The thing is that a lot of things are server side, like weapons and armor and such things, so I'd really rather wait. I've played enough games in Japanese for a lifetime.
Luckily, stats are pretty easy to understand even if you don't have a translation patch. On the bright side, The Arkive has been up for a while which is an English database for the game ran by the same people as PSUPedia.
I heard 'End of February' and I'm still holding out for that. Not that playing an un-patched game is hard, it would be nice to see in it English sooner then later. I'm not gonna start looking into a fan patch now, not if it's out within 3 months.
Keep in mind, that if the game is in the state that it was in at launch in terms of content, I don't think a large majority of the English community will be jumping ship to the US servers. Especially with how terrible PSU was handled. Sega of America has one last shot to prove that they can actually run a server in the series competently and I'd love to see it happen. Otherwise, I guess I'll just stay on the Japanese version. The language barrier isn't an issue to me.
I haven't heard much of the Vita version either, I would be getting that for sure to play between PC and portable.
My opinion on the Vita version so far: 1. Despite being a visual downgrade over the PC version, it runs incredibly smooth. I've yet to experience any framerate drop outside of the first couple of seconds of joining a full block. (This happens on PC too) 2. The game's controls work incredibly well despite the lack of buttons, I'm also surprised at how well the right stick camera's sensitivity is at default, it's just right. 3. The game actually looks really nice for the Vita, screenshots really don't give it justice.
It probably doesn't need to be posted here, because anyone who is playing the game probably knows about it already, but there's now a separate translation patch available for the story quests. The download is 1.19GB. It also translates the dialogue of some of those random people you talk to during quests by hitting the use key near those floating card-things; And most of those messages that scroll across the top of the screen telling you about current ship-wide events. I had a really stupid experience yesterday. I admit that I haven't played much since the game came out (I resumed playing for the Vita version earlier this week) but yesterday I discovered the shopping area for the first time. I previously assumed that all 4 teleporters in the quest counter area took you to other blocks. So I managed to go 15 levels before I knew that the shop on the campship wasn't the only place to buy things, thus I didn't even have the matter board until then. I hope they announce a release for the official English version soon.
*sees new posts* *thinks there's finally news about the English release and clicks* *is disappoint* I haven't touched the Japanese version at all in the past few months except to test out the new video card I got back in September. That and I wasn't sure what SEGA was doing with non-Japanese players; I kept hearing conflicting info so I thought it would be best to lay low for a while. Here's hoping they announce SOMETHING about the official English version soon.
I just don't have time to mess around with constantly updating and translation patches etc. I'm just waiting for the worldwide release to start playing again on PC, I'll for sure play a lot if we do get an English Vita version.
I've been waiting for the worldwide release as well. I don't really feel like looking up what I'm reading while playing a game.
Haha, that's kinda clever until you realize that some point a floating pair of tits are gonna pop up in the top corner of your screen.
SURPRISE: http://www.polygon.com/2013/3/25/4146658/phantasy-star-online-2-delayed-in-north-america-sega-confirms
Do Sega's western branches even have the staff anymore to maintain something the scale of PSO2? I kinda doubt it.
From what other people have told me, the western releases of the Phantasy Star Online/Universe games have been problematic in the past, especially with PSU. I doubt they'd release the game with the currently up to date material, they'd probably start several updates behind what the Japanese version has so that way people can't just rush to whatever level is the latest level when it's just getting started, update a few times, and then stop caring about updates for about a year or indefinitely. Unless SEGA West can prove they're not lazy and are more than capable of maintaining a massive online game that needs tweaking and staying on par with the Japanese which seems to be getting updates nearly every week, I wouldn't bother with the Western Release.
I know PSU got they way it did because Japan introduced microtransactions and the West didn't want to do that.
Everyone's pretty much playing the Japanese release. That is until SoJ outright ban western connections. According to their TOS, we're not even suppose to be able play unless we live in Japan. They been nice enough to let western players play, despite the lot of them "unintentionally" breaking their TOS.
That has been removed and re-added to the TOS at least 3 times. I think the only reason it's there at this point is so they have an excuse to ban problematic foreigners. If they really did mind us being there (and they've made it pretty clear that they don't), we'd have been gone a while ago—or at least, it would be harder to get in. I'm sure it was the same situation for PSU as well. While both the NA and JP servers were running, there were plenty of non-Japanese players playing on the JP server.
I've heard stories about this as well, and how the US servers were like a year behind in updates. Many people seemed to be getting pessimistic about the US version of this game because the experiences with PSU left a bad taste in their mouths. Can't say I blame them. I just find it hilarious that it's taking Sega over six months to release a game in English while a bunch of random people online have managed to translate and patch most the game's text into English in a LOT less time. Seeing how there's so many non-Japanese players on the Japanese servers already they might as well add an English language option to the game and just have the servers be international.
