Gaming Wild Arms 3 / Upcoming RPGs

[Semjaza]

Several people have been talking about Legaia here, and it seems as though no one seems to know (for whatever reason) about Wild Arms 3 or Suikoden 3. These two are my most wanted RPGs of the year (especially now that Star Ocean 3 was delayed. I can't say much of anything about Suikoden 2 yet as it's not out, but people tell me it's even better than the 2nd. Suikoden 2 was near godlike, so that's good ;).

Anyway, Wild Arms 3. Wild Arms came out on PSX early on in it's life. It really wasn't anything super special, but it was a good, low-budget RPG that came around at a time when PSX had little RPG games to choose from. Wild Arms 2 hit much later, and I thought this game was crap honestly. Both basically proved that the developers working on them couldn't handle 3D at all (although WA had decent 2D graphics). If you could get past the ancient look, the games were quite good... At least that's what I'm told about WA2 lol.

Anyway, I don't know what SCEA did with this series... But this is an incredibly good game. It blows the previous 2 out of the water in every concievable way. The presentation and polish in this game impressed the hell out of me, especially considering I wasn't expecting much in either of those categories.

The game looks surprisingly good. Characters and enemies have this sketchy/cel shaded look. It seems odd at first, but after seeing it in motion it turns out well. The characters are still detailed, but they have this thin black line around them. There have been a few areas where light casts down over the characters, which just looks amazing. The animation is decent as well, and while it doesn't have any real lip movement, the characters have far more mannerisms and body language than many other RPGs.

Sound is also excellent. I can't tell if the music is always orchestrated or not, but I know for a fact some of the songs are. There are tracks with choirs, some with vocals... It all just sounds great. My only complaint is that the battle theme seems rather out of place. The sound effects are more or less standard stuff that every RPG has. It's worth noting that there is NO voice acting in this game at all. I personally don't miss that heh.

Gameplay is quite good. The game starts out in present time, where 4 main characters meet up by accident. You are then allowed to play each of the characters prologues (in any order you choose), which detal what they did before meeting. It's a lot like the first WA in this way, and I wish more RPGs did it.

Fights are pretty much normal stuff that all RPGs have. Wild Arms has always featured guns though, which are referred to as ARMs in game. You can attack with ARMs, or with your bare hands... ARMs are best to use of course, but they need to be reloaded. Each character's gun can hold different amounts of ammo. Ammo is unlimited though, and can be replenished by using Defend in fight. Ammo is automatically reloaded when a fight ends.

The game also has an interesting spell system, which is honestly kind of hard to explain. You'd have to play it to really understand, and I don't want to type out something coherant right now lol.

Dungeons are well made. Each character has tools they can use to get through an area. One can use bombs to blow up stuff, another has a boomerang to his switches far away. It gives the game a Zelda-ish quality which is nice.

Most importantly, the characters are great. I'm already interested in them this early on, especially since the game is good at telling you just enough to get you interested in finding out more. The game has a Wild West theme (cowboys... one of the characters is Native American (or whatever they'd be considered in this world, it's called Felgaia). The main character is also female... So it has two rather uncommon qualities for RPGs right there.


There are problems... The game uses a compass, but it's at times hard to follow because it's so damn small. The game also has jaggy problems from time to time, as well as some really annoying shimmering. Lastly, the world map is just plain weird. It's set up normally, except when wandering around you cannot see towns and landmarks at all. You have to press Square to do a "search" which makes them show up. Basically you wind up running around pushing Square every 5 seconds. It's just not needed lol.

Anyway, it's a great game... I don't understand some of the low scores it has gotten. It really isn't that old school, and is just a lot of fun. I've personally enjoyed it more than any other PS2 RPG so far.




I'll probably add Suikoden 3 stuff in here next week. It comes out on the 22nd.

[Charles]

Well, when I heard that the developer of the original game, MediaVision was handling the game, I was immediately pleased. For some reason, I loved the first Wild Arms and it remains one of my favorite role-playing games for the PSX. I know that many will disagree on that front, but it reminds me so very much, of a quality Super Nintendo role-playing game. In fact, the dungeon crawling was eerily reminiscent of a Zelda game. But, the addition of party members added some neat puzzle possibilities, where cooperation was necessary.

The third game in the trilogy seems to follow a lot of the same guidelines that made the first so cool. As you mentioned, each character has an epilogue, they are able to utilize tools when exploring dungeons and I've learned that the credits appear very early on. The nostalgia value within the approach is really nice.

From what I've read, the introductions only pose one serious problem and that's that they're too long (about an hour each). Because of this, there have been complaints about the game being very mundane early on, featuring repetition of the same monsters and puzzles. With four character introductions to play through, did you notice any of this?

I would have picked this game up already, but with GTA: Vice City and Tony Hawk 4 releasing simultaneously, I'm strapped, lol.

[RicoTranzrig]

I should check out WA 3 game soon. I really enjoyed the first one...mainly as an appitizer for Final Fantasy 7. Not much in the 3D department...but that was okay, it was better than Beyond the Beyond. I really liked the battle system where you power up your force each turn you make then unleash a special power. Hope the store has it.

[Semjaza]

Honestly, the introductions are not long at all. I had completed all 4 in under 50 minutes. I don't know who came up with this hour each idea, but that's really far from the truth. Each prologue does have baically one or two enemies you fight, plus a boss. The prologues are really only meant for you to get used to each characters items and fighting skills. Anyone that spends 4 hours doing these areas is not very good at games lol.

And yes, the credits do appear early on and are done in a really nice movie style... part of what I think really adds to the polish of this game.

Honestly, this is my favorite RPG on the system from what I've played so far. It certainly grabbed my interest far more than FFX has.

I know what you mean about too many games... I still have to get Timesplitters 2. I'll probably get Tony Hawk 4; Suikoden 3 come out on the 22nd. Then RE: Zero, Nightfire, Metroid Fusion and Metroid Prime all come out on the SAME day. What the hell...lol.

I've never played Beyond the Beyond since I was lead to believe it was laughable.


Two other problems I forgot. They might be confined to my copy. One, the rumble just doesn't seem to work at all. And two, every once in a while the PS2 makes me start this game from the Browser menu. I've never had that happen before.

[Charles]

Well, I just purchased Suikoden III today. I expected to trade in two games and pick it up for ten dollars as per a promotional deal at Electronics Boutique. Unfortunately, they screwed me over by saying that the games I had brought in were too old (they were under a year old), lol.

Luckily for me, the game has been worth the price so far anyway. I was immediately impressed by the opening cinematic. It's a beautiful anime intro that plays to an impressively orchestrated song (with vocals). I usually don't rant over intros, but, goodness, that was gorgeous--and quite long as well. It even features a hint of 3-D effects. Thankfully, they are subtle and don't appear superfluously.

When the actual game begins, the player may choose between three characters: Chris, Geddoe and Hugo. After a brief (approximately three minutes) introduction with each character, actual chapters are available. Thus far, I've only played through Chris's.

For those of you who don't know, Chris is a female. I'm really impressed with this character and the supporting cast. Konami is portraying this heroine tremendously. Chris is the leader of the Zexen Knights and acclaimed as almost mythical in her battle abilities. I mean, it's quite cool to see a strong, prominent female character who isn't exploited for sex appeal. If anything, Chris is constructed to be very masculine--she's clad in armor and is treated very much like a male.

The actual game seems polished so far. The visuals aren't meticulously detailed, but they are [I]very[/I] clean. In fact, they appear to be more impressive than Kingdom Hearts' visuals in my humble opinion. Facial models aren't dripping with polygons, but they do move their mouths and convey emotions through facial expressions.

Hmm, come to think of it, Suikoden III's visuals are reminiscent of those found in Skies of Arcadia (but much better). The animation is a bit stiff though. Especially walking animations. Camera angles in towns aren't flexible, but they show you what they need to.

The audio is [I]okay[/I]. There is no voice acting, which can either be a positive or negative aspect depending on who you are. The background effects are adequate, featuring clamoring crowds, birds chirping, plates clanking, etc. Sometimes the game comes across as a bit silent, but it's not a major flaw. The music composition is standard Suikoden (upbeat).

The gameplay doesn't seem to be a huge deviation from past games, except for the large-scale battles. Because the graphics are now polygonal, these ordeals have become more strategy oriented. Cards represent your squadrons and similarly to a strategy rpg, you recieve turns, in which to attack, heal, set up defenses, etc. Also, you are given battle objectives such as "Survive X number of turns."

Also like a strategy rpg, there is no real-time world map. The map is very similar to the map featured in Final Fantasy Tactics. It's a hand drawn image, in which markers represent different areas.

So, from what I've played, I'm very content. Importantly, the game [I]feels[/I] like Suikoden. The translation seems excellent. The storyline, even in this early stage, is very deep, featuring betrayal, a heavy war theme and tragedy.

[B]Minor Spoiler[/B]

One scene in particular comes to mind in which Chris inadvertently strikes and kills a young boy (depicted in slow motion). Later, she reflects on the situation in an [B]incredible[/B] church scene. Everything is penned extremely well. [B]End of Minor Spoiler [/B]

Best yet, those of you who have Suikoden II data on your memory cards may load it up at the start of this game. Very cool.

[Semjaza]

I'm about to cry. I just missed EB... 5 minutes too late and they close at 9. Best Buy didn't have it at all. They had about 45634563456 copies of Mario Party 4, which I completely ignored, so I grabbed TS2 instead (awesome).

My main question is this: I've heard the game allows you to import saves from Suikoden I and II. This this true? And does the manual give any clues on what it might do? Thanks :).

Edit-----

I am really, really suprised to here there is no realtime map. IThere have been a lot of games where you just pick your location and that's that. Sure it speeds up the process of the game, and realtime maps do get tedious. I'm not sure what I'd prefer.

The female heroine reminds me of WA3 as well. The main character in that game is named Virginia, and she is stuck in the lead of many situations. She was given an interesting personality in that she is trying really hard to put on a strong face through everything, but she is still prone to mistakes. It gives her a more human side that a lot of characters in RPGs lack (I feel like most of the time, the main character is some angst ridden teenager who cares about nothing).

Anyway, Wild Arms 3 is still great :).

[Mitch]

[color=red] Well, at the moment I am saving the rest of my left over birthday money for a CD player for my car, but for Christmas, I've got my list now, heh. I've never played any Wild Arms or Suikoden, but I will certain get a shot when Chirstmas rears over. I'm content with Kingdom Hearts and Timpsplitters 2 for the momentary time between Christmas...so yeh.[/color]

[Charles]

[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Semjaza Azazel [/i]
[B]My main question is this: I've heard the game allows you to import saves from Suikoden I and II. This this true? And does the manual give any clues on what it might do? Thanks :)
[/B][/QUOTE]

Well, I believe that you're only able to import saves from Suikoden II. At the start of the game, a menu prompts you to do so, if you wish. Unfortuntately, the manual doesn't seem to mention much regarding the results of uploading data. It simply reads:

[b]Saved Data from Suikoden II[/B]

[i]After entering a name, Playstation Suikoden II saved data can be read. But the data must first be copied to a memory card (8MB)(for Playstation 2) and inserted in Memory Card slot 1 or 2.[/I]

Oh, and yes, that female character sounds very similar. Chris is also young and prone to mistakes. Plus, I heard somewhere that the Virginia character lost her father or something. There's a similar situation lingering in Suikoden III.

Overall, I was fairly impressed with the upward recognition and importance females were getting in rpgs--until I saw Yuna's new look, lol.

The loss of the world map doesn't really seem to hurt the game too much in my opinion. Unlike other titles (Final Fantasy X, for instance) you're given the freedom to explore different locations on the map at any given time. But, you can't skip over a location to reach another one.

[Semjaza]

I read that last night as well. I was under the impression that PS2 cards can't even hold PSX saves. Only because PSX games themselves don't even recognize when the PS2 card is in the slot.

I can't even find Suikoden 2. I had it in my hands the week it came out, and for some reason I changed my mind. Stupidest game purchasing mistake I ever made lol.