PS Collection Review

In 1991, Yuji Naka was busy elsewhere with artist Naoto Ohshima, on a quest to change Sega's identity. Without him, it appears that the rest of the Phantasy Star Team weren't altogether interested in attempting another game of the scale of Phantasy Star II right away. Never to let the obvious stand in the way of potential success, however, Sega assigned a new group -- comprised largely of the crew behind the dodgy Genesis version of Golden Axe -- to work on a sequel.

Only one member of the this new team had been at all involved with either of the previous two games; Director and Lead Designer Hirondo Saiki had done a bit of minor coding and design work on Phantasy Star II. There was some obvious talent in the pool, however. Ippo Takeuchi, the new musician, has become as fondly associated with Phantasy Star as the enigmatic Bo. Further, Character Designer Toyo Ozaki is responsible for some of the most memorable designs in the Phantasy Star universe, from the Wren and Mieu-model android series to the googly Rappy bird.

To follow up, and to try to best, a project like Phantasy Star II would be a daunting task for anyone -- but for a largely untested new team, with only the most tenuous of connections to the prior games? Apparently rather than attempt to compete with history, Saiki decided to approach the project from a different path altogether.

Phantasy Star III would not be a direct sequel. Instead, Saiki began to formulate an grandiose, and in some ways rather clever, new gameplan. He would set the game in a perplexing medieval world, with the occasional futuristic trapping or passing reference to the previous games.

Through a lengthy, complex network of events, it would eventually be revealed -- to the utter surprise of all -- what the relationship was between his strange new world and the familiar one of the previous Phantasy Star games.

To make things more elaborate, Saiki chose to distract the player even further from the previous games, by building an ongoing history of sorts into his new world. Over the course of the game, the player would twice marry and birth children and then continue on from the next generation.

After three generations of familiarity had built up between the player and the game, Saiki would pull the rug out from under the player. In a highly dramatic, literate manner, he would reframe all that had come before, in the terms of what was already established in the Phantasy Star continuity.

Much of the game's development is shrouded in mystery, but it sounds like there was trouble almost from the outset. Development has been described as "joyless". Saiki's team was apparently under time and budget constraints. They were eventually forced to compromise large sections of Saiki's original design in order to get the game finished at all.

All of this strain can be easily sensed in the final work. It comes off feeling rushed, unfocused, and frankly not a whole lot of fun to play. Its elements don't really gel. There are gaping chasms in nearly every element of design. From characters to plot, to monster design, to the scope of the world, the game feels pared-down and at times a little desperate. Ultimately, Phantasy Star III feels like it was begrudgingly compiled out of the lonely pieces of potentially a much better game that never got a chance to whittle itself into being.

Even some major pieces of the game's foundation had to be left behind. After all of Saiki's clever plans, what appears to be a large hunk of the plotline was omitted -- in particular, most of the later section which effectively connects Phantasy Star III to the rest of the series. The game which we're left with is forced to cling to its other central gimmick -- its three generations of characters, with their multiple paths and endings -- as its major feature.

On its own, this construct could be enough of a draw for the game. But the game's characters are so undeveloped and lacking in charm, and their stories are so generic and interchangeable, that there is little real motivation to care much about how one plays through the game. Even on a gameplay level, it simply doesn't matter very much. And if it matters so little, it begs the question as to why all of the game's remaining energy is spent focused on such a half-developed structure, to the neglect of so many more important design elements.

Level design is one of the most obvious victims. Nearly all of the dungeons, for instance, are built from the same short, simple, uninspired template: a grid of square platforms, connected by bridges in each of the four cardinal directions. These bridges might or might not be blocked off, forming a maze. Compared to the ingenious dungeons for which Phantasy Star is renowned, this is frankly pathetic. The dungeons in Phantasy Star III might as well be randomly-generated. At least then there would be a random chance that they would be interesting.

Aside from the forgettable dungeons, nearly every area of the game -- from towns to the overworld -- is filled with vast, mostly unadorned, empty spaces. In order to get from one location to another, indeed accomplish anything, the player is invariably forced to walk -- very slowly -- across these tedious expanses, often wasting minutes at a time. I commonly put off buying supplies, just because I don't want to go to the effort of searching for all of the right (poorly-labeled) stores.

If the use of space is a needless irritation in towns, it can become infuriating in the overworld. All of the major locations in the game -- towns, dungeons, passages -- are spaced far apart from each other, across a drab, washed-out, barren landscape with few memorable landmarks. It is not uncommon to become lost, walking across a seemingly endless field of cracked earth or dead grass or other similarly uninteresting terrain. This would be annoying on its own right, but when you add in the typically high encounter rate that Phantasy Star is known for, it can sometimes be a real struggle to get one's bearings again.

This brings us, logically, to the battle engine. If fighting monsters were as enjoyable as in Phantasy Star II, that might make up a bit for some of the game's more pressing flaws. But somehow, not only is the battle engine awkward and sloppily-designed, it seems just as carefully-engineered to be annoying as nearly every other element of the game.

In terms of interface, we've taken a step backward. The unique terrain-based backdrops from the original Phantasy Star have returned (although, oddly, they were well-rendered on the Master System), but the animated character sprites from the second game are wholly absent -- emotionally distancing the player yet another step from the already-bland cast.

As with the earlier games, by default it is still generally random which enemy any given character will attack, but now (through what is initially a byzantine process) it is at least possible to select an individual monster. The problem is that, in favor of a clearly-labeled menu of comprehensible commands, the game gives the player a confusing selection of abstract icons to choose from.

Further, the most obvious icons represent relatively unintuitive actions. To fight one round, for instance, you select the small wind-up key. To fight continuously, you choose the big key. In order to simply strike a particular monster, you need to sift through a few menu levels. Eh?

The monsters are another big problem. Whereas in the original Phantasy Star every monster had at least one fluidly-animated attack, and where in is sequel the average monster had two distinct and well-animated attacks along with several frames of idle animation, there are few (if any) standard monsters in Phantasy Star III with over two frames of animation in total. What we are left with, are generally still sprites which either shake or change to a second frame when attacking.

Further, monster design often seems incongruous at best; sad and desperate, at worst. Few enemies in Phantasy Star III have any real charm at all, although several are memorably bizarre. There are, for instance, the gigantic buck-toothed grinning faces which wiggle their ears when attacking, or the blue, finger-wagging demon men without pants -- or the GoGo Macho Men...

It's not just how poorly-conceived the monsters are, though. Annoying as it might be, their appearance doesn't affect gameplay. Far more troublesome is that so many creatures are poisonous in this game -- and seemingly in all of the most inconvenient locations. Status effects are such a standard mechanism in this genre that I can generally live with them -- but what makes Phantasy Star III so unique is the way it handles poison.

Usually when a character is poisoned in an RPG, that means that his or her health will steadily drain away until the poison wears out, the character is cured, or until said character dies. What happens in Phantasy Star III instead, is that it becomes impossible to heal the poisoned character by any means whatsoever until the poison is removed from his or her system.

It shouldn't take more than a few moments to realize how incredibly frustrating this can make a game, in the right circumstances. And Phantasy Star III is one huge "right circumstance".

To give an idea of how utterly annoying this game can be, my most vivid memories from Phantasy Star III consist of being lost in a sea of overworld nothingness, probably only yards away from town. My entire party is on the verge of death, and -- although I have the equipment and the technique points to do so -- I am not allowed to heal any of my characters.

I wander slowly across the map, feeling like I'm walking through molasses, hoping that my next step won't land me in a random encounter. If I somehow manage to find an antidote and I cure one of my characters, then that character will almost invariably be poisoned again if I take three more steps in any direction.

This scenario is what I most closely associate with Phantasy Star III. Given how much of the game is spent in exactly such a state, I imagine I must not be alone in this respect.

Even small issues like the save system are more bothersome than they should be. There are fewer save slots than before, and now it costs money to save. At the start of the game, this can get pretty expensive. Further, the only place to save in Phantasy Star III is in town. And while by default you do get healed whenever you save, there's the poison issue again. If you're poisoned, you've wasted your money. If you accidentally choose that no, you don't want to save, then again you waste your money. Why make such a chore our of such a simple, and necessary, task?

Perhaps the most enjoyable element of Phantasy Star III is the music. Ippo's score is at times brilliant; the way the overworld theme is gradually assembled and strengthened as new characters are added to the party; the castle and dungeon music; and particularly the theme which accompanies Wren's transformation sequences. Even with Ippo's talent, though, something has to be at least a little screwed-up. In execution, the use of music in this game is hit-and-miss. You might call it schizophrenic.

The good stuff is really good, but I can't escape the impression that Ippo wasn't given a lot of direction as to what the rest of the team wanted from him, and then wasn't given much cartridge space to work with. There is a lot of... strange material, which really doesn't seem to work very well. Battle music, for example, consists of a handful of short, undeveloped loops which cut into, and substitute for each other seemingly at random.

I imagine each loop must somehow tie into a particular event, but it isn't immediately obvious how this system works. As a result, each random battle sounds more like a car stereo on seek mode than a dramatic encounter. It is a testament to Ippo's competence that his talent still manages to shine through despite what often seems the poor use of his work through the course of the game.

Regardless of all of these nagging problems, I feel that Saiki's original plan was hardly without merit. To the contrary, Saiki seems to have been a bit too visionary for his own good. With the right kind of skill and support, Phantasy Star III could have been one of the most involving console RPGs of at least its own time -- and perhaps a few others.

Ideally, the game could reel the player in by being coy and evasive about its true nature. Start by overhauling the game graphically and restructuring the level design. Refit the battle system. Distinguish amongst the characters better, and give the player reason to care about them. On a surface level, just make the game feel like Phantasy Star from the outset.

Then, gradually throw out carrots to the player throughout the course of the game. Wryly hint toward a more profound link to the events in Phantasy Star II. Release enough puzzle pieces to keep the player guessing and intrigued until the surprise is revealed.

As it is, there is little obvious connexion between Phantasy Star III and the rest of the series until near the end -- and even then the references are oblique enough that without some additional explanation it's hard to grasp what they have to do with anything. The only straggling elements to remind the player that this is a Phantasy Star game are a few item and spell names scattered around.

The game's drab, gritty, washed-out visual approach and atmosphere isn't remotely similar to the one used in the rest of the series. The menus and user interfaces don't particularly resemble the ones used in the past. Level design is completely different in style from the earlier games. Even the last boss -- one of the most significant links to the earlier games -- doesn't much look like what the player would expect. Were it not for the familiar names used throughout, there would be little mistaking Phantasy Star III for a Phantasy Star game.

Especially given the moving, cliffhanger-like ending of Phantasy Star II, it is not hard to imagine the dismay in fans' eyes when -- instead of their expected epic conclusion -- they were presented with as perplexing, unfinished, annoying, and just plain different a game as this. Phantasy Star III is not what was expected, and to many it was hardly a pleasant surprise.

The thing is, even with all that I've said, the game still isn't half bad. It follows that it also isn't that good either, but on its own merits Phantasy Star III is a pretty adequate genre piece for the early '90s. The largest flaw one can associate with the game isn't in its monsters or its characters or its plot or its battle system -- it's in the title. Saiki's game does not feel like Phantasy Star. It is of neither the style nor of the standard of the rest of the series.

If Saiki had quickly decided to rename the game, and several of its items, no one would probably have been the wiser -- and I'm tempted to think that few would have ever complained, either. In the end, Phantasy Star III, is a curiosity. It isn't part of the main series. In some circles it isn't even considered a real Phantasy Star game. (Note that it is the only major Phantasy Star not on the 3D-AGES remake schedule.) Yet, as the peculiar side story which it is it is, the game is not without interest.

Hirondo Saiki would later go on to design the hit arcade game I Forgot My Homework, and subsequently disappear off the face of the Earth.

Under pressure from Sega, Rieko Kodama would finally get the old band back together. After a few false starts, Tohru Yoshida would find his inspiration in the bathtub and begin work on the true sequel to Phantasy Star II and tell-all, please-all conclusion to the Phantasy Star series. Ippo would be adopted into the new, reformed Phantasy Star Team, as the sole graduate of the Phantasy Star III project.

But that is a story for another day.