When it was announced that the Xbox 360 Phantasy Star Universe servers would be shut down, many expected that they could simply jump over to the Japanese PC servers. If Phantasy Star Online Blue Burst was any indication, the PSU servers in Japan would stay up long after the US/EU servers shut down.
Not this time.
Sega of Japan has announced that the PC servers for Phantasy Star Universe will be shut down on Thursday, September 27, just three weeks after the Xbox 360 servers go down for good. This will end all official online support for the game worldwide.
After Sega gradually phased out PSO support in the United States, Europe, and Japan, the end of PSU seems rather abrupt by comparison. Perhaps this is an admission that the game was not as good as Sega had hoped it to be. In any case, this means that the focus will now be on Phantasy Star Online 2 only, which hopefully translates into regular content updates and better support.
The Phantasy Star Universe era is about to come to an end. Hopefully the era of PSO2 will be more enjoyable and far less frustrating!
Showing posts with label PC. Show all posts
Showing posts with label PC. Show all posts
Friday, July 27, 2012
Monday, June 25, 2012
PSO2 Announcement Possible This Week
For the last week, Sega of America has been publishing a Phantasy Star series retrospective of sorts on Facebook, Twitter, and the official Phantasy Star Universe forums.
Today, the trip back in time continued with Phantasy Star Portable. Sega's Twitter posting for this game included a not-so-subtle message and another possible hint:
If Sega sticks to the Phantasy Star games released in the US, then there should be only two left in the retrospective: Phantasy Star Zero (tomorrow) and Phantasy Star Portable 2 (on Wednesday). Players with an interest in an English version of Phantasy Star Online 2 should keep an eye on the official forum thread beginning Thursday afternoon.
Of course, even if PSO2 does get an official English release, there are still some details that will affect whether people actually play it. Will the game have international servers? Will it receive regular, consistent content updates? Will it be given the same level of support as the Japanese game? Many players will probably stay away unless these questions are answered (or unless they're answered correctly). Hopefully Sega will provide the answers later this week.
And for those of you that aren't so sure Sega is building up to a PSO2 announcement... do you really think they would go to all this trouble to promote the shutdown of the PSU servers?
Today, the trip back in time continued with Phantasy Star Portable. Sega's Twitter posting for this game included a not-so-subtle message and another possible hint:
PSP on the PSP! http://bit.ly/Q6c6lh If you're keeping track that's one PS game every day, in order, starting from the first. Hmmm.....
If Sega sticks to the Phantasy Star games released in the US, then there should be only two left in the retrospective: Phantasy Star Zero (tomorrow) and Phantasy Star Portable 2 (on Wednesday). Players with an interest in an English version of Phantasy Star Online 2 should keep an eye on the official forum thread beginning Thursday afternoon.
Of course, even if PSO2 does get an official English release, there are still some details that will affect whether people actually play it. Will the game have international servers? Will it receive regular, consistent content updates? Will it be given the same level of support as the Japanese game? Many players will probably stay away unless these questions are answered (or unless they're answered correctly). Hopefully Sega will provide the answers later this week.
And for those of you that aren't so sure Sega is building up to a PSO2 announcement... do you really think they would go to all this trouble to promote the shutdown of the PSU servers?
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Xbox Live on Windows 8
Microsoft announced today that the next iteration of Windows, currently dubbed "Windows 8", will feature Xbox Live support on the PC:
Of course, there isn't a whole lot of information about this feature right now, so nobody knows what Microsoft is really planning for Windows 8. This could just be a re-branding of the failed Games for Windows Live service, but at this point it's hard to tell.
So why do I bring this up here? Last year, Phantasy Star Universe was made available for purchase digitally on Microsoft's Games on Demand service for Xbox Live. You could buy that, download the Ambition of the Illuminus expansion and the "Guardians Advanced Content" expansion, and then play the game.
If Microsoft is intending to bring the entire Xbox Live experience to Windows 8 including Games on Demand, it wouldn't be a stretch to say that PC players would have an opportunity to get back into PSU on Xbox Live. You'd have to start over from scratch (assuming you don't already play the Xbox 360 version), but the option would be there. The Xbox 360 version of PSU should be playable on a PC thanks to DirectX (that's where the X in Xbox came from, after all).
On the other hand, it remains to be seen whether or not Phantasy Star Universe will survive until Windows 8 is officially released, probably no less than one year from now. Nevertheless, it's an interesting scenario to consider. How would the Xbox 360 PSU community (and the Xbox Live community in general) change if PC gamers were added into the mix?
Xbox LIVE brings your games, music, movies, and TV shows to your favorite Microsoft and Windows devices. Bringing Xbox LIVE to Windows 8 is part of our vision to bring you all the entertainment you want, shared with the people you care about, made easy.
Of course, there isn't a whole lot of information about this feature right now, so nobody knows what Microsoft is really planning for Windows 8. This could just be a re-branding of the failed Games for Windows Live service, but at this point it's hard to tell.
So why do I bring this up here? Last year, Phantasy Star Universe was made available for purchase digitally on Microsoft's Games on Demand service for Xbox Live. You could buy that, download the Ambition of the Illuminus expansion and the "Guardians Advanced Content" expansion, and then play the game.
If Microsoft is intending to bring the entire Xbox Live experience to Windows 8 including Games on Demand, it wouldn't be a stretch to say that PC players would have an opportunity to get back into PSU on Xbox Live. You'd have to start over from scratch (assuming you don't already play the Xbox 360 version), but the option would be there. The Xbox 360 version of PSU should be playable on a PC thanks to DirectX (that's where the X in Xbox came from, after all).
On the other hand, it remains to be seen whether or not Phantasy Star Universe will survive until Windows 8 is officially released, probably no less than one year from now. Nevertheless, it's an interesting scenario to consider. How would the Xbox 360 PSU community (and the Xbox Live community in general) change if PC gamers were added into the mix?
Saturday, April 23, 2011
First "Update 3rd" Content Appears Next Week
The Japanese PC PSU servers will be receiving their first set of "Update 3rd" content next week to coincide with the start of a new event.
Sega's Japanese PSU Web site announced the update on Wednesday. Three new field areas will be added to the game, the first such content update since Ambition of the Illuminus was released nearly four years ago.
The release of this content coincides with the start of Maximum Attack Infinity, a special crossover event with Phantasy Star Portable 2 Infinity. The event runs until Thursday, May 26.
Of course, it goes without saying that players on the US/EU servers are probably going to be grumbling about this for awhile. Now that the Japanese game has begun to get legitimately new content, it will be even more difficult to swallow the schedule of mostly rehashed updates on the Xbox 360 servers.
There has been speculation in the US/EU community that "Update 3rd" could steal many of the hardcore Xbox 360 PSU players away from the regional servers. Whether or not that happens remains to be seen. However, if it does happen, Sega should make a note of it when deciding on region-separated servers for PSO2.
Sega's Japanese PSU Web site announced the update on Wednesday. Three new field areas will be added to the game, the first such content update since Ambition of the Illuminus was released nearly four years ago.
The release of this content coincides with the start of Maximum Attack Infinity, a special crossover event with Phantasy Star Portable 2 Infinity. The event runs until Thursday, May 26.
Of course, it goes without saying that players on the US/EU servers are probably going to be grumbling about this for awhile. Now that the Japanese game has begun to get legitimately new content, it will be even more difficult to swallow the schedule of mostly rehashed updates on the Xbox 360 servers.
There has been speculation in the US/EU community that "Update 3rd" could steal many of the hardcore Xbox 360 PSU players away from the regional servers. Whether or not that happens remains to be seen. However, if it does happen, Sega should make a note of it when deciding on region-separated servers for PSO2.
Monday, April 18, 2011
Slightly Off Topic: See, This Is What I Mean
Today I spent a little time at nVidia's geforce.com Web site getting driver updates for my graphics card. While there, I stumbled upon an interesting interview with Battlefield 3 executive producer Patrick Bach.
In the article, Bach argues that the consoles are holding PC gaming back. Because the majority of developers continue to view the consoles as "the superior platform" for gaming, they start development of new games there instead of on the PC. Bach says that by doing this, the vastly superior processing power of the PC is never harnessed.
He then discusses his solution to the problem, one that I wish more developers would use. Sonic Team, are you listening?
I agree with Bach on this subject -- I've even touched briefly on the topic right here on this blog. It would be nice if developers would do a better job of targeting the PC community when creating games. When they port console games to the PC, they usually don't bother adding any additional features or effects that can be handled more easily by a PC graphics card.
Case in point: think back to version 3 of Phantasy Star Online for the GameCube and Xbox. There were parts of Episode 2 in the GameCube version that featured great water effects. (Yes, at 256x192 the effects are a little difficult to see -- to better see what's going on, try browsing YouTube for some videos, or play the game!)
However, when PSO: Blue Burst was released, those effects were surprisingly absent. PCs at the time were more than capable of displaying them, so what happened?
It turns out that the Blue Burst PC code was ported from the Xbox version of the game, which lacked the water effects. Similar effects in the Seabed level were either missing or badly ported. (Also see: telepipes).
Of course, Phantasy Star Universe and its expansions suffer from a similar problem. Since that game was originally developed on (and ported from) the PS2, it lacks the ability to take advantage of features on modern-day graphics cards.
Thanks to these two examples, I generally try to steer clear of games that have been ported to the PC from a console, whether it be the PS3 or Xbox 360. There are some instances where the developer writes the game for consoles and later releases a texture patch to make the game look prettier on PCs; such was the case for the PC version of Dragon Age II, which got a DirectX 11 patch shortly after release. However, most developers don't do this and such games are few and far between.
This, among other things, is why I fear a console version of Phantasy Star Online 2. I've been fairly optimistic so far because neither Sega nor Sonic Team have indicated that a console version of the game is coming. Hopefully that doesn't change.
Sources:
DICE to Focus on the PC with Battlefield 3 (GeForce.com)
Hi-Res Texture Pack for Dragon Age 2 Available (TomsHardware.com)
In the article, Bach argues that the consoles are holding PC gaming back. Because the majority of developers continue to view the consoles as "the superior platform" for gaming, they start development of new games there instead of on the PC. Bach says that by doing this, the vastly superior processing power of the PC is never harnessed.
Most games are actually still based on the same core idea that the consoles are your focus, the superior platform or something. I don’t know why. That was the truth 5 years ago, but the world has moved on. PCs are way more powerful than the consoles today and there are actually almost zero games out there that actually use the benefits of this.
He then discusses his solution to the problem, one that I wish more developers would use. Sonic Team, are you listening?
So for our target of what we want to hit, we are now using the more powerful platform to try and prove what we see gaming being in the future rather than using the lowest common denominator, instead of developing it for the consoles and then just adding higher resolution textures and anti-aliasing for the PC version. We're do it the other way around, we start with the highest-end technology that we can come up with and then scale it back to the consoles.
I agree with Bach on this subject -- I've even touched briefly on the topic right here on this blog. It would be nice if developers would do a better job of targeting the PC community when creating games. When they port console games to the PC, they usually don't bother adding any additional features or effects that can be handled more easily by a PC graphics card.
Case in point: think back to version 3 of Phantasy Star Online for the GameCube and Xbox. There were parts of Episode 2 in the GameCube version that featured great water effects. (Yes, at 256x192 the effects are a little difficult to see -- to better see what's going on, try browsing YouTube for some videos, or play the game!)
However, when PSO: Blue Burst was released, those effects were surprisingly absent. PCs at the time were more than capable of displaying them, so what happened?
It turns out that the Blue Burst PC code was ported from the Xbox version of the game, which lacked the water effects. Similar effects in the Seabed level were either missing or badly ported. (Also see: telepipes).
Of course, Phantasy Star Universe and its expansions suffer from a similar problem. Since that game was originally developed on (and ported from) the PS2, it lacks the ability to take advantage of features on modern-day graphics cards.
Thanks to these two examples, I generally try to steer clear of games that have been ported to the PC from a console, whether it be the PS3 or Xbox 360. There are some instances where the developer writes the game for consoles and later releases a texture patch to make the game look prettier on PCs; such was the case for the PC version of Dragon Age II, which got a DirectX 11 patch shortly after release. However, most developers don't do this and such games are few and far between.
This, among other things, is why I fear a console version of Phantasy Star Online 2. I've been fairly optimistic so far because neither Sega nor Sonic Team have indicated that a console version of the game is coming. Hopefully that doesn't change.
Sources:
DICE to Focus on the PC with Battlefield 3 (GeForce.com)
Hi-Res Texture Pack for Dragon Age 2 Available (TomsHardware.com)
Saturday, April 9, 2011
JP PSU "Update 3rd" Content Rollout Begins This Month
Back in January, news broke of yet another set of expansion content coming to the Japanese version of Phantasy Star Universe. A few glimpses of new content were shown at the time, but no specific details were provided about the update.
However, a Web page has now appeared on the Japanese PSU Web site offering actual screenshots of the new content, dubbed "Update 3rd" and slated to hit the Japanese PC servers beginning this month.
Of particular interest are the new environments being added. I, for one, was happy to see that an actual beach level is finally being added to the game. It will be interesting to see what kinds of enemies will inhabit these areas. Hopefully we'll get to see some actual new enemies with new moves and abilities, instead of boring reskins. In any case, I must say that this is actually making me want to play on the Japanese servers!
Of course, these updates are made possible because the Japanese version of PSU has finally been freed from the shackles of console support. With the shutdown of PS2 support imminent, Sega / Sonic Team can now theoretically release as much genuinely new content as they want for PC players to enjoy. In fact, Sega has indicated that the content pictured on the Web page is only the tip of the iceberg.
If this had been done earlier, could the US/EU PC servers have been saved? Nobody will ever know. However, if this is the kind of support we could get for PSO2, then I sincerely hope that a console version of that game never sees the light of day.
However, a Web page has now appeared on the Japanese PSU Web site offering actual screenshots of the new content, dubbed "Update 3rd" and slated to hit the Japanese PC servers beginning this month.
Of particular interest are the new environments being added. I, for one, was happy to see that an actual beach level is finally being added to the game. It will be interesting to see what kinds of enemies will inhabit these areas. Hopefully we'll get to see some actual new enemies with new moves and abilities, instead of boring reskins. In any case, I must say that this is actually making me want to play on the Japanese servers!
Of course, these updates are made possible because the Japanese version of PSU has finally been freed from the shackles of console support. With the shutdown of PS2 support imminent, Sega / Sonic Team can now theoretically release as much genuinely new content as they want for PC players to enjoy. In fact, Sega has indicated that the content pictured on the Web page is only the tip of the iceberg.
If this had been done earlier, could the US/EU PC servers have been saved? Nobody will ever know. However, if this is the kind of support we could get for PSO2, then I sincerely hope that a console version of that game never sees the light of day.
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