3ERSS PanSaga

Arguably the most sought after Sega game in history, Team
Andromeda's Panzer Dragoon Saga (PDS) concluded the Panzer trilogy
on the Saturn. Unlike the first two, which were rail shooters, PDS is an
RPG-giving gamers an opportunity to explore the Panzer world with
complete freedom in full 3D.

Set 30 years after the events of Panzer Dragoon (Zwei was a prequel),
the Empire is continuing its excavations in search of ancient weapons
from mankind's last great civilization. You play as Edge, a young guard
in the Imperial military assigned to protect one of the Empire's
excavation sites. One day you are attacked by the rebel leader
Craymen and his army of airships. They kill your mentor and kidnap
Azel, a mysterious girl recently uncovered in the excavations. You are
almost killed as well as you tumble down into a chasm in the site.
Trying to escape, you find yourself surrounded by bio-monsters; but
before they can attack a dragon swoops down into the cave and
destroys them. You have been selected by the dragon as its next rider.
You vow revenge on Craymen and begin your journey.

But you will soon find there is much more going on as you become
engulfed in the conflicting factions of the Imperials, Craymen, the
Seekers, and so on. Politics, mysticism, religion, and philosophy will hit
you from all sides as you realize the complexity of human nature as
everyone seeks to control the same power-an ancient Tower that holds
unbelievable destructive potential.

Gameplay

There are three main modes of play: walk, flight, and battle. Walk
occurs when you explore towns and camps on foot as Edge only. You
can run, talk with Non-player characters (NPCs), and examine most
objects via the face buttons. This is pretty standard RPG fare. Flight
occurs when Edge rides his dragon. Most of the game is completed via
flight and you have the freedom to explore the various areas on the
World Map. While the World Map is nothing new to the genre, the ability
to fly around on a dragon brings a sense of excitement to the game.

But Battle is where PDS separates itself from other RPGs. Battles take
place on your dragon. They aren't completely real-time, but they aren't
completely turn-based either. Regarding the basics, you can position
your dragon to the right, rear, left, or front of your opponents. Radar will
tell you where they are most vulnerable to attack and where you are
safest from their attacks. Meanwhile there are three gauges that
continually fill up (except when you position yourself). When a gauge
fills you can perform a function, from using an item, to firing your gun,
to firing your dragon's lasers, to using berserk (magic) attacks. Your
lock-on laser will generally tell you of any weak points on an enemy,
and often you will have to play around to learn the best way to defeat
an enemy.

After a battle you will earn experience points and dyne (money) based
on how well you fight. In my opinion, this process is quite arbitrary.
There were many times I felt I battled extremely well, only to come up
with the lowest ranking while other times I would earn a perfect rating
when I thought I made many mistakes. Thus, I didn't like how I got less
experience points on many battles I thought I fought well on.

As you gain more experience and level up, your total hit points (HP), the
damage you can take, and berserk points (BP), the amount of magic
you can do increase. In between areas of the game you can fly to Camp
and replenish both your HP and BP. As you progress you will learn new
Berserk attacks (spells) and your dragon will evolve. Eventually you will
be able to morph your dragon in real-time to better fight your enemies.
Your dragon has four major classes: Attack, Defense, Spirituality
(magic ability), and Agility (position speed and gauge speed). Attack
and Spirituality are complementary in that if you increase one, the
other will decrease. Defense and Agility are complementary as well.

So, you can choose to have a Normal (balanced dragon), or you can
adjust any of the four attributes whenever you want to create special
class dragons. None of the changes are permanent so if you find your
class inept against a certain enemy, you can adjust accordingly mid-
battle. That is, if you're fighting a boss that dishes out heavy attacks
and offers no safe zones, it's best to switch to a Defense class dragon.
If you need to stay on the move to win, switch to an Agility dragon. (My
preferred dragon was Agility with high Attack, but I switched it up a log
as needed).

All in all, the battle system is brilliant. The positioning system, the
multiple attack system, the real-time dragon morphing system-they all
add up to an innovative approach to RPG battling. Knowing whether to
use your gun, your laser, or your berserk, as well as what dragon class
to fight in, can greatly affect how easily you win. I say win only because
many people complain that PDS is too easy. And I'll admit that I only
lost one battle during the entire game (due to carelessness
nonetheless), but you don't really think about that while you're playing.
I enjoyed and appreciated not having to re-fight battles. Battles are still
randomly generated, but they aren't overwhelming. And I love the real-
time dragon morphing. None of that picking a class and being stuck
with it for the entire game crap.

The game itself is rather linear as far as the story goes. So even though
there is the freedom to go to almost anywhere on the Map, the story
itself is plotted out and there is no escaping it. Some of the puzzles are
rather obvious while some are excellent. But overall, there is little to
complain about in the gameplay department.

97%

Graphics

Building off of the brilliance of Zwei, the graphics in PDS are superb
(especially for a system that can't do 3D, right?). You will be treated to
some amazing FMV scenes, but the in-game graphics are great as well.
If you fly your dragon low to the desert sand will kick up. In an
underground water tunnel a whale passes by. Fish jump out of the
water in a valley river. Birds fly around the skies of an old ruin.
Sandworms jump in the desert. The sun's reflection off the water
changes as the sun sets. Campfire light flickers off the ground. The
setting is intriguing and captures the Panzer ambience very well. There
is some rare slowdown and noticeable popup, but the world itself is
quite large. Moreover, load times are basically nonexistent-an amazing
accomplishment for the 32-bit era.

97%

Sound

The soundtrack to the first two Panzer games where superb and PDS
continues the tradition. Each orchestral track complements the exact
mood of the game-filling in flawlessly. The sound effects are great as
well and the dialogue is fully voiced. The in-game dialogue is in
Japanese while the intro and ending are in �Panzerese.� Every
character has multiple responses (all of them voice-acted!), which only
adds to the realism of the game.

94%

Replay

RPGs tend to suffer in the replay area simply because they are so long
(most RPGs require a 40 hour commitment). PDS is not one of those
RPGs as it clocks in at 15-20 hours. I beat it in 17 hours and I was
pretty thorough in my explorations. And while many people complain
about its shortness, I thought it was almost perfect. I say almost
because for a split second towards the end of the game I felt like it
dragged on (dare I say it!), and I questioned why the developers were
forcing me to do this lengthy and repetitive puzzle. But, all in all, the
game length was right on. None of this leveling up crap for 20 hours like
other RPGs. Nope. PDS sticks to its story and tells it like it was meant
to be told, wrapping up the trilogy and connecting it with the other two
games.

Because of the short length and excellent gameplay, though, if anyone
were to replay an entire RPG a second time, PDS would be first choice-
especially because the story itself is so deep. It will make you think,
and that's a good thing. Just take a look at all the PDS theories that
have popped up on the web as an example of how complex the Panzer
storyline really is.

After you defeat the game you unlock a few bonus surprises (as is
Team Andromeda's tradition). And even though they won't keep you
interested very long, they were a nice addition.

89%

Overall

The pricetag for PDS nowadays is extremely high. If you loved the first
two games you will love PDS, but you have to remember that it was
released in 1998 (and that was a long time ago); so, it might not seem
so special anymore (especially at that price). Some people claim it's
the best RPG ever made. I'm not going to tell them they're wrong
because it really is a great game and it was definitely under-
appreciated in its time. It's not a flawless game, but none of the minor
issues prove to matter in this masterpiece.

The story is great; the gameplay is great (the battle system is superb);
the graphics are great; and the soundtrack is great. All in all, PDS was a
great end to the trilogy and saddening proof that the Saturn could have
offered the gaming world so much more.

95%