what happened here? in PD1 they let you have wide angle, close, and first person views but that got dropped in all the others???
i liked going into first person sometimes! it was good for shooting stuff down with the gun and it was nice to take in the scenery
but it was removed without explanation in zwei and you totally needed it if you ever played as the guardian dragon or type 02 form (darky).
in saga, it would have been worthless in combat. so whatever.
i thought they might bring it back in orta… but no
i think a lot of boss battles, environments, and quick flying sections would have looked really good in first person i think we should petition the next PD game to have multiple views! who’s with me! did anybody else switch up the views the way i did? if not, which did you stick with?
The optional views were unnecessary in my opinion. What real difference did they make to the gameplay? The player is controlling the dragon as much as they are the rider, so remaining in full view of the dragon is for the best (a first person perspective is more of a hindrance than anything remotely helpful IMO).
The extra views were probably cut to save time, or because fans of Panzer Dragoon never made us of them, or worse, hated them.
While I didn’t really like the first person view, the zoomed out view was actually quite useful. It allowed the player to see quite far in all directions around the dragon which was actually pretty useful at times.
I used all three vision modes in PD a lot, trying to give the game a more cinematic feel. I’d use the normal mode (which switched to first person when you were looking any direction but forward) in the outside areas, zoomed-in mode in the indoor ones, and zoomed-out mode for the bosses (made them look even bigger), and for whenever the dragon but on a burst of speed.
I also noticed that the extra views were removed after the first game. However, I can definatly understand why they went to a fixed camera system. For one, the controls were MUCH more ridged in Panzer Dragoon 1. Compare rotating your view in the first game to Zwei: in the first it’s like the camera feels like it’s robotic and stiff, whereas with Zwie the turn is nearly instantanious and smooth, almost like how your head would move when you turn to look at something. Because of this, it made more sense to have only one camera view that stays the same distance away from the dragon no matter which direction you were looking, rather than switching to a first-person view or zooming out depending on which direction you were looking.
Also by making the camera angle more consistant, they were able to cram more “action” into the game. Since you no longer had to worry about the camera angle (in fact, not allowed to since you were stuck in the same view), and since rotating your view was now much quicker, they could have enemies appear from any side of you without having to worry as much about giving the player enough reaction time to face them. Also it allowed them to be more precise when designing levels: they didn’t need to worry about the camera being 30 feet away from the dragon like they did in the first game (if Zwie had that camera view, it probably would’ve been obstructed by the trees in the 3rd level).
Still, I think it would’ve been a cool little easter egg if the original views were unlockable in Orta or Zwie. Might’ve messed up with some of the levels, and it might’ve been disorienting considering how fast you can rotate your view in those games, but I wouldn’t have minded seeing it as an option. Oh, and did anyone else notice that in Saga it switched to a first-person view when you fired your gun? Reminded me of the view in the first Panzer Dragoon game, though I think in Saga it was done so you had a better view of what enemy you were selecting.
I didn’t have anything against the multiple views generally, but the way the camera zoomed in to first person and out to third person whenever you turned around (with the default view) seemed a bit irritating. I preferred the fixed-distance views in PDZ and PDO, and I wouldn’t have minded first-person or long-distance views in those games too - as long as they weren’t triggered by turning left or right.
(In PD1 I usually use the long-distance view BTW, as it seems easier to tell what’s around you and exactly where you are in relation to large, violent bosses / missiles.)
i think we should petition the next PD game to have multiple views! who’s with me! did anybody else switch up the views the way i did? if not, which did you stick with?