Phantasy Star IV – 1993 Developer Interviews (shmuplations.com)
113 points by speckx 4 days ago
falsaberN1 4 hours ago
Raise your hand if you got Megid without a guide.
I love Phantasy Star I-IV (except III, mostly everyone agrees it's too flawed and wacky despite some good ideas). I never got into Phantasy Star Online, which is the only game people today seem to be familiar with, though. Is it even related to the original RPGs? I heard 2 has Dark Force as a boss but the events of IV make it...strange. That shouldn't be possible in-universe.
Still, Phantasy Star IV is my favorite and most likely the best RPG on the Megadrive by a long shot. It had good combat, good music, it stayed away from medieval fantasy and generally speaking was full of good vibes (except after the first battle with Zio. If you know you know.).
If you want to replay it there is a randomizer called Profound Distortion that allows to mix things up and I believe it's still in active development.
Anyway, I really loved some of the things it did with enemies like the witches using combined attacks or monsters fusing together like the Dualblade and the Life Deleter. Even today that stuff is rare to see, last game I remember with enemy fusions is Etrian Odyssey V.
I never managed to find the game in a normal shop, but when the local Blockbuster closed up, they happened to have a rental copy that I managed to get. It's still with me.
xphos 6 hours ago
The OG phantasy Star was a little before my time but the GameCube version of Phantasy Star online was so good. They even have community servers for it today as Phantasy Star Blue burst. The game is now dated but honestly I could still play it because it had a good grind formula
rybosome 7 minutes ago
This brought back a flood of wonderful memories. Tying up my parents phone line with the Dreamcast's 56k modem was a formative experience for me as a nerdy middle-schooler.
- The Dreamcast keyboard made communication so much better - I was studying French, and joined European servers sometimes for the thrill of using the language with real Francophones (VERY rudimentarily)
- I once met someone whose job was composing jingles and writing slogans for a greeting card company, which I found really fascinating for some reason, and I spent an hour peppering them with questions about it
- The lore of the "gladius spike", a supposedly really rare dual-saber weapon that never actually existed
- Being given a treasure trove of the rarest items in the game by a duper named "Cap'n PooBeard"; the drop rates were so ludicrously, absurdly low that I would never have seen some of this stuff otherwise (Chain Sawd, Spread Needle...)
- The fear and thrill of playing with strangers, due to the mechanic that you drop your weapon when you die, allowing others to steal it
- The vibey, synth-heavy soundtrack and diverse biomes
I haven't played it in decades, but I bet that it still holds up. :)
AdmiralAsshat 5 hours ago
To clarify: Blue Burst was actually the PC port. [0] I put alot of time into that one, once an English patch became available on Schtserv. They made a bunch of the perks/models available to everyone that were previously only available to Sega employees and holidays. Running through the game with a trio of friends, all skinned as Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles, is one of my treasured gaming memories.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantasy_Star_Online#Blue_Burs...
xphos 12 minutes ago
Thank you for the clarification! When you say you put a lot of time in do you mean as a developer or just game time? I find it facinating how that worked. I personally enjoyed the game cube version but the time to actually port it and get it work on PC most have been fairly interesting!
AdmiralAsshat 9 minutes ago
NDlurker 2 hours ago
I spent so much time playing PSO on the DC. I'd start the night playing with Americans, then Europeans, then Japanese. When the Japanese guys started getting on I knew it was far past my bedtime. My whole sleep schedule was messed up from it, but that's ok, I had fun. I made a bunch of online friends and we'd chat on MSN messenger and the PSOtakus message board.
NoLinkToMe 6 hours ago
Uff Blue Burst, fantastic online game, it's one of those blasts of sheer nostalgia that is almost unbearable, I'd give everything to go back. It's partly the game, and partly my life around the time I was playing the game, a time of constant wonder and exploration and true excitement. There are times every few years that I just put the games' music album on a loop to relive the memories. Though just watching some gameplay is also fantastic with the sound and graphic design.
matheusmoreira 2 hours ago
> partly my life around the time I was playing the game, a time of constant wonder and exploration and true excitement
It's those feelings that I miss the most. Sometimes when I replay old games or rewatch childhood stuff I only end up destroying my memories because it's not as good as I remembered it being.
mountainriver 6 hours ago
Phantasy Star Online was so far ahead of its time. I remember connecting it up to my early modem via phone jack.
Gameplay was amazing, story and graphics were great, the community was really fun.
Oddly it’s also the last MMO I ever really played. As I got into high school I focused more on music and whenever I would try a new MMO game they never felt nearly as good as PSO.
hnlmorg 6 hours ago
I still play PSO weekly online with a small guild of friends.
mountainriver 6 hours ago
How can I play with you all!?
hnlmorg 5 hours ago
mghackerlady 5 hours ago
AdmiralAsshat 6 hours ago
Reiko Kodama did some incredible work for Sega, Skies of Arcadia probably being her most notable after Phantasy Star. She unfortunately passed away in 2022, and it took some months before anyone was even aware of it due to her family's desire for privacy.
kinow 5 hours ago
Phantasy Star I was the first RPG I played when child. I remember my father showing us the basic commands, and then my brothers and I taking notes of items, magic, and drawing cave maps.
functionmouse 4 days ago
Awesome game, highly recommended. It's fine if it's your first PS game
Esn024 6 hours ago
Yes, it is surprisingly polished. I tried playing the first three Phantasy Star games, but each time was put off by one annoying design flaw or another (such as the camera not being centred in II, so that you can't see very far ahead when exploring). In the fourth game, everything just works.
Just about the only annoying flaw still left is that it's not obvious what items do, and you kinda will need to memorize lots of random names... (Well, or have a reference near you while you play) This is actually mentioned in the interview as them not wanting to be too explicit about what things do (not saying "attack +20" etc.) - unfortunately, it's one of those design decisions that does create friction for the player.
ansgri 6 hours ago
PS3 was one of my favorite games, maybe it's time to get myself one of those pocket emulators and play PS4 finally.
functionmouse 4 hours ago
edit: If you have the space, a Nintendo Wii running Genesis Plus GX with the video mode set to "Original" and a CRT with at least composite (yellow cable) blows all of those handhelds out of the water. If you only have composite, the emulator has a "trap filter" option which utilizes some custom hardware and the Nintendo Wii's graphics chip to isolate the chroma and luma channels, resulting in a much cleaner composite image. Of course, component is still better, but it's becoming harder to find a 15kHz CRT with component hookups.
Otherwise, I recommend Retroid Pocket 6 if you like Android or want to play GC/PS2/N64, or a Miyoo Mini Plus if you don't care about any of that. Neat thing about the mini plus is its 640x480 screen, so you get Genesis/Mega Drive games edge to edge 2x integer scale if configured properly. Also has OnionOS which is a pretty good custom firmware.
Other than that, lots of these things have major problems. Watch out for things like improperly calibrated joysticks (can't run in certain directions in 3D platformers, only walking speed), screen tearing, saves disappearing from the filesystem if the system shuts down improperly during gameplay, audio crackle/poor audio in general, IPS bleed around display edges, soggy dpads, face buttons too firm, etc. A lot of problems with any given device you can run into that don't fall under the usual umbrella of review metrics, so you won't know until you realize a week into owning it why something feels off about it...
deafpolygon 7 hours ago
Not sure if it was on PS (except as part of the Sega Collection disc), but I played it on the Sega Genesis. Loved it.
code_duck 19 minutes ago
Incidentally, there are remakes of the first two for PS2, released under the Sega AGES line of discount games. Unfortunately, only in Japanese at the time I played, though translation patches are now available. They’re called Phantasy Star Generation 1 and 2. There is also a release of a compilation of the original games for PS2.
loloquwowndueo 7 hours ago
PS = Phantasy Star
deafpolygon 7 hours ago
izzydata 5 hours ago
I like Phantasy Star IV, but my main love of the franchise is still Phantasy Star Online 1. From my understand during the planning phase of PSO it hadn't been decided to be a Phantasy Star game. It wasn't until later that they decided to skin the game to Phantasy Star. Funny how you can be well into development on the fundamentals of a game and not know what it will be called or exactly what it will look like.
fooqux 5 hours ago
I would say it showed though. The game basically had zero story, and that's why.
tosh 5 hours ago
one of the best RPGs on Mega Drive
I wish like for Sonic (Mania) there would be additional Phantasy Star entries in the IV formula
saejox 4 hours ago
This part fires me up to create art for arts sake:
Kodama: That’s also partly why this development was a lot of fun, I think: we (the developers) started the project on our own initiative, and many people on the team had worked on PSII and were able to address the shortcomings and unfinished ideas they had from that game in PSIV.
mghackerlady 5 hours ago
Phantasy Star is such an underrated series. They're all far before my time, I was exposed via a sega genesis collection on the xbox 360. I've played a lot of I, II, and IV. I've also played and enjoyed phantasy star zero on the ds and got some enjoyment out of it
throw_m239339 2 hours ago
Fantastic game, and the only PS game I actually finished! Unfortunately Rieko Kodama passed away not too long ago, fantastic game director and artist she was...
I really like the Manga style cut scenes in the game, it really added to the production value, and the plot is once again, full of twists and turns.
This is a JRPG that did age well and it's still engaging to play today, so it's a classic... like Breath of Fire III, Final Fantasy 6, Chrono Trigger,... they have well crafted stories & characters and they are not too hard to play or too grindy... and they all have a certain care for presentation.
ZeroClickOk 6 hours ago
By far one of the best games I have played.
musha68k 7 hours ago
Phoenix Rie <3
theologan 5 hours ago
This game was ahead of its time, and had a most excellent sound track.
mwkaufma 3 hours ago
RIP Rieko Kodama
sylware 3 hours ago
Proud player of phantasy star I on sega master system here (I was a really, really, young kid when I played it)
Yeah, and I don't want to play more phantasy star games, and you know why? I am klinging to those amazing positive emotions I can still remember, namely I don't want to ruin them.