Review – Phantasy Star 2

The layer of pipes obscures your vision in dungeons. At least it looks stupid.

A little over a year ago, I attempted to play through the original Phantasy Star. It was a trying experience, considering there is little in the way of direction or newbie-friendliness in the game. In the end, cuddlier JRPGs prevailed and I lost interest shortly after recruiting Noah.

Last month, I finished a play-through of Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door and was looking for something else to play. I checked the Wii Shop, expecting once again to find an update with two, maybe three bland-looking clones of games already on VC. “Hmm”, I thought. “Phantasy Star 2…” a quick check around had me somewhat concerned. Most of my friends who enjoyed the Phantasy Star series told me not to even try. I shrugged and figured that if nothing else, my 800 Wii Points (which are no doubt all the more valuable due to the declining dollar and the burgeoning economy of Wiiville) will have gone to support classic RPGs.

A couple of hours later, when I told Jay I had started playing, his first words were “I’m sorry”. I could see his point. Much like Phantasy Star 1, it took an hour or two to get to the point where entering a dungeon is a realistic proposition. There are no critical hits, but even early enemies have special attacks that target the whole party or do a considerable amount of damage.

Menu hell.

Make no mistake; this game is not forgiving. A dead end in a friendlier game would reward you with a treasure chest or a save point. A dead end in this game gets you anywhere between two and ten more random encounters to wear down your party. But herein lies the very thing that made this game so satisfying to play. In other games, dungeons are often just a means to an end. You want to advance the plot, so you beat the four Towers of the Elements (or the four colored dams, or the four sets of ancient ruins). Fine. Phantasy Star 2 does this too. But each dungeon in Phantasy Star 2 feels like a milestone to overcome in a marathon. Even as you enter them, each one seems almost to tell you that there’s no way you can make it, that you’re not prepared enough or patient enough. But you have a chance to prove it wrong, to overcome the hurdles the game throws at you one by one. With some planning, this doesn’t even take much longer than in a normal RPG.

My first piece of advice to anyone who wants to play the game would be to use maps the second time you enter dungeons. Each time I did this, the game actually became a lot more enjoyable. The first time, I would go in well-prepared and explore a bit while grinding. This served three purposes: First, I got all-important EXP and Meseta while scouting out the monsters. Second, I got the satisfaction of trying to explore the dungeon on my own. Third, between the first and second I realized how hopeless it was to try to beat it without a map.

The first four Phantasy Star games all share plot elements and even reference other game’s characters.

But I digress. The plot is good despite being told one short paragraph at a time. The characters have widely varying abilities so they actually feel pretty different from each other; given that each has about three sentences of dialogue in the whole game, that’s a pretty impressive feat. If you want believable characters participating in the plot along with the hero, though, you’d be better off with another game. In fact, the characters show up at your doorstep, announce a brief reason for joining your party, and then say pretty much nothing all game.

The atmosphere is very well done. It’s clear that something is rotten in the system of Algo; Mota feels like a doomed planet filled with people who have no idea what they’ve gotten into. Insectoid bio-monsters roam the countryside, killing any who stray too far from their domed cities. Mota’s denizens huddle in fear, feeling a false sense of security because of their all-providing AI, the Mother Brain. This super-advanced technology avails them not when it goes haywire – which is, of course, where you fit in. As you would expect, your character will either be ordered or will volunteer to save everything that needs saving, especially his game. He is likely to uncover incredible secrets about Mota and the Algo system on his way. To any RPG veteran, the plot sounds cheesy and cliched.

Phantasy Star 2, though, was a change of pace for me. It was refreshing to play a game where characters don’t ominously announce a plot revelation in a horribly inappropriate voice as lightning rakes the sky and your party gasps in horror. While plot revelations certainly do happen, they occur in such a simple way – animated scenes at the most, but more often merely a block of text with a portrait – that there is a laid-back feel to the game. Phantasy Star 2 merely presents the plot; take it or leave it. No scene is longer than 2 minutes, but I was still impressed with the finale.

The future won’t be so bad if our biggest fear is being stung by giant mosquitoes.

In this there is probably some bias from nostalgia. This was my first playthrough of the game, but many of my favorite classics are told in this fashion; it’s a practiced reaction for my imagination to fill in the details. It could be a knee-jerk reaction, making me effectively an old codger yelling at 3D models, voice acting, and novel-sized plots to get off my damn lawn. But I’d like to think there’s still a lasting appeal to a game that tells its plot simply and with little detail. Many of the main plot points may have been done better later, but this in no way diminishes PS2’s plot. My feelings about simplicity adding to the game, of course, are dampened somewhat by the fact that I’d still love to see the Playstation 2 remake cross the Pacific, since it contains a lot more background information and characterization.

Another question came to mind while thinking about Phantasy Star 2. Is it a JRPG? At first, I thought, there’s no question, since it’s among the founders of the genre – but the modern JRPG is a far different creature from its roots. Now, JRPGs are largely character-driven, filled with sidequests and effeminate crazy men who want to take over the world. Few are as much of challenge as PS2. In fact, PS2 is linear, has very little characterization and a vague, far-off villain up until the end. But then, none of these means it can’t be an enjoyable game. It’s a classic in the hearts of many, and I found it fun, though a little rough around the edges.