2003 Sega
Except for a couple minor ventures, the GameCube has been pretty barren when it comes to the RPG market. Skies of Arcadia Legends, an enhanced port of the Dreamcast original, is thus a very pleasant surprise. It's a traditional RPG in the truest sense of the word, featuring random turn-based battles, an expansive world map, and a plethora of upgradeable weapons, armors, and magics.
The story takes place in the land of Arcadia - a world composed of floating islands and flying ships. Vyse and Aika are two members of the Blue Rogues, a pirate group that steals from the rich and gives... well... to themselves. During a routine raid of a Valuan vessel (they're the bad guys), they stumble upon and rescue Fina, a mysterious girl dressed all in white. Lead by Vyse's desire to explore the entire world, and Fina's mysterious mission, the trio sets out on an adventure that takes them from the highest lands above the clouds to the deepest depths of the planet's chaotic surface.
Standard battles are staunchly ground-based, with each party taking turns to attack. On each turn you can make one of your fighters attack, use a special move, use magic, use an item, defend, or focus. All magics and special moves use a predetermined amount of Spirt Points, which are shared between all members of the party. Your Spirit Points will increase at the end of every turn, or when a character chooses the "focus" command. Depending upon how many Spirit Points an attack consumes, it can range from piddling to incredibly devastating.
As you progress through a battle, you can switch the alignment of your characters' weapons between 6 different colors. Depending upon the color you have selected, you will be able to do more or less damage to certain enemies. Also, which color you have selected directly effects what types of magics you will be able to learn. Keep a character's weapon set to yellow most of the time, and he will learn mostly lightning spells. Keep the weapon set to green, and he'll learn mostly recovery spells. By altering the alignment of your weapons regularly, you can decide which of your characters will be proficient in what types of magics.
While flying over the world map in your ship, you can engage in yet another type of battle. Usually reserved for certain boss battles or other huge baddies, Ship battles take on a completely different dynamic from hand-to-hand fights. You are presented with a 4x8 grid in which you can plot the order of your attacks. The first 4x4 grid represents the positioning of your attacks for your characters over the current 4 rounds, and the second represents the upcoming round. You place your attacks or defenses in certain grids depending upon your enemy's predetermined weaknesses or advantages, and sit back and watch the ships duke it out. As you progress through the game your weaponry and defenses will become more powerful, through items bought from shops or won from important battles.
Skies of Arcadia Legends also features a refreshing customization system, where you can choose to seek out and recruit crew members for your ship. These crew members will take up residence on your ship, and assist in its functionality. Many of them boost your ship's stats just by being aboard, and others provide special abilities in battle. Also, once you get your own home base, your crew members will set up shop and provide you with many useful things. Some sell you a variety of items, while others upgrade the appearance and functionality of your base.
But what's so different from the Dreamcast version of the game? The changes in graphics and sound are negligible, and the game still looks and sounds like its Dreamcast counterpart. The majority of the changes involve added content. You can now go bounty hunting based upon information you acquire at a sailor's guild, and attempt to capture some dangerous fugitives. These "Wanted Battles" are some of the most difficult fights in the game, and will definitely challenge your abilities. Another addition is the scattering of "Moonfish" throughout the areas of the game. If you collect and bring these creatures to the man looking for them, you'll be rewarded with many rare items previously only accessible through the Dreamcast's VMU unit. Lastly, there is the bounty hunter Piastol. This mysterious girl fights you several times during the game, attempting to defeat you for unknown reasons. Both the Piastol and Moonfish segments of the game actually provide additional backstory for the characters that wasn't present in the original Skies of Arcadia. There have also been various tweaks involving game balance, such as faster-paced battles and less frequent random encounters.
Features- The GameCube's first bonefied traditional RPG
- Soar above and below 6 huge worlds in your moonstone-powered flying battleship
- Battle both on the ground and in the air with dramatic strategy-based ship battles
- New "Wanted Battles" and additional sidequests
- Customize your own crew and home base to enhance your abilities and boost morale
Jason Nuyens: One of the major appeals of Skies of Arcadia: Legends is that it caught me off guard. So before you read any more, I need to make it known that its a highly recommended purchase. I warn you because one of the major reasons I was so impressed with it is that I wasnt sure what to expect. One of my colleagues was mentioning to me that when he got it on Dreamcast a while back it was most impressive because it came out of nowhere. The same sort of thing happened with me. I heard it was a good RPG, but little did I know it would end up being one of my favorite games ever.
What a fantastic ride you are taken on. Today its really hard to find a long game that is paced really well. Nintendos development teams have this down to a science, but third parties often get caught with games that are poorly paced. Here, the minute you start your adventure, you are taken through a series of story sequences to make you feel like you are part of pirate life. Right away you have a good sense of the characters and how they live their normal lives on a small island. This playful and relaxing setting feels really grand, and oddly enough its only the tip of the iceberg. Nothing you see at the beginning gives you the idea that you are about to embark on one of the largest journeys ever. Looking back, I remember the feeling of not knowing what kind of adventure awaited me. Once I was thrown headfirst into the full-scale expedition there was no turning back.
Story-wise, the game still surprised. The stakes end up being a lot higher than I thought it was going to be. It had this interesting way to make you underestimate the title many times and then be surprised when youre proven wrong. For instance, I thought the story was going to be very sedated and brief. It ended up being the exact opposite. The game is absolutely massive, and has characters with lots of energy and personality. When characters talk, they show the appropriate reactions through their body language. Even though the character animations arent as significant as, say, the Wind Waker, its still exceptionally appropriate. Sometimes I would catch myself giggling at the characters facial expressions and dialogue. To put it simply, the story was engaging and fun. It doesnt have a lot of sensationally dramatic elements like other dark RPGs, but the story is very intoxicating and light-hearted. Of course, that doesnt mean it insults your intelligent as a gamer. It just means that the characters and story have a light-hearted approach to them that is oh-so-charming. Color me impressed.
I dont feel like talking about the graphics, so Im not going to. The graphics are great in this game, but since its not the core aspect of the title I wont bog the review down with it. So how about we look at the battle system? The first thing I noticed is that its fun. For once I actually really enjoyed doing the battles in an RPG. The reason for this was almost completely because of the idea of spirit points. To compliment the high amount of energy demonstrated by the characters, the game comes with a system whereby the characters use their determination (or spirit) to do moves on enemies. The interesting part is that everyone shares one lump of points, forcing you to plan ahead and think up strategies. I really enjoyed this, as it made fighting big bosses almost complete strategy. Forget the brainless fights you may be used to in RPGs, because if you dont use your brain in this game you will definitely have a hard time.
Something I was hoping would shine was the music. As you probably know, music can make or break an RPG. The lands you visit, the emotions, and the adventure all have to be signified through the games soundtrack. Lucky for us the music is solid in the game. The melodies are actually quite catchy and definitely get the job done. The sound quality (in terms of sample rate) is really bad, but thats really not an issue. Its good enough that you wont care when you get into the meat of the game. Not that I shouldnt be downplaying the audio quality more, but it really didnt make that much difference to me. When the game is this big, and the story is this grand, the sample rate is hardly going through my head when I hear the boom of hundreds of canons. I am sure you will agree.
Ultimately I feel this game is for everyone who doesnt mind playing an RPG without insane amounts of drama. The story is really solid, and the characters are fantastic. The graphics are great, the gameplay is definitely fun as all get-out, and to top it all off there is some great music to be heard. If I had any complaint it would be that the overworld seems a little bare. Sometimes I had this feeling that a little more system power would have made for less fog, and more stuff. Thats a pretty minor qualm though considering the huge scale of the game. Go out there and buy this game. Youll be glad that you did. I completed it with 65 hours on the clock and hope to visit the world again sometime soon.
Cory Faller: Like Jason, I went into Skies of Arcadia Legends with almost no knowledge of the title. I just heard from a LOT of people that it was really great on the Dreamcast, and I hadn't played a good-old-fashioned RPG in ages. So I picked the thing up, and boy am I glad I did. I pretty much agree with everything that Jason said about the title, so I'll do a little something different. There were certain points during the game where I literally had to exclaim, out loud and to everyone around me, how friggin great the game was. So if you're up for some very slight spoilers, allow me to share those moments with you.
At one point during the story, Vyse gets separated from his companions - stranded alone on an uninhabited island. The game up 'till that point had been very fast paced, with Vyse and co getting into sticky situation after sticky situation. And now, all of a sudden, it screeched to a halt. On the island, everything was peaceful. No noisy machinery, no marauding enemies... just calm water, beautiful foliage, and blue skies. And my God, the MUSIC. The whole thing was so cathartic an experience, I had to put down the controller and just listen to the music. Vyse's adventures on the island ranged from discovering a cave where some guy had lived a long time ago, to having to pick up sticks and forge for food. It was all so calming and disconnected from the rest of the game universe. I fell in love with that island, and was genuinely upset when I had to leave.
Much later in the game, I finally gained the ability to be the captain of my own ship. I had read in the instruction manual that you got to find and customize your own crew, as well as build and customize your own base. I'm a real sucker for stuff like that, so I was very excited. Imagine my surprise when the site of the base turned out to be my favorite little island. I squealed with girlish glee at the mere thought of making that place my home. Unfortunately, once the base had been situated, the music changed. Not only that, but they had cut down almost all of the trees. Boy oh boy did I raise hell about that. I soon accepted it, however, as I found that the crewmembers that you can recruit will set up shop on your island. I could even give them money so they could remodel and expand their shops and residences. For me, at least, being able to control the look and layout of that place was an endlessly enjoyable experience. Tack on the fact that at one point later in the game the music comes BACK (albeit only for a very short period of time), and that island becomes one of the greatest things ever.
Alright, last thing I'll mention. This wasn't so much of an event, as much as it was a dawning realization. I had played the game for something like 40 hours, which was already more than double the amount of time I've spent on any other single player game on the GameCube, and I realized how much there was still to do. I still had a VERY significant chunk of storyline stuff to do, there were tons of Wanted Battles that I still had to initiate, and I hadn't even began the Piastol sidequest. The game managed to do what few games have ever done for me; it got to the point where I didn't want it to end, and it DIDN'T end. I clocked in at something like 64 hours in the end, my GameCube totally overflowing with Skies of Arcadia love.
Any game where I can go back and remember certain events with such fondness gets a definitive thumbs up in my book. Not only that, but one of the ending events of the game gave me freakin' CHILLS. Any game that does that instantly gets on my highest honors - inclusion on my "most f@#$in' badass games ever" list. Hopefully it'll sell well enough to convince Overworks to develop a sequel, since the ending of the game just BEGS for it. And so do I.