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.

My first venture into Takahashi's video game design, as well as the "Xeno" series and well... it's interesting that's for sure.

This game is insanely ambitious, to a fault. The combat is unique, but poorly executed and therefore mediocre. The platforming is atrocious, and the sudden shift in puzzle-heavy dungeon level design near the very end is confusing. It just doesn't mesh. But at the same time, I respect the game even at its faults because I can tell there was a lot of innovation, or at least an attempt.

What makes Xenogears iconic is its story and presentation and, even then, I'm widely conflicted. There's much that I really liked, but much of the plot beats and resolutions either just didn't hit or were compelling but extremely convoluted and so rushed that it all comes at you in waves of exposition instead of natural build-up. It's a real shame that the most intriguing portion of the story (Disc 2) is incredibly rushed and cut. Therefore, the most climactic and important part of the story felt kind of... hollow.

I respect the hell out of the ambition this game has, but I also equally don't care for how much that ambition really got in the way of itself sometimes.