The lovely Megan Ward's lone star vehicle for Full Moon (she had acted in nice supporting parts in Crash & Burn and Trancers II) has her as a burdened teenager struggling with the loss of a mother to suicide, soon having to deal with a malicious virtual reality arcade named ARCADE, equipped with artificial intelligence. ARCADE can take the souls and bodies of those who lose against it! Preposterous premise is typically B-movie as only a Charles Band production could be. The special effects are very much of the rough variety as opposed to what we see today (Big Hero Six, this is not), of the time right around when The Lawnmower Man would introduce some promising signs of a fabulous future in science fiction. The cast of recognizable faces will be perhaps this film's interest as a curio: Peter Billingsley (A Christmas Story; The Dirt Bike Kid; Death Valley), Seth Green, Bryan Datillo (known as the flawed long-time character, Lucas, on Days of Our Lives), AJ Langer (My So-Called Life; Escape from LA) as friends of Ward, including the creator of ARCADE played by Star Trek The Next Generation's Q, John de Lancie and Don Stark (of That 70s Show) as a brutish bully arcade player who picks on Green. Even Sharon Farrell (It's Alive and lots of television) has a bit part as Ward's mother, efficiently used as a traumatic device by ARCADE to hurt his nemesis during a faux "nightmare awakening" sequence which milks her suicide. Use of neon aesthetic for the arcade itself produces a nice visual but overall director Pyun seems to be going through the motions with little use of his enthusiastic camera stylistics on display. I think Ward is good enough to keep our attention even if the film doesn't seem as interested. The budget just seemed too small to really set this film off. Arcade seems to be a middling effort from Full Moon but it falls in line with the output regarding the use of sci-fi for off-the-wall plots. The ending is a bit of a clunker pulled right out of the ass of the filmmakers but goes with the "virtual reality could be dangerous if toyed around with" theme that echoes throughout. Jonathan Fuller's voice for ARCADE has a full snidely confident relish, deep and antagonistic (listen to how it often refers to Ward as "BITCH!") which fits in line with the purpose of the machine's evil manifesting itself against players wanting to defeat it. ARCADE's taunting Ward as a failure is a strong dramatic device for us to root in favor of her.