History VideoGame / PhantasyStarII

* DebutQueue: Remember, every time you reach a new Motavian town, go back to Rolf's house. Someone will be waiting to join the party.

* DubNameChange

* DevelopersForesight: [[Spoiler:If you somehow manage to beat Neifirst as Nei, the cutscene afterword has different dialogue to explain that Nei, being a part of Neifirst, will die when she dies.]]

* AmericanKirbyIsHardcore: The US box art makes Rolf and Nei look around 15-20 years older than in the game, and uses a realistic art style, clashing with the game's manga look and [[YouDontLookLikeYourself rendering the characters basically unrecognizable.]]

* CrutchCharacter: Nei levels twice as fast as anyone else and gets access to ridiculously powerful equipment early in the game (though she gets mediocre stat boosts and only learns a handful of techniques compared to the others). This is so that she can carry the rest of the party until they're strong enough to go on by themselves... which, if you're careful about LevelGrinding, should be just in time for her demise. Fortuntely with effort is' possible to catch people up.

* JustBeforeTheEnd: [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin As the subtitle indicates]], this is the end of Algol's golden age. Palm is an ivory-tower world where the wealthy spend their lives in an idle paradise. Mota's great cities are equally idyllic, but the rest of the world is beginning to collapse into anarchy due to the breakdown of the Biosystems Lab and Climatrol, and space travel is forbidden. Later, Palm is destroyed when Mother Brain suddenly {{Colony Drop}}s the Gaira satellite on it. Rolf and his party eventually have to destroy Mother Brain to save what's left of Algolian humanity, ending the technological Golden Age that she made possible and knocking technology back to a lower level than it had been in the PSI era. [[spoiler: PSIV reveals that this event became known as the "Great Collapse", where roughly 90% of the population in Algo died because they didn't know how to take care of themselves after living so long under the control of a supercomputer.]]

* NoEnding: The Earthlings who had been trying to ''destroy the world'' in the BolivianArmyEnding of PSII were never mentioned in PSIII or PSIV. It's stated in one of the {{Universe Bible}}s that Rolf's TrueCompanions defeated the Earthlings, but for those of us outside Japan, there's no clue whatsoever whether they won, lost, or won a PyrrhicVictory and died stopping them... Damn you, Sega! (That said, anyone who played PSIV probably figured out the Earthlings lost, since the Earthlings stated they'd build another Mother Brain, but that never happened.)

* UndergroundMonkey: Every non-boss enemy comes in several varieties. Most are strictly [[PaletteSwap Palette Swaps]] with different stats, with one exception: the "Carrier" and "Mushroom" monsters' upgrade, Head Rot, is a Carrier with a Mushroom infesting its head.

''Phantasy Star II: The End of the Lost Age'' is the second game in Creator/{{Sega}}'s long-running ''VideoGame/PhantasyStar'' series of science fiction/fantasy {{Eastern RPG}}s. This is the first entry in the series released for the UsefulNotes/SegaGenesis, and it is widely considered the [[NintendoHard most difficult]]. It was also hailed as the best RPG on the system, only unseated by ''VideoGame/PhantasyStarIV'' five years down the line.

* {{Stripperiffic}}: Nei's "battle teddy." In the Japanese box art, it shows a visible camel toe, even ''viewed from the side''.

* AmazonianBeauty: Nei, particularly on the Japanese box art. She looks somewhat less muscular in-game.
* AmericanKirbyIsHardcore: The presumed reason why Rolf and Nei look about 10 years older on the US box than anywhere in the game. Also the artwork is realistic-looking rather than the manga look of the Japanese box.

** When you first arrive on Dezolis, you'll undoubtedly be relieved to discover a town and go to heal, only to discover that you cannot communicate with '''any''' Dezolians, and therefore cannot heal, shop, or save. There is no indication whatsoever of what to do here. The solution is that you have to trek back to the Skure space station and navigate its labyrinth once more to find a Mogic Cap ('''not''' to be confused with the Magic Cap, of which there are several throughout the station), which, when equipped, will translate Dezolian words (and no, the game does not tell you the Mogic Cap does that.)

* LoveMakesYouEvil: Duram turns to a life of crime in order to pay the ransom for his kidnapped daughter.

* StupidityIsTheOnlyOption: Early on you need to get past a character named Duram, who is blocking a tunnel and robbing anyone who tries to pass in order to pay the ransom for his daughter Teim, who has been kidnapped by bandits. After resucing Teim, you go to confront Duram, but instead of simply showing him his daughter is safe so he will no longer have a reason to rob anyone or block the path, Tiem suddenly walks up to him in disguise and refuses to comply with his robbery demands. Duram ends up killing Teim, and then blows himself up when he realizes he murdered his daughter. The final result is the tunnel is no longer blocked, but also two needless deaths that could have been easily avoided with a few sentences of dialog.

In 1994, Sega released ''Game no Kanzume Vol. 1'', and ''Game no Kanzume Vol. 2'' for the UsefulNotes/SegaCD. These were [[compilationRerelease compilations of]] various arcade ports to the console. Included in these were a series of prequel [[InteractiveFiction text adventures]] centering around a particular party member, in addition to providing much needed backstory, Nei's in particular. A total of eight were produced, covering the entire playable cast. Naturally, [[NoExportForYou none of these left Japan]], though FanTranslation patches exist.

* ForcedLevelGrinding: ''Good Lord'', yes. You'll need to grind to around level 10 just for the first and second dungeons, and every character who joins you starts at level 1, no matter how far along in the game you are, requiring you to do catch up, traditionally by taking him alone with rolf,a nd using leaked exp to get to the point the new character can do some soloing.

* PyrrhicVictory: Almost every victory you obtain in the game is accompanied by a tragedy. End the biomonster infestation? You'll lose your closest friend in the process. Save Motavia from flooding? Palma becomes space dust. Pry Motavia from the corrupt supercomputer controlling it? Society will collapse as a result.

* ShootTheShaggyDog: The first main quest involves rescuing a DamselInDistress and bringing her back to her father, a bandit guarding a BrokenBridge...only for her father to kill her by mistake, and then commit suicide.

* CampGay: There's a reason Ustvestia gives men a discount on the Musik technique... This got [[HideYourLesbians removed]] in the translation, though.

* CrutchCharacter: Nei levels twice as fast as anyone else and gets access to ridiculously powerful equipment early in the game (though she gets mediocre stat boosts and only learns a handful of techniques compared to the others). This is so that she can carry the rest of the party until they're strong enough to go on by themselves... which, if you're careful about LevelGrinding, should be just in time for her demise.

* DifficultySpike: While the game is already hard enough, things suddenly become ''much'' more difficult once you start facing robots in battle after completing roughly one-third of the game. Most of them hit harder and are much more resistant to damage than the biomonsters you were (finally) destroying with ease due to being sufficiently geared / leveled. The shops don't sell anything new, and you won't be coming across any new ones for quite a while, which means that your only resort is to find better upgrades in the dams. If this wasn't bad enough, it comes right after you've lost your heaviest-hitting character. Good luck.
** And it further spikes once more when you first reach Dezoris about two-thirds through the game. The spaceport isn't too difficult, though rarely you may face a few powerful robot types there that you haven't previously. Once you step foot on the surface, you'll inevitably be confronted by biomonsters far higher in power than anything that was on Motavia. They are the ''easy'' ones... the dungeons have even ''more powerful'' biomonsters that are capable of decimating your party and often attack in groups, much like the Blaster example from very early in the game. Also, depending on where you are, robots may show up from time to time which have absurdly high HP and defense and can take a very long time to kill, but usually aren't as threatening as the biomonsters.

* DubInducedPlotHole: The reason that Nei [[DeaderThanDead can't be cloned]] makes much more sense in the Japanese version. In the original, the DNA for her non-human parts is [[NoPlansNoPrototypeNoBackup unavailable after Climatrol's destruction]]. In the English version, however, it just says that they can't clone nonhumans, which [[VoodooShark doesn't make any sense]] because Nei could be cloned like anyone else before the fall of Climatrol.

* ForcedLevelGrinding: ''Good Lord'', yes. You'll need to grind to around level 10 just for the first and second dungeons, and every character who joins you starts at level 1, no matter how far along in the game you are.

** When Nei is killed by Neifirst, Rolf tries to revive her at the clone labs, but is told "it only works on humans". Prior to this, if she dies in battle she can be revived there just like any other character.[[note]]In the original Japanese it makes more sense -- she's half biomonster and you just blew up the plant manufacturing those.[[/note]]

** After inserting the keycard of the final dam into its console, the party is attacked by three Army Eyes which are normally impossible to defeat. They have 3000 HP each (usual enemy HP at that point range in the 100's at most), and after a set number of turns, they will end the fight by trapping you in plasma rings, to be transported as prisoners to Gaila. [[GameBreakingBug Defeating them before they do so will yield a mere 2 EXP, and leave you stuck in the Dam, with no way to advance the plot further.]]

* KilledOffForReal: Nei. This can be averted if you do a special quest in ''Phantasy Star Generations II''. If you have just have the original however...

** Neifirst is the BigBad for the first arc of the game. She is, however, a creation of an "accident" arranged by Mother Brain. (Mother Brain does not actually control her, but it hardly matters - she's out to destroy humanity, exactly as Mother Brain wants.)

* ThisLooksLikeAJobForAquaman: Most of Kain's techs only work on machines, which you probably will have encountered none at the point he joins you giving you no reason to bring him along. [[spoiler: Come the time Mother Brain sics all the robots on Rolf, and he becomes an invaluable member of the party.]]

* WhiteMagicianGirl[=/=]TheMedic: Amy

''Phantasy Star II'' takes place a [[ViciousCycle thousand years]] after the original ''Phantasy Star'', and in the intervening centuries the people of the Algo(l) system mastered {{terraform}}ing, using complex control systems to transform Mota(via), the original game's [[SingleBiomePlanet desert planet]], into their breadbasket. But the normally automated control systems are starting to go haywire. Our protagonist, Rolf, a government agent (and descendant of ''[=PS1=]'' heroine Alis, as it happens,) is sent to investigate. Accompanied by his [[MysteriousWaif mysterious]] friend Nei, they find themselves caught up in a plot to destroy the entire solar system. They stop the plot, but not without great losses.

* BolivianArmyEnding: After defeating Mother Brain, the party is attacked by the Earthlings, and prepares for battle, at which point the game abruptly ends, leaving the outcome ambiguous. In a later (Japan-only) UniverseBible, it's stated Rolf and co. won. However, the even-later PS2 remake reverts back to the original ambiguous ending.
* CampGay: There's a reason Ustvestia gives men a discount on the Musik technique... This got [[HideYourGays removed]] in the translation, though.

* CyberPunk: Has elements of this, though cybernetic implants are out, and the society is more [[CrapsaccharineWorld crapsaccharine]] than [[CrapsackWorld crapsack]]. There's still a totalitarian MasterComputer running things, human cloning and data centers as key elements in the game mechanics, and genetic engineering has gone completely out of control.
* DarkerAndEdgier: This is the darkest game in the ''VideoGame/PhantasyStar'' quadrilogy, which is saying something. It started the Phantasy Star trend of AnyoneCanDie, and it rather convincingly portrays a world that's on the edge of collapse while its citizens continue to while away their lives in a dying paradise. The game also features one hell of a DownerEnding (see below). Probably the darkest JRPG of the 16-bit era, only challenged by the ShinMegamiTensei games. Hell, it's possibly one of the darkest narratives in gaming history. To put this in perspective, the first major quest involves saving a DamselInDistress to cross a BrokenBridge, just like in ''Videogame/FinalFantasyI''...but it's a BrokenBridge because the damsel's father had become a bandit to raise her ransom money and blocked the bridge, and then when she's brought to her father, [[ShootTheShaggyDog he kills her for any money she might be carrying before learning who she is, and then kills himself once he learns the truth]].

** Nobody cares to revive dead minor characters either. This includes male citizens of Anima and [[spoiler: Darum and Tiem.]] They stay dead despite the clone shop being right down the town's corner, completely unharmed by the scoundrels' raid.

* GeneticEngineeringIsTheNewNuke: Mota's Biomonster problem is a result of an accident at the Biosystems Lab. Because of this, Motavian monsters tend to be giant-sized simple lifeforms, such as insects, worms, amoebae and bacterial colonies, with a few higher-animal splices and [[CatGirl Cat Girls]] for flavoring. The exceptions, of course, are the two {{Artificial Human}}s who are the source of the problem.

* DiscOneFinalDungeon: Climatrol.

* BolivianArmyEnding: When the party is attacked by the Earthlings at the end. In later (Japan-only) supplementary materials, it's stated Rolf and co. won.

* BolivianArmyEnding: When the party is attacked by the Earthlings at the end. In the original Japanese, it's clearly stated that Rolf and co. won; in the English release, the game ends ambiguously.

* BarrierWarrior: Amy

* DebutQueue: Remember, every time you reach a new town, go back to Rolf's house. Someone will be waiting to join the party.

** When Nei is killed by Neifirst, Rolf tries to revive her at the clone labs, but is told "it only works on humans". Prior to this, if she dies in battle she can be revived there just like any other character.[[note]]In the original Japanese it makes more sense -- she's a biomonster and you just blew up the plant manufacturing those.[[/note]]

* SquishyWizard: Amy and Hugh

* ThisLooksLikeAJobForAquaman: Most of Kain's techs only work on machines, which you probably will have encountered none at the point he joins you giving you no reason to bring him along. [[spoiler: Come the time Mother Brain sics all the robots on Rolf, and he becomse an invaluable member of the party.]]