Wild Arms 3 Interview: MediaVision brings unique visual and story development features to the world of role-playing games

In October, Sony Computer Entertainment America released the latest title in their classic role-playing series, Wild Arms.  MediaVision gives us the full story on the game’s interesting development process.

by Louis Bedigian

RPG.  Those three letters mean more to some people than their own initials.  They’re so important to us that thousands of gamers stood out in the cold for several hours just to get a brand-new console to play them.  The RPGs (role-playing games) we wanted were a year or more away, but we didn’t care.  The anticipation got the better of us, and we just couldn’t wait to get our hands on the machine that would someday run those masterpieces in the making.

Two years later, that console – PlayStation 2 – is the leader of every major genre out there, especially RPGs.  While there still aren’t enough of them to go around, PlayStation 2 has seen more RPGs come its way in the past few months than Xbox and GameCube have all year.  It has also seen more RPG releases than the PSone had in its second year.

This is all due to game developers like MediaVision and publishers like Sony who are responsible for giving the gaming community a whole bunch of classic RPGs in the latter part of the year.

Sony’s latest release, Wild Arms 3, is the long-awaited follow-up to one of the best role-playing series on the PSone.  Featuring cel-shaded graphics and an all-new interactive story development system, Wild Arms 3 takes the genre even further with technologies not yet seen in an RPG.

Game creator MediaVision handcrafted the game to meet the higher standards that role-playing fans have come to expect.  The game’s development team stopped by the office today to give us the full story on the Wild Arms 3’s interesting development process.  Find out what the intriguing “ASK” system is all about, hints for acquiring one of the game’s coolest hidden features, and why they decided to use cel-shaded graphic technology to outline every character.

Question: How does the story in Wild Arms 3 relate to the first two games?  Who are the heroes and who are the villains?  Are any of the classic characters returning, or is this intended to be an entirely different experience, a la Final Fantasy?

MediaVision: The storyline or characters for Wild Arms 3 have no relation to the past two games. When we develop a “Wild Arms” title, we try to make sure that each of the episodes has their own conclusions, and do not rely on the other titles from the series.  This is to make sure anybody can play one of the series’ titles without having to know the background of “Wild Arms.” It is true that we have included some of the characters who were seen in the past two “Wild Arms” titles, to keep the smiles on our fans’ faces, but I won’t tell you which ones, since that will spoil the fun.

Another characteristic of Wild Arms 3 is we have excluded the aspect of “good versus evil” in terms of pre-set settings. We have left that for the players to decide, whether the characters the players are using are “good” or “evil.”

Q: What is the new ASK (Approach to Selected Keywords) system all about?

MediaVision: The new ASK system will support the players by providing in-depth definitions for some of the terms used in the conversations between the characters in the game. For example, if the word “evil tribe” were used in one scene, the system would provide background information explaining in more detail about the “evil tribe.”

Wild Arms 3’s ASK system is one of the

game’s most appealing features.

Q: Will it affect the outcome of the story?

MediaVision: The ASK system does not affect the storyline in any form. As mentioned above, the system will pick up keywords from the characters’ conversations to provide more detailed explanations.  Don’t worry if you accidentally skipped some of the explanations provided by the ASK system. This won’t mean that later on you will find yourself completely lost. Of course for those of you who want to know as much as possible about the world of “Filagia”, be sure to check the details provided by the ASK system.

Q: How does the battle system work?

MediaVision: The battle segment for Wild Arms 3 is unique in the sense that attacking or fighting power isn’t everything when you are in battle with the monsters, and at times, this may or may not affect the monsters’ damage points.  This means that players need to discover or ascertain their enemies’ weak points in order to fight battles efficiently. There are hints hidden in the actual battles and throughout the adventure. We hope you can find them.

Players can also help their characters become more powerful with the use of items they have obtained. Good luck finding the right items which will help your character against the monsters’ inherited characteristics using powers such as fire or water.

Players will have to be much more clever than usual

if they intend to survive the many challenges

that await them in Wild Arms 3.

Q: What inspired the change from standard, realistic-looking polygon characters to cel-shaded characters?

MediaVision: The “Wild Arms” series includes moves such as un-doing traps called “goods,” as well as allowing the use of a wide variety of items which are often unique to each of the characters.  If we restricted ourselves to realistic looking characters, we would have encountered problems especially with characters’ response since there are many detailed moves involved.  By using the cel-shaded characters, this gave us more room to work with the controls of the characters as well as maintain character response. This, as a result, was closer to our ideal image and feel of the game.

Q: How many minutes/hours of animated sequences will there be in Wild Arms 3?   Will there be more than one ending?  (It's alright if you aren't allowed to comment on the number of ending(s) right now.)

MediaVision: We would like to keep our comments to a minimum at this time, however, let me share just a little bit.  The only reason for this is because we would like for the players to find for themselves how we have treated the animated sequences in the game. There are a number of animated sequences throughout the game, but I won’t share the quantities or details on how to activate them.  Changes occur when players save game play at various points (locations) and then load game data. I apologize that I cannot share information regarding the ending segment.

Q: What is the camera system like?

MediaVision: Some of the features of the camera system are, for instance, when characters move behind steep cliffs or other obstacles, we have made sure the players do not lose sight of them.  In battle segments, where the characters can move around, we have designed the camera system to focus on those characters in movement.

We also made sure the camera and the map system link, especially in areas such as inside the dungeons, or other locations such as small and closed rooms in the towns or villages.  Players will find this very useful in finding hidden treasure boxes, or finding the solution to traps. We have always tried to consider the players’ position in designing the game, and hope our fans will enjoy our new product.

As you can see from the picture above,

Wild Arms 3 has gorgeous graphics.

Q: The Wild Arms series is known for having spectacular music, and Wild Arms 3 is no exception.  I recently had the chance to hear a couple songs from the game and I gotta say, I was really impressed.  Who composed the music for Wild Arms 3?  Is it the same man/woman who composed the music for the first two games?

MediaVision: The composer’s name is Michiko Naruke, who has also composed pieces for the last two Wild Arms titles. She is very keen on the concepts and the world environments for Wild Arms, and we can always count on her to compose great pieces for us.

Q: Many RPGs have a hidden soundtrack feature that allows you to play all of the game's music from one location.  Is there anything like that in Wild Arms 3?

MediaVision: Try looking for a character who is at a bar in one of the villages. This character will allow the player to select from all of the tracks they have heard so far in the game as their BGM (background music).  The further you are in the game, the more tracks you will have to select from. Try talking to all kinds of characters in the game.

Q: How is the dialogue presented in Wild Arms 3?  Via text messages, voice-overs, several cut scenes, etc.?

MediaVision: Wild Arms 3 uses a mixture of methods in presenting dialogue among characters.  For instance, for dialogue sharing general information, a text window appears and the dialogue is shared.  In scenes where the dialogue contents are more important, the camera will zoom in on the character and enter the “event dialogue mode.”  Voice-overs are not used here, but players will be able to recognize the characters’ personality through the dialogue as well as the gestures used.  Here too, text windows and text will be used to convey the message.

Virginia is one of the game’s all-new characters.

Q: Are there any side-quests/mini-games in Wild Arms 3?

MediaVision: There are a number of side-quests we have included in Wild Arms 3, however we have been careful as we do not want our players to be confused by leading them too far off of the main plot. We would like to hold back on the details at this time, as this will give away the fun…

Q: Assuming that a strategy guide wasn't used, how many hours would it take the average gamer to complete Wild Arms 3?

MediaVision: For those who play the game for their first time I would assume players would need at least 30 to 40 hours of solid gameplay (this ignores the in-game time count).  This, of course, will vary amongst those hardcore gamers, or those who have played at least one of the Wild Arms series, and those who are new to gaming.  If the question is how many hours to thoroughly complete the game, including the side-quests and other details, total time needed would be roughly 50 hours.

Q: What would you say is the most outstanding aspect of Wild Arms 3 – the gameplay, the graphics, the music or the story?

MediaVision: This is a tough question… I would have to say all aspects are great!  However, if I had to choose one specific aspect, I would say the cel-shaded graphics.  Please take a good close look at the “anime”-like graphics.  You will notice that each of the characters are outlined clearly, as well as the use of lighting and shading to enhance the texture quality.  We hope this will start a new trend in graphic methods.

Louis: I have to agree, the graphics are really cool.  I can’t wait to see how Wild Arms 4 looks…

Thank you for your time, guys!

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