Savage Skies was originally called Ozzy's Black Skies, and it was intended to be a fantasy flight combat game that was inspired by the music of Ozzy Osbourne and starred the infamous rock icon. Somewhere along the line, Ozzy Osbourne's name, music, and likeness were dropped from the game, and the result is Savage Skies, a pure fantasy-themed shooter. The strongest points in Savage Skies are its unique lineup of fantasy creatures and a good number of interesting environments that reflect the theme well. But beyond that, you'll find a basic aerial shooter that often has an abnormal level of difficulty and doesn't really provide the sort of entertainment that's likely to keep you coming back for more. Further detracting from the game are sketchy graphics, poor voice acting, and forgettable music.
The setting of Savage Skies is a mythical world that has been torn apart by war. As the story goes, the land used to be ruled by a king who reigned in peace until his primary advisor betrayed him. The population was led to believe that the king had been slain, and chaos followed shortly thereafter. During this chaotic period, control of the land was divided among three warring factions. The Virtwyn are the remains of the old guard, and as such they are constantly protecting themselves from the advances of the other two factions. The Chrysalis are the most neutral of the three, and their population operates as a hive mind that is constantly trying to expand. Finally, the Pariah are a group of necromancers who are set on destroying everything living. You can represent any of these factions in the game.
The game consists primarily of the story mode, but it includes a few two-player modes as well. These multiplayer modes are pretty cut and dried, giving players the standard head-to-head match, time attack, and team battle. There are a total of seven multiplayer maps, and, for the most part, they have to be unlocked via the story mode, much like the majority of the creatures in the game.
The biggest thing that Savage Skies has going for it is the number of creatures that you can play as. There are a total of 24 flying beasts that can be unlocked, though only three of those will be available to you immediately--one for each faction. In order to unlock more creatures, you need to progress in the single-player mode, where you will acquire a new creature for each level you pass. All these creatures are completely different from one another and have a set of attributes that further adds to the distinction between them. You'll find yourself flying everything from a large flying leopard to a winged eyeball or a giant airborne manta ray as you make your way through the game.
Graphically, Savage Skies is very middle-of-the-road. While the designs of some of the creatures are quite good, others are very uninspired. The amount of detail in the creature models is pretty low as well--they're all mostly made up of a low number of polygons, and the textures can be quite bland. The rider who sits atop the back of each creature also looks like he was slapped on there at the last second. The creatures animate well when they're flying, but landing and walking is another story. Some of the creatures can't walk at all, but those that do have pretty shoddy walking animations. Several of them, such as the dragons, have tails and longer wings that will clip into the ground as they walk and almost completely disappear.
The environments are interesting, and they can even be spectacular at times. They range from coastal levels and lightning-blasted desert plains to jungles that are inhabited by foreign plant life. Most of the levels are pretty large too, which is fitting considering the speed and range of some of the aerial battles that you'll find yourself in. Unfortunately, there is a lot of pop-up that is barely concealed by an ever-present veil of fog. Savage Skies at least maintains a pretty steady frame rate, even in the multiplayer modes.
There are a number of prerendered cutscenes scattered throughout the game, but their quality level of is quite inconsistent. In some parts they will look almost good, while in others they'll look like something you would've expected to have seen five years ago. In general, they're all pretty low quality.
Even when compared with the game's graphics, the sound in Savage Skies is especially lacking. The music is mostly guitar rock, and it's not very good. The sound effects are quite bland, with the exception of the meaty splattering noise when you kill a foe, but the real low point of the sound is the voice acting. Not only is it bad, but it's also somewhat buggy. In the tutorial, for example, you will be instructed to land on a platform, and if you miss it, you'll be chided and told to try again. In one case when we were playing, the voice used in the tutorial continually repeated that we needed to try again, despite the fact that our creature was already firmly planted on the platform. The voices also have a bad habit of continuing despite the game being paused, too.
The actual gameplay mechanics are pretty easy to get used to, and they can be fun for a while. Each creature has a pair of attacks, and they all share a basic homing attack. The individual attacks of each creature can be anything from a rapid-fire breath weapon to a protective shield. All these drain mana points, which can be replenished by picking up the power-ups that are scattered throughout the level or will often show up in the place of a defeated opponent. The missions that you'll find yourself playing generally skew toward protecting or destroying different targets.
The difficulty level is what gets in the way of the gameplay. Even with the difficulty set to easy, the Pariah missions are frustratingly hard. Even the Chrysalis missions can be quite difficult. The reason for this is that the computer fights cheap. Enemies will somehow be able to hit you before they're visible, and other flying creatures have a nasty habit of getting behind you and staying there, no matter what you do or how well you fly, until you've been reduced to smoking chunks of meat. This wouldn't be such an issue if it could be remedied by the adjustable difficulty in the options menu, but as it stands, it affects roughly half of the game.
Add all this up and you'll get Savage Skies, a game that is only decent looking, doesn't sound very good, and plays well as long as you stay away from the higher difficulty levels. It's true that, with practice, a seasoned player could probably get past the cheap AI, but by then, you will undoubtedly have passed well beyond the boundaries of what is normally considered fun. That said, though, Savage Skies can be entertaining at times, so it's not bad. But its flaws generally outweigh its strengths.
