EoFF RPG Thunderdome 2020 Round 2: Match 7

[Wolf Kanno]

Match 7 is up and it's a Takahashi/Saga throwdown! Categories are Villains and Music

Xenogears

vs.

Xenosaga Episode 1

[Fynn]

Lol really tough call, especially since they’re so similar in those respects. But Xenogears is still the more complete game of the two, and i still feel it’s villains stand out more. And though neither game’s soundtrack is my favorite work by Mitsuda, there’s just something special about Xenogears music

[Lord Golbez]

This is a joke. An absolute joke. There is not one single category in which Xenosaga could legitimately compete with Xenogears. Not one. Eh, okay I'll admit that if there was one music would be the closest, but still think Xenogears has a clear and substantial lead. In the category of villains though, Xenogears just absolutely leaves it in the dust. You're gonna compare greats like Grahf, and even more than him Krelian, to that cackling piece of trash Albedo? I haven't picked up Xenosaga since the well over a decade ago when I stopped just short of the final area because I realized playing it wasn't worth it to me, and I still remember how absolutely repulsed I was by how troutty and one-dimensional a villain Albedo was, especially after how great the villains of Xenogears were.
Krelian would probably be on my top 10 list of all time villains. Albedo might be on my top 10 of all time worst characters, right along with Zack and Namingway!

[Spuuky]

Huh. I wonder if I've ever read a single worse opinion about a video game character than that "summary" of Albedo. I am hard-pressed to think of one.

[Fynn]

Huh. I wonder if I've ever read a single worse opinion about a video game character than that "summary" of Albedo. I am hard-pressed to think of one.

Don’t worry, this one’s by far one of Golbez’s least controversial takes

[Lord Golbez]

I didn't even summarize Albedo at all other than to say he was cackling, which is literally an undeniable fact, unless you want to debate what kinds of laughs can be called "cackling."

[Wolf Kanno]

Honestly in terms of villains, I feel they are almost neck and neck. Margulis, Albedo, the Testaments, and Yuriev are all incredibly well defined villains in Xenosaga, my only beef was ever with Wilhelm who suffered terribly from a rush job in Episode 3 despite being hinted as the big bad from the get go. Of course the issue here is that most of their development happen in the sequel episodes so it's almost like taking anything you know about Xenogears cast from just the Aveh arc where characters like Grahf would come across as one-dimensional Darth Vader expy's and you wouldn't even know how important Miang really is or the full depths of Ramsus' character. Hell you wouldn't even know that Deus or Krelian existed.

Albedo is pretty much Grahf in that he comes across as one dimensional and then you learn his backstory and motives and realize he's really a victim in all this. I also just give him points for being voiced by Crispin "voice of sex personified" Freeman and being what a modern take on a character like Kefka would look like.

Musically speaking, Xenogears is debatably my favorite work by Mitsuda next to Chrono Trigger, but I also feel his work on Episode 1 is underappreciated and suffers from poor utilization in the game's soundtrack with some of the best tracks being one note wonders. Especially annoying because going by track titles, it was obvious he was composing for what was suppose to be a full game with track titles referencing Zarathustra and Omega long before they ever appeared in the story proper. I've always wondered if he may had more tracks composed for the game but simply had them removed from the final product when it got shortened.

[Lord Golbez]

I'm guessing that a lot the stuff you're talking about with Albedo doesn't happen in Episode 1.

[Wolf Kanno]

There are hints to his past in his dialogue with Rubedo, but most of it is shown in Episode 2. Guy had an incredibly troutty past. As I said, judging Albedo's character in Episode 1 as his whole character would be like doing the same for Grahf by skipping the second disc of Xenogears.

Conjoined twin to Rubedo, he has a codependent relationship with his brother which is shattered the day he learns that due to his regeneration powers, he's going to outlive all of his brothers. In fact he may technically survive to see the end of the universe and beyond since it's heavily implied that his consciousness it tied to his very atoms and even having them disassembled and scattered across the cosmos wouldn't actually give him true death. Obviously this does a number on his already fragile psyche. He becomes even more protective of Rubedo until Rubedo "betrays him" by showing feelings for other people like Sakura Mizrahi. Episode 2 implies Albedo murdered Sakura, but the DS remake (which gave Takahashi more control of the writing) retcons this to having Sakura save Albedo from being corrupted by U-DO at an earlier point. He's happy she's dead, but also feels guilty because of how much her death hurts Rubedo. When Rubedo realizes that the plan during the Miltitan Conflict for the U.R.T.V. units is a suicide mission that is guaranteed to kill them all and possibly all of Miltia; Rubedo breaks the link between his brothers which makes them all fall prey to U-DO's influence that drives all of them mad. Rubedo and Nigredo are not affected due to having built in immunity but Albedo and the clone brigade are not so lucky. He tries to kill Nigredo because he figures out what he really is (a fail safe to kill Rubedo and a surrogate body for Yuriev to body surf into) and Rubedo has to fight him off and leave him broken on Miltia where they abandon him. He gets rescued and raised by U-TIC but comes up with his own goal which is ultimately to finally be killed off for good. So he plans on re-hooking up with U-DO because he knows that if he merges with it, then Rubedo would finally be able to kill him with his powers since U-DO's power could overwrite Albedo's immortality. Come Episode 3, we discover that Albedo's true desire, which is inadvertently granted by Wilhelm making Albedo into a Testament, is that he wanted to merge back with Rubedo since their story revolves around this idea that the two of them were always meant to be a single being. Sadly, we lost out of the power up this was to give Rubedo because allegedly, their re-merging would have aged Rubedo up to his brother's physical form.

Albedo's who schlick is how troutty immortality really is. He pretty much tells the player this while he's torturing MOMO because to him, pain is the only thing that makes him feel alive. I mean our whole structure of society and living is based on the aversion to death. If you can't die, what point does pain, empathy, bonds, and creation hold?