I have been having some FOMO about the xbox players on NA PSO2 so i went and spun up my old JP account to play a new character and i was quite thrown off.

when I spun up my lvl 1 character i immediately started receiving a level up after every mundane quest. things like applying a photon art to my bar, equiping items, talking to an NPC. By the time i was actually playing my first mission (and there wasn't a quest to walk me through how to actually start that which surprised me) I was already level 13, 10 Skill points to ration out, and had like 15 other quest givers to talk with.

Is this really the starting experience on the NA servers where you are bombarded with quest givers and items before you ever leave the first room?

Last year with the release of Episode 6, they released the ARKS Mission system to replace the old ARKS Road as the game's tutorial system; it is definitely designed to get players leveled-up quickly, as the daily rewards from it can also include Tokyo Silver Keys. Additionally, they changed it so that all Free Fields and ARKS Quests unlock at once relatively early rather than having to unlock them one by one.

The NA version is built off of the Ep6 client, so it includes this ARKS Mission system, but they did not make the changes to the Free Field/Expedition unlocking, and things like Level-Up Quests and Bonus Quests are not present, so while the first ~15-30 are relatively quick to get through, it can take a while longer once you get to VH and SH.

Maybe I'm doing something wrong, then. I just started last week a lvl 1 on jp server and it took me many hours to hit level 10.

@Qvor Were you completing and redeeming the ARKS Missions?

You can also reach right around level 19 in NA by just doing the string of quests that start with Alfin without going to the field.

Redeeming? Huh... I thought it is automatic after completing the missions when that screen appears with the exp and your rank (S or A, usually). I will check it.

You can access ARKs Missions from the main menu by pressing X. This is the best source of rewards in the game early on.

@Qvor said in Is this really the Early game?:

Redeeming? Huh... I thought it is automatic after completing the missions when that screen appears with the exp and your rank (S or A, usually). I will check it.

Those are called quests. The ones you pick up in the lobby areas with the icon over the NPCs' heads are called "client orders" btw.

Oh. Got it. I was doing only the arks quests, which give que exp Just after we complete them and return to the ships. But I was not giving attention to the client orders. I will look for it.

As a new player I rather enjoy the fact they boost our levels early on, because at the end of the day the fact that the grind to lvl 95 is so long will always overshadow anything to me.

@Lwyu Luckily by the time that they release the level 95 cap we should have Bonus Quests available which make leveling so much easier when you hit the EXP spike of 76-95. On PSO2 Days, with the right Boosters a Tokyo Silver Bonus quest can easily give ~2mil EXP.

@Qvor said in Is this really the Early game?:

Oh. Got it. I was doing only the arks quests, which give que exp Just after we complete them and return to the ships. But I was not giving attention to the client orders. I will look for it.

No, they're just called quests, not Arks Quests and client orders aren't the same thing as Arks Missions, they're just like what other MMOs call quests. Arks Missions are entirely menu-based, something more like achievements in other MMOs.

Ouch that sucks I liked the way everything was in 2014/2015. These changes sound bad