Don't Hate: Emulate! (Phantasy Star 2 Portable Infinite Part 2)

21 Jan, 2026

Phantasy Star Portable 2 Infinite Part 2

How it started

Emilia looks dejected as the two of you step onto your Company ship for a job.

“Do we really have to work, Bear?”

“Another day another dollar, kid.”

How it’s going

“LOCK THE FUCK IN OLD MAN! KEEP UP! GOTTA GET PAAAAID!”

Emilia is unloading an assault rifle down range while the player character is mixing it up in melee.

“I have killed just as many of them as you, Emilia.”

A Foreword of Comparisons

This game reminds me so much of a Dreamcast RPG that I keep expecting the climax to kick in incredibly suddenly and usher me to the end of the game in a couple hours. But the story keeps building and the game keeps going.

And this is only Episode 1.

I imagine they saved a lot of disc space by having simple areas with re-usable “Cell” style design instead of completely bespoke areas. Not a dig, either, incredibly clever space saver for a smaller storage medium. “Visual novel” style cutscenes with scant video clips was also smart, something that helped games like Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker be more game on such a small storage medium. If I were doing a direct comparison between games, I would be playing Phantasy Star Episode 1 or Episode 2 to compare, but...It does mostly the same things. Saves space with re-usable cells and areas, tells its story entirely through text instead of overloading the disc with voice clips, and makes good use of its storage space.

Evolution has already taught us what the average Dreamcast RPG is paced like. I do hope there’s a fan translation for El Dorado Gate at some point, though, because it would be really interesting to play. Masterful 2D art spread across several full size games, but... never came west, never been translated. Without going into a full tangent, Dreamcast RPG design is either like Evolution, where the plot happens around you in a few steps while you complete disconnected objectives and then everything wraps up in a grand finale...though the road there is usually short enough to make it feel somewhat if not entirely unearned. As I’ve said in my Evolution posts, Mag himself seems like a bit of a dimbulb because of his level of disconnection from the plot until he has to jump in and clean everything up that he didn’t even know was happening.

The other kind of Dreamcast RPG design is Everything Happens Forever for about 20 hours until it all wraps up. This is better than the first example, arguably, as your victory feels earned and “Wait what? I guess this is happening now, oh SHIT OH SHIT OH SHIT!” is a more visceral feeling than “While I was out in Nondescript Ruins 4, Shithat McDoodle came and kidanpped Princess Butterbeans?!”

Phantasy Star Portable 2 Infinite, henceforth referred to as PSP2, manages to avoid the pacing problems of its predecessors much the same way PSP (Phantasy Star Portable) did. Good use of padding.

Much like an anime can use filler properly to deliver character building the manga’s author originally wanted to but did not have time or energy to, “Padding” is a neutral word. In this case, you are a mercenary tasked with going on “Open Missions” between Story Missions. Not only does this help you afford better equipment, skills, and make you stronger, it gets across the feeling of being an actual mercenary, not getting hired onto an agency just before shit flies so far off the handle it enters orbit.

It also supports a really... what would become bog standard “Go fight things to get strong to fight bigger things” ARPG loop that games like Diablo 2 popularized. Infinite Growth Mill powered by, in PSP2I’s case, “Reincarnating” your level down to 1 and getting a bunch of bonus points to add to skills and “Extend codes” to raise equipment rank based on Reincarnation Points (RP) you spend, which builds up the further above level 50 you were when you reincarnated. The setting and story are just kind of gravy to an overall...

Deep, extensive, and kind of repetitive action RPG that you can play in multiplayer. You can even still play online, using emulator netplay, but setting it up beforehand can be a pain, let alone finding a group.

The big thing about this game that a lot of people forget emulating it and it’s predecessor is that they are handheld titles. “The missions are only 10 minutes long at most with a linear track through a few rooms...”

Yeah, the sleep mode on the PSP wasn’t great! Alongside... well, have you ever tried to play a longform multiplayer dungeon on a device with battery life upwards of three hours if you don’t have an outlet to plug your AC adapter into at a convention? The Phantasy Star portable games are meant to be played in “bites” with friends over the course of a long time, or at home near a plug in for the story and leveling yourself up for multiplayer. Quick bites of dungeon crawling combined with a compact “City” area for shopping for your next dungeon delve and a private room to decorate.

This still feels like more “Game” than a Dreamcast RPG. I don’t know what it was about the Dreamcast that made genres that had been structurally “figured out” at that point so... strange? Grandia 2 and Skies of Arcadia feel like the least... “off” RPGs on that particular platform, which I keep bringing up because Phantasy Star Portable is a continuation of Phantasy Star Universe, which is a successor to Phantasy Star Online, a full blown MMORPG on the Dreamcast that also feels like one of the most complete games on the system.

The PS2’s own RPG, Final Fantasy 11, ended up feeling much less complete at launch, at least.

Back on the topic at hand, PSP2 has a story that feels like it’s moving quickly, where a lot happens very quickly, but in a way that’s... is believable the right word? Believably slow moving at the same time.

Despite Mika warning us about the Ancients, we don’t actually know where to start. Trying to simply halt the Subspace research is suicide for the entire system, and nobody would ever believe us besides. So we’re bopping about doing random jobs for pay while the protagonist mentors Emilia in the ways of the mercenary. She’s... genuinely taking to field work like a duck to water, getting actual praise from and growing closer to Kraz, her legal guardian and boss. The CEO of Little Wing and CLAD 6’s commander sort of... decided to take up residence in the office, too, after an attack on the station where Kraz completely fucks up the response because he’s drunk.

Then you meet a Guardian. The biggest defense agency in the system, but according to Emilia it’s run by nepo babies and hilariously ineffectual, even if everyone seems to immediately respect a Guardian as soon as they’re in the room, and Tonnio, one of the party members you pick up, is super cagey about his time with them.

There’s a lot to talk about that I don’t want to go into that much because...

I’m gonna be real

Emulate. Nobody is getting hurt. I legally can’t link you the files but PPSSPP is free to download and completely legal. Emulation itself is legally protected. Don’t listen to people screaming at the top of their lungs that emulating “Ruins the spirit of gaming” or whatever, or that you’re taking food out of developer’s mouths when you don’t buy a game and real hardware from a collector (reseller).

One day there’s not gonna be any more of that stuff left. Archival and passing the tapes is something that’s kind of my duty as an archivist, and sharing these stories and opinions is something really important to me. Art deserves to be preserved for and experienced by everyone. Not just people who can afford to give someone 100 dollars for a dubiously working PSP and a potentially working UMD disc. The same goes for everything.

And me? I archive and I dive. I share these stories in the hopes that other people will say “That sounds pretty cool!” and hunt the game down and play it any way they can. I’m a bit of an archive diver..

A Time Diver, if you will.

Evolution’s duology continues in the next two posts! Thanks for reading!