The Darkness. Act 1. You'll know it if you've played it. Freaking. Gutted.
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The Darkness. Act 1. You'll know it if you've played it. Freaking. Gutted.
So (SPOILER)you figure Albedo "died", so to speak? I always got the impression that he was simply integrated into Rubedo's consciousness somehow. Judging by his seeming immortality in Episode II (as Albedo himself said, the Patriarch literally reduced him to particles, and yet failed to do any true damage), just because Albedo may not be present in a physical sense does not mean that he is altogether absent. Perhaps I am mistaken about this one, but I was always fairly certain that Albedo and Rubedo became merged entities, permitting the former a period of "rest" in his perpetual state of undeath. And in "rest", perhaps Albedo simply occupies a more elementary state of matter, like the state to which he was reduced by the Patriarch.Quote:
Originally Posted by The Unknown Guru
*Shrug* It isn't as if any solid answers about the Xenosaga trilogy are forthcoming anymore, so we are free to theorize. :p
Episode III was just loaded in every respect. Since it was required (in a damned vicious turn of fate) that the plot be reduced from a sextet to a trilogy, Episode III had to oversee four plots in one (Episodes III, IV, V, and VI), and some aspects thereof were handled remarkably well, and some, understandably, were somewhat neglected. I am certain that the writing team would have liked a great deal more time to introduce the whole (SPOILER)Mary Magdelene concept. As it was, the plot accelerated rather rapidly towards the end. *_*Quote:
Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno
As for Episode II, fans had legitimate reason to be incensed, in all fairness. The voice acting changes were brutal, and the soundtrack (minus a mere handful of tracks, primarily "Lamentation") was an utter joke when compared to the previous Mitsuda score (which wasn't even one of Mitsuda's best to begin with). It was essentially Albedo's game, however, and they developed the insane, inexorable tragedy of his existence extremely well (the moment where a young Albedo demonstrates his inability to commit suicide was particularly shocking, and his crippling fear of solitude particularly poignant). Thus, I consider it a good game; excellent in some respects, quite deficient in others.
Yeah, Voyager wasn't much in the Americanized version. And they go very much out of their way in Episode II to imply that an in-depth backstory between Ziggurat 8 and Voyager is imminent. :mad: The Testaments in general were an exercise in squandered potential, depending on how you feel about the incredibly indecisive Kevin and the easily swayed Virgil. Albedo was the best developed, but even his exeunt felt rushed due to the time crunch that was Episode III.Quote:
Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno
That one never hit me, to be honest. :erm: No doubt related to the fact that I knew the general layout of the plot long before I ever managed to pry a copy of the game itself from Ebay, and that I watched Advent Children first. :laugh: So yeah, completely imperfect experience, but to be blunt, I never felt any particular attachment to Aerith at any time I can recall. I always got the impression from those who were affected by her demise that the impact really comes from the surprise with which it was enacted, which certainly explains what I was missing.Quote:
Originally Posted by ReloadPsi
Yeah, The End took a piece of my heart to his grave, as well. :( Seems like it was probably "his time", though. <_< >_>Quote:
Originally Posted by Psychotic
The death that occurs in disk 2 made me tear up, which never happens :(Quote:
Originally Posted by leader of mortals
and then Capell (SPOILER)gets some tailand you pretty much forget about it...
Oh, I completely forgot about (SPOILER)Faina... Her death was much more powerful and saddening than Sigmunds...Quote:
Originally Posted by TsukasaThe death that occurs in disk 2 made me tear up, which never happens :(Quote:
Originally Posted by leader of mortals
and then Capell (SPOILER)gets some tailand you pretty much forget about it...
This was my interpretation as well. (SPOILER)It works considering Rubedo and Albedo were originally conjoined twins.Quote:
Originally Posted by Vice Nebulosa
Well actually... The three Xenosaga games we got were originally planned to be simply Episode 1. Each episode was suppose to take place thousands of years apart and be a generational story, much like its original source, Xenogears, but time restraints made it impossible. Then the stuff from Episode 1 and 2 were suppose to be together, this was proven by the original trailer for the game (known among fans as the 8min 8sec trailer) which actually featured scenes from episode 2 in it using the eps.1 graphics (it also shows symbols that Xenogears fans will know at 6:58 if you watch the background ;)).Quote:
Episode III was just loaded in every respect. Since it was required (in a damned vicious turn of fate) that the plot be reduced from a sextet to a trilogy, Episode III had to oversee four plots in one (Episodes III, IV, V, and VI), and some aspects thereof were handled remarkably well, and some, understandably, were somewhat neglected. I am certain that the writing team would have liked a great deal more time to introduce the whole (SPOILER)Mary Magdelene concept. As it was, the plot accelerated rather rapidly towards the end. *_*Quote:
Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno
That also obviously got trashed. Then after Episode 2 was released, Soraya Saga (one of the scenario writers, credited with the story arcs of Ziggy and the Yuriev/U.R.T.V. specifically) left Monolith Soft and posted on her blog about several editing and removals of the original script which included the entire plot of what we know as Episode 3. Fans speculated that she may have apparently quit due to this mismanagement of the project. So once again, they tried to wrap up the story for Episode 2 but early in production it got cut down again to being a trilogy.
The whole series was marred by bad decisions from Monolith Soft and time constraints. I'm surprised Eps. 3 came out as good as it did considering everything the project went through. Though I agree it still feels a bit rushed towards the end.
I agree Eps.2 had some great merits, I fault it more for being lousy as a game rather than its plot though as you pointed out half the soundtrack was bad but I actually enjoyed most of Kaijura's tracks. I also felt that outside of building up the characters of the U.R.T.V.'s that the first disc hardly revealed anything we didn't already know from Episode 1. Most of the great reveals were in the second disc but once again, outside of the U.R.T.V.'s I felt no one else got any good character development except for Jin.Quote:
As for Episode II, fans had legitimate reason to be incensed, in all fairness. The voice acting changes were brutal, and the soundtrack (minus a mere handful of tracks, primarily "Lamentation") was an utter joke when compared to the previous Mitsuda score (which wasn't even one of Mitsuda's best to begin with). It was essentially Albedo's game, however, and they developed the insane, inexorable tragedy of his existence extremely well (the moment where a young Albedo demonstrates his inability to commit suicide was particularly shocking, and his crippling fear of solitude particularly poignant). Thus, I consider it a good game; excellent in some respects, quite deficient in others.
I stumbled onto a site that had a translated script for Pied Piper and was pretty damn amazed at how well it came out. So for me, the moments with Voyager were a bit more powerful but I agree Kevin's was a bit weak. Albedo really came out the strongest of the entire cast. Even more than Shion who never overcame her inherent flaw of being an unlikable bitch. Virgil I did feel got a bit more if you put in account what you know of him from Eps.1 Now that I think about it, (SPOILER)Cherenkov was also one of the most powerful characters and deaths in that series...Quote:
Yeah, Voyager wasn't much in the Americanized version. And they go very much out of their way in Episode II to imply that an in-depth backstory between Ziggurat 8 and Voyager is imminent. :mad: The Testaments in general were an exercise in squandered potential, depending on how you feel about the incredibly indecisive Kevin and the easily swayed Virgil. Albedo was the best developed, but even his exeunt felt rushed due to the time crunch that was Episode III.Quote:
Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno
When Aeris died the only thing I thought was "Am I going to get my items back, or are they gonna stay on her."
For me, has to be (SPOILER)Lavitz in Legend of Dragoon
That, and in Metroid Prime 3: (SPOILER)the deaths of Rundas and Gandrayda. Didn't care too much about Ghor. Why is it that anyone that poor bounty hunter ever meets ends up dying?Quote:
Originally Posted by chaos_ghost
I'm going to go ahead and add in Lufia II: Rise of the Sinestrals. (SPOILER)Maxim and Selan dying in the end, leaving their Child Jericho behind. :Cry:
Though it loses its impact if you played Lufia 1 ;)
I think it would still keep it, I mean knowing about a death in advance doesn't nescescarilly mean it loses it's emotion.
Take for example, X. (SPOILER)You are told through the whole series, by Sarutobi himself, he will die to protect the women he loves, and guess what?? It happens. And when it did, I was so sad. :Cry:
In short, a well done death sequence doesn't have to be a surprise to be good. :p
Sora is alive in the manga though. I'm waiting for his death there cause knowing CLAMP, it will be a hundred times more heart wrenching than we can imagine. Like Seishiro or Nataku's deaths. :cry:
It was pretty freakin' heart wrenching in the Anime. :(
And Seishiro was easilly my favorite from the Dragons of Earth. Him and Subaru were the heart of that show man. Well, and Sora. XD
ON that note, at first I thought it was odd those two were the ones to get a prequal, Tokyo Babyon, and not the Main Character, Kamui. XD
Well X was started right after Tokyo Babylon finished running. ;)
On topic...
(SPOILER)Sprite and Dyluck from Seiken Denetsu 2 :cry:
Agree 100% it's the second thing I thought of when I read this thread title. Can't mention the first one apparently :)Quote:
Originally Posted by Lacarus