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[ethelred]

...

:lol

 

[CO_Andy]

Mana Knight = Lindsay

 

[Tabris]

Spoiler

Xenosaga is awesome!

*Won't say anything else to circumvent the onslaught of drama and backlash :lol

All the power to ya

I liked Episode II. I was able to ignore/forget the first half of CD1 and CD2. (which absolutely sucked) The ending was very enjoyable.

 

[Chris Remo]

Xenosaga is what you buy when you CRAVE a third-rate technofantastic anime series uncomfortably distended across 40+ hours of crap mechanics with bad polygon puppet theatre substituted for the typically mediocre direction of an actual anime.

Xenosaga is paradoxically the most pure and most disingenuous of fanservice: loli/moe garbage colored up with throwaway references to Parcelsian Gnosticism and a literal-minded high school art student's take on Nietsche. To anyone above an eighth-grade level of literacy, it's quasi-physical torment. There's no real gameplay to speak of to make the usual high-concept low-execution frame of anime palatable, so you're really just stuck moseying some boggle-eyed tart in spandex lingerie down neon hallways between protracted cutscenes featuring underdirected anime puppets shaking their porcelain udders or flowing boybitch locks while spewing arbitrary acronyms or glib references to shit that wasn't even that clever when it was written in Latin or German.

Just ****ing rent Evangelion already and get it out of your system.

Without even having played any Xenosaga game, I would have assumed this to be the case.

 

[ethelred]

Mana Knight = Lindsay

Oh, ****ing hell, as if one of them wasn't enough.

 

[Tarazet]

I was thinking Xenosaga DS could be cool because it would be less of a snore-fest. No such luck?

 

[WYWY]

Xenosaga is what you buy when you CRAVE a third-rate technofantastic anime series uncomfortably distended across 40+ hours of crap mechanics with bad polygon puppet theatre substituted for the typically mediocre direction of an actual anime.

Xenosaga is paradoxically the most pure and most disingenuous of fanservice: loli/moe garbage colored up with throwaway references to Parcelsian Gnosticism and a literal-minded high school art student's take on Nietsche. To anyone above an eighth-grade level of literacy, it's quasi-physical torment. There's no real gameplay to speak of to make the usual high-concept low-execution frame of anime palatable, so you're really just stuck moseying some boggle-eyed tart in spandex lingerie down neon hallways between protracted cutscenes featuring underdirected anime puppets shaking their porcelain udders or flowing boybitch locks while spewing arbitrary acronyms or glib references to shit that wasn't even that clever when it was written in Latin or German.

Just ****ing rent Evangelion already and get it out of your system.

I'm going to copy and save this.

And then quote it as and when the need to do so arises.

Or when I'm feeling EVIL, post it on the gamefaqs Xenosaga board to smite the fanbois.

 

[Bizarro Sun Yat-sen]

Takahashi and some ex-Xeno staff are rumored to be working on a new non-Xeno-related religious-themed RPG for another company; the future looks bright for Drinky's trolling career.

 

[Tellaerin]

I've enjoyed both XS games for the PS2, and I'm looking forward to Ep. 3. The series is space opera at its heart, embellished with references to everything from Gnosticism and Nietzsche to classic Western sf. (I also have a soft spot for world-building and future histories, so the degree to which the universe was fleshed out and the wealth of data available through the database in Ep. 1 really appealed to me.)

Yes, all the usual anime tropes are present , but since I don't share the pathological hatred of all things anime that seems to afflict some of our more vitriolic posters, I don't find that particularly offensive. Likewise, while the presentation can get stilted or heavy-handed at times, just the fact that the narrative has an intentional subtext is welcome enough that I can overlook the occasional awkwardness.

Last but not least is the fact that sf RPG's (Eastern or Western) are rare to begin with nowadays, and few of the ones that are released take place in an interstellar setting. While Xenosaga's not perfect, it does scratch that particular itch for me, so I'm inclined to be tolerant of its shortcomings. *shrug*

 

[Amir0x]

your post can best be summed up as "Well I'll take it even if it sucks, because there's not much else like it out there!"

 

[demi]

I hope this game comes out in America, I'll buy it at... 10 bucks?

 

[AniHawk]

I hope this game comes out in America, I'll buy it at... 10 bucks?

Well it's Xenosaga I and Xenosaga II, so that's $100 right there. Plus you're paying for portability, so that's an extra $20, and then you have to consider they took out all the stupidly long cutscenes that they forced you to listen to- another added bonus.

So hey, it might be $150, but it's actually a deal if you really think about it

 

[demi]

Why would it be $100?

 

[Tellaerin]

your post can best be summed up as "Well I'll take it even if it sucks, because there's not much else like it out there!"

Heh, I feel it's more along the lines of, 'This is the videogame equivalent of an ambitious B-movie' - while I realize that the games could be better, that doesn't get in the way of me enjoying them for what they are. I felt the same way about Advent Rising - the shortcomings there were technical rather than writing-related, but in both cases, what the developers were attempting to achieve was interesting enough that I could still enjoy the overall experience in spite of the flaws.

 

[thetrin]

I felt the same way about Advent Rising - the shortcomings there were technical rather than writing-related, but in both cases, what the developers were attempting to achieve was interesting enough that I could still enjoy the overall experience in spite of the flaws.

Trying to get demi on your side?

 

[Tellaerin]

Trying to get demi on your side?

On my side? If anything, I think he's probably deeply offended that someone would draw parallels between AR and XS. :lol

 

[demi]

Using Advent Rising as an example, I would understand why you would enjoy Xenosaga, problem is Xenosaga's story is garbage, compared to Advent Rising's. I play my games for the same reason, I hope they have a nice story flowing with them.

 

[AgentOtaku]

I've enjoyed both XS games for the PS2, and I'm looking forward to Ep. 3. The series is space opera at its heart, embellished with references to everything from Gnosticism and Nietzsche to classic Western sf. (I also have a soft spot for world-building and future histories, so the degree to which the universe was fleshed out and the wealth of data available through the database in Ep. 1 really appealed to me.)

Yes, all the usual anime tropes are present , but since I don't share the pathological hatred of all things anime that seems to afflict some of our more vitriolic posters, I don't find that particularly offensive. Likewise, while the presentation can get stilted or heavy-handed at times, just the fact that the narrative has an intentional subtext is welcome enough that I can overlook the occasional awkwardness.

Last but not least is the fact that sf RPG's (Eastern or Western) are rare to begin with nowadays, and few of the ones that are released take place in an interstellar setting. While Xenosaga's not perfect, it does scratch that particular itch for me, so I'm inclined to be tolerant of its shortcomings. *shrug*

+1

 

[thetrin]

The question is, how many of you XS haters hated Xenogears, and how many liked it? That would help determine why exactly you so vehemently detest it and everything it represents.

 

[demi]

I certainly didn't hate Xenogears, but I'm not going to go rave about it being the best ever

Xenogears is [playable] - key word there

I tried to play Xenosaga and I couldn't even get past the intro training level

 

[AgentOtaku]

The question is, how many of you XS haters hated Xenogears, and how many liked it? That would help determine why exactly you so vehemently detest it and everything it represents.

I enjoyed Xenogears back in the day, but never finished it :/

 

[MoxManiac]

The question is, how many of you XS haters hated Xenogears, and how many liked it? That would help determine why exactly you so vehemently detest it and everything it represents.

I hate all the Xeno games equally

 

[Red Blaster]

While Episode III looks pretty sweet and all, I love Drinky's anti-Xeno rants.

 

[ronito]

The question is, how many of you XS haters hated Xenogears, and how many liked it? That would help determine why exactly you so vehemently detest it and everything it represents.

I loved the art work the gameplay and the idea behind Xenogears. But I hated the execution. I mean if they would've allowed players to just click past text the game would've been half as long. I've posted it here before but I recently replayed Xenogears and blogged it. Here's my first and final entries, it pretty much sums up what I thought of it.

First post:

However, with all that's wrong with the game some things are very right. There is a huge backstory, creating a very believable world. The game has countries each with it's own motives. Countries. Think about that. Even the darlings of RPG-dom FF6, FF7, and FF10 only really had one evil or governing body: Vector, Shin-ra and Yevon. Resistance groups were an after thought: Returners, Avalanche, and to a lesser extent Al-bhed. The world felt huge, and it genuinely felt like adventure to get to a new place. Cities are huge but only open to exploration where you need to go. Scale of maps and such was done to inspire a sense of awe, and they largely succeed. Also the art is just great, very creative, sets your imagination free.

Last post:

Look, the most basic rule of videogames is this:
1. People read books to be told what something is and imagine it.
2. People watch movies to be shown what something is, and not told.
3. People play videogames to play through events, not be shown them.

Xenogears cannot even keep this most basic rule of videogames. And further goes off and breaks it in the most egregious and horrible way possible. They don't let you play it, ok, great, then at least show it to me. Nope they wont even show you, they'll tell you. So much wasted potential, observe: Deus, the intergalatic weapon, awakens from it's thousands of years of sleep in its floating city of Merkava, it sends armies in an epic battle to destroy all of earth. Doesn't that sound exciting?! You bet! Oh, but you don't get to play it. Well at least watching it would be cool. Well and actually you wont even get to see it either. Nope instead you get a still picture behind the main character who's sitting on a rocking chair and lines and lines of text to tell you of this momentus event.

And boy do they tell you what happens. They'll tell you in 45 minutes of inane psychobabble and details you don't care about. A good example is preparations for an attack take 12 minutes (I kid you not...12 MINUTES) of explanation of how they're going to get up the special generators. WHO THE %$#)$#*__)$#@(_%#@$ CARES!!!! This is a game!!! I got this to play, to fight the bad guy, to go on an adventure and save the world. Not to spend twelve minutes hearing about STUPID GENERATORS!!!!

Now Xenosaga was just like Xenogears. Without the whole cool artwork, good gameplay, and stuff, you know the stuff that made Xenogears bareable.

 

[the year 20XX]

Putting aside the fact that the Xenosaga series sucks, is the DS game more enjoyable to play than the PS2 games? I think that's what the thread is about.

 

[bengraven]

If I were desperate for an old school RPG with a far too convoluted story, I would consider Xenosaga 1&2...IF it were coming out in the States, which it will not be.

I have XS1 and for some reason, I've kept it, even though I can never get past the first three hours without dying of boredom. It turned me off modern J-RPGs period, actually.

 

[daegan]

Takahashi and some ex-Xeno staff are rumored to be working on a new non-Xeno-related religious-themed RPG for another company; the future looks bright for Drinky's trolling career.

I get the feeling it's the people he DIDN'T take with him that made Xenogears great.

 

[Doom_Bringer]

the series sucks. Kill it now!

 

[the year 20XX]

Takahashi and some ex-Xeno staff are rumored to be working on a new non-Xeno-related religious-themed RPG for another company; the future looks bright for Drinky's trolling career.

I hope it's Wisdom Tree.

 

[UltimaKilo]

the series sucks. Kill it now!

Thank you. I was looking for a Xenogears 2. Oh how wrong I was! =(

 

[SatelliteOfLove]

Saga 1's battle system? Enemies towards the end still pull turns out of their ass with Boost?

 

[djtiesto]

Never understand all the Atelier Iris:Eternal Mana (first one, never played the second) hate. Nothing special but it's not that bad a game... much better than the Xeno games for instance.

 

[Kurosaki Ichigo]

I WANT THAT DAMNED MOMO PIC WITH BRA

fixed for what the real...

Doom_Bringer
illegal hentai gamer

...would say

 

[X26]

The only way Xenosaga can ever redeem itself is if..

- Monolith gave everybody who bought these games their money back
- Monolith publically apologizes
- Monolith commits harakiri