Wild Arms Alter Code: F

Wild Arms is a role-playing video game. The player controls the party of three characters, Rudy, Jack, and Cecilia, as they explore the world of Filgaia, navigate its environments, battle enemies, and solve puzzles. The game is presented in a top-down two-dimensional fashion where the player has an overhead view of all the action taking place on a particular screen. As the game's story progresses, the player navigates through various dangerous areas filled with randomly appearing enemies, as well as set-piece boss encounters.

Characters progress and grow more powerful by gaining experience points after a battle, finding ARMs (Rudy), discovering crest graphs used for magic spells (Cecilia), and mastering sword techniques prompted by various events in the game (Jack). Players can also find and purchase a variety of equipment, including weapons, armor, and consumable single-use items.

Wild Arms takes place in the world of Filgaia, a fantasy world. The technology of the world varies greatly, with some areas resembling medieval Europe, featuring cloistered monasteries and castles, while other areas resemble a frontier loosely akin to the American West. Advancements such as motors are found sporadically. Much of the technology is remnants recovered from the distant past by archaeologists and engineers who refashion it for the present day. Destructive technology such as ARMs (firearms) is seen as a dangerous and therefore forbidden technology that is feared by the general populace.

A thousand years before the main events of Wild Arms, a great war engulfed Filgaia between its original inhabitants, the humans and Elw, and an invading race called the Metal Demons. The Metal Demons had lost their own homeworld and sought to make Filgaia their new home. During the conflict, powerful weapons were developed, including mechanical golems and artificial warriors known as Holmcrosses, which combined metal and flesh. The humans eventually captured the demon's leader, "Mother," and sealed her within a castle in the tundra of Arctica.

Vision. The studio was founded in 1993 by several members of Telenet Japan who had left the Riot division after working on the RPG series Tenshi no Uta for the NEC PC Engine. The idea for the game had been around for some time; it may have been originally intended for the Super Famicom (SFC / SNES) in its earliest stages before plans changed and it became a Sony PlayStation (PSX) game. The game took about 3 years to create and was driven largely by a team of just 10 or so employees, including producer Takashi Fukushima, game designer Akifumi Kaneko, and character designer Yoshihiko Ito.

Vision pursues their concept without meddling or rushing them. Sony's "Japan Studio" team assisted a bit with development. The game was released in Japan in late 1996.

Wild Arms garnered a positive response. It sold over 250,000 copies in Japan during its first two weeks after its release and was positively reviewed by Japanese critics. Game Informer magazine stated that it was "by far one of the best action RPGs of the year", praising the game's use of 3D battle graphics in addition to the colorful 2D graphics of normal gameplay. 5 out of 10.

GameFan's three reviewers scored it 95%, 92%, and 90%, and also awarded it their "Game of the Month" honor. They said it's a spectacular RPG" and, "if not for [Final Fantasy VII], Wild Arms would definitely be RPG of the year so far."

The success of Wild Arms led to a series of sequels and spinoffs. These included 5 other console video games, mobile phone adaptations, a manga, and Wild Arms: Twilight Venom, an anime distributed by ADV Films.