I didn't know much about Wild Arms but after seeing footage on later entries I wanted to get into it. Seeing that the first entry was cheap and short I figured I'd start from the top.

While it is a Wild West theme Wild Arms instead relies on a lot of ideas you'd expect from JRPGs at the time. Monsters, demons, even princesses and kingdoms play a significant role. The western theme serves to freshen it up, but those looking for something that really uses the western genre to it's fullest this doesn't attempt that.

The game is also more similar to Snes standards than ps1 or beyond. With 3 characters there's not too much experimentation, and a high encounter rate that you'll only be able to mitigate with a few tricks mid way through.

That said I did enjoy my time, you have three prologues to pick from to set up the characters and they all carried the weight pretty equally. With their unique tools to puzzle solve through dungeons naturally giving them character.

Wild Arms may be worth it for those who still don't mind going back to the old conventions of SNES RPGs, or those who really want to see how this series evolved from the beginning.