Reviewed on:
Xbox 360Also available for:
PC, PS2
The Good:
The online mode is an acceptable update to the format. A suitable soundtrack and excellent graphicsThe Bad:
Costs more money to play online, even straight out of the box. The single player mode is awful in almost every wayThe Verdict:
If the online portion was free to play out of the box I could at least recommend that, but the single player game has turned this into an expensive folly
Sega studio Sonic Team's original Phantasy Star Online, released on the sadly missed Dreamcast in 2000, was a revelation: the first true online multiplayer RPG on consoles. Effortless to play and set up even using the Dreamcast's straining 56k modem, the title was free to play online and immensely popular. As the majority of the game was the online component, by the time the Gamecube port Phantasy Star Online: Episodes I&II appeared Sega had taken to charging a (not unsubstantial) $8.95 (U.S.) per month for online access.
For a game that offered little (if anything) in the way of content updates this proved a bit too rich for many, and interest in the title soon dwindled, with the change of genre in Phantasy Star Online: Episode III making little impact.
Despite the mistakes that have been made, the strength of the intellectual property remains, and Phantasy Star Universe, advertised as the first true revision of the Phantasy Star Online was hotly anticipated by many.
But Phantasy Star Universe is a slap in the face to any true fan of the series.
No Free Month?
The first problem, and one which is almost astonishing in its disrespect for the consumer, is that unlike every other online RPG on the market, after you pay your hard earned cash for the game ($69.99 SRP for the Xbox360 version, $59.99 for PC and PS2) there isn't a free month of online play in the box. There isn't even a single second. Yes, if you want to play the game online at all, even just to try it out, perhaps, you'll have to pay $14.99 plus all applicable taxes for one full month of play, and be billed monthly from then on until you cancel.
To add insult to injury, the offline portion of the game is entirely limited to the story mode until you complete chapter 4 (a fairly time intensive requirement; it takes about 5 hours just to reach the fourth chapter) after which you can play "extra offline" mode, which is the single player version of the online mode. Even then, however, you are limited to playing the sections of the Phantasy Star Universe that you have already completed in story mode.
Sub-Pokémon Single Player Plotting
If the story mode were superb and worth the price of admission its own, we could perhaps forgive Sega for their boneheaded, if not greedy, demand that the player pay just to sample the online portion. Sadly that is not the case.
Designed like one of the anime series that currently infest children's television, the game steals the format so wholesale that each of the game's twelve chapters begins with an introduction, theme song and title credits sequence, and ends with an end credits theme and a "next time…" teaser trailer.
It makes this reviewer suspect that the original plan for Phantasy Star Universe was episodic content, for which the monthly fee would make perfect sense. If this was the original idea, I can only surmise it was scrapped to either increase revenue (due to the initial outlay for customers purchasing the game) or because they realized that within a couple of episodes absolutely no one would be interested in playing any more.
Yes, keeping to the style of the cookie cutter anime series of today, Phantasy Star Universe's plot is soporific, its characters horrifically clichéd, and its dialogue inane. Main character Ethan Weber begins the game petulantly disagreeing with the "Guardians" (essentially space policemen) before, surprise surprise, it turns out his (deceased) father was a Guardian. Thanks to a convenient disaster situation that requires Guardian help, within a matter of minutes he's realized the errors of his ways and signed up to become one.
This kind of lazy writing might be bearable if the voice acting wasn't so grating. As it is, I defy anyone to not find themselves skipping cutscenes within a couple of chapters.
Updated but Still Outdated
Some of the old magic really is there, online and off, however. The soundtrack is very similar at points to the wonderfully alien synth led music of the original Phantasy Star Online, and does a lot for the atmosphere. In the same way, the greatly updated graphics do a world of good, with the Xbox 360 version standing out as particularly gorgeous. And once you're got into the hypnotic grind of exploring the areas and killing monster after monster to gain levels and new items, there's something rather pleasant about it, specifically in the online mode; making hunting parties and playing missions together is an easy and fun form of social gaming thanks to the unique (among online RPGs) lobby system.
However the decision of Sega to limit the amount of missions and worlds available initially (with the rest to be released over time) has made the game lack variety.
The intentional limitations of the online mode add no value, and in the end the game is truly only a minor update to the format of the original Phantasy Star Online. With the offline game is something that shouldn't be touched with a bargepole too, Phantasy Star Universe is yet another disaster from the once mighty Sonic Team.
