully rendered, and monsters are superbly detailed. The Dreamcast was a powerful little box, and this game cements it.
Does it still hold up? I think so. It’s not a very advanced game by today’s standards. It has aged well, though, and looking at the video of gameplay gave me that long-forgotten itch again.
Playing online is where players like me hit a small snag. SEGA shut down the servers for Phantasy Star Online years ago, so playing the original way is impossible. However, there are dozens of private servers that have sprung up and support the original and its 3 subsequent episodes. Of course, you would have to have a copy of the game. The original was later released on the Xbox and PlayStation 2, which have proper ethernet adapters, so those options will be easier for gamers to try. Unfortunately, I have the Dreamcast version, and I never did pick up the Broadband Adapter. I was, therefore, unable to rekindle my love for this game.
(Note: I had no idea that Phantasy Star Online 2, the proper sequel to the original, was released in Japan only in 2012. Uhh…I’m gonna have to start learning Japanese…)
But I do feel that gamers – especially lovers of RPGs – should find a way to play Phantasy Star Online. It was the game that cemented online gaming on consoles, and it could have been the shot in the arm SEGA of Japan needed – if they weren’t such addle-brained morons!
Good: Gorgeous visuals; absolutely addicting gameplay; the MAG system added cool companion gameplay
Bad: Weak story; must be played online in order to be truly appreciated; original servers dead
Final score: 7.5/10
