Panzer Dragoon Zwei

Classic SEGA Ads: Panzer Dragoon Zwei’s US Commercial

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You want to know how good Panzer Dragoon Zwei is? It’s apparently caused a nuclear holocaust. Think about that.

From what I’ve seen of them, SEGA Saturn commercials are…weird. Worse yet, they often aren’t really all that appealing. This one in many ways is kind of perfect example of that. Here they have this weird, quirky Japanese rail shooter where you destroy hoards of enemies atop a laser-shooting dragon, and what do they do? Compare dicks with the Playstation.

Of course, bit-measuring and graphics chest thumping was all the rage back in ‘90s video game advertising, but the sad thing about its use here is that it does nothing to make me want the game or the system. The commercial really is just kind of…lazy. It definitely has nothing on Japan’s iconic Segato Sanshiro campaign, or the Xbox’s Panzer Dragoon Orta commercial, which we’ll be getting to next month.

I’ll admit, Zwei is probably a hard game to fit into SEGA of America’s typical commercial formula. It has no attitude to it, and it’s very Japanese. That said, I doubt commercials like this did the Saturn many favors.

To wash the taste of this one out of your mouth, I’ve gone ahead and included the Segato Sanshiro commercial for Panzer Dragoon Saga below. It’s pretty much an abridged version of the Zwei ad, but its still got that awesome theme song!

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The Future of Panzer Dragoon

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It’s hard to believe Panzer Dragoon Orta is more than 12 years old. Looking back, Orta has aged incredibly well. Its visuals are still gorgeous and its gameplay still feels just as smooth and polished as it did in 2003. In an age where all sorts of obscure games are seeing digital re-releases and all sorts of franchises and genres are finding new life in the realm of digital, I think it’s a missed opportunity that Panzer Dragoon hasn’t received any sort of new release while digital gaming has been booming.

So today I thought I’d write up an article exploring the many ways Panzer Dragoon could (and should) fit into SEGA’s renewed focus on digital and mobile gaming.

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Developer Retrospective: We take flight with SEGA’s Team Andromeda

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The SEGA Saturn’s surprise early launch in America is considered one of the most disastrous mistakes in the history of the video game industry. It angered SEGA’s third party publishers and retail partners, it allowed Sony to get the drop on the Saturn with a lower price point and it ultimately destroyed SEGA’s dominance in the American market, financially crippling SEGA permanently. The launch did have a bright spot though: it introduced the games of SEGA’s Team Andromeda to the West.

This month is devoted to the games of Team Andromeda, and to kick things off we have a developer and Panzer Dragoon franchise retrospective. Ready to take flight?

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Panzer Dragoon creator talks about his time at SEGA

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Eurogamer is running a pretty neat piece on Yukio Futatsugi, the creator of the Panzer Dragoon franchise. Like every great piece they go into detail on how he grew up, the schools he went to and how he ended up at SEGA. One of the neat pieces of information was that at age 23 he took over Team Andromeda. Think about it, this dude was in charge of many people older than him at the age of 23. He was 25 when Panzer Dragoon came out. Crazy!

“I handed in several proposals, one of which was Panzer Dragoon,” says Futatsugi. “I’d only been there about two years, but they accepted my proposal and put me in charge of the project. Just like that I was making Panzer Dragoon for the Saturn launch. It was a difficult project. All the programmers and designers were above me in the company but I had to tell them what to do, which was tricky. But I was young, so I could be stubborn.”– Yukio Futatsugi

The piece goes on and talks about his work after leaving SEGA, working at Microsoft Studios and releasing Phantom Dust (a great Xbox game, if you haven’t played it). He also confirms that Crimson Dragon is still in the works!

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Petition: Asking SEGA for remastered versions of the Panzer Dragoon games

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The guys over at The Will of the Ancients have posted up a very good petition, one that asks SEGA to remaster the past Panzer Dragoon games for current generation consoles. Not to mention the recent passing of artist Jean Giraud, now is the perfect time for SEGA to bring these classics back. You want them, I want them. Sign the petition below!

http://www.panzerdragoonrevival.com/

Spread the above link, everywhere. Also follow The Will of the Ancients on twitter.

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SEGA Tunes: Panzer Dragoon Zwei “Forest of Taboo”

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You know you’re listening to a great theme when your moving your dragon to it. The jungle level was one of my favorite areas in Zwei. Enemies coming at you from every direction, as you fly under a forest canopy, and one of the first really good themes of the game playing the background. I was really tempted to go with the stellar menu theme here, but I really wanted to go with something from inside the actual game.

It was in Zwei that we really began to get the Panzer Dragoon music DNA that would permeate the rest of the series. In place of the epic,  westernized orchestrations of the original Panzer Dragoon was instead a soundtrack that relied heavily on music that sounded tribal in nature.  This music helped define the series as something unique and all together different from other games, and helped give Panzer’s unique world some additional, cultural flavor.

Another great example of this is “Ruins”, which you can hear below the fold.

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Weekly Five: Saturn titles that should be on modern consoles

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One of the best things about the SEGA Saturn is it’s wide array of exclusives. While Dreamcast lost many of its best exclusives to its competitors shortly after it died, the exodus of Saturn exclusives has been painfully slow. A port here, a remake there, but nothing like the sort of treatment that Dreamcast, Genesis, and even Game Gear/Master System libraries got after SEGA’s departure from the console business. Heck, when a Saturn game does get ported, it doesn’t even get localized much of the time. Why the general lack of porting or emulation? Well, according to Panzer Dragoon series director Yukio Fatatsugi, it’s because SEGA has misplaced the source code for many of their Saturn games, meaning that many games now on the Saturn will never see the light of day on another console unless they are completely rebuilt from the ground up, something that is probably unlikely to happen.

Hey, a gamer can dream, right? Here are five Saturn titles that I think should see the light of day on modern consoles, whether it be a port, emulation, or a total remake for a retail release. Since I recently wrote an entire article demanding an Astal remake, and since Guardian Heroes is now going to be the latest Saturn title to make the leap, obviously those won’t be counted.

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