Xenosaga: Was mi�riert

Oh my gosh that scene. It's just...

Uggghh.

At the rate she was going I swear if Ziggy had spoken up she would have blamed him for Canaan's death. She, uh, wasn't at her best in that scene.

Buuuuuut at least it's over, and now all that's left is a whole other kind of nonsense. Can't wait!

Man, maybe it's really just the time frame since I played but I think I blocked out that shit rationalization. Really might be one of the dopiest moments a JRPG lead has ever had.

I kinda get this, though? I mean, Shion seems really psychologically damaged from the get-go in the first game. And she's given a total fantasy situation that she's probably dreamed about every time she wasn't having her brain invaded by Neph and U-DO. I mean, the situation she's in is almost totally self-inflicted, but it's not like a JRPG is ever going to be progressive/smart enough to say "go get some counseling and talk to someone about your problems," so she's got this totally unhealthy ideal that's taken root in her mind.

Now she's presented with it, at the culmination of a ton of stress from all the end battles going on, and... I can see her making this colossal fuck-up if she were a human being going through this.

I think my problem isn't that it happened, it's that it happened in a VERY short time span for a game that's, well, 3 games long by this point. Maybe if Shion was captured and not part of the party for a good chunk of the last part of the game it could work.

I'm suddenly reminded of Bastilla from Knights of the Old Republic, she vanishes for a while, then when she comes back, she's evil. I could see that working here. But the suddenness of this plays out just like aturtledoesbite summed it up, so it feels very hollow in the end.

I think this discussion really sums up Xenosaga in general: as Bunk says, this emotional moment is "earned" (in that it makes sense that Shion would reach this point), but it's timed and paced so poorly that it comes off as comical. Shion has been emotionally broken this entire game (and, with the flashbacks, you could probably say that's been the case for 15 years), and she needed some major "event" to set her back on track (... this is how JRPG psychology works, at least). .... But this all also happens after fighting Yuriev for three dungeons, killing all of U-TIC here, and Ziggy grappling with his own past. And, oh yeah, Canaan gave his life for the party like an hour ago. "Nobody understands me" Shion doesn't even remember a dude dying for her a few floors up.

Anyway, I'll talk about it more in the wrap up update in a post or three, but Xenosaga has some worthwhile ideas wrapped up in utter plot confusion.

HINDSIGHT THEATRE: It would have been a bear from a gameplay perspective, but it might have been better for everyone if Shion left the party when Kevin showed up during the Flashback World Finale. If KOS-Mary was then rearranged to occur after this Kevin nonsense, nothing would be lost, plot wise, by having Shion out of the party, and then the plot could turn into something like a rescue-gone-wrong when Shion reveals herself to have become a "bad guy" (until Allen brings her back, natch). Come on, guys, it worked for Lufia.

Today I sat my ass down an FINALLY caught up on this LP. Gogglebob you have done absolutely incredible work, and I'm very excited to see the big finish!

As a lifelong Christian who takes his faith quite seriously, SEXY ANIME ROBOT MARY MAGDALENE is uh... Well... Huh.

I'm not offended by it. When it comes to inaccurate representations of people's faiths, there's a point where you pass the rediculousness threshold, and FUTURE HOTTT ROBOT WITH THE GARTERS AND HEELS IS SECRET JESUS'S BFF falls well past it. There was some discussion on the sincerity of the whole thing, But it's REALLY hard for me to not giggle at the idea that there's anything sincere about two SEXXXY ROBOTS kung fu-fighting over who's the REAL first witness to Jesus's resurrection.

But on the upside, the single shot of Jesus Circa 30 AD is at least pretty respectful, as far as anime vidjagame representations of the sermon on the mount go. So you get Life of Brian points for realizing that Jesus Christ himself is not best used as a punchline.

Honestly, it's not the worst anime mangling of my religion I've ever seen. That vaunted title goes to an Outerheaven Feature about anime harem monster girl high school IN HELL, where the big finish was one of the guys going "oh btw I'M JESUS" and all the anime harem monster girls were like WHAAAT and I'd already lost intrest an hour ago.

That doesn't mean it's GOOD, just that the bar to clear here has been set astonishingly low.

EDIT: Then I did some googling, ended up at the Tvtropes (Bane of Man) character page for Xenosaga. I didn't get this impression reading this LP, but apparently the tropers (involuntary shudder) interpretation is that Chaos was the one who preformed all of Jesus's Miracles, and Jesus just sort of took credit for them.

I don't know if TVtropes is just being Stupid, as it can be a remarkably stupid website, or if there's gonna be some big revelation in the final update that confirms that detail as series cannon.

I just know that the moment I read it, I tensed up with what no that ain't right anger. So I guess that's where my line for offense is, for whatever that's worth.

As for Shion's whole KEVEN KEVIN KEVIN thing, I get what they were going for, with the whole abusive relationship angle, but it's execution just feels kinda... off? Just a little?

I'm very interested in promised writeup on that whole thing.

Yeah, to go back to what I said, I get why she makes the choice, and kind of interpret all of her stupid shit as just basic lashing out because she knows deep down it's wrong, but doesn't want to accept that yet. It doesn't really make sense with what she's saying, but Shion is psychically wounded at her best and this is definitely not her best.

To me it's that moment when you see a character in a show or movie or whatever making a huge mistake, and you know it's a huge mistake, so you're shouting at them "no ffs don't do it," but their reasons for doing it are pretty human.

So I've been reading an LP of Xenogears recently. It seems much more coherent than most of Xenosaga, but still just as silly and long winded. Did finally find out why one of those ES's was called Dan, it's silly. Not done yet, but it's interesting to see where the direction this was coming from.

named after the tribes of israel (jacob's sons)

if you ever have a question about where something is from then it's probably biblical. Some are jungian or lacanian

It's also good to remember that (as if the enemy "race" didn't make it obvious) is that Xeno***** draws from gnostic Christianity in particular. Which ties into the spoiler bit Beat brought up, with divine and mortal versions of Jesus.

Xenoblade Chronicles is probably the least biblical of the Xeno-games. At least until the 11th hour. Then some biblical shit starts happening.

Outside of the Monado itself (Monad) and some themes (loads of JRPGs are guilty of this) it's definitely the least blatantly religious, basically going to more typical JRPG territory in that we have analogs but not throwing around Jesus or Yahweh or whatever. Xenoblade X looks to finally cast off the themes (just as well since Xenoblade probably did the cleanest job of them all there) but that seems to be set up for a larger series and continuity, so they may yet throw some surprises in a follow up if they don't just leave it as is.

Uh, I mean, XCX's MC is a very literal-Jesus/Messiah analog with his/her very own Mary Magdalene whose false/real body color schema is a neat inversion of KOS-MOS/T-ELOS.

Couple of things I want to get out of the way while I'm thinking about it...

Just to address this specifically... and I'm deliberately not going to spoil this because that way you, audience, can watch for it when the update goes up later... Jesus definitively had some level of "miracle power" in the Xenosaga universe; Wilhelm verbally confirmed this when he mentioned that Lemegeton, the power to summon space ghosts, came from Jesus Himself. That said, it's also about to be confirmed that chaos had his share of power, too (as if that wasn't obvious). It's kind of up to the viewer where Yeshua (chaos) ends and Jesus (Christ) begins. Though, to be clear, if you take everyone in XS at their word, Jesus clearly was Jesus, and not some random mundane dude.

And, not to imply that I want to stifle the most discussion this thread has seen in a while, but Xenoblade Chronicles is going to be addressed eventually in its own (well, kinda its own) post. When I do an LP, it gets comprehensive to the point of parody.

And speaking of which, because it's going to be weird to wedge this in anywhere else in the LP, as I approach the end, I really want to thank everyone that has read this, commented, or just silently enjoyed the experience. It all helps me to come back to this crazy nonsense every week, and it's genuinely appreciated.

And, while I'm at it, I want to thank basically everyone that has ever done an LP before, as I now know well how much effort is involved in such a project. And, incidentally, I wouldn't even be on this forum if it wasn't for that White Mage v Black Mage LP from forever ago. That said, I'm personally thanking Brickroad, Sky Render, and BEAT for being a big influence on this project. And, Mightyblue, you were responsible for that Wild Arms LP from forever ago, right? I liked that. And it was probably BEAT's Hotline Miami LP and its indepth analysis that was a bigger influence on this crazy project than anything, so that deserves some kind of mention.

Anyway, expect the real final update... well, gameplay update... within the next 48 hours or so.

Yeah. Every now and then I think about starting it back up (or over, more likely) and finishing it now that I'm not a suicidally depressed sadsack.

I can't wait to post wild, half-assed, unsubstantiated theories on how all the xeno games can/do exist in the same universe

Aw shucks. Thanks man! I'm sure my weirdo LOUD VIDEO offerings weren't nearly as important as everyone else's mastery of the screenshot form, but I'm glad I was able to help in some small way-

Great! Just what this thread needed! More gifs!

Oh, and Parish and Glass Knuckle's respective anatomy series. Also a good influence. ... I'll realize whoever I forgot later, because now we've got...

Previously on Xenosaga: Shion was the director of Vector R&D First Division. She was anxious to activate the KOS-MOS project, a sentient android that also doubled as an anti-gnosis weapon. Shion decided she would enter a virtual reality construct to oversee KOS-MOS’s mental development. Then a bunch of stuff happened, and now her ex-boyfriend and boss are working together to reboot the entire universe. Somewhere in there, Junior got a puppy.

Before we begin, I’d like to note that this update is going to be a whopper. I have tried to make the majority of these updates approximately 150 to 200 screenshots, because, as was wisely recommended to me by you, the audience, like a year ago, it allows for a greater amount of discussion. This update is going to be… let’s see here… 389 screenshots. Really? Couldn’t do an even 400? Whatever. Point is that this is going to be a long’un, so get some cocoa or something.

If anything gets confusing (haha, “if”), our next update will be the mandatory “what the hell just happened” post. Please look forward to it! Additionally, we’ll be saving any character denouements for a later post as well. Again, going to be a long enough update as is.

And, incidentally, I did consider slicing this nonsense into more digestible sections, but XS3 crams all this nonsense down your throat at once, so who am I to argue with the director’s intention?



We’re starting with a gif? Okay, fine. Welcome to THE FINAL ROOM. The Brews just followed Kevin in here, and Wilhelm is chilling with some crazy glowy orb and a pair of mechs. The red mech is ES Judah, Kevin’s ES, and it never actually gets to do anything in the whole trilogy.



And Abel is suspended in the fetal position at the center of all this nonsense. Kid has not had a good… ever.



Wilhelm wordlessly snaps his fingers…



The party’s ESes appear. Oh boy! Maybe this fight will involve those giant robots we poured so much cash into.



Even before you acknowledge Wilhelm’s godly powers, you may recall he is Vector’s CEO, and is completely responsible for the construction of the ESes. You don’t need a backdoor when you built the house.



“I had a feeling it wouldn't be a good idea to leave them in your hands any longer.”

Finally, a villain that realizes you remove the heroes’ mega murder machines first.



But on the downside, that means any ES equipment/”leveling” became completely useless like an hour ago.



“You don't mind do you Yeshua?”

Could we have one villain that isn’t wholly obsessed with one particular party member? No? Fine.



So the Anima Relics are extracted from the party’s ESes. Is that going to…



Oh, all the ESes start falling over. Guess they’re done now. While I didn’t capture it, the ES Judah also drops like a fly. Wilhelm has got the last mech standing.



And now all twelve Anima Relics are orbiting the compass thingy.



And someone welded the Zohar in there, too. Fits like a glove.



Yes, please give it a name. I’m tired of typing “thingy”.



Shion identifies it as Zarathustra, an object with a name so annoying, I’m going to have to copy and paste it like a hundred times this update. Wilhelm compliments Shion on her insightfulness. That doesn’t happen very often.



But Wilhelm has already got eyes on using Shion like… Oh, hi Kevin.



“Kevin, you suck. Why did I hire you? Was it the same day I hired Allen?”



Ziggy doesn’t even want to acknowledge whatever crazy nonsense is happening here (Ziggy, like the rest of the party, is probably still trying to wrap his head around “That Mary Magdalene?”), but he is anxious to interrogate the perp on this whole “Hey, aren’t you the president of Vector” thing. This also serves as a reminder that this is the first time everyone is meeting Wilhelm at all after three games.



Wilhelm claims that the only one that knows the real Wilhelm is chaos. Just another would-be god obsessed with a random Realian Justice Warrior.



“Anyway, spent enough time talking to you losers. Wanna help me destroy the universe now? K?”



Never trust anyone that uses phrases like “such an incredibly human choice.”



“And don’t ask me why such a simple equation required a plan that involved time travel and the destruction of multiple planets.”



When will people in ancient times learn to stop making doomsday weapons?



… What? Mary Magdalene and chaos are responsible for all this nonsense?



Uh… thanks?



Dammit! Would someone please talk to chaos about the destruction of the universe!

CONTINUED NEXT POST

Wow, really digging “awakened” Shion.



But chaos doesn’t answer. Wilhelm decides to fill in the gaps.

“Everything that makes up this universe is connected by the collective subconscious. ‘Redoing’ everything from nothing by acting upon that collective subconscious, and sending everything into the flow of imaginary time. This is the role I gave to the eternal circle, Zarathustra.”

Thanks, that clears up exactly nothing.



Gasp!



“The two Abels” are Abel (the kid) and Abel’s Ark (the giant pulsing spaceship/dungeon). Don’t judge, if you were God, you’d have scale issues, too.



Apparently this was accomplished by sticking Abel in the center of Zarathustra, and suckering Abel’s Ark into paying attention to only this planet. The Brews probably are inadvertently responsible for this, too.



Well, good for you.



“You keep saying ‘maiden’, but… uh… regarding Kevin…”



Okay, so, just to be clear, Shion activates Zarathustra, KOS-Mary guides everyone into Zarathustra, and then the universe reboots and starts all over again. Oh, crap, this is the same plot as Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy 13.



Shion claims mankind doesn’t want a do-over, but Wilhelm has some evidence to the contrary…



Yep! We’ll get into it more in the wrap-up, but apparently the “secret” of the gnosis is that they’re all humans that rejected reality. And if that sounds crazy, consider how attached you’d be to reality after being attacked by a unicorn.



Gnosis are people that don’t want to die, and would rather become goblins. And they have magical powers because, hey, why not?



“So did that convince you?” “What? No.”



“Okay, what if I show you a magic trick?”



“Or just torture you until you agree. I think we’re all aware that violence is the only answer.”



Well, since she’s screaming in pain, I’d assume he’s giving her a telekinetic massage. What do you think he’s doing to her!?



“I’ve been watching you guys for years, I may have grown a tweak vindictive.”



“Don’t need both your hands to use a key.”



Shion routinely fights monsters with fire breath. She’s actually pretty resilient at this point.



Most of the party is just floored by this show of force.



KOS-Mary really would rather not watch “her maiden” suffer.



“Can’t you, like, give Shion cake until she’s more agreeable?” “No, this is faster.”



Hey, Allen has a permanent portrait change thanks to his injuries last update. Neat.



Aaaaaaand flashback!



“Do you two have any important memories where you’re not half naked?” “No.”



Oh, that was Kevin imagining his sexy past. Horndog.

CONTINUED NEXT POST

Shion calls out for her vaguely omnipotent ex. You’ll note that she’s not asking Allen if he’s available.



“I’m sorry if I summoned a giant robot to kill you.”



So Kevin finally decides to lend a hand.



Kevin has betrayed Wilhelm! I think that makes him a good guy now! … This also means we’re four for four with Testaments leaving Wilhelm.



“Wow, didn’t really think you’d help. Also, I nearly broke my neck falling from the ceiling, but, still, thanks.”



Wilhelm might be down an arm, but he apparently still holds some sway over Kevin.



“I have always known you were doing it all for nookie.” “C’mon…”



Kevin, were you even paying attention last update?



Things aren’t looking good for this character that has been nothing but an asshole up until ten seconds ago.



Oh, and I guess his act of betrayal didn’t help at all, anyway.



“The joke here is that I am making literal what some…” “I get it.”



Yeah, because watching her ex sacrifice himself to save her life would weaken her resolve.



I swear this scene is stuck in its own time loop…



“And could you bring me my arm while you’re at it? Please and thank you.”



KOS-Mary is conflicted about going so far against Shion’s will.



Allen, you’re allowed one heroic moment. Don’t push it.



Surely democracy will stop KOS-Mary! Wilhelm is outvoted!



Or… not.



“I knew there was a reason I left you standing.”



Yep, Mary Magdalene was responsible for sealing the Anima Relics in her crypt. Mary Magdalene is partially responsible for giant robots, just as the Bible always said.



“How does it feel... to be betrayed by someone you once trusted, Shion?”

How does it feel to be carried over the threshold by your favorite bot?



“And I’m going to keep narrating, because I so rarely get to talk to anyone other than Kevin.”



“Just a little further. Heeeeere, Mary.”



“On a technicality.”



But… the key is shattered!? You go, girl!

CONTINUED NEXT POST

“Great, now instead of the universe being destroyed and rebooted, it’s just going to be regular destroyed. Reeeeeeal great.”



“He’ll be… what’s the opposite of immortal? I’ve forgotten.”



“We can’t do a thing to change anything now, but, ya know, just want to check.”



Bang!



Here’s your big emotional beat for this quarter of the finale: Mary realized she couldn’t disobey Wilhelm (because it would mean hurting chaos… we’ll get into that), so she knocked herself out, and let KOS-MOS take over. KOS-MOS has grown her own robo-heart over the course of the trilogy, and she has the strength of will to protect Shion over the cost of the universe. It’s everything Shion ever wanted!



And then Kevin uses the confusion to stab Wilhem. When did he get sword hands?



“Seems like a plan, boss.”



“Are you being sarcastic? I can never tell with you.”



“We’re destroying the universe?” “Shhh, Allen. The adults are talking.”



Oh, Mr. I’m Responsible for the End of the Universe is finally going to chat?



He’s said that at the end of every Xenosaga Episode so far, so I’m assuming yes.



“I’ve got these heroes helping me out! And Allen!”



Heroism is never on time.



Abel: still here, still having a bad day.



Oh, I guess the whole glowy magic thing is going out of control.



Zarathustra? Which part is… Meh, not going to try to figure that out.

There’s a Zarathustra Storm going on, and Wilhelm’s AMWS is tearing pieces off the ESes. Incidentally, I incorrectly identified Wilhelm’s craft as an ES earlier in the LP, it is merely an AMWS, because it doesn’t (and didn’t) contain an Anima Relic. Maybe it got jealous? It is still named Joshua, though.



“If it continues like this, the universe will eventually dissipate and vanish.”

So, yes, the heroes destroyed the part of the system that reboots the universe. The destroyer part is still ready to go. Good job, guys.



“Do it, or I… Are these your intestines? Would cutting these hurt you?”



“If I should stop it, then what? What will you do with this tremendous energy? With these countless wills that reject each other, that have nowhere to go?”

Basically, Zarathustra is going nuts because it’s powered by a whole lot of gnosis, but all that energy has nowhere to go now. We were going to send it back to the big bang, but someone screwed that up.



And Joshua continues to tear up the ESes. Here’s the ES Dinah losing a head.



Oh! Wait! Yes! We’re good at that! MOMO, get the med kits!



Wilhelm, that is off the table. Stop looping on yourself.



But…. No.



Wilhelm: surprisingly shortsighted for an immortal.

CONTINUED NEXT POST

But Kevin has an idea! Hey, he always was a smarty.



“Are you using both of your arms just to taunt me? That’s childish, Kevin.”



“I refuse to continue to let you do as you please!”

“You probably guessed that from how I’m repeatedly dismembering you, but I wanted to be clear.”



Kevin is… shooting out waves of purple energy? Uh… sure.



“Whatever the hell ‘that’ is!”



“And then at least you’ll shut-up.”



“Don’t do this thing you’re doing that I’m told will kill you!”



Oh, okay, I guess he’s merging Cannibal AMWS Joshua with Zarathustra so we have a final boss to defeat. How considerate!



“You’re just saying that so you have an excuse to not join the battle party!” “So!?”



“Try not to die!”



You live in a JRPG plot. It kind of is…



Shion has the steely resolve of a Vector R&D chief.



Aaaaand final boss time.

What we’re looking at here is AMWS Joshua merged with every other ES (go ahead and try to pick out all the pieces. ES Dan’s wing is a gimme), the Zarathustra mechanism, and the Zohar. Technically, considering just one ES is supposed to have the power to destroy armies, this battle should be over in twelve seconds, with Shion and friends vaporized at the starting bell. However, we’ll claim that Kevin’s energy is weakening the creature, so it’s merely a pain in the ass.



Note that Zarathustra is resistant to nearly every element, has a lot of HP, and is technically Machine class. Also, Zarathustra does not offer any steals, drops, or EXP points. This isn’t Mega Man Battle Network, and the boss does not get more powerful if you’ve collected everything in the game. Thus, other than wanting to watch the ending again, there is never a gameplay reason to beat the game more than once. This stands in stark contrast to XS2’s “farm the final boss” setup.



Like the final boss of XS1 (though not XS2), we’re fighting a monster that is dramatically larger than every (on foot) creature in the game. The attack animations seem so piddling…



Zarathustra starts the battle by being pretty status ailment-heavy. Reminds me of Yuriev.



Then comes the pain. Kinda. MOMO has that “absorb physical” accessory equipped, so Zarathustra technically net healed the party, even if Shion is down half her health points. It’s the thought that counts.



Like the battle with Omega Uniwhateveritwascalled, there are a lot of messages that mean… something, I’m sure. Probably getting ready for a giant attack or something? I don’t know.



Oh, there it is. This attack, again, net heals the party, but it completely wiped our break gauges. We’ll repay the favor in a moment.



Oh no! Not whatever…. Man, how many times have I made that joke?



Like a lot of the “final” bosses (in XS3, not elsewhere in the franchise), Zarathustra picks up the ability to shift its defenses and weaknesses partway through the battle.



At one point Zarathustra “regrows its arms”. No idea what’s going on there. Didn’t even notice it losing arms the first time…



Here’s something you don’t see every day. Technically, all you need to do to end this battle instantly is summon Erde Kaiser Sigma twice. That’s all it takes! But, just for the fun of it, I summoned Erde Kaiser Sigma when Zarathustra was “randomly” immune to physical attacks. This means that Erde Kaiser Sigma, the strongest attack in the game, did exactly zero damage.



But it did completely empty Zarathustra’s break gauge. Considering it has 999 BP, that doesn’t happen very often.



And I have no problem beating a cannibal bot while it’s down. Battle over. For the record, there isn’t even a “results” screen.

CONTINUED NEXT POST

And, yes, that’s it for any interactivity in Xenosaga. For the absolute end of the franchise, the final boss being one form seems kind of… anti-climatic? Maybe there’s a version of the final battle that is an ES fight against ES Judah followed by fighting “regular” Wilhelm, and then a battle against the “final” Zarathustra… but, nope, one fight and we’re done. What’s more, the usual response to Zarathustra seems to be “how can I best cheese this fight”, so I want to say a lot of people just used Erde Kaiser Sigma and were done with it. Again, very anticlimactic for a three part JRPG series.



Though I suppose violence never solves anything in Xenosaga.



“Abel's controlled by the system and I'm the operator. If I should somehow, suddenly vanish, this world... and the universe will—“

Be destroyed. We get it!



“You may be right, but I-- I want to believe in the light of human beings' will.”

Only betting the entire universe on that roll, chaos.



Wilhelm has been working on a mean Regis Philbin impersonation for centuries, but nobody ever gets it anymore.



“That does sound like you, Yeshua.”

So, did you two used to date… or…? Oh, never mind. You're dead now.



And someone finally decides to look at the broken Shion Pendant, and there are a pair of flower petals in there.



So, naturally, we’re going to have a feelings-off about it.



“Perhaps, I wanted this from the very beginning. Since the day when I first met you, I may have been waiting for this day to come.”

When you first met her? When she was, like, seven?



Oh U-DO, you did mean that.



Yep, the flower petals wedged into Originally Kevin’s Mom’s Pendant were from flowers from Shion’s Miltian garden. Kevin might never have brought it up, but he never forgot the little girl that forced him to water flowers one time. This is inordinately creepy.



“I should not have been allowed around children.”



Do you, Shion? Do you really?



All the hopes and dreams about eventually making out with that seven year old.



“Precious memories I may have blocked for some reason.“ No, seriously, remember that Shion was completely shocked to find that she knew Kevin as a child.



"I'm just trying to get closure before you die like everybody else in my life."



Shion claims that it was all thanks to Kevin that she was able to “make it this far”. Remember “this far” is “just about destroyed the universe”.



“Probably got another twenty minutes before the credits roll, anyway.”



“That's right. You'll be fine now.”

End of the universe, Kevin.



Kevin is glad he was able to see a happy Shion again. What was so happy about today, again?



“The world... is waiting for you.”

Wake up, dummy.



And back to Final Room.



So I guess Kevin and Wilhelm are good and vaporized now. Yay! We’ve beaten all the bad guys! Drinks are on whoever inherited Wilhelm’s prodigious assets!



Oh, wait, Zarathustra is still here.



“We’ve accomplished nothing! Dammit!”

CONTINUED NEXT POST

Have you tried hitting it? Oh, right.



Awesome, chaos has a plan.



And now we’re in some white dimension with the children.



“So, that is your wish?” is all we get out of this scene, dialogue wise. I guess Abel can only speak when no one is looking.







Abel is free! Yay!



And Nephilim is with him! Just a reminder: these two are the child doppelgangers of the twin stars of Xenogears, so I think it was contractually mandated that they had to eventually hang out together.



Would you like to share the decision with the rest of the class? No?



I think they just gave Shion an aneurysm.



“This phenomenon is being caused by the wills, the Gnosis gathered in Zarathustra with nowhere to go. Together with Abel, I will gather all those wills into me... and dimensionally shift this entire region of space to the land of origin.”

New plan! Instead of watching the universe explode, we’re going to take all the extra souls and toss them back to the land of origin.



Which would be Earth, because I guess souls are comfortable there, or something.



Then why are we bothering!?



The full explanation is that they can’t stop the end of the universe, but they can buy humanity some time. Well, that’s helpful. Are you going to give us a timer or something?



And that’s a load off!



Turns out the glitch in the system here has been chaos this whole time. The Anima Relics that are damaging the fabric of reality came directly from him.




And Mary Magdalene used her Mary-powers (or… something) to suck the Anima Relics out of chaos and stick ‘em in that crypt. Eventually, they were unearthed and used to power giant robots. This act also killed Mary Magdalene, but it’s cool, because she got to come back as a robot herself.



And chaos, now de-Anima’ed, became merely an immortal with general magic powers, and not super duper Anima powers.



And chaos had no idea why he was born with UNIVERSE DESTROYING POWER this whole time. He was just as confused as anybody else! I guess he didn’t want to reveal his 6,000 year old origins until he was completely sure.



But chaos has discovered the real UNIVERSE DESTROYING POWER is friendship. Or whatever.



Dammit…



“6,000 years is a pretty good run. Don’t worry about it.”



“I'll be seeing you in all the old familiar places…”



How much slower!?

CONTINUED NEXT POST

“Um, we only have 10,000 years to fix this problem? Gosh, uh…. Hrm… Let me put this on my to-do list…”



“Listen to me Shion. The key to saving all lies in the land of origin, Lost Jerusalem. I, and the Gnosis, the wills of countless people, will all return there. For mankind to survive, you must do what must be done in this universe... and then come find Lost Jerusalem. Shion, I know you and the others can do that.”

“Find Earth within the next 10,000 years. Got it. Totally doing that.”



We’re done with text boxes from here on out, folks! Grab the popcorn!



Guess who else is staying with chaos.



How long did XS3 last? Shion spent the last six months without KOS-MOS, and was then reunited for, what, a week?



Please note that this is KOS-MOS talking (and emoting!), not KOS-Mary.



Yes, Shion, KOS-MOS has a heart.



“That's unusually vague coming from you, KOS-MOS.”




“Like, you know, building me.”



“We can hang out, watch G Gundam. It’ll be fun.”



“Hey, if you get invited to any cross-over games, bring me, too.” “No promises.”



There it is. A “real” hug between Shion and (100%) KOS-MOS. Only took the end of the universe to get there.



And everyone (minus KOS-MOS and chaos) hops on the ES Asher to hightail it out of there. Why is the Asher still operating? Well, you may recall that the Professor stuck an Erde Kaiser generator in there during the time travel adventure. So ES Asher, despite having an arm torn off by Joshua/Zarathustra, is still operating. Professor inadvertently saved the entire party!



Bye KOS-MOS! Bye chaos! Bye ghost girl! Bye little boy that is apparently God!



And away we go… Wait, why didn’t we just fly here in the first place?



“I’m gonna call the gnosis, and you shoot ‘em.”



Oh, right, Mary Magdalene powers.



KOS-MOS, did you know chaos’s deal this entire time? Well, since after Cathedral Ship or so, at least?



KOS-MOS… crosses the streams?



Oh, no, that’s just the spirit of Mary Magdalene escaping to get some air.



Mary draws the Anima Relics back to her…



And assembles her very own chaos. Or Yeshua, I guess.



Hey, remember that one special attack from XS2 that featured chaos and KOS-MOS dancing? Does… does that count as foreshadowing?



And chaos reabsorbs his Yeshua self.

CONTINUED NEXT POST

Mary returns to Nephilim, not KOS-MOS. Change of venue?



Wilhelm claimed that Mary had gnosis summoning abilities, so I guess it’s easier to use those abilities as/with Nephilim, and not KOS-MOS, who is going to be running defense.



Good morning, Zohar. Hey, never realized how much that monolith looks like a cross in silhouette.



Meanwhile, in space, Abel’s Ark is doing… something? Making the area negative? It’s kind of neat to look at, at least.



And here comes the party.



Doesn’t make Asher’s escape any easier, though.



MOMO is the friggen gnosis whisperer all of a sudden.



That’s what KOS-MOS is for, honey. Now put on your helmet.



“Will be fine”. That’s what you want to say.



Oh, pshaw, we just handled a full dungeon of these dorks. Don’t worry so much!



Find Earth within 10,000 years! There's a deadline!



The Brews acknowledge that they still have a job to do, so hope for the best with our missing teammates.



Shion regretfully nods in agreement.



Meanwhile… oh smack, they are having a tough time. I guess they thought the gnosis, a group of creatures that exist exclusively because they can’t stand the universe, would go quietly?



“KOS-MOS, get your chainguns primed.”



“That’s what I’m here for, chief.”



We’ve made it back to the trolley stop in the caves beneath the research facility beneath the cathedral in the section of the city that is a few short blocks from the Elsa. We’re almost there!



Everyone exits the Asher…



Well, almost everyone.



“I’m a mean, green anti-gnosis weapon.”



Shion! We just covered this!



“Those 10,000 years will go by fast. You are a procrastinator, Shion.”



“I left the house key in my other shorts on a planet I’m not sure exists anymore!”



Yes! Another Shion breakdown!



“Though your friends are dropping like flies.”

CONTINUED NEXT POST

“Shion, I know that I was never a very good brother.”



Legitimately, Jin has been saying this about himself since he was introduced. Self-loathing is an Uzuki genetic trait.



Cats in the cradle and the silver spoon…



“So please, let me be... your brother one last time.”

Suicidal brother.



Baka!



“Shion, the universe is collapsing, we should probably be going.”



“You did literally save my life repeatedly.”



“Also, I stole your TCBY Frequent Yogurt Card and never told you!”



“I just told you!”



Loose definition of “wonderful” here.



“And live in a universe that, you know, exists.”



“Allen, my friend, she's a troublesome girl, but, please, take care of her.”

Jin does the paternalistic, macho gesture of “handing off” the woman to the obvious suitor. This kind of thing always bothers me, but it’s very Jin, so I’ll let it slide. You know Jin has a stash of drawings where he’s doodled himself in samurai armor.



Allen is cool with it, though. This does have a little extra oomph thanks to these two always discussing Shion when she knocked herself out.



“chaos is usually right about these things, so I’m sure we’ll all be together by Thanksgiving.”



“And besides, as a scholar, I have some interest in this land. This special land called ‘Lost Jerusalem.’"

“I hear that’s where the cronut was invented.”



“Time to go die! Thanks for the robot!”



And away he goes. Anybody else want to go get their fool ass killed? No? Good.



“Jin, I know I never said it, but I was happy. In my heart, I was so happy to be your sister.”

“Like, literally never said it.”



“Travel down the road… and… and back again.”



“I seem to have wet my Asher.”



Ya know, this would be a little more meaningful if this was actually his own ES…



Meanwhile, on the Dammerung, Vector’s planet-sized home ship.



By U-DO, remember this sub plot? The UMN system, the space internet that also controls all ship laneways in the galaxy, was maintained by Vector, but nobody knew where it came from. That was mentioned during the prologue chapter, and then never again. Now it’s relevant! Turns out Wilhelm was keeping that “underspace” going, and now that he’s gone, well…



Basically all the space highways are done, and that’s how Xenosaga-era space ships get around, so… Hope no one has to get anywhere.



We’ve apparently got ten minutes before space is just space and “warp” is no longer possible.

CONTINUED NEXT POST

Shion just inadvertently destroyed the known universe with the help of your boss and Mary Magdalene, duh.



The Brews are hitting a bit of a snag with their escape, as it turns out every gnosis ever is kind of a roadblock.



Good thing we still have a smidgen of a battle party.



Aw, Junior is protecting MOMO. At least someone remembers she exists.



MOMO is probably the inadvertent MVP here. With KOS-MOS back with the Doom Patrol, MOMO’s Hilbert Effect is the only thing keeping the local gnosis corporeal.



Shion attempts to give a pep-talk, but she’s interrupted.



Mega Allen to the rescue!



She’s not exactly melting into a puddle, but Shion does like a sentient creature that is handy with a machine gun.



Allen gets to finally be cool. Congrats, kid, you earned it.



Looks like those bruises cleared up, too.



Meanwhile, back at Final Room, KOS-MOS is zooming around, doing her best to kill every gnosis in the universe.



KOS-MOS has a bit of trouble with a giant gnosis, but Jin and the ES Asher fly in with a helping hand.



“Don’t worry chaos, now you’ve got a super fighting robot and Jin: dude with a sword.”



Miraculously, The Survivors make it back to the Elsa. Reminder: they initially used the ESes to navigate this cityscape, and they weren’t even beset by packs of gnosis then, either.



Oh, that Captain Matthews.



“Universe… ending… no time… to explain…”



“chaos… god… or… something? Really… confusing…”



“We’ve gotta find Earth. Does this ship have a map?”



It’s nice that someone remembered that chaos was originally “just” an Elsa crewman, so Captain Matthews and his buds would naturally be hit hard by losing the lil’ guy. chaos was also probably the only dude on the ship that knew where everything was in the storage room, so this is a double loss.



No waiting for extra party members this game.



Away we go!... Would the sky even be gray if all of space was randomly changing color? Shouldn’t Abel’s Ark be blocking the sun entirely? … Is there still a sun in this solar system?



Doing… pretty okay here.



Whoops, got your giant sword stuck.



Time to bail out.



And the last ES is detonated by the coolest pilot ever.

CONTINUED NEXT POST

Incoming gnosis sword! Not a big deal, I’m sure we’ll be fine.



Or not.

Welcome back to Xenosaga Censorship Theatre. We haven’t had any changes between regions since the Durandal invasion, but we’re back to The Land of No Blood now. Above is the “painful but whatever” NA version, and below is the original Japanese bloodbath. This scene is also accompanied by a lovely splorch of blood dribbling out of Jin in the Asian version.



Doesn’t look too bad, though.



The Japanese version includes a wonderful “sound of a sword being pulled out of human flesh” effect. The NA version just looks like Jin missed his scabbard by thaaaaat much.



chaos is concerned about his bleeding buddy.



Jin wins his final duel, and he gets another free sword!



In Japan, it’s clear that he’s been practically bisected.



“It cool, everybody! I’m just drunk! See? It’s okay!”



Jin’s vision is getting a little blurry.



Not usually how one describes a battlefield…



Jin has a fun little flashback to accompany his death thoughts.



Even XS2 scenes are included!



Which “Shion is sad and needs to be consoled” scene is this? You decide!



“I long for those hectic and chaotic days that once were. But this, too, is pleasant, in an odd sort of way.”



Here’s the last of the blood/edits. As you can see, things look a bit more dire in the original.



And Shion does the “immediately recognize when someone close to you has died” plot telepathy thing. Yes, Jin is capital D dead. That’s the end for this old soldier.



Meanwhile, chaos and Nephilim are gabbing like old friends.



At least until chaos looks back.



This is technically the third time Jin saved chaos. Maybe fourth? I don’t know if it counts if you do the same thing twice in a half hour.



Still a few space whales to go.



KOS-MOS and chaos exchange knowing glances.



Oh, did I mention that KOS-MOS lost an arm somewhere in all this nonsense? Damn fragile Figmas.





“Shion. Thank you. I know that I failed to protect you back then, but, this time... I will!”

Shion spent a lot of time inspiring loyalty and being an absolute jerk this game.

CONTINUED NEXT POST