Something I really like to do when trying out a new franchise is starting from the beginning - I love playing through a series and seeing how it grew with each successive entry, even if it means trudging through some frankly horribly aged games. Phantasy Star is, bar none, the epitome of this kind of endeavour; it kinda baffles me how they kept hammering at this franchise after III, but man am I glad that they did. IV is, in my opinion, one of the greats of the 16-bit era, thanks to its unique presentation and consistent game flow. To explain why IV is so good, at least for me, in greater detail, though, a bit of a lengthy summary of my experience with the series is needed. You can skip straight to my thoughts on IV if you want, though. It'll be clearly marked.
Phantasy Star was a game that was certainly interesting for the time, electing to take place in the sci-fi-fantasy hybrid Algol Solar System. It still had very obvious roots in contemporary jrpgs for the time, but definitely stood out, being one of, if not the first game in the genre to feature multiple differing overworlds - a year before Dragon Quest III and three before Final Fantasy III. The 3D dungeons and their smooth scrolling were undeniably impressive for the time as well, with other dungeon crawlers like Digital Devil Story - Megami Tensei and the Wizardry series being several leagues behind in terms of presentation. Despite all this, the game aged pretty poorly, with the endeavour of playing it nowadays being slow, grindy and obtuse. Even the Sega Ages re-release wasn't able to solve the latter. It is nonetheless one of the pioneers of the JRPG genre, and provides the setting and baseline lore that the rest of the series would build on. Naturally, the sequel would build on this and be an improvement, right?
Right????
Yeah. When I left a review for Phantasy Star II initially, all I did was say; "Dungeon design is my passion", and gave it one star. That's not a lot to go by, aside from the dungeon design being terrible. Maybe I was a bit too harsh, but let me tell you; unless you have played the game yourself, you have no IDEA how labyrinthian and contrived Phantasy Star II's dungeons truly are. I genuinely cannot properly express how miserable they are to play through. They're horrendously mazey, moreso than Phantasy Star I's actual mazes for dungeons (that were at least easy to draw on on paper), absolutely full of dead ends and paths designed to waste your time and put you in a loop, and require you to search them from top to bottom to progress. Most of Phantasy Star II IS the dungeons, too. You'll spend more time in them than on the overworld, or in towns, because the thing you need to do or get in order to progress will almost always be in one of them. Oh, and the walkspeed is just as slow as the first game on top of it having a higher encounter rate and somehow being even grindier. You're admittedly fed more story than PSI, and the ways it continues the first game's narrative are actually cool. The ending is also a really unique, interesting twist, and some of the revelations and developments around the mid-game have a permanent effect on the Algol Solar System that are touched on in later entries in the series, and referred to as historical events. Still, any semblence of story is so infrequent and requires so much reading between the lines that it just isn't worth the play. What is worth it, though, is reading a plot synopsis, as doing that will do the game and its impact on the rest of the series far more justice than actually playing it. I highly recommend watching this video by Mr. Gentleman on Youtube for this purpose: https://youtube.com/watch?v=k3QN8HxMkIw
The next game, Phantasy Star III - Successors of Time as it was dubbed in Japan, or Generations of Doom as it was dubbed in the west, was a bit of an odd experiment. Essentially, development was handed to a B-Team, and the end result was something very different to the games that came both before and after it. It's a game that still inherited its fair share of flaws from its predecessors, but made an active effort to rectify some of them. It feels like Sega just wanted to test the waters a little with a filler entry and see what changes needed to be made for the Algol saga's finale to truly be remembered fondly. Grinding no longer became necessary, for one, but most importantly, III dropped II's dungeon design philosophy and instead opted for simple albeit mazey 1-2 floor ventures. They were far from ideal, but perfectly tolerable. One thing that people often point out about Phantasy Star III though is the dismally slow walking speed. Yeah, they made it even slower, for some reason, and I'm convinced that complaints from reviewers convinced the devs to finally increase the default walking speed in IV. While Phantasy Star I and II were marred by archaic game design and inexperienced developers, III is actually tolerable to play through for the most part, but it's still far from a must-play. By this point, the story in these games was still being dripfed, and III was heavily disconnected from the first two games in the series. The series was starting to fall behind competitors in both quality and quantity, and it needed a title that would not only mark an end of the Algol saga, but prove that the Mega Drive was more than capable of housing worthwhile JRPGs.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>THE ACTUAL REVIEW<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
Historically, the Mega Drive hasn't really been a console that was known for its JRPGs. The Super Nintendo had numerous prolific Squaresoft, Enix and Atlus games to its name, but the Mega Drive only housed a few notable series and standalone titles. Needless to say, it was a tough sell for fans of JRPGs. Fastforward 30 years later, though, and games like Shining Force II and Phantasy Star IV place very favourably in JRPG rankings; so what happened?
An actually good video game happened. A game with superb worldbuilding and contextualisation of past titles' events. A game with presentation that not only raised the bar for limited 16-bit consoles but for the genre as a whole. A game with actual characters and discernable character development nearly a whole year before Final Fantasy VI. Most importantly though, Phantasy Star IV was a game that understood the fundamental, core appeal of the genre. I can't understate how satisfying and refreshing Phantasy Star IV was after the first three games. I went from dozing off in the sloggish labyrinths of PSI and II, constantly looking to a guide in hopes of getting them over with as soon as possible, to enjoying just about every second of IV, not thinking once of turning to any external help. It was the game I got into the series for, so it needed to live up to the praises I'd seen online, and it delivered.
Addressing the elephant in the room - yes, the encounter rate is pretty high - but it becomes a non issue considering that battles are faster than ever, and the macro system lets you customize auto-battling to deal with encounters to your liking. It also helps that grinding is never required, and bosses generally remain challenging. The walking speed is practically tripled from past games in the series, as well, so you'll never be on the overworld or in a dungeon for too long. On the topic of dungeons, they're actually pretty well designed, being concise and short, but not lacking complexity or branching paths. TP and skill uses are very finite, and, for the most of the game, are irreplenishable in dungeons, so resource management is paramount. Enemy and character sprites in battles are beautifully detailed and animated, and the battle theme has this distinct Mega Drive twang to it that I love. The game part of Phantasy Star IV is all around just incredibly solid, even compared to many other JRPGs.
I adore the manga style cutscenes, for one. They're extremely well illustrated and plentiful, helping to elevate the game's moments and story. The best thing that games could do at this point in time were FMVs, but those were heavy on storage and compressed to even display favourably on consoles that supported it, but Phantasy Star IV's way of storytelling proved to be far more effective and engrossing. Shockingly enough, basically no other game I can think of adapted this style with the same quality, consistency, and frequency, which is a damn shame. I can only imagine what it was like playing the game back when it released, seeing those cute closeups of Alys teasing Hahn, Chaz' many emotions, Rune's introduction, and so on, and thinking: video game story presentation had progressed.
The story admittedly isn't amazing; it's kinda tropey, but what it provides is definitely good. This is more than made up for by the previously mentioned stellar presentation, but also by how it validates players of the first three games with the references and alusions to events of the past, and the worldbuilding. I've referred to the connected story of these games as a saga, but I wouldn't be calling it that if it weren't for Phantasy Star IV. The passage of time and consequences of the preceding games' events are made no more apparent by the transformation of Motavia; the home planet and initial setting for Phantasy Star II and Phantasy Star IV. The Motavias of Phantasy Star I, II, and IV are almost entirely different, yet IV carries DNA of both prior incarnations. Abandoned, technologically advanced factories from II are being unearthed and becoming sites of archeological and historical interest, while the terraformed landscape has long since eroded and has mostly reverted to the desert that it was in the first game, with occasional patches of grassland and greenery still growing a thousand years after the collapse that stopped facilitating their growth. The game even starts with you visiting an academy that studies the past, the bookshelves being littered with historical accounts and notes, and the professors expressing their findings. Even the third game, despite being disconnected, is given representation in the form of a data log that had been long since lost to history. This aspect is probably my favourite of the game.
Phantasy Star IV ends the story of the Algol Solar System on an incredibly high note, both comparatively and relatively. It's one of the most unique JRPGs of the 16-bit era, embracing its sci-fi setting and affirming its, for the time, unparalleled presentation. While not a stand out game narratively, it's a must-play for anyone into JRPGs, and a cornerstone of the genre.
Phantasy Star was a game that was certainly interesting for the time, electing to take place in the sci-fi-fantasy hybrid Algol Solar System. It still had very obvious roots in contemporary jrpgs for the time, but definitely stood out, being one of, if not the first game in the genre to feature multiple differing overworlds - a year before Dragon Quest III and three before Final Fantasy III. The 3D dungeons and their smooth scrolling were undeniably impressive for the time as well, with other dungeon crawlers like Digital Devil Story - Megami Tensei and the Wizardry series being several leagues behind in terms of presentation. Despite all this, the game aged pretty poorly, with the endeavour of playing it nowadays being slow, grindy and obtuse. Even the Sega Ages re-release wasn't able to solve the latter. It is nonetheless one of the pioneers of the JRPG genre, and provides the setting and baseline lore that the rest of the series would build on. Naturally, the sequel would build on this and be an improvement, right?
Right????
Yeah. When I left a review for Phantasy Star II initially, all I did was say; "Dungeon design is my passion", and gave it one star. That's not a lot to go by, aside from the dungeon design being terrible. Maybe I was a bit too harsh, but let me tell you; unless you have played the game yourself, you have no IDEA how labyrinthian and contrived Phantasy Star II's dungeons truly are. I genuinely cannot properly express how miserable they are to play through. They're horrendously mazey, moreso than Phantasy Star I's actual mazes for dungeons (that were at least easy to draw on on paper), absolutely full of dead ends and paths designed to waste your time and put you in a loop, and require you to search them from top to bottom to progress. Most of Phantasy Star II IS the dungeons, too. You'll spend more time in them than on the overworld, or in towns, because the thing you need to do or get in order to progress will almost always be in one of them. Oh, and the walkspeed is just as slow as the first game on top of it having a higher encounter rate and somehow being even grindier. You're admittedly fed more story than PSI, and the ways it continues the first game's narrative are actually cool. The ending is also a really unique, interesting twist, and some of the revelations and developments around the mid-game have a permanent effect on the Algol Solar System that are touched on in later entries in the series, and referred to as historical events. Still, any semblence of story is so infrequent and requires so much reading between the lines that it just isn't worth the play. What is worth it, though, is reading a plot synopsis, as doing that will do the game and its impact on the rest of the series far more justice than actually playing it. I highly recommend watching this video by Mr. Gentleman on Youtube for this purpose: https://youtube.com/watch?v=k3QN8HxMkIw
The next game, Phantasy Star III - Successors of Time as it was dubbed in Japan, or Generations of Doom as it was dubbed in the west, was a bit of an odd experiment. Essentially, development was handed to a B-Team, and the end result was something very different to the games that came both before and after it. It's a game that still inherited its fair share of flaws from its predecessors, but made an active effort to rectify some of them. It feels like Sega just wanted to test the waters a little with a filler entry and see what changes needed to be made for the Algol saga's finale to truly be remembered fondly. Grinding no longer became necessary, for one, but most importantly, III dropped II's dungeon design philosophy and instead opted for simple albeit mazey 1-2 floor ventures. They were far from ideal, but perfectly tolerable. One thing that people often point out about Phantasy Star III though is the dismally slow walking speed. Yeah, they made it even slower, for some reason, and I'm convinced that complaints from reviewers convinced the devs to finally increase the default walking speed in IV. While Phantasy Star I and II were marred by archaic game design and inexperienced developers, III is actually tolerable to play through for the most part, but it's still far from a must-play. By this point, the story in these games was still being dripfed, and III was heavily disconnected from the first two games in the series. The series was starting to fall behind competitors in both quality and quantity, and it needed a title that would not only mark an end of the Algol saga, but prove that the Mega Drive was more than capable of housing worthwhile JRPGs.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>THE ACTUAL REVIEW<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
Historically, the Mega Drive hasn't really been a console that was known for its JRPGs. The Super Nintendo had numerous prolific Squaresoft, Enix and Atlus games to its name, but the Mega Drive only housed a few notable series and standalone titles. Needless to say, it was a tough sell for fans of JRPGs. Fastforward 30 years later, though, and games like Shining Force II and Phantasy Star IV place very favourably in JRPG rankings; so what happened?
An actually good video game happened. A game with superb worldbuilding and contextualisation of past titles' events. A game with presentation that not only raised the bar for limited 16-bit consoles but for the genre as a whole. A game with actual characters and discernable character development nearly a whole year before Final Fantasy VI. Most importantly though, Phantasy Star IV was a game that understood the fundamental, core appeal of the genre. I can't understate how satisfying and refreshing Phantasy Star IV was after the first three games. I went from dozing off in the sloggish labyrinths of PSI and II, constantly looking to a guide in hopes of getting them over with as soon as possible, to enjoying just about every second of IV, not thinking once of turning to any external help. It was the game I got into the series for, so it needed to live up to the praises I'd seen online, and it delivered.
Addressing the elephant in the room - yes, the encounter rate is pretty high - but it becomes a non issue considering that battles are faster than ever, and the macro system lets you customize auto-battling to deal with encounters to your liking. It also helps that grinding is never required, and bosses generally remain challenging. The walking speed is practically tripled from past games in the series, as well, so you'll never be on the overworld or in a dungeon for too long. On the topic of dungeons, they're actually pretty well designed, being concise and short, but not lacking complexity or branching paths. TP and skill uses are very finite, and, for the most of the game, are irreplenishable in dungeons, so resource management is paramount. Enemy and character sprites in battles are beautifully detailed and animated, and the battle theme has this distinct Mega Drive twang to it that I love. The game part of Phantasy Star IV is all around just incredibly solid, even compared to many other JRPGs.
I adore the manga style cutscenes, for one. They're extremely well illustrated and plentiful, helping to elevate the game's moments and story. The best thing that games could do at this point in time were FMVs, but those were heavy on storage and compressed to even display favourably on consoles that supported it, but Phantasy Star IV's way of storytelling proved to be far more effective and engrossing. Shockingly enough, basically no other game I can think of adapted this style with the same quality, consistency, and frequency, which is a damn shame. I can only imagine what it was like playing the game back when it released, seeing those cute closeups of Alys teasing Hahn, Chaz' many emotions, Rune's introduction, and so on, and thinking: video game story presentation had progressed.
The story admittedly isn't amazing; it's kinda tropey, but what it provides is definitely good. This is more than made up for by the previously mentioned stellar presentation, but also by how it validates players of the first three games with the references and alusions to events of the past, and the worldbuilding. I've referred to the connected story of these games as a saga, but I wouldn't be calling it that if it weren't for Phantasy Star IV. The passage of time and consequences of the preceding games' events are made no more apparent by the transformation of Motavia; the home planet and initial setting for Phantasy Star II and Phantasy Star IV. The Motavias of Phantasy Star I, II, and IV are almost entirely different, yet IV carries DNA of both prior incarnations. Abandoned, technologically advanced factories from II are being unearthed and becoming sites of archeological and historical interest, while the terraformed landscape has long since eroded and has mostly reverted to the desert that it was in the first game, with occasional patches of grassland and greenery still growing a thousand years after the collapse that stopped facilitating their growth. The game even starts with you visiting an academy that studies the past, the bookshelves being littered with historical accounts and notes, and the professors expressing their findings. Even the third game, despite being disconnected, is given representation in the form of a data log that had been long since lost to history. This aspect is probably my favourite of the game.
Phantasy Star IV ends the story of the Algol Solar System on an incredibly high note, both comparatively and relatively. It's one of the most unique JRPGs of the 16-bit era, embracing its sci-fi setting and affirming its, for the time, unparalleled presentation. While not a stand out game narratively, it's a must-play for anyone into JRPGs, and a cornerstone of the genre.