Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis will delay the Summoner's arrival into late 2022. Originally planned for the spring, the Summoner was included in pre-launch plans for the spring, but the recent roadmap heading into 2022 did not include it.
This matter was brought up in the most recent Headline stream during the Q&A. The Summoner has been pushed back on the priority list in order for the dev team to focus on improving existing content and strengthening what’s already included. Given that the rough schedule for major updates and new chapters is roughly twice a year, with other updates in between, some had called for more of that in between development to improve and add more.
The Summoner seems to be the most visible casualty of the delay to shift focus on current content, but the pet-based class will come. It will just have to happen later than originally anticipated, but the team will announce a date down the line when it’s known. The requests for “expanding adventuring elements” have been heard, so this was why the new class had to move down the list. Additionally, an unannounced class from PSO2 that wields a gunblade has also been pushed down in priority for the same reasons.
Yet, the delay in adding more classes should give them a good opportunity to shore up the game from its foundation. With the Bouncer being added this fall and the new region of Retem out, with its series of challenges and a whole new chapter in the story, there’s plenty to fine tune and improve going forward, but they’re not so far from launch that they have so much to overhaul to get things on track to support the long waits between major content updates.
You can see the Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis development roadmap for 2022 here.
