Phantasy Star Online Hands-On

Phantasy Star Online is arguably the biggest title Sega will publish in the next six months, and it marks a huge change in the way console games are played. As a game that is meant for play primarily over an Internet connection, Phantasy Star Online brings the concept of massively multiplayer game worlds from the PC to consoles. And while the game has generated a healthy media buzz from its appearances at various trade shows and industry events, no outside media has actually gotten a chance to play the game - until now.

Phantasy Star Online tells the story of a dying Earth and humanity's struggled attempt to find a new home. Through unmanned space probes, the scientists of Earth find a suitable planet named Ragol. The government of Earth decides to send a colony ship, dubbed the Pioneer 1, to cultivate and settle the planet. Pioneer 1 successfully lands on the planet, and members of the newly formed colony build a huge domed city to support their new civilization. They send word back to Earth that Ragol is indeed habitable, and Earth responds by sending Pioneer 2, a larger ship with more civilians and fewer military personnel to the planet. But just as Pioneer 2 reaches Ragol it detects a huge explosion on the planet and loses contact with the city.

The game begins at that moment. Your created character is a warrior that happens to be traveling to Ragol aboard Pioneer 2. As one of the more qualified people aboard the ship, you're commissioned by the man in charge to go down to the planet and assess the situation. Of course, the mission isn't as simple as it originally seemed, and what you learn from this first quest opens the storyline to all the side quests and plot goodies contained within the game. Ragol turns out to be not as habitable as once thought, and suddenly there are all sorts of angry native animals ready to kill your party members without the slightest provocation. This, of course, ties in with the game's complex storyline, which Sega hasn't been eager to reveal.

Phantasy Star Online lets you create one of nine different preset characters. Each character is one of three classes, one of three races, and is either male or female. The three classes represent the three types of attacks the characters can perform in Phantasy Star Online; when they are combined with the character's race and gender, this creates a unique set of attributes, which are used throughout the game to determine that character's performance in various tasks. The three character classes are the Hunters, who specialize in melee weapons and short-range attacks; the Rangers, who specialize in ranged attacks and guns; and the Forces, who are the magic-wielding characters in Phantasy Star Online. Additionally, the races are Human, Newman and Android, though neither Sega or the game itself hasn't really explained the differences between the three. Though there are only nine preset characters, each character can be customized a tad with the game's create-a-player-style interface. Once you select your character, you're taken to a screen where you choose one of several face types, hairstyles, body colors, skin tones, and customize the general height and width of your character. Once you've created your character, you start the game. You cannot change any physical aspects of your character without ditching your current character and creating a new one.

The game is playable in both offline and online forms. While the offline mode has the same general storyline as the online mode, the offline version of the game definitely lacks some important elements found in playing Phantasy Star Online online. The most obvious difference is the lack of interaction with online players. Phantasy Star Online is designed to build communities of gamers. Servers set up to host Phantasy Star Online games will be able to support up to 1000 players at any given moment, and any number of those players could be in the same fully 3D lobby room as you at any time. If you are looking for a particular item or weapon, or if you have something to discuss or to trade with other people, it's conceivable that you could take your problem to 1000 different gamers, all playing Phantasy Star Online from different parts of the word. The lobbies are important, because they not only draw gamers together to trade items and discuss the game, but they also set the stage for party forming.

The most important part of Phantasy Star Online and, indeed, where the bulk of the game lies is in its quests. During the quests you and up to three other online players depart from the accessible game world into the unknown territories of Ragol. While on a quest the game only supports you and your party, and you are unreachable to the rest of the online world. Until you take a transporter back to the town or quit out of the quest, you are considered away and will not be able to find any other online players, besides the three that tagged along on the quest with you. It's in this regard that Phantasy Star Online differs from massively multiplayer games like Everquest or Ultima Online. While any number of quests may be going on online at any point, each one is separate and individual from each other and only supports four players at a time.

These quests are how the game's plot unfolds. When you enter towns and other general online areas, you can usually find people who will ask you to complete certain quests for them. Be it a big quest that impacts the entire storyline or a small side quest assigned by the hunter's guild, each quest will affect you and your party individually. Some quests have to be completed, while others can be done at your leisure. All the important quests are also available offline, but a good majority of the specialty quests can only be completed with other players in the online mode. Finding other characters interested in completing the same quests as you shouldn't pose a problem according to Sega, which plans on sorting the prequest lobbies so that players can easily find suitable party members.

Actually going on a quest is where all the action in the game is. There are portals from Pioneer 2 - and all the other cities in the game - that teleport players to the outside areas of Ragol, where all the quests actually take place. The quest areas all start in a safe zone - a small section of the map where enemies cannot enter. It's there that you and your party members can do your final preparation for the battle ahead. Crossing a small energy gate signals the start of the skirmish; immediately afterward you will usually run into a group of enemies who must be dispatched before you can continue on with the level. The enemies range from cute yellow blobs and mechanical cats to horrible-looking insects to giant dragons.

All the combat in Phantasy Star Online occurs in real time, and you can actually never pause the flow of the game. Your characters start with only two attacks, a strong attack that is less accurate but causes more damage, and your normal attack, which is very accurate but causes only moderate damage. Force characters also get a third option, which is to cast a spell, or technique, as the game calls them. Once you engage an enemy a series of small red triangles locks onto the character, indicating whom you're attacking. From there you simply pound the appropriate button and watch the results. Your character will automatically dodge and parry according to his or her skill level. Dead enemies fall over, then quickly disappear, leaving behind some goodies for you to collect.

You control the movement of your character with the analog stick. Moving in any direction causes your character to start walking in that direction, and continuing to hold that direction will eventually cause your character to pick up the pace and start running. While in towns, the buttons on the controller are preset to perform specific commands, but on a quest anything is configurable. While on a quest, a small control layout similar to one found in Zelda, and several games since, appears in the lower left. The layout represents the four face buttons of the Dreamcast controller and displays an icon describing the chosen task in the space for the button that will trigger the task. This scheme is totally configurable and changes depending on how you set it. Once you go into the options menu, you can set what buttons trigger what attacks, and you can even bind phrases, the use of items, and actions to the button of your choosing. Additionally, the game expands the total number of hotkeys on the controller by letting you alternate buttons when holding down the R trigger. So players using only a Dreamcast controller will be able to do six common actions of their choosing at any time without bringing up the sometimes cumbersome menu and inventory screen. Additionally, players using a Dreamcast keyboard can bind any number of actions and items to any key on the keyboard they see fit, so it's entirely possibly to have a whole range of hotkeys covering every possible phrase, action, and use of an item at your disposal.

Phantasy Star Online features a number of stats and attributes that directly relate to how your character fights and deals with the environment around him. Besides the race, class, and gender of your character, certain weapons, items, and skills will be able to increase your stats. Also, characters level up and get stronger as they gain experience points, similar to a scheme common in RPGs. After leveling up, you'll be able to spend a small number of points increasing the your character's stats as you see fit. These stats, and the general level of your character, not only gauge how well you perform in combat, but also regulate what sort of weapons and items you can equip. Certain weapons have particular level demands and cannot be equipped by characters beneath the weapon's required level.

The game uses a unique futuristic currency called meseta. You can find meseta hidden in the crates that populate the quests or from the corpses of slain enemies themselves. The money can then be used to purchase all sorts of different things in the game, from standard futuristic swords and polearms to high-tech guns and items. Enemies and crates are sometimes hoarding items, which you can either keep - and eventually use - or trade with other players. The online mode of Phantasy Star Online will also boast plenty of special items that range from common to extremely rare. Finding these items through the game's online mode is supposedly random and will no doubt lead to some interesting online bartering systems between players.

Sega claims that Phantasy Star Online has no language barrier, as the game is available in English, German, French, Japanese and Spanish. All of the actions and preset text that occurs in the game will be translated to each player's default language. Additionally, the game features a slew of preset messages ranging from simple greetings to more complex queries and even has cries of help that will also be translated to the player's appropriate default language. Players can always opt to use their Dreamcast keyboard to type in any amount of custom text they wish, but the game will make no attempt to translate the text for other players. However, adamant players will be able to use the game's construct-a-sentence feature to write custom text word-by-word that will be translated into the game's various languages. This system should let players from all over the world ask helpful questions and work together to solve the riddles of Ragol.

The graphics in Phantasy Star Online are breathtaking. All of the towns are very expansive and detailed, from the 3D appearance of the various characters wandering about to the lights and layout of the special shops. But it's not until you get to Ragol that you really start appreciating just how beautiful this game really is. The environments that host the quests are stunning. Lush forests, foreboding caves, and decrepit ruins are a visual treat. The game definitely carries a distinct anime-inspired visual style, from the characters to the actual backgrounds. Colors are used extremely well, and lighting and shadows really look good. All of the enemies in Phantasy Star Online are very original and appropriately menacing. The animation in the game is very good. From the quick attacks of an android character to the lumbering nature of some of the huge beasts in the game, all of the movements look right.

Unfortunately, at this point the game's sound is the weakest part of the game. While there are a few fairly decent tracks running through the game, you'll get pretty tired of the music pretty quickly, especially after you've spent a good amount of time exploring the town. The sound effects are standard RPG fare, with plenty of booms and whaps during combat and cute little high-pitched noises when talking to people or working the menus.

Still, Phantasy Star Online has a good ways to go. What was originally scheduled as a holiday release has been pushed back until January, and for good reason. Sonic Team is working very hard to make Phantasy Star Online as revolutionary and complete as it can. From the promotional videos that Sega has released to the amazing nature of the offline mode found in this very incomplete demo version, Phantasy Star Online will no doubt change the way we think of RPGs.