I've been trying to work out what the target market for PD Remake is. And I've come to the conclusion it's literally just the people who have heard of Panzer Dragoon but never played it and are mildly curious when they see it on a deep sale on steam or the eshop.
Because I feel for literally everyone else, it's kinda... pointless? And it's not really that it's accidentally pointless, it almost feels by design that there's very little here to appeal to both the Dragoon die hards or the people who don't know what the fuck it is.
The core problem is the premise - not so much a panzer dragoon remake on it's own, but remaking it whilst keeping the content almost identical, and putting it in the hands of an indie studio who don't have the budget to make it look truly current gen.
And when the game you're building your remake on is frankly a glorified Saturn tech demo and the apotheosis of "boneless Launch Title" - as much as I like it - not building content on top of it really leaves it as something only for the die-hards - when the stylistic changes are something that's liable to put them off.
Frankly though, I think the artistic direction kinda works? It's quite comparable to the Demons souls remake in the changes it makes, but i prefer it to that frankly, despite the lower production values. The new look is reminiscent of the FMV cutscenes of Panzer Dragoon past, mixed with a bit of Orta's look. It's not quite right, and I do prefer the original look, but it's quite neat in it's own right.
The remake does, however, have one absolute ace up it's sleeve - a brand new arrangement of the OST by composer of Saga and Orta Saori Kobayashi. It's predictably fantastic and is worth the price of admission alone when the game is on sale.
But still, the game remains this weird chimera. Divorcing PD from being the saturn tech demo thing it is takes something away from it, and to new players, they're gonna experience a stupidly short game with very little to it, frankly.
So I kinda like it, and I definetly reccomend it on the frequent sales it gets put on where you grab it for like $5. But it's a missed oppurtunity for it to only be that.
Because I feel for literally everyone else, it's kinda... pointless? And it's not really that it's accidentally pointless, it almost feels by design that there's very little here to appeal to both the Dragoon die hards or the people who don't know what the fuck it is.
The core problem is the premise - not so much a panzer dragoon remake on it's own, but remaking it whilst keeping the content almost identical, and putting it in the hands of an indie studio who don't have the budget to make it look truly current gen.
And when the game you're building your remake on is frankly a glorified Saturn tech demo and the apotheosis of "boneless Launch Title" - as much as I like it - not building content on top of it really leaves it as something only for the die-hards - when the stylistic changes are something that's liable to put them off.
Frankly though, I think the artistic direction kinda works? It's quite comparable to the Demons souls remake in the changes it makes, but i prefer it to that frankly, despite the lower production values. The new look is reminiscent of the FMV cutscenes of Panzer Dragoon past, mixed with a bit of Orta's look. It's not quite right, and I do prefer the original look, but it's quite neat in it's own right.
The remake does, however, have one absolute ace up it's sleeve - a brand new arrangement of the OST by composer of Saga and Orta Saori Kobayashi. It's predictably fantastic and is worth the price of admission alone when the game is on sale.
But still, the game remains this weird chimera. Divorcing PD from being the saturn tech demo thing it is takes something away from it, and to new players, they're gonna experience a stupidly short game with very little to it, frankly.
So I kinda like it, and I definetly reccomend it on the frequent sales it gets put on where you grab it for like $5. But it's a missed oppurtunity for it to only be that.