Panzer Dragoon is one of Sega's great lost gems in its history as a developer and publisher. First released as a launch title for the less-than-popular Sega Saturn in 1995, the game is an arcade-style rail shooter not unlike Star Fox. At the time Panzer Dragoon was lauded by both players and critics, and its sequels included some of the best rail shooters in the genre (and one of the most inventive JRPGs ever). Despite the quality of the series, it never really broke into the mainstream and the IP has been left dormant for years. That's finally changed with Panzer Dragoon Remake, developed by MegaPixel Studio and published by Forever Entertainment with Sega's blessing. While the game is a cool piece of nostalgia for old fans, it shows its age with its short length, outmoded gameplay and meager content.
Panzer Dragoon is set on a desolate unnamed planet, where humanity's hubris in creating living weapons has pushed it to the brink of extinction. Centuries ago, these cyber-genetic creatures rebelled against their creators, causing the surviving humans to split into tribes and flee to all corners of the ravaged world. Over the years, humans steadily uncovered the technology of their past and turned it against each other in an attempt to unify the tribes into an empire.
The player is a descendant of one of these tribes; a group of desert-dwelling hunter-gatherers. During an ordinary hunt, the player character spots an unusual imperial airship overhead before suddenly being attacked by a desert creature. He chases the creature into an ancient ruin, where a cyber-genetic guardian nearly kills him - until the guardian is crushed in the crossfire between two armored dragons and their riders. The dragons, one blue and one black, are locked in aerial combat and destroying everything in their path. When a lethal shot pierces the blue dragon's rider, he's forced to land near the player character. With his dying breath, the rider beseeches the player to take his dragon and stop the empire's black dragon from reaching a mysterious tower and morphing into the ultimate weapon.
This premise is still the most intriguing thing about Panzer Dragoon, even after 25 years. All the implied factional strife between the empire, tribes, creatures, and ancient living weapons gives the world a persistent sense of history and wonder. The visual variety and stark beauty of each new stage teases the imagination even more as your dragon blasts enemies while soaring through sunken cities, sand-choked mining towns, and beyond. Panzer Dragoon's setting and themes give it a definite air of Hayao Miyazaki's epic Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind - not to mention the fact that it has one of the best soundtracks in video game history. This remake also includes a re-orchestrated soundtrack by returning series composer Saori Kobayashi, which can be freely enabled or disabled and is a nice treat for longtime fans of the series.
On the other hand, the middling visual upgrade makes this game feel more like an elaborate remaster than a remake. The cutting-edge presentation was a major draw of the original Panzer Dragoon at the time, but the re-engineered graphics and cutscenes of the remake won't be mind-blowing for legacy players and certainly won't wow newcomers, either. Panzer Dragoon is also an extremely short and simple game, which is all the more noticeable nowadays. It's slow even compared to other 3D shoot-'em-ups, and its lock-on shooting is very basic despite the 4-way aiming feature and decent challenge. One can finish the game in less than an hour (which was always the case), although there's very little new content in the remake anyway. Panzer Dragoon was never exactly a content-stuffed game, but it's disappointing that this remake doesn't take the opportunity to bring something substantially new to the table.
Panzer Dragoon Remake provides a fascinating piece of video game history to a much wider audience, and yet it's difficult to recommend to anyone other than those who just want to experience it again. New players won't get a lot out of it, and will likely be left wondering what all the fanfare was about. However, the game's setting is as interesting as ever, and it can still stoke a desire to know more about the series and its world. Although it feels outdated in many ways, Panzer Dragoon Remake somehow makes one more excited for the upcoming remake of Panzer Dragoon 2: Zwei.
Panzer Dragoon Remake is available now on Nintendo Switch for $24.99, and will come to Steam and Google Stadia in 2020. A Switch code was provided to Screen Rant for the purposes of this review.