Phantasy Star Online: Blue Burst

Phantasy Star Online: Blue Burst is an expanded version of Phantasy Star Online that offers more content in the form of Episode 4 and also features improved graphics and more items to collect.

Overview

Phantasy Star Online: Blue Burst was released for the PC on July 15, 2004 in Japan and June 23, 2005 in the United States. PSO: BB is an enhanced version of prior PSO games, but it offers a few features that the Dreamcast, Gamecube, and Xbox versions did not have such as extra content and improved graphics. The story follows Phantasy Star Online Episode 1 and 2 while adding episode 4.
The story in Episode 1 has you looking into a problem on the planet Ragol, finding out what happened to Pioneer 1 and also finding the Principal of Pioneer 2 daughter Red Ring Rico. In the second episode you are tasked by the government to find out what has happened to Flowen and the labs that he was taken to.

PSO:BB plays different from the console versions because the story is broken up into missions that are accessed via a special desk and these missions are shorter than their console counterparts. Just like the Xbox version, PSO:BB is only playable online with the creation of an account - otherwise players can still enjoy the single player experience. As of March 31, 2008 the official servers of PSO:BB are no longer available for play online, although fan-run servers such as SCHTHACK have arisen to meet the demand for online play.

Plot

Episode 1

The story of episode 1 is relatively simple. When the citizens on Pioneer 2 observes the explosion on Ragol, the Principle sends down a team of Hunters to the surface to investigate what happened. You play as one of the Hunters. When you reach the surface you find all of the local wildlife to be violent and mutated creatures with few signs of normal habitation. Also, you find voice recordings left behind by Rico Tyrell in small capsules. As you continue through the forests you eventually reach the local area around the central dome. In this area you find an odd pillar with engraved markings that once activated will glow and make a quiet noise. When you reach the central dome you find a teleporter that leads inside the dome where you fight a ferocious dragon. Once the dragon is defeated, you go deep into underground Ragol where there is a series of caves filled with full-bodied mutants. Farther in the caves is another pillar like the one in the forest. Once activated, it will also glow and make a quiet noise. Deeper yet into the caves is a gigantic crustacean called De Rol Le. Originally went by the codename of Beta 776, this giant worm was created by the insane Dr. Osto experimenting on altering life forms. This creature then grew too large for the containment facility, killed all of the scientists working there and then escaped into a nearby sewer line. This creature is the reason for the mutations in the caves and forests. It injects it's victims with a type of sap from it's needle like whiskers, which mutates whatever it injects. Once you defeat De Rol Le you go deeper underground Ragol into a technologically superior type of underground mine. On entering these mines robots of all kinds attack you on sight. You can then deduce that something definitely afoot because robots are normally programmed by people. In one particular mission, you end up partnering up with FOnewearl Elly Person, who is in love with someone named Calus. She ends up receiving a letter from him asking her to meet him and is currently in the mines. Elly asks you to escort her there, and along the way Elly gets messages from Calus warning her to stay out of the mines for fear of her safety. Elly gets confused about this since he wanted to meet her and now changed his mind. A couple messages later, Calus seems to be having conflicted emotions about having her come see him or having her return to Pioneer 2. Once you reach Calus, you find out he's really just an AI inside a computer. Elly still likes him even though he's not human, and Calus explains that he fears for his own safety since something is corrupting all of the machines in the mines, and he can feel the effects already taking place on him. In a last ditch effort, Elly downloads his AI program onto a disc and then shuts down the computer hosting him in the mines, thus saving him. Later on, while exploring the mines with Dr. Montague and Elenor in search of Ult, you find out there were 3 AI's created in this facility. Calus, Vol Opt, and Olga. All three were developed with the Delta MOTHER AI project Dr. Osto worked on with Dr. Montague. Due to unknown reasons at the time, the project never got completed. Calus was recently saved by Elly before he succumbed to the evil influence and the Olga AI got moved to an underwater laboratory for an unknown reason. Soon you find out the facility's robot's went out of control due to the autonomous giant AI called Vol Opt, which has control over the entire facility's machinery. Something had corrupted Vol Opt's program and used it to make the machines attack whoever entered the mines. As you continue through to a deeper section of the mines you find another pillar like those in the forest and caves. It has the same symptoms as the other two when activated. At the deepest portion of the mines you find the terminal room where you fight Vol Opt. Once the supercomputer is defeated you find a teleporter that leads to a series of underground Ruins. Before actually entering the Ruins you go to an entrance hallway. At the end of the hallway is a large door. The door will be closed if you have not activated all of the pillars that were in the earlier areas and you will have to go back to find and activate them. However, if you have activated the pillars, you can easily enter the Ruins. Upon entering the Ruins you are attacked by D-cellular lifeforms of an unknown origin. As you go deeper it is revealed to you from Rico Tyrell's capsules and several piles of wreckage that there was a once great battle between the military and a great demonic creatures. It was in this battle that Healthcliff Flowen the military commander was crippled with a living wound, a type of living entity that slowly grew on him like a leech and would eventually kill him. Later in Rico's capsules she claims that you are not actually in ancient ruins but an ancient spaceship. The spaceship was apparently made to contain a dark entity known as Dark Falz. Dark Falz is the god of destruction and is reborn at the end of every millennium. However, to be reborn IT needs a host body to possess. So IT uses Rico Tyrell's body when she goes into the ruins. Eventually you find a teleporter that leads you to the inner domain of Dark Falz. ITs inner sanctum is a large lush green paradise with a large stone podium. Upon reaching the podium the ground turns into twitching corpses and Dark Falz will appear. When you fight Dark Falz on hard, very hard, and ultimate difficulty it has three forms. When Dark Falz is defeated, you can see Rico's soul being freed.

Episode 2

Episode 2 takes place after the ancient spaceship is discovered. You find yourself in the Government Lab of Pioneer 2. The Chief of the Lab asks you to go on a mission for the government to Ragol where they have found a secret Laboratory on Gal Da Val island. They want this island investigated. Before you can accept this mission though they need to certify that you are strong enough to go research the island. The Lab invented a virtual reality simulator consisting of two areas, The Temple area and the Spaceship area. If you can clear both of these simulators then the Lab deems you strong enough to go to Gal Da Val island. Each VR area has two levels that have enemies from Episode 1 and a boss at the end of Temple Beta and Spaceship Beta based on data from two previous Episode 1 Bosses, De Rol Le and Dragon respectively. De Rol Le's Episode 2 counterpart is Barba Ray, with a slightly different arsenal of attacks and resistances. The Dragon's counterpart is Gol Dragon, which sports 3 elemental breath attacks and the ability to replicate itself. Due to it's massive size and the data required for it, it must be fought inside a giant computer control room and occasionally fades out and back in to add to the effect that it may be too powerful for the simulator to handle.

When you have completed the simulators you are allowed to go to the surface of the island. When you get there you end up in the Central Control Area to investigate, only to find out that the door is locked and that you need to deactivate all 3 security switches scattered about the island to open it. The island is divided up into three sections to explore; jungle, mountain, and seaside. You have to go to each of these sectors and deactivate the security switch by reaching the terminal at the end of every sector. Along the way to the terminals you fight many native and mutated creatures. You also find many computer terminals that once accessed will transmit data to Pioneer 2s Lab. You can check on this data whenever you reach a terminal from the Lab. Some of the data is about the native creatures and their abilities, but you also find voice recordings left by Heathcliff Flowen, the presumed dead military commander. You learn of how Flowen fought valiantly in battle with the military in the ancient ruins, but he was grievously wounded. He claimed that his wound was alive and that it was leeching his health away. The top scientist from Pioneer 1, Dr. Osto, treated Flowen's wounds. He said that Flowen would eventually die but that his wounds were one of a kind and asked him if he would consider donating his body to the government for testing and experimentation. Flowen agreed to it, knowing he would die one way or another and that he might as well use his body to help mankind, but as his final request he wrote a letter to his friends and family, and asked Dr. Osto to deliver it. The insane Dr. Osto never delivered it, he wanted to use Flowen's body for his own selfish purposes. He took Flowen to the underwater seabed laboratory to test and experiment with so they could create bio monsters off of his wound.

Once all of the Security Terminals around Gal Da Val island have been deactivated, you go back to the Central Control Area and the main gate will open. Past the main gate is a high security area full of robots and traps. Once you clear this area you find a teleporter that leads you to a plateau where you battle with an enormous mutant creature called Gal Gryphon. Gal Gryphon was one of Dr. Ostos bio weapons, just like De Rol Le, the crustacean from the caves that mutated the animals.

Once you defeat Gal Gryphon you get access to the Underwater Seabed Laboratory Facilities. The Seabed Facilities were an underwater research area made for the sole purpose of researching bio weapons. You find more voice recordings from Flowen and new data about the enemies that infest the Facilities. You learn more about Dr. Osto and Dr. Montague creating the AI Olga, an artificial intelligence, Vol Opt the corrupted supercomputer from the mines and Calus, whom Elly rescued 2 years prior from Vol Opt's hacking.

The new voice recordings from Flowen say how he was taken the seabed level and was starting to regret donating his body. The only conditions that he had donated his body for was that Pioneer 2's immigration was postponed and that a letter was sent out to his friends and family about his death. Dr. Osto never honored either of those requests. By the time Pioneer 2 arrived it was too late. They had come to the worst possible place at the worst possible time. The only thing that awaited them on the planet... was Hell itself. By the time Pioneer 2 arrived, De Rol Le had already escaped and had begun to mutate the animals, the seal on Dark Falz had already been weakened since it was the turn of the millennial cycle in which Falz was sealed 1,000 years earlier. The explosion that Pioneer 2 saw was Dark Falz spirit being awoken with a massive burst of energy destroying all citizens onboard Pioneer 1. A Dragon then went to nest in it's remains. Rico went to investigate the explosion and fully broke the seal in the ruins, with Dark Falz taking over her body as host and corrupting the Vol Opt AI program with it's dark powers causing the machines to go berserk. The creatures in the ruins were all created from Falz's D-cells, and Dr. Osto's mutant creatures begun to escape. Dr. Osto then performed the worst experiment of all... Merging Flowen's already mutated body with the Olga AI. Dr. Osto deemed this a failure and after what appeared to be a huge struggle destroying the underwater facility, threw him down the Test Subject Disposal Area. One of Flowen's recordings mentioned the disposal area as a failure site where they chucked down the failed Bioweapons down an abyss. This corresponds with his last voice recording which went as follows: "I wait at the bottom of this dark abyss for the savior of the red captive."

Episode 4

Unknown as Sega hasn't really revealed any info on what Episode 4 is suppose to be about, but it is safe to conclude that is follows after the events of Episode 3.

Trivia

- As of now all known official servers of PSO have been shutdown, but for a while the Dreamcast version would still let you connection, but would drop you after inactivity for a while.

-The game remains active via private servers, the most well known being SCHTHACK's Server.
Credits