Panzer Dragoon Orta (Xbox)

You don't need to be a fan of Sega's 8-year-old Panzer Dragoon fantasy shooter series to appreciate the outstanding Panzer Dragoon Orta. But if you were fortunate enough to have played the Panzer games for the Sega Saturn, you'll be especially thrilled with this latest installment, an Xbox exclusive developed by Sega's talented Smilebit studio that not only showcases the power of Microsoft's console, but is also one of the best traditional video game shooting experiences ever made. Panzer Dragoon Orta is surprisingly long for a single-player shooter, and it's loaded with great extra features that are sure to keep you coming back to the game's 10 diverse and challenging levels. You'll find that the game's mechanics are deceptively simple, and that there's some real depth hidden beneath the incredible good looks and fast-paced, epic action. All this adds up to an experience that every Xbox owner ought to indulge in.

It's not a stretch to call Panzer Dragoon Orta one of the best traditional shooters ever.

Since Panzer Dragoon Orta is a pure shooter, you'll probably be struck by its rich and detailed story and setting, though the plot elements never intrude on the action of the game. The Panzer world is beautiful and surreal, with its own language and bizarre technology. But it's a world of strife, dominated by a mighty empire and its vast fleets of airships yet constantly threatened by dangerous creatures that evolved from biological weapons used by an ancient civilization. Orta, the young main character of the game, has little knowledge of any of this, however, because she's been a prisoner her entire life for reasons unbeknownst to her. The game begins when a squadron of the empire's dragonmares, which are basically hideous-looking dragonlike jet fighters, attacks her prison. Orta is rescued from this peril by a being that instantly becomes her most trusted ally, a proud winged creature that looks like a cross between a conventional dragon and a stag beetle. Now Orta finds herself desperately fighting off the empire's forces, bioengineered foes, and more as she sets out to find some answers. She soon crosses paths with an ominous character named Abadd, who seems to know much more than she does about her true nature. At any rate, all this is merely the context for a series of levels offering up relentless action against strange foes in vividly detailed environments.

It's easy to criticize the core mechanics of Panzer Dragoon Orta, as the game is essentially a rail shooter, a dated action subgenre that forces you onto a set track, like on a roller coaster, and expects you to merely point and shoot at everything that gets in your way. This simplistic style of gaming became all but extinct when successful first-person shooters such as Doom and GoldenEye 007 afforded players with the freedom to move about at will. However, Panzer Dragoon Orta's modern presentation and gameplay nuances make it far more than just a shooting gallery. The presence of a rather lengthy tutorial suggests that this isn't just a game about reflexes and button mashing, but one with some real strategy to it. That's not to say the game completely eschews the conventions of the traditional shooter genre, because it doesn't--there's never a dull moment during Panzer Dragoon Orta's long levels, and they all feature (and usually culminate in) protracted battles against powerful bosses. But these are gameplay elements that will never go out of style. They're what help make Panzer Dragoon Orta an intense and memorable shooter, like numerous others in the past, only with state-of-the-art technology and superlative production values.

The game's 10 levels are filled with dangers and surprises.

More specifically, the core gameplay of Panzer Dragoon Orta is similar to that of the first two games in the series. You view the action from a third-person perspective and can use the shoulder buttons to rotate your view 90 degrees at a time as an onscreen radar display informs you of where your enemies are coming from. You'll find yourself rotating all around, using Orta's rapid-fire pistol in conjunction with her dragon's homing lasers to inflict grievous damage upon her enemies. The left analog stick moves the dragon and your targeting reticle. Your ammo is unlimited, you never have to worry about reloading, and using both attacks is simple: Pressing and holding the fire button while "painting" foes with the reticle causes the dragon to lock on to multiple targets for its homing laser attack, releasing the button fires your lasers, and tapping the button makes Orta shoot her pistol. The homing lasers are generally much stronger than the gun attack, but you'll learn to use both in conjunction, because only Orta's pistol can shoot down the numerous enemy projectiles you'll constantly be trying to avoid. It may not sound like a big deal, but the fact that Panzer Dragoon Orta alternately requires you to tap the fire button and hold it down during nonstop action sequences lends the gameplay a completely different feel from that of any shooter other than its predecessors.

There's also a lot more to the gameplay this time around. For one thing, at any point you can rapidly cycle through your dragon's three different forms with the Y button. The base wing form is described above and will be familiar to those who played the first Panzer Dragoon. It's maneuverable, its homing lasers are quick, and it can acquire many targets at a time. Meanwhile, the heavy wing presents a larger target for its enemies, and Orta can't fire her pistol quite as quickly either, making it difficult to defend yourself while in this form, but the heavy wing's powerful lock-on blasts are the most damaging to armored targets. Then there's the glide wing form, the smallest and seemingly the weakest, especially since it can't use homing lasers at all. But the glide wing is by far the most maneuverable, and in this mode, Orta's pistol auto-acquires targets in a wide radius, making it perfect for avoiding enemy attacks or easily picking off incoming missiles. Each dragon form also has its own berserk attack, a special move that becomes available once you've dealt enough damage to your enemies. The concentrated heavy wing beam can do huge damage to bosses, while the base wing's flurry of homing lasers can clear the area of multiple foes, but the glide wing's health-absorbing attack is the most useful since there's no other way to restore your life during a level.

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