Deconstruction: Dragon Age RPG

Put out by Green Ronin, the Dragon Age Roleplaying Game adapts Bioware’s great Dragon Age Origins computer game into an RPG. Unfortunately, the roleplaying game falls short of the greatness of the computer game.

A Look At: Wild Arms pt 2

Part 1 can be found here

This article is also going to contain major spoilers for Wild Arm’s endgame, and focuses largely on the villains.

A Look At: Wild Arms

After Suikoden, I’ve been playing Wild Arms, another playstation RPG from the system’s early years. It’s the first game is what has since become a series (the sequels, especially #3, my favorite, I’ll cover later). The series has always had a sort of fantasy western feel to it. While its light in the first game and more of a “desert punk in the second, the third is also filled with it.

Wild Arms feels a more like a tabletop game than many other RPGs. You have three members in your party throughout, and their personalities develop through the story. Each has a different type of abilities they can use, with how they gain them varied as well. Most uniquely, each character gains different tools that are available outside of combat, and are used for the many Zelda-esque puzzles in the dungeons. There are bombs, grappling hooks, treasure locators, watches that turn back time, and so on – there’s an actual element of problem solving, rather than just exploring areas filled with nothing but random encounters.

The three characters in the game are Jack, a swordsman, Rudy, a gunslinger, and Cecilia, the mage. Rudy, the toughest of the group, can use the artifact guns of the game called ARMs, which require some sort of psychic link. ARMs can be found in different dungeons in special chests, and it’s always a rare, happy event to find one. Each ARM has different attributes, and has its own bullet counter, that can be refilled for a tiny bit of cash back at town, or through the use of a Bullet Clip item which is very rare. There are also shops where you can upgrade each ARM, in damage, accuracy, or ammo capacity, also for money. 

Deconstruction: Alternity

Because I like to keep current, I want to talk about Alternity, a ten year old sci-fi roleplaying game published by TSR. I’ve recently got a chance to play in a game of it, and the system has several unique things worth talking about.

The Alternity system is meant to be a “generic” sci-fi rules set. There are classes (which I’ll go over later), but things are primarily skill based. The classes just give a few small features and discounts on some skills. While they present multiple races to use, I haven’t looked over them in great detail, and they’re mostly a side thing. Alternity also uses D&D’s six attributes, slightly renamed – Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Will, and Personality. Skills are divided by attributes, and each attribute has a fairly large list, except for Constitution’s, which is tiny. In addition, skills are divided under Broad Skills, which are groupings of them – you get six broad skill groups for free, and then have to purchase others individually. If you do not have a skill’s broad group and try to use it, you take a +1 step penalty (see next paragraph) and add only half of the appropriate attribute to the skill ranks. If you do have the broad group, but not any ranks, you just take the +1 step penalty. With any ranks, you suffer no penalty; your skill total is the number of ranks you have plus the appropriate attribute.