Panzer Dragoon Orta (XBox)

I totally missed out on the XBox - I had a PS2 and Gamecube, and had a foot in that stupid "I can play all those games on the PS2 or PC" camp. Of course, there were a few decent exclusives on the old monolith, Panzer Dragoon Orta being one of them.

I may have missed out on the XBox, but I was already very familiar with the Panzer Dragoon series having owned the first one (Eins?) and Zwei on the Saturn. And although Orta is intrinsically the same as those games, the cut-above graphics help elevate it way beyond them. Even now, it looks very decent indeed.

As far as the gameplay goes, there's no denying the fact that it's very similar to Rez, although of course that should be the other way around. Rez kind of stole a lot of thunder from the Panzer Dragoon series, a lot of which was probably down to the way it incorporated music into the game.

It's a shame, because although there is a gameplay similarity, the two have such different looks and styles that it's well worth owning both. PDO has a wee bit of strategy - your dragon can morph into three different types, each of which has a slight advantage over the others in certain situations. Switching on the fly is easy, so once you get to grips with the system and the enemies in your way, it becomes second nature to morph at the right times for maximum effect.

Another thing this game has in common with Rez are the lengthy and often difficult boss battles. I struggled for ages on the first one, only to read online that "if you find this one difficult, you might as well give up now". This is advice that I'm only too happy to ignore, because Panzer Dragoon Orta is worth every minute you sink into it.

I'm doing well so far... I haven't played any stinkers and there's only been one game that I haven't felt an urge to return to. Let's hope this lucky streak continues...