Sam's video game collection essentials

Sega had big plans for the third Panzer Dragoon game. It started development at the same time as Panzer Dragoon II, but was intended to be something much different and more ambitious than those other two games. The plan for Panzer Dragoon Saga was to take the intriguing world created by the first two games, some of the series’ gameplay elements, and use those concepts to create a cutting-edge, totally unique turn-based JRPG. An absolutely brilliant idea for a video game.  Our main character of this game is named Edge, and at the start of the game he’s working for those darn imperials at an excavation site which guards relics from long-past civilization which was victim to the events that led to the series’ post-apocalyptic setting. As a monster at the site causes a ruckus, Edge fights it, and then accidentally discovers a slab in which seems to rest a real, unconscious, mysterious young woman. Soon thereafter, the empire’s “Black Fleet” comes to take the girl away and kills most of the

Now we’re talkin’. Here’s another prime example of a good video game sequel: one that takes the solid foundation of the original game, adding and improving many things to make a game that is clearly superior.  Story-wise, Panzer Dragoon II is actually a prequel. It’s still in the post-apocalyptic part of the timeline, though. Surviving humans are very cautious about mutating creatures. One species, the Khourieats, sometimes are born with blue-white light in their throats, and the surviving humans euthanize those specimens as soon as that light becomes visible, out of fear. This game’s protagonist disobeys this norm and raises one of these mutant Khourieats and named it Lagi, and eventually Lagi starts growing wings. Our protagonist hopes that this will cause a change of heart in his fellow villagers, but as soon as Lagi learns to fly, those darn imperials destroy his village! And so, our hero sets out with his special friend to make the darn imperials pay. As in the original, a story p

Here we have an early Saturn game that was one of the launch titles for the surprise North American launch in May of 1995. It’s the start of a new series developed by Sega’s Team Andromeda.  Panzer Dragoon takes place in a post-apocalyptic future, after a series of genetically altered creatures turned on those who made them into weapons and nearly wiped out the whole human race. In the events of the game, a group of imperials have found a tower that houses powerful weapons that were used to fight off those creatures in the past. Well…the imperials are up to no good. You play as a hunter who notices that the imperials are up to something. While investigating, our main character finds a dragon rider who is killed by a rival dragon, and as he dies he warns of what may happen if the imperials get their way. And so, you team up with the unfortunate fellow’s dragon to go try and stop those darn imperials. This is one of those examples of a game that was made only for home consoles, but was d

I already wrote about NBA Jam for the Sega CD not too long ago. Tournament Edition is not really a sequel, more like an updated version that first came out in the arcade as well. You can read my post about regular NBA Jam for more info on what it’s about. What’s new in Tournament Edition? The biggest thing is probably expanded rosters. Now, each NBA team has three players from their real-life rosters instead of just two. The gameplay itself is still two-on-two. But in between quarters, you can make a substitution. And you should, because characters get tired and need to rest on the bench to be refreshed. There’s a stat called “Injury” which shows you how much of a beating a player has taken up to that point in the game, and it resets to 0 when they get a quarter to rest. There are other additions too, including additional player stats to differentiate them further, and more options such as “Tournament mode” which turns off some of the game’s gimmicks for a more skill-based experience

Here we have one of the Saturn’s most popular and successful titles, from the creators of the beloved Sonic series. Of course, the console wasn’t very successful in general, so even being one of the most successful doesn’t mean it was a big mainstream hit.  Nights is a rather unique game that’s a little hard to categorize into a genre. The plot is a little weird, and it involves a couple kids named Elliot and Claris who find out upon falling asleep that there are two dreamworlds, the awful Nightmare and the good Nightopia, and they must team up with a character named Nights (portrayed on the box) to thwart the evils of Nightmare.  When you start the game, you control either one of the two kids, and you immediately want to go up to Nights and become one with them and start flying around. While the game is 3D, the flying is mostly done on a 2D plane (occasionally switching to a third-person perspective), with the player generally moving to the right with the ability to fly up and down as