Wild ARMs 2

Wild ARMs 2

My friend had introduced me to this game and I thought it looked really promising and thought I’d have a lot of fun playing it. Unfortunately, I was wrong. By the time I got the game I wasn’t as interested in playing it as I once was and that hurt my opinion of it from the start. Wild ARMs 2 is not the worst RPG I’ve played, but it was a below average game from what I found. I wish I could just sit down and force myself to play the game again to try to point out the positives that I found, trust me there were some, but I can’t seem to get into it anymore. In fact I wish I never played this game and got another game instead. To put it simply, the 40 hours I spent playing this game I want back.

Well, I remember a few of the pros so I will start off with them. First off there is the storyline. It starts off very linear and gives you a good idea of where you are going. The storyline is also very deep at first. Unfortunately, suddenly you seem to have no idea what to do. So you have to talk to anything and everything on the entire face of the planet to find out what to do next. Then you get all depressed when you realize what you have to do next is so obvious. Thus you contemplate stopping. However, if you can stick with it you may find the storyline fairly interesting. It revolves around a terrorist organization called Odessa and they are obviously using terrorist attacks as their means of power. It develops into a very interesting storyline honestly, but the horrible gameplay and annoying characters totally ruined the story for me.

As I said, the gameplay is horrible. Your dash and talk button are the same button, very annoying. You can only dash in one direction and when you want to change direction you have to stop your character where he is and change the direction he’s facing and dash again. Though the game has some very cool puzzle sequences that make Zelda look easy, the dungeons and world map travel that are staples of RPGs are awful in this game. They give you no information where to go and the main characters seem like idiots and have no idea what to do and refuse to think of anything to do. I would like it if the game was based entirely on their fun and difficult puzzles, in fact I’d love it.

As previously mentioned, the characters are annoying. In fact I found me liking the villains more than all of the main character. There are a few interesting characters you pick up later in the game it so far through most of you may have already decided the game sucks and don’t feel like playing it anymore.

I forgot to mention the music. Some very great tracks were in the game and made me actually want to find many of the songs from the game. In fact, I recommend instead of getting the game you get the Wild ARMs 2 soundtrack. You definitely can’t go wrong there. That is, if you like video game soundtracks.

For a Playstation game, Wild ARMs 2 has very good graphics. It is an anime-style game and the anime cutscenes are absolutely beautiful. Sadly, there are not enough of these to make me happy.

All in all, Wild ARMs 2 is a fairly bad RPG. However, I have met people who like the game a whole lot. It is a hit or miss I suppose. I didn’t like it, however you may like it a lot.

Story: 8
Characters: 5
Music: 8
Graphics: 7
Gameplay: 4
Replay Value: 4
Reviewer’s Tilt: 5

Overall: 5

Not a great game. If it is part of a series and you like then you should pick this game up. I recommend you rent this game first to be assured you enjoy it before going out and buying it. Nothing stands out and many of the aspects are at or below average.


RingMasterFrodo's Reviews
Wild ARMs 2 Reviews


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