I knew for some time that Working Designs' newest 20-pound game collection reminded me of something. I couldn't put my finger on it, but I knew it was of epic proportion. And then finally it hit me: Alien! It was like a light bulb went on in my head in that silly cartoon way, and I suddenly understood. You saw the movies right? Alien, the first movie, seriously dated but still effective as long as you keep it in context and remember how scary it would have looked in 1979. Aliens, the second movie, looked better and was more action packed. For many folks, Aliens marked the high point of the series. Alien 3 felt a lot like Aliens but with a darker mood and a different look you either loved or hated. And then Alien: Resurrection, which came totally out of left field and basically felt like an add-on. And, my friends, that may be the Arc the Lad Collection in a nutshell!

The first game set the stage with a strong story and graphics that may not seem groundbreaking by today's standards, but were certainly on par with standard fare for the time, especially considering U.S. gamers never got a look at them in a domestic release. The second game absolutely rocks. If James Cameron got behind an old-school RPG this is exactly what you'd expect: bigger, tougher, more of everything. Some of the visual elements took a jump in complexity and quality, and the depth of both battle and non-battle segments increased as well, but the game just blew up as a complete production. You'll spend a long time on this baby. The third game, possible lost in the shadow of Arc 2, felt almost like an expansion pack rather than a full fledged game. And Monster Arena? Well, suffice it to say that while watching Wynona Ryder in space and seeing Ripley as some kind of monster-cyborg was cool, Alien: Resurrection didn't really stand on its own. Monster Arena lets you develop your party and battle with characters from the game(s), including neat features like listening to the sound bites characters utter during battles. It's good fun for a while, but it really is just in this collection for the 'neato' factor. Through all the Arc games, sound and music stood out as excellent, with orchestral scores and mood music that really helps pull more emotion off the screen than you'd think possible sometimes given the rudimentary graphics. In a time when story was everything and graphics capabilities were somewhat limited, music allowed developers an (almost) unlimited resource for conveying emotion and driving excitement in key moments.

No discussion of this release would be complete without mention of the total game packaging. Working Designs continues to amaze us with the level of attention given to presentation. Not only do we have the 5 Arc game CDs (Arc I and II plus 2 disks of Arc III, plus Monster Arena), but we also get a 'Making Of...' CD. The hardbound manual has become standard for WD releases like this, as we saw in Lunar, and the little paper character stands along with some other goodies are a neat touch as well. Those who preorder get a slick watch as well, but there's still plenty of booty for the rest of us. Great illustrations of game characters appear on each of the CDs, and I tell you it's like Christmas or (insert your favorite gift-giving holiday here) when you start unwrapping the Arc the Lad Collection. Nothing shows love like this kind of packaging, and at the risk of sounding like a mindless drone, I'll repeat my fervent hope that other companies start trying this hard to make their games look cool. The touches applied to the exterior are mirrored once you get into the game and see the great conversion job WD did for the Arc games that never appeared before in the States. Translations are excellent and it's a good thing, since all the games feature a great deal of text to read. Especially in Arc II, the story really spins out at length, and all of the localization touches were lovingly applied.

For those who don't know the Arc saga, it plays out like a real epic. You don't have the feeling of starting over completely, but each game seems to begin with completely new material. As the story unfolds, you eventually do come back to some familiar ground, with the net effect being that characters like Arc return in roles that remind you of the parts movie characters like Roger Moore played after being James Bond. You know, the ones where he comes in and we all nudge the person next to us and go, 'Look, Roger Moore' or 'Look, James Bond.' The calculated appeal of 'stars' wasn't lost on Arc's developers, so you'll find Arc popping up after his starring role in the first game, and a neat feature allows you to transfer saved data from a previous game and carry stats of characters over when they reappear. It's not as huge a piece of the game as you might like, but it is slick to have use of characters you worked hard to develop as a way of giving you an edge.

Not for us here to give a synopsis of the entire Arc collection, but I can say that gamers who like their RPG action long on story won't be disappointed. As with the Alien analogy, Arc II feels like the real zenith of the series in terms of story and plot. Not that the material in Arc I isn't excellent, but there's not enough to the game to pull opinion away from the second title, which is easily 4 or 5 times longer. And, while most of the story elements in Arc III are brand new, they don't go far enough to really meet expectations of fans who beat Arc II and couldn't wait for a bigger and better next installment. Story leans toward tragedy for each of the games, and we find some fairly typical material such as lost love, political ambition and reluctant heroism. There's plenty of exuberant and red-blooded heroism going on in these games, and the bad guys are bad enough to really make you enjoy beating them. Events in all three games run together with nice continuity, but the computer animation is used to best effect in Arc III for connecting key areas and fleshing out particularly important plot twists.

Arc I developed the foundation subsequent games would build on in character control, party dynamics, item collection, etc. Battles are always a key part of any RPG, and the Arc saga used a decidedly 'strategy' style of battle. A top-down perspective, characters who move like chess pieces and attack according to some fairly strict patterns and distance limitations, all contribute to battles that feel more like 'Final Fantasy Tactics' than 'Final Fantasy.' Certain improvements in how battles are conducted came in for Arc II, and not a huge amount changed for the third game. Some things you'll like are the ability to level up weapons and develop skills with particular weapons, magic casting that targets specific enemies or allies by location, and a challenge level that should bring out the best in any RPG-er. Some things that will bug you are not being able to navigate around enemies or allies on the battlefield, limited range for magic, and an encounter system that sometimes felt too linear. In fact, the strategy style of battles feels too limiting now that we have so many creative and different styles of battle represented in the RPG world. Square's ATB system, action-oriented systems like Crave's 'Shadow Madness' or Game Arts' IP system in 'Grandia' all stand as variants on the more static, traditional style. Really, a purist could say that strategy or strict turn-based style based on range, formation and party composition is the only thing worth playing, but we all know that companies responsible for innovative battle systems have responded to gamers who clamor for new stuff. So, it's not that Arc doesn't do battles well, but they're more on the traditional side to be sure. The bounty hunting along with some changes and improvements in battle flow and activity help sustain interest, and if you don't get enough during the three Arc games, Monster Arena is a place to battle monsters until you grow old and they have to pry the PS controller from your cold, dead hands.

Other relevant issues include a change from linear progress in Arc I to some fairly free-flowing and exploratory play in II and III. Working as a bounty hunter beginning in Arc II will give you a chance to foray out of town or into little side dungeons to gather loot and raise experience. The bounty hunting system is very simple, but it's a nice addition. Also, party development through capturing monsters becomes an interesting addition in Arc II, while a card system for conjuring monsters mid-battle expands this even further in Arc III. Each new game brings new ideas, but the third installment fell somewhat short of quota in most gamers' eyes after the huge jump between Arc I and Arc II. Not that you won't enjoy playing Arc III, but it comes off as the most forgettable of the three main games in that it just doesn't go very far beyond the ground covered in Arc II.

Adjusting to the admittedly older style of battle especially in Arc I will be hard for some folks accustomed to fancy, fringe-filled RPGs like 'Final Fantasy X.' But, any RPG gamer worth her salt will find that battles are easily won through application of some basic strategies. Several updates to the system in Arc II and Arc III actually made battles more challenging, and the greater variety alone made strategy more important. Being 'locked in' during battle and sometimes getting stuck behind a friend who was bottlenecked and getting slaughtered by monsters was a common problem in Arc I and to some degree Arc II. For Arc III, it became possible to move through friendly party members to reach enemies, but that also exposed the party to attacks that it would have resisted previously. For the first two games, I found battle interesting, but somewhat tedious after a time. Especially with dungeons that regenerated monsters room-by-room, fighting felt overwhelming at times, and I wanted more focus on story. But, this is the same complaint about random battles we hear constantly, so I'll refrain from adding my whining to the general roar. Anyone who likes a challenging RPG will be able to handle Arc the Lad Collection, but there are some very tough moments during the second game, and don't be fooled by the older 2D look here. Those monsters may not look fancy, but they'll still get ya!

Most all the conventions we accept as standard for RPGs are present from the first Arc title. Sure, there's way more linearity than we'd like, but the mainstay elements of navigating dungeons, collecting items, outfitting your characters and moving through the game fighting bigger and badder monsters are preserved intact here. What has come a long way since 1995 is the interface we accept as standard for this kind of game. Really, one can go back pre-PlayStation to the beginnings of computer RPG games and their respective UI (User Interface) design to see where things got started (think Ultima, The Bard's Tale). But, the infusion of Japanese cuteness and the superdeformed anime and manga tradition combined to give Arc its visual style. Beyond the graphics, which improved drastically for Arc III to be polygonal instead of sprite-based, Arc didn't go through too many UI upgrades. Monitoring the progress of characters could be done through battles, where a particularly strong showing could result in upgrades right there on the spot in the heat of battle. This would include weapon upgrades, in the games where weapons leveled up along with characters. Also, you can see monsters' stats changing, which is funny since the whole point is to wipe out the monsters or die trying. In other words, the chances are good that you won't be around to fight those monsters again, so why does it matter that they gained a level before you killed 'em?

During battles, some limitations on movement were an issue, but what I found more annoying was the limitation on multiple spells. Unlike the modern convention, which assumes that we can cover any one character against multiple status effects, Arc only allowed for a single spell to be in effect for a character, meaning that you could wipe out the effect of a spell by casting another on an ally. Monsters were obviously subject to the same rule, but it limited the usefulness of magic. Action during battle feels a bit more open, due to the fact that characters can be moved around the field (within their predefined range of movement) before casting a spell or attacking. One neat aspect of this feature is that where you attack the enemy becomes very important. Enemies attacked from the front, where they presumably have the strongest armor and best preparation for you, returns sad damage results. Attacking from the back is best, and savvy fighters (you or the monsters) will try to pick a place on the field where it is impossible to be flanked. Not that this trick would make weak characters strong, but it allows for strategies like luring monsters into a place where you can pile into them from the side or back and score big damage before they got the first hit off.

Otherwise, Monster Arena really stands out as the add-on game that reveals many of the things about the regular Arc Trilogy you would have liked to have seen more of or played around with longer. The different character expressions, all the monsters relevant to the game you are playing, and a place to perpetually battle with or against friends is a cool addition for die-hard fans, but may not mean much to those who really just want to experience all the original games. But, the process of loading saves from Arc I-III to use in Monster Arena is simple to understand, so try it. Once you actually get into this game, even though it doesn't play as a traditional RPG, there are a multitude of NPC helpers to walk you through the steps to take for battling, shopping, saving, etc.

There are lots more little joys and gripes to be found here, but Working Designs has really topped any previous release of this type and brought a true classic out in classic form. Fans of Arc the Lad will obviously be thrilled, but even newcomers will see the quality of this game shining through. Arc II is really where you'll spend the bulk of your time, and Arc III is only average compared to its predecessors, but taken as a whole this collection is above average. It's fair to say that any PlayStation owner who considers him- or herself a fan of classic RPG action would be missing something special to not get this collection. If you're only a casual fan of the genre, it may not be worth the money for you, but the one thing you won't do is bust open this beautiful package and think you didn't get your money's worth. It's not a perfect collection, but there are plenty of great moments and solid action to keep you happy through close to 100 hours of play.