Panzer Dragoon Orta (Xbox) Review

By Rin4ku

Console: XBOX
Game Name: Panzer Dragoon Orta
Developer: Smilebit/Sega
Genre: Rail Shooter
Number of players: 1
Pros: Classic rail shooter with your favorite dragon
Cons: Its harder then ever before!!
Rated: T
Games Like it: Rez, Star Fox

Its been a 5 year wait.. after all those hold backs, a lot of us hardcore Panzer Dragoon fans was frustrated with the hold back... But, now that you think about it, it was for the good! During the hold back, they added so many features that i will talk about later in the review.. but until then, i truely have to say this shows "The real power of the X" ever since Dead Or Alive 3 and Splinter Cell!!

Gameplay:
All of us vets of the old Panzer Dragoon will still remember this classic gameplay with new features, but to those that just joined the Panzer Dragoon game, I'll explain it just for you!  The game is very very similar to any rail shooter, such as Star Fox or Space Harrier, but the thing that made this game different from the typical rail shooter was that you have a 360 degree view!  Now instead of bashing the enemies ahead of you and running away those that are behind you, you can now just turn your main character around and blast them down, and trust me, you have to care about blasting those behind you in order to survive. You have two kinds of fire, your rapid fire (Bashing the A button) or your Lock on missiles (Holding A, locking on, then release for fire), very similar to the one on the old games. Now for you vets, here's the things that are new from PD Zwei. You now have a boost button (Boosting forward or slowing down) which makes a big difference into this game now! Some enemies will show up with a shield in front of them, and what's the only way to get them...... "GET BEHIND THEM!!" so now you can boost in front of them and blast them from behind. Another thing it has is that you now have 3 types of dragon forms which is the following: Glide, Base, and Heavy. They each have their own style of Strengths and Weaknesses. As an Example, Glide is the smallest and can dodge a lot of projectiles and can glide, but it doesn't have any lock on missiles. Heavy mode has super strong lock on missiles but it can't Boost and it can hardly dodge!

Graphics:
The graphics (As said above) shows the great power of the X. Not only is there so many polies on screen (And hardly any slowdown), but the background is just beutiful!! Sometimes I just wish they had a "No enemy mode" so i can just fly around and looking at the beutiful backgrounds!!... And if you enjoy water visuals, you'll enjoy level 2 as you fly over a river! Im sure most of you saw the power graphics from the commercial (And even the intro to the game) with nice explosions and facial expressions and the lighting just puts you in "Awe!"

Sound:
The graphics were stunning but the sound will also make you smile! The voices are great and well acted to make it feel kind of like a movie and the soundtrack is just stunning! The kind of music is the kind that will get your adrenaline pumping from the fast action and the good beat!

Replay Value:
This game has got a ton to keep you busy! The normal game can keep you busy for over 20 hours, but once you don't feel like playing the normal game, you can play sub scenarios and find out what happened on "The other side".. So you can play as the empire, or even Mobo and see how they like flying a ship! Or you can live a story of a empire little boy named "Iva" which has another story of its own about a boy losing his father and being forced to join the empire to survive! There is also a mode called "BOX MODE" which will let you replay any level but with different kinds of stats, so you can play The last boss with only a little bit of health and level 1 dragons to see if you can still beat him! But one of the best feature it has is the ability to play the classic PANZER DRAGOON! Now this is something that'll bring back memories!

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