Welcome to a series that you may or may not have heard about. Phantasy Star, first of that name, is what we are discussing this night.

A young woman, named Alis Landale, is forced to watch her brother Nero die in the streets of their city, Camineet, on the planet known in the Algol solar system as Palma. He was slain by roboguards under the order of King Lassic, later known in the series as Lashiec (which I personally like more). King Lassic was once a kind man and fair, but no more it seems, as many hideous monstrosities are allowed loose in the solar system and people oppressed. Why could he have changed….

Watching her brother die before her very eyes, Alis takes to heart his last words to her…”Find the man named Odin. He will be instrumental in defeating King Lassic!” She then prepares to do just that, venturing outside of the town and the ugly monsters that await her there…

The graphics in this installment aren’t terrible, considering it’s pre-Genesis, and the music wasn’t that bad either. Even in the original, the sprites of monsters in battle would animate, which was a pleasant change from the static sprites of older games. This continued into every other installment of the original series. Not as prevalently in III, but we don’t talk about that.

This is a good game and a good series to follow. The first game DID seem to have issues about somewhat random values for damages, but it’s not all that bad, considering it was for the Sega Master system at the time. The other 3 games in this series were for the Genesis. If you’re a newcomer to this game, start with what started it. I doubt you’ll be disappointed.

This patch is complete and features a number of core changes to the game engine to include the following (from the readme):

• 2-line naming terminology
• Narrative formatting
• Window expansion
• Replaced 8×8 font
• Use of adapting indefinite articles
• Reworked name entry screen
• FM/PSG switching (press Pause on the title screen)

I’m not sure why the game was re-translated, but the hacking is top-notch. So, check it out!

In the latest version (1.02) the following changes have been made since 1.00:

• Checksum fixed for play on a real system
• Fixed a bug with the Pause button mod
• Fixed lockup when you visit Tajim

• CRC32: 6605D36A
• MD5: DFEBC48DFE8165202B7F002D8BAC477B