I second this!

This was something that the classic Phantasy Star Universe website used to do, even promoting Bumped.org (back when it was about PSU) and the PSO World forums.

With how many PSO2 sites there are, it would be great to see them promoted!

Its been announced that PSO2 JP will be having a Closed Beta for PSO2 NGS.

https://new-gen.pso2.jp/cbt/entry/

To summarize a bit, this Beta is only for PSO2 JP players and registration will be between December 15th to January 4th. There's no exact date for the Beta but it will be taking place between late January to late February. A second Beta will also be taking place but its date and registration period is not yet available.

In addition, we now have the specs that will be required for PSO2 and NGS following that release.

https://new-gen.pso2.jp/cbt/entry/spec/

(As NGS is an expansion to base PSO2, these requirements will also apply to regular PSO2)

OS

• Windows 8.1 64bit / Windows 10 64bit

CPU

• Minimum: Intel Core i5-9400

• Maximum: Intel Core i9-10900

Memory

• Minimum: 8GB RAM

• Medium / Maximum: 16GB RAM

Harddrive

• Approximately 100GB or more ("PSO2: NGS": approximately 30GB, "PSO2": approximately 70GB)

Video

• Minimum: 1280 x 720 dots or more

• Maximum: 1920x1080 dots

Graphics

• Requires DirectX 11 or higher

• Minimum: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 950 equivalent graphics card / AMD Radeon R9 285 equivalent graphics card

• Medium: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 / AMD Radeon RX 580

• Maximum: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER / AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT

Sound

• There are no conditions for sound cards.

Internet

• Broadband environment (ADSL, optical fiber, etc.)

So this is a bit of several suggestions in one single post so please bear with me....

So first off, keep in mind that i'm not entirely aware of all kinds of promotion the game's getting in North America, however I do know that some kind of promotion is present at the very least... which isn't available elsewhere. As such the suggestion is pretty straightforward, to better promote the game have what promotion the gam has, be it ads on sites and YT, be present globally!

(Images from Sega Retro)

The other suggestion... despite the global availability, PSO2 is still not listed on any of the International Sega websites such as the UK or Australian sites like it is on the Sega of America website:

@VanillaLucia I am aware of this practice as this has happened a few times as well in the past with PSO2's Steam version.

With that said, I did also point out that the option to "Check File" has been removed from the launcher and the launcher no longer has the pop up window to check for updates from the server at the start. Starting PSO2 brings up the launcher instantly without any checks whatsoever!

@coldreactive said in Future Updates will be handled through the Digital Storefront:

This is something that FFXIV did on PlayStation Network, since whenever PS3/4 tried to update via their launcher the game would constantly disconnect during download, forcing players to be at the PS3/4's side during an update, which could take hours.

I'm guessing this is just to help update better like that.

I can't say i'm familiar with this specific scenario but, I do believe this is an improvement also (if you aren't already using the PSO2 Tweaker that is). Updates through the original launcher are quite slow to begin with... at least now updates can be downloaded at a much faster rate.

So, throughout maintenance, I found Steam downloading a 5 GB update for PSO2 and on top of that, the option to scan the game's files from the launcher is also gone and the launcher doesn't scan for any updates when launched!

Its too early to confirm but... its beginning to look like future updates will be done through Steam / MS Store (anyone still uses the MS Store version to confirm if this is the case for that version?).

@Jman I'll be sure to pull up the original quote when I can! Regarding the server instability and issues that plagued the JP release, you can find that here: https://w.atwiki.jp/gcmatome/pages/2728.html (as well as several other JP sources that bring it up)

@Blade-Syphon said in We need more games like Universe,/Portable/Nova! (let's show the devs that there is demand for it!):

@Ryuzaki-Morgoth

No, there was a third online only episode that continued AotI's story after the Guardian Colony crashed on Parum. Episode 1 and 2 are both still playable offline on the PC version as well I believe, it's just Episode 3, that wrapped up all of PSU's story, was only available as an online episode.

I imagine once upon a time, Sega did probably have plans on bringing it offline with another expansion but, well, we know how that all panned out.

According to a Japanese developer interview, there were plans for each expansion to have their own individual Offline version disc. However in the end, Ambitions of the Illuminus sold quite poorly in Japan. This, on top of a series of ongoing technical problems the Japanese version was facing (PSU sold quite well in Japan, but that didn't translate to paying subscribers) lead to Sega cancelling the third expansion disc in favour of working on PSU's successor (which would go on to become PSO2) a year after Ambitions of the Illuminus had just released.

As for Phantasy Star Nova, I personally believe that one was caught up in a bit of a internal embargo on Phantasy Star content in the West, from my own memory the franchise's anniversary wasn't even celebrated in the West. With PSO2 and IDOLA now released outside of Japan, about the only hurdle standing in the way of a Global release of PS Nova is the fact that its a PlayStation Vita game and the Vita's discontinued. The only way we'd get to see that title localized is if Sega were to port it to Switch or PC. In general, localization aside, PS Nova wouldn't require much to begin with as that game did not have an online mode but rather a local co-op mode.

@Valinda small correction... "Just Attack" and "Just Guard" were retconned into "Perfect Attack" and "Perfect Guard" in Phantasy Star Portable 2, the two terms being what PSO2 uses (though originally PSO2's "Perfect Attack" was to be "Perfect Strike").

@GM-RubyEclipse As a newcomer to the series, I can't say that i'm a familiar face.... but regardless I am familiar with the amount of work you've done for Phantasy Star and the Sonic series and am most definitely excited to see you have a presence again with this franchise!