After playing through for 40 hours, I can say that
Xenosaga Episode I: "Der Wille zur Macht" ("The
Will to Power") was a great game in nearly every way I can
think of. Sure, the game had a large number of cut scenes that seemed
to take large amounts of time to watch, but they were great looking
cut scenes. The story and the game play of the game were excellent.
The music was also spectacular. It was a shame that the only time
there was any real music was during those cut scenes. I spent most
of the time in captivation of the game. However, now that I've
beaten the first episode, all I seem to be able to do now is to
wait for Episode 1.5.
Now, one might be thinking that I might have miswritten the above.
After all, the next part in Xenosaga is not an Episode 1.5, but
an Episode II. The reason is that I felt that "Der Wille zur
Macht" left not at a convenient break, but more like in the
middle of a story. I was still trying to make out all of the details
of what exactly was happening in the game, then boom, the story
just stops. At the end of the game, players are also asked to save
a file that they cannot open, so this adds more to the feeling that
the story is stuck in the middle, and that the company has something
like an Episode 1.5 planned. Of course, I can see why Monolith Software
(the Developer of Xenosaga) would do something like this. Monolith
is not a very large company, and has very limited resources. A lot
of those resources were spent to make Xenosaga. I can say, however,
that I'll be perfectly happy to wait for Monolith to make
money off of this game so that they can finish up Xenosaga and really
finish up this episode.
(Ed. Note: If some out there who haven't played Xenosaga still
think this sounds eerily familiar, it's probably because the same
strategy is being used with another popular game. Bandai is using
this strategy with another highly anticipated RPG: .hack. Bandai
has split .hack up into 4 volumes, each leading to the next, with
saves carrying from one game to the next. If Xenosaga is in any
way similar, Jeff will be stuck with this feeling of an incomplete
story for about 5 more volumes, since Xenosaga has been promised
to be 6 parts. Maybe Jeff should call the next part Episode 1.1667
instead ~nishi-kun).
Now that I'm done talking about the few bad points I found
with the game, I can just talk about how I felt about the first
part of the story I've seen so far. The story has held to
the level of the original Xenogears game very well so far. There
are a large number of simultaneous plots going on through the game.
As the story unfolds, the player learns about the world of Xenosaga,
and how everything is not as it looks: some of it good, and some
of it not so good. I will avoid going too far into depth about the
details of the game, since I obviously don't want to spoil
anything for those out there who haven't played through the
game yet (although I'll just say one thing: KOS-MOS [the main
female character that's used in all the advertising for the
game] kicks ass all over the place ^_^).
All of the characters in Xenosaga stand out. Sure, some of the
characters spend much more time in the spotlight than others (namely,
Shion and KOS-MOS). However, all of the characters will have some
time to shine. The player gets to learn a lot about Shion in this
episode, and the other characters will probably have their details
revealed over the course of the next few games. The crew of the
Elsa also shares a great deal of screen time in this Episode and
proves that not all NPCs are useless. The guy that's madly
in love with Shion, Allen, is also good for a few laughs in this
epic story.
Up to this point, I have to say that my favorite characters are
KOS-MOS and the robot Sakura, err, I mean, M.O.M.O. The reason why
I love KOS-MOS is because she's just about the coolest killer android
in any game that has been released up to now. She has a wicked set
of weapons that she can call on at any time to destroy anything
that stands in her way. As for the reason I like M.O.M.O... Well,
she's like Sakura from Card Captor Sakura in nearly every way I
can think of. From her appearance in her school uniform, to her
wand, has powers with outfits like Sakura's outfit, and acts like
Sakura if she were stuck in the same situation. All she would need
is Kero-chan and no one would be able to tell who is who anymore.
(Ed Note: as an add-on kicker to the joke, apparently M.O.M.O.,
which stands for Multiple Observative Mimetic Organicus, was designed
by Joachim Mizrahi and his wife Yuri after the physical appearance
of their late daughter named... Sakura. Let the in-jokes run free,
free! ~nishi-kun).
The game play for "Der Wille zur Macht" was good. There
was nothing groundbreaking in the game play. However, it is a solid
game with a good combat system that forces the player to think and
figure out how to handle a particular fight. The game system is
based on four stats that the player needs to accumulate: tech points,
skill points, ether points, and normal experience points. Experience
points for Xenosaga work the same as one would expect for a standard
RPG. The remaining points are not hard to understand either. Tech
points are used to upgrade tech attacks and ability stats, like
dexterity, strength, health points, and similar. Skill points are
used to allow a character to take power from another and use it.
Ether points are used to grow ether skills and transfer the skills
to other. These points allow for some cool custom characters in
the game. The mech (A.G.W.S.) is cool to look at in the game, but
is rarely used (at least, in this episode). The enemies are visible
on the screen, and there are things the player can shoot at to give
the characters a boost. The game also has a number of mini-games
to keep the player interested.
I could continue ranting on and on about Xenosaga, but I'll
leave it at that since I've expended all my energy just playing
the game. All I have to say is that Xenosaga was definitely the
best $60 I've spent this year thus far. I had a lot of fun
with this game, and am hopeful that the rest of the Xenosaga episodes
will be as excellent as this one was. All I have to do now is to
avoid killing myself by avoiding any more games that could be too
hard and drive me mad like Xenosaga did (of course, I already know
that I can't wait for the next episode, and so .hack will
have to hold me off until then).
Until the next time I pick up a great game and am not too lazy
to write something about it, I'll see you all later. Have a good
time, and get some rest every one.
jeff
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