Article: Some PSOBB News from IGN

[Saladwood]

IGN Reported this today in their PC news:
April 13, 2004 - As reported in our recent Gaming Life in Japan, the latest Phantasy Star Online game is coming to the PC.
Blue Burst is actually just the PC version of Phantasy Star Online: Episode 1 & 2 which already appeared on GameCube and Xbox. However, there are a few changes in store. You can now access shortcut commands, visible at the bottom of the screen. A new character, Momoka, appears in the game's lobby area and offers up new quests. More exciting is the new "Team System," where you hook up with team members and can even communicate with one another from across different ships.
There is also the promise of improvements in a few areas that have gotten a bit stale in the PSO world. Sonic Team has mentioned improved graphics and control. We're not sure how much these areas will be improved, but with the PSO engine being a few years old now, we'll take any additions.
The biggest change appears to serve as a good means of keeping people from cheating. Phantasy Star Online: Blue Burst is an online-only experience. Character data is now stored on the game servers far out of reach from those who would modify their characters to give them an advantage in battle.
A closed Beta test for Phantasy Star Online: Blue Burst began recently in Japan, meaning an official release for the game should happen shortly.

Expected, so nothing new.

nothing new to pso

nothing new at all

wont see a US release so why care?

Hmph, some improvement.

We now lose offline mode so we can't get our characters up and if Sega gets hit by a massive storm, we can't play online so stuff that.

Hell, I'm not paying to just play a game online, I already pay to connect to the net and as far as I'm concern its more theft from Sega since they can't even to support their own console let alone company anymore.

Cheap scates..

[Sharkyland]

Hmm, I wonder how much it costs to save your characters on their server. I guess it's only online, and no offline value.

[AndyPandy]

Sounds like a great idea...no off-line PSO, after all it is called Phantasy Star ONLINE. No more cheating that ruined the other versions. This will be superb, and I think all hardcore legit PSOers will lap it up.

Top job.

Someone will find an exploit, and tell everyone about it, then everyone uses the hell out of it. Then there will be a character wipe and everyone will suffer.

The last version's PC servers lasted how long..? Barely 2 years? No offline AT ALL is stupid. (Although they might be nice and release a patch to let you play offline when they take servers down.. but it's sonic team.. we shouldn't get our hopes up)

How are multiple characters supposed to be handled? Are we gonna need to pay more to have more? For consoles it just depended on how many memory cards you wanted to invest in. For old PC version you had like a 100 character limit. I don't see a 100 char limit happening for a game with server side saving.

Also unless you, as said in one of the posts, are 'hardcore legit', you're gonna hate the fact that the PIPE TRICK is gone.. But what's this..? Recobox trick I bet will still be there.

Who raises their first few char levels online? What hells are classes like FOnewearl supposed to face when they try to get to level 10 without 'battle training'?

[AndyPandy]

Well considering 99% of cheating started with offline exploits, I think this is great news. Yes people will always find a way of exploiting the game, but at least this cuts down on 90% of it. Also, stuff like the pipe trick was kind of boring anyway. I prefer to just play the game with friends like its suppose to be than be a loner piper. Again your point about Forces starting online, and it being hard. The point is that you are meant to HELP and play TOGETHER in this game, play together and you will enjoy it more. The new community additions sound great.

Multiple characters....who knows. Maybe you create as many as you like (within reason) from a menu when you log onto the servers. Choose/make your character from the online log-on screen then head into the lobby..

'The point is that you are meant to HELP and play TOGETHER in this game'

Was that the point? It simply won't happen.. Games that try to be like that have a very select few players willing to play like that.

I agree that pipe trick was really boring though, so now ultra rares will really be.. ultra rare.

But still, forcing everyone to be saved server side wasn't the way to go in a game like this. This game was the perfect mix of being able to solo and being able to play together.. Now with online only, the enemies are so tough you're going to be forced to play together (or stay in one area much longer).

Server side saving was a good idea for some people, but a really crappy idea for others. From sonicteam's POV, this is going to do more harm than good, cause killing off chunks of the playerbase isn't exactly the way to make money.


Another point for me to bring up. The GMs. Seeing as this game will more than likely not see a release outside of japan.. there won't be too many multilingual GMs. What if some japanese player doesn't like how someone is playing? (EXP hogs, people that take rares way too often) They could tell the GM that said person was cheating, and they wouldn't be able to say anything to defend themselves (let's face it, you'd need a really detailed word select to get out of that one)


[Please note: I am against hacking, and duping, and exploiting and all that stuff, I'm talking from the point of view that alot of friends I have wanting to play use dialup and only have one phone line. Alot of this stuff isn't being fair to them. Plus I like to do my major leveling alone.. so easier enemies offline is the way I do it.]

[AndyPandy]

I agree, if you want a better chance of the rares, you have to play solo. Unless of course you have a good group of friends who share and are willing to import the game with you.

I think its a trade-off for a better economy. Unfortunately the exploiters always spoil it for legit people in the long run, people like yourself who like to play offline.

I still think server-side saving is the way to go with this game. It will bring it upto speed in relation with all other online games of this type, and hopefully in the long run produce a better playing environment were rares are rare, and cheaters are a thing of the past......lol, yeah right.