UPDATED: Phantasy Star Online 2 Heading for North America and Europe in 2013

UPDATE

Turns out that post was dead on. Sega has officially sent out the press release that was posted on PSOWorld. Blam.

ORIGINAL POST

A post on Massively today reports that an announcement regarding a Western release of Phantasy Star Online 2 is forthcoming later today. The news comes by way of a forum post on PSOWorld, a community site devoted to all things Phantasy Star, which claims that Sega will announce that the game will be coming to North America and Europe in early 2013. In addition, there’s a very official-looking localized website devoted to the sequel, which launched in Japan last week.

Chris Olson, Sega of America’s Vice President of Digital Business, is quoted in the supposed press release:

“Phantasy Star Online was a revolutionary game when it was released, and we want to make sure that its successor in the series is every bit as ambitious. We look forward to introducing Phantasy Star Online 2’s unique, easy-to-access multiplayer action to the rest of the world next year!”

PSOWorld’s press release also offers some of the pheatures that phans can look phorward to:

• Deep sci-fi fantasy universe filled with lush landscapes, extraordinary creatures, and epic adventures
• Revolutionary real-time combat and third-person action with devastating combos and counters to master
• Flexible, class-based leveling system that lets players define their own play-style with distinctive melee, ranged, and magic weapon types
• Randomized dungeon maps and unexpected mid-quest encounters that ensure each quest is different for each player
• Deep character creation system with a nearly limitless number of potential appearances
• Three degrees of humanity to experience across three unique races: the versatile Humans, spiritually-powered Newmen, and artificial CAST

Personally, I will never, ever play Phantasy Star Online 2. The original PSO for the Dreamcast is what swore me off any kind of online RPG forever. I was a freshman in college, and I was playing the shit out of that game for all hours—even well into the night before one of my final exams. Just pushing the buttons, over and over…man. That game. It was like crack. Never again.

PSOWorld via Massively