Phantasy Star Universe (Xbox 360, 2006)

The game's single player campaign is well done, it has an anime television show feel to it, similar to ".Hack//". The story is well thought out and after each chapter you get a slight glimpse of what to look forward to in the next chapter, kind of like a preview to a TV show. The characters are decently designed with futuristic clothing and hair styles while some characters have a traditional Chinese look. Each planet that you explore has a great environment feel too it. The music and level design matches quite well, making it feel like this could be a real place someday. The game took me a few of sittings to beat, about 6 hours a night for about 3-4 nights. Considering what's out there recently, that's impressive. You will have to do side missions to level up your character enough to get through the later levels, this will become repetitious at times, however if you're use to the hack and slash RPG titles, this shouldn't be anything new to you.

The MMO aspect of the game is no where near as diverse as some of the PC MMOs out there, however it does have it's bonuses. New missions are added from time to time and some of the old missions from the campaign are there to keep you busy. You have your own room to decorate as you please, you can open up a shop and sell loot that you receive during missions for whatever prices you desire or you can turn your room into a night game stadium. There's tons of room decorations, some which can only be received by killing monsters for them. You can also make your own weapons, armors, and accessories through the synthesizer in your room. You will need to collect the appropriate items to synth them but this is great for those who are trying to stock weapons at there store with different elements attached to them.

Many people have complained that the online price is too steep. It's 10 dollars a month, which is average compared to other MMOs. It isn't the greatest price in the world, but if you play the game frequent enough, it's not that much. Playing every now and then for quite a few months, well... that's when you need to switch to network mode. Which is like the MMO version just you team up with characters from the game instead of real people. (Side Note: Obviously opening a store in this case is useless.)

All and all, I give this game a 4 out of 5. If anything, I recommend playing it for the campaign mode, since it's worth it. Those who do not want to dive into the MMO part of the game won't miss a great deal, but there will be people who like it enough to dedicate time to it. It's all a matter of personal opinion. For X-Box 360 players, you can download a demo of the game through X-Box Live, which contains a portion of the online mode free to try. That way you can see if you truly want to dedicate time to it. Character can not be carried over from the demo to the full version though, so only try it as much as you need to if you plan on switching to the full version.

- Scott V.

IF YOU VALUE YOUR SANITY DO NOT BUY THIS GAME. The graphics are sub-par for 360 games, the voice acting literally gave me a headache, the story made me naucious, and the online mode is abandoned and full of hackers and spammers.

Let me elaborate. The graphics for the 360 version are barely suitable for a PS2 game. The weapon swing animations are painfully slow and overacted. The voice acting is WORSE than any English voice-over I've ever heard, and I've watched a LOT of anime. It's like they hired Keanu Reeves and Hayden Christensen to do these lines. Every laugh seems forced and they don't actually sound like they understand what they're talking about. I actually looked in the options to see if I could switch the dialogue to Japanese, but unfortunately you can't choose.

The online mode is just as bad. Just like with it's predecessor PSO, Sonic Team abandoned it the day it was released. No GameMasters to get rid of spammers or hackers, and no one to complain to if something is bugged out and won't work. Walking around any town means trying to see between all the chat bubbles of people spamming things like, "PAYING 5K TO SEE HOT CHIX PIX!" and "CN SUM1 RUSH ME 2 LVL10? PAYING 20K" It gets worse than that, but it's not appropriate here.

Bottom line, DON'T BUY THIS GAME! SAVE YOUR MONEY AND YOUR SANITY! You'd be better off buying the Burger King games.

I bought this game since I like the PS series as a whole. Compared to the older games, this doesn't really stand out. It's more story than game and the gameplay itself gets repetitive. The worst thing about this game is that the XBox live part you have to pay ($10 roughly a month). Not really worth the buy unless you want the achievement points. Plus, in order to get new options like Extra Mode, you have to play out the story mode up to chapter six which can relatively take a long time. If I didn't have to dish out $10 to play with other people, it would have made a big difference. For RPGs, this is really nothing special. I say, get this for under $20 if possible. Not worth it if you get it for more than that.

This game was a present for my nephiew how mention to me that he had been looking for that game on game stop but vegas not find it and he knew my 5 year old had just discover small soldiers movie and want it those toys and we explains to him they do not make them no more duebto he got very sick I knew they sell everything on eBay so I looked and found them so he ask me to look for this game, I found it and boghh it for him, he got extra happy and now plays it all the time even on line. He says is a great game and I just love that eBay just has it all. :)......... Janet

Honestly, it would be a 3 point rating if not for the fact that the game's been out since 2006 and still, to this day, is being updated by SEGA. Only the Xbox servers are still up for online play, but they're still being added to. Single player mode is a joke, and the game has a $9.99 monthly fee for the online, but it's a pretty decent experience, especially for fans of the series.