Played
Phantasy Star until 3 AM. Wow, the Ages version is really good.
I'm playing on "Ages Mode" (enemies give you 4x money and exp) and it works very well. In the original game, money is tight and you need to grind a lot at certain spots because there are some crucial items that are very expensive. Even regular equipment sold in towns is pretty expensive and you have to grind for it, so I usually skip most of the weapons and armors sold in shops.
in Ages mode, however, it looks like I always have the right amount of money to buy new equipment. Not only that, but grinding for those expensive items is very quick. I think the 4x number is the sweet spot: it doesn't break the game, but you get enough money to try new equipment and advance without the need to grind. Super cool stuff.
I think I'm finally getting used to the FM sound. While some themes sound more melodic in the non-FM version, I think the FM version sounds more modern and smooth (my wife says "this version isn't annoying", I guess that's a good thing ^_^). The FM dungeon theme in particular sounds surprisingly close to the remixed version found in Phantasy Star IV.
I also like the display options. I don't usually enable filters, but smoothing makes the game look a lot like it did when I played it as a kid and I think it enhances the shades, giving the dungeons a comic book style that was probably intended by the devs at the time:
No filters
Smoothing enabled
The only issue I've found so far is the weird crackling in the town theme. Oh, and the music stutters veeeeeery briefly when you save the game, but I'm being super picky here :P