Xenosaga: Episode I - Der Wille zur Macht, the first chapter of a trilogy, is a Japanese-style sci-fi role-playing game, sharing many common themes and gameplay elements with Xenogears. The battle system is not unlike the one used in Xenogears (combo attacks, AP and EP gauges, etc.), but random encounters are eliminated. Instead, the enemies are now visible and battles can be avoided. During combat the few upcoming ally and enemy turns are shown onscreen, allowing the player to make strategic decisions based on who will act next. A rolling slot moves with each turn as well, conferring a bonus such as added damage or bonus XP for any action on that turn. If the enemy would be in position to take an advantage then the player can expend a character's "boost" gauge to cut in and act next, although enemies can boost as well, and enemy boosts always over-ride player boosts. Each character has a unique tree of Ether spells they can learn by spending Ether points earned in battle, with lower spells requiring spells above them to be purchased first. After a spell is purchased, so long is it does not require a unique talent of that character, the spell can also be purchased and learned by any other character that can afford double its normal cost. The Anti-Gnosis Weapon Systems can be equipped with different weapons and accessories and can be used in combat provided that a character has enough AP on that turn to board their AGWS.
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I really want to love this game, but god, is this a hard game to love.
I adore Xenosaga’s futuristic sci-fi space opera aesthetics. The slick, clean, artificial look of the game's environments, highlighting how far into the future this game takes place - which is reflected in an interesting way in the game’s treasure hunting system, where constructional nanomachines bugged out and accidentally created a bunch of closed rooms throughout levels with treasures in them. Mechs, ranging from a little bulky and awkward-looking mass produced military mechs to slender and sophisticated mechs of a private developer. Array of space ships with imaginative designs - one of them functioning both as a space battlecruiser and as a governmental skyscraper amid a lake on a space stanchion looking a little like a lotus flower.
Story in Xenosaga is very slow burn in nature, but that allows it to present a world lush with detail and focus on worldbuilding, slowly immersing the player into it. Characters are pretty cool and represent various aspects of the sci-fi setting - there’s cyborg made with old technologies, secret top of the line android, artificially created humans, and nature of their existence is relevant to their stories.
However, that slow burn nature is a double-edged sword - a lived-in feel to the world comes together with an incredibly slow pace. This game feels like a short prologue to an epic RPG story, except it runs for the whole duration of an average RPG - around 45 hours. Yes, this game is a first part in a franchise which also got cut short, but regardless of any circumstances, any story that spans such a long time just HAS to have a proper substance to it, and this game unfortunately doesn't. There’s no proper narrative arc, most characters get very little development, and it feels like nothing of importance happens. This game is all setup with no payoff. The way this game tried to up the stakes and epicness in the final dungeon also felt very unearned because of that. It was unnecessary and left a bad taste. The story that is being set up seems intriguing and interesting, and the payoff in the latter games is interesting enough, but in this game there is little satisfaction from it to be found.
Gameplay is somewhat okay. It’s a colossal improvement coming from Xenogears, but overall kind of mediocre. Base mechanics are alright, but the game feels like it’s lacking focus and a concrete vision on what experience its mechanics mean to convey to the player. It has tons of them, but interacting with them is a little confusing and not very fulfilling. The UI is also exceedingly cumbersome. If I have to manage equippable skills which are extracted from armor and accesories with a UI this bad once more in my life I’m gonna fucking gnosify.
Decision to leave exploration gameplay without music wasn't good. I get and like the idea of using silence and sound effects instead to highlight the cold and distant nature of Saga’s setting, but this idea wasn’t executed with a necessary quality. It just comes off as unfinished, and not as a stylistic choice. Combat music was also a bit lackluster considering it’s just ONE track for the whole game. Music was a letdown coming from Gears.
But everything being said, I do love this game despite its many imperfections. Also, KOS-MOS is hot. Seriously, she’s now one of my favorite female characters in animanga sphere, even though writing in this game really lets her down.
I adore Xenosaga’s futuristic sci-fi space opera aesthetics. The slick, clean, artificial look of the game's environments, highlighting how far into the future this game takes place - which is reflected in an interesting way in the game’s treasure hunting system, where constructional nanomachines bugged out and accidentally created a bunch of closed rooms throughout levels with treasures in them. Mechs, ranging from a little bulky and awkward-looking mass produced military mechs to slender and sophisticated mechs of a private developer. Array of space ships with imaginative designs - one of them functioning both as a space battlecruiser and as a governmental skyscraper amid a lake on a space stanchion looking a little like a lotus flower.
Story in Xenosaga is very slow burn in nature, but that allows it to present a world lush with detail and focus on worldbuilding, slowly immersing the player into it. Characters are pretty cool and represent various aspects of the sci-fi setting - there’s cyborg made with old technologies, secret top of the line android, artificially created humans, and nature of their existence is relevant to their stories.
However, that slow burn nature is a double-edged sword - a lived-in feel to the world comes together with an incredibly slow pace. This game feels like a short prologue to an epic RPG story, except it runs for the whole duration of an average RPG - around 45 hours. Yes, this game is a first part in a franchise which also got cut short, but regardless of any circumstances, any story that spans such a long time just HAS to have a proper substance to it, and this game unfortunately doesn't. There’s no proper narrative arc, most characters get very little development, and it feels like nothing of importance happens. This game is all setup with no payoff. The way this game tried to up the stakes and epicness in the final dungeon also felt very unearned because of that. It was unnecessary and left a bad taste. The story that is being set up seems intriguing and interesting, and the payoff in the latter games is interesting enough, but in this game there is little satisfaction from it to be found.
Gameplay is somewhat okay. It’s a colossal improvement coming from Xenogears, but overall kind of mediocre. Base mechanics are alright, but the game feels like it’s lacking focus and a concrete vision on what experience its mechanics mean to convey to the player. It has tons of them, but interacting with them is a little confusing and not very fulfilling. The UI is also exceedingly cumbersome. If I have to manage equippable skills which are extracted from armor and accesories with a UI this bad once more in my life I’m gonna fucking gnosify.
Decision to leave exploration gameplay without music wasn't good. I get and like the idea of using silence and sound effects instead to highlight the cold and distant nature of Saga’s setting, but this idea wasn’t executed with a necessary quality. It just comes off as unfinished, and not as a stylistic choice. Combat music was also a bit lackluster considering it’s just ONE track for the whole game. Music was a letdown coming from Gears.
But everything being said, I do love this game despite its many imperfections. Also, KOS-MOS is hot. Seriously, she’s now one of my favorite female characters in animanga sphere, even though writing in this game really lets her down.
Hoo boy...
I just don't see much of a really good game here, to be honest. When you're not watching cutscenes for a story that is kind of intriguing albeit really boring to watch, you're forced to slog through shitty combat or run at an insanely slow pace through maps. My condolences to anyone that plays this game without the use of an emulator's turbo mode because holy shit this game is so... damn... SLOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW.
Takahashi is trying to do something here and I just don't know if what this game offers is enough to get me really interested in seeing what the other two games in this series have to offer.
I just don't see much of a really good game here, to be honest. When you're not watching cutscenes for a story that is kind of intriguing albeit really boring to watch, you're forced to slog through shitty combat or run at an insanely slow pace through maps. My condolences to anyone that plays this game without the use of an emulator's turbo mode because holy shit this game is so... damn... SLOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW.
Takahashi is trying to do something here and I just don't know if what this game offers is enough to get me really interested in seeing what the other two games in this series have to offer.
Gonna be honest and quick:
1) This game is like 65% cutscenes, and they're long, some of them have save points in between them.
2) Most of the story of this game it's just a setting for the next games. This is more evident because the game does A LOT OF INFO DUMP, the game is literally throwing a lot of concepts and therms and you'll have to remember it for the next games.
3) Gameplay is well done, the only complain I have is that a lot of the abilities (Ether, Skill and Tech) are behind walls of points that you won't be able to obtain without grinding the shit out of this game, that's a really poor decision given how little gameplay is on the game.
It's a shame, that you can't get to experiment with all the abilities because of this, and also because there's no point, becuase yes, there're some optional bosses, but there's no fucking way that those bosses demands that amount of grinding also because if you get the 6 robot parts, you unlock the Erde kaiser, and that mech can do 9999 points of damage ignoring all defense to all enemies, and only 2 end game enemies have enough health to survive that.
Not complaining, I love those kind of things in rpgs, because it rewards you for exploring the game, it's just weird that the developers block 40% of your abilities behind point walls, but they're ok with giving you this thing with no penalization...
Recommendations:
- I'll share with yall the HD pack for every Xenosaga game for the PCSX2, for those who wants them. Tnx to Panda_Venom for doing and sharing these packs: https://gbatemp.net/threads/xenosaga-trilogy-usa-hd-remaster.612395/
- The best team is Shion, Jr and Kosmos by far.
- Save your Tech Points for all characters for their lasts Tech Skills. You can use some of these points to upgrade the speed of the firsts tech attacks that can target all enemies tho, it will help you through the game.
- Save and use Kosmos Tech Points to only upgrade X-Buster tho, trust me, that thing is versatile and broken and it'll help you a lot. Only like 3 bosses are resistant to that attack, but the other characters will be support enough.
- Unlock Shion's "Boost 1" and "Quick" Ether Skills and transfer them to your other main party members. (Medica/Goodbye/Boost 1 and Analyze/Refresh/Quick to unlock them)
- Gather the six robot parts to get Erde Kaiser, that'll do 9999 points of damage ignoring all defense to all enemies to speedrun the final part of the game if you're tired and just want to be over with it.
Use the Angel Ring to half the cost of EP that the mech demands and play Poker Level 4 on the casino, obtain 10000 points and buy 99 of the first pack to have 99 ethers so you can spam the hell out of Erde Kaiser.
Final thought: Even tho I liked it, only when I finish the series will I know if this game was worth playing.
1) This game is like 65% cutscenes, and they're long, some of them have save points in between them.
2) Most of the story of this game it's just a setting for the next games. This is more evident because the game does A LOT OF INFO DUMP, the game is literally throwing a lot of concepts and therms and you'll have to remember it for the next games.
3) Gameplay is well done, the only complain I have is that a lot of the abilities (Ether, Skill and Tech) are behind walls of points that you won't be able to obtain without grinding the shit out of this game, that's a really poor decision given how little gameplay is on the game.
It's a shame, that you can't get to experiment with all the abilities because of this, and also because there's no point, becuase yes, there're some optional bosses, but there's no fucking way that those bosses demands that amount of grinding also because if you get the 6 robot parts, you unlock the Erde kaiser, and that mech can do 9999 points of damage ignoring all defense to all enemies, and only 2 end game enemies have enough health to survive that.
Not complaining, I love those kind of things in rpgs, because it rewards you for exploring the game, it's just weird that the developers block 40% of your abilities behind point walls, but they're ok with giving you this thing with no penalization...
Recommendations:
- I'll share with yall the HD pack for every Xenosaga game for the PCSX2, for those who wants them. Tnx to Panda_Venom for doing and sharing these packs: https://gbatemp.net/threads/xenosaga-trilogy-usa-hd-remaster.612395/
- The best team is Shion, Jr and Kosmos by far.
- Save your Tech Points for all characters for their lasts Tech Skills. You can use some of these points to upgrade the speed of the firsts tech attacks that can target all enemies tho, it will help you through the game.
- Save and use Kosmos Tech Points to only upgrade X-Buster tho, trust me, that thing is versatile and broken and it'll help you a lot. Only like 3 bosses are resistant to that attack, but the other characters will be support enough.
- Unlock Shion's "Boost 1" and "Quick" Ether Skills and transfer them to your other main party members. (Medica/Goodbye/Boost 1 and Analyze/Refresh/Quick to unlock them)
- Gather the six robot parts to get Erde Kaiser, that'll do 9999 points of damage ignoring all defense to all enemies to speedrun the final part of the game if you're tired and just want to be over with it.
Use the Angel Ring to half the cost of EP that the mech demands and play Poker Level 4 on the casino, obtain 10000 points and buy 99 of the first pack to have 99 ethers so you can spam the hell out of Erde Kaiser.
Final thought: Even tho I liked it, only when I finish the series will I know if this game was worth playing.
The story is one of the most interesting I've experienced in a videogame. It has a great cast of characters, and a lot of really interesting world building that would serve as setup for things to come. Sadly my praises go as far as the story goes because actually playing this game is no fun at all. Miserable and slow ass hell turn-base combat, uninteresting exploration, and very lackluster dungeons. This game is also infamous for its cutscene lengths, THERES LITERALLY A SAFE POINT IN A CUTSCENE DUE TO HOW LONG IT IS. Music is fire tol.
I still appreciate this game, it was the first one published by monolith soft and in many ways it planted the seeds for what they would become in the present time. Anyway 5/10
I still appreciate this game, it was the first one published by monolith soft and in many ways it planted the seeds for what they would become in the present time. Anyway 5/10
Story is easily the best part of the game — it’s fun, it’s dark, it’s frightening at times. However it does spend a lot of its runtime setting up plot points that will only be elaborated upon in the sequels, which can lead to this game sometimes feeling like the exposition game. Still tons of memorable scenes and an incredibly likable, thoroughly fleshed out cast of characters.
Gameplay is generally good here. I think the combat system is fun, but as the game went on, I realized just how slow it actually is. It gets especially bad when you start unlocking really powerful moves to include in your normal combos. By the last two dungeons, I was fast forwarding every encounter, and I found the combat to be much more enjoyable that way. I have no doubt that my experience wouldn’t have been as enjoyable if I was playing on real hardware. Also, there are more than a few times where a side character would wander off and I was forced to go find a them in the world. Sometimes they’d be close by, other times they’d be in some pretty stupid spots, and each time it took way too long and killed the pacing. Without going into spoilers, there’s one segment where I have to find over a dozen people in one area and that was easily the worst part of the game.
The points system is also something of which I am both fond and critical. I found it both satisfying and rewarding whenever I took the time to spend my points on new skills and upgrades and shit. On top of EXP, are three different types of points you are rewarded with upon finishing a battle and four different upgrade systems to spend them on. This wouldn’t be that bad if weren’t for the menus being really slow and kind of a pain to navigate through. In most JRPGs, when looking at stats and gear and shit for each character, you can use L and R to switch to a different character’s menu — that’s a pretty common QOL feature that Xenosaga lacks, and sometimes led to me spending 5 to 10 minutes in the menus anytime I wanted to level up my party.
Also there’s barely any fucking music in this game! There are TWO battle themes in this game. One is for the final boss, the other is for every other encounter. By the end of the game I never wanted to hear the main battle theme ever again. It’s not even that good. This game is composed entirely by the legendary Yasunori Mitsuda, who I has contributed to some of the best video game OSTs ever (Chrono Trigger, Xenogears, Shadow Hearts, Xenoblade, etc.) and I fully expected him to kill it here, but it’s not his best work. Aside from some amazing standouts, it’s some nice but forgettable RPG music. Also, most areas in the game don’t actually have any music, only ambience. I’m sure this was a deliberate creative decision, and it’s one that I think paid off in some areas. It contributes to the game world’s cold, synthetic nature, but there was more than a handful of times in the game where I think it would’ve benefited from having background music without killing the game’s atmosphere (episodes II and III are testament to that). When the music is good, it’s great — the cutscenes are filled with awesome tracks — but most of the game’s music it’s just serviceable.
I think this is a very strong first chapter in this series, but it’s probably going to end up as my least favorite. I’m still going to give this an 8 out of 10 because the experience overall was great and I couldn’t stop playing it, though that’s almost entirely due to the story and mostly quick pace. As rough as it is around the edges, it’s still a great time and I don’t think anyone should skip this. I hear Episode III is a masterpiece and I can’t wait to get to that but this is a necessary first step. I’ve heard some people say that you should just watch the game’s cutscenes on YouTube and get the story so you can skip to Episode III, and I think that’s pretty ridiculous. You’re not getting the full experience that way, plus a good chunk of the story and world building takes place in dialogue boxes outside of cutscenes, so you’d be completely missing the context of these great cutscenes. Also the game itself is actually pretty good.
Gameplay is generally good here. I think the combat system is fun, but as the game went on, I realized just how slow it actually is. It gets especially bad when you start unlocking really powerful moves to include in your normal combos. By the last two dungeons, I was fast forwarding every encounter, and I found the combat to be much more enjoyable that way. I have no doubt that my experience wouldn’t have been as enjoyable if I was playing on real hardware. Also, there are more than a few times where a side character would wander off and I was forced to go find a them in the world. Sometimes they’d be close by, other times they’d be in some pretty stupid spots, and each time it took way too long and killed the pacing. Without going into spoilers, there’s one segment where I have to find over a dozen people in one area and that was easily the worst part of the game.
The points system is also something of which I am both fond and critical. I found it both satisfying and rewarding whenever I took the time to spend my points on new skills and upgrades and shit. On top of EXP, are three different types of points you are rewarded with upon finishing a battle and four different upgrade systems to spend them on. This wouldn’t be that bad if weren’t for the menus being really slow and kind of a pain to navigate through. In most JRPGs, when looking at stats and gear and shit for each character, you can use L and R to switch to a different character’s menu — that’s a pretty common QOL feature that Xenosaga lacks, and sometimes led to me spending 5 to 10 minutes in the menus anytime I wanted to level up my party.
Also there’s barely any fucking music in this game! There are TWO battle themes in this game. One is for the final boss, the other is for every other encounter. By the end of the game I never wanted to hear the main battle theme ever again. It’s not even that good. This game is composed entirely by the legendary Yasunori Mitsuda, who I has contributed to some of the best video game OSTs ever (Chrono Trigger, Xenogears, Shadow Hearts, Xenoblade, etc.) and I fully expected him to kill it here, but it’s not his best work. Aside from some amazing standouts, it’s some nice but forgettable RPG music. Also, most areas in the game don’t actually have any music, only ambience. I’m sure this was a deliberate creative decision, and it’s one that I think paid off in some areas. It contributes to the game world’s cold, synthetic nature, but there was more than a handful of times in the game where I think it would’ve benefited from having background music without killing the game’s atmosphere (episodes II and III are testament to that). When the music is good, it’s great — the cutscenes are filled with awesome tracks — but most of the game’s music it’s just serviceable.
I think this is a very strong first chapter in this series, but it’s probably going to end up as my least favorite. I’m still going to give this an 8 out of 10 because the experience overall was great and I couldn’t stop playing it, though that’s almost entirely due to the story and mostly quick pace. As rough as it is around the edges, it’s still a great time and I don’t think anyone should skip this. I hear Episode III is a masterpiece and I can’t wait to get to that but this is a necessary first step. I’ve heard some people say that you should just watch the game’s cutscenes on YouTube and get the story so you can skip to Episode III, and I think that’s pretty ridiculous. You’re not getting the full experience that way, plus a good chunk of the story and world building takes place in dialogue boxes outside of cutscenes, so you’d be completely missing the context of these great cutscenes. Also the game itself is actually pretty good.
Shion is simultaneously heinously ugly and adorkable beyond measure. Truly peak.
The game's cool too I guess...
The game's cool too I guess...