[quote="Ice Cream Jonsey" post_id=106308 time=1581430237 user_id=3]
I thought Phantasy Star and Phantasie were the same franchise. I am learning a lot here. Okay, so what's the best Phantasy Star game out there that someone who's never played them should look at?
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Jiz will be able to set us straight. I've really only put a lot of time into 2, but I think 4 is well-regarded as one of the better entries (as far as the single player games go).

[quote=RealNC post_id=106277 time=1581343861 user_id=914]
Always wanted a master system.
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Yeah, they were kind of an oddball here too. I remember seeing their demo stations at a few local stores and playing Shinobi and something else on one. I didn't own one until many years later when I traded a kid my Gameboy for his Master System. It was fragile I guess though and only lived a couple of years. I had an old Sears catalog and when I called to see if Phantasy Star was still available.. they had some copies just sitting in a warehouse somewhere haha.

[quote="Ice Cream Jonsey" post_id=106308 time=1581430237 user_id=3]
I thought Phantasy Star and Phantasie were the same franchise. I am learning a lot here. Okay, so what's the best Phantasy Star game out there that someone who's never played them should look at?
[/quote]

For the original offline games.. I'd say Phantasy IV. All you need is a Genesis or emulator to play it. While I like all of the series, it's the easiest to approach and the story is pretty good about moving the game along.

I thought Phantasy Star and Phantasie were the same franchise. I am learning a lot here. Okay, so what's the best Phantasy Star game out there that someone who's never played them should look at?

Nope, never played it. But I remember seeing the sega master system box in stores. Every time I saw one, I would pick up the box and look at the screenshots. The 3D dungeons looked amazing. I had an (in Europe) less popular NES though, so I couldn't play it. Always wanted a master system.

Today while lurking in a lobby on the Japanese Phantasy Star Online servers, I overheard people talking about the US release of PSO2 that have been playing the beta. Some odd things I gathered:

1. British accents are used a lot for the English dubbing. That would probably be pretty jarring to me being used to Japanese dialogue.
2. People kept talking about "height limitations" when creating a character. Did they mean you can't make giant characters due to console port resolutions or something? No, you can't make your character too SHORT in the US release! Apparently the reason going around is that they do not want people creating "sexy characters" that only stand 4 feet tall. I should perhaps mention that there are 4 different races in this game; only one of them even being human! Stupid.

The Visiphone! That item was a bitch to retrieve. You must have not had the hintbook that came with it when it was new.. it had maps to the dungeons and everything. But yeah you basically had to have it for the endgame of grinding dragons over and over until you were strong enough for Mother Brain.

The Visiphone is actually still used in modern PS games. In PSO2 for example it's used to access player shop listings and to retrieve bonus items from Sega.

In the last handful of years, I looked up Phantasy Star 2 on internet cheat sites to see what kind of advice people had for Dezo. The main thing I learned was that there's a device you can get in the game that unlocks save-anywhere. Man, had I only known that back in the 80s. Now it's unlikely I'll ever play that far again. Good to know that Phantasy Star III also had good music, as I really enjoyed 2's.

[quote=Roody_Yogurt post_id=105824 time=1580028597 user_id=9]
I played Phantasy Star 2 a bit into the second planet, but the sheer amount of grinding did me in. I've wanted to go back and finish it with today's internet knowledge at my fingertips but I probably never will. I played just a tiny amount of 3 (that's the one with the generations mechanic, right?) but didn't play much further than the first generation choice.
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Phantasy Star 2 was the first one I ever played. I think it was my 2nd game I got for the system. $82.99!! I'll never forget that price. It came with a hint book and was a huge game, but man. That and a Quija board were the only gifts I got for my birthday that year haha. It really sucked me in. Dezo (the 2nd planet) was pretty cool but for some reason it felt more foreboding to me in the first Phantasy Star when I got it. As far as grinding.. I remember grinding for equipment and monomate/dimate/trimate seemed to get me by for like 90% of the game. Then I get to the last dungeon to fight Mother Brain and it kicked my ass so bad I had to grind it for like over a month!

Phantasy Star III is an odd one. It was originally never intended to be a Phantasy Star game at all. This is why the planet names and such were so different. Item names remained the same for the most part. At some point in development, Sega decided since it was both a medieval and space themed RPG, it should be another Phantasy Star game. The generations thing was kind of cool. After Rys (the first, main dude you play) marries the chick that washed up on the beach or the princess he was supposed to marry, you get older. Later on when you run into an old friend of yours named "Lyle" with green hair who basically is a space pirate, he's got some grey added to the green and missing an eye from a battle he was in while you were doing other things for a few year. I remember my mom saying she thought the city music was pretty. All of the music in the game was pretty cool.

I played Phantasy Star 2 a bit into the second planet, but the sheer amount of grinding did me in. I've wanted to go back and finish it with today's internet knowledge at my fingertips but I probably never will. I played just a tiny amount of 3 (that's the one with the generations mechanic, right?) but didn't play much further than the first generation choice.

Just a check.. have any of you guys played any game in this series? (Not listing handheld game versions)

Phantasy Star 1 : Master System
Phantasy Star 2-4 : Sega Genesis
Phantasy Star Online: Sega Dreamcast
Phantasy Star Blue Burst: Windows
Phantasy Star Universe: Windows
Phantasy Star Online 2: Windows