Phantasy Star Universe (PSU) is SEGA’s latest incarnation of the long running Phantasy Star series of games which first debuted on the PC-Engine platform in 1987. Phantasy Star Online (PSO), the previous incarnation, which was a major title for the Dreamcast, also made it’s way to Xbox where it proved itself to work quite well over Xbox Live. Many still hold PSO in fond memory and it is the balancing act of giving these gamers something familiar while offering newcomers a readily accessible experience that PSU must achieve.

Gameplay

The game itself is a hack and slash RPG set in a future sci-fi universe where the action component of game play is as important as character development. Yes, you can select different armour, weapons and fighting skills. You do level up your character, earn money (mesetas) and interact with other characters but ultimately you fight, in real time, a lot of the time. There really is little planning to do as far as a story or strategy goes as each mission consists of many interlocking rooms with a set path through them. Although I have called them rooms each area is specific to the world you’re on at the time and environments range from outdoor deserts and underground caves to the insides of space stations and temples. Each room greets you with waves of enemies that need to be killed in order to unlock and progress to the next one. The number and type of enemies per wave / room varies from mission to mission as do the number of rooms. Large enemy bosses make an appearance throughout the game and these can take a while to conquer as in addition to taking lots of hits they have set attack patterns which have to be figured out and countered in order for the player to land those all important attacks.

The X button is used for standard melee combat attacks while the Y button used for the special techniques. If these buttons are used in conjunction with the right shoulder button then any ranged weapons equipped will be fired instead. It is possible to use a combination of ranged and melee weapons in combination during combat by equipping one in each hand. The control method is simple and works well although it is occasionally difficult to aim ranged weapons and you do sometimes feel that the melee combat has degenerated into a ‘button bashing’ session. As the game is played in real-time it is necessary to equip or swap weapons quickly during combat as well as use items like health regeneration packs. PSU implements this well with its quick action palette, a menu option that can be brought up by holding the B button and navigated with the D-pad.

The weapons in the game are numerous and vary from large two handed swords, single handed swords, hand blades and other melee items to ranged weapons such as handguns, rifles and cannons as well as magical items such as staffs and wands. Different character classes are better suited to some weapon types than others and some weapon (and armour) types are even class exclusive. Different photon arts (attack skills) can be learned and associated with a weapon which produce enhanced modes of attack. To use these photon arts a weapon needs to be charged with photon points which diminish with use; although weapons do recharge over time and items are available to allow for instant refilling.

Characters have the ability to wear shield armour (or new body parts in the case of CASTS – the game equivalent of a robot) greatly improving resistance. Like weapons, armour can be upgraded by adding extra units which can add further enhancements to the item. Killing enemies gives you experience points which level up your character stats allowing you to wear improved armour and use better weapons. Many of the downed foes also reward you by dropping money, health restoration packs, weapons and other items that can be collected by the player. Your money can be spent at the many shops available in the game that each specialise in a certain area such as weapons, armour, part upgrades (if you are a CAST [robot] class character), etc. Additionally, weapons can be upgraded in certain shops using things called grinders which again can be bought, found or synthesised during the course of the game. Many items in the game at first seem useless until you decide to use them for synthesis, the process of combining items to create new ones. Synthesising is carried out by your partner machinery (a robot) who resides in your private room on a Colony Space Station. You get to hang out in your room in-between missions (you will visit here often during the main story mode) and to allow for that personal touch there are various items available in the game that you can use to decorate and make it feel more homely.

Your partner machinery is a useful little fellow and provides several major functions. To start with he provides useful tips to help out those new to the game and it is the sort of game that can be a little confusing for a while until ‘the penny drops’. As you play the game the amount of items you collect gets quite significant and you do have a finite amount of storage on your person. There comes a point where you are so encumbered with items that you can’t carry anymore and the need for a storage facility becomes a must. Luckily this is another facet of you partner machinery – he can store items for you until you need them. Like an ATM, he’s available 24/7 and as a bonus, doesn’t cost anything to use.

To synthesise items in the game you need to use your partner machinery again. Synthesis can get a little involved and it is sometimes preferable to just buy an item instead but some items in the game cannot be bought anywhere and have to be synthesised. In order to synthesise an item you first need to acquire an appropriate board for the item which you place into your partner machinery. The board is a list of ‘ingredients’ showing how many of what items you need to put together to create the new item although the boards can only be used a certain number of times. The appropriate items then need to be collected and put into the partner machine and then he gets to work on the task. Synthesis success rate varies and you don’t always get the item you were hoping for! As well as giving your partner machine items to synthesise or store you can also give it items to eat! Different items have different effects on his stats and careful feeding allows him to mutate through different levels of advancement. In the ultimate state your partner machinery is able to undertake missions, fighting alongside you in battle.

There are two main modes of game play in PSU, a single player, offline ‘Story’ mode and the online multiplayer portion which is what the title is really all about. The single player story mode consists of twelve levels (chapters) in which you take on the role of Ethan Waber, a human character. Although there are other character types in the game this is the only option for the story mode. The story is one of those typical of Japanese games where you will either get into it or think it’s all over-acted, pointless rubbish.

It is all driven along by lots of cut-scene story telling which is done using a mix of both pre-rendered videos mixed with scenes using the in-game engine. Some of this has audible speech but much of it uses speech bubbles to display text which infuriatingly requires the A button to be pressed in order to progress to the next one. Once a mission has been cleared there is a preview trailer of what is coming in the next chapter. This starts off as a nice touch but can get a bit pointless and irritating by mid-game, just seemingly holding up the game play as the story will be explained properly anyway. Luckily cut-scenes can be skipped by pressing a button on the controller.

You can have up to three other people that can assist you in battle but this is prescribed by the story line. The process of selecting characters for missions is the same for both the online and offline play and a set menu item is available for Party controls. It almost feels as though this option is really there in the story mode just as a tutorial for it’s use in online play. In online play it should be noted that parties can consist of up to six players. Party controls could be likened to a bespoke in-game version of the Xbox Live friends functionality. You can’t help but feel that a version of PSU written specifically for the 360 would not have needed party controls as such and that they have simply been ported over from the PS2 and PC versions where they would be needed. Characters have a partner card which is like a gamertag / profile and they are exchanged between each other. It is then possible to invite others into a party in order to go to battle, as well as message and exchange in game emails.

If the only figures to talk about in PSU were defence stats, attack power and mesetas, things might be quite rosy. Unfortunately £6.99 rears its ugly head in the form of a monthly subscription charged in order to play PSU online. It doesn’t cost anything to play offline – ever, but online requires this fee. Online there are lots of missions and although these are not exactly the same as those found in the story some of the locales are. Gameplay is pretty much the same although without the story to follow cut scenes are reduced although there are still plenty of them. The first thing you really notice online is that you are no longer Ethan Waber and instead you get to create your own character in any of the available classes (Humans, Newmans, CASTs or Beasts). When you select your character you get to customise their physical appearance and outfit which instantly gives you your own identity and allows you to ‘bond’ with your character.

Online there is a lot less structure as there is no story to follow and many times you will be asking yourself ‘what should I do next’. It certainly helps to have had a little go at the story mode first just to familiarise yourself with the game concept. As you play online you do sense that the main aim of many of the people playing is to simply gain bragging rights on what items they’ve collected, how far they’ve been, how good their character stats are, etc. You do get to see people’s outfits and weapons as you play but in addition you can even invite them to your room to show them how good you are at decorating!

PSU allows for players to trade items and mesetas which if nothing else gives those playing online a break from the constant battling they appear to do. Content is added regularly in the form of extra missions and the like and goes some (small) way to justifying subscription costs. After a player has reached chapter four of the story then an additional mode of play becomes available – ‘Extra’ mode. This is basically the online portion of the game it gets played, in single player fashion, offline. As the character you develop in this mode cannot be used online this component seems pointless. Why spend hours playing this mode when you have no-one to share it with? ‘Extra’ mode should really be named ‘Pointless’ mode as far as I’m concerned.

Graphics

The graphical prowess of this game could be summed up simply using two words - LAST GEN! It is obvious that the title has been designed primarily with the PS2 / PC platforms in mind and that no enhancements have been made for the 360 version. The models and environments in the game are basic and texture quality does vary quite a bit - grass looks quite good whereas the character textures look quite bad. There are lots of 'jaggies' in the game and a fair bit of clipping takes place whereby you can see through walls and other objects. These graphical weaknesses are particularly noticeable during the many cut-scenes in the game where the camera is often positioned for close-ups of conversations. That said, during normal game play the graphics hold up well enough due to the fact that the environments are quite basic and the action is viewed from a distance. As this action is fairly constant throughout the game there is little need to be looking at the (rather sparse) environments anyway.

Note: It should be noted that this review was done using a good quality 36" standard definition CRT TV. There are normally very few issues with running games on this screen but Phantasy Star Universe did have one major problem with it. The text in the HUD was very difficult to read properly as it was so small and therefore blurred. Information such as character levels and the amount of power left in a weapon were particularly bad although the game was still more than playable. A high definition display was not available for this review but it would be a safe bet that the text would not be an issue on one of these screens.

Sound

In a similar vein to the graphics, audio in Phantasy Star Universe is also somewhat of a mixed bag. The sound effects of many of the weapons are adequate and work quite well without ever making you go ‘Wow! The voice acting is quite poor and does little to help the story line and cut-scenes although it is difficult to see how any sort of voice over could do much in this respect. You also become very aware of the lack of lip-synching and this provides a further annoyance in cut-scenes.

In-game music is similar to that found in Phantasy Star Online, a blend of operatic, classical and typical Japanese pop/techno – awful really! Although it is (just about) bearable for a short while, after a few hours you may find that there is a need to turn the background music off, or at least down, as it does get irritating. This is an ideal game with which to use the custom soundtrack option from the system blade although some of the FMV video scenes will play over the top of your soundtrack regardless.

Longevity

As you play the same character each time, once the story is complete there seems little point in replaying it although a single play could net about 25 – 30 hours depending on how it was played. The extra mode appears to have no real appeal. A single player game with no story to interact with crossed with an online game with no people to interact with. It seems a bit pointless really. Online things can get repetitive. Those people who play online regularly would argue that the quest to get lots of rare items is compelling and that the community aspect of the game is fun. This is true to a point but it would be fair to assume that the majority of 360 owners would not see the appeal, long term – especially when considering the extra monthly subscription costs.

The game has a total of 8 achievements ranging from 100 - 200 Gamerpoints each. All these achievements can be obtained offline, gained just by playing through the main story and beating certain end of level bosses. While this is great news for those people without XBox Live you would expect the majority of PSU players to be connected. The achievements therefore seem a little cheapened and of all games released it seems that a weighting towards online play would have been more suitable.

Overall

This game just about holds up with a decent sized, although repetitive, single player mode allied to an even more repetitive but community based online mode. The style works well retaining the feel of its predecessor Phantasy Star Online. Technically it certainly doesn't push the 360 (it's hard to imagine it would even make the original xbox break a sweat) and is therefore probably not a title to demonstrate your 360’s capabilities to friends.

As there is a monthly subscription fee required to play online this game should be considered carefully before being purchased. It would probably make a decent bargain basement buy if you like the genre and fancy a quick fix offline (or fancy a fairly straightforward set of achievements), a definite buy for the majority of PSO lovers and carry a buyer beware warning for everyone else. A Marmite sort of game – you’ll either love it or hate it!