Ever since the Arc the Lad Collection came out, i've been interested in
trying the series out. I didn't buy the Collection because the price of
entry was quite high and you know..paying so much premium for a bunch
of (old) PS1 rpg's wasn't right up my alley. But after playing Arc the
Lad: Twilight of the spirits, you can be sure that I will snatch up the
Collection on ebay eventually.
The game is divided in two stories. At first you control Kharg, a
human, who's basically THE man in town since he's the son of the lady
who instituted a whole democratic system in the city instead of the
whole monarchy, etc. She also saved the town from Disaster 17 years ago
or so. Thus, the residents of Yewbell revere both you and your mom. You
have your traditional bunch of friends and everything is great until a
bunch of Deimos (intelligent monsters basically) appear in the south
mines! Oh no! And the story goes from there.
Then, you play as Darc, an half-human half-deimos guy who's a slave to
some huge Toad or something. His father died when he was a kid and the
Toad saved him and made him her slave (No, not in that sense your
pervert) and now he's basically forced to do her bidding. Let's just
say that he eventually breaks free of her grasp and decides to rule all
Deimos and destroy all humans.
I don't really like talking about the story in games because I feel
like the player has to experience it for himself, but it's a mixed bag.
Kharg is a simple hero, the typical RPG guy. He's likeable enough but
aren't all typical rpg heroes? He's no different. Since the game is
divided into chapters, you play one of Kharg's for everyone of Darc's
so you truly play two stories in one. Darc's story is more interesting
than Kharg's but his personality sucks. He's actually pretty cool until
the end of his first chapter but then he becomes genocidal and gets
hard on the nerves. How often can you hear "I'm going to destroy all
humans"? He says it often. His friends are often even more crazy than
he is and although they're more interesting than the humans, they're
much harder to relate to. So it makes for a weird game where there's a
plainer story that you can sympathize with, and a more interesting one
where you cannot feel involved because it's just so violent and
rageful, against humanity no less. And in the end the Deimos are much
more cruel than the humans and the games makes that VERY clear by the
end of the game (but there's also an explanation that explains their
behavior in a genetic sort of way). So overall, the story is pretty
good, but you'll have seen better ones.
I would definitely send Darc to see a psychologist though, this guy
would be a danger to society if he were to run free on the streets.
This game was in some ways better than expected. I especially liked the
first 10 hours, and the part before entering the final dungeon. It did
feel like it has a lot of filler, which is something proper to a lot of
rpg's. Lunar 1's length just seems like the perfect length for an RPG
(good ol' 25 hours), it doesn't have any filler or very few of it, but
once you get into 40 hour territory you can be sure to get into some
weird missions who just don't make any sense or running around a huge
city looking for some crappy objects, etc. This game definitely has
some of that but it's not too bad as to make the game unenjoyable.
I gave the gameplay a 7, even though most people think this game's
saving grace is the gameplay system. So what's up with that you ask?
Well I played Final Fantasy Tactics and this game doesn't hold a candle
to it, that's what. At it's core Arc is a Strategy RPG, where on the
field everyone take their turns moving like on a chess board, although
that chessboard is now in full 3D so they don't move in grids but are
free to roam in a circle determined by their movement rating. They all
have their walking range, firing range etc. The problem is, the system
is very limited. Character customization is low, you can equip three
items per weapon and three items per armor, and you never change your
equipment throughout the whole game so only the accessories equipped
change. But often, there's no reason to equip anything else than
'coating' and 'armbands', basically attack enhancers and defense
enhancers. Everything else seems nifty but not really useful expect in
specific circumstances. The reason for that is this game relies very
heavily on normal physical attacks rather than on special abilites,
which are only really useful if you wanna down many enemies at the same
time (and they have to be placed around your character or bunched up
together for you to be able to do that). They're often LESS powerful
than a single normal attack would be. So boss battles come down to
doing normal attacks over and over, thus the reason why the accessories
should be kept simple. I only had to change my get-up for the last boss
so that says something about the game's un-variety.
As far as magic goes, MP went out the window and was replaced with the
system of Spirit Stones. Basically, each character has a set limit of
spirit stones he can carry on him (and this amount never grows
throughout the game except if you equip special bags that increase the
amount, but who would waste a precious accessory spot for a spirit
stone bag?) and you guessed it, each ability or spell requires a
certain amount of those stones.
You replenish those stones in two manners. First, in battles when you
kill enemies they might drop one or more of three things: Gold, Items
OR Spirit Stones. Then, you have to manually pick up the objects and
they're yours. This is the only way to get gold in the game aside from
treasure chests, and one of the ways to get cheap spirit stones.
The other very annoying way is buying em at the store. Yes, you now
have to buy your 'MP' 1 point at a time. Early on one spirit stone will
cost you 2G, but after time the price goes up to 4G. A normal amount of
spirit stones to carry for a character is around 70 stones so do the
math, it could eventually get pretty expensive. Enemies do drop a lot
of stones so I never really had to buy much in stores and you have a
party Items section where you can store up to 999 spirit stones, so it
becomes like a huge MP pool that replenishes your characters in between
fights.
Enemies dropping stones in battle is also the only way to replenish the
stones you spent in battle. There's no Ether or whatever to replenish
your magic, but if for example your total stones are 48 out of 70
during a battle, and you grab 20 spirit stones it'll put your character
at 68/70. I like that, and I used it to great effect during the last
boss. It's a cheap way to always have stones during battle which are
highly useful for healing.
I would have liked to see more variety in the equipments available,
more reason to mix up the accessories and more powerful spells and
abilities since right now, the gameplay system feels swallow and seems
to offer much for nothing really. You'll spend most of the game doing
normal attacks on monsters and bosses alike and that will be it. It
still is fun though so I give it a 7.
On the graphics front, I'll be honest I loved em. The characters are
the weak link of the graphics in my book but they still look great,
except for their recycled animations. I think all characters have only
two animations: The OMG I'm surprised animation and the HEY DUDE I'm
talking look at me animation. The latter is a weird animation where
they sort of swing their arms around a bit, my friend Helen calls it
the "Do you want a cup of tea sir?" look. Whatever :) They sure do look
like idiots though when they do that.
However, some levels of this game are simply breathtaking, and
generally the graphics just mesh in a great way that deserves the 8 I
gave it. But as in every game that scores in the Sevens, you get lows
and highs.
As for Sound, I have to say it right there, this game has some of the
best music pieces I ever heard in the game. I loved the Yewbell theme
right here and there when I first heard it, there's a bunch of battle
themes and they're ALL amazing, that is quite a feat. I also loved the
Pyron theme etc. You get the point, this game has incredibly music
mixing electric guitars with soothing instruments. I'm trying to find
the soundtrack right now actually since it was so good. The only thing
I didn't like is the "Ouuuuh something bad is coming" theme which was
kinda cheesy and especially the game's theme song. Who said people
loved Fanfare? Every time I start the game I cringe because the music
sounds like i'm in sort of a military parade or something, it's truly
horrible and just doesn't deserve to be a theme song of anything. They
should have taken a cue from Square, their title themes are always
amazing (by that I mean the themes that play at the New Game screen)
like Eternity- Memory of Light and Wave in FF X-2. But nooooooooo, they
gave us this weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee we're going to viiiictoryyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
song. Blah.
it just contrasts with everything else this game as to offer music wise because it truly is an amazing piece of soundtrack.
As far as normal sound goes, well you have your typical sound effects
which are good in pretty much everygame nowadays, and you have the
'tududuuuuum' dreaded voice acting. I found it to be average, not bad
but not good either. It did the trick, and wasn't horrible enough or
good enough to affect my sound score.
You can surely find this game in the Bargain Bin by now (like I did)
and it's a pretty good value. But then again, a bunch of older, as good
or better games can also be found in the Bin so..but they're all games
you should buy anyway :) Arc is a good 35 hour game if you do it
straight through, and you can probably stretch this to 55-60 hours if
you decide to do the arenas and get every special item. Also, there is
a New Game+ option but it only gives you your old equipment and money,
not your levels. Still that's enough to make you overpowered for the
whole game, but probably not enough to make you replay through the game
again. It's good, but not THAT good.
Overall, I was pleased with Arc the Lad: Twilight of the Spirits. It's
a good game, with a good try at a strategic fighting system and an
overall good storyline. You'll have played better games in your
lifetime, and better rpg's, but this one is an overall package that
comes cheap and will give you a good return for your low investment. If
you have some time to spare, give this game a try.
