With the announcement of Sega's new RPG, Skies of Arcadia they didn't manage to get much attention, well not from me anyway. Little did I know that Skies of Arcadia would soon turn out to be among my 5 favorite RPGs of all time, and believe me, there's stiff competition on my list. Skies of Arcadia just brought so much to the table, and for once it actually felt like Sega had made a right choice, well that is until the game bombed and the Dreamcast met a fate so horrible that I cannot even mention it; one thing's for sure, this game never got the attention it deserved. Now let's face it, right now Sega is in a huge slump, I mean really, when was the last time Sonic Team released an original game, and when was the last time Hitmaker developed a game that didn't totally suck? One thing is for sure, I was actually happy when Sega announced that Overworks would be releasing an updated port for Skies of Arcadia, but honestly, Sega's making a big mistake in not releasing the game on both PS2 and Gamecube, instead of just on Gamecube.

The thing about Skies of Arcadia when it was released on DC is that I was a little worried that I wouldn't get around to playing it, as Grandia II had a release date that was very close to the game, and many (even I) predicted that Grandia II would be the superior game, but I was definitely wrong. Even though I still own my Dreamcast and Skies of Arcadia, I really could not pass up the opportunity to pick of Skies of Arcadia Legends for Gamecube, now I did do the same thing with Grandia II (I bought it for the PS2), but Overworks has added some new content to Skies of Arcadia this time around, and so I didn't feel as ripped off as I did with Grandia II.

If my memory serves me right then the same team who created the original Phantasy Star games is pretty much the same as the team who made Skies of Arcadia. This game really really isn't too conventional as far as RPGs go, but some aspects of the game noticeably trace back to the golden era of gaming. This may be the reason why it isn't as easy as most of the dumbed down RPGs of today, and at times, Skies of Arcadia Legends can be downright difficult, but in a good way. Skies of Arcadia Legends is not what you could call a dungeon crawler, and it's not even a cinematic event. It's a story driven RPG that has old school roots, while at the same time, it incorporates newer RPG techniques and even has some original aspects to it.

Storyline
The age of exploration has dawned upon man, there's treasure to find and cultures to explore. Exploring isn't as easy as it may seem though, as the world is divided into floating continents, and thus people must use airships to travel from floating island to floating island. Since there is a lot of treasure around that attracts one type of person in particular; pirates. Air pirates are the equivalent to normal pirates, only they sail through the sky instead of in the sea. There are two types of pirates; Black pirates and Blue Rogues. Black pirates are your typical swashbuckling group of rag tags who steal from everyone they encounter, they especially like stealing from unarmed ships, while Blue Rogues steal from the rich and give to the poor, my doesn't that sound familiar.

The story begins with Vyse, son of a Blue Rogue leader, on a mission to steal goods from a heavily armored ship, this ship though, has more than just precious cargo, as a strangely dressed girl is also on board. Well you can probably guess what happens here, Vyse and friends crush the opposition and take the girl into their custody, little do they know just what they're in for, as a whole adventure unravels for Vyse and his best friend Aika, a journey that will take them where nobody has gone before, but this is exactly what Vyse has been waiting for his entire life.

Sure, so the story isn't quite Final Fantasy caliber, but strangely enough, that's why I like it. Exploration is a huge aspect in Skies of Arcadia Legends, as you'll definitely want to sail around and check out some of the sights and of course look for discoveries to earn yourself some money. The story surrounding Skies of Arcadia Legends is actually fairly simple, but the gameplay will have you so immersed that it won't even matter to you after a short while.

The story and it's plot twists aren't actually incredibly hard to predict in this game, but it's fun to watch them unfold. The thing that I really like about the game's storyline is that more than anything, it's just fun to follow. It's not uber dark, and it doesn't have a plot twist around every single corner, but it's easy to follow and it does the job quite well actually, and for what it's worth, I thought the storyline was an excellent change in pace from modern RPGs that I've grown used to.

With most RPGs the storyline centers around a character, this character usually has a mysterious past and a rival. Skies of Arcadia Legends avoids this contemporary formula, and instead, the story focuses on the three main characters; Vyse, Aika, and Fina. None of these characters fit the modern mold for a main character, but the storyline seems to focus more on the world around them than on them particularly.

Gameplay
My favorite aspect in Skies of Arcadia is it's immersive gameplay, which to say, is top notch quality. Skies is a very non-linear game, and actually gives players the choice of either exploring or advancing the story. Sometimes it's easy to get slightly confused over what to do next in the story, and you might sometimes forget directions on how to get somewhere, but that's nothing that a little exploration won't solve, and there are very few to no hard puzzles to solve in this game, and that's always a plus.

Overworks was almost able to match Game Arts with the battle system in Skies of Arcadia Legends, but it doesn't quite keep up with that of Lunar or Grandia. Quite a bit of originality was incorporated into the battle system in this game, one such original feature is in the form of SP. Special moves and magical spells require SP in order to use them, and each turn you are awarded with a certain amount of these points depending on your character's levels. This feature makes it so that you cannot simply bust out with a special move every turn, but you must strategize and save up SP so that you can have your characters use their special moves or magic when you need it the most, and when they are most effective against the enemies.

The most original aspect to Skies of Arcadia Legends is the airship battles, which is also my one of my favorite modes of gameplay. Once engaged in an airship battle with an enemy ship, creature, or whatever else, the screen will change to accomodate your ship and the enemy as they fly/move around each other. You are then given a small menu to input commands from, on this menu you have each character in your party perform a command; they can do anything from use an item, shoot a weapon, and even use magical spells. The winner of a ship battle is determined once one of the sides loses all of it's HP.

As you can upgrade your character's equipment, you can also do the same for your ship. You can manage which weapons your ship can utilize, and you can also equip it with different accessories to change the ships statistics. Your ship can also level up; by earning captain's stripes and using them your ship will gain Hp. Ships use SP just like the characters by themselves do, and so you'll have to use quite a bit of strategy in the ship battles.

Once Vyse becomes the captain of his own ship you can actually customize the ship more. You can select a flag from three models, and even find yourself a crew in the world of Arcadia. Crew members aren't completely necessary in completing the game, but they do make the ship battles easier, as each crew member has something to offer the ship. Some crew members offer a stat increase in specific areas when you set them to the active crew, while others can be used through a command to perform a special task for the ship, like recover HP or build up SP for example.

Of course, managing an airship is only a small part of the game. Hand to hand combat is probably the biggest gameplay element in Skies of Arcadia Legends, and you'll be doing a whole lot of it. The original Skies of Arcadia was plagued with too many random encounters on the world map, but thankfully this was toned down a little for the Gamecube version, even if things do seem slightly more difficult than before.

Combat is played out in a turn based affair, with each character and enemy taking turns to perform their attacks. Battles are pretty standard fare when compared to most other RPGs, of course that is only if you don't count the use of SP. One interesting thing about combat is that to make the battles look better, passive characters will move around the battlefield and strike at their opponents, this won't cause any damage to them, but at least it doesn't make the characters out to look lazy.

Sega included many different additions to gameplay in the Gamecube version. One of these such features is the form of moonfish, which you must travel around the world to collect. You can trade these moonfish for items with someone you find sailing in the skies. Another addition is in the form of the "wanted" missions, through these you go around the world and find people who are wanted by the law, and by beating them you can earn a bounty at the sailor's guild. Of course, the coolest of these wanted characters is Vyze and his friends, but it's also one of the hardest at the same time.

Graphics, Sound, and Control
Graphics are rather bland and the models are low on polygons, but that is because Sega didn't update the game's appearance too much when they ported it from the Dreamcast to Gamecube. The character models in particular make this game look like a first generation Dreamcast game. Textures appear to be slightly improved on, and even though the game does have it's good looking moments, it's still an old Dreamcast game.

The music and sound effects in this game are fairly nice, and fit well with the massive world of Arcadia. The battle theme is a little weaker than one would expect though. My favorite song in the whole game is definitely the tune that plays while you fight the last boss. There are no real voice overs in this game, but small grunts and a few spoken words work nicely in this game. The overall music seems to have lost some quality in the transfer from Dreamcast to Gamecube, but it doesn't take much away from the game.

Controlling in the world of Arcadia is very simple, with the only slight problem being the camera which often doesn't do what you want it to. The good thing with the camera though is that you can manipulate it however you want, and you can even look around in the world in first person mode to see if you've missed anything. Menus are pretty easy to navigate, but I at first had problems remembering which is the confirm and the cancel buttons, but I got over it after a little playtime.

Final Recommendation
If you like RPGs and own a Nintendo Gamecube I highly recommend picking this game up, as it will probably be the only decent RPG on the system for a while, well at least until Tales of Symphonia is released. I highly recommend it, Skies of Arcadia Legends is one of the greatest RPGs ever created.

Overall Rating: 9.5

Recommended: Yes