Wild Arms 3 (PlayStation 2)

Reviewed by Greg Kasavin
Review date: 10/23/02
Release date: 10/15/02

You could probably imagine a world with too many Western-themed games for its own good. But that's not a world we live in at the moment. Games about gunslingers trying to stay alive in the Wild West just aren't common, and stuff like six-shooters and cowboy hats isn't nearly as popular in gaming as stuff like swords and helmets. This is understandable, seeing as odds are good that your dad is much more likely to be a fan of Clint Eastwood movies than you are. Nonetheless, there's definitely room for a good Western game every now and then, and Wild Arms 3, the latest in what's now a long-running series of role-playing games, definitely fits that bill. Actually, superficial Western touches aside, Wild Arms 3 is a pretty conventional Japanese RPG that's similar to its predecessor as well as to other games in the genre. And because of its great looks, gameplay twists, and good cast of characters, Wild Arms 3 should appeal to most anyone who likes games of this type.

You'll guide Virginia and her three companions through many dangerous missions.

The first Wild Arms game was released for the PlayStation in 1998 and put a different spin on a style of gaming that had recently been redefined by the epic Final Fantasy VII. First of all, there was no traditional sci-fi or swords-and-sorcery setting to be found in the game, but rather a hybrid Western fantasy world filled with monsters and mystical firearms--the title of the game in fact refers to these weapons. Also, though it basically played like other role-playing games of its time, Wild Arms included a number of action adventure elements to keep the gameplay interesting whenever you weren't engaged in battle. Wild Arms 3 carries on all these traditions, but with a new set of playable characters, a new world to explore, and some much improved production values since the last installment. It's worth noting that 2000's Wild Arms 2 was considered something of a disappointment for being too similar to its predecessor for its own good. The same criticism could be leveled at Wild Arms 3, though it's been long enough since the previous game that this sequel's prospective audience probably won't see this sequel as a rehash.

The game's visual style is one of its distinctive traits.

You control a party of four different characters throughout most of Wild Arms 3. These include a determined girl named Virginia, who sports a couple of high-powered six shooters; a well-mannered, well-intentioned sniper named Clive; a good-natured but somewhat thickheaded Native American-looking man named Gallows, who uses a sawed-off shotgun in battle; and your prototypical too-cool-for-you anime loner, named Jet, who's armed with a machine gun. Though these four by no means break the mold in terms of character design, and though the circumstances in which they decide to forge an alliance are pretty iffy, the heroes of Wild Arms 3 end up being likable. Over the course of the game's story, they'll often learn from each other and help each other out, and each character has his or her own unique abilities and well-defined personality traits. So collectively, they're a good gang.

Wild Arms 3 follows the RPG formula without much variation. There are lots of random battles to be fought, a number of towns to be visited, a number of dungeons to be explored, a number of secrets and hidden treasures to be found, and a number of powerful villains to be vanquished. Besides the fact that much of the game takes place in dusty, windswept regions reminiscent of the Old West, the twists in the game's combat and exploration sequences certainly help distinguish Wild Arms 3 from other RPGs out there. For one thing, though you'll often stumble into random battles, Wild Arms 3 gives you a chance to avoid some of them by timing a button press just before a fight begins. You can skip only so many random battles before your ability to do so is used up (until you rest at an inn), but it's still nice to be able to bail out of the occasional fight before it even starts. Still, this once-innovative feature now seems like a strange way of addressing the problem shared by many RPG players that, well, random battles in RPGs are getting to be pretty old.