During one of their confrontations with a battle ship, they encounter a girl named Fina, who is on an important mission whose secret she cannot tell yet. The boy Vyse and the girl Aika are members of the Blue Rogues - noble pirates who attack only Valuan war ships. Guided by its greedy admirals, Valua strives to possess all the power in Arcadia. Among the countries of this world, the most powerful one is the Empire of Valua. Nintendo Switch Accessories & PeripheralsĪrcadia is a world where continents float high above, and people travel by airships. Nintendo GameCube Accessories & Peripherals Nintendo 64 (N64) Accessories & Peripherals While I am a sucker for original releases, I would argue that prospective buyers would be better off hunting the GameCube version down, as it has extra content and should be easier to find a working GameCube (or Wii through backwards compatibility) these days.Super Nintendo (SNES) Accessories & Peripherals If I didn’t own the game already and wanted to play one of the best role-playing games of all time, Skies of Arcadia would be one of my first choices.įor the foreseeable future, Sega has no plans of remastering Skies of Arcadia, and if this continues to hold true, then the game’s value will inevitably rise over the next decade. In my opinion, Skies of Arcadia is the very best Japanese role-playing game post PlayStation 1 era. Of this (Arcadia’s worth) I have no doubt. That said, the numbers above mean that there is a limited amount of copies available at online retail which makes Skies of Arcadia all the more valuable, and perhaps, coveted by JRPG aficionados and collectors. The GC version of the game sold better with 220,000 copies. That’s an astronomically low number of copies sold for a AAA JRPG of the era. The Sega Dreamcast having an early death contributed to Skies of Arcadia’s demise, as it only sold 90,000 copies on the system. In fact, the former statement was quite polite in describing how poorly the game sold. The main issue for Skies of Arcadia being a pricey find, despite being one of the greatest JRPGs ever made, is that it did not sell well. Skies of Arcadia aged very well, and if you have a working copy with its original case you have a game that has gained a lot monetary value over the last two decades. Now, $400 seems like spare change in comparison to Panzer Dragoon Saga’s asking price, but I remember acquiring the game 22 years ago for $39.99. Said game copies now hover around the $400 mark for a working disc (or discs in the DC’s case) with all of the original materials (booklets and case) included. Skies of Arcadia would also not receive digital releases or remasters, meaning that the only legitimate way to play it is to get a Sega Dreamcast or GC and purchase a copy of the game. In addition to that, Sega quickly abandoned the game after the GC’s 2003 release. Why is Skies of Arcadia so Expensive?Īs mentioned above, the game is a damn good one. This issue would be fixed on the game’s GameCube port. The only complaint that anyone could have had about the game was its high frequency of random turn-based battles. In my opinion, Skies’ visual display and large explorable world is what made it the superior Dreamcast RPG. Unlike Grandia II, Skies of Arcadia felt like a proper 3-D RPG. The game featured beautiful locales and detailed polygonal characters that could be fully appreciated behind a close third person camera. Skies of Arcadia looked like a proper 3-D RPG of the time too. Vyse, Fina, and Aika were a likable cast, and even the collection of villains that made periodical appearances throughout the game’s run time were entertaining to read. The entire quest was one which took place in a sky populated by floating islands and continents. However, as a game very few RPGs from the era (or any era) gave the epic sense of adventuring into the unknown as well as Skies of Arcadia did. This was because Sega was struggling from the losses incurred by Shenmue’s development and marketing campaign among its many other financial woes brought upon by previous hardware blunders. Much like other Sega RPGs from the era such as Panzer Dragoon Saga, Skies of Arcadia did not receive a full marketing push. Skies of Arcadia the Greatest JRPG of the 2000s? Skies of Arcadia is one of the finest JRPGs ever made, and now, it is also one of the priciest on Amazon.įrom 2000 to 2010 only Chrono Cross (94 average score) and Final Fantasy IX (94 average score) scored higher than Skies of Arcadia (93 average score) with critics. However, purchasing a working copy (with case and booklets) of Skies of Arcadia remains a considerable investment in both of its versions. The Dreamcast’s greatest Japanese role-playing game, and perhaps the best JRPG of the 2000s, is not as costly as other entries on this weekly series.
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