Phantasy Star 2 is an early jRPG for Sega Mega Drive and a sequel to Phantasy Star for Sega Master System. It was made by Sega of Japan and released in 1989, coming to US right in the very beggining of 1990. 6 Megabit ROM cartridge with battery saving, up to 4 slots. This time around it's all leaning more on sci-fi style and no more 3D first person view dungeons.
Also, there is a single important character who has differently translated name than the previously translated Phantasy Star 1 (PS1 translation is the one which is wrong).
The game that you have here is nothing more than emulation of Sega Genesis version. Well, actually, emulator uses pre-Virtual Console release. VC version had cross icons removed from the game because Red Cross complained. While uncompressed ROM provided is actually Virtual Console one.
Also, yep, Western release, has drum sound in music lower in volume.
Actually, American and European releases also came with a hintbook that had full maps of dungeons! But you aren't getting any in Steam release, aha.
Now, technical part about Sega's emulation here:
The Sega Classic games that you purchase on Steam count as DLCs for "Sega Mega Drive & Genesis Classics" game that should appear in your library.
It has Bedroom HUB which is the one with many features yet lags for many and Simply Launcher which lacks Workshop and Online but at least it works just fine for everybody.
However, Simple Launcher has it's fair share of glitches as well. It can crash. And it does the second time you go to main menu, so always quit after saving there so it doesn't crash when you want to save next time!
Emulation itself, mostly sound, isn't that good but it does it's job. Also, yes, emulator supports quick saves.
As alternative, you can use external emulator to run games that you purchased. Sega kindly placed in all games that you purchased in "uncompressed ROMs" folder that program itself doesn't use, just change file extension to ".bin" or so. The file for this one being "PhantasyStar2_UE_GreenCrossFix.SGD".
I also demand you to read digital manual of this game first. You can find it here on store page or go to "manuals" folder of game root and open "PSII_PC_MG_EFIGS_WW_HR.pdf". Actually, it's a very short manual and sure isn't going to even hint at what all those MEGID and GIRES and SASHU techniques do, so track down US manual. Like on Sega Retro site.
And yep, this game includes saving. In-game saving, not emulator one. Bedroom HUB works fine but Simple Launcher one is buggy:
You have to remember, you have to close emulator in proper way, otherwise it will not have them actually saved in files. That means that you have to avoid crashing it or closing in different way.
Even more, if you load emulator-side saves, the emulator will not see in-game saves and will not be able to do in-game saves either. Even if it makes look as if it does.
Oh yea, and there another important thing! There is one nasty glitch that is caused due to game code itself: Near the end of a game there is a single cutscene at the start of which the music will hang on a single note and will stay like this even after cutscene. Other side effects will occur: the text may become garbled and the game can even crash in certain event.
To fix this you should try to pause and unpause few times. I actually managed to fix this by pausing few times in same cutscene. Other did it in the next dungeon. But a good alternative is to make in-game save, quit emulator, launch it again and load the saved game.
And yep, it's the old jRPG, which means that the plot is completely linear. But the plot was great at a time, as it deals with more mature theme than others, even having tragic elements in it way before your fantasies sevens. At least when compared to popular jRPG on consoles that came to the West at the time, can't speak for others.
But sadly, it's not executed good, you have arrays of dungeons before anything interesting happens and even then it has some plotholes, mostly how plot reasoning completely contradicts with what is going on in gameplay. Not to mention that this new more sci-fi style isn't as charming as fantasy-sci-fi mix that original has. No more cake shops in dungeons.
As for gameplay, it's grindy like old jRPGs. But not only that, it's clear that Sega wanted this game to take as much time to beat as possibly and created one hell of a dungeon mazes. No more pseudo-3D, they are now top-down. They are huge compared to your walk speed. Actually, later rereleases of a game would often have option for increased walk speed included to set it to Phantasy Star 4 standard. And even more, random encounters are way too frequent. The mazes are multi-level and often are connected with chutes in various ways.
This game feels more of dungeon crawler. And here is how you enjoy dungeon crawlers: you pull out paper, take a pen and [strike]shove it up your butt[/strike] start writing down maps and info. Yep, info like what each shop has in each town, what each magic item does and drawing maps of mazes. This way it even doesn't feel as grindy, as you spend time mapping out every corner. Still, monotomy sets in after a while anyway. Especially in second half of game. In dam chapter you don't get any new towns or shops items. You do find magical items that anybody in party can use without equipping them, by the way. And then you gain so much meseta that they stop mattering much.
Plus, some "puzzles" in a game are really awful. Like, in one dungeon you have to walk from entrance to another entrance that you can't see through the black space. The very same black space that in other dungeons make you immeditly leave the area. Sega should be ashamed. And then there are similar ones, like having no graphics for entrance into mountains or one control tower being suddenly enterable unlike others.
It does have some really good at a time things going for it though. Music is great. You meet more playable character than your party can hold at single time so you can pick who you want to take to try out different loadout. By the way, you get a game over if your whole party dies. Death can come anytime, but as long as you progressed on drawing map you are still a winner. Sadly, figuring out who can use what equipement in shops is a drag.
And the battle system is very awesome. Well, the presentation of it, where it takes on behind-party perspective and you get to see monsters and characters attack each other in turns. It looks spectacular even when compared to other 16-bit jRPGs that came after it. It also has a battle system where it automatically cycles on after you press fight command, only breaking at beggining of next cycle if you press a button to let you select a new orders. Really fits to grindy jRPG. Even music is awesome unlike "let's be tense" in other jRPG at time. But shame about boring grid background.
Sadly, the game has only three bosses in game. And two of them are placed in same spot. So you don't really do much of long-term thinking in battles. Though, it's still somewhat hard due to many encounters. Don't even think that you will beat the dungeon on a first go! And the last array of dungeons is such a drag.
Protip: "order" of party impacts who enemies are more likely to target.
But hey, can build 4 member party out of 8 members! Almost. 2 are always same required ones.
Overall, while it might be quite a top jRPG at a time, it aged badly. It's way too monotonous even when drawing a map. Just not enough substance, it drags whatever it has way too much. So yea, I wouldn't recommend it nowadays for sure. Plus, there are flaws in design due to being such early. To be honest, I like this one less than the first Phantasy Star.
