Phantasy Star Online 2! Open Beta now!

[Invictus Ordo]

Good news everybody we have confirmation of a western release! http://www.pso-world...lease-pso2-2013

The bad news is its so far away and I fear it may be handled the same way as PSU's western release. I hope SoA proves me wrong though and we get global servers so we can have the same quality support as Japan.

Edited July 9, 2012 by NovusToonami Ordo

[Remy]

If the update timing is anything like it was for PSU and OG PSO I'm staying on the JP side.

[Candescence]

Too little, too late, SOA...

So. I just slew a fucking dragon. And I mean the actual boss of the caves. That giant flaming asshole took a century and a half to kill.

[Pawn]

Wow I didn't expect it to come as soon as early 2013*. I'd love to play the game in English but it really depends on whether the servers are separated from the Japanese or not. I wouldn't want to play a version where the support is severely lacking.

*Although, having said that, I'm taking 'Early 2013' to mean Jan/Feb when that could easily mean later.

Edited July 9, 2012 by Lungo

[Candescence]

Holy hell. So, I think I've run into two things that is extremely difficult to do solo/with computer partners:

- Doing the "kill the dragon cave boss in 20 minutes with an S rank" mission. Holy shit.

- The emergency city mission with all the Darkers. It's either the mission where you have to kill the massive boss, or acquire 500 points killing Darkers - either way, you can't do it without a group, because you have a 20 minute time limit.

Seriously, I need to meet up with some of you guys at some point. I usually hang out in Room 23, if it's not full, or the next room down that isn't full..

[Pawn]

Yep. I tried to complete both of those alone and with NPCs and failed miserably. I seriously need to stop being such a massive loner in this game. I have been joining groups a lot more recently though. Doing this and completing many client orders have allowed me to level up very quickly (considering how little I've played the game) and as such I've bypassed the period where Desert would have been very difficult. Hard Mode will probably kick my arse though.

[gato]

Bad news everyone!

Ship 10 is also getting teh lock.

Is it normal to be killed so easily bin the early portion of the game?

I have the testimony of someone else who isn't that familiar with the game an let's say that yes... it Is... Most of the enemies take a good chunk of your health and most of the healing items take time to consume, time that will be used by the mobs to keep clobbering you, the idea is to not get hit and if you do, find a safe spot to heal yourself, Ir's not like you need to run away from them, just find a place where you can heal before they reach you.

Also, dodge (and block if you are a hunter and have the right skills purchased) it's one of the most useful skills in the game (not so much for rangers... They roll is pretty weak, but still better than nothing). Also, most enemies give some cues before attacking you, in the Forest most are easy to spot, Oodans will get upside down to kick you, Za Oodans give you plenty of time before they throw the rocks at you, keep close to the Galfs and Fongalfs (if you are a hunter) and you shouldn't have a problem with them, still, you can see them crouching before they leap at you.

Also, is there a lock-on to an enemy target feature?

There is, but I don't know what key it is (I play with an XBOX360 gamepad, there I use the LB), it's been pretty much a life saver in my time as a ranger (and quite the annoyance while playing as a Hunter).

Too little, too late, SOA...

So. I just slew a fucking dragon. And I mean the actual boss of the caves. That giant flaming asshole took a century and a half to kill.

Oh yeah, Vol Dragon... Love the guy.

Anyway, here is the little tutorial I promised you about the symbol art.

I totally forgot I was going to teach you to make your symbol art... Truth to be told I never used the editor either. X_x

But this is how you import the art everyone is using.

First of all you open the menu and go to the settings tab, choose the first option to go to the symbol art section.

You should see this screen with all the symbol arts you have (IIRC you can have up to 10), if you don't have anything there should be some empty squares.

You go to that menu in the upper left corner and pick up the second option, this is where all the symbol art you've seen from others get "cached" (for the lack of a better word in my limited english).

You can have pages of them so take a time to look for the one you want (depends on how much of them you have seen on the day, they get deleted once you log out)

I'm going to pick this dog, click on it and you will see 2 options, the first one let's you post that pic like if it were yours (but it won't get saved) the second one lets you save it on your list.

Pick and empty space (or one you want to replace and the picture should be saved there).

Click in your symbol art and it will give you 3 options, the first one is to post it, the second one is to edit it and I never used the third one but I believe it's to delete it.

Have a little view of the editor, this is just the preview, all the tools are in another tab but I can't remember how to access to them. >_<

Once you are done, click in the picture and then in the first option and you will post your new symbol art!

I believe there are chat shortcuts for this but I haven't experimented enough with this feature...

EDIT: I'd like to say a few things about the latest posts you've made.

First of all about the city mission, the Ragne one can be beaten solo if you rush for it, but you miss the good part of the quest that is the exp grinding you get out of the Darkers, more often than not people outright ignore the main objective and stay there slaying monsters til time runs out.

The second mission can be failed even with a group, you either finish the mission with only 200 points or clear it way before the timer runs out... It's the luck with the codes (especially Destruction).

Having said this, the Dragon mission is a bitch to solo (mostly because the thing has insane amounts of HP and you have to S rank it so you can't just rush it), and the quests are obviously funnier with more people...

Seeing as most of us are on the same ship I would like to ask you if you would like to join the guild I'm part of, I discussed this with my "boss" when I mentioned another users intention to join (which I haven't been able to meet yet >_> ... Sorry for that) and he has no problems with me inviting randoms to the guild.

SO I'm going to do this, anyone who wants to join should PM or post his/her character and player ID (not the SEGA account, the player ID) and I'll try to make the visiphone work for once and try to reach you, whenever I find any of you online I'll try to contact you, send a friend invite and if you want a guild one. (though I can't remember how to do those ones >_>), if you accept the friend request you can always whisper me... I might not answer inmediatly (AFK) but I will do my best to be as quick as possible...

*gets sword* I'll start the hunt tonight (tomorrow I'm taking a break from the game though).

Edited July 9, 2012 by gato

[killemoff]

Good news everyone!

Phantasy Star Online 2 launches in Europe early 2013.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-07-09-phantasy-star-online-2-launches-in-europe-early-2013

[Dobkeratops]

Hmmm. I decided to skip on the Beta to clear up some backlog but early 2013 sees a lot of new releases. I'm never going to be able to finish all these games, am I?

#firstworldproblems

At least their current SEGA EU shenanigans haven't impacted negatively this one. Good to know. Not too confident on their post launch support, however...

[gato]

ehehehehehhehe...

ehehehehehehehehehehhe...

It turns out I didn't need your IDs at all because I got most of you...

And now we can party party paaaartyyyyyyyyyyy

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAaaaaa....

...

Except for Coral... I couldn't get her... I need her ID. >_>

>_>

>_>

>_>

...

Anyway!

While this is already covered in Bumped I decided it would be a good idea to share my adventure with the Visiphone... I understand not all of you might want to PARTY with me, and I honestly think it would suck to have to be the middle man in this little group... I would have to be on all the time you want to play and that's a big no no... That's why I wanted some of you to join the team I'm part of (again, perfectly understandable if you don't want to... And once again sorry to the guy who tried to find me but couldn't. Nice to see you found a group to hang out with ), so you could get more people to play with and weren't dependent of my presence...

So yeah, here is a little tutorial about how to add people to your friend list with the Visiphone!

First things first, go to your favorite visiphone, as I mentioned before they are these terminals with a "question mark looking thingie" on them... handy gadgets they are.. lots of stuff to do in them and this is only the first of many uses it has.

Select the 4th option for Arks Search

You can search for:

* Character ID

* Team

* Player ID

Since I never got any of your IDs (not that I gave you time for that) I looked for Character IDs.

I think I had a sprout of common sense back then because I decided to block the player's identity, but I think the amazingly photoshopped squares give a nice explanation about what you should get when you are searching, the box on the left lets you put the name of the character/team/playerID you were looking for and in the right one you will get the results, I must confess, I'm pleasantry surprised about how many results are displayed... I was expecting the search to be more sensitve but it's way open and it allows for the tiny mistake while trying to remember your "want him/her to be" friend's name.

Once you have found your desired result you select the name and a menu will pop out... This are the options:

* Whisper Chat

* View Arks Card (always nice to have a second confirmation)

* Send Good Job

* Send/Delete Friend Request

* Go to Their Room.

You select the fourth option to send a friend invite, but if you have some sort of regret about your choice you can always delete it by selecting the same choice.

Now, all the invitations sent and received, how do you keep tabs on what your friends and possible partners are up to? This little option (the first one in the third tab) in the main menu takes you to the friend list.

This guide should give you all the ins and outs of the menu but the most important part right now is how to accept requests.

This (sans the amazing photoshop) is what your friend list should look like, the top list lets you know about the requests you have pending (which you can accept or decline anytime you want, keep in mind a player will not be your friend until you accepted the request), the lower ones show you who's online, offline and blacklisted (in that order).

Having a player as a friend gives both of you some benefits apart of making you a more social individual :V , meeting with friends is way easier than doing it with randoms, you have options to teleport to their rooms and block, in the quest counter an icon will appear next to any room that your friend is playing in, you can always whisper or send them a mail to plan some hunts... You can receive notifications whenever one of your buddies goes online... And last but not least, if your buddy took the (little) time to make one you can always call his very own NPC to help you in your quests. (which is one of many ways of getting FUN points).

As a side note, this array of features makes me feel like a stalker... >_>

And this is all you need to know about the requests I sent to you, now you can deny them and send your own so you don't have to deal with me for some SSMB action! :U

Have a nice hunt out there! n_n

In sort of related news, I think I picked up a good day to take a break from the game, 12 hours maint incoming.

Edited July 10, 2012 by gato

[Coral]

Aaaand now I'm back! Computer problems solved, new hard drive and whatnot. Derp. Dunno how to use the visiphone to add people right now so I'll look into that once the super big epic maintenance is done with. I think my ID is the same as my character name but I'm not so sure about that. I know my log in is definitely different if that's anything to go by.

I will say I'm not big into joining guilds. I mostly just run with friends. If I ever do see any of ya'll around though, I'll def give a holler! It's already been a weekish since the game has come out and it's already booming with activity in most of the blocks! I switched my primary block to 30 since that seems to be the new English hotspot.

Super happy to hear there's gonna be an English release! There's an official site up and running already too! Kinda sad that it's not a global server type deal but at least I'll be able to understand it better. I'll prolly play on that when it comes up next year with a new chara as well as continue playing the JP version as Arle. Should be fun!

[gato]

Aaaand now I'm back! Computer problems solved, new hard drive and whatnot. Derp. Dunno how to use the visiphone to add people right now so I'll look into that once the super big epic maintenance is done with. I think my ID is the same as my character name but I'm not so sure about that. I know my log in is definitely different if that's anything to go by.

I will say I'm not big into joining guilds. I mostly just run with friends. If I ever do see any of ya'll around though, I'll def give a holler! It's already been a weekish since the game has come out and it's already booming with activity in most of the blocks! I switched my primary block to 30 since that seems to be the new English hotspot.

No, you don't have the same name as player ID, but I think I saw something similar enough so...

Expect me ♪

...

As for guilds, the only reason I wanted all of you to join... Well... The only reason I made my last posts (Visiphone tutorial included) is because I read most of you talking about how you were going solo or how would you love to get a party to help you, being friends with each other helps with this issue and being in a guild just adds more people to the mix (not to mention that asking for help in a guild chat is less of a hassle that having to ask all your contacts).

Anyway, as I said before yesterday was my PSO2-free day so I don't have anything to talk about...

*shrug*

*logs in*

EDIT: Ugh... Work... Game will have to wait.

Edited July 11, 2012 by gato

[Coral]

This is serious. Koffee works long hours to keep all the paperwork in check for the colony. And how is she repaid? By having a lowsy salary that's how! She's done with this trash!

Yep, client lady and Koffee decided to take a much needed break from their duties on blocks 20 and 21. Many shenanigans were had this day, which is one to be remembered!

Also I did the time attack mission with some friends. Being our first run, we got lost a lot. Also one of our group got DC'd during the boss fight. My other friend ran out of healing items and reviving atomizers. She was also the designated cat bait. When she died, I revived her but at the cost of my own life. She shot 1 round from her assault rifle and wouldn't ya know it, the boss died!

Troll rewards are best rewards.

The wolves not being satisfied, they chased after my friend so that she couldn't grab her rewards. x'D I was ROFLing like none other! She eventually returned back to the lobby, got some healing items and then came back for me but lol. That was crazy!

Awesome mission! xD

[gato]

I'm not an expert but I could give some tips about time attack, the first part is pretty straight foward but the second part gets a little more complicated (mostly because I never got to take the left path at the beginning so I don't know whats in there).

Also, having a full party makes wonders.

In other news, here is my picture of when our party realized the quest counter ladies were on strike...

PSOworld is reporting more shenanigans of the sort (like NPCs outside the ship), but I don't feel like thalking about this right now.

Now, for something that actually interest us, have a little teaser of the update we will have next week. (the 18th)

[Pawn]

Yeah it was weird that all those NPCs were outside. XD People kept going over to look so I had a peek.

Anyway, hyped for Mines and those new costumes look cool.

EDIT: I don't think this has been posted here yet, but Sega has announced three new classes, five new weapon types (including a double saber/sword), new fields (and there are small, translucent teaser pictures on the site) and a 'giant boss' (possibly the final boss) among other things for this year. Source: http://pso2.jp/players/news/?id=165

I fiddled around with the fields' teaser images from the site to get a better look at what environments we'll be exploring in the future:

I've written the names of the images below since they tell us when they'll be released. I can't wait to see how these will look in-game. =] Looks like Darker territory, that last one.

Edited July 12, 2012 by Lungo

[Candescence]

Now the desk ladies are going on strike in Room 23. I find this both head-scratching and hilarious.

Also, I've gotten up to level 20 and gotten the Sword Technic skill. I never realized how awesome this skill is, when the meter is full, your photon arts become multiple times stronger - my sword beam can now hit multiple times in one go!

Also, nice trailer. Hopefuly the CASE parts aren't just for Arks Cash. Big Vader looks fucking awesome.

[gato]

Now the desk ladies are going on strike in Room 23. I find this both head-scratching and hilarious.

Also, I've gotten up to level 20 and gotten the Sword Technic skill. I never realized how awesome this skill is, when the meter is full, your photon arts become multiple times stronger - my sword beam can now hit multiple times in one go!

Also, nice trailer. Hopefuly the CASE parts aren't just for Arks Cash. Big Vader looks fucking awesome.

[Coral]

^ I took a double take on that pic before I read the caption. Dohohoho. _{Those chibi Rappy suits are so cute though the eyes kinda freak me out. lasjdlas}

We all need some KFRappy now and then. And speaking of fried Rappy, the maintenance has started to fix the shenanigans of the disappearing NPCs. It'll last until 5 AM eastern.

Oh yeah, also there's this nifty interview with Sakai about PSO2 over at 4gamer. It's all in Japanese at the moment but thanks to the internets, we have translation technology!

Original: http://www.4gamer.net/games/120/G012075/20120706038/

Translated: http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=ja&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.4gamer.net%2Fgames%2F120%2FG012075%2F20120706038%2F&act=url

They go over how the game came to be, updates and touch on some tidbits about the western version coming up.

Edited July 13, 2012 by Coral

[Candescence]

FINALLY! I unlocked the desert missions after managing to S-rank the Vol Dragon with just 3 minutes to spare. Granted, I was at level 21, nearly on 22, but still.

And I think he dropped the strongest sword I've gotten, yet - it was roughly 200 attack points before I grinded it a bit, and that was way more than the base value of any sword I had gotten before.

Also, I've done a few hard mode missions. Yes, you can unlock hard mode before ever getting the desert missions.

[Shade Vortex]

I've pretty much decided that I'm patient and can wait for the game to officially release in the US. I'm interested in the story and it's annoying that I can't understand it when it's Japanese, so I end up skipping all the cutscenes anyways. Plus, it's annoying dealing with all the Japanese menus and figuring out how to do everything.

As someone else said, constantly switching between the game and some translation guides is a hassle.

If there's somehow a translation patch that works for the full release at some point before the official English release, I'll most likely play more.

[gato]

Okay, we have a bunch of news coming from that interview.

The most important bits are:

* No Global Severs

* Different lobby themes (holidays) will be available in the western version

* Next week he will reopen character creation

* He plans to give some sort of compensation to those player who spent on premium set and had to go through all the maintenance

* There is a new clause in the TOS that says you should report hacks and cheats via the official forms instead of posting it in public sites like forums, Youtube, Twitter and the like (I call it the common sense clause).

* And last but not least, new costumes are coming...

I can see where this is going...

Edited July 13, 2012 by gato

[Pawn]

^ LOL! I should have seen that coming. People will forget the yukata now. XD

[Coral]

lol It just ain't a complete game without the fanservice. Oi! In coming the loli parade. Keep all appendages inside the vehicle at all times, please and thank ya!

The western version. I'm kinda tempted to go with the consensus and call PSU2 shenanigans, but I'll wait it out and see. I'm just happy they're willing to translate the thing in the first place.

[Coral]

The Bumped PSO2 site has expanded on details from the Sakai interview. One of which stating that the developers plan on having North America and Europe share a server, and that the different versions may have unique features not present in the Japanese version. An example from Bumped is that the Korean version may get a PvP mode if demand is high enough.

As far as the new classes are concerned...

New weapon categories and new classes are coming together. He thinks they’ll make it so that the weapon categories could be used by 2 classes, however, all classes will continue to use the Gunslash.

http://bumped.org/psublog/

Also 3 days until Mines update!

[gato]

Good news everyone!

Today at 7:30 PM EST the server will go down for an hour.

...

No, wait...

The good news are, that after this 1 hour maint, character creation will be open again, so if you want to make a char in ship 02/10/whatevs this would be the right time!

Also, random screens time:

I somehow managed to trick Lungo into joining our team... Poor Lungo...

Random Burst was random, this things are happening at the oddest times nowadays, yesterday I had 2 while I was sleeping on the ground (AFK), one of them was a cross burst...

What? Yes! City has just started! How did you know?

2 days for the mines update. (depends in where you live though)

Edited July 16, 2012 by gato