i find the enviroment awesome, especially in the first city man looking at that city makes me happy.

I have the game already and really sweeping between those 3 games really show how big difference is in quality. Beside 45h? It's an RPG or Racing game? Ehh FF XII gave you 80 for fast finish game. I just finish Grandia III with 35h on timer. Doh games are shorter and shorter =(.

Dont compare it to Final Fantasy XII, something this great doesnt need to be compared with something crappy.

.....Wow.

Anyway, more pluses.

+ The dialogue system for NPCs. Now you don't have to click every character to get a dialogue window. Instead they start talking as you pass by, and if you want to hear more information, just press Square.

This is a great idea, and it could be further implemented for next-gen RPGs by having NPCs talk with realtime voicechat. I hope to see this feature become a standard for future games.

+ Towns are finally, finally, finally interesting and bustling with effects (speeding trains).

+ I don't believe it....the game has a cutscene viewer. Fans have been requesting this since the first game, but I thought Namco would never actually listen (at least for NA editions).

+ A legitimate reason for Shion leaving Vector.

- More talking heads. It works fine for a sprite-based game like Xenogears, but these are detailed 3D models with a full range of expressions. Take the first conversation involving Togashi and the other Vector members. In the original game, the standard dialogue was enhanced with the amusing expressions and manerisms of the characters. But now it's just typical RPG dialogue.

Also, Margulis' scar shifts from his right eye to his left according to the position of his portrait. Lame.

- I wish the whole "Gnosis Terrorism" story wasn't limited to some online story (and in Japanese). It would've served better as a bonus movie or something. Too many details (such as the mysterious Realien) demanded more visual data.

+ Towns are finally, finally, finally interesting and bustling with effects (speeding trains).

True, i really loved First District, My only complain for now is the fact that its still feels like a dungeon crawler, everytime a good story unfolds you'll be thrown on a dungeon.

I only have one question for this game :
Does it have any replay value? And is the replay value worthwhile or just a bunch of pointlessness?

Am I the only one feeling a little remorseful about this being the last game in the series? Xenogears was my favorite game of all time and I remember how upset I was when I found out about Disc 2. What happened to Xenosaga was even worse, prematurely ending the series by three episodes. But at least they did a good job on this last one. There doesn't seem to be much talk about the Episode 3 so I guess it didn't sell many copies. We can thank Episode 2 for that. We probably won't see anymore games except for the already existing prequals.

Anyway, today I finished up all the optional stuff, Omega, Erde Kaiser, 100% database, swimsuits etc. For some reason I want to keep playing but theres nothing left to do besides reading the database. I hate it when you only get to fight optional bosses once and they leave you with some uber item but nothing worth using it on. I really wish developers would stop with the one time only sidequests. It's a shame X3 doesn't have a New Game+ feature.

Also, Xenosaga makes Final Fantasy look like a fairy tale. Trying to compare the two is like comparing The Bible with a coloring book.

Since you can already watch all the cutscenes, go back to any dungeon without replaying the game, and theres only a few missible items [not including the ones you have to steal from bosses], the replay value is pretty low. Unless you want to revisit certain cities that won't be accessable later in the game. I'm going to replay it because I missed a chain of sidequests which unlocks better items in the shops [skill upgrades etc], I'm also missing one key item. But the first play through is a good enough reason to buy the game.

Is it just me or is HaKox the greatest RPG minigame ever?

Honestly, I don't like HaKox all that much. However, one of the levels -- and perhaps all of them -- had music from Episode 2 playing in the background.

*sighs* This' why I get mad. And yes, it really has good replay value. The whole game got good reviews.

The only replay value this game has is watching cutscenes with swimsuits on. This' why I get mad. There's absolutely no reason to play the game over, since you can watch the cutscenes with the viewer thing.

Well, I thought Namco/Bandai said they MIGHT continue the series, should Xeno3 sell well and get fan praise or something. They just said "We'll see". I'd personally like to see it continue on the PS3, the game's beauty would be portrayed 10 times better.

I loved the VAs for this game, I'm glad they brought Shion and KOS-MOS's Xeno1 VAs back. The guy who played chaos in Xeno2 is back, I hated his voice in Xeno2 but this time he is quite good, along with MOMO (who is also voiced my her Xeno2 actress -who I wasn't all that impressed with in Xeno2, but the actors seem to have improved their skills since then). The story is top notch,

Yuki Kaijura's music is also amazing, not quite Yasunori Mitsuda amazing, but it comes pretty close. Very dramatic and epic in some places. I've also come to love the in-game tracks since I've played the game (I'm at the last boss btw, w00t!), and I'm bummed that no one has ripped a higher quality version (like that of Xeno2's gamerip, which was freakin' amazing) of them.

In all of the non text/voice cutscenes, the visuals are great...but it would have been nicer if they used those as the in-game graphics and a better engine for cutscenes, like they did in Xeno1 and 2.

Overall, amazing game. Doesn't seem like it has too much replay value unless you loved it so much you just want to play it again, but DEFINATELY worth the buy.

P.S.

P.S.S.

As for the final boss, just cast Best Ally or that other auto-revive spell and he should be easy.

I see, makes sense

....no :P I hated it and still havent beat the second stage ;/:biggrin:

Blitzball gets my vote for best minigame. Followed by the Fairy Colony system from the Breath of Fire series. HaKox reminds me of The Sims.

Shenmue's multiple mini-games that were made up of gambling, playing classic Sega games and Lucky Hit wins for me... and to this day Shenmue 1 and 2 are my most overplayed RPG styled games... Star Ocean : Till the end of Time as a close second.

Seconded. Kaijura can never do any wrong, but this time they let her compose the entire soundtrack. As a result, this is probably the best XS soundtrack of the three, even though I did find Mitsuda's biblical music more fitting.

The one scene that really stood out thanks to the music so far is the first conversation with chaos and Nephilim. They play this really haunting violin piece that makes things very foreboding, a sign that the end is coming.

Anyway, it's been a good 4 hours since the first dungeon, but now I finally made it to the second dungeon. Looks like they still have a problem balancing the cutscene to gameplay ratio. By a lot. :edgartpg:

Just like that you have over 5 party members in your disposal. On the plus side, they all have some really cool special moves (favorite goes to Ziggy's enormous handcannon; looks like something the Major used in GITS).

I also found a more major negative than the talking heads; MOMO's role, or lack of, so far. Her prescence so far is so unimportant she might as well not be there. Even when Shion reunites with all the other characters for the first time, MOMO is the ONLY one who doesn't say anything. Would it have been too much to toss in a "Hi, Shion!"?

It's good that Shion is finally getting some real development (especially with Allen), but this was never just her story; leaving characters like MOMO with no story, or even dialogue in the final story is just unforgivable.

"Miyuki! You screwed up again, didn't you!?"

So mean. :edgartpg:

I just remembered something regarding censorship.



YouTube doesn't have any out takes from the Japanese version, all I see is a bunch of game trailers.

Another part I was wondering around censorship...

Uh, MOMO (and Jr.) were pretty much the focus of things for the first two episodes. I'm glad their finally taking a backseat and Shion, KOS-MOS and Ziggy are taking center stage.

So, I'm gonna burn a rented copy of this today. Since I didn't play Xenosaga 2, will I still be able to 'enjoy' numero 3? I figure I can just read up on some story FAQs on Gamefaqs or something.

While it's good to hear Ziggy will get some screentime, I still don't approve with MOMO's lack of a role here. I'm not saying she needed to be the center stage, but they could at least make an effort to remind us she's still in the party.

This problem goes back to Xenogears (and most RPGs in general). You shouldn't have to subtract one character's screentime to focus on another. You need to balance them all out.