Author Topic: Skies of Arcadia 2 (Read 6588 times)

LMSx · « **on:** March 16, 2003, 09:31:38 PM »

Now that it's official that SoA 2 will come out, what do some of you people that've played the game think about it? I have a few ideas and improvements that have come to mind...(I love the game, by the way. Just saying.)

1) Fewer battles.
-This seems to be how Overworks tacked on extra gaming time. By making a relatively small overworld (admit it, there's a very small land %) and making random battles extremely common, OW stretched out the gameplay length. They didn't fix it for SOAL, either.

2) More interesting sky.
-A combination of three factors makes me want to yell out everytime I try and navigate Arcadia now.

a) Lack of land mass. The only actual continents are Valua and Nasr, and they're both puny. Ixa'taka is debatable, but Yafatuma is pathetic.

b) Upper Sky and Lower Sky. Simply, there's not much to do. The 'mountain ranges' on the continents should have at least stretched to midway in Upper Sky, instead of buried in Middle. That way, a new plot device is introduced-high altitude mountain villages, but only access through elevators powered by.....the Moon Stones! Or something. For a while, anyway.

c) Vanishing sky rifts. Now there are no landmarks when I wander around, it's vast...giant....sea....of nothingness....NOTHINGNESS!!!! Excuse me. I tend to get lost, and have to consult the map alot. Ties back in to letter a, mountain ranges that are unable to be passed over in the beginning would serve a more logical purpose (and serve as navigation guides) then Sky Rifts.

3) A horizon.
-Seriously. It's creepy, seeing a blue/black nothingness where by all means, a Sun and stars should be setting/rising. Also invest in 'nighttime'. No, not just a localized anomaly over Valua. Weather effects also, me thinks. Rain, storms, and big, round, fluffy, pillowy (3-D!) clouds.

4) Exploration of Continents
-Translation: More villages. The Great Valuan Empire consists of its capital. Ixa'taka consists of Horteka. Yafatoma consists of...well...Yafatoma. Nasr is encouraging, with THREE individual towns.

5) A more reasonable Magic system.
-The ONLY magic I've ever used is Healing Magic, Curia, and Sylenis. Everything else is moot, since magically charged SP attacks kick SO much ass.

6) Something with the Black Moon Stone
-You remember the Dark Rift, no? The Black Moon Stone at its core powered the whole thing, and the Discovery entry ominously notes that a Black Moon may have at one time existed.

7) A thought sparked by Esperanza.
-Say you come across a town, need to defend it, and invest in heavy weaponry to defend it from a maurading Black Pirate fleet. It would play out similar to ship battles, except you remove the individual characters and replace them with guns located around town. Build up enough SP and fire the Moon Cannon from the....um....Lighthouse, or something. To throw an idea out there.

What does everyone else think? What *needs* to be done for a sucessful sequel?

Arbok · « **Reply #1 on:** March 16, 2003, 09:56:40 PM »

More playable characters

That's about all I can think of, your list was pretty good.

But I would just like to point out that no system for the sequel has been announced yet. For all we know it could be coming only to the PS2 (oh please god no). So don't get your hopes up.

LMSx · « **Reply #2 on:** March 16, 2003, 10:22:02 PM »

Quote
Originally posted by: Hedorah64
More playable characters

That's about all I can think of, your list was pretty good.

But I would just like to point out that no system for the sequel has been announced yet. For all we know it could be coming only to the PS2 (oh please god no). So don't get your hopes up.

Yes, it has, for the GameCube.

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #3 on:** March 16, 2003, 10:27:37 PM »

Quote
Originally posted by: LMSx
Quote
Originally posted by: Hedorah64
More playable characters

That's about all I can think of, your list was pretty good.

But I would just like to point out that no system for the sequel has been announced yet. For all we know it could be coming only to the PS2 (oh please god no). So don't get your hopes up.

Yes, it has, for the GameCube.

Who told you that?

egman · « **Reply #4 on:** March 17, 2003, 02:18:23 AM »

I like to know where that has been confirmed also. On Beyond3d's forum there's a poster there he works for Sega, and right now from what he is seeing inside the company, the multiplatform strategy will be changing. I think he said about 80 percent of their attention is going to be paid to the PS2, and there may be a lot less exclusive titles between the consoles.

I wouldn't fault Sega for going this route because they are not getting as high of numbers as they need from the GCN and especially the X-box to get them where they need to be financially (It's a shame that PDO and other Smilbit titles are not selling out. I just rented PDO this weekend and I think it's masterpiece of art design. Plus it's actually challenging to play.)

theaveng · « **Reply #5 on:** March 17, 2003, 06:19:00 AM »

Quote
Originally posted by: LMSx
I have a few ideas and improvements that have come to mind...(snip)

A lot of your complaints are due to lack of space on Dreamcast's 1.0 gigabyte disc. They didn't have room for dozens of towns, and 5-6 continents.

Black Knight · « **Reply #6 on:** March 17, 2003, 06:29:09 AM »

It's got to be on the GC. They canned the PS2 version of Skies in the first place. Why would they bring a completely new game out for the system when they didn't even want to work on a port for it? It wouldn't make sense....not that Sega doesn't do things that don't make sense, but you understand what I mean.

Oh, by the way. I'm 100% certain that had PDO been made for the GC, it would have sold exceptionally well, and I'm also sure that sales of Skies must have had some positive effect to prompt Sega to make a sequal. I heard it was something like 20,000 in two days....or something around there. Hopefully it breaks the 200,000 mark. I hope the game sells on word of mouth since Sega is doing a half-ass job putting commercials out there...as a matter of fact, I've never seen one Skies commercial unless I downloaded it.

I'd like to agree with you LMSx, Sega needs to put a lot more land masses and add 3-D clouds. Also, Vise carries two blades, and I would have loved if he could upgrade both seperately. And, the final boss fight in my experience was just too darn easy, maybe I leveled too much for my own good, but he hardly layed a finger on me before he was dead. I'd also like a more complicated magic system which allows you to apply magic spells to the weapons. Such as, if you have the Blue Moon Stone equipped, and someone casts the power of the Red Moon Stone onto your weapon, you could attack with a Whirlwind of Fire...just an idea. I'd also like to see Vise gain the ability to hit multiple times in one attack, without having to be a special.

Uglydot · « **Reply #7 on:** March 17, 2003, 06:39:05 AM »

I found the original SoA to be an amazing RPG. It had a nice mix of old school elements, and newer play mechanics. The random battles where simply apalling, though. It would be increadible if they did away with random battles entirely and used a more "Grandia 2" style of battles, where when you walk by the enemies, they are activated and begin to chase after you, even though you rarely were able to get away, it lessened the frustration. Designers also tend to put in fewer enemies if you can see them. The effect is similar, where you are forced to attacked monsters, but you don't have to wade through as many, and it makes walking feel less pointless when you can see the enemies.

More land mass would definatly be appreciated as well. Flying around was great, but it is nice to get out and walk sometimes, your legs get cramped in that ship

.

I loved the artistic style, but if you are going to do voice samples, make it less of a joke. I don't like full out voice, I have never asked for it. I like to make up the voices with my imagination, but if you are going to do it, you may as well do it well. Those little comments at the end of battle made me laugh almost ever time.

Arbok · « **Reply #8 on:** March 17, 2003, 08:12:36 AM »

Quote
Originally posted by: Grey Ninja

Who told you that?

I second that motion!

Link please!

cyrus420 · « **Reply #9 on:** March 17, 2003, 11:16:41 AM »

i already posted this in skies of arcadia discussion, but you guys are getting rowdy, so here u go

it's hidden in this big long interview

i think overworks and sonicteam are putting most of their games on the GC. the rest of sega on the otherhand, may very well be going towards the PS2.

oh, and as for the black moonstone, maybe it's not a moon, but a big piece of the planet arcadia's core. maybe wayyyyy below the sky is a big chunk of black mass.

mouse_clicker · « **Reply #10 on:** March 17, 2003, 11:19:35 AM »

"It's got to be on the GC. They canned the PS2 version of Skies in the first place. Why would they bring a completely new game out for the system when they didn't even want to work on a port for it? "

Pretty much the only reason the Cube got it and the PS2 didn't was, according to Overworks, because SoA had a LOT of competition on the PS2 and virtually none on the Gamecube. Overworks also said they'd bring SoA 2 to the Gamecube if SoA sold well. It's possible that SoA sold horribly and now Sega wants to take it's chances with the PS2. Nothign's real certain.

Darc Requiem · « **Reply #11 on:** March 17, 2003, 03:02:11 PM »

Quote
Originally posted by: mouse_clicker
"It's got to be on the GC. They canned the PS2 version of Skies in the first place. Why would they bring a completely new game out for the system when they didn't even want to work on a port for it? "

Pretty much the only reason the Cube got it and the PS2 didn't was, according to Overworks, because SoA had a LOT of competition on the PS2 and virtually none on the Gamecube. Overworks also said they'd bring SoA 2 to the Gamecube if SoA sold well. It's possible that SoA sold horribly and now Sega wants to take it's chances with the PS2. Nothign's real certain.

While it may not be setting sales records, Skies is selling pretty well so far. Its the 8th best selling GC game in January selling 19,693 copies and the 6th best selling GC game in February selling 24,881 copies. So its sold better in February and so did the GC, sales were up 103% last month but thats another thread. Anyway Skies has sold a total of 44,574 copies thus far and I think it would be higher if Sega could manage to increase the distribution on Skies.....I've heard many a people in the forums complain that they can't find a copy even though they'd purchase it. At this rate Skies well probably sell at least 60,000 copies by the end of this month, hopefully sales will continue to increase like they did from January to February. I certain Skies will sell at least 100,000 copies, hopefully it well sell much more though.

Darc Requiem

LMSx · « **Reply #12 on:** March 17, 2003, 03:26:47 PM »

http://www.gamingcubed.com/article.php?aid=33

Seems official enough.

rpglover · « **Reply #13 on:** March 17, 2003, 04:15:57 PM »

well i think its a given that skies will be on the gamecube
maybe skies 2 will be ported later to the ps2 if it sells well

well the only thing i didn't like in skies was probably the speed of the battles- they were a little slow
if they could speed them up a bit i would be satisfyed
also- hopefully they have a good story in the works, not just some dumb sequal where the same bad guys come back
we shall see though

cyrus420 · « **Reply #14 on:** March 17, 2003, 04:42:50 PM »

i'd like to see a new battle system in the sequal. don't get me wrong, the original had that classic-RPG feel that i really like. but i just want something new this time around. maybe they could try to make something with real time, i dunno. but the fighting was kind of slow.

Arbok · « **Reply #15 on:** March 17, 2003, 07:21:00 PM »

Quote
Originally posted by: LMSx
http://www.gamingcubed.com/article.php?aid=33

Seems official enough.

"It's likely this title will make it to the GameCube."

How is that "official"?

Don't get your hopes up, like I said.

mouse_clicker · « **Reply #16 on:** March 17, 2003, 07:32:19 PM »

I was just about to post the same quote from the article as Hedorah: while I do think Soa2 is Cube bound, it is in no wya official or certain. There's always a chance Sega will decide it's better as a PS2 exclusive, etc.

LMSx · « **Reply #17 on:** March 18, 2003, 03:27:42 PM »

Got a few words mixed up there, didn't I?

Regardless, excluding a last minute snap from Sony or MS, the continued lack of RPGs on GameCube means SoA 2 for Cube is in a position similar to Sonic Adventure 3-why bother releasing an update of a previous title for the platform unless they were confident it would sell?

Don'tHate742 · « **Reply #18 on:** March 18, 2003, 06:30:35 PM »

There should be combined spirit attacks.........not everyone just like 2. And more with the elementals...

Also I didn't like the walking around.....they should stay in one place charge and jump back. When theres a critical hit for Vyse, he should charge slash through then stay there. Basically better cut scenes for critical hit and magic.

Darc Requiem · « **Reply #19 on:** March 24, 2003, 04:45:08 PM »

Hmm....I'm still pondering about the Storyline for Skies of Arcadia 2. Hopefully it will continue with Vyse, Fina, and Aika. I especially like Fina's new gear. I hoping for a trek into the Deep Sky, discovery of the Black Moon, a lost civilization of the Black Moon, a Black gigas, some more Silvites....Fina and Ramirez couldn't have been all of them. Maybe some of the Silvites split from the elders in disagreement. Plus it would be nice to be at the helm of Vyse's ship. We got to see it in the ending, seems like a variation of the Albartross......I'm sorta partial to the good old Delphinus. Hopefully there is more land in the sequel. There was just a bit too much open sky and and not enough towns. outside of Nasr, none of the other countries had more than one town. Well.....Horetaka had the town of women but you never got to visit it. And maybe Piastol could be playable....I don't know just tossing around some ideas. What do you guys think?

Darc Requiem

cyrus420 · « **Reply #20 on:** March 24, 2003, 06:10:17 PM »

but there's a problem with that tho. one of the major fun factors in skies of arcadia was all of the exploring. over half of the world wasn't even discovered until Vyse came along. if they did a direct sequel, it'd be really hard for them to do that again. and i don't think they can go into deep sky, cuz it looked uninhabitable. but who knows for sure?

what i'd like to see is an indirect sequel. new characters, a new (but slightly similar) world to explore. new adventures and what not. that's why i liked skies of arcadia, it was a fresh new experience for me. if they continued with the same characters and such, to me it wouldn't quite be as good. look at FFX-2. that game looks like it's gonna be worse than the original (square says that the gameplay is a mix between FFX and tomb raider, what the heck are they thinking?) they way they made skies of arcadia, they kinda made it hard for them to make a good sequel to it (unless they go into space??)

and now for some flamage.....

Phazon77 · « **Reply #21 on:** March 24, 2003, 06:25:11 PM »

Yeah, thats what I was thinking too, mabye in "the future" of Arcadia, people start to explore space and mabye Vyse Great, Great, great grandson would be at the fore front of "space exploration", and mabye that ties in with the black moonstone. Or how bout an evil power rises up from the core of the black moonstone shrouding the world in darkness, and only *insert heros name* can save the world af arcadia by looking for other "atmospheric cores" the equivalent of planets in the fantasy world of arcadia, therefore leaving the old world behind and facing bold new adventures to save his family.

Darc Requiem · « **Reply #22 on:** March 25, 2003, 09:54:04 AM »

Cyrus and Phazon both of you have great ideas. I can see the merit in all new characters. I just have an attachment to the crew of Skies after beating it on DC and GC. I think a brand new adventure with new characters would be great, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't want to see Vyse, Fina, and Aika return. Hopefully Aika cuts back on the hair spray the next time around though

Besides they could always pull a Dragon Warrior 2 and greatly expand the world by leaving the current world intact and add new continents. The Upper and Lower Sky would be great places to add new lands, and they could make the Deep Sky inhabitable.....I mean they made the core of Earth habitable in Final Fantasy 4 and they and they threw in a habitable to moon to boot. Skies is from the creators of Phantasy Star.....maybe they will throw in a whole new world in addition to Arcadia....maybe another set of Silvites or citizens of the Black Moon inhabited a near by world. Its all conjecture on my part but whatever Overworks comes up with I'm sure it will be excellent. I just hope it keeps the upbeat emotion of Skies, its refreshing to have a group of happy heroes....the current depressed anti hero phase of RPGs was getting old.

Darc Requiem

Nephilim · « **Reply #23 on:** March 25, 2003, 12:55:01 PM »

yes sega are going to be doing more games for ps2 then gc now
ONLY cause of the SAMMY meger, and SAMMY MAKES ALL THERE GAMES ON PS2!
geez dumb morons, and that interview was for vitual fighter... and thats on PS2.....I wonder why he would talk sony related things.....hmmmmm maybe cause he relized PS2 owners would be reading it and not Gamecube owners
geez

anyway the game is out already, u cant really change it
maybe with a dantel card u can unlock a character who was in the beta..but thats proberly about it

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Author Topic: Skies of Arcadia 2 (Read 6588 times)