
	Platform Sega Genesis Genre Role Playing Developer / Publisher Sega Released 1991
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Phantasy Star III: Generations of Doom

Phantasy Star is arguably one of the most respected RPG series in console gaming. As one of the few games to spearhead a sci-fi theme in the genre, it has managed to garner itself quite the following over the years. Whenever a new Phantasy Star is announced, fans are chomping at the bit to get their hands on it. However, the series isn’t without its black sheep, as Phantasy Star III has often been looked down upon as the series’ low point.

After the unique, and all together impress visuals seen in the first two Phantasy Star games, part three went in a totally different direction. From the get go, it had a new group of people handling development, and with it new concepts were brought into the fold. Many who played the game felt that the series abandoned creativity in favor of showing off what the Genesis could do. Compared to the last game in the series, Phantasy Star III’s visuals just didn’t have that much detail. Walking over land was far from impressive, and even the monsters in battle were anything but dazzling. It seemed the one graphical obsession that the development team had on the game was parallax scrolling, as they tried to give a strong sense of depth when walking along the gangplanks of the game’s dungeons.

What hurt the game even more was how long it took for it to reach North America. Phantasy Star III was completed at roughly around the same time as another Sega RPG, Sword of Vermillion. However, the folks at Sega decided to bring Sword of Vermillion to these shores first. An odd move, but not out of the ordinary

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considering how poorly publishers understood gamers’ thirst for RPGs at the time. Because of this decision, Phantasy Star fans were stuck waiting even longer for a new installment in the series, and by the time Phantasy Star III was finally released, the visuals were starting to look a little bit dated.

Another strike against the game was how much of a step backward exploration was. The game took place on a massive space vessel comprised of a series of

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orb-shaped biospheres, each of which contained a unique ecosystem. The problem was that each of these areas was very small, and took very little effort to navigate. Even the dungeons were not as well laid out as that in Phantasy Star II. If a player made a mistake when making their way through a lair in that game, it could mean certain death as they tried to get back and try a different fork in the road. With Phantasy Star III, there just wasn’t this sense of risk, and overall apprehension that certain doom was quite literally right around the corner.

This isn’t to say that everything in Phantasy Star III was disappointing, as it had quite a few things about it that more role-playing games should incorporate. First and foremost of these was the way the game followed three generations of heroes, and going hand-in-hand with this, a very strong storyline. Early on in the game, many Phantasy Star fans probably wondered why the game had all of a sudden turned into a sword and sorcery romp, but as the game went on the history of Phantasy Star III’s world became clear, bringing some tantalizing little connections to the game’s predecessor. However, what really made the story work was that at the end of each generation’s adventure the hero would have to choose who to marry. Depending on who players tied the knot with, they would have a different hero to play in the next generation, as players took control of the offspring of their previous hero. By going this route, Phantasy Star III provided several “what if” scenarios, because as players replayed the game to try different generations, they would see, or at least hear rumors related to, what happened to some of the main characters they had in there party when trying different generational paths. One of the key long-term benefits that Phantasy Star III had was that it continually showed what could have been for those who were willing to play through every possible combination of generations.

This too shows how interesting a lot of the characters in the game were. While not nearly as engaging as Shir, Hugh, Rolf, Rudo, Nei, or any of the other cast members in Phantasy Star II, the characters of Phantasy Star III still had a long standing likeableness to them as players watched them grow old, and sometimes die, all the while seeing how the game’s two cyborgs, Mieu and Wren, just kept on trucking in their own ageless way throughout the generations.

Despite the lackluster dungeons, and unimpressive visuals of Phantasy Star III, what killed it most were the huge expectations many had for it considering the epic nature of the game’s predecessor. Phantasy Star II had such a huge, sweeping tale to tell that many expected the same in part three. In some ways it did do this, but it required players to go through the game several times in order to truly appreciate it, something most were not inclined to do.

Mr. Nash

(April 23, 2005)


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