What would you like to see in pso2?

[Aerilas]

well, my signature and topic posted in the lounge says it all, really ;)

[Kirukia]

The best part about PSO was, once the game began. You met the Principal, he was like, "Hey, Im the Principal, nice to meet you. Now go kill us some Boomas son".

Bam you went and killed Boomas, I hope that carries over to PSO2.

I will admit, I did like the lack of a real "story" element. I find the PSP series to be very enjoyable, but if I have to go through a story mode one more time, I will hang myself.

Doing story mode on every character gets extremely tedious, and I'd rather be given a straight foward objective and find out info through side quests. It lets you explore at your own pace and at the same time have a "story mode" to explore.

[DragonStriker]

well, my signature and topic posted in the lounge says it all, really ;)

You should make your signature something witty and obnoxious.

Here's a few ideas:

"Aerilas, so awesome that I had Alpal make my signature"

"I am deeply and madly in love with Alpal"

"My love for Phantasy Star games is only surpassed by my love for Alpal"

or even...

"Alpal is great"

and little more risque...

"I wish Alpal would impale me with his "spear""

[Moss Cow]

The best part about PSO was, once the game began. You met the Principal, he was like, "Hey, Im the Principal, nice to meet you. Now go kill us some Boomas son".

Bam you went and killed Boomas, I hope that carries over to PSO2.

That's probably the best (and most true) ... anything... I've ever read.

That's pretty much what I want from PSO2. More-so than that, I want it to have a full sized offline multiplayer.
I never really played much PSU (none online), but from the looks it seemed like there was the "story" mode for it, for single player, and online for multi. That's NOT what I want.

Hell, you could polish up PSO, add a bunch of new levels and gear, and I'd be willing to pay more than most games out there :)

[bns1991]

500+ posts :D:D:D

[Kaziel]

I would have to agree with the above poster. I loved the way the PSO storyline was presented. You weren't forced through it over and over. I love the storyline, but the force-it-down-your-throat method is irritating. ^^;

[Linka]

honestly, i have an idea that might be difficult, but interesting if pulled off. namely, a two-path system for how you advance the story. in one way, you do it like PSU if that's your thing...and in the other, its more like PSO and Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles. steady, light, but tantalizing, and required using your brain to actually piece it together from fragments that alone don't make much sense. kinda what i loved about FFCC. there was a story, but only dedicated players ever found it.

as for gameplay? up the tempo, please! maybe to 60-90% of what Devil May Cry has?

[BIG OLAF]

as for gameplay? up the tempo, please! maybe to 60-90% of what Devil May Cry has?

I think that may be a little too fast-paced of a combat system for a co-operative series like Phantasy Star.

[Linka]

...nah. i think people could handle it. XD.

[Dongra]

as for gameplay? up the tempo, please! maybe to 60-90% of what Devil May Cry has?
I still think this is a horrible suggestion for Phantasy Star. If you want a fast paced hack 'n' slash game, then just play Devil May Cry or, the vastly superior, Ninja Gaiden.

[Linka]

....Ninja Gaiden...better than DMC? nah. i'd argue about this here, but...yeah. bad idea.

as for temp up, well...hey. 60% of DMC's speed is not absurd amounts of rev-up. and every time...every time...someone suggests 'faster gameplay like such and such game'...SOMEONE inevitably says 'then just go play said game instead, dumbass'. the point of suggesting faster gameplay in a specific game, is...oh...i dunno..cause we want whatever the game's got, but done at a faster pace, maybe? if we wanted to play something different, we would.

besides. i wasn't saying make the gameplay style be DMC's, i was saying speed up gameplay to within 60 to 90 percent of what DMC has at best. big difference.

...some people can completely miss the point in certain types of game change suggestions, huh?*sighs*

[Dongra]

So you want the combat speed to be increased to over half of DMC which I would think is nearly 1.5 that of PSU's speed? Or is it that you are too impatient with the current speed of the games? Do we really need to make this series into more of a button mash fest? I actually enjoyed it when just attacks were introduced so that those who time their attacks were actually rewarded rather then just mashing the PA button over and over again. Personally, I'm fine with PSU's combat speed since it's a huge improvement over PSO's sluggish combat. Yeah, I really don't want to see PSO2 driven towards extreme button mashing to an even further extent. Not that there is anything wrong with button mashing, it's just not my style.

[Linka]

well, if i wanted a button masher, i'd have suggested a PSU/PSO/PSP/PSP2/PSP2i fighting game. i just get annoyed with how long it takes to get through fights sometimes, and get through areas at others. and a 1.5x rate would seem about right, actually. i'm not saying get rid of the exact attacks, or anything, just speed everything up.

[Kaziel]

And you both left your points, so leave it as-is? We all know you want it x1.5 faster. He doesn't. Cool story bros. ;)

[NoiseHERO]

I don't see a problem with faster gameplay...

You can still have speed and keep strategy and tactics. I need we need more of both...

If you ask me...pso and psz is just a slower clunky hack n slash, but psu took out all of the thinking altogether making it just as bad, possibly more monotonous to players like dongra.

I think psu took a small step in the right direction, but certain things ruined it all, there were a lot of things in terms of strategy...but then there would be that one photon art or class that would make it all pointless, and the fact that you only needed 2 buttons to attack. that just made everything solo friendly and play half awake and still win....

For example, Certain weapons and Elements/bullets could DoT, AoE, Pierce, Aggro, Debuff, Knockback, Stunlock, Instant kill chance, and there would be times where certain ones would be specifically useful in certain missions. But then can also just make a beast, become a fighmaster, Get a 50% 10/10 spear and spam the first two parts of one photon art and make any of those strategies comepletely pointless.

So there has to be something that'd need to keep you up and focused at all times, that's something you're not doing over in the same pattern everytime you re-do that mission/map.

I haven't play psp2, but the chain system looked like a step in the right direction...then it just looked like the only direction after a while. At least thats the impression I get from watching a video.

I also definitely don't mind the return of timing your attacks for successful combos, as long as that's made faster and smoother as well maybe even more challenging to pull off. I also saw fit with PSU's idea of certain classes attacking faster than others for various uses.


All in All, if I'm going to be running the same dungeon/map/mission to get that one rare item, I don't want to worry about slow gameplay putting me to sleep, because that's literally happened with both PSO, PSU and PSZ for different but similar reasons each game at least...

[Dongra]

And you both left your points, so leave it as-is? We all know you want it x1.5 faster. He doesn't. Cool story bros. ;)
It's not like we are flaming each other or anything. I simply misunderstood him in my first post and I made my second post to make a clarification and to state my opinion about his. I can understand why he would want faster combat. Not everyone has a whole lot of time to play games like this and it would be nice to get through areas or missions faster so that the game can be enjoyed sooner. I would assume that the monsters would be faster to compensate, right? Anyway, I have had patience with the games and don't really care how fast I get through it, so I don't feel the need for faster combat. Others might disagree which is perfectly acceptable.

[BIG OLAF]

Remember, though, PSU was just as much about enemies being underpowered as it was players being overpowered.

I want enemies that scare me again. One of the only things I liked about PSO was the fact that you actually didn't look forward to fighting certain enemies. In PSU, everything was just a re-skin of something else, and they all moved and attacked too slow, and in extremely predictable ways. Oh, and they died almost instantly once you got some endgame gear. I want to fight something strong, fast, and nearly invincible, and keep it very challenging even if I have the best stuff in the game.

[Dongra]

PSO actually suffered from the same problem, the difference is that it took longer to become overpowered in PSO.

[NoiseHERO]

One thing that would be kind of fun is something from kingdom hearts recoded, that game also has a mission based system.

and there'd be some missions where out of random a super strong enemy would pop up, and you either have to run for your life, or try to man-up and fight it, and one mistake will get you killed. Kind of a fun feeling, but yeah something like that would be interesting until spoiled players would complain that it ruins their missions to much and sega nerfs it or takes it out.

But yeah just a random idea that crossed my mind. >3>;;

[Dongra]

An overpowered monster that would take actual teamwork to kill and would most likely end in a rewarding drop and experience? I like the idea of that.

[Seth Astra]

I'd like both:

A. Faster combat.

B. Do indeed use the PSO "time your attacks or no combo" thing.

That would be pretty much perfect. Oh, and challenging enemies, too.

[BIG OLAF]

I'd like both:

A. Faster combat.

B. Do indeed use the PSO "time your attacks or no combo" thing.

Wouldn't these two kind of cancel each other out? You can't really have truly fast combat if you have to time your attacks perfectly to continue the combo. I think there should be regular "button mash" attacks, but they only do like 1/10 of the damage a "timed attack" would do. Therefor, if you have time, you can pull off powerful combos, but you can also just quickly jump in and tag enemies for cleanup damage, too.

[Seth Astra]

Not really. Just speed up the animations and shorten the time between button presses. Also, I wouldn't MIND that, only I think that the difference you mentioned is a bit much...

[Kaziel]

It's not like we are flaming each other or anything. I simply misunderstood him in my first post and I made my second post to make a clarification and to state my opinion about his. I can understand why he would want faster combat. Not everyone has a whole lot of time to play games like this and it would be nice to get through areas or missions faster so that the game can be enjoyed sooner. I would assume that the monsters would be faster to compensate, right? Anyway, I have had patience with the games and don't really care how fast I get through it, so I don't feel the need for faster combat. Others might disagree which is perfectly acceptable.

I just don't see the point in getting so worked up about it if SoJ won't even acknowledge you as a voice. I just saw the debate as moot, since neither of you seem to be moving on your stances.

Faster or not, I'm just glad to hear they're making a sequel.

[Dongra]

I just don't see the point in getting so worked up about it if SoJ won't even acknowledge you as a voice.
Thank you captain obvious. You think I actually believe my opinion will change the shape of the game? All we are doing is stating what we would like to see in the game since it's kind of the point of this topic. Linka would like to see the game sped up while I would prefer a steady pace. We both gave our reasons and we are aware that our views won't matter, but the purpose of the thread is to give our opinion which is what we did.

[Kaziel]

Thank you captain obvious. You think I actually believe my opinion will change the shape of the game? All we are doing is stating what we would like to see in the game since it's kind of the point of this topic. Linka would like to see the game sped up while I would prefer a steady pace. We both gave our reasons and we are aware that our views won't matter, but the purpose of the thread is to give our opinion which is what we did.

Which you both presented. We understand that. Move along.

[Jonty]

I'd actually be happiest with a return to the PSO style and speed of combat; though I admit I'm almost certainly looking through nostalgia coloured spectacles here. The sluggishness made everything feel deliberate, and the timing meant you had to concentrate (even if just a little) to make it through. I realize it may well be possible to achieve both these effects with a sped up version of the same sort of gameplay, so I may well simply be stuck in the past!

I'd also like a return to form for the rappy, with the little yella fellas taking centre stage again, after being relegated to rare enemy status for a while.

But now I'm falling into the trap of basically wanting to play an updated PSO. Which kind of is what I want to do. I'm a nostalgic idiot.

I guess something that I'd really like (and this isn't just nostalgia talking this time) is the kind of stylistic flare that PSO had, and that I think PSU rather lacked; the kind of attention to detail in character design that meant, even though there were very few choices in how your character looked (mostly it was just colour swaps), you still looked bloody amazing. I don't know if other people feel the same way, but I certainly never felt any annoyance that other people looked too similar to me online.

This isn't an argument against more customization, of course; that'd be nonsensical. It's just that customization at the expense of unique / interesting base character design is something that really gets my goat - and I do think that there should be real, big differences in class appearance from the beginning. Some people like class / appearance fluidity. I'm a crusty old man, and I hate it.

[The Last Baron]

I would like to see the work pork uncensored. One of the hardest things I ever had to explain to someone was that I cooked pork chops last Saturday without shoes on.

[NoiseHERO]

I would like to see the work pork uncensored. One of the hardest things I ever had to explain to someone was that I cooked pork chops last Saturday without shoes on.

LOOOOOOL I've never played an online game with a good censor system...ever.

[JesMaz]

I would very much like every mission to have a difficulty level that is gruesomely challenging for efen hardcore players. And by grusomely challenging,i mean that any party that hopes to have a chance at success must be full size, have very good equips, techs, and skills, but most importantly a have well thought-out and creative strategy.

[Chaobo99]

I would very much like every mission to have a difficulty level that is gruesomely challenging for efen hardcore players. And by grusomely challenging,i mean that any party that hopes to have a chance at success must be full size, have very good equips, techs, and skills, but most importantly a have well thought-out and creative strategy.

This.
Every mission should have the usual C-S2(3)/Normal-Ultimate but there should be a "Death" mode that makes you carry fluids(charges) for your techers, blows through scapes like crazy, and really tests the overall skill of you and the typical group of players you play with(or perhaps even randoms). I don't mean challenge mode either, which was a more teamwork/puzzle-based type gameplay. Talkin' straight-up taking more damage, triple monster count, the works.

It would be cool also if there was some sort of team-based objective play. Like protect the VIP, obtain intel inside the base, seek possible survivors in an area, etc.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

That wouldn't really be very fun, though. It would just be tedious.

[RenzokukenZ]

This.
Every mission should have the usual C-S2(3)/Normal-Ultimate but there should be a "Death" mode that makes you carry fluids(charges) for your techers, blows through scapes like crazy, and really tests the overall skill of you and the typical group of players you play with(or perhaps even randoms). I don't mean challenge mode either, which was a more teamwork/puzzle-based type gameplay. Talkin' straight-up taking more damage, triple monster count, the works.


Might as well add "Lose equipped weapon upon death" on that list since you want the game to be ridiculously frustrating.

[Dongra]

To each his own I guess. I mean it sounds like it would be just an optional mode anyway.

[Chaobo99]

And i'm sure people want the game to be ridiculously easy as well. I wouldn't know though, everything people have said was hard in PSO/PSU was easy beyond belief >.>; which with fair enough skill and knowledge and even ghetto equipment was true.

[Dongra]

Does anyone really play PSO or PSU for the challenge or even expect a challenge? This isn't really a hardcore game, even if it does have some hardcore players/nerds.

[Chaobo99]

Does anyone really play PSO or PSU for the challenge or even expect a challenge? This isn't really a hardcore game, even if it does have some hardcore players/nerds.

I hope not, but it'd be nice for a change. I've ran the same missions over and over like everyone else, with most likely the same equipment/gear, from missions that were over-populated(white beast >.>) to running Demons Above hoping a Halarod would drop(back in the day). And I suppose it is a tedious challenge for things to drop, but then they made getting stuff way to easy to get, which I didn't mind till the creatures didn't get any harder and the missions never changed. It'd be nice to ask for an endless supply of missions but that's unrealistic, so they might as well make a harder difficulty. Doesn't mean you have to play it

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

You see, there is a difference between challenging and tedious.

Enemies that have an absurd amount of HP, take forever to kill, and have unfair attacks make something tedious, but not challenging. A good example of this was pretty much everything in v1 PSU.

Challenging is more along the lines of challenge mode in PSO, where things were difficult, but never really unfair. Also, things were not obnoxiously drawn-out if you knew what you were doing.

[Tetsaru]

I would very much like every mission to have a difficulty level that is gruesomely challenging for efen hardcore players. And by grusomely challenging,i mean that any party that hopes to have a chance at success must be full size, have very good equips, techs, and skills, but most importantly a have well thought-out and creative strategy.


This.
Every mission should have the usual C-S2(3)/Normal-Ultimate but there should be a "Death" mode that makes you carry fluids(charges) for your techers, blows through scapes like crazy, and really tests the overall skill of you and the typical group of players you play with(or perhaps even randoms). I don't mean challenge mode either, which was a more teamwork/puzzle-based type gameplay. Talkin' straight-up taking more damage, triple monster count, the works.

I would be all for this. I don't know about nowadays, but PSU's endgame difficulty was pathetic during the PC/PS2 days (although pre-AotI seemed alright at the time). The only mission that really provided a challenge for me back then was the storyline-related one that had Magashi and Helga in it (forgot the name of it) that was in one of the events, and that was mainly because you had to solo it and scape dolls wouldn't work. Just recently, a friend and I tried playing East Tower on Blue Burst on Normal when were around Lv30, and struggled up to the point where we got to Epsilon, and just got one-shotted. I was even using rare weapons! It made me remember how much more difficult PSO was overall, and how you really had to work towards certain things and rely on your teammates, instead of LOLOLOLZERGRUSH everything.

[EJ]

I would rather have like a endless nightmare type of mission and a ttf one as well.

The PW 3&4 missions were also my favorite.

[Dongra]

Yeah, I don't think there is anything in PSU that is close to matching the difficulty of Phantasmal World 4 on ultimate. PSO certainly was harder, but it still wasn't a hard game.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Just recently, a friend and I tried playing East Tower on Blue Burst on Normal when were around Lv30, and struggled up to the point where we got to Epsilon, and just got one-shotted. I was even using rare weapons!The Towers of PSO is yet another example of tedium posing as difficulty. Is it hard? Yes, but only because of bullshit that kills you instantly flying from every direction that you can do nothing about.


You are correct that PSU was far too easy, though. Vanilla PSU was far worse, though, as it was both easy and tedious. There was no excuse for it to take upwards of an hour to solo most missions. Unbelievably boring.

[Randomness]

The Towers of PSO is yet another example of tedium posing as difficulty. Is it hard? Yes, but only because of bullshit that kills you instantly flying from every direction that you can do nothing about.


You are correct that PSU was far too easy, though. Vanilla PSU was far worse, though, as it was both easy and tedious. There was no excuse for it to take upwards of an hour to solo most missions. Unbelievably boring.

SEGA needs to look at Capcom for an idea of how to make things difficult the right way. Tri got difficulty RIGHT. If something's hard its because you either need better/appropriate gear or you don't know how to dodge it's attacks. Not because it does 90% of your health the second it grazes you or has eleventy-gazillion HP. You can easily go through a hunt in no time while using no healing at all if you and your teammates know how. In PSU, you're gonna get smacked a ton and need to pop mates/resta plenty. Hell, PSO had Falz's uber-grants, which is as cheap as it gets. The only challenge mainly comes from whether you have enough healing to last until everything has fallen down. If you aren't a force, there's no point dodging. Forces only dodge so they can cast something other than Resta (or because the enemy hits so damned hard they'll die if they get hit!).

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

That was the beauty of challenge mode. The enemies were still weak as hell, and you could get by unscathed if your party knew what to do and were careful. However, you would get punished repeatedly if you got cocky and just spammed attacks.

There were still a lot of exceptions to this (like Falz and his completely undodgeable multi-Rabarta spam and Grants), but challenge mode overall was as close to getting it right as they have come in this series.

[Dongra]

PSO has demonstrated a poor balance with difficulty in several areas. Falz grants is a problem when you first fight his third form in hard mode and your character doesn't have high max HP, which is usually the case for players that first encounter this part of the boss. At least you don't have to worry about his grants in challenge mode. There is also the megid spitting lilies in ultimate caves which takes some getting use to once you experience your first death to them as well as the instant kill spit that the Meri family gains in the same difficulty. Personally, I found De Rol Le to be an inappropriate jump in difficulty at such an early part of the game. There is a very noticeable gap from forest's easy Dragon boss to the caves boss, but that difficulty fades once you face the mines boss. I don't know about you but I usually expect the boss in a later level to be more difficult than the preceding, not the other way around. Most characters that start caves are level 4 or 5 and will maybe be level 9 or 10 by the time they get to De Rol Le. No one will have the HP to survive him without HP materials, which new players probably won't find, or HP units. Vol Opt can be stunned to the point where it can hardly attack and it also gives a fair amount of warning when it will attack since it targets the players with glowing lasers. It has never really been a test of skill, but more a test of luck and how well the players manages their gear.

[ttdestroy]

I really dont care about the difficulty, in fact I hope the game does use cheap attacks, it's all part of the PSO style.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Yeah man. Unfair, frustrating gameplay is totally a great thing in a game.

[Tetsaru]

Ehh, as long as it's not directly from the start and creates too steep of a learning curve. To me, "frustrating gameplay" would be stuff like bad programming, glitches/exploits, poor game design or controls, playing with a lot of lag, etc. If an enemy or area is "frustrating" in an RPG, that just tells me, "there's a working strategy you just haven't tried yet," or "level that shit up elsewhere and try again later," lol. :razz:

I'd rather the game be frustratingly difficult later on than be a cakewalk from early game to end game. Then, it's all the more satisfying when you finally DO beat it, and often times, you hone your overall skills as a gamer and teammate in general.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

If an enemy or area is "frustrating" in an RPG, that just tells me, "there's a working strategy you just haven't tried yet," or "level that shit up elsewhere and try again later," lol. :razz:Let me refer back to the previous mention of Towers in PSO. You could go in at level 200 and with a load of the most broken weaponry, and the enemies will still spam so many instant kill attacks that you will die. A lot.

The only way to prevent this was to abuse how broken Frozen Shooter was, and just take out enemies from outside the radius where they would notice you. BOY, WHAT FUN GAMEPLAY.

Really, this falls under your mention of "poor game design."

[Tetsaru]

I guess I'll have to see for myself when/if I get that far. I've only been on East Tower once on Normal so far, and while I found it very challenging at my level, I didn't feel like it was impossible, despite not finishing it. From the way you're describing it, it just sounds like you'd need the proper resistance items, a Force on heal/buff duty, Scape Dolls and Moon Atomizers, and know how to play Megid dodgeball, lol. As for freezing everything... I don't have a Frozen Shooter, but I use my Freeze/Confuse Traps all the time on the tougher enemies. If that's what it takes to beat something, so be it. Of course, I wouldn't want that for EVERY level, but you get the idea. You just need the right combinations of skill, strategy, stats/equipment, and being able to work well with your teammates.

Anyways, we're getting off-topic... as long as PSO2 has similar levels of difficulty at endgame for max level veteran players, I'll be quite pleased. There's a difference between making a level that's hard as balls and one which is completely impossible to beat. What really falls under "good game design" is what holds the player's interest the most, whether that be something really easy, or something that tests your limits. I think the best option would be to provide both (easy at first, hard later on, of course) with a proper learning curve in between, so that anyone at any level can have something to do, easy or difficult.

[JesMaz]

You see, there is a difference between challenging and tedious.

Enemies that have an absurd amount of HP, take forever to kill, and have unfair attacks make something tedious, but not challenging. A good example of this was pretty much everything in v1 PSU.

Challenging is more along the lines of challenge mode in PSO, where things were difficult, but never really unfair. Also, things were not obnoxiously drawn-out if you knew what you were doing.

Tedious means tiresome or monotonous, ie: not requiring a creative strategy. Nobody wants a video game to be tedious (that doesn't even have to be said). However, what should be noted for a player who uses language like 'unfair' to describe an obstacle such as a mob of enemies, or for a player who uses language like 'tedious' to describe a high level of difficlty on a mission, is that in a game with as much character and combat variety and room for strategic thought and execution as PSO or PSU, such labels reflect more lack of creativity in the player than anything else.

What was tedious, however, was reading this entire thread in hopes of absorbing a full 50 pages of peoples ideas and hopes are for pso2, but monotonously discovering that almost 50% of that space was filled with your tiresome posts telling people their ideas are bad.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

If you are going to call me dumb and bad at video games, at least have the decency to just say it. Thanks.

[NoiseHERO]

Calm down guys...

You're both Rolf...

[Dongra]

Tedious means tiresome or monotonous, ie: not requiring a creative strategy. Nobody wants a video game to be tedious (that doesn't even have to be said). However, what should be noted for a player who uses language like 'unfair' to describe an obstacle such as a mob of enemies, or for a player who uses language like 'tedious' to describe a high level of difficlty on a mission, is that in a game with as much character and combat variety and room for strategic thought and execution as PSO or PSU, such labels reflect more lack of creativity in the player than anything else.
So you wouldn't say that PSO and PSU are monotonous? Funny, I find monotonous is the best way to describe them. Doesn't mean I don't find them enjoyable but they certainly are repetitive. By the way, you probably shouldn't take any of Ffuzzy-Logik's posts seriously.

[JesMaz]

What I wouldn't say is that my previous post has anything to do with whether or not PSO and PSU are monotonous.

[Aerilas]

Ahh the horror of Recons swarming you in challenge mode, just to annoy you. or their damn mines.
Damn the assery they put in that game

[BIG OLAF]

What I wouldn't say is that my previous post has anything to do with whether or not PSO and PSU are monotonous.

^Wow, he talks like a politician.

[Arkios]

I like how this thread has devolved into an argument on semantics. :-\


Ahh the horror of Recons swarming you in challenge mode, just to annoy you. or their damn mines.
Damn the assery they put in that game

I HATED going through Mines in c-mode, hands down the most annoying portion.

[jayster]

I think I may be the only one but I loved being able to level skills and classes. I hope we can do it again.

Also, lots of unique weapons and drops.

[KodiaX987]

More useful weapons that actually push to vary one's playstyle, a la TF2.
Less joke or novelty rares. They're pretty. And they're fucking useless.
The entire game should be solo-able to a reasonable degree.
There must be a fair abundance of useful weapons, or ways to get one. Getting kicked out of games because you weren't lucky enough to find a good rare is not a valid definition of fun.
Take out the material usage limit. Puh-lease.
Allow a player to use any mag model regardless of stats, for cosmetic purposes.
Techs should actually be useful.
Ensure low-tier techs remain useful to a degree. Have low-tier do high point damage, and high-tier techs do low AOE damage.
Fix the hit reaction. Getting knocked down was a blessing, and having a DEF that was too high actually rendered you easier to kill due to juggling.
Allow the possibility of unranked community maps and areas. PSO had several dungeon layouts that could be easily reproducible using an editor.
Move as much management server-side as possible. The client can never be trusted.
A NPC should take up its own special NPC slot, not a player slot (see where I'm coming from here?)
Fix code strategy to render negative-level techs impossible to perform.
Greater variety of areas - PSO already had something good enough, just keep it coming.
Stick to VHard. Ultimate wasn't challenging. It was an exercise in sheer frustration and cheapshot endurance.
Similarly, stick to Level 100 and make it attainable in 80 hours of play.
Document everything. I shouldn't have to learn by accident that mashing the Y button donates my PB charge to a teammate. What happened to the manual?
Give the game host the ability to kick players.
Give players a kickvote option.
Give games a friends-only option.
Challenge mode wasn't fun. Not by any stretch. It only served to breed rage. Get rid of it.
Rare monsters should show up more often. Playing upwards of 750 hours without ever encountering a red slime is overkill.
Introduce environmental dangers that are more natural-looking than crushing pillars in the middle of corridors.
Introduce rooms that pose an environmental or mini-boss challenge that does not consist of simply killing everything in sight. For example: an automatic gun battery shoots at the players from a faraway position and can only be disabled by approaching it, using cover to shield oneself from incoming salvoes.
Introduce gauntlet events where players are swarmed by several monsters that award little to no XP, with the horde stopping after a certain objective is accomplished.
Monsters should not be entirely helpless if attacked by all players at once (hi Vol Opt!)

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

About half of your ideas there already happened in PSU, so I don't think you'll have to worry about that.

I'd go through and offer my opinion on some of your ideas that I think are stupid, but apparently people don't like it when I stimulate discussion.

[Nitro Vordex]

I'd go through and offer my opinion on some of your ideas that I think are stupid, but apparently people don't like it when I stimulate discussion.That would probably have to do with you stating it as forced fact, rather than a respectable opinion.

[Sinue_v2]

Kill the ambiguous differentiation between "Rares" and "Rare Rares". Gameplay should not have to grind to a standstill every few minutes while you sift through Varistas to see if a Heaven's Punisher dropped. I don't care if both rares and "rare rares" are both in Red Boxes, but at least give the truly rare weapons and units a special effect (like blue sparkles) that designates them as worth picking up.

Varistas and Flowen's Swords and other common rares still have a viable place as cash generation or high-end mag food... but I don't want to have spend hours hoovering every item in an area, wasting time sorting through the litter bin my inventory has become to see if I got anything good, and I certainly don't want that unidentified junk cluttering up my weapon swap menu.

Each difficulty level and area should have their own unique drops of "rare rare" assortments (which can also be designated with special effects even if not in a red box), but which are not available with higher drop rates in higher difficulties. This might even facilitate more inter-difficulty level tier trading... as a lvl 90 player is not going to want to canvass a normal level area for hours on end to find a collectible or upgradable item - giving lower-level players something of value worth trading to higher level players. I really don't want to see a return to item synthing, but perhaps a trade-up system where multiple low difficulty "rare rare - NubGun 3000's" and monster gizzards can be traded in at a V.Hard level item exchange for an appropriately tiered rare gun.

To a degree, they could also make weapon stats scalable to player levels to a certain degree, boosting the usefulness of lower-level "rare rares" when equipped by higher level players so that they're not completely useless. This could also work in conjunction with a level-scaling option that gives higher level players a chance to run lower level missions with their newbie friends without having to carry multiple sets of equipment and spend time swapping between them manually. It would help prevent higher lvl players with uber weapons from trolling lower-level games (though they would still have a noticeable advantage). Of course, V.Hard/Ultimate level "rare rares" should be more powerful (or have a greater range of special attacks) than lower difficulty "rare rares" even when scaling... preventing them from losing their worth.


Also: Make damage calculation more closely dependent on character and weapon stats, rather than on elemental/enemy type %'s. PSU screwed up elemental %'s by making them more important than class and stats, using those to shore up the difference in poor balancing issues while homogenizing race/class differentiations. High Elemental/Enemy bonuses should be noticeable, not a mandatory requirement for running with competent parties. Further, it removes much of the element of player skill and adaptability and makes being a optimized player more dependent upon the pure luck of the synth or bartering ability.

What if elemental/enemy %'s were raised by experience killing mobs, so that eventually every weapon you carry could potentially be a 50/50/50/50.... but make those 50's mean less than they did in PSU & PSO so that they are not game-breaking. Base elemental/enemy boosts could still be used, making them more of a short-cut to fully-upgraded weapons rather than a static and unchangeable feature. There's nothing fucking worse than searching for hours/days to find that prized weapon, only to have it turn out to be a "worthless uber-rare" because it's devoid of %'s.

Also, perhaps make element/enemy % "quick swap"-able, letting you change element/enemy bonus's on the fly to deal more efficiently with mixed mobs, but each individual stat would need to be leveled independently. (Sort of like a more streamlined version of what PSU does with Gun PAs) This would help limit the number of weapons you need to quick-select down to just what weapon types works best against which types of mobs. (swords for clumping hordes, rifles for armored enemies, pistols for small flying mobs, sabers for large single enemies, daggers for juggling... ect)

Further, each weapon would have to have it's stats raised independently... so a fully leveled 50% A.Beast on your current Yasminkov will not transfer over to any other rifles, or even identical weapons. Weapons can be traded with their boosts intact, though, giving higher level players a means of high-end weapon trading that is based more on time-spent and player efficiency rather than on luck. Sort of like raising mags, except you're raising weapons.

And on top of it all... make lower tier weapons gain % exp faster than higher tier weapons... so it's easier to cap them off at 50% than it is the higher tiered weapons. This would extend the usefulness of low-level "Rare rares" as they could match or exceed the damage potential of low % high-level "Rare Rares" when covering the scaling spread. However, if you stick to those lower tier "rare rares", you won't gain % experience on the higher tiered "Rare Rares" - creating a dynamic where high tier stuff is used in less dangerous situations, while the lower tier stuff may still be useful for boss-fights and more robust enemies... at least until the higher-tier rares are sufficiently raised to overcome the damage differential.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

I think I get what you are saying there about rares, and I totally agree. Rarity should be rarity, not necessarily an indicator of weapon strength. Meaning, there would be rares that would be extremely good at low levels, but pale in comparison to common high level weaponry.

Ideally, they would work it so there are multiple tiers (for lack of a better term) of levels, with a whole set of weaponry (common through rares) designed for each tier. Of course, to make this worthwhile, there would have to be lots of areas where your level is capped at one of the lower tiers, or low tier rares would become completely worthless very quickly.


That would probably have to do with you stating it as forced fact, rather than a respectable opinion.Sorry, but it should go without saying that anything posted in a topic like this is an opinion. I shouldn't need to say "this is just my opinion guys and it is ok if you disagree!!!!" in every post. And of course I think my opinions are more correct or more valid than alternatives, otherwise I wouldn't hold said opinions.

This is all very obvious and shouldn't need to be verbalized, ever.

[KodiaX987]

I'd go through and offer my opinion on some of your ideas that I think are stupid, but apparently people don't like it when I stimulate discussion.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/39/Fred_Phelps_on_his_pulpit.jpg

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Don't know who that is or why I should care, but it's pretty obvious I'm just trying to get people riled up by calling them on ideas that, frankly, are really shitty.


Basically, my problem is when people post a bunch of ideas, many of which are of, at best, questionable merit, and do not provide any justification or explanation for why their off the wall ideas are worth implementing. I'd just like to see people provide more reasoning behind some of the more ridiculous propositions.

[Seth Astra]

Take out the material usage limit. Puh-lease.

I could nitpick at the others, but this is the only one I really disagree with. Materials should be for customizing your character, rather than just blindly pumping up stats as high as possible. That's just my take, though. If you have a good reason why you do think this should be removed, then please tell me, I'd love to hear it.

[Dongra]

I'd just like to see people provide more reasoning behind some of the more ridiculous propositions.
I think you are asking for too much from them.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Exactly.

And by me calling them on their stupid ideas, my hope is that they may reexamine them and realize how stupid the ideas are. Will it happen? Mostly not, but I still get the fun of seeing them flip their shit over it.

[Dongra]

Unfortunately, people will most likely think of you as a prick when they witness your criticism. Hell, I get that vibe from some of your posts. Should you care? No. Will you care? I doubt it, but I understand where you are coming from.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

I am almost exclusively ornery, all the time.


On the Internet, at least. I so no reason not to be completely honest given anonymity.

[Nitro Vordex]

Sorry, but it should go without saying that anything posted in a topic like this is an opinion. I shouldn't need to say "this is just my opinion guys and it is ok if you disagree!!!!" in every post. And of course I think my opinions are more correct or more valid than alternatives, otherwise I wouldn't hold said opinions.

This is all very obvious and shouldn't need to be verbalized, ever.
If you ever said it was my opinion I'd probably actually have a reason to be pissed at you. That irritates me more than someone who doesn't state that.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

So you want me to present my opinion, making it abundantly clear that it is only my opinion, but without stating that it is my opinion.


Right, got it.

[Nitro Vordex]

Finally, someone understands.

[Arkios]

[1]More useful weapons that actually push to vary one's playstyle, a la TF2.
[2]Less joke or novelty rares. They're pretty. And they're fucking useless.
[3]The entire game should be solo-able to a reasonable degree.
[4]There must be a fair abundance of useful weapons, or ways to get one. Getting kicked out of games because you weren't lucky enough to find a good rare is not a valid definition of fun.
[5]Take out the material usage limit. Puh-lease.
[6]Allow a player to use any mag model regardless of stats, for cosmetic purposes.
[7]Techs should actually be useful.
[8]Ensure low-tier techs remain useful to a degree. Have low-tier do high point damage, and high-tier techs do low AOE damage.
[9]Fix the hit reaction. Getting knocked down was a blessing, and having a DEF that was too high actually rendered you easier to kill due to juggling.
[10]Allow the possibility of unranked community maps and areas. PSO had several dungeon layouts that could be easily reproducible using an editor.
[11]Move as much management server-side as possible. The client can never be trusted.
[12]A NPC should take up its own special NPC slot, not a player slot (see where I'm coming from here?)
[13]Fix code strategy to render negative-level techs impossible to perform.
[14]Greater variety of areas - PSO already had something good enough, just keep it coming.
[15]Stick to VHard. Ultimate wasn't challenging. It was an exercise in sheer frustration and cheapshot endurance.
[16]Similarly, stick to Level 100 and make it attainable in 80 hours of play.
[17]Document everything. I shouldn't have to learn by accident that mashing the Y button donates my PB charge to a teammate. What happened to the manual?
[18]Give the game host the ability to kick players.
[19]Give players a kickvote option.
[20]Give games a friends-only option.
[21]Challenge mode wasn't fun. Not by any stretch. It only served to breed rage. Get rid of it.
[22]Rare monsters should show up more often. Playing upwards of 750 hours without ever encountering a red slime is overkill.
[23]Introduce environmental dangers that are more natural-looking than crushing pillars in the middle of corridors.
[24]Introduce rooms that pose an environmental or mini-boss challenge that does not consist of simply killing everything in sight. For example: an automatic gun battery shoots at the players from a faraway position and can only be disabled by approaching it, using cover to shield oneself from incoming salvoes.
[25]Introduce gauntlet events where players are swarmed by several monsters that award little to no XP, with the horde stopping after a certain objective is accomplished.
[26]Monsters should not be entirely helpless if attacked by all players at once (hi Vol Opt!)


I'm just going to go through this list and number each response. I found probably 50% of these ideas to be horrible. I'm not going to lie, my first reaction to this post was sheer rage. So if you're a troll, congrats.

1) That goes without saying. I don't know how many more weapon types they could actually incorporate though. Perhaps just rebalance the ones that sucked in PSO?
2) They could always make these weapons... oh I dunno... not suck? I actually enjoyed running around with my Chameleon Staff slapping stuff.
3) Sure, in single-player/solo mode. It should not be soloable otherwise.
4) This must be a PSU complaint, since I've never seen that happen in a PSO game. Ever.
5) ... and replace it with what? Materials were awesome and I actually enjoyed them quite a bit. I just wish that some of the stats scaled better later on and remained useful.
6) I hate this idea with a passion. Leveling your mag and NOT knowing what cool new mag it was going to change into was awesome. I can see the push for allowing players to CHANGE the mag using mag cells, but that's not what it sounds like you are saying.
7) Uhmm... they are/were? I do agree they should scale better though.
8) Wut.
9) I agree, no argument there. I would actually prefer if they added multiple "taking damage" animations
10) I can stand behind this one as well, that sounds pretty cool so long as they don't allow people to drastically adjust the enemy count as well.
11) Yes. I agree. Cheating will absolutely ruin this game.
12) I don't know where you are going with this point.
13) I think that goes along with the client-side comment mentioned above.
14) Yes.
15) I don't know what the hell you are talking about. Ultimate was awesome. You get all of the same maps REVAMPED with new skins for enemies. I loved it.
16) Fuck you man, seriously fuck you. Don't turn PSO into a casual piece of crap game. It's always been a massive grindfest and it needs to stay that way. I should not be able to knock out a max level character in a week or two.
17) Fair enough.
18) NO, please NO. It should be a group kick or no kick at all. Too much power in one persons hands.
19) Yes, this I can agree with.
20) They already did that, it's called password games.
21) Clearly you had difficulty completing the only challenging part of PSO? LOL. Are you kidding me? Challenge Mode was one of the greatest parts of PSO, myself and several others loved it. Hell, there were players that EXCLUSIVELY played Challenge Mode and nothing else.
22) I agree, piping being the only reasonable way to get some rare drops was stupid. I also think more enemies should have rare variants.
23) OK. I don't see how that's fun, traps were always annoying, 100% of the time.
24) I'm indifferent.
25) Wut.
26) They shouldn't completely shrug off all your attacks though either.


About half of your ideas there already happened in PSU, so I don't think you'll have to worry about that.

I'd go through and offer my opinion on some of your ideas that I think are stupid, but apparently people don't like it when I stimulate discussion.

I'm happy to do it for you. :-)

[Dongra]

Challenge mode wasn't fun. Not by any stretch. It only served to breed rage. Get rid of it.
I really feel the need to let you know how much I disagree with this. To me, challenge mode was the purest form of PSO. It actually requires that you know how to play with a team and without broken weapons. Maybe you didn't like it because you don't know how to do it, but I learned how to play it and it is the most enjoyable experience PSO has to offer. Not to mention challenge mode served a purpose by not only providing an enjoyable experience but customizable weapons as well. If there is a mode that needs to be removed I would vote for battle mode which was so horribly imbalanced and implemented. If battle mode is going to make a return then it will need some major tweeking.

[Tetsaru]

More useful weapons that actually push to vary one's playstyle, a la TF2.
Less joke or novelty rares. They're pretty. And they're fucking useless.
The entire game should be solo-able to a reasonable degree.
There must be a fair abundance of useful weapons, or ways to get one. Getting kicked out of games because you weren't lucky enough to find a good rare is not a valid definition of fun.
Take out the material usage limit. Puh-lease.
Allow a player to use any mag model regardless of stats, for cosmetic purposes.
Techs should actually be useful.
Ensure low-tier techs remain useful to a degree. Have low-tier do high point damage, and high-tier techs do low AOE damage.
Fix the hit reaction. Getting knocked down was a blessing, and having a DEF that was too high actually rendered you easier to kill due to juggling.
Allow the possibility of unranked community maps and areas. PSO had several dungeon layouts that could be easily reproducible using an editor.
Move as much management server-side as possible. The client can never be trusted.
A NPC should take up its own special NPC slot, not a player slot (see where I'm coming from here?)
Fix code strategy to render negative-level techs impossible to perform.
Greater variety of areas - PSO already had something good enough, just keep it coming.
Stick to VHard. Ultimate wasn't challenging. It was an exercise in sheer frustration and cheapshot endurance.
Similarly, stick to Level 100 and make it attainable in 80 hours of play.
Document everything. I shouldn't have to learn by accident that mashing the Y button donates my PB charge to a teammate. What happened to the manual?
Give the game host the ability to kick players.
Give players a kickvote option.
Give games a friends-only option.
Challenge mode wasn't fun. Not by any stretch. It only served to breed rage. Get rid of it.
Rare monsters should show up more often. Playing upwards of 750 hours without ever encountering a red slime is overkill.
Introduce environmental dangers that are more natural-looking than crushing pillars in the middle of corridors.
Introduce rooms that pose an environmental or mini-boss challenge that does not consist of simply killing everything in sight. For example: an automatic gun battery shoots at the players from a faraway position and can only be disabled by approaching it, using cover to shield oneself from incoming salvoes.
Introduce gauntlet events where players are swarmed by several monsters that award little to no XP, with the horde stopping after a certain objective is accomplished.
Monsters should not be entirely helpless if attacked by all players at once (hi Vol Opt!)


Guess I'll add my thoughts as well:

1 - Sure, of course. I listed my ideas for classes in this post, (http://www.pso-world.com/forums/showpost.php?p=2586950&postcount=29) and it mentions things about how different playstyles would automatically unlock classes to fit them.
2 - I would be okay with these if they were lower rank/tier than the really hard-to-find/really good weapons. They could be used for alternate characters, and be stronger than the weapons you would normally find at low levels, for example.
3 - I feel that there should be plenty of solo-able areas, but not the whole game. Some missions need to be difficult and challenging enough that you would NEED a full party to beat it. Kinda distracts from the concept of "online game" if you don't play with other people...
4 - To me, this sounds more like something that would've happened on FF11 rather than PSO/PSU... I guess it just depends on the community.
5 - Maybe raise the caps a bit from what PSO had, but don't eliminate them completely. Having practically infinite stats would break the game, especially if there was ever another duping bug...
6 - Perhaps if there were items you could buy to change it, such as Mag Cells, or something similar to PSU's EX Devices or whatever they were called. Better yet, possibly have "Mag Workshop" located somewhere in the game world, where people could design their own cosmetic Mag designs, or just have a separate customization option for it when you make your character or something. Feeding them to change their stats should stay the same, though.
7 - Of course, lol.
8 - Techs should do more than just damage and status effects, imo; each needs to be unique in some way. Here's some ideas I had on how I thought they should work. (http://www.pso-world.com/forums/showpost.php?p=2585278&postcount=64)
9 - Yeah, I could see that as a potential problem. In PSU, it seemed like certain enemy attacks would knock you down/back regardless of how much damage it did, so I guess they should just stick to that.
10 - Sounds kinda like that "create a mission" idea that was going around the PSP2I thread a while back, iirc. Might be kinda interesting, but there would need to be ways to prevent it from possibly being exploitable (spawning a bunch of weak enemies with high exp/rare drop rates, etc.)
11 - Definitely.
12 - I agree with this. I remember quite a few instances on PSU when I couldn't join a party because some asshole wouldn't get rid of his PM... oh, and for God's sake, fix the AI on those things, geez.
13 - Negative level techs....?? Must be some glitch that I'm not familiar with...
14 - Certainly. And no reskins of maps!
15 - That just sounds like a balancing issue to me. Some missions/difficulties need to be brutal though, and have appropriate drops/rewards for those who are skilled enough to finish them. If you don't like them or can't handle them... just don't do them, lol.
16 - That... sounds waaaay too easy. I thought it was rather easy to level up in PSU... well, post-AotI, anyway...
17 - Yeah, I can agree with that. Of course, I tend to read a lot of online guides for games like this...
18 - I'd have to say make it a team vote on who to boot. If you don't want someone in your party, just lock it beforehand, or blacklist/report them if they're causing any serious issues.
19 - See above.
20 - With passwords and guild cards, this is easy enough to do. I guess they could add a private/public slot option for parties though, if you really wanted to nitpick.
21 - Wut. I thought it was cool, and I'm sure most other people on these boards would agree with me. Again, if you don't like it, don't play it. It's always better to provide options for people rather than to force them into a particular playstyle.
22 - Maybe not THAT rare, but they still need to be pretty rare. Makes it all the more exciting when you finally DO find one. Stuff like that shouldn't be intentionally hunted for imo, because that takes the fun out of the game, doing the same thing over and over again with no results until you're just sick of it.
23 - I'd be fine with levels having environmental hazards: falling rocks, lava pits, places where you could swim(!) and potentially drown, etc. Hell, throw in some platforming elements where you can actually jump around and climb and what-not, instead of being stuck on the ground all the time. I could see how Traps could be annoying if you played a non-CAST character, though.
24 - YES. I hated how most missions were simply "zerg rush through everything to win." Throw some strategy in with the action.
25 - Hmm, an endurance-style mission would be cool: kill off as many monsters as you can, and the game only ends when you die or survive so many waves. You then get rewards based on how many kills you got.
26 - I agree. It seemed like larger monsters with multiple hitboxes often got ridiculously easy because the hitboxes essentially served as a damage multiplier for certain weapons and techs.

[jayster]

Let us have splitscreen offline again. It'd be even more amazing if we could have splitscreen online as well.

[Arkios]

Let us have splitscreen offline again. It'd be even more amazing if we could have splitscreen online as well.

I hate the offline idea, just because it makes it easier for cheating to make it's way online.

I do think the dual screen online option would be cool if they port the game to console.

[KodiaX987]

Oooh, passion and emotions abound! It's like I'm back on the Steam forums already.


I could nitpick at the others, but this is the only one I really disagree with. Materials should be for customizing your character, rather than just blindly pumping up stats as high as possible. That's just my take, though. If you have a good reason why you do think this should be removed, then please tell me, I'd love to hear it.

I'm personally of the stat-pumper crowd, so it boils down to personal preference. I don't necessarily have a problem with not being able to max everything out, but I tend to prefer situations when I can max everything out.


1) That goes without saying. I don't know how many more weapon types they could actually incorporate though. Perhaps just rebalance the ones that sucked in PSO?
Good examples in that venue were things like, say, the Lavis Cannon, or the Inferno Bazooka. The basic motion was the same, but it introduced some sort of tradeoff that you may or may not find suitable to your tastes. This is why I mention TF2 for that one since almost all the alternate weapons serve exactly this purpose, so it's an easy thing to reference.


2) They could always make these weapons... oh I dunno... not suck? I actually enjoyed running around with my Chameleon Staff slapping stuff.

2 - I would be okay with these if they were lower rank/tier than the really hard-to-find/really good weapons. They could be used for alternate characters, and be stronger than the weapons you would normally find at low levels, for example.
The not-sucking solution is the easiest one of course, though what I got as an impression was that the fancier weapons had been intended as nothing more than novelty. So, you have this nice-looking piece of hardware that you will never use, because such-or-such other sword is better in almost all situations.


3) Sure, in single-player/solo mode. It should not be soloable otherwise.

3 - I feel that there should be plenty of solo-able areas, but not the whole game. Some missions need to be difficult and challenging enough that you would NEED a full party to beat it. Kinda distracts from the concept of "online game" if you don't play with other people...
One reason why I mention full solo is because sometimes, no one you know is online, and you are waiting for your game to fill with pubs. Similarly, I have gotten shafted in the past, in online games that require a team of so-or-so people to do whichever dungeon, except said game was on the downhill and all of a sudden you had a hard time finding suitable people to play said dungeon. Worse, some games had sections that you simply couldn't do offline, at all. This has left a bitter taste in my mouth.


4) This must be a PSU complaint, since I've never seen that happen in a PSO game. Ever.

4 - To me, this sounds more like something that would've happened on FF11 rather than PSO/PSU... I guess it just depends on the community.
I've gotten the treatment, especially on BB. I recall one particular instance where all I had going for myself was a Wals MK2. Not even my own finding - someone else had given it to me. I was told to leave games since that weapon was not powerful enough and it was the best I had on hand. At the mention of this, I was told to trade for something better. Yeah, great idea - but with what?


6) I hate this idea with a passion. Leveling your mag and NOT knowing what cool new mag it was going to change into was awesome. I can see the push for allowing players to CHANGE the mag using mag cells, but that's not what it sounds like you are saying.
That one stems from me ending up with pretty much every hunter/ranger character I had on PSO find itself with a Kama at the end game. At this state, I could use some visual variety. Simply switch the mag color and model. The special abilities and PB don't need to follow up.


8 - Techs should do more than just damage and status effects, imo; each needs to be unique in some way. Here's some ideas I had on how I thought they should work. (http://www.pso-world.com/forums/showpost.php?p=2585278&postcount=64)
That's what I'm aiming for too. I find it sad that once you get a hold of Rafoie, then Foie and Gifoie cease to have a raison d'etre.


10) I can stand behind this one as well, that sounds pretty cool so long as they don't allow people to drastically adjust the enemy count as well.

10 - Sounds kinda like that "create a mission" idea that was going around the PSP2I thread a while back, iirc. Might be kinda interesting, but there would need to be ways to prevent it from possibly being exploitable (spawning a bunch of weak enemies with high exp/rare drop rates, etc.)
This is why I took care to mention "unranked", since otherwise you end up with that special mission thing they had going on Schtak where you killed untold amounts of enemies for 10 straight minutes in a small room - or endless TTF runs. All this just to farm XP. And what I look for is not a XP farm but a way to design potentially interesting and fun areas. No XP gain means the interest here is in the dungeon itself being fun to play, without focusing on the mindless butchery.


12) I don't know where you are going with this point.
The NPC-using-a-player slot was an exploitable flaw in the first PSO game, that could cause someone to permanently transform you into a level 5 NPC.


13 - Negative level techs....?? Must be some glitch that I'm not familiar with...
This was another exploitable flaw, where it was possible to have Resta Lv.-1. This caused you to cast a tech that healed a large amount of negative HP, instantly killing yourself and all your teammates in range.


15 - That just sounds like a balancing issue to me. Some missions/difficulties need to be brutal though, and have appropriate drops/rewards for those who are skilled enough to finish them. If you don't like them or can't handle them... just don't do them, lol.
There's a really fine line between brutally challenging, and frustrating. Super Meat Boy was brutally challenging. PSO was more frustrating than that. In the latter, deaths felt cheap and unearned. Several times, you did not feel like you'd screwed up, as much as you'd somehow caught a bad luck spell and gotten juggled to death by a sick twist of fate. Some aspects of late-game PSO and several monsters in Ultimate did not make you feel like you had committed a honest play error, but rather that you'd been cheated out somewhere along the line with little recourse. Finishing a dungeon did not mean 'Yes we did it!' as much as 'We got lucky enough this time.' Naturally I speak strictly of the gameplay elements. The area reskin is another matter entirely.


16) Fuck you man, seriously fuck you.
Thanks! :)


Don't turn PSO into a casual piece of crap game. It's always been a massive grindfest and it needs to stay that way. I should not be able to knock out a max level character in a week or two.
See, I don't equate 'grindfest' with fun. Some games can pull off the there-is-no-maxing-out concept, but it doesn't seem to fit into the PSO universe. Something's amiss and I can't really put my finger on it. Nonetheless, I felt the lower level cap and lower overall difficulty gave the game a pick-up-and-play quality that it doesn't have anymore. On BB, I played not so much for fun, but more to attempt to catch up to my friends who were playing - only, I'd come in at a later time and was a paltry level 10 peashooter while they were enjoying Lv.150 runs. And I was locked out of it all unless I spent hours farming XP.

Plus, there is the whole relationship balance between difficulty, character power and weaponry that makes a direct comparison between PSOv1 and PSO:BB feel like night and day. The former is relatively easy. It allows you to screw around without taking things too seriously, and this reflected into the playerbase mood. The latter was much more hardcore in its endgame, which bred a nasty playerbase that first was much more restrictive and prone to anger and rage, and operated by the twisted self-reinforcing principle of "if you can't stand the heat, then get out of the kitchen" in some attempt to justify them acting like assholes. There is no help, there is no compassion - there's only a desire to perform and whoever does not perform is given the boot. I don't go online after work hours to get treated like a little piece of shit!


20) They already did that, it's called password games.

20 - With passwords and guild cards, this is easy enough to do. I guess they could add a private/public slot option for parties though, if you really wanted to nitpick.
This is a wish stemming from L4D2, which had the option to make friends-only game. In PSO, it would take out the need to reply to messages or create passworded games. Though passworded games do the job well, I feel friends-only games can do the job even better - so hey, why not?


21) Clearly you had difficulty completing the only challenging part of PSO? LOL. Are you kidding me? Challenge Mode was one of the greatest parts of PSO, myself and several others loved it. Hell, there were players that EXCLUSIVELY played Challenge Mode and nothing else.

21 - Wut. I thought it was cool, and I'm sure most other people on these boards would agree with me. Again, if you don't like it, don't play it. It's always better to provide options for people rather than to force them into a particular playstyle.
My experience with Challenge Mode was largely negative, and the bulk of it stemmed from playerbase behavior explained a little earlier. Only, mistakes were punished even more harshly than in the remainder of the game. If nothing else, I was expected to have a FAQ sheet handy for the mission and know the script by heart. In retrospect, I was not in the right game mode for my personal playstyle, but I felt that the mood bled into the rest of the game and polluted the general, ongoing mindset. Again, the game had gone from easygoing to sheer performance, and I did not agree with that direction.

I don't disagree with the concept of playing as a team, far from it. Between friends, it can make for some great moments. But I place it in the same spot as L4D2's Expert Mode: a small mistake can cost you the game, and whoever has the misfortune of doing it has everyone else on him like a ton of bricks. It's... not a really good mood to play in. I worry less about the game getting thrown and more about if I'll be the one blowing it.

If your friends are missing that night, you are also effectively screwed. The majority of players in any online game quite simply do not grasp the concept of teamwork. In some games, monsters are designed specifically to destroy anyone who wanders off from the group, yet public players keep doing it with unprecedented bravado, which is a truly puzzling way of playing.


23) OK. I don't see how that's fun, traps were always annoying, 100% of the time.

23 - I'd be fine with levels having environmental hazards: falling rocks, lava pits, places where you could swim(!) and potentially drown, etc. Hell, throw in some platforming elements where you can actually jump around and climb and what-not, instead of being stuck on the ground all the time. I could see how Traps could be annoying if you played a non-CAST character, though.
Traps were frustrating; I'd rather do away with them. I would like to keep visible environmental hazards though, just in a way that seems to fit with the level, and that pushes you to approach some battle situations differently. Suppose a volcano level where a part of the room consists of semi-molten rock, which will damage you if you walk into it. Or, automated machinery that poses a body hazard and into which you could potentially knock monsters. Things like that.


25) Wut.
I'll put in a video, which best explains what I mean. I directly reference L4D2.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxmteCC9uAQ

This is the longest gauntlet in the game and the final chapter of a campaign. In this one, the team must reach the other side of a bridge. The zombie spawns are infinite. There is no holding out in a safespot and wait for the horde to end. The players must bulldoze their way through.

To a degree, this was also done in Call of Duty 4 in a much clumsier way. I feel L4D2 did it just right. It's both implied and explained that you have to go forward. Either to hit a switch, or reach a rescue vehicle, or blow something up.


26) They shouldn't completely shrug off all your attacks though either.

26 - I agree. It seemed like larger monsters with multiple hitboxes often got ridiculously easy because the hitboxes essentially served as a damage multiplier for certain weapons and techs.
That's why most bosses can be prime targets for tweaks in that regard. Some bosses completely ignored attacks. Others, like Vol Opt, got stunned by anything and everything, making it unresponsive and extremely easy to fight. Somewhere between the two extremes is a sweet spot where a fair combo is rewarded with a stun and the possibility to perform more damage, and where the monster in question will have moments where it's bolstered or shielded in some way (interpret this liberally) or where attacking is unwise. I also enjoyed monsters/bosses that shifted battle conditions - for example, De Rol Le, where you had both opportunities to shoot, and opportunities to use close range combat. Not to mention the abundance of target spots and the collapsible shield - and I'm a sucker for bosses the hero disassembles piece by piece like in old-school schmups!

[Tetsaru]

See, I don't equate 'grindfest' with fun. Some games can pull off the there-is-no-maxing-out concept, but it doesn't seem to fit into the PSO universe. Something's amiss and I can't really put my finger on it. Nonetheless, I felt the lower level cap and lower overall difficulty gave the game a pick-up-and-play quality that it doesn't have anymore. On BB, I played not so much for fun, but more to attempt to catch up to my friends who were playing - only, I'd come in at a later time and was a paltry level 10 peashooter while they were enjoying Lv.150 runs. And I was locked out of it all unless I spent hours farming XP.

Well sure, no one likes a long grindfest, but at the same time, some people find it much more fulfilling when they work hard towards hitting that next level so they can take on a new area or hunt for better items, instead of having everything practically handed to them on a silver platter (I felt like PSU did this a lot after AotI: too much meseta in circulation, Scape Dolls can be bought at every corner, mission rewards became horribly unbalanced, etc.). On the other hand, I understand that people have lives outside of gaming, and may not have as much time to play and level up as people who, well.... don't have lives, lol.

FFXI's Level Sync system was, imo, the best solution to this. It allowed everyone in a party to temporarily adjust their level down to match a certain person, without forcing them to unequip their gear in the process. Instead, the stats of your gear were also scaled down in proportion to whatever level you synced to. All of you would gain experience at the same rate, but iirc you could only use abilities up to the level you were synced to (for example, if you were synced to level 20, but you learned Firaga at level 30, you couldn't use Firaga), so it prevented you from having an advantage over whoever was being synced to. If PSO2 could incorporate a similar system, especially if they also incorporate that "reincarnation" mechanic that was in PSP2I, it would literally allow anyone to play with anyone, while still keeping a purpose for leveling up in general (new items and abilities, etc.).


Plus, there is the whole relationship balance between difficulty, character power and weaponry that makes a direct comparison between PSOv1 and PSO:BB feel like night and day. The former is relatively easy. It allows you to screw around without taking things too seriously, and this reflected into the playerbase mood. The latter was much more hardcore in its endgame, which bred a nasty playerbase that first was much more restrictive and prone to anger and rage, and operated by the twisted self-reinforcing principle of "if you can't stand the heat, then get out of the kitchen" in some attempt to justify them acting like assholes. There is no help, there is no compassion - there's only a desire to perform and whoever does not perform is given the boot. I don't go online after work hours to get treated like a little piece of shit!

Ehh, I think this happens with every online game, to a certain degree. I've always found it best to stick to playing with your friends, or find like-minded people and make new friends. :) Or, just solo if you need some "me" time, but I've always had more fun playing alongside others (unless of course they were total assholes/noobs).

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Ok, well since everyone else is doing it, I might as well join in:
More useful weapons that actually push to vary one's playstyle, a la TF2.Not really sure what to say about this. Additional variation in weapons is always appreciated, and PSU was severely lacking in this regard.

Less joke or novelty rares. They're pretty. And they're fucking useless.As long as they don't clutter up drop charts at the cost of decent drops, it doesn't really matter. Just don't use them.

The entire game should be solo-able to a reasonable degree.I kind of agree here, but I think PSO handled this is a reasonable way, with having the separate solo mode with slightly reduced difficulty. That way, everything is soloable, but without it taking forever (vanilla PSU) or making everything pathetically easy in a team (AotI).

There must be a fair abundance of useful weapons, or ways to get one. Getting kicked out of games because you weren't lucky enough to find a good rare is not a valid definition of fun.Yes to the first point. About getting kicked (you couldn't get kicked in PSO, so not really sure where you were going with that) for not having good rares, well, you probably didn't want to play with those jerks anyway.

Take out the material usage limit. Puh-lease.No. In fact, no materials at all. Instead, have stat customization use a system like GAS in PSU or the system in PSP2. Meaning, accumulate points from missions and stuff, then spend those points to increase certain stats. Furthermore, these stats boosts would be reversible, so you don't permanently screw yourself by picking a crappy distribution. There would need to be a cap on the total number of stat boosts you could have active at one point. Otherwise, any attempts at balance would be woefully unsuccessful.

Allow a player to use any mag model regardless of stats, for cosmetic purposes.I'd actually rather not have MAGs at all, as they were broken beyond belief in PSO. I think I've said before that there should be a level requirement for equipping a MAG, something like half the MAG's level. Anyway, that's all beside the point. Changing the MAG's appearance through some customization system is fine, within reason, though.

Techs should actually be useful.
Ensure low-tier techs remain useful to a degree. Have low-tier do high point damage, and high-tier techs do low AOE damage.This was more or less fixed in PSU, though there is still obviously a lot of room for improvement in this area.

Fix the hit reaction. Getting knocked down was a blessing, and having a DEF that was too high actually rendered you easier to kill due to juggling.They fixed this in PSU (having high enough defense makes hits do little to no damage), but created another problem. Blocking was based on your evasion, and it would interrupt your PAs and combos. Basically, having high evasion was a disadvantage. Anyway, yeah, fix obnoxious things like that.

Allow the possibility of unranked community maps and areas. PSO had several dungeon layouts that could be easily reproducible using an editor.Still not really sure what you mean by this, but in general, more missions and more variety is never a bad thing.

Move as much management server-side as possible. The client can never be trusted. This cannot be stressed enough.

A NPC should take up its own special NPC slot, not a player slot (see where I'm coming from here?)
Fix code strategy to render negative-level techs impossible to perform.These issues have not existed since the earliest versions of PSO. I don't think you need to worry about them.

Greater variety of areas - PSO already had something good enough, just keep it coming.Again, the more variety the better. No one is going to disagree with that.

Stick to VHard. Ultimate wasn't challenging. It was an exercise in sheer frustration and cheapshot endurance.See my thoughts on the previous page regarding difficulty versus tedium.

Similarly, stick to Level 100 and make it attainable in 80 hours of play.No, absolutely not. In my opinion, leveling was one of the things PSO got very, very right. Shortly after level 100, you have all the stats and most likely enough weaponry to be able to tackle everything in the game (at least in a party). From there until 200, the stat gains were largely trivial, and your level was more of a status/bragging rights sort of thing. Getting to 200 was a feat very few would ever accomplish, and achieving it gave a sense of accomplishment.

Having a low level cap that is reached quickly is a bad idea, because it makes the lack of "endgame" content painfully obvious. PSU was chronically plagued by this problem. They would increase the level cap by ten once every three or four months, and most players would hit the new cap within a week or two, leaving them with nothing to do for the rest of the time.

Document everything. I shouldn't have to learn by accident that mashing the Y button donates my PB charge to a teammate. What happened to the manual?They've been terrible with documenting all the features in this series. While it would obviously be preferable for them to tell us everything up front, it isn't too big an issue for me if they do not. There will always be communities more than willing to document things.

Give the game host the ability to kick players.
Give players a kickvote option.
Give games a friends-only option.The first option was implemented in PSU, and it was fine. Some people abused it, but I never had an issue with that, and I do not think a party vote kick would be a good idea. If you do not trust someone enough not to boot you, simply do not join his party; make your own.

As for the friends only thing, the password system always worked well enough for me. I can see how a friends only option might be more convenient, but I don't see it as necessary by any means.

Challenge mode wasn't fun. Not by any stretch. It only served to breed rage. Get rid of it.They did not have it in PSU, and it has been sorely missed. Challenge mode was a completely separate mode with literally zero impact on the main game, so you could simply never play it if you did not like it.

That said, I fucking loved challenge mode, as it was the only thing in this series that required any semblance of teamwork and strategy. Of course people were going to expect you to know what you were doing, because there was very little room for error. That said, if you had asked around, I think you may have found some people willing to take time and walk you through the basics and get you up to speed on the challenge levels. Lord knows I never would have known what to do if someone hadn't given me a lot of tips.

Anyway, the mode I would get rid of would be battle mode, as it was a completely unbalanced mess that only dragged the community down into hyper-competitive infighting in what should be a purely cooperative game.

Rare monsters should show up more often. Playing upwards of 750 hours without ever encountering a red slime is overkill.Some higher encounter rates would be welcome, sure.

Introduce environmental dangers that are more natural-looking than crushing pillars in the middle of corridors.
Introduce rooms that pose an environmental or mini-boss challenge that does not consist of simply killing everything in sight. For example: an automatic gun battery shoots at the players from a faraway position and can only be disabled by approaching it, using cover to shield oneself from incoming salvoes.
Introduce gauntlet events where players are swarmed by several monsters that award little to no XP, with the horde stopping after a certain objective is accomplished.Again, variety in missions is always welcome, as long as it is well implemented and not frustrating or pointless.

Monsters should not be entirely helpless if attacked by all players at once (hi Vol Opt!)Yeah, there's no way a boss should be able to be stun-locked. Again, balance is paramount.

[イーマー]

-Character creation as good as, but perferably better than PSP2i
-MAGs
-Exploring
-No generic empty dungeons like PSU (If this is an HQ...Where are the desks, hallway doors, security room, wreck room, etc????? Design some maps like they were lobbies! Playing PSU online, i saw lobbies that would be much cooler to fight in than those generic passage ways...)
-Make running around and etc feel more natural. PSU-PSP2i just doesnt feel natural when moving around. It doesn't give me the feeling of natural movement like Kingdomhearts does. Feels like you're air running.
-PAs/whatever similar
-Vehicles (Better than PSU's promise...)
-Missions being more interesting and realistic than just kill everything and keep going...
-Paralyze shouldnt prevent you from healing T^T
-Maybe have monsters as pets/comrades? xD
-If I unlocked missions/clothes on one character, dont force me to do it again for my other characters...
-Fighting bare handed (I liked that in PSO xP)
-Make the game a bit more forgiving? I don't really like the whole one mistake and you're dead thing going on in PSP2-2i, but i guess it isnt too much of a problem.
-Secret bosses that are HARD AS HELLZ

[Wayu]

^

In PSP2 and Infinity everyone is apparently absurdly flexible. Take a close look at how far the legs kick back when running.

Secret boss = Heaven's Mother. Sorta.

-Wayu

[FluffyFox]

Treat non-JP players as good as JP players. for reals :/

[NoiseHERO]

-Character creation as good as, but perferably better than PSP2i
-MAGs
-Exploring
-No generic empty dungeons like PSU (If this is an HQ...Where are the desks, hallway doors, security room, wreck room, etc????? Design some maps like they were lobbies! Playing PSU online, i saw lobbies that would be much cooler to fight in than those generic passage ways...)
-Make running around and etc feel more natural. PSU-PSP2i just doesnt feel natural when moving around. It doesn't give me the feeling of natural movement like Kingdomhearts does. Feels like you're air running.
-PAs/whatever similar
-Vehicles (Better than PSU's promise...)
-Missions being more interesting and realistic than just kill everything and keep going...
-Paralyze shouldnt prevent you from healing T^T
-Maybe have monsters as pets/comrades? xD
-If I unlocked missions/clothes on one character, dont force me to do it again for my other characters...
-Fighting bare handed (I liked that in PSO xP)
-Make the game a bit more forgiving? I don't really like the whole one mistake and you're dead thing going on in PSP2-2i, but i guess it isnt too much of a problem.
-Secret bosses that are HARD AS HELLZ

Yes

I definitely agree with running and exploration.

But I think the reason lobby's looked better than actual missions...(aside from us only having crappy free missions and PSU being an abortion) was so that they could play their map shape pattern trick...It's even more sad to the point where...

It's failure to reskin a monster, but to reskin an entire mission??

and running...I couldn't stand how there were like 20 something weapons... and when you ran around holding them, there was only like 4 different running animations...at least Greatswords and Twinswords deserved better. Though from what I've seen they look a lot better in PSPo2 but still kinda lame.

[lostinseganet]

-Pso running on the Serious engine "Serious Sam 3" Having 16 player coop would be bliss.
-Character customs is currently great, but girls want some serious outfits like the guys. Can't be serious in a three piece suit with under boob.
-Do something other than kill stuff. I loved the carnival in pso.
-Give players three upgradable floors and an outside for their rooms.

[KodiaX987]

three piece suit with under boob.

You speak madness. This is as serious as it can get. :D

[Zyrusticae]

-Pso running on the Serious engine "Serious Sam 3" Having 16 player coop would be bliss.
It'd also be pure, unadulterated madness.

Fun, but definitely not for the core game. A "MADNESS MODE" where you have a massive arena full of 16 players fighting huge numbers of mobs sounds like great fun! Just not as the core game.

[Arkios]

I feel like I need to reiterate the fact that I abhor some of these ideas. Don't get me wrong, some of the ideas in this thread have been pretty cool... but some are so off the wall.

I'm not going to call out anyone or anything specific, but some of these ideas are the equivalent of wishing that Burger King would sell Sushi, Tacos and Lasagna. A game should stick to what it does best and build upon that. Throwing random crap into the game for no reason is retarded.

[KodiaX987]

I feel like I need to reiterate the fact that I abhor some of these ideas. Don't get me wrong, some of the ideas in this thread have been pretty cool... but some are so off the wall.

I'm not going to call out anyone or anything specific, but some of these ideas are the equivalent of wishing that Burger King would sell Sushi, Tacos and Lasagna. A game should stick to what it does best and build upon that. Throwing random crap into the game for no reason is retarded.

Your complaint has been duly noted and forwarded to the relevant departments. As per your request, the blue copy shall be returned to you by mail and should arrive at your home address within five business days. :)

[NoiseHERO]

I feel like I need to reiterate the fact that I abhor some of these ideas. Don't get me wrong, some of the ideas in this thread have been pretty cool... but some are so off the wall.

I'm not going to call out anyone or anything specific, but some of these ideas are the equivalent of wishing that Burger King would sell Sushi, Tacos and Lasagna. A game should stick to what it does best and build upon that. Throwing random crap into the game for no reason is retarded.

Doesn't jack in the box sell tacos...

and pizzahut sells chicken AND pasta? @_@

Things might sound off the wall, but maybe it just means people don't want this game to be like pokemon e_e...expanded clones of it's former self.

Plus this IS the wishing thread.

[ChronoTrigga]

Day/Night Cycles (With Different Monsters coming out during each times)
Weather Cycles
Actual updates that include new areas/possible planets
US Support that doesn't rely on Japanese say so.
The ability to jump.
Platforming levels with climbing, etc.
Real puzzles, not none of that step on this button here, and that button over there type shit.

[NoiseHERO]

Day/Night Cycles (With Different Monsters coming out during each times)
Weather Cycles
Actual updates that include new areas/possible planets
US Support that doesn't rely on Japanese say so.
The ability to jump.
Platforming levels with climbing, etc.
Real puzzles, not none of that step on this button here, and that button over there type shit.

!!!

That IS one thing that always bugged me!

No day/night cycles. e_e

weather is a meh, maybe

[DragonStriker]

I would like to see more people who pretend to be NPCs in PSO2.

[landman]

Buying items from an "ebay-like" shop, instead of going to the shop, at least put it as an option because the shop search in AOTI was greatly improved.

"Exchange trade", instead of putting a price in currency, you can put an item/s in exchange of your item. All variable values should be an option in the trade (element, if any, percentage, if any, whatever). You should be able too search by item you want, or items people want in exchange.

"buying items" option, you put a price you will pay, and the quantity limit if any, and anyone accepting the price sells it to you and gets instant money (I saw this on EVE and thought it was awesome, in fact, any MMO game should look at EVE's economy and take example)

Variable weather and time in both "areas" and "towns". In pso only the Central Dome had rain, in PSU it was only in one of Onmagoughs fight (if I remember correctly)

More customizable rooms / houses / ships, with the ability to use the same house with all your characters, or party / guild / clan members, or set a town / base camp / station with all the houses accessible in the same area, using some editor at the level of... can't remember the name of the game, something "cloud" for PS2, choosing the landscape, and the distribution of the houses.


And I will stop here my ration of wishful thoughts...

[NoiseHERO]

Depending on how they make a travel system between all the planets, it would be cool if we had our own ships that would double as "My Rooms" but with added functions and of course possibly missions, starfox-like or minigame-like.

[ChronoTrigga]

Depending on how they make a travel system between all the planets, it would be cool if we had our own ships that would double as "My Rooms" but with added functions and of course possibly missions, starfox-like or minigame-like.

Oh my fucking god that would be the best fucking minigame ever. A starfox-like travel system between planets instead of a cutscene. Kind of like Kingdom Hearts with the gummi ships. Only 10x better because it would be like Descent or Eve Online. :O :O :O :O *Head explodes*

[Zyrusticae]

Only 10x better because it would be like Descent or Eve Online. :O :O :O :O *Head explodes*
....No. ಠ_ಠ

[NoiseHERO]

Descent was awesome, whaddaya mean no. D:

Eve was kinda slow for me though...

[Randomness]

Buying items from an "ebay-like" shop, instead of going to the shop, at least put it as an option because the shop search in AOTI was greatly improved.

"Exchange trade", instead of putting a price in currency, you can put an item/s in exchange of your item. All variable values should be an option in the trade (element, if any, percentage, if any, whatever). You should be able too search by item you want, or items people want in exchange.

"buying items" option, you put a price you will pay, and the quantity limit if any, and anyone accepting the price sells it to you and gets instant money (I saw this on EVE and thought it was awesome, in fact, any MMO game should look at EVE's economy and take example)

Variable weather and time in both "areas" and "towns". In pso only the Central Dome had rain, in PSU it was only in one of Onmagoughs fight (if I remember correctly)

More customizable rooms / houses / ships, with the ability to use the same house with all your characters, or party / guild / clan members, or set a town / base camp / station with all the houses accessible in the same area, using some editor at the level of... can't remember the name of the game, something "cloud" for PS2, choosing the landscape, and the distribution of the houses.


And I will stop here my ration of wishful thoughts...

In PSO Ep 1, everything except forest was underground. So no weather is a duh.

[landman]

And Episode 1 is one third of the full game.

[Tetsaru]

In PSO Ep 1, everything except forest was underground. So no weather is a duh.

Well, that does make sense, but I still feel like it would be cool to implement weather effects wherever appropriate... something like what FF11 had. You could have really sunny days, rain, strong winds... hell, even sandstorms, earthquakes, and auroras. You could also have different level strengths of each one (rain/thunderstorm/hurricane), with the really strong ones being extremely rare and providing certain effects, such as "25% extra damage to lightning spells when in a thunderstorm," or "a chance to see a rare enemy that only spawns in a hurricane," etc.

High-level Forces could also have access to spells that can cause basic-level localized weather effects that could do various things. For example, if enough Forces used the same weather effect spell while there was a thunderstorm in effect, it might grow stronger into a hurricane. I think they would need a very high TP/PP cost and a long cooldown though, to avoid being too broken (once every 15 minutes, or use only as a Photon Blast - Newman racial ability, perhaps?). Wouldn't want to be able to spawn rare monsters at will...

[Randomness]

Well, that does make sense, but I still feel like it would be cool to implement weather effects wherever appropriate... something like what FF11 had. You could have really sunny days, rain, strong winds... hell, even sandstorms, earthquakes, and auroras. You could also have different level strengths of each one (rain/thunderstorm/hurricane), with the really strong ones being extremely rare and providing certain effects, such as "25% extra damage to lightning spells when in a thunderstorm," or "a chance to see a rare enemy that only spawns in a hurricane," etc.

High-level Forces could also have access to spells that can cause basic-level localized weather effects that could do various things. For example, if enough Forces used the same weather effect spell while there was a thunderstorm in effect, it might grow stronger into a hurricane. I think they would need a very high TP/PP cost and a long cooldown though, to avoid being too broken (once every 15 minutes, or use only as a Photon Blast - Newman racial ability, perhaps?). Wouldn't want to be able to spawn rare monsters at will...

Summoning up a thunderstorm sounds like a fun racial super, I'll give you that. I mean, it would basically be a hail of Zonde. Lots and lots of Zonde. Then for fire we could have literal fire and brimstone (its raining Foie), blizzards, and such. Basically, things that amount to a long-term, sustained, random swarm of something. Ice could actually be an avalanche type deal.

I liked casts using giant super weaponry as their "photon blast" in PSU, and would not be against it returning.

I suppose for racial specials, I'd do something like:
Newmans: Long-duration, sustained tech spams. (Mostly over a giant area)
Casts:Short-duration high damage weapon bursts (Varying range)
Humans: Some kind of super-mode, an adrenaline rush deal. Zero PP consumption, high boost to action speed, basically.

If beasts come back, they need to rework nanoblasts to not completely wreck your damage. I'd redo it as having weapons transform along with you (to generic nanoblasted forms), and then you get a massive spike to all stats for the duration. (Living bio-weapon form sort of, where the weapon is integrated into the body)

[NoiseHERO]

That would be a little troublesome to implement unless it only affected certain mission, but then it would just be random weather in small missions...

If the game was designed so that it could affect a whole server...I could only imagine people abusing it to annoy other players with lag or anything similar.

[Zyrusticae]

Descent was awesome, whaddaya mean no. D:

Eve was kinda slow for me though...
I mean that kind of gameplay is most certainly not suited to a game like PSO.

Not to mention it'd suck up already-limited development resources etc.

Nice to have, maybe as an extra post-release content, but either it is a game unto itself or it's completely superfluous extra content that nobody uses. The latter is far more likely (especially knowing Sega).

[NoiseHERO]

I'm sure it can't be THAT limited...it's more dependent on how creative sega plans to be with the game...

But as you say knowing sega, It's extremely doubtable.

Just saying though... I want my own bachelor pad space battleship fighter thingy! e_e

*cough*


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjli3hj0ZkM

*cough*

[Kylie]

I want to see more customization options or at least the same as PSU--I think that's one area PSU excelled. I'd also like to see a working guild/legion function. More balanced combat, more variety in classes... I think PSU was full of golden ideas, just implemented wrong.

[Randomness]

I want to see more customization options or at least the same as PSU--I think that's one area PSU excelled. I'd also like to see a working guild/legion function. More balanced combat, more variety in classes... I think PSU was full of golden ideas, just implemented wrong.

PSP2 was well done overall, except that tech costs were too high for forces. Impossible to cast a bunch of big stuff in a row, and the chain system was not really designed for a class built around lots of big explosions. On the other hand, hunter and ranger gameplay worked great.

[NoiseHERO]

LOL Guilds...

A guild system might be fun... But the politics and drama it would add to the community with might be extremely annoying...Including things like idiots running around spamming *insert the badly thought of name of the most known and populated guild on the server* while they take up space and spread their idiocy. and guild leaders/co-leaders fueled with extra self E-peen enhancing elitism.

It would also be pretty lame if it became like other games, where you'd HAVE to join a guild just to meet new people aside from friends you already have.

I'm just gonna have to say I'd want nothing to do with that world. Guilds bring more drama and damage than they're worth especially since most mmo guilds don't even do 90% of the things they claim their purpose is for. It just ends up becoming a Teen Drama TV Show, Or a place where leetist come together to touch E-peens and act better than anyone that's not in their guild and or highly ranked. e_e

[Kylie]

But people did/do that on PSU anyway, just without an organized system, which makes it more ridiculous. :-P I like building groups, obviously... Not so much cliques, but it's nice to have a group of people to do stuff together. To be honest though, I don't remember a lot about PSU anymore, so mainly what I want is better service. Have they stated if PSO2 will be region locked yet?

[Mike]

BB had teams and the crazy team point system. I don't think having a similar system in PSO2 would be bad.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

PSOBB had tons of wonderful team drama, and the PSU community was much worse for lacking it.

[BIG OLAF]

PSOBB had tons of wonderful team drama, and the PSU community was much worse for lacking it.

Well, there's a bit of drama here and there between certain Time Attack teams on PSU. But, most of the PSU drama comes from attention-whores and other general forms of human sewage. Pretty much like almost any other online game.

[NoiseHERO]

I wasn't in any of PSO's primes, and I ignored the fake drama filled guilds in PSU...I had some friends in some of those guilds and they seemed to keep the drama to themselves. and PSU in general didn't have elitism so I guess it wasn't too horrible as long as you're not in them.

But if everything becomes official I just get the feeling it'd change the way people look at it. Then suddenly all the annoying Guild stereotypes that normal online games have will surface. e__e

[BIG OLAF]

I wasn't in any of PSO's primes, and I ignored the fake drama filled guilds in PSU...I had some friends in some of those guilds and they seemed to keep the drama to themselves. and PSU in general didn't have elitism so I guess it wasn't too horrible as long as you're not in them.

But if everything becomes official I just get the feeling it'd change the way people look at it. Then suddenly all the annoying Guild stereotypes that normal online games have will surface. e__e

Ohhh, yes it did. Still does. Quite a bit of it. Easy to ignore, though.

But, that's for another discussion, not this one.

[RenzokukenZ]

Well, in most online guild groups, there's elitism, and then there's stupid elitism where said elitists believed to be elitists but are not (i.e. posers)

This generally will not change, whether a guild system is implemented or not.

[NoiseHERO]

I don't remember too many elitists in PSU but I do remember there being some. But not only were they easy to ignore but you mostly ended up only playing with friends on PSU. I find it sad because I can't think of a more casual online game.

Only thing that really stood out were people that pointlessly bum rushed to every new level cap, and hackers that magically always had the new ultra hard-to-get rares... Oh and people that were smuthered in E-popularity...Yet PSU was so small... at some point I was/used to be friends with most of these people. @_@

[Kylie]

It was easy enough to hide on PSU, especially on PC/PS2, where there were many free spaces and universes to roam, so elitism wasn't as easy to see in-game. The ones who didn't keep to their own and practiced elitism with randoms just wanted to talk big anyway. But I don't think a guild system would make it worse. I think it'd stay about the same, really.

[Corey Blue]

Decent graphic's,global servers,deep character creation,no shitty bland levels,and combat similar to PSU's but better.Oh and the atmosphere.(That about sum's it up.)

[Wayu]

Final Fantasy/Fire Emblem collaboration.

>.<

In my dreams, hah.

-Wayu

[Angelic Fae]

how bout character hair and clothing physics not like psu where the hair consists of a near weightless block following ur head

[RenzokukenZ]

I don't know if PSU had it, but the PSP series has hair physics. Granted, it's not that great, but noticeable.

[NoiseHERO]

It was easy enough to hide on PSU, especially on PC/PS2, where there were many free spaces and universes to roam, so elitism wasn't as easy to see in-game. The ones who didn't keep to their own and practiced elitism with randoms just wanted to talk big anyway. But I don't think a guild system would make it worse. I think it'd stay about the same, really.

The thing about guilds is that it brings people together...different and alike...1 guy makes a guild, befriends a couple people, Gets serious into the game, then develops a disgusting cocky attitude and gets like 50 people into their guild and all of sudden every time you turn your head it's like "OMG THIS GUILD THIS THAT AND THAT THEY'RE ALL GODS I MUST JOIN THEM OR I SUCK AT THIS GAME!! <:O" in people's conversations. Then that turns into a 100 person guild, next all of the top players in said guild think they're better than anyone else. Getting suspiciously extra worked up when told they have no-life by trolls.

Eventually anyone with an IQ higher 40 sees the whole guild as an eyesore and the whole community becomes bitter, and it will then proceed to happen with 3 or 4 other guilds.

If SEGA DOESN'T screw up on this game and we end up having more than just a few couple hundred cult fans playing this time, I doubt things would go as smooth.

The only thing I could think of is if guilds couldn't hold a large number of members. So that they're not just a crowded unorganized waste of space drama-fest, and seem more like Small Groups or Teams, Possibly inevitable cliques but at least they wouldn't be 50-100man elitist cliques thus being easy to ignore.

Also as "small groups" I actually wouldn't mind being apart of one in terms of NOT being a tool where people judge you based on the guild you're from like it would be if you could have like 50+ members.


TL;DR
Guilds make elitists come together, while also giving them LOTS of followers making it almost impossible to ignore. But I would like a small group system that would have most of the same or similar functions of a Guild Possibly less than 20 people at most.

[Arkios]

I think I would prefer the idea of "Teams" rather than "Guilds". Give them a limited number of available slots (maybe 20?) and give us a chat feature.

Also allow us to join multiple teams. That way we can play and chat with different groups.

I really didn't care for the BB guild concept, the only thing I liked about it was that it gave me the ability to chat with people while doing solo runs.

[Dongra]

I'm sorry, but what are the differences between teams and guilds?

[Corey Blue]

I thought it was the same thing,teams just sound better.

[Tetsaru]

I really didn't care for the BB guild concept, the only thing I liked about it was that it gave me the ability to chat with people while doing solo runs.

I'd say just develop a chat system along the lines of what FFXI had:

- "tell" chat, where you talk only to one person. Think along the lines of PSU's mail system, but without having to go through all those menus, being able to do it straight from your keyboard with commands (as all chat modes were in FFXI)
- "linkshell" chat, where you talk to everyone in your guild, regardless of where they are in-game
- "party" chat, only your party members can hear you
- "normal(?)" chat, everyone within a certain radius can hear you
- "shout" chat, everyone in the same area you're in can hear you (didn't care too much for this one though, people liked spamming it)

As far as guilds go, I wouldn't be opposed to them, although I could do without all the drama and elitism behind them. FFXIV was supposedly working on a guild concept that sounded pretty cool, although I'm not sure if they finally implemented it or not: basically, someone (I guess with enough money) could be the founder and leader of a guild, and would gain access to their very own Guild Hall (I'm assuming this would be like PSU's My Room feature, but on a grander scale). As the guild grew in members, budget, and successes on the battlefield, you could gain access to different things like guild uniforms/logos, upgrades to the Guild Hall, your own Chocobos (mounts), even your very own airship! If this were the case, it would most likely be to your benefit to create your own guild, even if it's just a few of your closest friends as members. From there, you could probably even have your own competitions between rival guilds if you wanted (time attacks for missions, airship battles!), to create a beneficial, yet optional, PVP element to the game, and wouldn't necessarily be as broken as say, PSO's multiplayer vs. mode (although duels/raids for territory could also be an option).

[NoiseHERO]

I'm sorry, but what are the differences between teams and guilds?

I know it was apparently called "teams" in PSO but obviously in my idea I meant for the concept of teams to be way smaller.

10-20 annoying people is 1000x less effective against the community than 50-100 annoying people. Or at least that's what I would find safe to assume.


You could say what if 5 of 10 teams just banded together to be just as annoying as a typical MMO guild. But that'd probably cut down the process in terms of making an entire army of d-bag 12-25 year olds and it'd be no more detrimental than PSU's "Guild" system.

[Mike]

- "tell" chat, where you talk only to one person. Think along the lines of PSU's mail system, but without having to go through all those menus, being able to do it straight from your keyboard with commands (as all chat modes were in FFXI)
No matter what kind of gameplay PSO2 will have, a tell command would be great. I don't think the simple mail system should be done away with though. It provides an easy way to keep in touch with offline friends.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Limiting size won't stop obnoxious teams from being obnoxious. PSOBB's teams were limited to 100 members (at maximum upgraded size), and that didn't stop Ruby from making 2 additional overflow teams for jeM.

[NoiseHERO]

I don't see the damage in 20 people but ehn, I can definitely live without guilds in general.

[Aumi]

Just thought about PSO2 while listening to "The Whole New World", and thought about what the most important things for me would be, in regard to the game.

- The atmosphere. This is definitely the most important to me. PSO had some kind of unique, mysterious feel to it. The mix of exotic environments, labyrinth-like maps and the unique style of music gave the game something I definitely haven't felt in any other game.

- The music. As I mentioned, the music of PSO was fantastic. Mysterious with a unique style. Of course, music should change when engaging in battle, another thing that made that part of PSO so enjoyable.

- The gameplay. For some reason I greatly prefer the gameplay of PSO to the gameplay of PSU. Or, at least it's that way for Ranger and Force classes. Though restricted, the slower pace made the game feel much more tactical and controlled that PSU, which feels rather hectic. I feel that the best elements of PSO, PSPo2i and PSZ should be combined. With dodge moves, the charge moves of PSZ and PSPo2i, a technique system similar to that of PSO and the general feel of combat of PSO with a bit of balancing between classes, it would make all classes enjoyable and worth playing.

Visuals. I wouldn't mind overall character designs similar to PSU, but even greater would be character visuals looking something like the following:

http://www.1999.co.jp/itbig13/10138054a6.jpg
(http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10138054)

As for environmental visuals, I would like to see a style similar to PSO's, of course upgraded to a current generation-level.

Last but definitely not least, character creation and customization. I LOVE character creation. I love being able to design a unique character. The level of character creation should be at least as deep as PSU, preferably much deeper. Clothes and parts should be incorporated like in PSU, although with updates adding new stuff once in a while. Not only one-pieces but others as well.

That's about it. I greatly hope that PSO2 won't be disappointing. :)

[Juza]

My wants are simple:

1. Single server farm and client. There are no shortage of games running with singular clusters handling the entire world, with a client that supports basic internationalization. It's 2011; there's no excuse not to have this. ...And it'd prevent the, "So long and thanks for all the dollars, suckas!" result that has always been Sega/Sonic Team's feeling toward non-Japanese servers.

2. NO MORE FREAKIN' HAPPY SPACE ELVES. NUMANS ARE NOT PEACE AND LOVE PATCHOULI-SMELLING HIPPIES. STOP MAKING RIKA AND NEI ANGRY, SEGA. RAWR. BITE. KICK. CLAW.


...Honestly, I'll settle just for #2. I don't care. Go back to stupid PSO mechanics. Take out the awesomeness of photon arts. Make grinding stupid. Have a single boss that's reskinned a thousand times. Don't update content for six hundred years. Make all the music in the game, every last track, be the Caves from PSO. WHATEVER. GIVE ME NUMANS, OR GIVE ME DEATH!

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

STOP RUINING MY PERSONAL INTERPRETATION OF YOUR FRANCHISE, SEGA!!!!!!

You realize that's what you sound like, yeah?

[Alisha]

for combat i would like something along the lines of PSZ. i always hated the pa spam of psu. PSZ largely solved that.

[Zyrusticae]

I still think PSO2 can evolve combat to something beyond the basic "light-light-heavy" of PSO and the PA spam of PSU (and even beyond the chain-combo-then-PA-spam of PSP2). Using the old games as a base is fine, but if they don't expand upon it... well...

[Seth Astra]

for combat i would like something along the lines of PSZ. i always hated the pa spam of psu. PSZ largely solved that.
This. I won't deny it had many flaws (too slow, unbalanced PAs, techs were boring, IMO), but PSZ had more enjoyable combat to me than PSP2 (those are the only to PS games I have, mind you). Also, PSZ's combat was challenging, while PSP2's was frustrating. PSZ's emphasized dodging, healing, and the like. PSP2's, at least for me as a VAnewm, came down to "deband, chain, PA, prey my EVP keeps me alive".

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

I kind of think the whole chain system was not that great of an idea, since it was intended to prevent PA spamming.

PA spamming is a good thing, by the way. Normal attacks are boring and not fun. The solution is to make all PAs well balanced so you don't have to use one of only three good ones all the time.

[Seth Astra]

I would disagree. PA spamming reduces it to just using the same move over and over, which would eventually get old. If the game revolves around PA spam, you may as well take out normal attacks.

[Dongra]

The PA system would actually be less boring if you could combo multiple PA's.

[Seth Astra]

That would be... Interesting, although I prefer the PSZ system of PAs, with them serving as charge attacks. That, IMO, created a better balance between PAs and normal attacks than the chain system.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

you may as well take out normal attacks.I would be ok with this.

Normal attacks are boring. Give me as much flashy, over the top shit as you can fit in there, SEGA.

[Dongra]

I don't mind flashy moves so long as they aren't ridiculous. PA's like Tornado Dance and Majarra just looked stupid. It's moves like those that make me feel like I'm playing an over the top cliche action anime, and that's not why I play this game.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

But that's pretty much exactly what PSU is. Well, the cliche anime part, for sure.

[Dongra]

Yeah, that was a bit of a downer when I moved from PSO to PSU. Didn't make the game itself bad just not visually appealing. Just not my style I guess.

[Seth Astra]

TBH, I would hate that. IMO, the way the combat can be best is if it rewards proper use of both normal attacks and Photon Arts.

Also, I may note, that I don't mind that sort of over the top stuff too much. However, when it isn't implemented right, it just looks lame, IMO. Personally, I'd rather have only normal attacks than only PAs. The flashier the move, the lamer it looks to repeat it again, and again, and again.

[Dongra]

One thing I liked about PSO's combo system, despite its clunkyness, was that you had to use light, heavy, and extra attacks effectively. ATA was a huge deal, you had to make sure you could use a specific combo without missing. Knowing that you had a 100% chance of hitting with a hard attack the first time but a 50% chance for a special attack on your second might make you reconsider using that special attack for a hard with an 80% (these numbers are pulled out of my ass, I don't have the formula memorized). All I remember about PSU was how much I could mash the PA button, so there wasn't much planning there.

[Zilch]

Ohh, I'll chime in on the combo system of PSO. Obviously I can do without the slow, clunky movement and pacing, but I really hope to see some more thought put into how you fight. The way you chain your attacks etc.

Sonic Team obviously tried to put some more thought into the combat of AotI with the "counter" attacks and a slight damage bonus from timing them perfectly, but it really didn't add much. Something along the lines of how Aion lets you perform certain moves at the end of a chain or on knocked down enemies would be sweet. Ultimately this didn't add to Aion since it still had that old "click-target-and-use-skill" combat but with the direct, movement based combat of PSO/PSU it could be pretty sweet.

[Aumi]

Forgot to add something to my list: There ought to be a single, global server, where all players play together and everybody gets the same updates and benefits at the same time.

[Corey Blue]

Forgot to add something to my list: There ought to be a single, global server, where all players play together and everybody gets the same updates and benefits at the same time.

That's a pass or buy for me.

[Tetsaru]

Forgot to add something to my list: There ought to be a single, global server, where all players play together and everybody gets the same updates and benefits.

This should be mandatory for any big online game, although it shouldn't necessarily be limited to ONE server. You can have multiple servers and still have them all communicate with each other. I just hate the idea of splitting the online community by region and/or console.

As for how I think attacks should be implemented:

- Bring back PSO's style of Light/Heavy/Special, and allow players to customize their controls as well.

- Implement PSU's Photon Art moves as well, but instead of binding them to a weapon (stupidest idea ever; why learn multiple PA's if you can only use one at a time per weapon?), simply give them a button assignment, or a combination of buttons. For example, if you knew Rising Strike and Spinning Strike for your saber, you could assign one to "Control Stick Up + the button you normally have for Special Attack," and the other to "Control Stick Down + button for alternate palette + the button you have for Heavy Attack," etc. Every PA you know for a single weapon type could be all at your fingertips this way.

- The PA's themselves would not utilize the properties of the Light/Heavy/Special attacks; instead, they would utilize their own stat modifiers as they did in PSU, and have their own properties (launching, knockback, status effects), and more practical uses in combat (focusing a single enemy, crowd control, disabling an enemy, etc.). Some PA's could also be unique, such as a saber PA that did damage based on MST instead of ATP.

- Every character would have a TP bar (like in PSO), instead of each weapon having its own PP bar (like in PSU). I believe that this, along with perhaps some cooldown timers for each PA, would help prevent them from being spammed too much and make players use them in a more judicious manner.

- There would be 3 main types of damage: melee, ranged, and tech. Each weapon and PA in the game would fall under one of those categories. Furthermore, each weapon itself would have its own strengths/weaknesses, on top of elemental (fire, ice, etc.) and enemy type (Native, A. Beast, etc.), against certain enemies. For example, a rifle would do a lot of damage to a flying bird enemy, but not against a heavily armored golem-like enemy. If the same bird enemy was Native and had a weakness to the lightning element, then a rifle with a +50% Native stat using something like Plasma Shot would help maximize damage on it. Capitalizing on these types of advantages will help each weapon type stay useful, as well as make combat more strategical and challenging.

- Melee damage would be affected by your ATP stat, techs by MST, and ranged weapons by a separate stat. This would be to help prevent high-ATP melee-oriented classes from dealing high damage with gun weapons, and taking over the roles of ranger classes. To oppose these stats, DFP would protect against melee damage, RST (Resistance) for techs, and another stat for ranged. Armor would still have elemental resistances, as well as enemy type resistances, although perhaps certain character customizations, jobs, etc. could also affect this. ATA would still affect accuracy, EVP would still affect evasion, and STA would still affect status effects.

- In addition, damage with each weapon type would be influenced by your own proficiency level with it; the more often you use a particular weapon, the better you become with it. This could affect not only damage output, but also attack/casting speed, and how quickly you can learn PA's with that particular weapon.

- LCK (or another stat) would affect critical hits - no "time your swings just right to automatically crit" bullshit that was in PSU. Crits are supposed to be RANDOM. If you want to hit hard, use a Heavy Attack. Weapon proficiency levels could also affect how often you crit with certain weapons.

[Juza]

STOP RUINING MY PERSONAL INTERPRETATION OF YOUR FRANCHISE, SEGA!!!!!!

You realize that's what you sound like, yeah?

Absolutely. Now ask me if I care. Go ahead, ask me. :3

[Dongra]

- Implement PSU's Photon Art moves as well, but instead of binding them to a weapon (stupidest idea ever; why learn multiple PA's if you can only use one at a time per weapon?), simply give them a button assignment, or a combination of buttons. For example, if you knew Rising Strike and Spinning Strike for your saber, you could assign one to "Control Stick Up + the button you normally have for Special Attack," and the other to "Control Stick Down + button for alternate palette + the button you have for Heavy Attack," etc. Every PA you know for a single weapon type could be all at your fingertips this way.
I don't know if you are listing controls of a controller because it's easier to relate to or not, but so far the game is PC only. Personally, I prefer the controller, but I would still like to be able to bind things to the number keys like in BB since it gave me more options.

- LCK (or another stat) would affect critical hits - no "time your swings just right to automatically crit" bullshit that was in PSU. Crits are supposed to be RANDOM. If you want to hit hard, use a Heavy Attack. Weapon proficiency levels could also affect how often you crit with certain weapons.
I always thought of those timed attacks as if they were hard attacks rather than critical hits.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

You guys are all lame. You honestly would prefer spamming regular attacks to spamming flashy PAs?

I don't understand that mentality at all.

[Seth Astra]

Actually, I would prefer if the game did not reward PA or normal attack spam. Make it so there's actual depth to the combat, where using both types based on the situation is the most effective path to victory.

Edit: And who says normal attacks have to be boring? I would very much enjoy seeing more dramatic animations for the attacks.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Ok, that's at least reasonable.

I actually thought PSU got the balance of normal attacks to PAs pretty much right. I never thought to myself "I am using PAs too much." I did, however, often think "I am using a specific PA too much," but that's because the PAs themselves were horribly imbalanced.

[Zyrusticae]

I still think a God of War-style battle system would be brill.

But of course, plenty of people also think this is too much of a departure from previous games. Meh, I say! MEH!

[Dongra]

You guys are all lame. You honestly would prefer spamming regular attacks to spamming flashy PAs?
Yes. Call me boring. Say I have no imagination. I prefer a realistic fighting style over the ridiculous jump-ten-feet-float-with-a-five-second-hang-time-while-slashing-fifty-times attacks. Fun as they may be, I think they look stupid. It's safe to assume that they will stick to the over the top fighting style they took in PSU, so you will probably get your wish. Since this is most likely the case, I'm going to agree with you about the lack of variety with PA's. If I have to watch these overly dramatic attacks, I would like to see them mix it up a bit.

[BIG OLAF]

Yes. Call me boring. Say I have no imagination. I prefer a realistic fighting style over the ridiculous jump-ten-feet-float-with-a-five-second-hang-time-while-slashing-fifty-times attacks. Fun as they may be, I think they look stupid. It's safe to assume that they will stick to the over the top fighting style they took in PSU, so you will probably get your wish. Since this is most likely the case, I'm going to agree with you about the lack of variety with PA's. If I have to watch these overly dramatic attacks, I would like to see them mix it up a bit.

Realistic...? You realize you're talking about the sequel to a game where you were a refugee aboard a giant spaceship-city, where you could play as a robot, wielding photon-based, light energy weapons, fighting giant monsters in pursuit of a supreme evil deity?

Realistic has nothing to do with anything.

[Dongra]

Realistic...? You realize you're talking about the sequel to a game where you were a refugee aboard a giant spaceship-city, where you could play as a robot, wielding photon-based, light energy weapons, fighting giant monsters in pursuit of a supreme evil deity?

Realistic has nothing to do with anything.
Environment and story don't have anything to do with the style of the moves. I'm well aware that the whole fucking thing is science fiction, but thank you for pointing it out for me. The PA's in PSU made me feel like a floating God rather than a human working for the Guardians. In PSO, I felt like a regular person with military training, and didn't become a God until I got the stupid broken weapons they decided to put in the game. It's hard to relate to my character when he is breaking the laws of physics.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Are you a bad enough dude to defy gravity?

[Dongra]

In PSU, everyone is. How could the Guardians possibly lose?

[BIG OLAF]

Environment and story don't have anything to do with the style of the moves. I'm well aware that the whole fucking thing is science fiction, but thank you for pointing it out for me. The PA's in PSU made me feel like a floating God rather than a human working for the Guardians. In PSO, I felt like a regular person with military training, and didn't become a God until I got the stupid broken weapons they decided to put in the game. It's hard to relate to my character when he is breaking the laws of physics.

You can't pick an choose what you want to be realistic in a science-fiction game. It's all up to the developers. Once again, play PSP2/i, if possible. If not, then go on Youtube and watch gameplay if you haven't already. They took the spammage of the PAs from PSU, and managed to tone them down. Not just with the PP bar, but the actual physical speed of a lot of them. You can't go through those games just mashing the ▲ button.

Now, if you're saying that you think the PAs are too "flashy", then that's just something you'll have to deal with, as many other people like how outlandish and physically defying they are. It's much more fun to look at than PSO's old "one-step, two-step" humdrum attack moves.

[Dongra]

You can't pick an choose what you want to be realistic in a science-fiction game. It's all up to the developers.
Yeah, I'm well aware of that. This thread is about what we would like to see not what we expect the developers to have.

Once again, play PSP2/i, if possible. If not, then go on Youtube and watch gameplay if you haven't already. They took the spammage of the PAs from PSU, and managed to tone them down. Not just with the PP bar, but the actual physical speed of a lot of them. You can't go through those games just mashing the ▲ button.
So I have heard. I don't have much interest in the series, no PSP, even though I have heard of the improvements. I'm mainly using PSU, even if it is outdated, as an example of what I think is over the top.

Now, if you're saying that you think the PAs are too "flashy", then that's just something you'll have to deal with, as many other people like how outlandish and physically defying they are.
A fact that I already conceded to in a previous post. It's likely these moves will stay so I would like to see a more diverse mix. Also, I'm fine with flashy, not so much with absurd.

It's much more fun to look at than PSO's old "one-step, two-step" humdrum attack moves.
Personal preference. I would have liked PSO's moves more if they were more fluid like PSU. I also like the look of PSU's normal attacks, even though they are never used. If anything I find the melee PA's to be distracting, especially when several people are using them at once.

[Zyrusticae]

I just realized they could easily increase the variety in combat by making it easier to quick-switch between weapons, possibly even mid-attack. Mixing up different PAs with different weapons to keep enemies under control just makes too much sense (not that you couldn't do it before - just not effectively due to the slow speed of switching).

[Dongra]

I still think being able to have more than one PA linked to a weapon, something I would like to see banished, and being able to use different combinations would have solved some of the issue. I guess doing that would promote more PA spam but in this case we could do away with the PP bar and make PA's into different normal or hard attacks that can be mixed up when desired.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Honestly, I'd prefer the PP to stay attached to the weapon, not to your character, but this being PSO2, it's very likely TP will be a character based stat.

Being able to mix different parts of different PAs together would be very cool, but it would also be impossible to balance (without making every PA have exactly the same stats, otherwise you would cherry pick only the best parts of each PA to create some ridiculous overpowered combo). Being able to use multiple PAs on the same weapon, though, is definitely something I would like to see.

[Dongra]

Solution to overpowered PA's. Make them slower. If you want the best parts mixed in, expect a slow overall combo.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

No, that doesn't fix anything. Unless you mean they would only be slower when mixing different PAs. I guess it could work, but it would still be nightmarishly difficult to balance even remotely well.

[Dongra]

Yeah, realistically that would be difficult, especially when we take into consideration Sega doesn't know the meaning of the word balance.

[Viraal]

I personally hope that they return Telepipes and Ryuker, I really enjoyed the convienience on PSO.

[Aumi]

You guys are all lame. You honestly would prefer spamming regular attacks to spamming flashy PAs?

I don't understand that mentality at all.

To be honest, I would like to avoid spamming at all. The reason why I prefer PSO's combat system is that it avoids spamming in favor of more tactical, albeit slower, combat.

My favorite combat in the series is from PSZ, as it combines PSO's overall system with dodge moves and charge attacks. It could definitely be improved, though, and I hope PSO2 will do just that.

[NoiseHERO]

PSZ still felt nerve wrackingly clunky and awkwardly frustrating to me, and the D-pad didn't help. but I doubt a joystick would fix anything if they were to use the same exact engine. e_e;

[Seth Astra]

It probably did not help that PSZ was painfully slow.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

PSO and PSZ are unplayably clunky for this day and age.

They both put me to sleep after five minutes.


Oh, and there isn't really anything "tactical" about going Weak-Berserk-Berserk over and over and over and over and over again.

[Alisha]

is more about trying your best to avoid getting hit,and theres a lot that goes into that especially in c-mode.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

I understand what you are saying, but it really applied exclusively to C-Mode (which was a great mode that needs to return). Otherwise, you could just stand there and let enemies wail on you without worrying about anything, because you probably have enough defense to block 95% of the attacks in the game.

[Anon_Fire]

Maybe they should keep chain combos

[Tetsaru]

I don't know if you are listing controls of a controller because it's easier to relate to or not, but so far the game is PC only. Personally, I prefer the controller, but I would still like to be able to bind things to the number keys like in BB since it gave me more options.

Why not use both? People who like to use keyboards could just shortcut/macro different moves to the Function or other keys (like in PSO:BB), and people who prefer to use a controller can set button combinations instead (like how in the old Tony Hawk games, you could set different specials to something like "left, right + triangle"). In my opinion, the only time you should have to go into a series of menus to use your attacks is to set them to a shortcut in the first place; an attack is ineffective if you can't have it available at a moment's notice in battle, or if you don't know the commands to activate it.


I always thought of those timed attacks as if they were hard attacks rather than critical hits.

Making them have the same critical hit sounds/animations, as well as the same amounts of damage as a regular hit critting, AND preventing you from doing an ACTUAL crit while performing them, are all just more of Sonic Team's poor design decisions in my eyes. :disapprove:

Now, regarding the "boring weak-heavy-heavy" attacks all the time... if there was some sort of weapon proficiency utilized that I've mentioned, why not allow players to extend their combos extra steps? For example, if you start out using a saber, you'd only have a 3-hit combo, but if you keep using it, you could learn a 4-hit combo, or 5-hit combo, with the last hit being some sort of finisher that does extra damage or has an extra effect, without actually being a PA. However, these would still be weaker than most PA's.

Guns and other ranged weapons would not have combos, like in PSU, but attacks would not consume TP/PP. Instead, you would only be able to fire so many shots at a time before your weapon would overheat, or would need to be reloaded. Likewise, better weapon proficiency would allow you to squeeze in more shots before you would need to do so, or would allow you to continuously fire shots at the cost of other things (recoil effects, an HP drain or burn effect to simulate the gun overheating in your hands, etc.).

Techer weapons, like canes, rods, and wands, would function similarly to melee weapons (as they did in PSO) and would also gain extra combo moves with weapon proficiency. Techs themselves would also level up with usage (as they did in PSU), but would have more meaningful upgrades EACH level, rather than every 10th level.

Finally, as a side note: since PSO gave different attacking/casting animations to certain classes, I think it would only be fair to allow players to customize their characters to have certain attacking animations if they so desire.

[NoiseHERO]

Finally, as a side note: since PSO gave different attacking/casting animations to certain classes, I think it would only be fair to allow players to customize their characters to have certain attacking animations if they so desire.

I like this idea, reminds me of graffiti kingdom...

Thug style running/attack animation(SWAGGERRRRRR)
Goofy style running/attack animations
Little kid animations etc
Girly animations etc
Normal boring animations etc
Ninja-like animations etc (NB4 overused next to swagg-I mean thug style)
Old man
"Professional"
blah blah blah

[Aumi]

PSO and PSZ are unplayably clunky for this day and age.

They both put me to sleep after five minutes.


Oh, and there isn't really anything "tactical" about going Weak-Berserk-Berserk over and over and over and over and over again.

Unplayably clunky? I played both just yesterday and did just fine. I might agree that playing a hunter in PSO can be annoying, due to the fact that it's almost impossible to avoid getting hit after a combo, at least for me. But PSZ changed that with the addition of dodge moves.

I find especially ranger classes much better to play in PSO and PSZ that in PSU. Instead of just strafing around the enemy, spamming the same button, you have to keep you distance to the enemies and choose the right weapon for the situation. There's also the element of traps, which works especially well with rangers, as you can set the up and activate them with a shot.


Oh, and another thing I forgot to add to my list: A chat system similar to PSU's would be great, although with the addition of PSO's symbol chat. Preferably symbol chat that allows more characters to be used, as the character limit in PSO was rather annoying.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Rangers were boring as shit in PSO.

They were slightly less boring in PSU.

[Kaziel]

Rangers were boring as shit in PSO.

They were slightly less boring in PSU.

Preeeeetty much. Pew *tsst* pew *tsst* pew x 9001. Rinse, repeat.

[BIG OLAF]

The new Charge Shot 2s in Infinity made Rangers a blast to play. Shame it took them so long to implement those kind of special PAs.

[Yata The Prophet]

Take everything that made PSO great, keep out everything that made PSU horrible or average, and work that into PSO2.

[Anon_Fire]

Take everything that made PSO great, keep out everything that made PSU horrible or average, and work that into PSO2.

No, take what PSO, PSU, and PSPo2i made great.

[Seth Astra]

Wrong again. Take what made PSO, PSU, PSZ, and PSP2i great.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Take everything that made PSO great, keep out everything that made PSU horrible or average, and work that into PSO2.Thank you for being so specific.

[Aumi]

The new Charge Shot 2s in Infinity made Rangers a blast to play. Shame it took them so long to implement those kind of special PAs.

They certainly look great. If similar, though slightly less over-the-top, moves could be implemented, similarly to PSZ, that would be great. I say less over-the-top, as I feel that the style certainly fits PSU and subsequent games, but doesn't quite match PSO and its more serious tone.

[r00tabaga]

Thank you for being so specific.

Lay off the poor guy. Jeesh!

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Well, you see, with a post that vague, there is nothing for me to criticize and pick apart. If don't get to tell at least three different people a day why my opinions are superior to their own, who knows what will happen to my self esteem.

[KodiaX987]

Well, you see, with a post that vague, there is nothing for me to criticize and pick apart. If don't get to tell at least three different people a day why my opinions are superior to their own, who knows what will happen to my self esteem.

I wish I could +rep that!

[Alisha]

they could always spice up the timing based attacks by giving you a different heavy attack depending on how many times you pressed weak attack before using heavy attack ala SW/DW.
also i prefer PSZ style rangers.

[Zyrusticae]

There's a lot they could do with just two attack buttons and button combinations thereof.

I've said this before, but stuff like
(Hold)A->A->B
B->B->(Hold)A
B->B->B->A
B+A->(Hold)A

Y'know... stuff like you see in Devil May Cry and God of War and all that jazz. Could do away with the concept of PAs as individual combo strings and instead introduce them as chains you can add to an ever-expanding repertoire.

I know the chances of them actually doing this are close to nil... but it's nice to dream.

[Aumi]

There's a lot they could do with just two attack buttons and button combinations thereof.

I've said this before, but stuff like
(Hold)A->A->B
B->B->(Hold)A
B->B->B->A
B+A->(Hold)A

Y'know... stuff like you see in Devil May Cry and God of War and all that jazz. Could do away with the concept of PAs as individual combo strings and instead introduce them as chains you can add to an ever-expanding repertoire.

I know the chances of them actually doing this are close to nil... but it's nice to dream.

I always thought that would've been great in PSU, due to its more fast-paced action. In PSO2 I would personally prefer if they kept a slightly less fast-paced and less chaotic system, one more similar to PSO and PSZ, but it could likely still be mixed with those kinds of combos.

[Randomness]

they could always spice up the timing based attacks by giving you a different heavy attack depending on how many times you pressed weak attack before using heavy attack ala SW/DW.
also i prefer PSZ style rangers.

Yeah, having actual PAs on your weapons was awesome. PSP2 incorporated that with the charge shots, more or less, but without options... which really hurt some weapon types...

[KodiaX987]

Oh hey, why not have color customization...


"Nice Durandal."

"Oh, it's just a DB's Saber I color-modded."

"..."

"Problem, officer?"

[Milla]

1. No Anime style graphics, keep that to the portable series please. I'm hoping for a more realistic approach but keeping the JRPG feel.

2. Fade in/out music on missions like PSO had and just similar music to PSO in General. I'm not sure if PSO had a different composer to PSU but if they did get them back or get Masashi Hamauzu.

3. Someone mentioned Devil may Cry and a got me thinking. Having a similar combat system would be great, just not as fast paced. Being able to switch between melee and ranged weapons instantly in mid combo or having the ability to launch a monster then follow up with an air combo with all the different types of weapons the possibilities would be insane.

4. Bring back real MAGS Nao!

[Zyrusticae]

1. No Anime style graphics, keep that to the portable series please. I'm hoping for a more realistic approach but keeping the JRPG feel.

[SPOILER-BOX]http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a7/Phantasy_Star_Online_III_CARD_Revolution.jpg
http://pampi.homelinux.com/games/nintendo_gamecube/images-covers/phantasy_star_online_episode_i_and_ii_front.jpg
http://www.dfsm.org/layouts/games/Phantasy%20Star/phantasy-star-online.jpg
http://downandb.com/userfiles/00216216-photo-phantasy-star-online-blue-burst.jpg
http://www.kawapaper.com/d/13411-2/Kawapaper_Phantasy_Star_0000017_1280x1024.jpg
http://www.wallpaperpimper.com/wallpaper/Games/Phantasy_Star_Online/Phantasy-Star-Online-7-1280x1024.jpg
http://downloads.khinsider.com/wallpaper/1024x768/2419-phantasy-star-online-005-zbqfh.jpg[/SPOILER-BOX]


http://images.icanhascheezburger.com/completestore/2008/8/21/rofl128638199133589166.jpg

[BIG OLAF]

Zyrusticae, I keep trying to tell people that Phantasy Star has always had an anime style (yes, even PSO!), but they refuse to listen.

[Dongra]

I don't recall Kairi-chan referencing PSO's style in that post. Though it's safe to assume that was implied, we don't really know if Kairi-chan wants a return to the PSO style or just a more realistic style that the series has yet to see.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

PSO was just as anime as fuck as PSU, you just couldn't tell as easily because the graphics were shit.

That's really all there is to report on the subject.

[Zarode]

It's from Japan, it's anime.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Preeeeeetty much.

[Alisha]

1. No Anime style graphics, keep that to the portable series please. I'm hoping for a more realistic approach but keeping the JRPG feel.

2. Fade in/out music on missions like PSO had and just similar music to PSO in General. I'm not sure if PSO had a different composer to PSU but if they did get them back or get Masashi Hamauzu.

3. Someone mentioned Devil may Cry and a got me thinking. Having a similar combat system would be great, just not as fast paced. Being able to switch between melee and ranged weapons instantly in mid combo or having the ability to launch a monster then follow up with an air combo with all the different types of weapons the possibilities would be insane.

4. Bring back real MAGS Nao!

funny how 2 of the things you want are in phantasy star zero:dynamic music and mags.
ultimately keep in mind its called phantasy star online 2 not phantasy star universe 2.

[Shadownami92]

All I gotta say is if they could make PSO2 with the character customization with the depth of All Point Bulletin I would be extremely happy.

Either way I have decent hope for this game, especially after playing the PSO2i demo.

I think an emblem creation system would be awesome too, like being able to put it on your clothing or something.

[BIG OLAF]

keep in mind its called phantasy star online 2 not phantasy star universe 2.

Also keep in mind that Sega isn't going to throw away all the progress they made with PSU/P2/i and go back to a formula from 2001.

[Dongra]

Disregard that they have been slowly shifting back to that formula since PSU, not that I'm saying they will completely go back to that formula.

[BIG OLAF]

Disregard that they have been slowly shifting back to that formula since PSU, not that I'm saying they will completely go back to that formula.

Yes, but only minor things (weapon drop system, Photon Art system, etc.) which admittedly worked better the way PSO did it, anyway. Major things like combat most likely will not be changing from Infinity's formula, since it's near perfect, but who knows.

[Milla]

Hey i thought this topic was called "What would you like to see in pso2?"
But yeah, i never said PSO wasn't anime style but to me it seemed it wasn't as heavy influenced as the Universe series hell even the story and characters were anime cliche.

Anyway maybe i should of worded it better, i would like to see a more mature and realistic graphic style but also keeping the crazy over the top weapons.

Its seems people like the more anime way which is great i would still buy the game but i would prefer a different a approach. Thanks for laughing at my though that was really nice.

[Zyrusticae]

I revel in crushing unrealistic dreams. :innocent:

[Milla]

"Go beyond the impossible and kick reason to the curb! That's the Gurren-dan way!"

[Alisha]

Also keep in mind that Sega isn't going to throw away all the progress they made with PSU/P2/i and go back to a formula from 2001.


admittedly i havent played since AotI so all of those advances i'm in the dark about.

[Temoki]

I personally would like:
*Mag Farming
*Photon Arts (without a cap on how many you can learn)
*Tekked Item Abilities being more useful so you might actually be happy finding a ??? that's not a vulcan.
*The ability to add %'s on an item whether or not it has that % on it already
*More visible shields / more shields with effects on blocking.
*EVP being useful
*Having too much DFP not get you killed (-cough- Gal Griffon -cough-)
*Visible armor or at least more armor visual effects (ex. Brightness Circle)
*Dodging and strafing / ability to strafe while charging techs
*Forces being as good as they were in PSO

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

*Forces being as good as they were in PSOSo you want them to nerf techs, huh?

[Dongra]

It's possible that he is use to the tech boost on some private servers.

[Alisha]

i want to be able to cast techs without needing to have a fo weap equiped!

[Randomness]

It's possible that he is use to the tech boost on some private servers.

Well, to be fair, FOs were really damaging in the lower difficulties. Until TP ran out, of course.

That said, they quickly become more useful for SDJZ when you hit VH and ult though...

PSU forces were, overall, stronger. Especially when Dambarta came out, because it was so damned OP, it just singlehandedly wiped out everything but the largest enemies in something like a 200 degree arc...

[NoiseHERO]

Well, to be fair, FOs were really damaging in the lower difficulties. Until TP ran out, of course.

That said, they quickly become more useful for SDJZ when you hit VH and ult though...

PSU forces were, overall, stronger. Especially when Dambarta came out, because it was so damned OP, it just singlehandedly wiped out everything but the largest enemies in something like a 200 degree arc...

It also blinded your team mates.

I remember the blue-green capped zonde techs made me want a force...but tech leveling took forever so I gave up...

Maybe it'd be smart to make a force first to get a head start this time around...IF they make tech and skill leveling annoying like PSU that is. e_e

edit: also for the love of god, please don't make afros look ugly as hell this time....*must get space disco on* ;o;

[Alisha]

in pso very few people played fo's that way.(nuke style)i prefered the cleric role personally with my fomarl. melee+heal+buff. unfortunately i feel that while FO's were better at nuking in psu the melee type FO was weakend in PSU since you need to have force weapons equiped to cast techs. i think you can have it both ways just bring back the action pallette and dont require techs to be bound to weapons.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Melee-centric Acrotecher is by no means a leader in damage output, but it is pretty effective and a blast to play.

The tech weapon issue was really only an issue for preventing support in v1, before TCSMs and Acrotecher came along.

[Alisha]

TCSM's? by the way i spent a couple hours reading psupedia early that was good reading sir!

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Madoogs.

[Nitro Vordex]

That's such a silly word.

Also I'd like to see some SCREENSHOTS IDNAVODSNGF. I had a dream that PSO2 was exactly the same artstyle as PSU, and even had that first green grassy area from online play. Needless to say I woke up somewhat annoyed.

[NoiseHERO]

The first stage is always green. : O

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

The first area of PSU is technically Linear Line!

It isn't green. Metro Line is, though!

[Nitro Vordex]

Must have been the first planet-side mission then? My memory's a little fuzzy on that.

[Randomness]

Must have been the first planet-side mission then? My memory's a little fuzzy on that.

Yeah, the first couple missions on Parum are all grassy.

[Kaziel]

*must get space disco on* ;o;

You don't like the space disco feel?!

whatiswrongwithyou

[NoiseHERO]

You don't like the space disco feel?!

whatiswrongwithyou

Are you misinterpreting something?

I said make afros better = pro-space disco. D:

whatiswrongwithYOU D8<
/appalled

[Vent]

PSO's artstyle or PSU's artstyle...it doesn't really matter to me. PSU's, of course, look more up to date than PSO's artstyle, but PSO's look more harmonieus. With that I mean the characters, weapons and effects all blend in pretty well with each other. Same can't really be said with PSU, where I have the feeling that the environment looks really bland compared to the characters.

But really, for me, PSO isn't a 'better made game than PSU', it simply just clicked somehow. The real question is not 'why is PSU worse than PSO?', but rather 'why was PSO so good?'. That question is still a bit of a mystery to me, so I'll focus on the former instead.

If we look at how PSU is, it's has basically become a game of either 'customizing your character' or 'getting the next best equip'. PSO focussed on the second part and at high levels, not even that. No, PSO depended on 'novelty' to keep players going; super rare items that might not even be that great in stats, but people wanted them just because of their rarity. Challenge mode offered a very...well challenging experience with an very good award to boot.

PSU lacked the thrill with item drops, although Sega is currently trying to correct their mistake by letting all the newly added items being dropped made with a chance of a high attribute. We can rest assured that they won't try something like PSU's synthesis in PSO2.
PSU also introduced S-rank weapons too early in the game and players are able to equip said weapons without (most of the times) even looking at the stat requirement to equip them. Also, PSU's weapons lack the hidden abilities of many PSO's weapons, which made the latter so much more interesting to play.

I'm also no fan of PSU's tech casting system. Tech casting should've stayed away from weapon limitations. But then again, PSO's system wasn't that great either; it required a massive amount of interface to effectively support all the different techs. PSU's palette system is much better than PSO's three-tab fastmenu if you ask me.
TCSMs/madoogs were a godsent if you ask me. Techniques should use another system than regular attacks.

Also PSU's classes compared to PSO's classes. You are able to switch between classes in PSU without significant penalty, which is a good thing overall, but most of the classes in PSU lack the uniqueness of PSO's classes, with most of them having hidden specialties, which make them really unique from each other.

Finally the difficulty. If someone who doesn't know Phantasy Star looks over my shoulder and watched me play and saw me dying and being revived by a scape doll without penalty. I would say: "Yeah that's how this game works, dying doesn't signify anything at all.". 6 players in a party with all kinds of knockback attacks. Monsters who do nothing 50% of the time. Bosses who just die because of their huge amount of hit spots. Of course, I haven't mentioned SUVs and in a lesser extent nanoblasts yet. All these things just sums PSU up.

What PSU does really really well is its customization. PSO really lacked that, but that was being forgiven all around. But really, after playing PSU and other modern RPGs, you can't really repeat something like PSO's lack of customization. You'll just upset the people who play PSU loyally.

[Nitro Vordex]

PSO could do with a bit of customization, I totally agree with that. Just I prefer it if everything weren't so bright. Like everything in PSU seemed really bright to me, even the darker colors were bright. Black hair was more like having a really shiny something that just looked dark in comparison to the shine.

[Dongra]

PSU's palette system is much better than PSO's three-tab fastmenu if you ask me.
Honestly, I've never really seen much of a difference between the two. For me PSO was a three tab system with a quick menu while PSU was just a two tab system with a quick menu. The only difference I felt when playing both games was that I could get away with button mashing in PSU.

[Nitro Vordex]

Also BB took care of the palette issue with the number keys, so that point isn't relevant. Mostly compared with the PC version of PSU anyway.

[レッドファンタシースター]

i want it to have mags :<

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

Mags are fine, as long as they aren't as overpowered and broken as they were in PSO.

[レッドファンタシースター]

well yeah I also kinda want them to have Photon Blasts to.

[Alisha]

mags werent broken but the way you leveled them up was. maybe if a mags level was capped at your characters level? also without mags melee fo's would be extremely late bloomers. i remember one time i entered a game with friends and i had victor axe equiped and people were surprised i could even equip that.

also is that supposed to read as red phantasy star?

[Dongra]

A pre-leveled mag is only broken until about Very Hard. They could make mags character bound but then it wouldn't be possible to get class specific mags by having a friend level it. They could also just not make mag evolutions based on class and ID (that seems a little boring though).

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

No, just do what I suggested before in another topic, make a level requirement to equip a mag like half of the mag's level. That way you can still get stat boosts, but not to such an extent that it overpowers newly made characters.

[Dongra]

That works too.

[Vent]

Honestly, I've never really seen much of a difference between the two. For me PSO was a three tab system with a quick menu while PSU was just a two tab system with a quick menu. The only difference I felt when playing both games was that I could get away with button mashing in PSU.

Why would you buttonmash in either menu in the first place? :-o


Also BB took care of the palette issue with the number keys, so that point isn't relevant. Mostly compared with the PC version of PSU anyway.

That's exactly the problem. Those hotkeys were much needed, but the interface accompanying it was not. That hotkey-bar was being displayed constantly without a way to turn it off. It filled a good portion of the screen along with the action palette, mini-map and, if you're playing with other players, the name and HP of the other players. Sure they didn't have high-resolution screens or transparent backgrounds back in the days, in fact, it would be cruel to blame PSO for its interface. What I am saying is that PSU's interface is an improvement. Less interface is always better and that's why I like PSU's interface more, even though it's really bland with just transparent grey backgrounds and borders, at least it isn't as intrusive as PSO's to the main view.

Did PSO have a hotkey for area-map? Or else I could complain about that some more. :-P PSU has F3 for it, which isn't exactly fast either. Why not just Tab Sega?...

[Dongra]

Oh, you meant the HUD interface. I thought you meant the interface for the combat system. Yeah, PSU didn't have a whole lot surrounding the screen, but I never found the HUD distracting in either PSO or PSU. I guess I just got use to them.

[Tyreek]

I believe I had a talk about this a while back regarding mags. I think it would be an awesome feature for them to incorporate the concepts between their uses from both PSO and PSU. Being able to build their stats to compliment your stats was fine on its own. But I always thought about them being machines themselves. Why do they not have defenses of their own? Attack for you, or shielding you from threats?

When the homage to mags came in the form of Madoog/Shadoog in PSU, that was the type of mag I dreamed of. Autonomous machines being able to assist on their own. Passively or aggresively. Locking with technics or firing a slew of lasers at the enemy. That was awesome. Now how about incorporating both? Customizing not only its stats, but its functions on the battlefield as well. Assigning it to be an attack drone, or a first aid. Managing its Sync/IQ so it can respond better to situations and act accordingly(IE: PSO's mags casting resta or shifta/deband when you're in a pinch). Expand upon the good points of the mags from both generations and I think you'll have a welcome addition to the game. THAT is what I want to see in PSO2.

[Nitro Vordex]

That's exactly the problem. Those hotkeys were much needed, but the interface accompanying it was not. That hotkey-bar was being displayed constantly without a way to turn it off. It filled a good portion of the screen along with the action palette, mini-map and, if you're playing with other players, the name and HP of the other players. Sure they didn't have high-resolution screens or transparent backgrounds back in the days, in fact, it would be cruel to blame PSO for its interface. What I am saying is that PSU's interface is an improvement. Less interface is always better and that's why I like PSU's interface more, even though it's really bland with just transparent grey backgrounds and borders, at least it isn't as intrusive as PSO's to the main view.

I thought you could change the opacity of the menu on BB. I'm pretty sure I'm wrong though.

[RemiusTA]

Fuck all this shit.

If PSU's soundtrack was at least ON PAR with PSO's, i feel i would have enjoyed it far, far more. Therefore PSO2 BETTER have a consistently kickawesome soundtrack like PSO Ep2 and 4.

PSO was like Sonic the Hedgehog to me. Yeah, the gameplay itself is pretty amazing, but the music is still 50% of the experience. You ever played a sonic game with a bad soundtrack before? Hell to the F naw you haven't. (minus sonic 4, but it sucks anyway.) Even Sonic 2006, the shittiest game in existence, had an amazing OST.

[Ffuzzy-Logik]

PSU's music was actually pretty decent, apart from a few notoriously shitty tracks. PSO's was excellent, though.

[Draggoon]

I would like it to be a fair combo of both. I'm hoping for a palette. I liked having a HUnewearl or RAmarl With techs and Weapon attacks on both sides of the palette with support techs on the 0-9 keyboard hot keys on BB. If I can play a similar role in PSO2 I would be happy.

Also I don't want the corniness that PSU had. I want the atmosphere that PSO had. Mags should be brought back. Maybe not play the exact same role as before but something close to it. I'm not sure about including Dumans Beast and Vangaurds. Beast could be included I wouldn't care but I don't know much about Dumans and the Vangaurd class. If anyone could quickly fill me in that would be cool.

I think classes should be changeable mid game but not have so many classes just three-four. Keep things simple.

[NoiseHERO]

Both soundtracks kind of get old for me fast...I do hope they try to mix things up with modern day underground electronic music genres.

Sonic soundtracks...went from interesting to "Quit the pseudo american J-Rock already, and go back to shitty 90's shopping mall music..."

Otherwise theres always my mp3 player, or hoping it's possible to mod the game's soundtrack again. If they go with their typical japanese businessman "THIS WILL SELL" music again and we end up with crap like the opening to ambition of the illuminus.

Seriously how the hell they go from... ep2's awesome sounding everything; To "you can tell the same guy that probably sings the lyrics on the sonic adventure soundtrack made this." wannabe fake metal marilyn manson sounding garbage? This isn't final fantasy 10.