Phantasy Star - Great 8-bit RPG or GREATEST 8-Bit RPG?
Nov 23, 2018 21:51:07 GMT -5
Post by edmonddantes on Nov 23, 2018 21:51:07 GMT -5
I'm wondering, should I use the title pattern every time I talk about a Sega game (as in a game actually made by Sega, not a game on a Sega platform)?
There might be slight spoilers in this text, by the by (I mean, I don't think there are, but some of my comments may count as spoilers slightly)
So recently, I beat the first Phantasy Star on SMS, and started on Phantasy Star II.
It's kind of a weird transition. In a weird way, Phantasy Star doesn't become Phantasy Star until the second game. I mean, in the first, your healing items are Colas and Burgers (they're called something different in the re-translation but they're still not Monomate and Dimate), you revive characters at Churches, and magic is simply called Magic and having straightforward names like "Fire" or "Exit," rather than "Foi" and "Hinas."
In other words, original Phantasy Star is more like a standard RPG that just happens to have space travel, whereas PSII is when the series properly took on its more anime-take-on-Sci Fi veneer and implying that coming back to life is just "cloning" and you're not doing magic, you just happen to know "techniques," and wounds are healed by injecting drugs.
So, one thing I often hear about the original Phantasy Star is "its the best RPG of the 8-Bit era."
Having replayed it... well, I like it a lot, but "best RPG of the 8-Bit era?" Ummm, I'm not sure I agree.
For me, there are two main strikes against it.
First, that you basically have no control over battles. You choose either to attack or use magic (there's also a pretty much unnecessary "talk" function and spells with a similar function, only useful if you really want to skip combat and to make yourself feel bad about attacking friendlies) and.. that is pretty much it.
The second is... and I can't believe I'm saying this... okay, qualifiers first: I actually do like a lot of first-person RPGs like Wizardry and Might and Magic--the latter's NES port is what I would personally consider one of the greatest 8-bit RPGs.
But Phantasy Star's first-person is not well handled, and feels like it was there more to show off the SMS' power than because it was a good idea (which would be weird if it were true, since its not like the NES lacked first-person RPGs... and those were in some ways better handled).
One biggie... for some reason you can't see doors unless you're looking right at them. This actually becomes a puzzle late in the game that you have to solve (twice, though one of them is optional). I've never seen another first-person RPG--not even Wizardry or Akalabeth, both from 1979 and on much weaker hardware--that had this limitation.
another weirdness is there technically are fake walls you can walk through, but there's no "tell" that they're there unless you obsessively bang against every wall... and there's only like two of these in the entire game and neither lead to anything special, so there is no reason to search.
In fact, one thing that severely hurt the game for me was when I realized that there was really no reason to explore the dungeons at all. See, in good dungeon romps (not that Phantasy Star is exclusively a dungeon romp) any nook or cranny or monster might drop an awesome thing. So there is a reason to see what is in the northwest corner because, you know, it might be a +4 Halberd of Barry Mantilow.
Phantasy Star though is more in the line of something like the original Dragon Warrior, where the only defining feature of any dungeon is having a major quest object and finding it is the whole reason you came there, and there is a bit of predictability as to where it will be. The only weapons or armor you will find in dungeons are the Laconian gear--and in the dungeons that have those, those are the ONLY things they have that are of interest, so once you find them you can back out. Every other piece of equipment is bought in shops. Even monster drops, the only thing I've seen a (non-scripted) monster drop is an item called Flash, which gets annoying as very soon in, you get an item called the Magic Lamp which makes Flash obsolete.
In essence, the main thing that harms Phantasy Star I is just it feels a little too simple. The "nothing really to find in dungeons" thing was okay in Dragon Warrior because it was a short game with only like three dungeons anyway, but Phantasy Star is a lot bigger and its underworlds go on a lot longer, and so feels a bit emptier.
It's still worth playing, but I wouldn't call it the best RPG of the 8-Bit console generation.
.... So here's a question: If its so easy to bring people back to life, why didn't Alis just drag Nero to the church?
There might be slight spoilers in this text, by the by (I mean, I don't think there are, but some of my comments may count as spoilers slightly)
So recently, I beat the first Phantasy Star on SMS, and started on Phantasy Star II.
It's kind of a weird transition. In a weird way, Phantasy Star doesn't become Phantasy Star until the second game. I mean, in the first, your healing items are Colas and Burgers (they're called something different in the re-translation but they're still not Monomate and Dimate), you revive characters at Churches, and magic is simply called Magic and having straightforward names like "Fire" or "Exit," rather than "Foi" and "Hinas."
In other words, original Phantasy Star is more like a standard RPG that just happens to have space travel, whereas PSII is when the series properly took on its more anime-take-on-Sci Fi veneer and implying that coming back to life is just "cloning" and you're not doing magic, you just happen to know "techniques," and wounds are healed by injecting drugs.
So, one thing I often hear about the original Phantasy Star is "its the best RPG of the 8-Bit era."
Having replayed it... well, I like it a lot, but "best RPG of the 8-Bit era?" Ummm, I'm not sure I agree.
For me, there are two main strikes against it.
First, that you basically have no control over battles. You choose either to attack or use magic (there's also a pretty much unnecessary "talk" function and spells with a similar function, only useful if you really want to skip combat and to make yourself feel bad about attacking friendlies) and.. that is pretty much it.
The second is... and I can't believe I'm saying this... okay, qualifiers first: I actually do like a lot of first-person RPGs like Wizardry and Might and Magic--the latter's NES port is what I would personally consider one of the greatest 8-bit RPGs.
But Phantasy Star's first-person is not well handled, and feels like it was there more to show off the SMS' power than because it was a good idea (which would be weird if it were true, since its not like the NES lacked first-person RPGs... and those were in some ways better handled).
One biggie... for some reason you can't see doors unless you're looking right at them. This actually becomes a puzzle late in the game that you have to solve (twice, though one of them is optional). I've never seen another first-person RPG--not even Wizardry or Akalabeth, both from 1979 and on much weaker hardware--that had this limitation.
another weirdness is there technically are fake walls you can walk through, but there's no "tell" that they're there unless you obsessively bang against every wall... and there's only like two of these in the entire game and neither lead to anything special, so there is no reason to search.
In fact, one thing that severely hurt the game for me was when I realized that there was really no reason to explore the dungeons at all. See, in good dungeon romps (not that Phantasy Star is exclusively a dungeon romp) any nook or cranny or monster might drop an awesome thing. So there is a reason to see what is in the northwest corner because, you know, it might be a +4 Halberd of Barry Mantilow.
Phantasy Star though is more in the line of something like the original Dragon Warrior, where the only defining feature of any dungeon is having a major quest object and finding it is the whole reason you came there, and there is a bit of predictability as to where it will be. The only weapons or armor you will find in dungeons are the Laconian gear--and in the dungeons that have those, those are the ONLY things they have that are of interest, so once you find them you can back out. Every other piece of equipment is bought in shops. Even monster drops, the only thing I've seen a (non-scripted) monster drop is an item called Flash, which gets annoying as very soon in, you get an item called the Magic Lamp which makes Flash obsolete.
In essence, the main thing that harms Phantasy Star I is just it feels a little too simple. The "nothing really to find in dungeons" thing was okay in Dragon Warrior because it was a short game with only like three dungeons anyway, but Phantasy Star is a lot bigger and its underworlds go on a lot longer, and so feels a bit emptier.
It's still worth playing, but I wouldn't call it the best RPG of the 8-Bit console generation.
.... So here's a question: If its so easy to bring people back to life, why didn't Alis just drag Nero to the church?
