Here is a much-revised version of my theory from the “Dragon Crests” thread:
The Impurity is ejected from Sestren, and enters into Lagi the Coolia. The events of PD Zwei take place. The Impurity’s mutation of the Coolia culminates in the Blue Dragon / Solo Wing form.
At the end of Zwei, the Impurity leaves Lagi’s dying body. It saves Lagi’s essence - that is, Lagi’s own consciousness / spirit - by transferring it into the Dragon Crest within Shellcoof.
Lundi enters into the wreckage of Shellcoof, and sees the crest glowing with Lagi’s essence. (This would be what we see in the ending sequence.) Afterwards, he continues his exploration and comes across Lagi’s dead body, as he records in his diary.
The Impurity finds a second body - another Coolia? - and brings it all the way up to the Blue Dragon / Solo Wing form again. At some point, the dragon also acquires the Sky Rider. The events of PD1 take place. The physical dragon is again exhausted from the effort of destroying a Tower, and parts company with Kyle before it dies.
The Impurity finds a third body. (Yet another Coolia?) This body does not reach the Blue Dragon / Solo Wing form before the events of Saga take place. In the course of the story, the dragon is physically merged with the essence of Lagi, which is retrieved from the Dragon Crest within Shellcoof. It also reaches the Blue Dragon / Solo Wing form again.
At the end of Saga, the Impurity finally leaves the physical dragon, and allows itself to be deativated in order to take down the Tower network. (As we see in Saga’s ending sequence.) The physical dragon is allowed to remain, and returns to the world. (As we find out in PD Orta.)
(It isn’t 100% new, but it does away with the really convoluted bits from my theory in the other thread.)
This incorporates the most obvious interpretation of Lundi’s diary: that Lagi’s body died, and that the Impurity would eventually return, but with a different body. I think it provides a good alternative to the theory that the dragon is the same one (Lagi) all the way through the games, which is apparently still not confirmed anywhere.
I honestly think this is what is meant to be going on in the Saturn trilogy.
I’m still searching for that interview which confirms the dragon in each game is the same. I also remember the official Sega website providing confirmation of the dragon’s identity in Panzer Dragoon Orta – that being Lagi.
Isn’t the fact that all three dragons in the Saturn Panzer Dragoon trilogy morph into the Solo Wing dragon proof enough that they are all the same dragon?
To be honest Geoffrey, it wouldn’t totally surprise me if the dragon is meant to be the same one in each game, for all the reasons you and others have raised. If this is so, however, the very fact that this is never literally commented upon in the games would strike me as very strange - especially when there is a fair amount of evidence opposing the whole idea. Still, I too am very interested in reading this transcript.
We know that the morphing is down to the manipulation of the creature’s genetics, obviously by the Impurity that caused Lagi to start mutating in the first place. If it could do this to one creature, the idea that it could metamorphose another one - assuming that Lundi is right, and that the Impurity did return in “a new body” - seems perfectly reasonable to me.
Plus, the Solo Wing’s Spiritual form in Saga is identical to the Dark Dragon from PD1. That is evidence that a dragon can be manipulated into the form of a creature that is seperate to itself.
[quote=“GehnTheBerserker”]But still I don’t find Lance’s theory ridiculous at all.Two questions :
By impurity you mean the Heresy Program or something else interily?[/quote]
I mean what Sestren is referring to as the Impurity in his memory orbs at the end of Saga. That is, the thing that starts off as a black dragon-symbol in the Sestren system, gets ejected into the physical world, enters into Lagi, and at the end of Saga allows itself to be “switched off” in order to take down the Towers.
In other words: yes, the thing generally referred to as the Heresy Program on these forums, or sometimes the Heresy Dragon.
No. For this theory I’m interpreting Lundi’s diary (the “Old Diary” from Saga) literally. I’m taking his assertion that Lagi’s body actually died following the events of Zwei, and that the Impurity would return later in a new body, to be the truth.
Lance, how would you feel about compiling all of your ideas into a theory for this website? I honestly think you’ve raised some worthwhile points that can not be easily dismissed, even though I’m still convinced that it was the same dragon in all four games. I could write the alternative theory and they could be placed on the site together so that people could weigh the evidence for and against and make up their own mind.
One thing I’d like to add to this topic is a comment about the baby dragon found inside the crest in Shelcoof. At the campsite when Edge looks at the baby dragon he says “Is he the son of my dragon?” If all four dragons were Lagi, then maybe he gave birth to a son at the end of Panzer Dragoon Zwei - a son that he left behind in the crest so that the Solo Wing could be created in PDS. This doesn’t confirm that it was Lagi’s son (Edge was asking a question, not stating a fact) but it’s contributing evidence that is worth considering. Games sometimes add questions like this which are actually explaining something to the player (for example, the “Sometimes you have to lose to win” comment from the Saturn action RPG, Dark Saviour).
Ultimately, I have to agree; I myself usually find it very hard to think of games as anything other than games that were made by people with purposes in mind. I fear I may have been applying a little too much real-world logic to my reasoning recently, though
I know some software companies include information in their games to mislead the player at every turn, but I don’t think that the Panzer series is really like that. Maybe I’ll come up with some interesting ideas on the whole “son of my dragon” topic after giving it some more thought…
I’d very much like to, Solo - and I’m quite honoured that you think my theory’s good enough for the site. I’ll happily get a write-up done at some point in the near future, probably by the end of this weekend. I’ve got a few questions first, but I’ll PM them to you if that’s OK, so as to not clutter up the thread…
A babelfish.altavista.com translation of the panzer dragoon website has this discription for a wall paper which includes pictures of all the forms of the dragoon
"Oneself dragon/Dragon which evolves
The strongest attack characteristic living thing dragon into among one generations oneself evolves into various forms. This ability to be adapted to circumstance always shows the fact that it is designed because the dragon acts independently at thousands year unit."
That seems like it is saying they all are the same dragon.
I havent read Lundi’s diary recently so im not sure exactly what it says but isnt it possible that it could have been mistranslated to english making it seem like Lundi found Lagi’s body?
To me it seems too much of a coincidence that the PD1 dragon is solowing and the perfect ending of PDZ ends in solo wing. I am almost certain that the Sky Rider didnt train PD1 dragon up to solo wing from a coolia(or indeed from any other form), the sky rider does not seem competant enough or strongly bonded to PD1 dragon. Also the amount of destruction it takes to get a dragon to solo wing from coolia is immense, surely PD1 dragons training would have been documented if it happened?
The PD Orta quote “now you are frail and mortal now” implies to me that before PDS it was impossible for Lagi to die, this fits with lagi being the same physical dragon in all of the games. When he exhausted himself he would hibernate as per the standard theory. However I dont think the baby dragon crest fits with the in game fiction, i dont think they could think of another way of including PDZ forms a bonus
side note: while thinking up that last paragraph i just came up with a counter point to my own arguement(i need more sleep). My counter point is as follows : The dragon from PDS/PDO is physically incapable of assuming solo wing form on its own (i.e. through training). This would explain the reverted form of the PDO dragon from PDS, it was never intended to make solo wing. It would also mean that the dragon from PDS/PDO was not the same as PDZ/PD1 and was only able to assume solo wing form( a form belonging to the last dragon) by absorbing part of its DNA.
Of course i still believe that it was the same physical lagi in all 4 games however i cant think of anything to counter my counter point yet.
That’s cool. I think it’s worth exploring all possible angles, which is the main reason for having a Theories section. By all means PM any questions this way.
I found this on a Japanese website dealing with PD…
I think the japanese have truer versions of the story than the english, so this might be somewhat reliable.
It’s a bad translation but apparantly at least two dragons are “verified”…the two untranslated parts might explain it?
The untranslated parts are fairly easy to translate: "Placing Atolm dragon and the lundi kyle edge, the blue dragon ", but I still don’t understand the meaning.
Anyway I’ve always considered it to be different dragons in every game, as does the Pandoras Box in Orta. For example it says that Edge’s Dragon is “…demonstrating a dramatically higher level of flexibility than that shown by Lagi.”
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