 SEGA DRUNK! Skies of Arcadia for Sega Dreamcast, and by proxy Skies of Arcadia Legends for Gamecube, is a labor of love. It's a game that's made by people that clearly know what they're doing and clearly love JRPGs. In fact, the dev team here is made up of people that worked on Panzer Dragoon, joined up with some of the original fantasy star dev team. And they know well enough not to dither around, Skies of Arcadia starts with a bang, with a snooty hair-flipping commander chasing down a girl until... Pirates! And not just any pirates, air pirates! No, not those air pirates. From there, you fight some random battles, take down a boss, and you're off on your adventure. Now, the story here is pretty standard stuff. It's typical Rebels vs. Empire, where you play as Vice, a plucky air pirate who meets Fina. That's the gal who's being chased, and she was sent to the land of Arcadia to collect six moon crystals, which are capable of controlling the legendary Geiges. No, not that Geiges. Vice and his band of pirates help her after learning the evil Valuin Empire is after the same thing, led by the greedy and mischievous Lord Galcian, who's willing to do anything to further his plans of conquering the world. See, this Geiges thing is a weapon by way of those six moon crystals, one from each of the six civilizations in this game, and if they fall into the wrong hands, well, that's no good, so we gotta track them down. And yeah, all the classic JRPG character archetypes are here, but rather than coming off as tired and derivative, there's a certain spark of life to each of them, and I think a big reason for that is just the settings and environments here. Sure, the story and characters may seem paint by numbers on the surface, but Sky's of Arcadia's strongest quality is in how the world is designed. The emphasis here is on discovery. The airship pirate motif is really well done, it is legitimately fun sailing the skies, not knowing what you could run into next, because this game is just so packed full of imagination. It's not the same old sword and sorcery fantasy stuff or whatever, and I think that's a big reason why Sky's of Arcadia to this day still feels fresh and vital. This is just my opinion, of course, but I think when a game establishes such a fun, unique and varied atmosphere, as you'll see throughout this game traveling through the skies to deserts and cities and jungles and such, everything else by proxy just seems more interesting and engaging. It's just less of a leap to suspend disbelief, and it's easier to dive into the game, forget about everything else, and let the hours melt away. I'm reminded of games like Super Metroid and Chrono Trigger in that sense. The world in this game is so huge and just so friggin' cool that I just enjoy being here, let alone traveling around and finding new things. And of course, it goes without saying that the graphics, art direction, and especially the music play a huge part in the equation as well. The themes here range from ethereal and ambient to rollicking and fun. It's really the glue that binds this world together. Of course, this is a JRPG, so there's plenty of combat, and in the case of Sky's of Arcadia, there's both your typical character party combat, as well as ship-to-ship combat, both being turn-based. Starting with the traditional combat, there's up to four characters in your party amongst a host of playable characters, and yep, you guessed it, it's random battles, it's experience points, it's building up to boss fights, and it's the usual elemental stuff you're probably used to if you've played just about any JRPG before. Magic is represented in six colors, being based on the six moons I mentioned earlier, and each color, except for silver, has two tiers, regular attacks and status effects. Green is healing magic and poison, red is fire and damage buffs, purple is ice and stuff like mute and confusion, blue is water and air, as well as speed buffs and debuffs, yellow is lightning and power and energy buffs and debuffs, and silver has stuff like revive and insta-kill spells. What's nice here is that the game offers you the flexibility to change colors in the middle of battle. Also, before each turn, you'll have a set number of spirit points to use, represented by the bar up top. Sure, the basic stuff like physical attacks and defense and such aren't gonna cost anything, but the best spells in the game require spirit points, and yeah, one reason this is here is to prevent you from spamming big attacks, but it's also here to make you plan out your big attacks and build up to them. For instance, there's certain characters with spells that can add spirit points to the meter, so if you want to get the most out of the bigger spells, it's smart to plan ahead, because you'll be rewarded. I mean, who doesn't love to be able to drop a friggin' moon from orbit onto your enemy? That's so badass! There's also ship-to-ship combat, which occurs when your compass on the lower right starts beeping. It's pretty much the same framework as regular combat, only here there's a color-coded grid system. Yellow indicates the enemy will fire that turn, red means the enemy will be going balls to the wall to take you out, and green represents a good opportunity for you to attack. Additionally, there's the sea with an exclamation point, which indicates a chance for a critical hit. You line up icons accordingly, cannons, torpedoes, defense, and whatever else, and watch the battle play out. What's cool here is that there's all sorts of different ships you can commandeer as you progress through the game, and you can recruit people to take on different tasks. You even set up your own base eventually, and these characters aren't just here for the sake of being here, they actually show some personality, and, you know, give reasons for doing what they're doing and all that. It's a really cool touch. If there's a flaw here, it's not really anything particularly unique to this game, it's the same old encounter-rate issues you get with a lot of RPGs, and the fact that battles tend to drag along. That's why, if you play this one today, you're gonna wanna play Skies of Arcadia Legends for GameCube, since they dialed back the random encounters quite a bit. I played this one on Dreamcast because, well, I don't know, that's where I started and I guess I just got too into it and didn't wanna start over. There's other additions and upgrades to the Legends port as well, like new side quests and new stuff you can find. So yeah, Skies of Arcadia is a must-play if you're into role-playing games. It's around a 40-hour playthrough, and there's tons of stuff here that I didn't even mention, like how there's three different types of areas to navigate in your ship in mid-sky, airspace, and deep-sky. There's the Sailor's Guild, side quests, the goofy Dreamcast VMU minigame, plus all sorts of stuff that you'd simply be better off discovering for yourself, since, after all, this game is all about exploration and discovery. I'm just some guy here passing word along, saying this one shouldn't be overlooked, and yeah, the combat may be standard stuff, and the story may be kind of bland on paper, but I appreciate that there's none of this chosen one stuff for once. These characters grow from children to having real character, so there's a sense that they've earned their place, so to speak. And even if the story or the combat don't do it for you, the environment settings and atmosphere provided by the art direction and music really make this game stand out. In other words, the whole of Skies of Arcadia is greater than the sum of its parts. I don't wanna thank you for watching, and I hope you have a great rest of your day.