Skies of Arcadia

Skies of Arcadia is a RPG released for the Dreamcast in 2000. An enhanced port for the Nintendo GameCube, Skies of Arcadia Legends was released in 2002.

Plot
Vyse and Aika are members of the Blue Rogues, an air ship pirate crew who only plunder from the corrupt and tyrannical Valuan Empire's warships.

The Valuan Empire meanwhile are trying to get their hands on the Moon Crystals in order to awaken a living biological weapon capable of wiping humanity out. With this biological weapon they will be capable of taking over the entire world and soon corner Fina, a 17 year old 'Silvite' girl who has connections to the Moon Crystals and has been sent to find them by her people before the Valuan Empire does.

She is saved when Vyse and Aika, who had come to raid the ship that had captured Fina, chase off the Valuan Admiral and free her from captivity taking her back to their ship. As they share a common enemy, the Blue Rogues agree to help Fina in her quest...

Gameplay
The player controls Vyse as he roams around the sky islands, discovering new lands, exploring dungeons and recruiting more support crew members from the various islands for the Blue Rogues expanded crew. This has additional benefits in combat and exploration.

Players are tasked with levelling up Vyse, Aika, Fina and a fourth party member that is changed throughout the course of the story until nearer the end game when the player is allowed to pick who that fourth party member is. These party members are Drachma, Gilder and Enrique.

The crew require ' Spirit Points ' which they share between all members in the party in order to perform actions such as special attacks that deal huge damage or cast magic attacks. These spirit points are refilled at the beginning of each turn, although they can be filled manually by a character selecting the 'Focus ' command. Due to the way this system works it means for example Aika using the 'Focus' command could refill Vyse's Spirit Points.

The game encourages exploration with it's Discovery system which can vary from locations, animals and items to be found and catalogued. Discovery information can be sold at Sailor's Guilds for cash, although their value changes depending on how hidden the item was and how long it took Vyse and the others to discover it after it became available. This puts an emphasis on the player exploring newly discovered islands as soon as they can.

Exploration takes place between islands via the Blue Rogues' airship. One of the game's most unique features are the airship combat encounters, which have the Blue Rogues engage in ship to ship combat in the sky. The actions of the Ship Combat are similar to regular combat but the player must choose between which cannon to use to most effectively defeat their opponent. On top of this the NPC crew members Vyse has recruited can be called upon in these battles to unleash their individual special abilities. Each member can only perform their action once. If the party's Spirit Points are full, they can also unleash a super move in these battles that calls upon all recruited members on the crew to both attack the enemies and heal their allies.