SEGA working on solutions for PSO2 to the West.

[[Ayumi]]

As someone who lives on a shitty country that has blocked all and every online shopping no matter how much money you make, sincerely.

Fuck This

And thats exactly the problem i have with a "western release" is "release it for the USA, maybe mexico and canada, fuck everyone else"

I cant play any of the new AAA games that have been released, cant play any of the "Buy to play" online games that come out and its not even a hardware issue.

I even WANT TO and CAN pay for premium and scratches but due to the stupid circumstances cant buy ac or anything, you have no idea how happy i am this game is not p2w garbage like many other (even japanese games) that are (loking at you cosmic break).

Yeah fuck me and everyone else that cant afford anything besides f2p p2w garbages.

I wanna keep the full cosmetic not gear dependant model of pso2 that im playing right now, thank you.

Oh and if you didnt noticed, yes im saltier than a mermaid`s arse about this specific topic.

Plus, I like the idea of having alt accounts and not having to pay a monthly fee for all of them.
Or some of my old old old old account I've left to rot (like my 1st 1st PSO2 account I left to die years ago), I can go back to it if I ever wanted to.. no problem without paying a fee.

It's been established that SEGA is earning quite a large amount of money from PSO2.
But I'm sure it's not so much from the "pay to win" stuff like Scape Dolls that almost nobody buys.
It's more the AC scratches. Outfits, accessories, lobby actions, upgrade items, etc.

PSO2 has some crucial stuff (eg. Mags) locked behind paywall, but it's not as bad as other games I've played.
It's also very generous in giving people Half-Dolls and Este Tickets for free. Stuff like that.
Although it wasn't like that originally.
It's also possible to solo most stuff without dying. Other games, not really possible.

This is another thing I like for my "PSO" games. The ability to solo things. Some of the stuff takes longer than playing with others.. like PSO Ultimate or PSO2 Ultimate and PSU S3 and other crap but yeah... still doable.

Yeah I guess that's a bad example, but I find it annoying there are skills (not a lot, mind you) that are all "75% chance of not dying when you should have died" at max. Then again, if you just suck less sure that skill is useless (and so are scape dolls) that might be negligible, but makes you think then "what a waste of a skill, why does it even EXIST". Though that isn't that big a deal

I've seen many other games that's not in the PS series where when you die you're penalized whether it's in drops or exp or losing exp or something. I rather let's say die in a mission I need to S/A rank and either hope someone is around or I just go back to ship and try again.
TAs and XQs are the only things I can think of that if you die and no one around that you're fucked... and even then only in XQ as you lose the ticket... which you can get back with excubes which isn't hard to get either as you can get those in abundance in EQs or simply finding 10+* weps you don't want/need and recycling them.

If we are starting to think PSU, having your own room and everything that came with it basically requires monthly sub here (not even gonna mention offline as a worthy element, because well, not like PSO2 has one). But I guess it's not so bad, since the game is free by default here...

You can keep a room up almost constantly if you once again have cubes which is easy to get as I mentioned above. There's a 3 day room pass in the excube shop that cost only like 3 cubes I think (not near the shop to confirm) which is... really not hard.

But count in extra mags (unless you play ONE character), extra characters (if you don't want to pay for extra mags and don't want to pay for skill trees), skill trees (minimum to be viable if you want to have a minimum of diversity in one character) and maybe the same features of the PSO/PSU games at the ready, you'll end up paying monthly for the game in the end anyway. But yeah sure we don't have to, but compared to Nexon games I've played and never had to put money in, I hardly see myself be able to do the same thing with PSO2; too many little things costing you 3$ here, 6$ there... and 20$ here (if you want inventory space - not extra storage space because that's another story [and another 'premium' braquet/category of monthly costs]). Maybe because I lost interest in Nexon games before feeling like putting money, so that has to be a sign for something. Still, I was more put off by their games then by their cash-grabbing non-sense. In PS02, it's the other way around.

Mag: Weren't you only getting one mag per character on PSO too? I mean yeah you could've made a new character and take that mag off them, but still you had one mag per char.
Mags aren't necessary either if you like a specific class. Like while I play all class
with one character, then yeah I'll have 3 mags on her, but I personally like/main range class as I've been a "RA" since PSO1 so my 1st mag was the range mag.
Sega has now given everyong 3 free character slots.. and you know what that mean. If means, that if you want to play all 3 class styles, you can make 1 Strike, 1 Range, and 1 Tech.

Extra characters: Like I said, you got 3 free ones you can make. More is good, but don't forget that PSO and PSU mainly you only had 4 (or 8 on a certain server of PSU) so you're just off by one. One day I'm sure they would make a 4th free but still...

Skilltrees: Once again the same as the mag situation. Not needed and you can have 3 free characters.
Back to my main as an example before she got 3 mags... I've been range most of my Phantasy life so I had range trees. I did later went like let's say Ra/Gu and then Gu/Hu. Being Gu/Hu, I won't have a hunter main tree because I wouldn't main hunter so I would have a skill tree to use it as a sub. If I want to main hunter, I would have another character in those free 3 slots to make the main hunter tree.
While I've been playing for a while, I only have one character that has more than one tree on her. My main got 2 braver trees (one for bow and one for katana), and other than that I don't have more than one tree. This yes mean that while she plays all clases, she uses her main hunter tree when I play Gu/Hu now. It's not perfect and not the "OMG BEST!" it can be, but it's manageable and not crippling to the point that I notice. I only can notice if I go on one of my other characters who would always ONLY be range so she only has a hunter sub tree. She's stronger than my main but my main isn't having trouble pulling her weight or soloing many high level things in the game.

The only feature PSU had that's behind premium in PSO2 is the shop and trading.
And trading is somewhat very shitty anyway. You could not trade anything above 9* so... what's really the point of it? The only benefit in trading in this game is trading meseta which you can transfer between each other through shop.
Which brings me to shop which yes it's nice to have, but you can get one if you're one of the golden prophets of Falz and luckily get one through the FUN scratch. Not as viable as with AC, but it's still possible to get without paying a single dime.

And we're not even talking about character outfits yet. AC Scratch, what a delight. I can't just default play as, say, something that looks like the good ol' HUcasts for example (even if technically default for every other classes is sets of outfit close to the original designs). Unless they added the "melder set" to character creation (which I haven't checked), you have to GAMBLE your way with AC scratch to get it. Good times. More money burnt there. Then again, that might be too specific so that doesn't count... and probably should just buy it off someone's shop... for half a million meseta if I'm lucky? After I buy premium first to be able to trade, that is... unless I get something out of the FUN scratch I guess.

I'll let you in on a little secret that no one knows about me... okay maybe a lot know about me.
I don't AC scratch. I only AC scratched once... and that was in the beta to get that rappy suit and that was the AC Sega gave us to mess around with in the beta.
I have never AC scratched and will NEVER AC scratch. I see it as a gamble and I hate gambling to see if I maybe get something I fucking want.

So... where do I get my outfits and accesories and such?
Player shops.
Yup, I use money I get from wherever (like TA and XQ) and buy my shit right from people.
Also you said you would like to look like a HUcast, you do know... Sega every so often do a campaign thing where you don't have to spend a dime and get free Ragol Memories which you use to get PSO styled things, right?
They don't always do it, but it's still there.

You also make 500k sound like a lot. I used to say the same when I 1st started PSO2. I would praise myself when I get 2mil. You do know you can get 500k almost a day from just doing some of the daily orders? If you have 3 free characters and do those same orders on all 3 and if they gave EXACTLY 500k then you make 1.5mil right there? The only thing I can see you can complain about would be lobby actions and certain ugly looking hair (OPINION! OPINION! MY OPINION!) for like 20+mil or 30+mil which I say isn't needed at all (okay maybe the hair if you want it).
And if we put TA and XQ in the mix you can do weekly per character (that mean you can do 3 TA/XQs a week if you want to) they can give around 2.5mil per set... that's 7.5mil a week you can get on those 3 characters while excluding the daily orders which you can maybe make like 12 to 15mil (or more) a week from doing those things.

Alright, so maybe it isn't as BAD as Nexon... but it ends up being as costly or more costly than a game on its own to get the same things without having to pray the gods of luck in the scratches every couple days. Still, might be worth it in the long run. I mean, it's not like SEGA's selling everyone the Episodes in PSO2.

I don't see it being more costly than a paid subscription honestly. People can go months without spending AC again (and I know a lot that do that). They get AC for premium of one month and do all they got to do they've been stocking and storing until that day, get a shit ton done, and then when premium expire they're set for a good long time until they need to do so again.

Not bringing up the AC Scratch talk again.

I clearly just got intimidated by the insane amount of things that cost you money right off compared to the older PSO/PSU games. I still think the ACScratch/GoldScratch gambling bit sucks balls though. Just get a shop proper for that kinda shit, SEGA, geez, maybe THEN you'll be able to legally release outside Japan. Gambling regulations in Japan aren't the same and more accepting of that kinda stuff because it's technically "not gambling" since you are using money to get "stuff" not more money, so I wouldn't be surprised that's a big thing in preventing PSO2's release internationally, or just in North America... wait, who am I kidding, The Battle Cats is littered with that shit and is available here just fine. I have no idea anymore. I'm tired. I dunno, there's got to be something more to it. I WANT TO BELIEVE.

"I still think the ACScratch/GoldScratch gambling bit sucks balls though."
I agree, and that's why I never scratched (unless I got an itch on my body HAHAHAHAHAHAHA shitty joke... shut up).

Still. Ship transfer fees suck though; while not going as far as PSO ver1 or ver2 on Dreamcast where not only could you get on ALL servers, but on any ship at anytime, you could, in PSU (in American servers) just jump ships whenever to go see people populating ship x or y, without losing anything. That bit still bothers me about PSO2. A lot. Especially given all the things that DON'T transfer over to the other ship. Not only it isn't free, but it's a botched cheaped-out transfer at that. Best just start another character instead.

You know the whole "ship" thing of PSO and PSU are what are considered blocks in this game right?
If you had everyone from every ship of PSO2 in one gigantic ship, there would be stability problems. Sega isn't the 1st to do this so I wouldn't complain here. I even saw from a few of those nexon games I tried in the past too having things to lock/log onto and unable to change unless you make another character.
As for the whole moving all over the many ships, I'm kind of fine without having to move over randomly like that as I can see that causing problems as I'm sure all of those ships are on their own servers/drives which can get very messy.
OH I remembered another game like that... FFXI.

[Z-0]

If you had everyone from every ship of PSO2 in one gigantic ship, there would be stability problems.

No there wouldn't be. All they have to do is let you access all your characters from every ship. Bam, problem solved.

[[Ayumi]]

No there wouldn't be. All they have to do is let you access all your characters from every ship. Bam, problem solved.

Then explain why other companies that's not Sega does this? Making it sound like Sega is the only ones that ever did this when they have a lot of people playing PSO2 at a time on certain ships.

[BWS-1]

(all the things)

Well wow, thanks for filling me in with all that. Obviously, since I never jumped on a JP version of PSO (other than PSO ver1 on Dreamcast), I'd rather keep on waiting. But with everything you said, at least I feel more comfortable with the idea of ever seeing a release of PSO2 as it is right now. All seems more manageable, and really, I wouldn't mind GIVING sega money for the extra skill trees if I want to keep everything on one character. I just don't want to end up pouring money into PSO2 the same way I'd pour in money in a Japanese arcade.

...

But still, I want the Melder set (closest thing I'd ever get to HUcast) to be part of the default Cast looks. x~x

Every other race and class has their "Ragol Memories"-style by default when you MAKE a character, why not the HU-type CAST? No, has to be looking like an anorexic gundam who lost his way into this franchise for god-knows-what-reason, with FOcast understandably being new and RAcast being almost picture-perfect upgraded style from [insert all PSOs from the past here].

I would be willing to think someone lost a bet at SEGA: "I dare you to ruin the perfectly fine HUcast design instead of upgrading it! It's not like anyone will care! I DOUBLE DARE YOU". And on the following day, someone had to dress silly at the office, thanks to that. Also, HUcasts were ruined from PSO2 on day1 launch.

[Powder Keg]

It's way too late and they know it.

Anyone not playing already lost interest at this point. A 15 year old game is still more popular.

[jooozek]

Then explain why other companies that's not Sega does this? Making it sound like Sega is the only ones that ever did this when they have a lot of people playing PSO2 at a time on certain ships.

monetising ship transfers in context of ship-based limits is why as of now they wouldn't want to merge ships blocks of blocks already are on different servers as was already observed by people just checking what IPs does the game connect to when

also, personally i would start afresh on servers with better ping, being able to actually communicate on a level more than a greeting and goodbye, even more so that in january segac locked me out of my old account on which i had had thousands of hours played

[TaigaUC]

I've AC scratched a few times and got almost nothing but garbage for it.
So I don't AC scratch. It's not hard to earn money in-game, unlike other games.
But because of that, prices keep rising.

@Ayumi
Because a lot of people are stupid and shitty at game design? I dunno.
I'm sure there's monetary incentives involved.

There's also a thing where people just copy what other people have done up to this point.
"Because it works". They don't even think about improving it. Especially because it's risky to experiment.
That's why most games nowadays are mostly copies of each other.

A JP friend was telling me something like, in (I think it was) FF14, you can play with friends easily? But you can't because in PSO2 because of the ship and block system.
I don't remember exactly what they said. Haven't played FF14 either, so I don't know.
I know FF11 had that World Pass bullshit that took them a while to remove/improve.

In general I don't want to pay money for simple stuff that really should have been free/not a pain up the ass to begin with.
When they intentionally make stuff a pain up the ass to get people to pay, they can suck my butt. I'm not paying them.
In fact it makes me want to not pay them at all.

[jooozek]

well, in FF14 for time being you can play cross-server with random people in location based datacentres so it limits by ping technically but there isn't any way currently to schedule playing with someone else from another server within a datacentre but apparently they are going to add a cross-server (within datacentre) party finder which will enable hooking up with people across servers, now you can only do it by randomly stumbling upon people from another server; friend list and whispering people from another server isn't possible though and likely never will be

[TaigaUC]

That reminds me, Blade and Soul China has that cross-server dungeon matching system.
It didn't work well though. People kept getting disconnected or leaving.
And there was still the possibility of hooking up with leechers or assholes.
Sucks to wait a while for a group just to end up disbanding.

The joys of online gaming.
I don't even want to play with random people I don't know.

[landman]

The western BnS also has the cross server dungeon match up, but it's laggier than if you just go to the world in your server and open an instance, and that for certain classes is gamebreaking.

More than ship/server limitations (which is provably BS) the main problem is block confinement, but at least it has a server-wide party finder unlike the previous games, but it's still kind of useless if that block is full.

BTW:
PSO2 blocks = PSO ships = PSU universes
PSO2 Ships = PSO/PSU servers (JP, EU, US, Xbox, etc. you could only move freely between them in DC and GC)

PSO blocks are instances / channels for lobbies that reached the player limit, but you could access the same parties from the counter.