Video Game / Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis

True Adventure Starts, Now

Long ago, the space colony of Oracle, who pioneered the use of an advanced particle energy known as "Photons", fought a seemingly endless struggle against the Falspawn, creatures of evil whose sole purpose is to destroy all there is in the universe. With the aid of a special individual known as the "Guardian" and their allies, Oracle finally put an end to the cycle of fate and destroyed the source of all evil in the universe once and for all.

It's been 1000 years since Oracle's final battle. ARKS, now settled on the planet Halpha, have spent decades protecting their new home and its inhabitants from the mysterious DOLLS, enemies from regions unknown with even more mysterious purpose. Further complicating matters is the appearance of the Meteorn, entities who appear on Halpha via pods who have no memory of their past but have unparalleled skill as ARKS, oftentimes joining their new allies on the front lines.

One such Meteorn, the Player Character, crash-lands on the surface of Halpha and is intercepted by Aina, a young ARKS and Halpha native who hails from a beachside village in West Aelio called Aelio Town. Officially recruited into the organization, the protagonist must team up with Aina, their mysterious fellow Meteorn Manon, and the many, many planetside ARKS to solve the mystery of the DOLLS and their own past.

Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis (officially shortened to "PSO2:NGS" or simply "NGS") is a "title" in Sega's Phantasy Star series and a sequel to Phantasy Star Online 2, developed by Sega Sapporo Studio, the successor to the Online R&D branch that developed PSO2. Despite having the appearance of a new game, New Genesis released in the form of a large-scale update to the original PSO2 and co-exists alongside the original game. The update released on June 9th, 2021 in Japan on the PlayStation 4 and PC (with Cloud versions for Nintendo Switch and PC), while it released elsewhere at the same time on the Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. The Global version received its PlayStation 4 port on August 31, 2022. Japanese beta tests were held between January and February 2021 and during April 2021, and an English version beta was held in May. A character creator/benchmark program for the game was released globally on May 25th, 2021.

New Genesis represents a dramatic shift in the format of the post-tetralogy Phantasy Star series; while the original game took the features and gameplay of Online and Universe and built upon it in its own way, New Genesis diverges completely into new territory with the introduction of a Wide-Open Sandbox (dubbed "open-field") where rather than accepting Quests from a Hub City and moving into instanced rooms, players can now traverse a large, seamless open world at their leisure that is populated with a wide variety of landscapes and creatures as well as dangerous foes. In lieu of a traditional Quest system, players are guided around the world with Tasks, an updated version of the Client Order system that functions like a typical "objectives" system. Players are still able to participate in instanced content in the form of Cocoons/Towers, structures scattered throughout the world that provide a variety of battle and platforming challenges, as well as the return of PSO2's Urgent Quest system. Combat is also more fluid and streamlined than ever before; taking cues from PSO2's revolutionary "Scion Classes", characters now have access to more freedom in both mobility and battle, such as the ability to "Photon Glide" in the air to approach from above and access to an expanded Subclass system. Six of PSO2's original classes return in a heavily revamped and actionized form, with the Braver, Bouncer, and Waker (based on PSO2's Summoner) classes added post-launch. The Gunblade weapon category was reintroduced in April 2023 alongside a class that specializes in using them, the Slayer. In June 2023, a significant update titled Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis ver. 2 added several new features and adjustments, such as the Creative Space (an expanded version of PSO2's Personal Quarters), alongside the sixth chapter of the main story.

Most notably, since New Genesis is not actually a "new" release but rather an update, the game features backwards compatibility with Phantasy Star Online 2. Players are able to move characters between the original game and New Genesis, and along with it access to all unlocked storage boxes, all unlocked character cosmetics such as costumes, Layered outfits and Accessories, and most equipment (scaled accordingly), with the ability to inherit your Mag's appearance. Players can also bring forward any ARKS Cash and Star Gems in their possession as well as an active Premium Set and its benefits.

Much like the original game, New Genesis has been spun off into derivative works and other titles, which include:

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Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis series:

• Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis
• Pusonicomi NGS / PSO2Comi NGS: A sequel to the popular Pusonicomi webcomic focused around New Genesis. Ran from June 2021 through September 2021.
• Central!: A Slice of Life webcomic that stars the Operators of Central City. Began in September 2021.
• Popona, a Virtual YouTuber promoting NGS (migrated over from IDOLA: Phantasy Star Saga). Official channel can be found here. As of June 2023, Popona has been promoted to SEGA's Official VTuber.

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This game includes examples of:

• Accent Slip-Up: The PSE Announcer doesn't have much of an accent normally, except when announcing the PSE Encores where her accent slips into what can only be described as Quebecian.
  Announcer: PSE Encore!
• Achievement System: Titles return, as with previous games. The system is similar to before, except instead of granting you the Title's name to display on your ARKS Card and victory screens, each title instead gives you a word or phrase. Up to three words or phrases can be combined to display on your ARKS Card or victory screens (PSO2 Titles can also be used as standard if earned).
• Actionized Sequel:
  • Surprisingly zigzagged. While the gameplay is faster and more fluid than PSO2 was in the early years and certainly much faster than any previous Phantasy Star game before it, the pace of combat has been toned down significantly from endgame PSO2 where Scion Classes dominated the scene and resulted in EP6 designing enemies the way it did. Classes in NGS have Scion-like mechanics such as counters, better evasions, and Skip Arts, but weapons are deliberately slower and heavier than they were in current PSO2.
  • Played straight with Waker. The class axes the management aspects prominent in Summoner, such as Pet feeding and raising, and integrates the Pets (now rebranded "Familiars") into the characters themselves, making them play closer to the other classes.
• All the Worlds Are a Stage: Leciel, The Very Definitely Final Dungeon for the first story arc, takes the form of simulated environments representing each of Halpha's four regions, with enemies and terrain matched accordingly.
• Allegedly Free Game: Downplayed even further compared to the original game, as New Genesis strips back most of the features of Premium Set. While Premium players get access to a second row of login bonuses in addition to previous perks like unlimited Personal Shop use and additional fashion features, most other features like extra block space, unlimited Personal Quarters, and trading were removed due to being nonexistent in NGS. Ironically, players complained about this because it now makes Premium not worth it enough over buying the cheaper Personal Shop Pass for very little difference in gameplay experience if you don't care about fashion or cosmetics.
• Always a Bigger Fish: When a Gigantix Starless is about to spawn in, it promptly annihilates the existing Gigantix DOLLS on the field before taking its place for the remainder of the fight.
• An Interior Designer Is You: A better description would be "An Island Architect is You". The Creative Space, a heavily upgraded version of PSO2's MyRoom/Personal Quarters feature, is a whole private island that you can build upon and terraform to your liking. You're able place object on or off the grid, resize, reshape, and recolor your Build Parts, place copies of yourself for photoshoots, create an obstacle course, or script puzzles to solve. A blueprint feature is also available to save and copy whole builds.
• Anti-Frustration Features:
  • The SG Scratch is more lenient this time around. It costs only 50 Star Gems per scratch and you even get one free scratch per day.
  • Once you have discovered a Cocoon or Tower and marked it on the World Map, you can start its Quest at any time by selecting it from the map, without the need to physically go back to that location. This also allows you to use them as makeshift Ryuker Devices by starting a Quest and then immediately exiting it, which will dump you outside the Cocoon/Tower instead of where you actually started the Quest from. You can use this to get around to spots without any actual Ryuker Devices close by, such as using the "Lone Way" Cocoon to teleport to the hidden cave in South Aelio where multiple Photon Chunk deposits are held.
  • The First-Time Clear awards from Cocoons and Towers are account-wide rewards, not just character-bound. If you're particularly alt-happy, you'll get a head-start on any future characters you might have, trimming some of the grinding needed for Battle Power-gated objectives.
  • Likewise, once an Urgent Quest appears you can simply select it from the World Map to start it, even if you're not where the Quest is actually being held.
  • The game makes a point of significantly scaling back the relevance of Urgent Quests to avoid the issues it had in the original game, where players were essentially bound to SEGA's schedule to get the best gear and not being able to get it on their own time. While Urgents still serve as big EXP piñatas and drop a lot of stuff, anything you can get from an Urgent can be found elsewhere and is farmable in some other method, including the capsules. However, they wound up upending this decision with the introduction of Gigantix, which are essentially glorified Urgents that drop unique items and are effectively just as random.
  • The way Shifta and Deband worked in PSO2 was quite confusing, to the point that most of the people casting it were probably screwing it up without even knowing it (if you cast one and then started charging the other one too early, it would cut off the first one and players would not receive the full duration of it). Now the two are combined into a single skill that can't even be charged in the first place, just press the button/stick once and you're good to go. The downside, however, is that it's now restricted to Techter mains only.
  • Compared to PSO2, where inherent stats on Units were not revealed to the player and had to be manually calculated, in NGS Units just tell you any HP, PP, damage, and resistance bonuses they give on the stats screen.
  • While there's no shortage of Restasignes and Reversasignes in the overworld, Cocoons, Towers, and Urgent Quests leave you a full set of 10 and 5 respectively to top off your reserves, if you find yourself short-stocked before setting off.
  • Subclasses no longer give stats. Combined with SP being account-wide for all characters and classes, you are no longer required to level Subclasses like you were in the original game. Subclasses do still level like before so you can still swap to them down the line if you decide to make a change to your build.
  • The notoriously esoteric and Guide Dang It!-inducing PSE system has been drastically simplified to a single gauge that fills up when you kill enemies quickly in Combat Zones and triggers PSE Burst when it's full, constantly spawning enemies in a specific area of the map.
  • Since all items are now auto-pickup, your Item Pack is now fixed at 100 slots rather than the default 50 slots from the original game, and you have an additional 150 slots as "Drop Storage" once your Item Pack reaches capacity. You can also access your storage from anywhere you want, rather than only from the storage console. In addition, throwing away weapons or units from your storage automatically vendors them as if you had done so at the Item Shop.
  • The early August 2021 update notably changed how the level difference penalty functions by allowing a player to outright ignore it if their Battle Power stat is sufficiently high, allowing players with sufficiently stacked gear to fight and get rewards from enemies that are 5 or more levels higher than them without Forced Level-Grinding.
  • Unlike the original game, you can now freely change Mag Forms whenever you want and have access to any Mag Form used on your account (including those used in PSO2). You can also choose to simply turn off the Mag to hide it as opposed to shelling out for the Stealth Mag Evo Device.
  • The Weapon Camo system has been revamped for NGS. Rather than only being able to equip one Camo at a time and having to "cheat" Camo appearances onto other weapons using Weapon Form, you can now individually specify which weapon types use which Camo appearances using a new menu.
  • Affixing as a mechanic has been completely overhauled in the transition to New Genesis in response to complaints about the system being too convoluted and having a very steep barrier to entry. Changes to the system include multiple quality-of-life features, such as:
    • The system now uses capsules that drop from enemies directly as opposed to Augments appearing on dropped equipment. Capsules can be bought and sold as individual items separate from gear, and the success rate of a capsule is listed on the item's description. This also means you no longer have to sacrifice gear for affixing.
    • Augment upslotting as a mechanic no longer exists. Every weapon starts with two slots, and gains additional slots through enhancement at +20, +40 and +50.
    • The chance of failure only occurs for adding new augments; any augments currently on a piece of equipment have a 100% chance of retention unless you're trying to switch them with another.
    • The "fusion" system is gone and replaced with a shop where you can trade Augment capsules for higher-grade or "fusion" capsules, such as the powerful Ael Domina and Mastery augments. Due to being a shop now, the game always tells you what you need to trade for different capsules and there's no longer any gambling in terms of acquiring the augment.
    • The Treasure Shop re-introduced in the Kvaris update sells a random assortment of S Capsules each day that guarantees 100% chance to pass a given affix. With a bit of luck and Star Gems you can cheat some difficult augments easily, allowing you to divert resources into tougher gambles like Mastery IV.
  • Some Motions originally introduced as AC Scratch Bonuses are later given color variant versions as Rare Random Drop items from high-difficulty content, giving free players ways to get their hands on them (as long as they are willing to put up with the horrendous drop rates and/or exorbitant market value).
  • A Streamer Mode function was added in the April 2022 update in response to fiascos from streamers who were met with unscrupulous behavior when attempting to stream the game. Toggling this function on disables most communication features, allowing you to stream or record gameplay without risk of interference from other players.
  • The Waker is a simplified version of PSO2's Summoner class, and does so by excising the feeding and raising mechanics of their Pets; the Waker's Familiars instead grow stronger with the Waker's levels and equipment.
  • ARKS Record, the replacement for Weekly Interrupt Rankings, has a much more lenient reward scale compared to its predecessor. Unlike Interrupt Rankings, where rewards are only given out strictly on placement (1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc.), ARKS Record scales to a "bell curve" based on the average score of all participating players, split between Gold, Silver, and Bronze brackets that can all contain multiple players with varying scores. This means that you don't have to play perfect to break into higher brackets, so long as you simply do better than the majority of other players. In addition, participating at all guarantees Bronze bracket at minimum, meaning you will get some rewards regardless of how you rank.
  • While getting Neos Astraean weapons is good luck, it's not so lucky if you get the wrong one. Players are able to trade in unwanted Neos Astraean weapons for Aegis Integra, a token that, if you have five accumulated, can be traded in for a Neos Astraean weapon of your choice should luck not favor you.
  • Starting from the Ver. 2 update, you no longer have to pay money to reset your Skill Trees. Skill Points can now be reallocated at any time for free from the Class Counter.
  • Leciel Exploration introduced the concept of LC augments. LC augments are slightly weaker versions of top-class augments that are normally extremely difficult to get but with the tradeoff that LC augment capsules cannot be bought or sold. This makes farming Leciel for augments a viable alternative to doing standard endgame content for players who do not care about Min-Maxing while not devaluing the actual top augments for players who do want to min-max.
• Anti-Grinding: This comes in the form of level difference penalties. Unlike PSO2, which originally applied an Experience Penalty for any enemy 5+ levels higher than you (before this penalty was removed), in New Genesis you receive less EXP from enemies lower level than you and you deal Scratch Damage to anything 5+ levels higher than you. It is still possible to kill enemies this way, but it takes an excruciatingly long time even with a full room, and you get no drops from these enemies anyway.
• April Fools' Day: On April 1, 2023, the Global social media team released a parody of NGS Headline based on the SEGA Genesis action platformer Ristar.
• Armed Legs: The Kelkundo that plague the Retem region have hanging blades affixed to their legs, enabling them to fight much like a Jet Boots Bouncer in combat.
• Artificial Stupidity: The Smart PA feature from Luster in PSO2 was carried over to NGS as a base feature for all classes, but as before it is not especially competent at battle to compensate for the fact that it basically automates gameplay for the player. As a result little to no players use the feature, let alone know that it exists at all.
• Ascended Fanboy: Fubuki, Shien, and Ina, the three hololive talent featured in the August 2022 collaboration event, all have history with the game; Fubuki and Shien have played since the original PSO2 and continue to play to this day, while Ina is one of the few sponsored streamers from early New Genesis promotions who continued to play the game after her sponsorship.
• Attack Its Weak Point: Almost all enemies that aren't The Goomba have a bright yellow spot somewhere on their body where they take extra damage. Some of them require some clever positioning to reach it or breaking off enemy armour to reveal it.
• Background Music Override: The Mag Jukebox feature allows you to manually override most background music in the game with Music Disc tracks.
• Bad Luck Mitigation Mechanic:
  • There is a "hidden" mechanic where, if 5 minutes pass in a Combat Zone without a PSE Burst occurring, the PSE Gauge will stop decreasing, greatly improving the chances of starting a PSE Burst. In addition, once your PSE Gauge passes Level 2, it will not decrease below Level 2 until a Burst occurs.
  • When the game was released, SG Scratches had a "Step Up" mechanic that boosted the odds of pulling items with the "Featured!" tag on it the more times you pull. This mechanic was eventually removed as SEGA recognized that items with the "Featured!" tag were not necessarily wanted by all players.
• Balance Buff:
  • All six original classes now have Scion-style mechanics, such as having dedicated blocking/evasion Weapon Actions, a Counter-Attack, and the ability to block and counter attacks with Sidestep a la Luster, making combat significantly more fluid.
  • Gunner skills have also undergone a significant rework, as Chain Trigger is no longer part-based and Stylish Roll can now be chained infinitely with itself.
  • Talises were by far the least popular weapon choice for Forces and Techters due to their clumsy and slow usage that was overshadowed by the raw power granted by Rods and Wands. New Genesis completely overhauled their functionality, allowing them to directly modify the effects of Techniques based on how their two unique Photon Arts are used.
• Battle in the Rain: Since Gigantix enemies only spawn during harsh weather, every encounter with them is this, with Aelio having heavy rainfall and thunder, Retem with electrified sandstorms, Kvaris's electrified blizzards, and Stia's interior has magma chunks raining down.
• Beef Gate: Halphia Lake was this at launch; although only TAMES were able to spawn, enemies were Level 60, making them impossible to kill, and the present Gigantix was a Level 64 Daityl Sword that was magnitudes deadlier than anything else present in the game. The Kvaris update now makes it possible to kill both, as the player level cap was bumped up to Level 60.
• BFG:
  • The "tower" at the heart of Central City is revealed to be the barrel of a city-sized weapon called the Central Cannon.
  • Gathering enough points during Defense Quest allows you to call down a superweapon called the Mobile Cannon, essentially a Launcher on steroids that deals in big bullets and bigger explosions. It also has the ability to fly across the battlefield just like the Rodeo Drive PA from the original game. An enhanced version is made available during the Dark Falz Aegis fight, referred to as the Mobile Cannon Mk. 2, which loses the ability to Recoil Boost in exchange for gaining Macross Missile Massacre and Wave-Motion Gun attacks.
• Bilingual Bonus: Konigssee Yede is named after the German word "königssee", meaning "king's lake", fitting in with how its predecessor was named King Yede.
• "Blind Idiot" Translation: The translation effort in New Genesis is noticeably improved over the original game, but there are still some odd errors and typos here and there, such as the Knuckles PA "Tri-Drive" being inexplicably changed to "Double Drive" even though it deals three hits.
• Bonus Level: Yellow Battledias are short levels where players can obtain Silver and Gold Primm Swords/Armor, as well as rare capsules and boatloads of EXP.
• Boring, but Practical:
  • Ophistia weapons increase the rate at which your Photon Blast gauge fills by 15% when you successfully land an attack; Evolcoat weapons increase PB charge rate by 20%. Considering PBs output huge amounts of damage and are even more potent during Breaks, having even slightly speedier access to your PB can make a fair bit of difference over time.
  • Some Add-On Skills fall into this category. Hunter's, Ranger's, and Force's Main Add-Ons all give a flat damage bonus in their respective damage type. Bouncer's Main Add-On enables PP recovery during Photon Dash and Photon Glide, a godsend for any quest where repositioning and mobility is necessary. Jump Power Up, PA Charge Movement Speed Up, and Encore Jump are all excellent mobility upgrades for both combat and general use. Waker's Sub Add-On grants Regenerating Health, which has the potential to make or break high-score Trinitas runs where Restasignes are extremely limited.
• Boss Rush: Purple Battledia Quests have a party facing down multiple Gigantix DOLLS in a row with a tight 20-minute time limit.
• Boss in Mook's Clothing: Turning the Random Challenge Set C on in Trinitas Quest randomly turns enemies into Gigantix, giving them 350% HP and 50% damage reduction. If stacking Enemy HP challenges, this increases their effective HP to such disgustingly high values that they have almost as much HP as an Urgent Quest boss. This is the main reason why many players do not turn Random C on at the same time as the higher tiered HP boost challenges, as it pads out completion time by a massive amount.
• Boss-Only Level: Ordinal Tower is a Trainia Advanced quest where players exclusively challenge various bosses. Rank 7 has three bosses, and an optional superboss made available when two of them are killed.
• Bottomless Pits:
  • Present in all of the platforming-themed Cocoons and Towers. Falling into one simply respawns you at the last safe platform and takes a percentage of your HP. All challenges also have a Side Mission to not fall into the pit a certain number of times.
  • In some instanced content, you can knock or otherwise lure enemies into pits. Doing so causes them to die instantly.
• Bread, Eggs, Breaded Eggs: The "Divine Impact" Launcher PA is named after the PSO2 Photon Arts "Divine Launcher" and "Zero Impact". Functionally, it is a combination of both of its namesakes, granting a point-blank blast when uncharged and firing an explosive shell when fully charged.
• Break Meter: Hitting an enemy with enough physical damage or striking their elemental weakness enough produces a stun state called a Down. Urgent Quest bosses not only can be Downed, they can also be Downed by breaking certain parts, and they have an actual Break Gauge underneath their health bar that produces a special Down when depleted, causing the boss to topple over and drastically reduce its defense.
• Breaking the Fellowship: Downplayed in Chapter 6, where, although the main trio are still a team, they are eventually split up due to Crawford assigning them different tasks across Halpha to get to the bottom of the Starless situation. The player character becomes a Guardian, effectively retaining their role as a one-person combat specialist to provide moral support for the rest of the organization, Aina becomes an ARKS Cadet Instructor to train a new wave of recruits to help fight the Starless, and Manon is delegated to further research on Halpha alongside Ilma in order to uncover the planet's secrets and potentially clues or information left behind by Zephetto.
• Breath Weapon:
  • Bansers and Banshees share the common ability of being able to shoot a beam from their mouths, much like the Ultralized cats from the original PSO2. In addition to the standard grounded beam, they can jump into the air and perform a quick version that sweeps the floor in front of them.
  • Nex Aelio/Vera, being a dragon boss, can shoot fire from its mouth. It can change it up between fast-flying fire bullets or a sustained flamethrower.
  • Crocodylis (Vera) fires both energy balls and beams from its massive mouth. It can occasionally launch explosives onto the field before it fires these.
• Broke Your Arm Punching Out Cthulhu: The premise for the Kvaris chapter is that although the Urgent Quest against Dark Falz was successful, the Central Cannon was damaged in the attempt, forcing Crawford to send the heroes to Kvaris to enlist the help of a local engineer named Ilma to repair and reinforce it to defeat Dark Falz for good.
• Call-Back:
  • The battle against Dark Falz borrows a few elements from Dark Falz Elder from the original Phantasy Star Online 2. It's another Multi-Armed and Dangerous being whose arms are breakable. And like Elder, it survives its Urgent Quest and escapes.
  • The Evolcoat series weapons are designed after the Coat series weapons from PSO2 with an updated design. Likewise, the Evoleclipse and Evolorbit series weapons are an updated version of the Orbit/Nova series.
• Cave Behind the Falls: One of the largest waterfalls in South Aeilo hides one of the entrances to the tunnels leading inside Mt. Magnus. Following the tunnels all the way to the end will lead you to a Cocoon. The same caves are also a prime mining spot for Photon Chunks and Dualomite.
• Cataclysm Backstory: 500 years before the events of the game (and 500 years after the original game), a mysterious new force called the Starless appeared and nearly wiped ARKS out of existence. The events of the game in the present day have been engineered by a faction of the survivors, calling themselves "Resurgent ARKS", in an attempt to produce new ARKS combatants with powers equal or exceeding those of ARKS members from 1000 years ago in hopes of being able to face the Starless.
• Chain Lightning: Uncharged Zonde has the ability to arc to nearby enemies when it hits its target.
• Character Customization: The game features a vastly-expanded character creator, compounding on the highly-flexible and expansive character creation options featured in PSO2. While many new options are limited to NGS cosmetics and are thus incompatible with some existing PSO2 outfits and items, NGS features new options such as:
  • Expanded face customization options, including eyebrow angle/position/thinness, pupil position/size, and the ability to determine how open or closed an eye is by default. This also extends to a feature called Expression Editing, which allows players to individually customize every single expression available in the game to whatever settings they want. This has predictably led to Video Game Perversity Potential.
  • More specific body customization sliders, including sliders for thighs, calves, feet, hips/butt, hands, upper arms, and lower arms. Males also now have access to a bust slider like females.
  • A heavily reworked accessory system. Accessories now run on a cost system, with different accessories having different costs. The maximum cost limit is 17, allowing players to equip far more than the previous limit of four accessories. Accessories now also allow players to choose the initial placement for the accessory and move sliders from there, instead of accessories being stuck to specific positions on the body.
  • Most significantly, players now have the option of changing between male and female bodies of any race at will regardless of the player's initial settings. Race-specific traits can now also be toggled on and off regardless of the player's racial body, such as being able to equip Newman ears, Deuman horns, and heterochromatic eyes simultaneously. Facial customization options also now allow players to select between male and female facial bases of any variety regardless of the body type or body gender. Similarly, voices and motion bases are no longer restricted.
• Charged Attack:
  • Hunter's specialty, just like in PSO2. While there is no Focus system to speed up charging this time, all PAs charge fairly fast, and Partisan even has a skill they can pick up called Assault Charge that allows them to follow up a PA with a Dash Attack that they can charge up to increase damage dealt at the cost of range.
  • Gunner has charged attacks. In addition to gaining a small damage boost, firing a charge attack with TMGs activates Chain Trigger, where they can build Chain by attacking enemies with normal attacks and uncharged PAs, then complete the Chain with another charged PA and get a damage bonus based on the Chain value for a few seconds.
  • Techniques still come in charged and uncharged flavors. Unlike PSO2, where charged Techniques are generally a strict upgrade over uncharged Techniques, in NGS Techniques vary in effect based on whether they are charged or not. This makes them similar to Phantasy Star Online and Phantasy Star Zero Techniques, where you get a completely different Technique based on charge.
• Chromatic Superiority:
  • Item Containers come in three colors: Green, Gold, and Red. Both Green and Gold Containers respawn; while Green containers are very common and just drop N-Grinders, Gold Containers are rare and drop assorted materials. Red Item Containers are special; they are typically very well hidden and/or are protected by Deflector Shields that must be broken to get to them, there are a limited number of them and can only be encountered once per account, and they typically drop large quantities of Meseta, 10 Star Gems, Note capsules, or rare Units.
  • Enemies have a rare chance to spawn in Silver and Gold variations, in which the black armor plating on the DOLLS and ALTERS are replaced with a colored metallic sheen, and all other enemies are coated entirely in a metallic silver/gold color. Killing a Silver or Gold enemy has generally better drop odds, and they will frequently drop Silver and Gold Primm Swords, which are basically this game's version of EXP Weapon Mini and EXP Weapon. Silver and gold TAMES are guaranteed to give you a meat drop and can even drop more than one piece at a time. Silver and Gold enemies also spawn more frequently with higher PSE levels, with many of them spawning at once during a PSE Burst. A PSE Burst Climax will always spawn a Silver or Gold boss; Lv35+ zones may spawn a Megalotix/Elite boss instead.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Restasignes and Reversignes have an identical outward appearance, but to distinguish them the former are colored green and the latter are colored yellow. A special, extremely rare variation called a Liminalsigne, which can be used to treat Photon deprivation, is distinguished by sparkling iridescent as well as radiating pure energy.
• Color-Coded Elements: Fire/Foie is red and Barta/Ice is blue. Icons indicating Lightning element are yellow, but in gameplay lightning is bright purple. Wind is green, Light is bright yellow or white, and Dark is dark purple or black.
• Combos: Katana's unique gimmick is that its three PAs have three variations depending on when you use them during a three-step combo, and while you can spam one PA repeatedly for a combo, you can also mix and match the PAs for different results.
• Company Cross References:
  • The model for Seasonal Point drops is shaped like a regular icosahedron. An unnamed Invincible Minor Minion shaped like it shows up in Space Harrier, another Sega game set in a sci-fi fantasy land with dragons in it.^note This also isn't its first cameo in a fellow Sega game, having shown up before in Shenmue and Shenmue II as a capsule toy named "BB". The Seasonal Points' inventory icon is even positioned the same way as the "BB" capsule toy's inventory icon.
  • One of the "features" of the Floating Board is that you can perform tricks with it when jumping, purely for aesthetic value. The way the trick mechanic functions (hold a direction in midair to automatically trick) heavily resembles the trick mechanic from Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity.
• Collection Sidequest: There is a Side Task to open every Red Container in each region. Thankfully, the world map tracks how many you've found in each sector, but you'll still be hunting them down for quite a while. Especially since this particular Task doesn't point out nearby targets with an objective marker when set as the active Task, unlike every other collection-based Task. Thankfully, Mag Sonar helps in tracking them down.
• Console Cameo: The Uncle from Another World collaboration AC Scratch also introduces Build Parts based on SEGA consoles and accessories from the 1990s, reflecting protagonist Yōsuke Shibazaki's adoration for SEGA's golden age.
• Contractual Boss Immunity: Downplayed, much like the original game. You'll still need to pelt the boss with a bunch of techniques to make sure it procs, but successfully doing so will immobilize them in place, whether they're flailing helplessly on fire, frozen stiff, seizing up from electric shock, or so on. This is your chance to get in and wail on them while they're down, as you get a healthy amount of time to do so before they shake it off.
• Convection, Schmonvection:
  • While the Kvaris region is cold as hell, it won't get in the way of your combat performance in any capacity... as long as you stay clear of Rayjord Gorge, where you will take periodic damage and Freeze procs unless you have a sum of 100% Cold Resistance (which requires gear, Region Mag bonuses and food to attain, and the latter two cannot give alone).
  • Played completely straight throughout all of the Stia region: as long as you do not make physical contact with lava, you have nothing to fear from the environment (aside from the rain of explosive debris).
• Co-Op Multiplayer: Still a core mechanic as per PSO standard; however, with the introduction of an open world, the game keeps to the spirit of the series' limited multiplayer by randomly matching players to 32-player rooms every time they enter a new area, similar to PSO2's Multi-Player Area feature.
• Counter-Attack:
  • Taking cues from the Scion Classes from the original game, the basic classes are now outfitted with powerful counter attacks that can be activated by successfully evading attacks with Step, such as Sword delivering a powerful uppercut or Rifle chucking an explosive that deals heavy damage.
  • Some classes have skills which augment their Weapon Actions to perform a counterattack on a successful dodge; you don't have to have the class as your main in order to use these counters.
  • Gororox, a bigger and meaner counterpart to Gororon, has a belly that inflates when players attack it. When it becomes maximum size, it will release the energy stored in its belly in a massive blast that ravages everything in front of it. Sand Rorox and Snow Rorox have similar counters.
• Coup de Grâce Cutscene: The player lands the killing blow against Dark Falz Aegis by using The Power of Friendship after Crawford and Ilma weaken it by firing consecutive blasts from the Central Cannon.
• Critical Hit: Unlike PSO2, Critical Hits in NGS work like standard RPG critical hits, increasing the damage your attack deals by at least 20% in addition to ignoring variance.
• Critical Hit Class:
  • Slayer has several Skills that either boost the rate of critical hits under certain conditions or grant additional effects upon scoring a critical hit, giving them a lean into this archetype.
  • The Verschmelz weapon series has a unique Potential that increases the user's Critical Hit Rate by 100% in exchange for reducing their Potency.
• Crossover: In classic PSO2 fashion, the game began adding collaboration events following the Kvaris update, including:
  • hololive
  • Melty Blood: Type Lumina
  • Overlord (2012)
  • Nijisanji
  • Sonic the Hedgehog
  • Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045
  • Uncle from Another World
  • Oshi no Ko
  • Spriggan
  • Frame Arms and Frame Arms Girls^note Features different parts (including Type 1 CAST parts) and cosmetics from the previous FA Girls collaboration
  • Black Lagoon
• Crutch Character: An update eventually introduced Renessa weapons, a series of 4-star gear that you get shortly after clearing Chapter 1. Unlike other weapons at the time you acquire it, they have a noticeably better ATK rating than comparable early 4-star weapons and are very easy to invest in since they have uniquely lower Meseta costs for some of their upgrades. Their entire Potential upgrade path is even entirely free, allowing you to get a Lv. 6 Potential weapon no less than a handful of hours into the game. By the time you get to Kvaris their utility falls off as their raw numbers simply can't keep up once you pass certain rarity tiers, but they are very powerful if you are in the process of leveling quickly and trying to get through the game fast.
• Cutscene Power to the Max: Much like the original, the heroes in cutscenes seem to have a supremely higher amount of power than you do in gameplay. This is best shown with DOLLS; in gameplay, the average DOLL that isn't one of the small, disposable Mook types will survive an obscene amount of punishment, requiring a massive item and level difference from them to kill real fast; in cutscenes, our characters can one-shot these DOLLS as a matter-of-fact and even massive bosses will get staggered and finished off with singular blows.
• Damn You, Muscle Memory!: One significant difference about how grab-type attacks work in NGS; unlike grabs in PSO2, enemy grabs are unblockable in NGS. Attempting to guard against them will just get you grabbed, and compared to PSO2, the number of grabs you can actually escape from is severely limited.
• Darker and Edgier: Character death in PSO2 was generally for important moments at the climax of an arc or story portion, and while there were plenty of in-universe ARKS dying, there's merely a scant few scenes of it. Here, the very first thing you get hit with in the prologue is Aelio Town getting wiped off the map, with the story continuously focusing on how many, many ARKS have died in the war with the DOLLS. And after so much victory with the heroes that it seems like things are looking fine, Chapter 5 only hammers it in by revealing all of the death was an attempt to create ARKS on-par with the Guardians of PSO2, because the Starless appeared out of nowhere and wiped out hundreds of billions and up to fifty separate star systems, including the vast majority of the ARKS that had atrophied in their 500 years of peace. For an extra kick, our cast are members of the second and third generations of the Halpha experiments; the first generation were all exterminated entirely by DOLLS.
• Death from Above:
  • Although extremely unlikely, Stellar Gifts actually have active hitboxes during flight and can potentially obliterate unlucky enemies or players on impact.
  • The final battle scene of Chapter 3 involves the five Kvaris siblings teaming up to drop a stalactite on a massive group of Ams Clones, killing them instantly. You can do this yourself in Lost Central by targeting the stalactites with attacks, which will drop them and crush foes beneath them for massive damage.
• Developer's Foresight: Some Side Tasks can be completed by meeting their requirements before they've been accepted, either by doing them beforehand or by doing them on another character in the same account. Accepting a Side Task that has already been accomplished will elicit unique responses from the NPC congratulating the player for being ahead of the curve.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Defeating Dark Falz Aegis has it piled with multiple Central Cannon blasts in a row to finally stun it enough for the Meteorn to draw power from all of the ARKS on Halpha and literally punch a hole through its core to finish it off.
• Difficulty Levels: Clearing far enough in the main story unlocks the ability to change Ranks when teleporting into combat-focused map areas. Higher ranks increase the levels of the enemies and have a minimum Battle Power requirement to unlock, but also drop more EXP and generally better items.
• Disc-One Nuke:
  • Properly affixed PSO2 equipment can go quite a ways in NGS. As a general rule of thumb they are easier to get than high-end NGS equipment and given the abundance of resources and materials and the relative ease of equipment improvement in PSO2, you can easily compete with NGS equipment for quite a while. NGS equipment is still marginally more powerful if fully maxed out, but the resource cost and time needed to actually improve NGS equipment to its full potential is very steep compared to just hashing something together in PSO2 for a very small percentage difference in damage.
  • By extension, PSO2 units are good for mixed damage sets, while NGS units currently cannot achieve viable mixed damage sets. Very handy if you play multiple classes or mix and match weapons.
  • Players willing to scour the map (or use a guide) early to find Red Containers in the Aelio region are guaranteed to drop three unique 4-star armor pieces. While not a good as the one obtainaible as combat drops, they can easily carry players until level 20 with ease.
• Discard and Draw:
  • Jet Boots have had their moveset completely redone; they lose the old moves and their buffing potential with them, but in exchange the new moves are more fluid and have few movement restrictions, and the skills the Bouncer learns for them accelerate enemy debilitation and help with PP regulation. One thing they didn't lose is their superiority in aerial combat, enabling their wielder to reach and attack any part of any enemy they fight so long as their PP holds out.
  • The recurring "Short Cycle" skills, such as Overload Short Cycle and Photon Flare Short Cycle, decrease both the duration and cooldown of the Active Skill it is attached to. For players who prefer using them as burst damage (or in the case of Massive Hunter, as a panic button), it's a potential option.
• Distant Sequel: 1000 years is quite a long time after Oracle's war, which helps justify the new setting, enemies and characters. This specific time skip is a tradition for the series as a whole, however, dating back to the original quadrilogy, where Dark Falz would revive every 1000 years.
• Doomed Hometown: The game opens with you being escorted to the tiny coast town of Aelio, Aina's home town located south of Central City. Shortly after you get situated in, a DOLLS attack razes it to the ground with no survivors to be found.
• Dragged Off to Hell: A Rappy that is defeated by Dark Techniques has this happen to them, with dark hands pulling their fluffy bodies beneath the surface.
• Double Jump: An inherent ability is the ability to double jump, making getting to high places and large enemies easier.
• Double Unlock: You need both battle power to enter a zone and to be within five levels of an enemy. Not enough of the first, and you can't enter the zone, period, and not enough of the second means you'll do a single lousy point of damage regardless of how good your equipment is.
• Duel Boss: Duel Quests are single-player quests where you face a powerful field boss one-on-one. They are normally extremely powerful and next to impossible to defeat, but you can decrease their threat level by bringing equipment affixed with Defi Augments, which grant massive bonuses in Duel Quest when using your Main Class weapons.
• Easter Egg:
  • Standing in specific spots in the map will cause unique themes to play over the normal background music.
    • If you stand on the highest peak in each region, the game's main theme, "The World Beyond the Sky", will start playing instead of the usual background music.
    • If you stand on the second highest peak in the Aelio region, which is right next to the highest peak, the PSO2 main theme, "The Whole New World", will play instead.
    • Visiting the seating area with the fountain on the west side of Central City plays one of several songs from a past Phantasy Star game based on the in-game clock. The default lobby theme from PSO2 plays from dawn to noon, "Day Dawns" from Phantasy Star Online plays from dusk to midnight, and the default Franka's Cafe theme plays from noon to dusk as well as from midnight to dawn.
    • Standing on the very top of Retem City plays Dagora City's theme from Phantasy Star Universe.
    • A specific dead end in the lowest floor of North Retem will play the Amduskia Volcanoes field theme. If you encounter enemies in the area, the appropriate battle theme will also play.
    • Getting on top of a specific pillar along the rock wall at the edges of West Retem causes the Lillipa Desert music to play.
    • A certain plateau off the right side of the Cocoon in South Retem plays the Wopal Floating Facility daytime battle theme.
    • If you figure out how to get to the peak of Trinitas, the giant techno-pyramid in Retem, the game will start playing the Motavia overworld theme from Phantasy Star I.
    • In Northwest Kvaris near the ocean where there are penguins, the track will switch to Dezolis overworld theme from Phantasy Star I.
    • The very top of the arch in front of Dreisen Plant in Stia plays the VR Temple theme from Phantasy Star Online Episode II.
    • There is a certain salt formation to the left of the main Stia island where a Region Mag is located. Standing at the top of it plays the Dezoris overworld theme from Phantasy Star II.
    • Similarly, there is a lush island to the right of the main Stia island. Standing at the top of that island plays the PSO2 Sanctum theme. Fittingly, the enemies there are FORMERS based on Dragonkin enemies.
    • You can jump behind the outer walls of the centermost reactor in Dreisen Plant, which cues, of all things, a medley of the Rappy Slots music from PSO2's Casino Area.
    • Among the various rocks scattered in the sea of lava inside Stia, standing on a certain one will cue the Amduskia Volcanoes field theme.
    • Getting close to the giant fire pillar device atop Stia's volcano plays "Ignite Infinity", the theme song of Phantasy Star Portable 2 infinity.
  • Defeating a Rappy with elemental damage can produce a unique defeat animation depending on what you beat it with, most of which are comically callous. For example, using Fire damage causes it to catch fire and run around in a panic, while using Lightning damage causes it to become electrocuted and have a bit of a seizure.
  • Dying in battle against a boss usually displays hint text giving useful tips about the boss. However, if you die to a Great Rappy, the "hint text" is displayed as incomprehensible Rappy chirping.
  • If you dig straight down the origin point of your Creative Space (where Initial Teleporter is placed when you first access yours), you'll find a stone statue carved to look like an Emperappy. You can even take it back up to the surface to use as decor, and if you delete it you'll be awarded a Title that grants you its Build Part ticket so you can use it as much as you want.
• Easy EXP: The Kvaris update added a slew of Tasks specifically designed to help at least one class per character stay up to par by dumping utterly massive amounts of EXP on them. One of the silliest ones is a Task from Guiden, which awards a whopping 10,000,000 EXP just for talking to the Quest Counter. The Ver. 2 update rebalanced the EXP curve for the main story by removing Guiden's EXP dump Tasks and redistributing them across all of the Main Tasks so that new players do not hit a progression wall.
• Eldritch Abomination: It's unclear as of current what the Starless even is; the only cutscene where it is visible is a flashback where it has the appearance of an Unrealistic Black Hole. However, its destructive capabilities and omnicidal tendencies rival and potentially outclass even the Primordial Darkness and the Falspawn in sheer quantity, having decimated over 50 star systems and over 700 billion living beings by the time ARKS encountered it for the first time.
• Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors: Every element is effective against a specific type of enemy, and you can tell what element to use by looking at the enemy. Themed events have all enemies vulnerable to that specific element if they are marked, regardless of their original vulnerability.
  • Fire: Aelio FORMERS, most Aelio ALTERS, Kvaris FORMERS, Kvaris DOLLS, Doldoris Vera, Nils Vera, Christmas mark
  • Ice: Lizard Frey, Aelio DOLLS, Stia FORMERS, Stia DOLLS, Autumn mark
  • Lightning: Pettas Vera, Nex Vera, Retem FORMERS and ALTERS, PSO 2 Anni mark
  • Wind: Retem DOLLS, Crocodylis Vera, Ams Vera, Winter mark
  • Light: Dark Falz (Aegis, Solus), Stia ALTERS, Spring mark
  • Dark: Renus Vera, Dustyl Vera, Kvaris ALTERS, Starless, NGS Anni mark
• Elite Mook:
  • You can find variants of bosses called Dread Enemies in specific parts of the world that respawn regularly. Dread Enemies have the "Veteran: " prefix in front of their name and have slightly altered Palette Swaps, such as Dread Enemy DOLLS having rusted and mossy armor plating. They are generally tougher and stronger than their original counterparts, but when defeated they have the chance to drop the rare Dread Keeper augment capsules.
  • During thunderstorms, you can find Gigantix enemies, also variants of boss monsters, in specific zones. They are so named due to being somewhat bigger than usual, and Gigantix are stronger and higher level than regular bosses, oftentimes being 4 levels higher than the current level cap. Defeating a Gigantix has the chance to drop powerful items, including rare weapons, Gigas Augment Capsules, and Glass Cannon Units.
  • Chromium-hued Megalotix enemies appear with alarming frequency in Combat Zones Lv35+, and hit pretty hard; unlike the above, regular mooks can get the Megalotix treatment as well. Defeating them may drop Strugments (or, in extra-rare instances, whole Arms Refiners) and Megas Fusia capsules which can be used to make hybrid augment capsules.
  • Enhanced enemies are enemies with a pulsing red seed sticking out of them. Enhanced enemies take significantly reduced damage from attacks, but attacking the seed deals increased damage. Dealing enough damage to the seed breaks it, causing the enemy to take increased damage until it is killed.
  • Equalizing Enemies, first introduced in the High-Rank Aelio update, are the opposite of Enhanced Enemies. Equalizing Enemies take normal damage, but emit an aura that raises the damage resistance of all other enemies in the area. Defeating an Equalizing Enemy reverses the effect, causing all other enemies to take increased damage for a limited time.
  • In Trinitas Quests, activating Random Challenge Set C adds a random chance for random mooks to turn into Gigantix, giving them the 50% damage resistance bonus.
  • Stia introduced Recon Gigants, which are regular DOLLS mooks with the Gigantix power-up and aura. Unlike Gigantix bosses, they always appear in the same spots and spawn just like regular enemies. Recon Gigants share the exact same drop tables as boss Gigantix but with lower drop rates, making farming them an alternative when regular Gigantix or Purple Battledia aren't available.
• Evil Power Vacuum: The Starless, an evil entity(?) of unknown origin appeared 500 years after the defeat of the Primordial Darkness when ARKS had significantly weakened during an era of peacetime. It promptly kicked them to the curb and nearly obliterated the entire organization, forcing the remnants to take drastic measures to reclaim the power of "True ARKS" that was lost centuries ago.
• Feed It a Bomb: Crocodylis has an attack where it scatters yellow bombs using the cannon on its back. These can be picked up and thrown back at Crocodylis to inflict heavy damage. If thrown into its weak point while its mouth is open, it will stagger Crocodylis; do so enough times, and Crocodylis will topple over and enter a unique stun state while also causing its icicle spikes to fall off its body. Picking up and launching the icicles into its mouth while its stunned will cause its jaws to freeze over, causing it to blow itself up and stun itself when using one of its Breath Weapon attacks right after the first stun state ends.
• Final Boss Preview: The first Urgent Quest against Dark Falz effectively amounts to this. The heroes are way in over their heads but attempt to fight Dark Falz anyway hoping they can beat it, but they are too ill-equipped to deal lasting damage and it escapes. It takes two full chapters for ARKS to power up the Central Cannon enough and drive Dark Falz out of Stia before they can truly challenge it head-on as Dark Falz Aegis.
• First Town: The protagonist crash lands in an island near Aelio Town, a seaside village of small-time ARKS members. Aina's father Garoa leads the village and invites the protagonist as a member of their village and ARKS, and after going through some tutorials the village holds a big feast for the protagonist. Aelio Town promptly gets wiped off the map in the first 30 minutes of the game after a massive DOLLS unit called "Dark Falz" shows up and Wave Motion Guns it into oblivion, with no apparent survivors.
• Flechette Storm: Dual Blades have their Weapon Action that summons Photon Blades to home in and attack the target. Enemies with Photon Blades sticking out of them grant increased PP recovery on hit when a Dual Blades user strikes them. They also have the skill Fanatic Blade, which activates Death of a Thousand Cuts as it doubles the hits of every Photon Blade salvo and halves the cooldown between Weapon Action casts.
• Forced Level-Grinding:
  • If you are 5 or more levels lower than an enemy and your Battle Power is too low, any damage you deal will be reduced to 1 and a "DEFEND" icon will appear under your damage numbers. To make the point absolutely clear, defeated enemies won't give any rewards to underleveled players.
  • Level grinding is the most effective way to increase your Battle Power for Quests that require it, such as Cocoons and Urgents. Equipment also works off level requirements instead of stat requirements, so all your shiny gear will have to wait until you raise your Class's level high enough.
  • There are now Lv. 4 Potentials, but unlocking the fourth level requires five N-EX Cubes, which, like PSO2, requires grinding with a max level class until you level up, causing the EXP to roll over and turn into an N-EX Cube. Because of how Experience Penalty works with enemies lower level than you, grinding this out outside of Urgents takes much longer since the amount of EXP you get from enemies below your level rapidly decreases as the level gap increases.
  • Add-On Skills are additional abilities which improve various aspects of your character and carry between classes. You roll them from a randomized pool with the highest level for the Main Add-On Skill being retained. Unfortunately, the service requires class EX-Cubes, which aside from equally randomized distribution from a Trainia Advance requires leveling a max-level class like regular EX-Cubes (though getting them in this way does yield ten for that particular class).
• Forced Tutorial: Contrasting with PSO2, which simply gave a basic combat tutorial before dumping the player into the game world with almost no direction, the tutorial in New Genesis is extremely handhold-y and is integrated into the story, with the first 30 minutes doubling as the prologue being completely unskippable on your first character. Thankfully, after completing the prologue on your account once, subsequent characters on your account are able to skip straight to Central City, although the tutorials after that are still mandatory.
• Foreshadowing: Given what we are shown throughout the course of the main story, it is heavily implied that Dark Falz Aegis's vocal theme is partially sung from the perspective of Manon, whose lyrics also serve as a critical hint toward The Reveal.
• Frigid Water Is Harmless: Zigzagged; most of Kvaris' frigid temperatures has about as much effect on the players as the deserts of Retem or the plains of Aelio, except in Rayjord Gorge where the weather will kill you if you don't equip Cold Damage Resistance.
• Fun with Acronyms: Take the first letter of each region in Halpha - Aelio, Retem, Kvaris, Stia - and it spells "ARKS".
• Game-Breaking Bug: Loading PSO2 tends to be... problematic, to say the least. Switching to PSO2 has a high chance of arbitrarily causing crashes, especially when attempting to load into it directly from the character select rather than using a Ryuker Device, and similar problems occur when attempting to swap back from PSO2 to NGS. This is one of the few issues the devs have outright stated they cannot fix.
• Gathering Steam: All elemental Techniques have a Skill they can buy on the Force, Techter and Bouncer trees that gives them a "burst" mechanic. Rod, Talis and Wand weapons must cast repeatedly, while Jet Boots can apply it with Photon Arts once aligned with a prior cast.
  • Foie Brand, Barta Blot and Zan Gale: hitting the same enemy repeatedly with uncharged Fire, Ice or Wind Techniques causes a sigil to form, which can be detonated with a charged Technique of the same element to deal heavy damage.
  • Zonde-clad, Grants Glitter and Megid Sphere: repeatedly connecting with uncharged Electric, Light or Dark Techniques causes a purple ring to form around your character (Megid Sphere deploys dark spheres instead, up to three); once this appears, casting a charged same-element Technique greatly boosts the damage of the resulting cast (Zonde-clad) or augments its range (Grants Glitter or Megid Sphere).
• Giant Space Flea from Nowhere: In stark contrast with Nex Aelio and Renus Retem, Crocodylis and Ams Kvaris have zero buildup before they are unleashed upon the party in Lost Central. Dark Falz Solus also first appeared out of nowhere as a disturbance in Retem. However, this encounter is not (currently) canon to the storyline.
• Glass Cannon: The rare drops from Gigantix Enemies are all about this. The Straga weapon series, in addiction to being the numerically most powerful weapon series currently, has the Potential "Berserk Unit", which gives you a whopping +21% to Potency at Level 1, but also -10% Damage Resistance. Geant Armor gives you +10 PP and +2% to all Potency, and is the most numerically defensive armor currently, but that is more than offset by the -20 HP and -50% to all status ailment resistances it also gives you (meaning equipping at least two of them will make every elemental attack inflict you with a status ailment).
• Go into the Light: Defeating a Rappy with Light Techniques causes them to float away as a pillar of light envelops them.
• Gotta Catch 'Em All: Each Region has a Side Task that requires the player to open Red Containers hidden throughout the area. Aelio is the only Region that requires the player to open every single Red Container; Retem, Kvaris and Stia only require you to find most of them.
• Gratuitous Ninja:
  • The Bujin is a ninja-themed DOLL miniboss. It stands in a stereotypical ninja stance, deftly wields a kodachi in its right hand, and is a Lightning Bruiser with relatively swift and powerful melee attacks. When it Turns Red, it also gains even more powerful attacks, such as projecting an Area of Effect to kill players with Teleport Spam and even create shadow clones to deliver a triple-hit attack.
  • The Ikusa Bujin, the Final Boss of the Trinitas Quest, combines the speed of the Bujin with the power and reach of a nodachi and bigger shurikens, giving it more powerful attacks that hit in a wider range than its standard counterpart.
• Grid Puzzle: One of the possible puzzle rooms in Leciel Exploration is a nonogram played with floor tiles.
• Ground Pound: You can perform a Dive Attack by pressing the Attack button while holding Jump in mid-air or assigning the Dive Attack ability to the subpalette. Doing so allows you to quickly drop to the ground with either your weapon or heel (for ranged weapons) out and smash the floor beneath you, creating a shockwave that deals above-average damage to enemies near the impact zone. You also have the opportunity to alter your trajectory mid-drop if you have enough height to do so.
• Guide Dang It!:
  • Good luck finding all of the Red Item Containers. There are 113 of them in the Aelio region alone, and they are explicitly designed to be extremely well hidden and out of the way, much like Koroks. Rossa even has a Side Task to find them all, and have fun doing that without a map handy. Unlike several instances of this trope, it avoids Bragging Rights Reward as a guaranteed loot inside them is the full set of one of the best 4-star armors. This has since been alleviated as of the Retem update, as Mags now have an Active Sonar filter function that can detect nearby Red Item Containers.
  • Alpha Reactor spawns used to be spread out across the entire Aelio region, with semi-random distribution making them very difficult to track down without using your Mag's Active Sonar. A January 2023 patch changed this by moving all of the Alpha Reactors to Central Aelio and concentrating them in three consistent spawn locations, rendering this aspect of finding them moot.
  • Compounds are unaffected by Technique damage boosting Skills and instantly maxes out the elemental passive skills of both elements used in the attack, neither of which are directly mentioned by the game^note Although the former interaction is inherited from PSO2 Compounds. This makes them more useful as a way to push for stuns rather than as a burst damage option, despite their comparatively high damage output.
  • Rank 7 Ordinal Tower comes in the form of a massive virtual-reality structure. In addition to the main boss rooms, there's quite a number of secret walls and alcoves that you'd be hard-pressed to figure out how to get to. There's even two secret bosses hidden within if you know how to find them, and their unlock conditions are mutually exclusive.
  • One of the possible puzzle rooms in Leciel Exploration is a nonogram puzzle played with floor switches. Naturally, if you've never seen a nonogram (such as the kind in Nintendo's Picross franchise), figuring out what exactly the game wants you to do can be aggravatingly confusing without being told the solution.
  • After every daily reset, the status of everyone's GP Trees in their Creative Spaces changes. The Tree can come in basic, silver, gold, and platinum colors, with each subsequent color granting more GP when interacted with. The game tries to pretend that the GP Tree rotation is random but there is actually a fixed schedule for the Tree states based on the last digit of your Player ID, similar to the subeffect schedule for PSO2's Timed Ability Crafting. The schedule cannot be found in game since the game obfuscates it, meaning you will have to find an online resource somewhere if you want to know what the schedule looks like to determine your own GP Tree rotation as well as everyone else's.
• Happy Ending Override: To the original PSO2. While ARKS of millennia past defeated the Primordial Darkness, the organization grew complacent and weakened, having no fight left to fight. This led to them getting nearly wiped out when a new threat known as the Starless attacked.
• Helpful Mook: After breaking the faceplate of a Proctys, it will attempt to open its wormhole, but in its confusion it will instead spawn a Restasigne, causing the Restasigne to explode. If the player is standing inside the blast radius, they will recover HP as if they had used their own Restasigne.
• Heroic Sacrifice: During the battle against Nilus Stia, Manon winds up having to defend herself from two Pettas DOLLS and is rendered immobile. When Nilus fires an energy beam at her, a Red Shirt notices and rescues her by body blocking the laser, taking lethal damage and dying shortly after. Manon, who at this point is sick and tired of so many ARKS dying around her, goes absolutely ballistic and starts mowing down everything around her.
• Heroic RRoD: Chapter 6 reveals that excessive overuse of Photon reserves can render the user comatose, and a complete drainage of Photons can cause permanent damage. Manon falls victim to this after she aggressively overuses her Overdrive ability while on research expeditions, forcing the heroes to track down a special object known as a Liminal Sign that may have the power to heal her.
• Hijacked by Ganon: Sort of. The massive DOLL that shows up at the start of the game is named "Dark Falz" by ARKS, but it lacks any apparent connection to PSO2's Dark Falz and seems to simply be a really big DOLL that happens to have the name. Ultimately, it's revealed that this particular "Dark Falz" isn't a real Falz and was manufactured by Resurgent ARKS as a designated enemy for the True ARKS experiment.
• Hold the Line: The plot justification for the Urgent Quest against Dark Falz is that the Central Cannon needs time to charge up, and the players are defending Central City until it is ready to fire.
• Holiday Mode: Much like the original game, New Genesis tends to hold a holiday event every other month. In addition to changing Central City's appearance and decor, the trees in Aelio and the Region Mags will also dress up for the occasion, alongside the appearance of seasonal Rappies. A Seasonal NPC with a special shop will also appear alongside a Limited Quest that players can partake in for special goodies. The holidays celebrated include New Years, Tanabata, Valentine's Day, White Day, New Genesis Anniversary, Sonic's birthday, Summer, PSO2 Anniversary, Halloween, and Christmas.
• Homing Projectile:
  • The aptly-named Homing Dart PA, which locks on to up to 9 targets around you and fires a homing bullet at each one. You try to get close to a single target and fire multiple bullets into it to deal extra damage, but each additional hit on the same target reduces the damage by 50% of the previous hit.
  • Multiple Launch is basically a miniature Prominence Assail, AKA the Limit Break that Launchers had in the original game. With it, you can fire multiple energy shells followed by a big finishing blast at a locked-on target that have a soft-"hitscan" effect, enabling them to hit their desired target regardless of other enemies, enemy parts, and some objects in the way.
  • Holding down Waker's Fredran Breath PA locks on to up to 10 targets and shoots a homing bullet at each target.
• Hot Witch: The Relyn DOLLS miniboss in Kvaris is stylized after such, having a tall, lithe frame, narrow waist, and disproportionately large thighs accessorized by a witch's hat and sleeves. In a manner similar to the Waker class, like the Bujin and the Kelkundo before it, this boss summons familiars to attack, creating birds out of pure energy to fight from range and pursue players.
• Hover Board: Kvaris features Floating Boards as a method of transportation. They can be boarded from any Flying Board node you see on the map, and they will propel its rider forward at high speed. You can hit boost rings and jump off ramps to gain speed and height respectively, and you can also give yourself extra speed with your own boost button. They also happen to strike anything in their path, leading to Vehicular Combat as you mow down enemies, minerals, and containers unfortunate enough to be in the way.
• Iconic Starter Equipment: Virtually all official artwork depicts the characters using not only the starter weapons but also the starter costumes.
• Improbable Weapon User: Dustyl Hammer is like Daityl Sword and Daityl Axe, with one big difference: it wields a guitar. In addition to having most of the attacks of its Aelio counterparts (by using its guitar as a bludgeon), it can also perform sick guitar riffs to attack players with The Power of Rock, summoning literal rocks and Area of Effect shockwaves.
• In-Universe Game Clock: While day-night cycles were in PSO2, they were strictly limited to surface-level Wopal fields (Coast and Floating Facility). New Genesis expands the concept to the entire game world, with the entire environment adjusting to the effects of daytime and nighttime. A class of enemy known as ALTERS even sports different behavior depending on whether it's night or day, and drop Alts Secreta capsules if busted at night.
• Infinity +1 Sword: Changes over the course of the game's runtime, but as of Chapter 5, the strongest weapon series you can get is Neos Astraean. It only drops from Dark Falz Aegis, and, unsurprisingly, it's a Rare Random Drop.
• Info Dump: In Chapter 6 Part 4, the player gets diverted to running errands for a researcher named Quilla during a period of downtime. She wants to investigate some mysteries regarding Halpha but winds up interrupted by other researchers nearby who ruin the surprise by explaining exactly what they are.
  • When attempting to investigate the floating rocks in East Retem, the player happens upon a Lecielian named Guinea who explains that the massive metal rings scattered about, called Deglevs, were originally part of a high-speed anti-gravity transportation system connecting Aelio and Retem. The first encounter against Dark Falz destroyed the mechanism and scattered the Deglevs, with the remaining anti-gravity mechanisms in the Deglevs causing nearby rocks to float.
  • When investigating the glowing crystals in North Kvaris, the player meets another Lecielian named Pappe, who explains that the crystals are made of Photonsol, the material that DOLLS are made of. Nanomachines in enemies cause DOLLS and other enemies to disintegrate upon death, but occasionally the nanomachines fail to work and the solid matter from DOLL corpses form crystals. Photonsol is designed to glow red when excited, which explains why both the DOLLS and crystals change color in response to aggravated stimuli.
• Invincible Minor Minion: Wave 3 of Cannonball Rumble always spawns a Level 80 Gigantix boss nearby on the map, although with its stats tuned down so it doesn't One-Hit Kill players. As it is effectively unkillable, it essentially exists to harass the party and catch them unawares if they stop paying attention to their surroundings while destroying targets.
• King Mook: A limited time event introduced on February 21, 2023 introduced Geo variants of certain enemies and minibosses, which have a chance to appear whenever the players slay a Dread Enemy in specific locations. The Geo variants behave exactly like their base counterparts, but their size (and stats accordingly) is greatly scaled up.
• Later-Installment Weirdness:
  • This is the first Action RPG in the series to remove Perfect Attacks, a key mechanic introduced in the original PSO that rewards players for linking their attacks with good timing. While the concept was explored with the Summoner class in PSO2, this is the first time this has applied to all playable classes.
  • This is also the first game to graduate from the usual three-step combos and introduce five-step combos. The Luster class from the original tried out extending the basic combo with the Extra Attack skill, and similarly to Extra Attack, your final combo hit deals high damage relative to your other normal attacks.
  • The way stats work have been radically overhauled compared to any other game in the series; as opposed to melee/ranged and Tech damage being split into different stats or the MEL/RNG/TEC split of the original PSO2 and Phantasy Star Nova, all offensive and defensive stats have been combined into a single "ATK" and "DEF" stat respectively. Furthermore, this is the first game to introduce Combat Power, an overall estimate of the player's strength that is also used to gate access to content.
  • Skill points are no longer tied to levels in this game. They are instead obtained by completing special challenges in Cocoons and Towers. Each Cocoon grants one skill point while Towers grant four, with the latter being far more challenging than the former on average. Furthermore, these skill points are unlocked account-wide, meaning that challenges only need to be cleared once to grant skill points for every character on an account. The Aelio region has eight cocoons and three towers, the Retem and Kvaris regions have six cocoons and one tower, and the Stia region has three cocoons and one tower, for a maximum of 47 skill points.
  • Similar to Scions, there is no leveling up for Photon Arts or Techniques whatsoever and you do not have to pick them up. All PAs and Techs are given to you at the start of the game and they're always Lv. 1. The downside is that Techniques are bound to Technique-based weapons, so no casting Barta with your Soaring Blades.
  • As for the game's incarnation(?) of Dark Falz, you fight it very early into the story compared to its past versions. You've only explored two zones by the time you have your showdown, and four zones by the time you kill it.
• Legacy Boss Battle:
  • Most FORMERS bosses are enhanced versions of existing PSO2 bosses and minibosses from the various planets.
  • Leciel Exploration introduced Ruine bosses, which are Starless-enhanced copies of Falspawn bosses fought in the original PSO2. They generally stay true to the attack patterns of the originals but are amped up slightly to make them more powerful, such as Ruine Ragne hiding its weak spot unless stunned and Ruine Hyunal gaining a Spin Attack and an enhanced Ground Pound.
• Level-Locked Loot: Unlike PSO2, this is played straight. The ability to equip gear is strictly determined by your Main Class's level and not by stats.
• Limit Break:
  • Photon Blasts have been reworked into more conventional "super moves" usable by the players that have devastating coverage and power, such as Swords being able to rend foes with a powerful slash or Assault Rifles calling down an orbital strike.
  • Force and Techter have the ability to wield Compound Techniques, immensely powerful attacks that combine the powers of two elements to perform incredible feats.
    • Fomelgion: The caster summons a BFS made of Fire and Dark elements and performs a powerful horizontal slash, rending nearby foes while firing a Sword Beam to strike from afar.
    • Barantsion: The caster creates an elemental spear and launches it to the area in front of them, creating a light-infused ice crystal that absorbs photonic power until it detonates.
    • Zandion: The caster summons a flurry of tornadoes struck by lightning bolts at their nexus, then calls upon an even larger tornado and more powerful lightning bolt to deal the finishing blow.
  • Bouncer has Pinion Blade, an extremely powerful burst damage move exclusive to Soaring Blades inspired by Ètoile's Full Connect. Attacking with Soaring Blades fills the Pinion Blade gauge on your subpalette, and when it is full, you can activate Pinion Blade, upon which your character will envelop their Soaring Blades with photon energy and brandish them before cleaving the area ahead with an unrelenting strike.
• Last Chance Hit Point:
  • The Hunter Skill "Iron Will" makes a return. This time, it's guaranteed activation and has several seconds of invincibility baked in, but has a 5 minute cooldown timer.
  • Fighter has "Overload Endurance", an improved version of "Overload Insurance" from the original game. Like Insurance, it protects the user from dying while Overload is active and deactivates Overload, but it doesn't have a cooldown penalty.
  • Atlas Ex weapons have the ability to protect their user from a lethal hit once every 10 minutes. This notably has a handful of applications since it is the only weapon of its kind to do so in the game, allowing you to survive One-Hit Kill events such as the exploding rooms in Leciel Exploration. The only issue with them is that you have to play an entirely different game to get it if you don't already have one.
• Macross Missile Massacre: The Daityl bosses will occasionally shoot a barrage of lasers all at once and Pettas Vera does this with its satellite lasers which look like they came straight out of Franchise/Gundam.
  • When multiple launcher-wielders fire Sphere/Fear Eraser.
  • Nils Vera has an unsual variation where the red head will shoot icicles like a volcano.
  • Dark Falz Aegis fires missiles and shards everywhere during the first phase of its fight, and has a miniaturized one during the second phase. The Mobile Cannon M2 used against it can fire its own as either a step counter or as a standalone attack that costs 30 PP.
• Magic Knight:
  • Techters are still casting, bonking, and buffing as always. What their Wands lack in melee range, they make up for with the ability to produce elemental explosions on hit, allowing them to strike both Physical and Elemental Downs at once.
  • Jet Boots, just like in the original game. The actual method of weaving Techniques into their gameplay has been considerably streamlined with the introduction of the Jet Boots Element Set skill that allows them to imbue their Boots with an element by casting a Technique, granting them the ability to produce a Tech Explosion whenever they hit with a PA and allowing them to charge up the elemental support skills just by hitting with PAs, unlike Force and Techter which must repeatedly cast Techniques to charge them.
  • Theoretically any class combination that involves Force, Techter, or Bouncer main or sub. Unlike PSO2, where this was generally a bad idea because of the poor Skill Tree synergy and stat split, in this game any Tech class combo can be both competent and powerful. Want to play Gunner/Force and alternate between max-power Guns Akimbo and backrow Tech blasting? You got it!
• Marked to Die: Barta Blot enables uncharged Ice techniques to build a hazard upon enemies, with one stage showing three flake branches and a second, stronger stage showing all six branches. Performing a charged Ice technique detonates the hazard for extra damage on hit. While Rod, Talis and Wand users must rely on casts to apply it, Jet Boots users can align the Boots to Ice with Jet Boots Element Set to apply Barta Blot stacks with Photon Arts. Retem added Zan Gale (Wind) while Kvaris introduced Foie Brand (Fire), which have similar effects.
• Mascot Mook: Rappies are always around, just like in every other post-tetralogy game.
  • The TAMES, mainly Sunny and Moony.
• Mass Monster-Slaughter Sidequest: Many daily and side quests have you slaughtering anywhere from 50 to over 300 monsters to complete.
• The Maze: The "Lone Way" Cocoon is a small maze challenge. It's not particularly hard (just follow the walls with the glowing orange squares), but if you want the best score you will need to detour into seemingly-random dead ends to grab Point Cubes and still finish the maze within the Side Mission time limit.
• Magic Music: All over the place during Sandstorm Requiem and the Retem region.
  • Nadereh's lineage possesses special abilities that are conveyed through song. Her mother, the previous ruler of Retem City, had the ability to empower others with her singing, but Nadereh herself believes that she did not inherit her mother's powers since her singing doesn't do anything. With some urging from Manon, however, the heroes discover that Nadereh did in fact inherit the power of music, just not in the way she expected: rather than powering up her allies, her singing depowers DOLLS. If she crops up during The Battle of Halphia Lake, Dark Falz Aegis' defenses take a huge hit and the support DOLLS it summons are completely incapacitated.
  • Metius DOLLS have speaker systems attached to their arms, and can use them to cast Shifta or Resta on groups of enemies at a time. Breaking the speakers disables this effect.
  • Dustyl Hammer can use its "hammer" to scatter sonic bombs and trigger shockwaves, either vertically or horizontally, in addition to smashing it on your head. Dustyl Vera can do the same, except when it Turns Red it can also perform a lasting solo that juts rocks out of the ground until the control core on its "axe" is busted; since it becomes invulnerable when the solo starts, you have to do this to win the fight.
• Maximum HP Reduction:
  • A number of Starless foes have the ability to inflict the Wound status on hit, which will temporarily reduce your maximum HP.
  • One of the possible debuffs you can encounter in Leciel Exploration's boss battles is a debuff that will reduce the max HP of all players by 75% once the boss's HP drops below a certain threshold.
• Meaningful Name: The Evolcoat weapon series is so named due to being designed after the Coat weapon series from the original game, hence being an "evolved Coat" weapon.
• Metal Slime:
  • Captan, the successor to PSO2's Mesetan, is a rare spawn that can appear anywhere, but more likely in High Rank Combat Zones. It hides inside of its capsule-patterned flying orb to protect itself, but can be stunned with Dive Attacks. Defeating it causes to spew out a large quantity of augment capsules, including capsules that are otherwise exceedingly rare such as Mastery and Dread Keeper III.
  • Defeating a Dread Enemy has a chance to cause a PSE marker to appear in an Exploration Zone, where multiple Rappies will appear around a Mischief Marker. Defeating the Rappies will eventually cause the Emperappy to appear, who drops rare items, including Dark Falz Subjugation Quest Triggers. There is a very rare chance that Emperappy will be replaced by the elusive Great Rappy instead, who is even larger, more powerful, and boasts even better drop rates.
• Mirror Match: Some elite DOLLS units emulate the advanced classes to a degree.
  • The Bujin fights similarly to a ninja, but just as easily emulates a Braver that uses shuriken and kunai in place of a Bow.
  • The Kelkundo's kicks imitate a Jet Boots Bouncer; were the ARKS defenders' moves not as fluid as they are, its dance-like movements would make it maddeningly difficult to hit.
  • The Relyn in Kvaris evokes various phantasms to assail its enemies in the vein of the Waker class.
  • Various Pettas-style DOLLS use Gunblades to fight, like the Slayer.
• Mix-and-Match Weapon:
  • Gunblades, combination short swords and handguns that combine elements of Striking and Ranged damage attacks. Unlike PSO2, they exist but cannot be used by all classes, instead being used by the Slayer, a class dedicated to Gunblades like the Luster class from the original.
  • Deser Gunblade enemies in Retem, Zams Gunblade in Kvaris, and Gazzer Gunblades in Stia use attacks from both their Sword and Gun counterparts.
  • Multi-Weapons are a new feature in which two different weapons from the same series are combined together, allowing you to freely use the Photon Arts and weapon actions of both weapons. Hadi exploits this utility to switch between a guitar and clarinet during Nadereh's concert.
• Monkey King Lite: The Engouku is a DOLL miniboss who is based on Sun Wukong and his plethora of powers. It has "gouku" in its name, possesses a vaguely monkey-like design and has simian-esque movement, and wields a Telescoping Staff with which it extends and grows to attack. Its upgraded Trinites counterpart, Ikusa Engouku, adds the cloning ability to increase the range of its attacks and even gains the ability to enlarge itself for its Desperation Attack.
• Motifs: Death and sacrifice, as well as the consequences imposed on those who remain in their wake, recur persistently throughout New Genesis's first major story arc. Each Chapter involves either people perishing en masse to the DOLLS or coping with the deaths of those that have died at the hands of DOLLS, and as the story progresses this becomes a central issue to Manon specifically, who becomes increasingly frustrated and confused at the heavy sacrifices ARKS members risk taking each time they fight to defend Halpha. The Leciel arc seemingly has Manon confront an individual who appears to be conducting some kind of illicit research on the subject.
• Moveset Clone: Some ALTERS are essentially a Suspiciously Similar Substitute for certain PSO2 enemies.
  • Bigg Frogga is effectively a King Mook version of Blumegalla with a greater emphasis on projectile attacks.
  • Most of Eldi Scythe, Svadi Scythe and Duskdi Scythe's attacks are copy-pasted from Drago Deadlion, the Ultimate version of Dragon Ex.
  • Bubble Snapper and Dusk Snapper, minibosses in Retem and Stia respectively, is essentially just a smaller Fal Vibras.
  • Dark Renatus, a miniboss in Stia, shares most of its moves with Vol Dragon.
• Mundane Utility: Fredran Riding is a PA where the user rides around on Fredran's back as it flies. The intended use is to dismount it and throw Fredran into enemies to deal heavy area of effect damage, but you can also use it to cheat some instances where gliding is challenging or disallowed, such as in certain Cocoons and Towers.
• Musical Nod: The Phase 2 segment of Dark Falz Solus' theme includes a movement that reprises the main melody of the PSO2 Final Boss theme, "Dark to Light".
• Mysterious Past:
  • Dubbed "Meteorn" and completely absent of their memories, no one knows what the deal is with the player characters, where they came from or if they at all have any relation to the DOLLS thanks to similarly descending from orbit. They're notably stronger than the average ARKS operatives on Halpha, however, so their recruitment was welcome nonetheless. Chapter 5 reveals that there's no past to begin with, created solely to contend with the DOLLS as part of an artificially manufactured war to bolster the ARKS defenders.
  • One of the game's two heroines, a Newman named Manon, is also a Meteorn, but previews imply that she has her memories intact, making her a more literal case of the trope. Like all Meteorn, she has no past since her creation, but knows the Awful Truth behind the DOLLS, making her acutely aware of the damages the DOLLS have done.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Just like the original game, the demo characters are named Ash, Rupica, Sue, and Gilliam.
  • In the opening movie, Ash does the same corkscrew jump that PSO2 Ash does in the first opening movie of the original game.
  • The fast-travel devices are called Ryuker Devices, referencing the Ryuker Technique from the tetrology and Online that allows the party to warp back to the nearest town or Pioneer 2.
  • One of the first Urgent Quests in the game, "Nex Vera Suppression", is on the whole virtually identical to the first Urgent Quest of PSO2 EPISODE 5, "Crimson Fellwyrm Over the Castle"; both Quests feature the party breaking through several waves of mobs (including boss mobs) and fighting a gigantic, fire-breathing dragon with glowing yellow weak points at the end. Incidentally, the director of New Genesis, Hiroi Hamazaki, also directed EPISODE 5.
  • Summoning the Mobile Cannon during Defense Quest adds a backbeat to the music just like calling the A.I.S. in Mining Base Defense.
  • The Stork Destruction PA for Dual Blades brings back the Blade Destruction and Saber Destruction PAs from Portable 2 and PSO2, with both iterations of the PA being featured based on which version of the PA you decide to use.
  • Almost all of the weapon designs for the Relik series are recycled wholesale from past Phantasy Star games, primarily designs from Phantasy Star Portable 2 infinity's 16★ weapons and the Rod from the first Phantasy Star Online. The Harmonizer, on the other hand, is inspired by PSO2's Nox weapons, while also being an original design.
  • The second phase of the Dark Falz Aegis battle is structured similarly to the second phase of Dark Falz from the original Phantasy Star Online. Its theme also evokes elements of "Dark to Light", the Primordial Darkness's battle theme from the original PSO2.
  • Slayer lifts a fair number of elements from its predecessor, Luster. To name a few, the Gunblade Focus mechanic is very similar to the unique Voltage ability and Waving Rigel PA is Luster's Slash Rise and Slash Fall skills combined and transplanted into the form of a Photon Art.
  • The June 2023 "Ultra Evolution" update is officially named "Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis ver. 2", reflecting how the original Phantasy Star Online had a "ver. 2" update that added a ton of new content.
  • The NGS 2nd Anniversary event featured Quiz Quests as a Limited Quest format, which is a quest type originally coined by Phantasy Star Portable 2.
  • The Line Strike trailer features the Phantasy Star Online Episode 3: C.A.R.D. Revolution theme as background music, alluding to the last time a Card Battle Game was featured in a Phantasy Star game. The "Line Strike" name callout also sounds similar to that game's announcer.
• Nerf:
  • Active Skills in general took a heavy nerf in the form of drastically increased cooldowns. Mainstay skills like Hunter's Physique and Overload had their cooldowns doubled to 180 seconds compared to the 90 seconds or less in the original PSO2. This means that they can only be used once or twice in a given fight, dramatically reducing their usefulness. You could cut down the cooldown time by taking the skill's respective "Short Cycle", but that also comes at the cost of lowering the skill uptime. At max Short Cycle, it reduces the cooldown to 30 seconds...for only 5 seconds of uptime.
  • War Cry returns, but it got an under-the-hood change by way of no longer resetting Hate on all nearby enemies unlike its PSO2 counterpart, essentially nerfing it to near-uselessness.
• Never Found the Body:
  • Garoa is last seen jumping in front of Dark Falz as it charges its Wave-Motion Gun, with it being all but implied that he was vaporized. Since the heroes are not present for the confrontation (as they were evacuating the scene), it is vaguely implied that he may have survived somehow. However, the Dark Falz Aegis finale and Zephetto's confrontation seemingly confirm that he was in fact killed.
  • Zephetto is seen sacrificing himself to slow down the Starless's first assault on Halpha, managing to intercept the first wave before his DOLLS mech explodes brilliantly in a massive flash. However, it is left ambiguous if he actually survived or not, and it is explicitly mentioned by the heroes that his fate is unknown.
• Never Trust a Trailer: The initial reveal trailer had a lot of elements that were never implemented or even intended to be implemented in the final release, including the presence of Perfect Attack circles, PSO2 sprites as placeholders, and fields that bear little resemblance to the ones seen in the actual game.
• New Work, Recycled Graphics: The Line Strike card minigame added in the July 2024 update reuses artwork and card names from the defunct Phantasy Star Online 2 Trading Card Game.
• Not Quite Flight: Players have the ability to use "Photon Glide" to more or less fly across the field and approach both terrain and enemies from above. Think of it more akin to Knuckles the Echidna's gliding skill.
• Not the Intended Use: Kvaris Floating Boards can be used in other regions for Board Races, where it turns out that their property to break particularly durable objects comes in handy for the extra-dense mineral rocks in Stia that can otherwise only be blown up with thrown or exploded lava rocks. Notably, several of these are just off the Mediola Outer Area 2 race path with the race being released weeks after the region was, just for players to find out by curiosity or accident even though you should be racing.
• Obvious Rule Patch:
  • In the original game, a few projectile attacks had "shotgunning" properties, where the projectiles are intended to hit multiple targets but by standing right next to an enemy before firing, you could concentrate all of the damage of the attack on a single enemy or enemy part. In New Genesis this has been rectified by a hidden mechanic applied to multi-projectile attack like Homing Dart or Launcher charged normals that greatly reduces the damage dealt by projectiles after the first hit if a single enemy is hit by multiple projectiles in the same attack.
  • This game adds some extra stipulations to Skills to prevent them from synergizing too much outside of their native classes and avoid disastrous balance problems due to an oversight. This includes some Skills having a "Sub" growth that makes them significantly less potent when the class is Subclassed, as well as some otherwise-generic Skills having class weapon restrictions placed on them, such as Photon Flare only boosting the damage of Force weapons.
  • Prior to ver. 2, some Urgent Quest bosses could be phase-skipped by dealing enough damage to them in specific circumstances where they cannot change phases such as during a Down or Break, causing them to die before transitioning to their final phase and thus saving the players a bunch of time and effort. Starting from ver. 2, all subsequent raid bosses will immediately reduce all the damage they take to 1% of normal once they hit a specific HP threshold to prevent players from skipping their final phases.
• Oddly Named Sequel 2: Electric Boogaloo: The game still retains the "Phantasy Star Online 2" in the title despite being a sequel and tacks on a subtitle, just to ensure that players know that it's a direct sequel and not a "Phantasy Star Online 3".
• Officially Shortened Title: NGS for New Genesis.
• Offscreen Start Bonus: Unlike other VR areas, the prep room in Ordinal Tower Rank 7 isn't just a flat box, as you can actually walk behind the back wall of the room. Doing so reveals a gap in the wall behind it that you can jump through once the Quest starts, which leads to a small platforming area below it. Getting to the end of this platforming challenge rewards you with a terminal that unlocks the Blastisignes in each of the boss rooms.
• Old Save Bonus: As NGS is quite literally built on top of PSO2 itself, the game allows players to use their existing characters in NGS, which allows them to carry over things like all cosmetics and Emotes/Lobby Actions, storage expansions, Premium, Material Storage, Extended Storage, AC, Star Gems and so forth. Character progression and Meseta/FUN don't carry over, the latter for economy reasons. Old gear like those 15★ Weapons and 13★ Units you may have laying around from PSO2 can also be used if you meet the level requirements, downscaled appropriately, but the old endgame pales in comparison to even a fully-upgraded 3★ for new NGS gear, turning old loot into a leveling/comfort fallback.
  • This has a drawback, as SEGA didn't increase player storage to compensate. You now have to shoehorn two games worth of stuff in the same limited inventory.
• One-Hit Kill:
  • The Ikusa Bujin's grab attack freezes you in place before it slashes you with its nodachi, dealing high enough damage to kill you twice over at the base ATK settings. The brief black flash along with its purple-glowing eye are your only hints to dodge; if your class has a guard instead of a dodge for its Weapon Action, Sidestep if you value your life.
  • Near the end of its life, the Ikusa Engouku will create a hazard zone before striking it with an excessively large object; if you're in just before the attack goes off, a pulse paralyzes you so you can't escape being instakilled.
• One-Hit Polykill: Certain Rifle and Bow attacks have penetrating properties allowing them to pass through one or more targets at once and hit multiple the same target times if the enemy is sufficiently large. Unlike PSO2, there is an upper limit on how many times one projectile can hit the same enemy, and each consecutive hit on the same enemy deals 50% less damage than the previous hit.
• Our Dragons Are Different: Nex Aelio, a massive dragon-type DOLL, and its Urgent Quest counterpart Nex Vera. It does typical dragon things like tail swipes and spitting fire, but once it Turns Red it sprouts two additional heads like a hydra and bolsters its offense. Notably, it averts the series tradition of the Kaizo Trap death animation, since like all other boss DOLLS its body implodes on death.
• Palette Swap:
  • The 2-star Tzvia weapons have the same models than the 1-star Primm weapons, the only difference being the colors, switched from white with blue accents for Primm to black with red accents for Tzvia.
  • The Silver Primm Sword and Gold Primm Sword are Exactly What It Says on the Tin: Primm Swords with a white blade and a gold blade respectively. They are higher rarity than the regular Primm Sword and are marginally stronger, but are mainly designed to be used for either Enhancement or trading at the Item Trader for +10% Augment Success Rate.
  • The 8-star Primm Libra weapons are Primm weapons but with the Laser Blade components swapped out for solid steel.
  • Any "[model name] Almati" Weapon Camo can make any weapon look like any of the above, so if you like the appearance of a Primm weapon, you can get the proper Camo on the player market to give it the appearance of any of the above.
  • A feature introduced in the October 13th update is Color Variant Weapons, which are identical to other weapons of the same name but are harder to get and cosmetically different. As an added bonus, Color Variant Weapons also change the color of your attacks in addition to being a different color themselves.
• Peninsula of Power Leveling:
  • The "Combat Zones" of Aelio (Mt. Magnus, the Vanford Laboratory Ruins, and Resol Forest) and Retem (Retem Alnothe and Maqead Lower Level) are clearly intended to be this. Enemies spawn more frequently and in much larger groups than the typical Exploration Zones on top of being higher leveled than most of the surrounding areas. In addition, these zones have a chance to trigger a PSE Burst, drastically increasing the spawn rate and causing rarer enemies to spawn, giving more EXP and dropping rarer loot.
  • The "High-Level Sector" versions of the aforementioned areas are even more blatantly this, with enemies having higher levels than the original version. The areas themselves are only accessible to those with notably high Battle Power for their expected level, making it exclusive to those trying to grind out those last few levels.
• Play Every Day: In addition to daily Login Bonuses, there are Daily Tasks that award large amounts of EXP, as well as a Weekly Task that awards 200,000 Meseta for clearing 20 Daily Tasks. Materials also respawn every day, encouraging you to go explore daily to keep up on your resources. Leah May offered an assortment of weekly quests to further amplify EXP acquisition, which all became daily quests as of April 2022.
• Player-Generated Economy: The Player Shop is notably much more regulated than in PSO2; non-paying players no longer have the ability to sell items in any way; unless the player uses a Personal Shop Ticket (It works in both base and NGS), Meseta gain rate is severely restricted, undercutting is less rampant with the minimum price incrementation rate being set to multiples of 1000, and some items have a tag on them that marks them as "endorsed", preventing players from listing them below a market value of 500,000 Meseta. Unfortunately, Global's market is still much worse off than Japan's; multi-accounting for funneling Red Container Meseta into a single account is fairly common due to a lack of decisiveness about multi-account rules on SEGA's end, as well as Meseta bots being ridiculously rampant, resulting in faster and heavier inflation.
• Point of No Return: A very downplayed example - while Maqead Lower Level can be entered via a hole at the very top of Rwh Maqead, there is no similar passage to walk out or otherwise leave without teleporting to a Ryuker Device, Cocoon, Tower, Battledia or the Geometric Labyrinth. There is a story quest in the region, and jumping into that hole near the end locks you into a fight with Renus Retem.
• Power Levels: Explicitly referenced in game, to the point where you are blocked from urgent quests and even continuing the main quest until you sufficiently raise your "Battle Power".
• Power Glows: Much like Phantasy Star Nova, all of the New Genesis weapons have glowy bits on the weapons that power on when they're unsheathed, such as the Primm Swords being essentially Laser Blades and other weapons having various light-up components.
• The Power of Friendship: The finale of Dark Falz Aegis involves the player absorbing all of the positive photonic energy from across Halpha, gaining the strength needed to deal the final blow to Dark Falz Aegis by punching it through the core with their bare hands.
• Power-Up Food: Quick Food, which not only gives you a stat boost for an extended period of time, it can also be customized to give you the buffs you need for your adventure. Just pick out the ingredients with the stat bonuses you want and chow down.
• Purely Aesthetic Gender: Played completely straight unlike PSO2 which simply heavily downplayed the effects of gender. There is no difference between masculine or feminine bodies whatsoever gameplay-wise, and to state the point they're even renamed to "Type 1" and "Type 2" instead of being called "Male" and "Female" and you can swap between them at will. You still need to pick a gender body to start with for the purpose of cross-compatibility with PSO2, which still uses gendered stats.
• Purple Is Powerful:
  • Due to Color-Coded Elements, Gigantix enemies are covered in a purple lightning aura, and they are far stronger than any other enemy.
  • Enraged Starless foes turn from red to purple, denoting either active combat duty for the mooks or a more dangerous phase for the bosses. There can also be Gigantix Starless.
• Rare Random Drop:
  • The Relik series is by far the rarest weapon drop in the game. It appears on the fewest drop tables in the game, and even within its rarity is excruciatingly hard to drop. Compared to the Cinquem weapons, which are relatively common but expensive to upgrade, Relik weapons are cheap to upgrade but hard to get and may set you back a ton of Meseta if you choose to purchase one from another player.
  • It's possible for Arms Refiner to drop directly... just never expect it to happen unless you're extremely lucky.
  • Rank 2 Purple Battledia Quests drop color variants of Motion Tickets previously introduced as AC Scratch Bonuses. This is the only way to get said motions without paying real money, but they are one of, if not the absolute rarest items in the game, and tend to pitch a market value of 50,000,000 minimum.
  • Starting in Kvaris, the Rugged series was introduced. This is one of the only two 7★ weapon series in the game aside from Kaizaar. Unlike Kaizaar, Rugged is exclusively a dropped weapon, and is even rarer than the aforementioned Relik. It also has superior stats to Kaizaar, although to make Kaizaar a desirable upgrade, Rugged is saddled with noticeably worse base Damage Variance, making its damage less consistent.
  • The nine-star Tisah weapons were introduced when the Starless made planetfall in the Aelio region. They are obscenely rare, more so than other weapons, but are incredibly powerful for those who can secure one and kit it out.
• Recoil Boost: One of the Mobile Cannon's abilities is to flip the Cannon upside down and fire a prolonged jet blast from its barrel while the user holds on to the handlebar grip like a hang glider, propelling them across the map at extreme speed.
• Red Sky, Take Warning:
  • The presence of an Urgent Quest is indicated by red waves covering the entire sky, with a large red pillar rising from the quest's location.
  • If Stia's volcanic interior starts glowing bright red, expect chunks of volatile magma to start raining down.
  • If Stia's environs in general turn purple, the Gigantix are out and about; this is your only indicator aside from the electricity crackling in the air (if you're inside, the magma starts raining around you as well).
• Ridiculously Cute Critter: Local Mascot Mook Rappies are here, but now they can sing in groups and wave at you! You even get titles by watching them sing.
• Robot Buddy:
  • Mags are still around. Unlike in previous games, where they are battle companions and are the main source of Photon Blasts, in New Genesis Mags primarily exist for their Active Sonar ability, allowing players to detect nearby points of interest on the field.
  • There are also Region Mags, giant-sized Mags much larger than the players themselves that can be found out on the field. Region Mags are fed much in the same way that Mags are fed in PSO2, but the food gauge is shared across the entire server. In addition to granting temporary personal buffs when sufficiently fed, enough players feeding the Region Mag will eventually bestow buffs to the entire server within a given area of effect.
  • While in Vanford, defeating a Drome causes it to temporarily join your side and fire Kill Sat beams at nearby enemies. Defeating more Dromes while you already have a Drome with you recharges your current Drome's energy and causes it to level up, gaining the ability to target more enemies per laser shot. Dromes also appear in some Battledia locations and the Geometric Labyrinth. Hobacs in Belugana Ruins behave the same way, except replace the Drome's Kill Sat beam with the Hobac's homming missiles. The Hydrome in Neusen Plant has its own killer beam shower.
  • Late 2023 saw the introduction of Alliance Mags, which are this game's version of Alliance Trees. Like the Alliance Tree, feeding the Mag N-Alliance Points will power up buffs that players in the Alliance can purchase with Genesis Points. Buffs include Max HP, Max PP, Potency, EXP, and Rare Drop Rate, all of which can be powered up to Level 10. Purchasing buffs from the Alliance Mag fills up its gift meter, which will grant all Alliance members free Alliance Badges when full. In addition, you can customize the appearance of the Alliance Mag with N-Alliance Points, and you can even purchase buffs from Alliance Mags owned by Alliances that you are not in.
• Ruins for Ruins' Sake:
  • North Aelio has a lot of dilapidated structures of unknown origin.
  • As the name may imply, Lost Central is the frozen ruins of the original Central City, buried deep underground after it was destroyed in an attack by Dark Falz and abandoned in favor of the current Central City.
• Sand Worm: The cutscene that plays after finishing the first act shows that the Retem Region is being attacked by a massive worm shaped DOLL. This is later revealed to be Renus Retem, a DOLL that has been terrorizing Retem City for years with none of the ARKS in the area able to stop it until the heroes arrive.
• Scenery Porn: Halpha is populated with gorgeous, vast landscapes where every single frame can be a wallpaper. And as if to show off, the entire opening movie is rendered in-engine, instead of the pre-rendered movies used by the original game.
• Schizophrenic Difficulty: While the Battle Power ratings for each of the areas is mostly accurate, it's easy to stumble across foes far stronger than advertised if you happen to waltz into the wrong part of town. One particular case of this occurs if you decide to hike all the way back to the island where you start the game at, in which case the beach where your pod is may be populated by a Level 15 Veteran Nex Aelio.
• Self-Deprecation: The plot's pacing has been mocked at least once by the game's own official social media.
• Sequel: The Original Title: Subverted; while the logos highlight the name "New Genesis" over the original title, the official naming order is Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis.
• Shock and Awe: Thunder Banshees and Thunder Bansers, which follow the same movement patterns as your average Banser or Banshee but weaponize thunder and lightning against you, such as calling down lightning bolts with their roars or firing homing electric orbs.
• Shop Fodder:
  • Each region has an item that respawns daily and serves no purpose except to be sold to the Item Shop for Meseta. There are Alpha Reactors in Central Aelio and Dreisen Plant (Stia) for 3500 Meseta apiece, Stellar Fragments in North Retem for 2000 Meseta apiece, and Snoals in Central Kvaris for 3500 Meseta apiece.
  • The ARKS Record weekly ranking system has Alliance Task Rankings, where Alliances compete for highest number of Alliance Tasks cleared within the target timeframe. Alliances that place on the leaderboard win Beta Reactors for each member, a shop fodder item that sells for 100,000 Meseta each. Placing into the Bronze bracket earns 1 Beta Reactor, while Silver earns 3 and Gold earns 5.
• Significant Wardrobe Shift: Chapter 6 has Manon changing from her sleek black bodysuit to a more expressive and colorful custom design ARKS uniform, along with a hairstyle update to a ponytail. The plot justification is that Crawford wanted to give her a fresh look so as to dissociate her from the Resurgent ARKS, whose uniform she was wearing.
• Simple Solution Won't Work: In Chapter 6, Glen suggests shutting down Leciel to stop the DOLLS from spawning. Crawford immediately denies this, as Leciel controls Halpha's environment and they are unsure of what would happen if it were to be turned off; furthermore, as the DOLLS have continued to attack even after the facility was vacated during the inital Starless assault, it is unclear if disabling Leciel would actually stop the DOLLS. On top of this, the teleporter linking Lost Central to Leciel mysteriously deactivated shortly after Zephetto's sacrifice, meaning that they cannot even reach Leciel even if they did want to disable it. He also preemptively denies any attempt to shut down Dreisen Plant for the same reason, as that facility is a major source of Halpha's energy despite being a DOLLS factory and it would likely be a much bigger problem for the planet as a whole if it were to be turned off.
• Sliding Scale of Plot Versus Characters: Contrasting PSO2, which was mainly plot-focused and spent a lot of time on world-building while the majority of cast members save for the most critical were essentially stock anime characters, this game reverses the scale. The story's first act is mainly spent on Aina's Character Development, focusing on overcoming her trauma related to the DOLLS and her desire to become strong, while also introducing the main villain (Dark Falz) and some tertiary plot elements.
• Smashing Survival: It is still possible to do this against Cragbear and Dunebear if they grab you, just like with Rockbear.
• Soft Reboot: Contextually there is very little directly linking the plot of New Genesis to PSO2 besides the fact that ARKS is still present in the future. For all intents and purposes you could strip out any references to ARKS in the game and it may as well be a brand-new Phantasy Star game that has no ties to PSO2 whatsoever. The plot does make more concrete ties to the original game at the end of Chapter 5, however, where it is revealed that the Halpha experiment was designed to recreate the power of the Guardian from 1000 years ago in an attempt to fend off a new threat.
• Sorting Algorithm of Threatening Geography: The regions players explore are unlocked as they progress through the story, and each one is more hazardous than the last:
  • Aelio: an idyllic Green Hill Zone with verdant fields, lively forests, and tranquil beaches, as well as the location of Halpha's largest settlement, Central City.
  • Retem: A Shifting Sand Land ripe with resources, but also home to dangerous DOLLS and monsters.
  • Kvaris: A Slippy-Slidey Ice World adorned with ruins of the original Central City, where it's not just the DOLLS and monsters that imperil your life, but the bitterly-cold climate as well.
  • Stia: A Lethal Lava Land with rivers of red-hot magma and explosive debris raining from surrounding volcanoes. It is also home to facilities housing DOLLS, including none other than Dark Falz.
• Spin Attack:
  • Swords have the PA "Twisting Zapper", which hurtles the user forward while spinning, performing several AOE slashes in succession.
  • Soaring Blades have a PA called "Rolling Pheasant" where they spin forward and cut through enemies in their path. Pressing the PA button again causes them to stop and turn into a living sawblade as they rapidly spin in place, shredding nearby enemies.
  • Ruine Hyunal has been updated to incorporate Twisting Zapper in his moveset as well, in which he will charge up with the Ruine Elder Pain before charging forward while spinning and then follow up with a sword beam.
• Strong Enemies, Low Rewards: Enemies that are 5 or more levels higher than you and/or are outside of your Battle Power range are marked with red names, take 1 damage from all of your attacks, and don't drop any loot or count towards Task completion on kill.
• Super Mode:
  • Fighters have the Overload skill, which increases the damage they deal with Fighter weapons for a limited time in exchange for increasing the damage they take by 50%.
  • Force has Photon Flare, which increases the damage they deal with Force weapons as well as their maximum PP for a limited time. Additional Skills can also reduce the damage they deal by 10% in exchange for halving cast times, as well as regenerate 100 PP when the effect ends.
  • Braver has "Brave Combat", an ability that decreases the player's PP consumption and increases PP recovery rate for a limited time. Activating it again while it's active triggers a Limit Break attack just like the previous game's Katana Combat.
  • Techter has Wand Lovers, which grants guard frames to your Wand normal attacks. You can then buy Wand Lovers Reinforce below it, which gives your Wand normals increased swing speed, increased damage, a pursuit effect that zips you toward any locked-on target, and hitstop removal.
  • Slayer has Gunblade Focus Overdrive, which can only be activated when the Gunblade Focus Gauge is completely full and temporarily boosts the effects of Gunblade Focus not unlike Luster's Luster Time. Activating the Skill again while it's already active produces a powerful Limit Break attack, similar in function to Luster Time Finish.
  • Klauz weapons have the ability to gain bonuses to damage and Critical Hit Rate for 60 seconds after performing three normal attacks.
• Teleport Gun: Bow once again inverts this with the Dimensional Ray PA, which, when fully charged, functions much like Chase Arrow did in the original game. Charging it up fires an arrow into hyperspace that comes back when striking an enemy with a PA, dealing an additional hit.
• That Russian Squat Dance: The male variant of Emote 748 added in September 2021 has the player alternating between bunny hops and a squat dance.
• Theme Music Power-Up: The finale of the Dark Falz Aegis battle cues a battle remixed version of "The World Beyond the Sky" after Dark Falz uses its Desperation Attack and permanently cripples itself. Ditto for the cutscene finisher, where the theme music plays during the player's finishing blow.
• Theme Naming: The Rockbear variants added in NGS are all named after different geologic objects. The variant in Aelio is named "Cragbear", the variant in Retem is named "Dunebear", and the variant in Stia is named Volg Bear.
• Three-Point Landing: A Motion Ticket for landing animation released in September 2021 lets you perform one whenever you land on the ground from a jump.
• Throwing Your Sword Always Works: Double Sabers have the Deadly Archer skill, which allows them to expend the Kamaitachi they've built up from attacking to charge up and throw their Double Saber like a sawblade to deal multiple hits of heavy damage to anything in front of them.
• Time Skip: NGS takes place one millennium after the end of PSO2.
• To Be Continued: Each chapter ends with a "To be continued..." end slate.
• Tower Defense: Mining Rig Defense, the Spiritual Successor to Mining Base Defense and Buster Quest from the original PSO2. Like its predecessors, you must protect the Mining Rigs from an onslaught of enemies, including more powerful DOLLS. Collect Signs scattered on the field can be collected to earn points used to unlock power-ups, such as healing Rigs, summoning a barrier for your Rig, and calling upon the powerful Mobile Cannon.
• Trailers Always Spoil: The game's Steam page has an in-game screenshot of the world map that is taken after the prologue, as Aelio Town's location on the map is replaced by a giant crater named "Aelio Town Ruins".
• Turns Red:
  • Quite literally, especially for the boss DOLLS. Not only do their limbs shift from blue to bright red when hurt enough, they become more aggressive, break out new moves, and morph into more menacing forms. The Nogleth bulks up its body, the Nex Vera sprouts two more heads, the Pettas Vera grows crystal armor, to name some examples.
  • Boss Starless glow red by default when aggravated and turn purple when sufficiently low on health.
• Underground Monkey:
  • FORMERS by definition are PSO2 enemies with a Palette Swap and new moves. Cragbears are Rockbears with some Vangabear moves, and Ard Banser/Banshee and Thunder Banser/Banshee incorporate Falke Leone and Valima Leopod moves into their sets, just to name a few. Aelio FORMERS are based on Naverius Forest, Retem FORMERS are based on Lilipa, Kvaris FORMERS are based on Naverius Tundra, and Stia FORMERS are based on Amduskia.
  • Inverted with Rockbear Geo, which is functionally based on Rockbear's counterparts, the Cragbear and the Dunebear, but with the original Rockbear's color scheme as an homage to PSO2's Rockbear.
  • The Retem Region has desert-themed variations of existing NGS enemies. Even some of the FORMERS were recycled. Same with Kvaris' snow-themed variations and Stia's volcano-themed variants.
  • The fact that Zephetto and Resurgent ARKS terraformed Halpha with its environments artificially sustained implies that such reuse of bioforms was by design, to teach the new ARKS defenders to fight in a variety of environments.
  • Some of the Starless enemies are significantly enhanced versions of DOLLS. Justified in this case since the DOLLS were patterned after the Starless in terms of design and combat ability to train ARKS in fighting them, as Ilma and Dozer come to discover.
• Unexpected Gameplay Change: Some of the Cocoons and Towers are large-scale platforming challenges rather than traditional combat challenges, where the game tests your ability to wield the new mobility options.
• Variable Mix:
  • Just like PSO2, the music switches from an atmospheric field theme to a high-intensity battle theme when enemies are engaged in battle with you.
  • The Gigantix music sounds muffled when a Gigantix is nearby but you aren't fighting it. When a Gigantix's HP drops below a certain threshold, the music switches to a triumphant arrangement of the battle theme.
• Video Game Cruelty Potential: In addition to the DOLLS, the new world is also inhabited by a variety of docile wildlife called TAMES. You can proceed to kill said TAMES to harvest meat ingredients from them. And then there are the Rappies who don't even fight back and may drop N-Grinders when 'defeated', not to mention memes that glorify their abuse.
• Video Game Perversity Potential: The expanded face customization features available to the New Genesis face styles immediately prompted players to create extremely lewd expressions in much easier fashion than the original PSO2 faces. Then there's also the Creative Space, which is an open 3D canvas that allows you to build whatever—ahem—works of art you wish.
• Villain: Exit, Stage Left:
  • Upon Dark Falz's defeat, Crawford fires the Central Cannon at it, prompting it to summon Deflector Shields to block the attack. After it survives the onslaught, it teleports away to fight again another day.
  • This is the goal of Chapter 4. The heroes locate Dark Falz's base inside Stia's volcano and force it outside, where Crawford and Bruder strike it with the Central Cannon before it has time to react. Dark Falz survives and flees, but because its base has been compromised it cannot return to repair itself, giving ARKS a fighting chance at killing it once and for all.
  • When it does come back and gets thrashed by ARKS, Dark Falz Aegis tries to do this again; Crawford fires Central Cannon three times in a row to stop it. One empowered punch from the Meteorn later, and it goes down for good.
• Violation of Common Sense: It may be tempting to use 10 of a given capsule every time you attempt an affix, but for some rare Augments like Ael Domina, Mastery III and especially Halphinale this is a prohibitively expensive option despite minimizing the odds of getting screwed over by the RNG. The counter-intuitive but more sane option is to simply gamble on single capsules and hope one of your attempts sticks; sure, you may be gambling on anything between a 7% to 23% chance before campaign bonuses, but you may as well try 10 times rather than spend 10x as much to affix once, right?
• Virtual Paper Doll: As much of a feature in the original game as it is in this one, with even more options than before. You can mix-match race-locked features on your character with absolutely no limits to be had. Human with Deuman heterochromia? Sure. Want to be a Ridiculously Human Robot? Why not? Some crazy combination of all four races? Go ahead! The addition of non-standard anatomy parts such as reptilian tongues and Ear Fins further emphasizes your ability to make your creation as zany as you like it.
• Wall Jump: A technique called the Wall Kick allows players to gain an additional third jump by pressing the jump button near or holding a direction towards a solid wall, although it can only be used once per jump.
• Warp Whistle: Players can freely teleport to any Ryuker Device, Region Mag or Trainia they have found.
• Wave-Motion Gun:
  • Launchers have the Fear Eraser PA that enables them to charge up and fire a massive laser beam that has ridiculous reach and constantly fries anything in its path.
  • "Dark Falz", a gigantic DOLL that shows up to raze Aelio Town to the ground, has a core in its chest that it uses to fire an utterly massive beam at its target. When in its final phase in its Urgent Quest, it will use it on you and your allies.
  • Crawford reveals to the heroes the secret weapon of Central City: the "Central Cannon", a massive mounted superweapon that ARKS plans to use to fight Dark Falz. It initially starts out underpowered, only capable of repelling Dark Falz rather than killing it, but after receiving help from Ilma, an engineer hailing from Kvaris, it powers up enough to deal significant damage to Dark Falz when it returns as Dark Falz Aegis, weakening it enough for it to be killed for good.
• We Have Become Complacent: With the defeat of the Primordial Darkness and the complete elimination of the Falspawn, ARKS, having served its main purpose, weakened over the course of 500 years as there was no longer a fight for them to fight. This left them completely unprepared for the Starless, a force with strength approaching, if not on par with, the Falspawn, nearly causing their destruction. The next 500 years after the first Starless attack have been spent by a splinter faction, the Resurgent ARKS, attempting to create new ARKS members whose strength is comparable to ARKS at the peak of its power.
• Weapon of X-Slaying: Compared to the Glass Cannon Straga weapons, their 5★ counterparts, the Greaga weapons, don't penalize you for using them, but instead give a bigger multiplier against boss enemies.
• Weapon Tombstone: During a side story, Aina and the player revisit the Aelio Town Ruins, and while searching the wreckage they happen upon the shaft from Garoa's Partizan. Aina plants the fragment on top of a cliff overlooking the ruins in his memory alongside a bouquet of flowers; the weapon fragment will remain there whenever you visit that area after completing the side story. After the heroes defeat Zephetto and unveil the truth behind the war against the DOLLS, Aina takes the player and Manon back to the tombstone to pray for the fallen.
• Weaponized Teleportation: Kvaris has Proctys DOLLS, in Proctys Ael and Proctys Retena flavors. They are essentially people-sized boxes with arms and legs that generate wormholes from their "faces". Proctoss DOLLS attack by spitting attacks out of their wormholes, each of which is used by a DOLL in other regions. For example, Proctys Ael can teleport the arm of a Pettas Sword to attack, while Proctys Retena can fire explosive orbs that Sandoron uses.
• Wham Episode: As of April 2023, the final chapter of what is informally "Episode 1", which involves the mysterious floating island floating above Halpha since the beginning of the story, reveals the truth behind the DOLLS attack. Dark Falz is defeated at last, but Manon has disappeared. It turns out she knew exactly what was going on all along, and finally decided to try and put a stop to it on her own. As the DOLLS attacks escalate all over the planet, the player character and Aina encounter another Meteorn and find out that the battle between Meteorn and DOLLS was created explicitly as part of an "experiment". With the Meteorn's and Ilma's help, they reactivate a teleporter in Kvaris Lost Central to travel to the floating island of Leciel. They rescue Manon, and the three of them meet and defeat Zephetto, the mastermind behind the whole experiment and the leader of 'Resurgent ARKS', who wanted the Meteorn and DOLLS to fight it out until the ARKS Defenders were capable of being able to use photons to a certain threshold. He then claims to have had a very good reason for going to such extremes: after the events of the original game, without the Profound Darkness and its spawn to threaten the universe, ARKS became complacent and lost much of their photon-using capabilities, leaving them vulnerable when a new threat called the Starless appeared, with ARKS only avoiding being wiped out entirely when the Starless vanished without a trace. Anticipating the return of the Starless, Zephetto and his conspirators experimented to try and restore ARKS' fighting capabilities to how they once were when the Profound Darkness was around, and according to him, thanks to the player character, he succeeded with bringing out the needed results; And then the Starless show up ahead of schedule, causing him to perform a Heroic Sacrifice to take out the initial invasion force in order to buy time so the ARKS Defenders are ready to face the Starless.
• Wide-Open Sandbox: NGS is the first Phantasy Star game to change over from instanced fields to a seamless open world (dubbed "open-field") where players can traverse from the lobby to the game area and between zones in real-time a la Monster Hunter: World.
• Yin-Yang Bomb:
  • The first April 2022 update marks the return of the three Compound Techniques from PSO2; Zandion, Barantsion, and Fomelgion. However, while they share the same names and elements, they have different executions in NGS.
  • Ruine Angel possesses the ability to use the original Barantsion, just like its previous counterpart Omega Angel.

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