Savage Skies

Prerelease Info Notes

Regional Differences#

The first US release was M-rated (Mature), apparently due to the violent ending cutscenes. Other regions subsequently downgraded the rating, but the endings were left intact. In Japan, the game had a warning sticker on it, which said, “This game contains violent scenes and grotesque expressions”. In Europe, the game was given a 12+ rating.

However, only backstory cutscene was shortened in the Japanese & European releases. Some illustrations were removed and cropped, and the narrator played by Jude Beers was replaced by the actor Jay O'Berski who voiced Virtwyn's mate:

Ozzy's Black Skies Leftovers#

This needs some investigation. Discuss ideas and findings on the talk page. Specifically: Extract the files and see if they are of interest outside the filenames.

Present at 0x33CC10 in the executable, among save menu text:

Ozzy's Black Skies

The config files in the root of the disc still call the game "BlackSkies", and opening DATA.RFA and VAG.PCK in a hex editor reveals many files with "Ozz"/"Ozzy" in the filename.

There's a lot of codes for "War Pig", which was the original name of the War Beast, the living, floating fortress of the Chrysalis faction. This reveals that it was originally named after the song "War Pigs" by Black Sabbath, which used to be part of dynamic soundtrack. Some particles, textures and tree models are named "Sweetleaf", which is also a reference to the Black Sabbath song, "Sweet Leaf".

Two power-ups kept their original names in the code, which are also references to Black Sabbath:

|Models\group_PowerUps\PUP_IRONMAN\pup_ironman.rfmdl   modifier

"Iron Man" is a early name for "Hardcore";

Global.SetDeathPowerup( unitName, "Electric Funeral" )

"Electric Funeral" is a early name for "High Voltage".

Also, there's some lines called "OzzyCometh" in the code, which might be a reference to Ozzy's compilation album, "The Ozzman Cometh".

There is code for the soundtrack of the game with early titles:

Black Skies    SoundTrackName

War Pigs   SoundTrackName

Paranoid   SoundTrackName

Crazy Train    SoundTrackName

And one final unused voice line:

Global.Snd_PlayInstanceSound("sounds/vocals/ozzy/ozz_wantmore1.wav")

Unused Mounts#

Rarg is a humanoid skeleton creature that belongs to Pariah faction. Rarg has a very similar design to Gormag. It has unique anatomy for any playable creature due to hind legs working as wings. Its config code is still presents in Savage Skies, inside DATA.RFA file:

rarg-flyforward.rfanm

AssignToSquad( "Pariah1", "Rarg", "Pariah_Spawna", 2 )

Rarg has been planned to returned in Savage Skies for Xbox platform.

There's also Chrysalis' mount (or presumably a minion) Keeto, who is only known from its code remnants:

keeto-flyforward.rfanm

function StartCampaign()

    CreateSquad ( "Chrysalis1" );
    AssignToSquad( "Chrysalis1", "Keeto", "Chrysalis_Spawna", 2 )

Minions#

Minions is a group of non-playable characters; only Wraith (and Tentacleese presumably too) still appears in few missions, as the rest were scrapped. In "Ozzy's Black Skies PS2" teaser there can be seen giant dragonflies for few seconds, that were unused in Savage Skies. Apparently, each faction had its own pack consisted of few minions, some were low-attitude in the air, some on the ground. Other obscure minions includes:

Rohl, minion_crablouse, minion_willowisp, minion_smalldragon, minion_skull, minion_maggot, minion_leech, minion_dragonfly, minion_dove, minion_bat and eyeminion (or "eye").

All of these are located in DATA.RFA in path:

Animated_Models/group_Minions/

For some reason, Rarg and Keeto are also included in this path.

Character design#

Player takes under control not only flying creature, but fantasy ace-pilot of each faction. In Savage Skies they called champions. Original setting has same conception, but it was dedicated to three music career & life phases of Ozzy Osbourne. Lore gets through different timelines and could be played as one of three Ozzy's alter-egos, participating in dogfights, instead of blank champions, whose biography was left outside of released game, and can be found only in Manual and early previews.¹²

Judging by the models, that can be found in Savage Skies, and comparing them to concept art, they seems to had the same design, so can be investigated for references to Ozzy's Black Skies. Besides, each of them still possesses Ozzy Osbourne's face.

During gameplay, it’s very hard to examine riders' appearance, especially for Virtwyn "Ozzy". Each of them has 3 stages of gameplay models, and except 1rst ones, can be seen only if player would collect enough amount of Crystal Shards (aren't required for completing missions). Each skin replacing another automatically with every mission session, and cannot be switched to previous stages. This means that player might finish certain campaign with 1rst stage, and then in ending cutscene will appear the same character in completely different appearance.

Notably, in cutscenes main characters appears only in their last stages, and only in endings. They also have some inaccuracies compared to their in‑game models, which likely are leftovers of Black Skies design. In Virtwyn faction player can passes the story timeline as nobleman "Ozzy", son of a lord and lady. Anduras, leader of Virtwyn, recognized his superior fighting skills from an early age. Originally he represented Ozzy's virtuous side in 90s.

• On 3rd stage can be seen a gold cape that were unused on gameplay model, but appears on cutscene model in Virtwyn ending.
• At every stage of low-poly models developers replaced his long hair with skin texture.

In Chrysalis Collective there's madbeast "Ozzy", born of a respected sorceress, being the embodiment of Ozzy's scientific and magical side in 80s. He has a blue skin due to experiments provided by Kalavin, leader of Chrysalis, which is might be a reference to Ozzy's blue demon tattoo. With each stage, he grows more and more hair until starting to look like a yeti, which is a specific reference to Ozzy's werewolf likeness for Bark At The Moon album cover and music video. On second stage his design strongly refers to one of Ozzy's real likenesses with ponytail, bare arms and chest.

• His 3rd stage during gameplay appears with tilted crown, chest armor and implants, when in ending cutscene he deprived of it; his fur much more fluffier than on low-poly model.

In Pariah appears dark "Ozzy", who represents Ozzy's evil side in 70s. This character is a living dead, who was unwittingly saved by Mortalvis, leader of Pariah, after Fraewyn destruction. He used to have the same two chest tattoos as Ozzy in real life:

• on low poly models still presents an asymmetrical part of chest for one of those, but it was erased with skin texture.
• In Pariah ending his design differs from low-poly model: he wears a chain choker, shoulder pad placed on the side, appears with a demon tattoo on center of the chest and detailed entrails in torso.
• Each low-poly model wears a crown, since part of hair was replaced by yellow texture.

Other characters#

Noteworthy, in Chrysalis ending, each three characters also possesses Ozzy's face on their models, especially for Anduras and madbeast "Ozzy", whose face strongly resembles original model for King of Fraewyn.

Also Wilhn, a Virtwyn prince, still has Ozzy's face on low-poly model.

Developer Leftovers#

Also in DATA.RFA are these messages:

REM I've included some sample settings that you might want to adjust
REM depending on how you play the game.  For now, the game doesn't
REM actually require anything in this file.  If you remove everything
REM then the game will run fullscreen at 640x480 using your primary
REM display driver.
REM

REM For now, run with the default device driver, at 640x480
REM
deviceName default
xRes 640
yRes 480

REM Uncomment the following line to make the game run in a window
window

REM Uncomment the following line to run the game without music
REM noMusic

REM Uncomment the following line to run the game without AI opponents
REM noAI

REM The following is an example of a console command
+bindcmd o observe      REM

 -- Tell everyone the Eye has been stolen!
        BroadcastMessage("ArtifactStolen");

        -- Play the vocal indicating how to escape with the Eye

*** IMPORTANT NOTE *** 

-- Currently this file isn't used, because the Virtwyn and Pariah factions
-- need to cooperate in this mission. Because there is no mechanism for 
-- designating allied factions, the virtwyn script code is 
-- in the Pariah.lua script. (In effect, the virtwyn creatures are working for
-- the Pariah.)

There's also some messages started with "CALLED:", which details chat between developers, like this:

Whenever the player kills a ship, or otherwise needs a mission
--            directing him towards a ship.
--
-- PURPOSE:   Find the next weakest ship (siege's first, then gunships), and
--            create a player mission for attacking it

Concept Art Gallery#