PSO Gamecube - Multiplayer limited?

[king__sephiroth]

Some friends and I were excited to start a game of PSO on the gamecube, as we've always enjoyed games similar to Norath. Unfortunately for us, we found that when playing in 'Multi-Mode'>'Normal', we can't really do all that much.
We can't talk to anyone but shop keepers, we can't take missions from the guild, so all we can do is start at forest 1 and randomly mess about.
We did this for about an hour or two, with no real rhyme or reason to where we went or what we did. Eventually we made it to this huge dragon that we could barely hurt. We were level 4, so needless to say, it didn't go well.

I know that there are two other modes of play for Multi-Mode (which we're not all that interested in), but my question is:
What exactly is the point of 'Normal' mode? Just free roaming without missions or rewards?

I'm a little dissapointed if so.
Hoping someone can clarify this for me.
Thanks very much for reading.

[16085k]

In offline multiplayer you can't do really do anything other than run through the areas in free play. Also it doens't save any of your progress, so you can only go into the areas as far the person who's first player has unlocked.

[TheToyDolls]

Sounds like you're somewhat new to PSO. The real experience of the game in offline mode will first and foremost come from single player. After you've done quests, leveled up, killed bosses, and equipped yourself with some nice things, you can take your friends along (assuming they did the same) and challenge yourselves with certain areas/bosses as they do get increased health and damage in multiplayer.

My old friend of 12 years and I have high level characters with some pretty nice stuff and every now and then our favorite thing to do is Episode 2 Ultimate and it's a hell of a lot of fun. Although, ultimate might take quite a while for a level 4 to get to.

[Ithildin]

I used to run Caves over and over with old pals. Fun times.

[HUnewearl_Meira]

Do try Battle mode and Challenge mode. Challenge mode offers some unique weapons, if you can finish it. The best part about Battle and Challenge mode, is that your level is largely irrelevant, as the quests will set your level accordingly.

[bns1991]

Ah. This reminds me of when I was a rookie playing pso on the dreamcast at the start of the last decade. Once you get into the flow of things you will be able to go through zones with no problem. I enjoy seabed runs with friends. Olga flow is the most epic boss fight in the game (Gal Gryphon is a close second).

[thunder-ray]

Thats kinda how I got into pso by starting out in mulitplayer mode with my brothers. I personally found the multiplayer mode to be fun since I was playing with my brothers, we'd each had a important job that each of us had. My older brother was the tank and the leader of our little group, I was the sniper since my char was A ramar and my younger brother was the healer of the group since he liked being A force. We probally be still playing together today if the memory card we had didnt corrupet are data saved on there thus losing our chars :(.

[FoCaster]

You can always try free play in Battle Mode. As the instructions book suggests, it offers a more challenging experience in that "friendly fire" exists.

[zandra117]

are the towers in pso plus offline mode single player only?

[TrueChaos]

a friend and i had some great miltiplayer games on GC. did a 3 player once in Ruins and dies 2 seconds before Falz did. sucks
but, yeah, in multimode to stop people going further than they should you are limited to how far the person that has gotten least far. you also need to be a certain level to access the higher difficulty; 20 for hard, 40 v.hard and 80 for ultimate.

as for the Towers, i don't know. PSO+ wasn't released in the UK :(

[bns1991]

are the towers in pso plus offline mode single player only?

Yeah. You can't do missions on multiplayer, and the and going up the towers are a part of a mission. Its unfortunate though...

[FoCaster]

Yeah. You can't do missions on multiplayer, and the and going up the towers are a part of a mission. Its unfortunate though...

One way to do the towers offline in multimode is through PSO+ Ep 2 challenge mode.

[Norco]

Me, my brother and our friend spent hours and hours just hunting through every area in the game working together as a team. My brother sort of quit playing though because he felt the items he wanted was too hard to get but.. me and my friend kept playing and playing, I remember how we were always after to find a better Red Sword in caves or a Kasami Bracer which we eventually got.

[Kenbog]

Playing with more then 3 players is impossible, a 4 player party on ultimate gives a frame rate of like 2 frames/sec...

Its kind of a limitation

[twitcher05]

I played ep 1 the most and when I got my cousin into the game, we would fight with eachother alot because he would get mad when I killed a monster and he didn't even get to hit it. It's the same thing now with my lvl 158 Fomar and his lvl 118 Humar. I still play alot, him, not so much.

[paracelsus]

Well if i remember right Jellen and Zalure count as a hit, so either of you could use one or the other first then kill. you should both get exp then.

[twitcher05]

Shhh don't tell him that. XP