Phantasy Star IV: The End of the Millennium

At the time Phantasy Star IV came out, Sega Genesis was a well established console entering the twilight of its popularity. Sega was no stranger to great role playing games despite the rival Final Fantasy series on the Super Nintendo - Shining Force I and II and Phantasy Star II and III to name the most popular. The success for the first three games in the Phantasy Star series really drove the initial sales of PS4 and it took off after people realized how much better the final installment of the Phantasy Star series was over its predecessors. Phantasy Star 4 builds on the storyline from the first three games. You begin as Chaz Ashley, a young adult in the Algol solar system. If you have played the previous PS games, you will notice a few references as well as a few familiar faces and will not be let down here. Many of the same elements that made the first three so enjoyable are here as well; the turn based battles, the futuristic game environment, and the item system are all very similar. However, PS4 fine tunes all of these and adds a few new characteristics as well.

The story is a bit basic at times as is the dialogue, but there are also a few plot twists that I did not see coming at all. Your job is essentially to eradicate the evil in the universe by defeating a series of dark powers. There are side quests that will grab your attention as you are playing and your adventures will take you to the far reaches of multiple worlds and environments. You will meet a small variety of different characters that can join your team, each with its own personality and abilities. What Phantasy Star 4 does so well is its overall balance. As with most classic rpgs, you do need to grind out some leveling at times, but for the most part, there is a great balance between minimal grinding and challenging but not impossible battles. Your character will not have an overabundance of cash as you play and you can buy great items from the vendors so I felt like money was an issue and something to strive for. One unique aspect of PS4 over the previous PS games is the ability to set up battle macros and have combined attacks that utilize one or more players at once. I loved this idea when the game was first released and the developers seamlessly pull it off. The idea behind a combined attack is to have certain characters cast certain spells during one attack round. Doing so will result in the players doing a unique joint attack. There are numerous such attacks and just playing the game will result in you finding at least a few of these on your own. Macros are a way to increase the speed of battle. What you do is outside of a battle situation, you set up a list of commands each character in your party will execute during one round of battle. When battle ensues, you simply execute the macro instead of telling each character what to do. This saves time and helps you to pull of combined attacks quickly and easily.

The music is some of the best offered by Sega Genesis games with intense battle music, mythic world music, and classic title screen music. The only complaint I had when playing through Phantasy Star 4 was the endgame leveling. If you are into power leveling end game characters to god status, expect issues. PS4 is a big game and I saw glitches with extreme leveling where characters actually lost abilities and hit points when attaining high levels. Similar things happened for me on Final Fantasy 3 (or Japanese 6). Looking back at the game now almost 30 years after its release, the gameplay and especially dialogue is a bit dated. Unlike Shining Force which remains an enjoyable playthrough, PS4 is not quite as smooth. The labyrinth structure to many of the PS dungeons is an antiquated concept that is challenging to fully enjoy today. Still a great RPG and a standard of the Genesis repertoire.