The Phantasy Star series has been around for over 20 years, but it did
not start out as a game that was heavily focused on online play. The
first title came out in 1987 on the Master System, which played like a
traditional Japanese Role Playing Game. Since then the franchise has
spawned numerous sequels. Then in 2001 the series took a huge turn when
SEGA released Phantasy Star Online for the Dreamcast. It was no longer
turned based and instead was more action oriented. Also, as the title
suggests, there was a huge focus on online play.
Step forward a few years and you'll notice the online series of
Phantasy Star has had a few sequels, with the likes of Phantasy Star
Universe and the add on, Ambition of the Illuminus. SEGA's next step
for the franchise is to bring it to the handheld market, with the
latest instalment Phantasy Star Portable for, funnily enough, the PSP.
Phantasy Star Portable is a continuation of the Phantasy Star Universe
storyline timeline. Unlike the last game, which in single player had
you taking control of a specific character, you are given the ability
to create a user-generated hero who has recently joined the GUARDIANS.
What follows is a story of terrorism, where an unknown woman is causing
SEED monsters to reappear throughout the Gurhal System, the planetary
system of Phantasy Star Portable and the last game, Phantasy Star
Universe.
You can tell that the story isn't the main focus of the game. It's not
complex, deep nor full of twists and turns; instead it's simply there
to move you onto your next lot of missions. During your adventuring you
will meet a lot of the cast from Phantasy Star Universe, as well as a
few new faces. It's nice for fans to see some of the characters they
know, but players don't need to have played Universe to understand this
game.
There are two main modes, story and multi. Story mode takes your
created character into the game's story and you'll play out story
missions to push the plot forward or free missions to gain some new
equipment and level up. Multi mode is for multiplayer cooperative play
for up to four people, ad-hoc only.
The key word above is ad-hoc; the online aspect of Phantasy Star is
removed from the handheld version. It's a strange decision which means
you can no longer go online to get your fix of dungeon crawling. It
didn't have to be a full service like its console and PC brethrens,
where you would pay a subscription to take Phantasy Star online.
Instead they could have just allowed players to go online to continue
their multi mode game-playing. Maybe doing this would raise questions
over the premium MMORPG fees of other games.
The game allows you to create and save up to 8 characters. Starting
with selecting your race and gender, you move on to changing the
appearance of your character model through size, hair, facial features,
clothes and lastly selecting what type of class you are going to be.
Phantasy Star Portable's creation features are just about varied enough
to ensure the people you meet won't look the same. It's not the largest
or most customisable, but there are enough options there to please
people who try to create something unique.
Delving into story mode means you have to deal with playing with the
computer rather than human players. At the start it doesn't seem that
bad, but as you get to the longer, harder missions, problems become
visible. Characters like to get stuck behind objects when the maps get
complex. What's even more insulting is that when you go back for them,
they act as if it was your fault. When they come out with lines like
"Did you get lost?", you just want to slap them for it. Other problems
are down to attacking. The A.I seems to have a problem detecting when
to attack an enemy. They won't attack for a while, instead just sitting
there and not do anything whilst you do all the dirty work. They also
don't instantly heal you when you have low health, which can be
annoying on the harder boss battles if you run out of healing items.
These are rather major problems but thankfully you won't encounter them
too much over the course of the 20 hour story mode to get that
infuriated with them.
Multiplayer is where most of the goodness shines out of Phantasy Star
Portable. There's no story whatsoever. Multiplayer is just you and
mates as you group together to do some dungeon crawling as you try to
exceed the mission, while at the same time gaining the best weapons
possible. Not having to worry about random AI problems makes for stress
free playing.
When you look at Phantasy Start Portable there isn't really that much
to it. Gone is the 3D hub exploration, where all the shops and
Non-Player Characters (NPCs) hang out. Instead that has been replaced
with a 2D overview map, where you just simply click on the symbol you
want to interactive with, be it a shop or a NPC. The only 3D movement
now is when you go on your mission into the battlefield environment on
whichever planet you've selected.
Battling is done in real time. Phantasy Star Portable boils down to a
few things like exploring, killing monsters, finding items, rare
equipment and keys. You'll repeat this until you pass the mission
requirement or kill the boss of the mission. That's all there is to the
gameplay, which has been similar since Phantasy Star Online on the
Dreamcast. There are of course new items, weapons and so on; it feels
old, yet it's still fun to play when you're doing it all with friends.
A neat touch for Phantasy Star is the action palette. Holding down the
circle button allows you to bring up a list with weapons you've
assigned to the palette, making it so much easier to switch weapons on
the fly. Items can also be used this way. This means you don't have to
press start, go to inventory, select items and then scroll down and
find your healing item. It speeds everything up and keeps Phantasy Star
Portable feeling fast and fluid when exploring the dungeons as you
never have the time during battles to go through menus.
Presentation is a mixed bag. On one side you've got a game that
graphically isn't all that bad looking. The character models are
detailed and good looking, with a bonus of being able to have a variety
of looks to them through the character creation and clothes you will
find or buy. The art style is mostly attractive, especially in the
weapon and item departments where you get to see them close up through
your database. There's a huge selection of weapons ranging from energy
swords, lasers, pistols all up to fancier battle techniques involving
whips and fists.
On the flip side of things the environments are a bit bland looking,
there's some nice locations, but these could have been better with the
help of more things to fill in the surrounding areas around your
player. It also suffers from pop-up in large areas. In addition to that
are some awful character portraits during dialogue scenes. These scenes
are done with static pictures of high res 3-D models as they speak. It
looks awful on some portraits at times and it's a shame they are not
hand drawn or improved through CG instead.
There's the traditional Phantasy Star soundtrack that's charming,
pleasant and relaxing to play along to. The voice acting is passable,
but a couple of the characters just seem annoying when they speak. I
got this strange feeling of dislike every time Laia talked to me and
her picture looked straight at me, it's hard to explain, but you might
also feel it, it's just how she looks and speaks. The main character
you create is silent, even during the story scenes. The player you make
will just either say "?" or "…". It feels impractical when characters
are talking and all you do is reply with those two sayings; at least
the characters acknowledge this and comment about it. The sound effects
sound like they are reused from Universe, so they aren't all that
spectacular, but do the job fine.
In the end Phantasy Star Portable will only appeal to people who can
play it with friends. As a single player game is feels rather mediocre
as you traverse through the dreary story. It feels samey also,
especially if you've played Phantasy Star Universe, as it uses a lot of
those locations. If you've got friends who have a PSP and are
interested in the series or action RPGs like Diablo and Dungeon Siege,
then those guys are going to enjoy the simple gameplay of raiding
dungeons in Phantasy Star Portable. It's so much more enjoyable with
friends, even if you've experienced it all before and the best thing
is, you can take it anywhere you want to play.
