Welcome to 4th and final part of The Retro Review Series’ sophomore article, covering Xenogears. If you’re just joining us now it is definitely best to start at the beginning and check out ‘The Intro‘, ‘The History‘ and ‘The Review‘.
Obviously I love Xenogears; it transcends a 10/10 rating. But I played and beat it in 1999, and sometimes retro games don’t hold up well with modern gamers. Xenogears definitely maintains its extreme quality, but also has some issues.
Problem number one; random battles suck. We’ve gotten used to them not existing in RPGs anymore, and that feeling of wanting to get somewhere, but not being able to quickly, because you’re suddenly being zapped into a magical battlefield, can really be annoying. The story can be difficult to follow, and there are lots of subplots going at the same time. Folks who didn’t enjoy reading Game Of Thrones, might want to stay clear of a story this detailed. The sheer amount of watching and reading might be a turnoff for some who just want to play a game, and sometimes you have to sit through lots of cutscenes before fighting multiple bosses, and if you die… it sucks. The camera is in tight, and it can be difficult to get your bearings in some environments. This was obviously done on purpose, Metal Gear Solid-style, but it comes off as discerning by today’s camera standards. Two other omissions are the ability to adjust the controls (triangle is “jump”, not “menu”!?), and the ability to speed through dialogue (fast readers can’t hold down a button to make that text speed up).
Do these issues ruin the game? Absolutely not. I have several friends who have recently played Xenogears for the first time, and every single one of them who has beaten it, considers it to be one of their favorite games ever. All of them did say that it took a good ten hours or so before they started to really enjoy playing the game. The story, on the other hand, got them from the get-go.
Xenogears has a score of 84 on Metacritic, with a user rating of 94. I’ve heard many folks, online, refer to it as their favorite game of all time. It’s beloved, and aged well. In total the game sold almost 1,000,000 copies in Japan, and around 200,000 in North America, just barely earning it the ranking of a “PlayStation Greatest Hits Title”.
So how can you play this wonderful game? It can be downloaded on the PSN for $10! If you’re one of those folks, like me, who enjoys fancy packaging, and a thing on a shelf, a full packaged game goes for about $50 online. It’s not a rare game, so you will easily find it on eBay, and might be able to get it for as low as $30.
Xenogears has spawned five spiritual successors, three of which are very good, one of which is fantastic, and one of which has recently hit store shelves, Xenoblade Chronicles X. Luckily I was able to cover the game here on COG so feel free to check out the review as well. It does not disappoint and is truly as amazing as it looks. Hopefully the Xeno series will continue to be a long-lasting, quality franchise!
Stayed tuned to COGconnected for more of The Retro Review Series in months to come. This series isn’t going to be all about JRPGs or PS1 games though. Next month we will feature a game that is neither a PS1 game, an RPG, or a Square-Enix game, but you will have to tune in next week to find out what it is! Please share your thoughts, and check out my reviews for PS4, Wii U, and 3DS, found right here, on COGconnected.