Official statement from SEGA on parsing tools

[Aine]

Also, I inspect some of them mid fighting and they still don't have weapons on.

If you're busy inspecting gear while everyone else is fighting, what good are you to the MPA?

I've never understood the mindset of people who deliberately stress themselves out checking everyone else's gear and classes. Just show up, carry the MPA, and leave. The harder you can carry, the less significant other players become no matter what they're doing, especially if you're in a party of 'good' players.

[Keilyn]

What are these games you keep talking about?

A super long post through spoiler boxes ^_^

What I described was a typical, average MMORPG back in the day...
Lets say that you are an Elite Player. You've got your gear. You've got your guild... and you've got your experience. There are three types of fights you are going to look for as a gamer in an MMORPG. The following are the list of typical fights. When I say "Typical" I mean what we encounter in roughly 75 - 90%+ of MMORPGs out there all the way from late 90s games to present day. Some elements still remain...

Here is the list not in any order

1) PvP as in GvG (Guild vs Guild) or Open World PvP Zones.....

Spoiler!

Its true that in Open World PvP one finds the most unfairness, and this bane was what created the term "Carebears" which means "People who have no interest in PvP and argue against PvP in every conceivable way" and its because they were right about how PvP used to be. Solo players would try to find that one needed item to finish a weapon or set of armor... Only to be picked off by an enemy player in an Open PvP Zone. These Solo players would then go into forumboards and complain about how great they are as players because they have epic level equipment, blah blah blah, just to get ganked by 5 - 10 players in an Open World PvP Zone.

However, the polar opposite also occurred... and it was when Zergs (Large Blobs of people, more than half of them leechers) would gather together to one pug commander (Present-Day Guild Wars 2 WvW in Tier 1 - 2 Servers) and march against many groups. Things are good, until of course... they encounter me...... Someone who actually has an organized group who fights against the zerg and wins.... where usually there are 80 - 100+ people in a zerg unit getting their ass kicked by 30 - 40 well trained, well organized players. This demoralizes a pug group to no ends (I should know because I do pug-commanding at times and I know what pug zergs are weak against).

These whiners and complainers are the ones who in tandem claim a game is unfair and unbalanced because they got their ass kicked by half their numbers who are all on teamspeak and organized...

An example game that used to be super great in PvP that got ruined over time by it was Dark Age of Camelot. If you dared to run 30 - 50 people against 12 - 15 people in a choke point, those 30 - 50 would get their ass kicked in an AoE onslaught that was unbelievable. The Elite of that game knew that anyone who had to run with 30 - 50 people all the time was pretty much asking to get their ass kicked by smaller, organized groups.

MMORPGs that do not have guild halls usually have a community-designated PvP Area in a PvP zone where Guilds fight against each other in GvG (Guild vs Guild).....

2) Raid Bosses

Spoiler!

Endgame in MMORPGs is about Raiding. Raiding deals with creating an extra-large party or parties against an extra difficulty, extra long raid-zone (they can be open or instanced depending on the game). These require good VoIP communication along with having high end gear to get through. Being carried is not acceptable and its extremely clear when someone is holding back the group. One of the reason why DAMAGE PARSER tools began being used was because of the heavy DPS checks that began in raids. Some raids would begin with some monsters that gave the entire party a condition: "Defeat me in X amount of time, or I will one shot each member of the raid" hence creating a DPS-Check....and so tools were used extensively to make sure the party could PASS the DPS check.

ACT was common in Alexandre in FF XIV Part 1.....but I will give credit that before the RAIDS out there, there was nothing out there to test out DPS characters. At one point, any DPS can enter to a field and they were not bound to any strenuous in-game test. Then came the DPS check considering almost every damned instance was a Heal Check and a Tank-Defense Check....nothing tested DPS directly.....

There are so many games out there with good examples of Raids... RAIDS are an MMO Endgame. Good ones existed in most good MMORPGS out there. One of my favorites actually was FF XI Dynamis. Dynamis required up to 64 players to complete and their difficulty when first released was extreme. 64 players could go in there, 64 players could wipe... However as things got better, players learned how to run Dynamis and there were Linkshells that were specifically made for Endgame Dynamis runs.

It is also important to note that Worlds of Warcraft redefined how Raids work in MMORPGs. In fact it was raiding and how the game was especially before the game started being toned down for casual players left and right made it so that almost every new MMORPG started taking WoW elements and putting them into their games.

The difference between PSO-2 and MMORPGs is that PSO-2 started out as a casual game and the intention being F2P was to bring in as many people as possible. That is how the F2P model works... However, one thing are elites being told that a game is casual game. The other is the tragedy that occurred in some MMORPGs... where the games were MADE specifically for elites and being hardcore.... then without a thought in a the world outside of lining their pockets with cash... These MMORPGs went from being P2P to becoming F2P and the first thing done was to revitalize the game by completely wiping out any trace of hardcore play and completely selling out to casuals..

I've been in several of them.

3) Endgame World Bosses

Spoiler!

While World Bosses exist at every level of a game and usually are zone-based. Endgame world bosses are a special thing. An example of an endgame world boss is fighting the dragon in Guild Wars 2. I think people know of the Dragon I speak of in the Level 80 Ice Area. Players have to fight a multi-phase battle against a boss that starts by spawning crystals that have to be destroyed. After the crystals are destroyed the characters have to fight a two phase battle against the boss itself that has practically every player who is present in that entire map attacking the boss. Basically its called Claw of Jormag. Just between the FEAR and stacks of freeze on the character.....its easy in a bad server to see tens of people dead on the ground during the fight

However, there are plenty of games out there where there are World Bosses at level cap which have many players storm to the fields to try to destroy them. Just check global chat for when these guys pop up and be careful because depending on the game the timers on when these bosses reset along with their event chains can be extremely long.

Then I should include the two general type of MMORPGs...

Theme-park

Spoiler!

These games are just that... Playing them is like going around an amusement park. The player goes to a zone. In these zones the players handle quests which have the players go through the zone itself in a certain order doing quests from Collecting, to Slaying Monsters, and usually they end in entering some dungeon or instance in the map. Once you beat the dungeon or instance an NPC will send you to another area where the entire process repeats, but with higher level monsters, better gear to get, etc......but at least slowly the main story comes into being for the players to experience... until all the players get dumped in the final areas of the game that usually make around a quarter of the MMORPG along with the endgame. The more advanced MMORPGs out there make the endgame around 33 - 50% of the content of a game due to all the additions made over time. An example of Theme Park Based MMORPGs are pretty much Guild Wars 2, Worlds of Warcraft, TERA, and most games out there...

Sandbox

Spoiler!

Sandbox games are MMORPGs in which the player is closer to actually being a character in the world. The character can farm, gather, craft, and usually is part of several minigames or different things. The players can take on quests that go from one end of the world to the other, but the character is much closer to being a character in the game and taking part of the events in the world itself. The world can change and so can the environment. The players make do with whatever they have on the field. In a sandbox game, the player is more focused on roaming the world and doing things to better themselves in the game.

There are two games that come to mind. One of them has the endgame as Sandbox, and the other is a sandbox game from the ground up.

The endgame of PSO-2 is Sandbox Style.

Spoiler!

PSO-2s endgame is about bettering the player-character and overcoming challenges to whatever class combination a player wants. if I want to play Fighter/Techer, my endgame becomes how to make the two classes work and how to play under the two classes. If I want to be a Fo/Te, my endgame is about seeing how well I can use the techs together and gear up T-ATK and make it work. I can go through the Main Boss Battles, I can go through AQ, I can go through whatever endgame I wish to go... though I am not required to go through the endgame and going through the endgame or not going through the endgame itself does not affect people outside my difficulty level.

What I like about Japanese games is that many of these games start by actually running around with a theme-park based attitude, and then by endgame a player starts getting more sandbox elements. It works in some games, completely fails in others.... However, the other part of the sandbox element is dungeon-crawling to find the affixes one wants and then transferring them to the equipment that they want. Whether a person runs through alone or in a full group.... it doesn't change the fact that the endgame is about bettering yourself and through the end one combines the fashion with the weapons and character personalities, affixes, etc and one can see a story unfold to their own characters...

Black Desert Online

Spoiler!

This is by far one of the most demanding PC games of our time. However, it was made by the director who directed and created my favorite MMORPG back then, a PvP based game with First Person Shooter, Action Based Controls called Risk Your Life. This people also made R2R and C9. Black Desert Online is a game that started as a CASH COW Korean F2P game that became popular. The Korean Developer saw that in the west that the age of F2P had ended and that to be taken seriously your game had to be either a B2P game or a P2P game...and so they reworked the entire game to be B2P. They didn't just put a B2P label and ship it off to America, they actually took and changed a lot of elements to make it as close to how B2P games actually work in North America.

However, they left what made the game amazing...

Black Desert Online has no instancing (outside of playerhousing and crafting houses...in the B2P NA version). The game is known for having one of the best character creation systems down to the placement and manipulation of hair (doesn't beat changing my hairstyle in PSO-2) as well as one of the best rendering systems. What makes this game EXTREMELY resource demanding is that its an HDR 2.0 game in which if you own a 30 bit monitor, you will see the best in color and color-lighting effects ever made..

This comes in tandem with something very important that most MMOs have neglected..... Whether Effects! The weather has an effect on the character. The character can and will get wet and combat skills and attributes will get lowered. Characters suffer heat stroke during the daytime when they reach the desert and hypothermia at night.....meaning that in order to traverse the most dangerous environments, players have to actually learn how each environment works and really deal with the environment mechanics. This is a hidden gem to the game that actually makes the game's world come alive..

Also, crafting does not exist directly.. A player hires workers to gather materials and man crafting houses, who they actually craft for you.

Last patch introduced Large Scale Sieges to BDO but it was a really bad patch launch and the main company admitted their failure, and has been correcting issues. However, as far as Sandbox elements go.. This game is pure sandbox game from the ground up....AND its also a hardcore game. Trust me. Playing this one is one where one wakes up.....and as soon as they log off, they realize 8 - 16 hours have passed on by....

What has people turned off is because of the rather skimpy costumes and expensive cash shop out there. All your characters have their own energy pool and can contribute to the account in the form of contribution points to expand the character's crafting empire. So this means the game has an element that makes replaying and making new characters actually beneficial to the account, but there are specific events where having a capped character is truly what is needed to make things work. Rather than give out a HARD CAP, a SOFT EXP cap is give when once its reach, EXP accumulation slows down to nearly nothing and so raid parties get together to try to reach the maximum that can go....

Fighting a 1v1 in the middle of a lightning storm and then telling my enemy on Teamspeak... HEY LOOK!!! its the sunrise... :P and the player say "Oh lets see" while two enemies stared into the lighting graphics from the top of a tower...was an amazing experience I got...

About experience

Spoiler!

One rule for MMORPGs is that we are going to have a mixed bag of experience. In my own experience...
There are days I log into games and I royally get my ass kicked in PvP. Sometimes the environment completely kicks my ass. Sometimes I don't feel like logging in for a week... especially at times when there are flamewars attached and I hate dealing with them. Sometimes experience will make me fall extremely low, to even lower than those buried six-feet under...

Sometimes losing is so damned depressing when time, energy, in-game money, etc is involved...

But you know what?
There is courage because of what I get in return.

I get some of the greatest moments that become part of my memory.
The days where I saw something and took a chance and something so seemingly impossible, became possible...where nothing became something and the day was saved....and when everything went right and I was happy.

Even Guild Wars 2 had those experiences...
Those days where our Garrison was going to fall and people didn't know what to do...and I managed to rally people in our borderlands and challenge everyone to kick all enemies out of our server's garrison. A lonely Elementalist with a few guild mates and a lot of pugs...who just wanted to defend their homelands..... and then miracles and smart playing actually happen.

That one day that we were in the WvW Season and I told the forums "Lets just insult the hell out of third place. Lets AIM for third place overall just to knock them out of the tier...if they lose on their end, and then we hold SECOND PLACE next week.. As long as we can hold Second or Third place in the last week we will win third instead of fourth and all hell is going to break loose when a Tier 1 server loses to a Tier 2 server......

...and then fighting in Eternal Battlegrounds against the Tier 1 servers and winning for many days... and though it was a long shot and I thought no one gave a damn about my war strategy... the top two guilds and their commanders said to me "You're one of three pug commanders that people trust, and the only who can speak enough languages to talk to them.....lets us handle the main war down here" and I said "we just have to make sure we hold on to our territory and areas, If we want second place... lets never fall under +185...and the person said "GET ON MY TEAMSPEAK NOW..." and though the server had a mumble channel....

they said "you're strange in the forums...so tell us whats on your mind....." and after arranging that season strategy....on a 24 hour system... It was amazing when the strategy worked, the enemy server imploded and we received guilds as well as Tier 1 being stacked and for a VERY LONG TIME we were in Tier 1...as a server and I always liked the people who were in there...

Then a day came when the two commanders on the map timed out and I was going to take a break and I said "I can't leave now...we are going to lose if we do" because I knew each server had a commander due to the way people were moving... so I stayed an extra two hours while people reconnected and then I was happy to retain our third of the battlefield...and the commander's came online and relieved me and I told them "Blue Commander is thankful that I let them take the tower closer to Green Commander's keep, I went ahead and took back our territorial areas...so far Blue and Green have a grudge going so let them have at each other, then that night.... I logged back in and was told they managed to survive being double-teamed. We lost a lot of points but not enough to place us low. Then that night....I took a green tower (we were red) and I was messaged "Oh you really really want to have a deathwish" and I said "you want the blue keep, you can have it....just take it since they seem to be flaming us in the official forums..." and so My group struck the inside....but green group wiped and we took the blue keep to reset it to insult it....and spread the territory even...

then two hours passed and I said "Oh I need to log out to both commanders..." and Green said "oh no you dont!!! you arent leaving until your deathwish becomes a reality.." as Green was angry I capped their impenetrable and super fortified tower when I logged in... and I said "damn it, that tower has the best view on the map... :P I took many screenies.." but one thing lead to another and we agreed to meet in the middle of the map. We called the blues as well and fought a massive 100v100v100... with everyone killing each other. We actually managed to survive for the longest and I remember saying "thank you for caring so much for me and giving me a proper sendoff" and the other player said "The one decent thing we can do at least is to end the night by just killing each other" and that is how the three of us ended up on each other's friendlist.

...but that was a game I actually stopped playing for a very long time due to family issues. When my father came down with cancer I left all of gaming altogether for a year and a half. When I logged in to check on updates and junk... I logged in one of them was like "HEY!!! COME HERE AND LET ME KILL YOU" and after dying we said hello... ^_^...

If I gave up on playing games simply because a game can be capable of giving me the WORSE EXPERIENCES ever in a game, then It means also giving up on the being able to have some of the GREATEST EXPERIENCES I can potentially get in a game. This is why I am against SEGA toning down too much of their game and why I wish only so much more existed.

Phantasy Star Memories

Spoiler!

Its not fair to end a post covering some memories without actually tying to memories of phantasy star as a series. My first memories came from the opening music to Phantasy Star 1, which I have my own version of on guitar. The piece was unusual and enjoyed it enough that it became stuck in my head enough to make my own version. Nei's death scene in Phantasy Star II along with the ending to the game were memorable. I didn't care too much for Phantasy Star III. I loved almost everything about Phantasy Star IV as far as story-telling.. though I always felt strange that Kyra's face portrait looked like Sailor Mercury from Sailor Moon. Of course in part IV I remember learning Rune's theme and most of the music in that game on guitar as well. Rika was my favorite character, though I felt bad to Seed initiating Auto-Destruct after Rika (Fal) joining the party. Alys's death was sad, but the ending itself was one of my favorite video game endings...

Phantasy Star Online

Spoiler!

I think the first memory I got from there was when I was a newb and I entered in my own ignorance to a dup-room. I must have gone in when everyone was leaving.....and so I entered the maps and saw the items all over the place and said "wow...definitely online must be tougher than offline... my health is 50,000, and I just picked up a level 999 mag...and a double cannon???? The hell?? why does this look like a doublesaber...where is the damn gun???..." Then I beat bosses and im like "why is everything dying in 1 hit...???" I pretty much learned later what the cheat items were.... ....and I remember as Revenge making PK-Characters when I got Resta-PKed (that was a problem in the dreamcast version of the game).

Best memories there were the group of four composed of Jun Hime, Yoiko, Sou, and Myself... and I made a HUnewearl and named her Nei (just like many had done before as a fan to the Phantasy Star 2 character). This all started when I stumbled on the European Blocks to find that Jun was RPing and was like "Oh I've been waiting for you" and one thing lead to another and I pretty much didn't know I was drafted in an RP group.... back in a time people though I was female in real life due to how I ended my sentences and the way I acted....Didn't quite figure it out until later though. We had a system to help each other learn languages. Each of us were learning languages and were bilingual for the most part and we wanted to learn each other's languages..and we had a system of WORD = ???? and then each of us writing the word in the languages that we knew....with the original Word = ???? and language name. I was used to writing the name of the language in relation to the language name...). We used that system for so many things...

Favorite PSO-1 memory that sticks to my head

Spoiler!

?
??
???
????
?????
????
???
??
?
!!!
*LogsOff*

Yoiko's way of logging off or telling us she was ignored. Also, she was the one who started me of the path of rituals of running 10 circles around party members to mean good luck.. and the one who would cast RESTA on me when I didn't need a RESTA after saying a mean thing

"I don't need a resta!"
"Wanna Bet!?"

would cast it endlessly until I apologized for whatever mean thing I said...

Another memory was Ultimate Mode.... All the times I got Megid'ed by all those blasted flowers. Of course VR-TEMPLE ALPHA had the sweet surprise to proving that if SEGA wanted to make an EPISODE HARD, they could make it hard by just adding all enemy types to the map and no one could just get away with 50 - 60% weapons...not to mention the memories of all the time Falz stole my soul and everyone just fired anyway!!!

I was in several groups in PSO each to their own versions. There was one group I remember where there was so much drama in it that I would lock myself in several rooms to avoid the drama and I was like "Why do you always follow me into my rooms?" and a friend was "you trusted me with the same password and never have changed it" so I wasn't so alone when two of us ducked into a room to avoid some of the lobby drama...

I remember running multiple characters... Some fully legit characters and some completely gamesharked hacked. Everything about PSO1 as far as meeting people was a mixed bag.

Phantasy Star Universe

Spoiler!

I played PC version and Japanese version.

I remember playing the PC version, capping and then leaving for a while since to be honest I found the game insanely boring at first, then a few years later I returned during an event and capped my characters. Eventually I capped four characters. One girl, per race, and during that time I had a small group that I was part of where I liked several characters. My best time ever in PSU was when my subscription was going to end and I didn't know if I should play anymore due to people I liked a lot leaving the game, and the group I had asked me to stay and so I renewed and unlike most people when one renews and people then dont give a damn and leave afterwards....we continued on for many more months... Securing items and junk as each new thing came out...

Remaking my characters each three to four years older in PSU-JP was nice and my memory of that was in playing the game at first with members of the old group before I found that PSU-JP had a different way of people being organized. In PSU-NA/EU things were more compatible. In PSU-JP, a lot of groups existed allied mostly by country or geographic locations. There was the German group that for the most part only wanted to play with other people who were German, Polish, Austrian, basically within that geographic location...just to speak the same language. There were the TA groups, there were the Brazilian Groups. If there were three people who I shared the best memories in PSU-NA it was a friend named DarkStar, that I played a lot with; a polish girl named Katsu (in her characters), and finally a player named Red*. All three are fresh in my mind....as the sad thing is that I lost communication with all three and I was never able to find them again.

Three memories stand out to PSU-JP.

Spoiler!

The first was seeing a fresh start and trying to be friendly with rivals/enemies from PSU-NA/EU. I liked the runs I did with Krieger, Sul-Jien, Rune-Rina, Selene (though I had a character named Selene, this was a different one), Rose (Different character name in PSU-NA/EU who I helped bring to PSU-JP) and Vien. These people always had a problem with me and hated me for some reasons...but It didn't mean a fresh start couldn't exist. I was able to have four out of these six in friendlist which was interesting as I thought all six would just hate me to pieces until the day I die.

The second memory was meeting new people.... The first were Selphea and Myst. I kind of enjoyed running around the game and I always met elite players here and there, but It was nice. The second was on the old PSO-1 group...I never saw Jun Hime again, but in PSO-1 the relationship was that if we typed WORD = ????, then each person would write their translation in their primary language and that is how we learned words. Sou found me (under another character name) and said I seemed familiar to a friend. I said "I never met you before in my life" out there...and then we went on a map, and Sou said "Kazoku = ????" when the map was over and I replied " Kazoku = Familia (Speingo), Family (Eigo). Identified me because I always said the spanish word first, followed by the english word. Turns out that Sou had asked that to a lot of players and they said didn't respond back. Sou and Yoiko spent their time together online, so I managed to meet them temporary and it was nice to catch up.... but I never met Jun-Hime again. I still retain that habit today. The third was always meeting people AGAIN from PSU-NA all over again in PSU-JP......

The third memory was....
THAT FUCKING MAP....
that we traveled through two stages to kill just about anything. In fact I have youtube videos of that....(and im sure many people do too). I miss that map You know.. the one you go through the Pagoda (the one that looks like a ninja house) and have to kill Ethan in the end over in a flame room! The one that we all fired slicers through the wall!!! The one where you died and if you weren't revived fast enough you were pretty much teleported to a holding zone (which pretty much says to anyone..Congrats, you have lost!!!)....... That was my favorite map in the entire game!!! Still was an ASS of a map, along with some of the event maps. :P

I also loved that one SeeD mission map that was a Solo Mission map, as well as that one map where everyone starts in ruin-interiors and then go through a hallway, finally to the infected/burning fields and kill the dragon in the end... I also love the events that one had to clear stages. and ...Like a dream. ^_^

Speaking of Which..... I hope PSO-2 has a "....Like a Dream" event. :P

Phantasy Star Online 2

Spoiler!

Remembering the Good Memories start with my best memory of playing that game... and it was when I was a super-newb with Selphea and we were running the maps together about almost every single day that was out there. Those to me were always the best memories. Endgame is Endgame, but how I learned and how we ran together and our shenanigans to me was the absolute best. The best was always talking about MMORPGs even when I was not playing PSO-2 for a while, because I had left games for a year and a half....and then returned and it was nice to play together in PSO-2.

Of course not every relationship lasts forever and this one didn't. I never got to apologize for my things on my end. However, I am not the kind of person who tries to delete a person out of memory like a lot of people do. I can never forget all the crazy things we went through together in testing MMORPGs together... from Prius Online (super sad anima) all the way to Sewers and Kobolds Online. It lasted for a while. :P

There were two people who I will keep their names hidden in these forum because they do not want to be named. These two I am friends with, and we speak almost every day. Two down to earth people who aren't about epic skills, but simply just play games and are pretty much out there with the games that they play. Things seem ok, but when you meet these people and still are friends after a year and are able to open up well, that makes things special..

I think most of my memories on PSO-2 are just with individual people. The game is far more private than PSU was. I was able to find parties in PSU and events were extremely party friendly and party oriented, while events in PSO-2 are EQ-favored or LQ-favored. I have always believed that PSO-2 was never ready for 12 people. It would have been great to retain the Party Size Maximum of 4 from PSO-1. I think that would have been better...

I always felt that PSO-2 has suffered from not knowing how to make EQs for 12 people to fight in, and yet at the very same time not have enough content for a single party to actually fight. A lot of my memories deal with exploration and working on different builds, but I have to admit that for my love of parties, support, and just basic experimentation and trying out new things...

PSO-2 has the most Solitary memories in my "career" as a gamer. Its the only game I've ever played where at times I feel extremely alone and at times I feel that so unsatisfied at the lack of full party content. Just once I want to be able to have a mission read FOUR PLAYERS and then when we get to the very first spawn...Have the very first spawn kick our ass if we aren't careful! I would literally pay SEGA if they actually made a mode where a lot of abilities like Invulnerability was disabled and an entire party got their ass kicked...

What I miss the most from removed or altered content.. a real good memory was
PRE-NERF ULTIMATE MODE!!!
FINALLY!!! THE FIRST MAP WHERE I GOT MY ASS KICKED and ENJOYED IT!!! Then I got better. :P

The sad thing is that there are people from PSO-2 I know who have left to play MMORPGs and have not returned to the game, and others who like me, play the game as a secondary or tertiary game. I had PSO-2 as a primary game for a while, and it was the words from a friend who got me to make PSO-2 into a secondary game...

That memory...
Those words were....

"All that PSO-2 ever did for me was show me how to lose and feel happy from being a loser. For the first time I am happy, but I owe you. If you want me to return to hell with you, just say it!"

....a friend who got me to look at myself and saw the level of damage that PSO-2 had done to me as a primary game before it became a secondary game.

[CocoCrispy]

Huh. You know, I'm sure a Phantasy Star memories topic would prolly be a pretty cool idea. After reading those kinds of stories I'm always impressed at the many ways different people come together in games like this, forming friendships for better or worse, and just have fun. Which brings me to another point. At the end of the day, your experience in many online outings will be based on your overall outlook and more importantly: having fun. There are many different kinds of gamers out there. Casuals, elites, lore hounds, wanderers, fashion mongers. There can be some overlap, of course, but there are not many people that would fill all those categories.

Z-0 and milranduil both provide very good points. Based on all the complaining in this topic, if there is one good thing that does come out of this official statement against parsing, it's that it will finally give people enough encouragement to start their own community where they create the rules and do the runs they want to do with likeminded players. People that complain that others don't have specific affixes? Make a group so you can play with people that do have correct affixes/stats! Subpar palette? Make a group so that you don't play with undergeared players! Make a group with other likeminded people so you get the most enjoyment out of the game.

You don't know what the story is of the person at the other end of the computer. Games are monetary and free time-dependent forms of entertainment. How can you expect everyone to live up to your inhuman expectations for a pug? That's like the silly people in xiv that expect a farm group level of completion out of df. It's insane logic. I've even seen some people admit in this very topic that they don't affix because the system is way too convoluted to put any more effort into it. It's not that they're lazy. They've clearly put effort into trying to understand the system, but the reward is not worth the stress for some people when they could be using their time to do other things.

There are certainly enough people complaining in this thread to create a dedicated mpa/farm/eq/whatever group for whatever they want. Get 4 people together and have a blast!

[Shiyo]

If you're busy inspecting gear while everyone else is fighting, what good are you to the MPA?

I've never understood the mindset of people who deliberately stress themselves out checking everyone else's gear and classes. Just show up, carry the MPA, and leave. The harder you can carry, the less significant other players become no matter what they're doing, especially if you're in a party of 'good' players.

Takes 2 seconds to inspect someone while I'm waiting for PD to stop spinning around.

[Senketsu7]

What is this damage bump plugin? please enlighten the ignorant

[ArcaneTechs]

What is this damage bump plugin? please enlighten the ignorant

read around some more

[Keilyn]

Huh. You know, I'm sure a Phantasy Star memories topic would prolly be a pretty cool idea. After reading those kinds of stories I'm always impressed at the many ways different people come together in games like this, forming friendships for better or worse, and just have fun. Which brings me to another point. At the end of the day, your experience in many online outings will be based on your overall outlook and more importantly: having fun. There are many different kinds of gamers out there. Casuals, elites, lore hounds, wanderers, fashion mongers. There can be some overlap, of course, but there are not many people that would fill all those categories.

Z-0 and milranduil both provide very good points. Based on all the complaining in this topic, if there is one good thing that does come out of this official statement against parsing, it's that it will finally give people enough encouragement to start their own community where they create the rules and do the runs they want to do with likeminded players. People that complain that others don't have specific affixes? Make a group so you can play with people that do have correct affixes/stats! Subpar palette? Make a group so that you don't play with undergeared players! Make a group with other likeminded people so you get the most enjoyment out of the game.

You don't know what the story is of the person at the other end of the computer. Games are monetary and free time-dependent forms of entertainment. How can you expect everyone to live up to your inhuman expectations for a pug? That's like the silly people in xiv that expect a farm group level of completion out of df. It's insane logic. I've even seen some people admit in this very topic that they don't affix because the system is way too convoluted to put any more effort into it. It's not that they're lazy. They've clearly put effort into trying to understand the system, but the reward is not worth the stress for some people when they could be using their time to do other things.

There are certainly enough people complaining in this thread to create a dedicated mpa/farm/eq/whatever group for whatever they want. Get 4 people together and have a blast!

Lets look at why SEGA caters PSO-2 for casuals:

Though I know the answers, I will not make it easy for you... Google the following:

1. # of hours Japanese people spend in school in a given week
2. # of hours Japanese people spend working in a given week
3. Google the term hikikomori and learn how widespread that is in Japan

PSO-2 is the most time-inefficient and most time consuming game that I own.
I took a break from the game because I realized all I was doing was playing a game where most of the EQs are about having Play-Dates with one of Falz's different forms. The guy seems so lonely, that every few hours it comes around and asks to be taken care by ARKS...
Working in a game where the content is gated around EQs that come at the wee hours of the morning is not my idea of fun.

Lately I've been in BDO, which unlike PSO-2 has 5 - 6 full versions and over a million concurrent logins shared in what is the most demanding PC MMORPG right now; where a player can reach the endgame entry-level of 50 extremely fast (There are youtube videos of parties speedrunning level 1 - 50 in 5 hours), and I just need to remember two things for equipment checks on a player....(All Armor at +5, All Weapons at +7 minimum along with ALL slots filled on Armor and Weapons... )

Might as well show you how I feel as far as images goes instead of words...

Here is what you need to run PSO-2 as far as PC Specs go...

Spoiler!

Here is what playing PSO-2 feels like to me compared to other games...

Spoiler!

When people challenge me in PSO-2, this is what I feel I am being challenged to in order to prove my worth as a person...

Spoiler!

Here are the specs you need to run BDO as far as PC Specs go...

Spoiler!

Here is what playing a good designed MMORPG feels compared to PSO-2

Spoiler!

When I am challenged in a proper MMORPG, especially in PvP Sieges... Here is how it feels like

Spoiler!

When I deal with all the arguments in the forum related to PSO-2 compared to other games....here is what it feels like

Spoiler!

Just to break the idea of being purely biased... Here is how I feel when dealing with sub-commanders (and their friends) who run my territory for me in several games while in my absence...

Spoiler!

*sigh*... still remember logging in to find all my siege engines were pushed to the side, and the entire castle was redecorated red and pink... and all the soldiers were wearing pink-dyed armor with a touch of red...then being asked "What do you think?" as I was lead to a door and I said "What the **** is this!?" and I saw the greatest Pink Monstrosity ever and I Said "you know... **** this ****... We're marching with this after I am totally smashed!!!

....so it became "Legend of the Drunken Commander... as 50+ soldiers marched the field, all wearing pink and red and dining on the blood of our enemies, as we burned their bones as offering to our Gods, and sent their heads back home... :P ..while the rest of the playerbase were like "WHO THE **** are these idiots!!!" :P

...memories!!!

[ArcaneTechs]

wow Keilyn, this was the first post you made where I actually laughed and didnt have to stop 1/4 the way through. 10/10 on the pics, very accurate

[Maninbluejumpsuit]

Couldn't find an existing relevant thread and didn't want to start a new one on this subject.

So almost on cue, the lobby monitors are playing the 'grinding is so easy, even a rappy can do it' videos again.

SEGA is actually aware there's a big problem with players being shit.

[Renavi]

Hi, just wanted to know, if I choose to use the plugin now and don't say anything ingame about it whatsoever, can it still be detected? Sorry if this is a dumb question or in the wrong spot.