Phantasy Star Online 2: First Look

Apparently the space is not always a star ocean.... It's full of PHANTASY!!! (whatever it is)

The English Version of Phantasy Star Online 2 probably will never see the light on western hemisphere, although you can play the Japanese version with a third party english patch but grouping with random player probably can be a hassle, but anyway let me told you about my first few days on PSO 2 English Version (South East Asia only)

Before I played I never read any review, description, or anything about PSO2, not even a beta, so when I first zoomed in to the server I got quite stunned that it has Gameguard.... okay move along, PSO2 has only three basic class: Hunter (melee based), Ranger (ranged based), and Force (healer/magic type), they can 'evolve' on level 30 to become Fighter, Gunner, and Techer, also apparently there's a tech tree which you can mix and match with skill from another class (cross class skill) but I don't know how deep the system is, I'll keep it up in mind for my next post. So anyway PSO2 has three races, Human, Newman (elves), and Cast (androids). each race can be of any class, there's some basic and deep appearance customization for each race, for Cast however you can only change your body tipe and head, there's also several human head options that you can customize but it's kinda put me off because putting it on a robot body... it looks like a disembodied emotionless head being put in a robotic body. so I go with the ordinary robot head, and this is the 'final form'

now all that's left is to find a young boy to pilot me and we can go save the universe!!

Okay, let's go to gameplay, as a Hunter I sported a really big two-handed power sword which kinda encumbered my character, the battle in PSO2 occured in real time, you have two kind of attack, left mouse is your ordinary attack, you can combo it with another timed left mouse, if perfectly timed (indicated by orange aura around your character like Legend of Dragoon) you can stagger or even stun enemies (called perfect strike), enemy performance can't be interrupted with any other way... so here's the thing: looking at a big giant monkey raising and then throwing a big boulder while I spin around creating a cyclone of blade around him --while he is doing that without a single hint on his perturbed face that I caused big numbers by hitting him repeatedly -- is kinda... odd. Anyway my cyclone of death is called photon arts and it's my super attack initaited by right mouse button, it needs resource called PP so it's kinda have to be reserved, oh yeah you can also dash by double tapping your arrow button, and attack while you're jumping (now every new MMO has it!!!) :P

Not Pictured: I stumbled

Beside the big sword I also have a gunslash which literally is my ranged attack weapon, I can also press shift to change it's mode into a fast-attack one hand sword, if the Shift button is used while you're using the big sword you'll defend against an attack, you can also customize weapons to change it's combo and foton arts, a regular and foton arts combo usually initiated by two perfectly timed push of a button, sometimes photon blast occured, an environmental anomaly triggered by defeating enemies perfectly and enhancing your attribute, making you an unstoppable engine of death, not always though, and when you become unstoppable usually the enemy's already down before you know it, this can change on higher level though, probably. One more thing: I can also press 'Z' to change my view into those third party shooter mode like those like Mass Effect.or Gears of Wars

Just shoot it Shepard!!

PSO2 is instance based, meaning like Guild Wars you have one central hub, you can meet anyone in this city hub (or in case in PSO2: Mothership), everytime you entered a mission (quest) instance you'll be assigned a 'room', you can name this room and recruit people for it, the number is varied on each missions, you can also solo it or bring an NPC party member that you'll recruit as the main story progress, don't want to wait? Just find and open room with people on it and join the fray (just like Diablo 3), before the mission begins there's also a 'preparation' room for you to strategize and buy/sell buffs and items, when you're in an instance your HP/PP/MP won't be replenished unless you found a replenishments (contained in destroyable objects) or a healing station (on instance intermissions), consumables like HP potions are a kind of big point in here, (just like Diablo 3/Path Of Exile all over again) so make sure you're prepared to bring a bunch of instant health potion before you go dive into a mission

In the mothership there's a lot you can do, first there's the main story, yes it's kinda just slapped there with a sprinkle of dramatic moments here and there, some fancy magic scenes, some pony summoning... (yes, they exists). Apparently some bug creature called D-arkers are destroying planets and it's up to us to prevent it... and so on.  There are daily quests, and some special missions which provides tutorial, mailbox, crafting, there are furnitures, one thing I like about PSO2 is that like guild wars 2 I'm free to deposit my item wherever, unfortunately my storage is limited on slots, and like all free to play titles I can expand it for a little cash. Playpark is kind enough to give me a bonus of points every time I did consecutive day logging.

Pictured: A representative  from a p2w game

The thing I dislike very much about PSO2 is how BLAND the interface is, all the good thing came in from combat, but that interface, my God, always a white courier font text on blue background, yes I know it's in space, but come on!!

It killed your soul, quickly

 also, when you're disconnected your instance will be reset... noooooooooooooooooooo!!!

Well, despite the tedious combat, PSO2 has something... shiny, apparently for me it's just too boring to go on and the shiny thing died inside, but since it's free to play it's a perfect place to spent times shooting, hacking and slashing with friends, there's probably a better game for that, but hey at least they have ponies...

Wanna be friends?