If you guys didn’t know, one of my favorite aspects about the video game Panzer Dragoon is the incredible artstyle. The art in the game is a mixture of one of my favorite comicbook artists, Mœbius and Studio Ghibli (especially the movie Nausicaa). On this week’s Monday Memories we will look at the art that inspired the great video game known as Panzer Dragoon!
Panzer Dragoon
Like I stated before, one of the biggest influences on the Panzer Dragoon series was the incredible artwork done by the comicbook artist known as Mœbius and so the Japanese developer actually had him do artwork for the title. Above are two pieces created by Mœbius, which one was actually the cover art for the first game in Japan. Sadly the American and European covers didn’t feature such awesome artwork, instead they featured computer generated version of the game’s characters. Why the change? I have no idea, maybe SEGA America & Europe didn’t want consumers to believe it was a 2D game. This was a big fear at the time, especially considering that the SEGA Saturn was built from the ground up for really nice 2D games.
Above is another great piece of art, this one showing off the beauty of a city below and giving you a great sense of height. Just imagine playing Panzer Dragoon now, on new next generation hardware and looking down, seeing a big city that is inhabited by people while you ride your dragon and battle it out in the sky. Sadly you couldn’t get this much detail out of the SEGA Saturn, which is a damn shame. If you are a big fan of the Mœbius artwork you see here, you should definitely check out The Will of the Ancient’s look at Mœbius work that resembles Panzer Dragoon.
If you want to see more incredible artwork based on Panzer Dragoon games, head over to the incredible The Will of the Ancients site. Best site on the internet for Panzer Dragoon related anything.
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The Saturn was Sega’s first standalone 3D-capable console. I suspect SoA was simply trying to impress consumers by using prerendered models from the game instead of Mobeius’s gorgeous artwork.
Try comparing first-party North American and Japanese Saturn game covers with one another. You’ll find this wasn’t just unique to Panzer Dragoon. It was part of a broader marketing strategy.
panzer dragoon rpg remake now 2018 hello SEGA