Phantasy Star Online 2
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PHANTASY STAR ONLINE VER. 2

When the original PHANTASY STAR ONLINE came out, I was one of the first people at the local game store to pick it up. I quickly popped the game in and a couple of weeks later, I finally emerged victorious. While the first game sucked me in and stole my life, PHANTASY STAR ONLINE VER. 2 didn't have the same effect - though it's still a great game.

In the original game, you met up with a group of players on the Net and dug your way deep into the massive world that awaited. Players could communicate with gamers in Japan, with the first ever built-in translator. Weeks were spent finding rare items and new mags, as well as maxing out characters at level 100.

VER. 2 is aptly named. It's not technically PHANTASY STAR ONLINE 2, but rather a much more refined version of the first game. Besides the new mags and rare items that the true addicts all crave, there is now an ultimate difficulty mode open to Level 80+ characters. The online mode benefits from Soccer, Challenge and Battle modes, all adding to the replay value. More hacker protection has also been added in addition to more automatic saves to protect you from "The Black Screen of Death." While you probably won't spend a lot of time offline, that section of the game has been better balanced. Finally, gamers can finally go beyond level 100 to level 200.

The biggest difference in this version is that you have to pay $15 every three months for unlimited access time. But given that you probably will only need three months to complete the game, this isn't a bad sacrifice. It's worth paying if you ever got into PHANTASY STAR ONLINE or if you never played that game.

On the technical side there haven't been many improvements from the first PHANTASY STAR ONLINE, but they weren't really needed. The great graphics and sound from the original continue here.

PHANTASY STAR ONLINE VER. 2 still plays like the original. But if you liked that game, or never had the chance to try it out, you should definitely start with this version of the game. Of course, with the 4-player split screen mode coming in the GameCube version of the game, it might be worth waiting, even without the definite promise of online play.