My Life with SEGA returns this week with a review of the acclaimed SEGA Saturn game, Panzer Dragoon. Probably one of my favorite franchises in SEGA’s huge catalog of unique IPs, this week you get to see A.J. give you his take on the game.
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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!
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!
I’ve been struggling to figure out just what tune to feature this week. Panzer Dragoon’s Flight seemed so fitting! After all, it was used in the All Stars Racing demo Jason and I got to try out. Unfortunately, Flight had already been featured during Panzer Dragoon month. In the end there could only be one choice, another classic SEGA song from Saturn era.
Ladies and gentleman, Richard Jacques’ Super Sonic Racing! Sonic R is known for its cheesy lyrics and energetic singer, so much so that the PC version actually had an option that allowed players to turn them off. Frankly, I can’t imagine playing Sonic R without this music. It turned what was otherwise a mediocre racer with poor controls into one of the most memorable spin-offs in the mascot’s history. Fans don’t remember this game for the tracks or the characters, they remember it for its over the top soundtrack!
Yesterday it was the announcement, preview and podcast. Today: concept art! Thanks to French gaming site console-toi.fr comes a collection of artworks from the Panzer Dragoon and Monkey Ball tracks. They also released a few new screens including a look at the back of B.D. Joe’s vehicle in flight. Fun fact: some screens have a “ASN” label. This refers to the game’s internal name “All-Stars Next”. Check out the concept art, and new screens, after the break!
Sega has become synonymous with San Francisco. Station Square and the City Escape level from Sonic Adventure are loosely based on it as well as the first Crazy Taxi game. Even Sega of America itself has its offices based in the city by the bay. So it’s only natural that here is where they show off their latest game in the All-Star/Superstar series that includes both the blue-blur and B.D. Joe.
Just off the 101 freeway in good ‘ol San Fran is a Go-Kart tracing track which for one Tuesday afternoon, was taken over by Sega. In a meeting lounge, me and Nux (check out his preview at TSS) and other press were presented with the first preview of two tracks from Sonic and All-Stars Racing Transformed. (Sega, if you’re going to shorten the title, wouldn’t “Sonic and Sega Racing Transformed” have been better? You’re cutting out your own name!) Anyway, onto the preview!
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.
French artist Jean Giraud has sadly passed away today at age 73. He died of cancer. Jean earned world fame through his uniquely beautiful art style and worked on many comic books and films including Alien, Tron, The Fifth Element and even Star Wars. Sega fans will know his artwork from the fantastic 1995 game Panzer Dragoon released on the Sega Saturn.
Jean’s art was no doubt one of the biggest influences on the Panzer Dragoon series and went a long way in shaping its beautiful, melancholy world. I’ve personally always been a fan of his art, he created barren yet beautiful landscapes like no other. He will be missed. Rest in Peace, Mœbius.
Panzer Dragoon is my favorite video game series of all time, thanks in no small part to the consistently awesome musical score. For the first game, I had some major difficulties deciding between the full version of the main menu theme, or Flight. They are both superb pieces, and an interesting look at Panzer Dragoon’s musical style before it settled on a specific style in Zwei. The theme here is a bit more typical kind of orchestration, with horns, violins, and flutes, with some tambourines keeping a nice beat in the background. Not quite what the rest of the series sounds like.
Below the fold you’ll find the full version of the menu theme.
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.
Fumito Ueda is one of my favorite people in the industry and runs one of the best teams at Sony, Team ICO. They are working on the upcoming (and excellent looking) title, The Last Guardian.
Fumito Ueda talked on twitter about how he has been a massive SEGA fan since they released the Mark III in Japan. I have actually heard about him being a big SEGA fan and actually being friends with Ryuta Ueda (who worked on Jet Set Radio, Panzer Dragoon series and Yakuza series). They even have the same last name… weird?
Something about Team ICO’s games always reminded me of Panzer Dragoon… I could never put my finger on it.
[Source: AndriaSang]
One of SEGA’s most loved games is Panzer Dragoon Saga, it is also one that probably hasn’t been played by many. The game is pretty rare and received a very limited release. We see how SEGA could bring back a Panzer Dragoon RPG to modern home consoles.
After you spend hours in your favorite SEGA game, you always get those damn catchy tunes stuck in your head. They won’t go away, now we will share our favorite SEGA soundtracks, hopefully they stay stuck in your brain like they have ours.
If your favorite soundtrack wasn’t featured, make sure you head down to the comment section and share.
Yukio Futatsugi, creator of Phantom Dust and developer on Panzer Dragoon, is working on Project Draco. The game even looks like Panzer Dragoon, especially if you have seen the artwork (pictured above). Regardless of this, Microsoft Game Studios VP Phil Spencer says its not a Panzer Dragoon game, only inspired by.
“It’s a Kinect game for one thing, which is going to have its own take on it, there are some differences between — as a Panzer Dragoon fan — the stuff we’ve seen in the Panzer Dragoon series and [Project Draco] … Futasugi-san does have a passion for dragons and the interactions between humans and dragons, I think you could say ‘inspired by’ and obviously Futatsugi-san’s heritage with that franchise is an important part of his history. Wouldn’t characterize [Project Draco] as a Panzer Dragoon game.” – Phil Spencer Microsoft Game Studios VP
He says the game is going to be its own and even goes as far as to say “I think there’s some great things about the mechanic in Panzer Dragoon that can work really well, but we’re not in any way trying to diminish the value of that franchise or steal from it.” If this is a rail shooter, with the same art and concept as Panzer Dragoon; can we call him on his words?
[Source: Joystiq]