Phantasy Star IV: The End of the Millennium is a 1993 role-playing video game developed and published by Sega for the Sega Genesis. The fourth main installment in the Phantasy Star series, it is the final title in the original tetralogy and is currently the last traditional role-playing game in the franchise. The game's plot follows the hunters Alys and Chaz, as well as their traveling party, attempting to stop an ecological crisis from destroying their solar system. Phantasy Star IV kept many of the gameplay elements of the previous game, including turn-based battles, overhead exploration, and magic spells. It received positive reviews and has been listed among the greatest video games of all time.
Gameplay Phantasy Star IV is an archetypal role-playing video game, featuring the staples of exploration, NPC interaction, and turn-based combat. Like the previous games in the Phantasy Star series, individual characters each have their own statistics and equipment that determine the character's performance in combat, improving their statistics by gaining experience levels (achieved through victory in combat). Additionally, non-android characters have access to "Techniques" (i.e. magic spells), the use of which draw upon a character's pool of "Technique Points" (TP), with new techniques being learned as a character gains levels. Phantasy Star IV has a number of features new to the series, including combination techniques, manga-style panel illustrations that accompany the narrative, and an expanded script. The instruction manual for the American version states that there are 15 possible combination-attacks. However, only 14 were ever discovered. Occasionally, the "secret technique" Feeve, a useless technique accessible through hacking, is mistaken for the "lost 15th combo".
Plot
Phantasy Star IV takes place 1,000 years after the events of Phantasy Star II and 1,000 years before the era of Phantasy Star III. After an event called the Great Collapse, much of the once-thriving planet Motavia has reverted to its original desert-state as the climate and biosphere-controlling devices installed over a thousand years previously begin to fail, and life has become progressively more difficult for the planet's inhabitants. To make matters worse, there has been a marked increase in the numbers of the "biomonsters", a catch-all term for the strange and violent aberrations of Motavia's flora and fauna. Keeping these creatures under control is the job of "hunters." Hired by Piata Academy on Motavia, hunters Alys Brangwin and her young partner Chaz Ashley begin their investigation into the relationship between the biomonster problem and the planet's ecological crisis. Joined by others along the way, they connect the world's troubles to a cult leader called Zio, "The Black Magician", whose aims appear to be total annihilation of not only Motavia but of the whole Algol solar system. During their initial confrontation, Zio summons Dark Force and mortally wounds Alys with its Dark Energy Wave. Taking the lead upon her passing, Chaz is joined by Alys's wizard acquaintance Rune Walsh who helps break the barrier on Zio's tower and eliminate the wizard to restore the computer systems maintaining Motavia. With no change in Algo's abnormal conditions, the party turns their attention to a malfunctioning satellite space station found to be contaminated by Dark Force, which they are forced to engage and purge. However, Algo's disasters remain unabated and the party is further baffled as they encounter multiple incarnations of Dark Force along the way. Traveling to Rykros, an unknown fourth planet of the Algo solar system, Chaz and his companions learn of the Profound Darkness: a powerful entity banished behind a planetary seal billions of years ago that is able to manifest its hatred in physical form as Dark Force every thousand years due to fluctuations in the seal. With the seal now severely weakened by the planet Parma's destruction during the Great Collapse, Chaz and his party enter the Profound Darkness's dimension and eliminate it before it is able to break completely free and destroy the galaxy. With the evil banished for good and the party going their separate ways, Rika – a numan girl in the group – chooses to stay behind with Chaz as they bid everyone farewell, remembering the sacrifice of those who have defended Algo through the ages and awaiting the next one to come.
Release The game was released in Japan in December 1993, North America in February 1995 and the United Kingdom and Europe in November 1995. The End of the Millennium was the first Phantasy Star title not to be localized to Brazil by Tec Toy. Sega initially stated that they would not publish the game in Europe. In the United States, the game retailed for just under $100. The cover art for the American and European releases was done by Boris Vallejo. Both covers depict Chaz, Rika, and Rune, but the American/European box art deviates from their appearance in-game. In Japan, the game was initially announced as Phantasy Star IV, but by the time of release, it had been renamed Phantasy Star: The End of the Millennium. At the time, this renaming was seen by the gaming press as an attempt to make it clear that the game was a followup to Phantasy Star II. The American and European releases took the title Phantasy Star IV, though the title screen of all versions of the game reads Phantasy Star: The End of the Millennium. The titles are combined to Phantasy Star IV: The End of the Millennium in the Sega Genesis Collection compilation. Phantasy Star IV was the last Phantasy Star game until Phantasy Star Online (2000), which has a mainly unrelated story.
Ports and remakes An unlicensed demake of the game for the 8 bits NES famiclones was published in Chinese by Fuzhou Waixing Computer Science & Technology Co. Ltd. in 1996. The game was ported as part of Phantasy Star Collection for the Sega Saturn, released only in Japan. It was also included in the Sega Genesis Collection, Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection, Sega Genesis Classics, and the Sega Genesis Mini. Sega Ages planned a remake for the PlayStation 2 console, having revamped the first two games: Phantasy Star Generation 1 and Phantasy Star Generation 2.
Reception
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