Xenosaga Animation

Is it over? After only 12 episodes? Or are they going to start on Episode II now?

In other news, I don’t like how they changed the ending of Episode I. Frankly, expanding the whole Kirschwasser thing was really silly - Shion suddenly gets all lovey-dovey over someone she met for all of ten seconds on the Woglinde? It’s good that they fleshed out her character, but they went a bit too far. In any case, having KOS-MOS do the final blow-up was much more suspenseful.

I haven’t finished it yet. I must say, I like the time Ltn. Vergil got. I don’t remember him much from the game, but in the show he was one of the main characters.

How does it compare to the game?

It was pretty close, I’d say. they obviously had to make some changes, since it only went 12 episodes. (Still waiting for the last one)

But, what matters less, is the changed content, and what matters more, is the quality, I say. Despite the changes, I liked it. It was very well animated, and very interesting. The plot, while not exactly the same (usually a good thing), was quite involving and deep. I was involved right from the beginning. It’s going to be a series I will keep for a very long time.

I highly reccomend it.

Well… let’s put it this way. If you had to shell out money for it, and you’d already bought the game, I’d tell you not to bother. There are differences, but none of them are really all that major. The game had a lot more screen time to flesh out conversations and such. Yeah, Virgil has more time here, but Cherenkov has been completely cut out of the story, and he had an interesting backstory too. I also thought the animation style was a bit strange, to tell the truth.

Well, yeah, it was a bit different from what I, at least, am used to. But that doesn’t mean it’s bad. I think the difference suited it rather well.

And, the thing with Virgil was a bit weird, to me. I don’t really understand why they kept him alive so long. But as for why they killed Cherenkov, I think they did that because they had a limited number of episodes, and couldn’t put his story in without taking away a lot of time from the main story. Focus was the key, I think.

Anyway, it’s still unlicensed, so why not head on down to animesuki, and, hoping the Ani-Kraze version will be up by then, download it first, and then decide for yourself whether or not to buy it. Myself? I’ll buy the first DVD, at least, to compare it to the fansub. If it holds up, and is of decent quality, I’ll buy the rest of the series. I, at least, think it’s worth that.

I thought the game was better, what with the awesome soundtrack by Mitsuda.

And some of the humor was downgraded a bit (i.e. Allen being less whiney. What? I thought it was funny)

I have all of it on my HD. Still have to watch it >_>;;

Do I have to play the game to understand what’s going on in the anime?

Nope. The game and anime are two separate entities, capable of explaining themselves fully by themselves.
(Read: You don’t need to have played the game)

I can’t follow the anime. There’s so much terminology that isn’t explained. The fansubbers even had to make extra subtitles to explain some of it. I wish I played the game first

Does Xenogears take place in the same universe as Xenosaga?

Yes. Xenogears is technically Xenosaga Episode 5, although there’s now talk that by the time episode 5 comes around it won’t be a remake of Xenogears.

The game has an entire database of terms to help people along (Star Ocean 3 has something similar). So that is one thing that can be confusing, but the technical stuff presented in the anime generally doesn’t matter that much.

If they reach Xenosaga Episode 5 at all. ¬_¬

Xenosaga has already messed up the episodes, EP. II was supposed to be the time of Cain and Abel after the crash. As it is going, Xenosaga is just a big display of Episode One and I doubt we’ll ever see the rest, since there’s not much to talk about during the real Episodes II, III and IV that Xenogears hasn’t covered yet.

I heard Gundam Seed Destiny is like that: Lots of technical stuff that doesn’t matter

Maybe I should play Xenosaga before Xenogears just in case

Definitely not. They take place on different planets and 15,000 years apart. You don’t need to know anything from XS for XG.

I just finished seeing this series. What was that all about?

I find it hard to beleive the game is 80 hours

It’s not… more like 40. But there’s a lot more backstory and stuff that was excised from the anime; there are also a few actual changes between the game and the anime.

As a matter of fact, it’s sliiightly easier to understand Xenosaga if you played Xenogears before, because you sort of realize what something might be (Kinda like seeing the end of the third The Lord of the Rings movie and then watching the rest from the start).

Still, don’t take this the wrong way but if you had trouble following Dragon Ball GT, it would be better to just stay the hell away from this series’ plot.

Kind of like how there was the original star wars trilogy, then going back to episode 1, and so on. Stuff was probably explained in the first trilogy