Experiencing Wild ARMs 5: The definition of convoluted.

While I remain a huge fan of the whistling found in Wild ARMs 1, disappointed in its loss in 2 and bemused with the 3rd, I actually hung up the gloves on the series entirely.  I decided to revisit now that I'm older and a bit more tolerant of things.

It took some hardcore thought on how to write this up without spoiling.  Kudos to me.

What I Liked

✅ In dungeons there were some really good music tracks.  Not memorable, but good in their own right.

✅ At least initially and at the end, there were plenty of voiced cutscenes (but see below).

✅ There were only a slim few puzzles that were downright annoying.  The vast majority weren't that bad.

✅ Fairly well developed characters, certainly done better than earlier members of the series.  Persephone and Rebecca were standouts.

✅ It's not a short game.  If you enjoy it, you'll be enjoying it for quite a while.

What I Didn't Like

👎 ENCOUNTER. RATE.  Is just way too frickin high.  About midway through the game, you'll get a vehicle that negates this on the world map, but until then...ugh.

👎 The story is all over the place.  I mean just incoherent and nonsensical.  None of it "clicks" until the VERY last cutscene of the game, then it's like they just tipped over a barrel all at once, hitting you with everything you needed to know throughout.  I can't stand games that do that.  Also games that implement some form of time paradox are never going to turn out good.

👎 Buying improved armor yields only a marginal benefit at best.  Leveling up gives you way more of a benefit than the armor - to the point I just skipped it.

👎 Characters and towns had time spent from a development perspective, but the world map looks and feels sparse.  Train stations out in the middle of nowhere with no roads leading to them, etc.

Fortunately this is not a game I will ever have to touch again, and it's not like I regretted playing it, but I saw a lot more potential than it was given.  It almost felt like they were in a budget crunch and had to throw something out there.