Strong vibes, excellent narration and solid 16 bit jrpg adventuring with an overall difficulty curve just on the right spot..for the most parts.
Personally I feel like the story started of stronger than it ended up with, but the cartoon styled cutscenes were super cool and plentiful, while the pacing never dropped throughout its 20 or so hour run.
The inventory menu is easily the weakest aspect with zero item/ gear stat or spell descriptions, and there are A LOT of spells and skills to keep track of, so holding a sheet with descriptions on the side is absolutely essential to play through this.
While dungeons are a lot easier to traverse than Phantasy Star II, they still have no checkpoints, so if you game over it's straight back to the title screen.
Phantasy Star 4 also loves throwing gimmick bosses at you, so be ready to suddenly get wiped because you didnt use a requisite item or weapon.
Even with its share of flaws and less intuitive design choices, it's still a fantastic jrpg worth the trouble.
Personally I feel like the story started of stronger than it ended up with, but the cartoon styled cutscenes were super cool and plentiful, while the pacing never dropped throughout its 20 or so hour run.
The inventory menu is easily the weakest aspect with zero item/ gear stat or spell descriptions, and there are A LOT of spells and skills to keep track of, so holding a sheet with descriptions on the side is absolutely essential to play through this.
While dungeons are a lot easier to traverse than Phantasy Star II, they still have no checkpoints, so if you game over it's straight back to the title screen.
Phantasy Star 4 also loves throwing gimmick bosses at you, so be ready to suddenly get wiped because you didnt use a requisite item or weapon.
Even with its share of flaws and less intuitive design choices, it's still a fantastic jrpg worth the trouble.