CIBSunday Panzer Dragoon Saga (Saturn)

"If you remember me, then you must also remember what you did"

by Damien McFerran 1:45pm

CIBSunday: Panzer Dragoon Saga (Saturn) 2 — *Image: Damien McFerran / Time Extension*

When people talk about the rarest or most desirable video games of all time, you can be pretty sure that Panzer Dragoon Saga is going to enter the conversation at some point.

Released in the three main territories in 1998 on the fading Sega Saturn, this epic four-disc JRPG was envisaged as Sega's rival to the Final Fantasy series—and some would argue that, in pure gameplay and scope, it lived up to its potential. Set in the same fictional universe as the other Panzer Dragoon titles, it places you in the role of sword-for-hire Edge, whose life changes when he encounters Azel, a mysterious girl with a remarkable past.

Directed by Yukio Futatsugi and created by a team which includes Manabu Kusunoki (design), Katsumi Yokota (art) Saori Kobayashi and Mariko Nanba (music), Panzer Dragoon Saga was Team Andromeda's final game, although the spirit of the studio would live on via Smilebit, one of the many semi-autonomous internal studios founded by Sega in 2000. Smilebit would be responsible for the fourth (and, at the time of writing, final) Panzer Dragoon game, Panzer Dragoon Orta.

While Panzer Dragoon Saga gained rave reviews at the time of release (the UK's Official Sega Saturn Magazine famously gave away the entire first disc as a free covermount), it came far too late in Saturn's lifespan to have any impact on the console's commercial fortunes.

The same year it was released, Sega would launch its next console, Dreamcast, in Japan, so the company was already moving on from Saturn. As a result, Panzer Dragoon Saga was subject to a tiny print run, with some reports suggesting that only 5,000 copies were made for the North American market and 1,000 for the European market.

This low print run, coupled with the fact that Sega has never re-released the game in any form (it has apparently lost the source code), has resulted in second-hand prices hitting utterly insane levels.

If you want to read about the creation of this seminal video game, then I can't recommend James Mielke's incredible oral history piece on Polygon enough; it is perhaps the most exhaustive article on the game ever written in English.

Damien has been writing professionally about tech and video games since 2007 and oversees all of Hookshot Media's sites from an editorial perspective. He's also the editor of Time Extension, the network's newest site, which – paradoxically – is all about gaming's past glories.

1
BulkSlash
2:34pm

An absolute classic, and despite being 4 discs, it doesn’t drag on (pun intended) for ages like many RPGs can. The combat system in particular is very intuitive and you quickly learn how to find the weak spots and safe zones with enemies and whether to target them with the dragon or your blaster. The ending is particularly novel and open to interpretation too.

Luckily I do have a copy of it, although I normally play it on an emulator so I can jump in and out easily without having to worry about getting to the next save point.

It's a game that definitely matches the hype that it receives. In an alternate universe, this game would be spoken about among the greatest RPGs of all time, but unfortunately so few have played it. The game pushes the Saturn hardware graphically, and the battle system is probably its best feature, actually doing a great job adapting the rail shooter gameplay to a turn-based system. And of course the soundtrack is amazing, like all Panzer Dragoon games.

I was looking at an old Game Informer magazine, and I found their "review" of Panzer Dragoon Saga. It was a paragraph. A sad but not surprising state for a game that they admitted was one of the best games that year.

3
Ristar24
3:13pm

I owned a Saturn over PS1, I do still have a copy though sadly without the cardboard slip box, was a bit cheaper to obtain that way at the time and I mainly wanted to play the game. Not played it in years since I purchased my copy, but a great game.

4
Blofse
3:21pm

I love the fact that time extension has all these games. Did you guys ever do a report as to the history of your collection of games and where they came from? What was the original intent for the collection - to preserve them all or was it just coincidence? Cool though!

1,000 for the European market. please don't print this rubbish given how often this show up on ebay this is simpley not the case. if their where only 1000 copies that would mean only 23 copies per country in europe. This figure comes from a old ap interview and given they won't know te exact figure. My local game got 8 copies in the first print run. So if only 1000 copies where printed in the UK that would mean it got a quarter of the UK copies. It not the case at least 10,000,

As an example some warhammer models got a limited 1000 print run they show up on ebay once or twice a year. So this number is rubbish. Their are 10 copies on ebay at present.

6
GravyThief
10:19pm

I’ve never owned a Saturn, and likely never will, but I’ve always wanted to play this game. Shame it’s never had a re-release, and it sounds like if it ever does it will have to be remade from the ground up so wouldn’t be the same. Might have to watch a playthrough on YouTube. Even saying that makes me cringe! 🤣

@Fallingshadow yeah I thought a thousand copies seemed a bit unrealistic. It’s pricey, yes, but it isn’t what I’d call rare. I see it fairly regularly.

@Blofse when Time Extension and the other sites do pieces like this, the games will be from the individual’s personal collection. This will belong to @Damo.

Show Comments

Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment...