PixlBit

The latest from imageepoch and Marvelous Entertainment treads some new ground for the Wii. Arc Rise Fantasia is one of the first, if not the first, traditional JRPG created for the Wii. On face value, this is great for Wii owners starving for a current generation RPG, but after some examination, many Wii owners may want to think twice about purchasing this by-the-numbers JRPG.

The backdrop for Arc Rise Fantasia is the typical fantastical world complete with dragons, magic, and gods of both good and evil. Players are tossed into this world as L'Arc, a young mercenary for the Meridian Empire. Throughout the quest, L'Arc is joined by a wide variety of other support characters who constitute his party. I'd go deeper into the story, but it is no more than a veil of the classic good versus evil story seen in so many JRPGs. The characters are no better; L'Arc is the typical careless rebel hero-type, his friend, Alf is the moderate, level-headed foil who also happens to be Prince of the empire. They are both joined by Ryfia who is the clueless female who harnesses great and amazing power. Over time players encounter a variety of other characters that they will swear they have seen in a hundred games before under many different names.

Both the story and characters are very telling of the game as a whole; Arc Rise Fantasia is as cliche as they get. It borrows from a wide-variety of other JRPGs and doesn't feel, even for one moment, as if it treads any new ground whatsoever. This extends directly into the gameplay as well, which features some staples of JRPGs that I thought we had left in the PlayStation era.

Players will find themselves moving from location to location, fighting enemies along the way. Thankfully, one staple not borrowed from old-school JRPG design is the random encounter. Players will see enemies on the map, and can even approach them undetected to receive an advantage in battle. Conversely, if a player is taken off guard the enemy will be the one with the advantage. As players make their way through the world, given the fact that encounters aren't random, it seems as if the proper number of battles are being fought to remain strong enough to battle tough foes. This is proved completely untrue upon encountering a boss battle.

Battles in Arc Rise Fantasia are unique, to an extent, and have the potential to have depth. Upon entering a battle, depending on the party configuration and whether or not the player is at an advantage, a different number of action points are assigned to the party for the round. Players then use these points to perform any sort of function on the battlefield, whether it be attacking, defending, using magic, using an item, or simply moving to an alternate location. Additionally, players will be subject to other points, like limited magic points, and a slowly charging SP gauge to perform Excel Acts (your most powerful attack). Given all of these choices, players occasionally must strategically maneuver the battlefield in order to defeat their foes. Unfortunately, most of the time, players will find themselves setting characters on auto-pilot so that they can rush through the battle.

Given the potential depth of the battling engine, you would think boss battles would simply require good usage of your abilities with your given party. You would be thinking wrong. Instead, boss battles are a matter of having the right numbers, that number being your level. After being decimated by the first boss, I went back to an area that I knew respawned enemies, and I fought a horde of them, which I must add was completely effortless and uninteresting. Upon reaching the next level I fought the boss yet again, and lost... again. So, I went back, did some more grinding, finally brought all of my characters to the next level, and went to the boss fight for a third time. This time, things were radically different. I didn't just beat the boss, I embarrassed him. This is not bravado speaking, I didn't fight any differently than I had before this time, I was just at the right level to win.

As you might expect, this begins to run thin as you progress through the game. While many RPGs of today do require certain levels to win, there is still the potential of success with smart tactics. What's truly disappointing is that with a battling system that contains depth, none of it is explored in favor of an old-school experience where a high enough level is more important than your skills.

Even as players progress and earn other abilities, like the ability to modify their weapons with WP and Arm Forces, the same basic formula is kept throughout. I suppose for those who are into the hard grind through mindless enemies, Arc Rise Fantasia could still hold some intrigue.

Upon hearing the voice acting and reading the dialog, any hope those folks might have had is lost. I've heard some bad voice acting in games, some really bad voice acting at that, but Arc Rise Fantasia might have some of the worst I've ever heard in my life. Most characters deliver the lines completely wrong, speaking without any inflection in their voice. If it's not the inflection that's wrong, it's just the overall poor delivery that makes it obnoxious and distracting. Many times the spoken words of the characters don't match the (poorly) translated text. The entire script of the game is pretty terrible, and much to my chagrin, no Japanese voice-acting was available, though I was able to shut off the voices all together. This of course only added to my general boredom while playing the game.

Arc Rise Fantasia is just a disappointing title. There are a number of elements that could've propelled the game to being more than your average RPG, but none of them are capitalized on. Instead, Arc Rise leaves players to grind their way to victory through a cliche JRPG story with some of the worst voice acting ever. Those looking for a solid RPG are better off checking out one of the many great, (now) cheap, PlayStation 2 RPGs that crowd your local used game store.