Random Thoughts.....What Are You Thinking?

GAME WISE:

Overall a fun ride, but I will admit, in terms of fun, I would place it last out of the three parts. For me, I enjoed the most of XB1, followed by XB2 then XB3.

The game mechanics, imo, kinda changed leaving behind exactly what I loved in XB1, that was the feeling like FFXI I felt there, with large challenges mixed in the usual route, many mobs to farm gears, and a party with well defined fighting role.

XB2 kinda tossed out the gear-grinding part, but instead, used the gacha-gacha system to motivate the grind. Kinda cheap because using gacha is cowardice, but damn... I will take, because gacha is fun addiction if it doesnt involves real money.

XB3 had a kinda less motivating grind. Instead of farming dozen of pieces, we were supposed to farm "side quests" then farming some job points, in a system nowhere new, maybe a rehashed system from FFV/FFT job system. What, imo, is already dated.

STORY WISE:

I actually preped well before XB3 (as stupid as it may sound). Before playing it, I went to re-watch entire Xenogears plus Xenosagas 1,2 and 3, and watched many analysis to fully grasp those games. I had played both XB1 and XB2 prior, only missing XBX, that I will play once there is a Switch version of it.

So, unless I missed something in the story, I feel like XB3 is the weakest out of the entire franchise in terms of progression. Here is why:

The real protagonist in Xeno-franchise is none other than... humanity itself. Xeno-franchise tell the 6 part-story about how humanity get in touch with the supernatural, and how it adapt to it: Part 1 is the begining, where humanity encounter the transcendental relics. Parts 2, 3 and 4 are like the transitory state when humanity is trying to adapt to this new reality, obviously exposing the worst of it: war, greed, conspiration, deaths, experiments, etc. Parts 5 and 6 is like the closure of it. And its kinda seems whats not entirely finished in the Xeno franchise.

One of the theory about Xenogears/Xenosaga/Xenoblade relationship is that they are all re-telling the same 6 part stories, only with different focus:

- Xenogears, while being the most restricted one for many reasons, managed to tell the almost entire story from 1 to 5 due to the Perfect Works. The entire trip since the discover of Zohar finished when the Zohar changed it status (by freeing the Wave Existence/God). Maybe in this interpretation of the story, it would be kinda pointless the part 6, afterall, Zohar was no more, only a few people would know the ocorrence of the facts, so most likely humanity would return from the starting point pre-Zohar, with no evolution at all.

- Xenosaga retold parts 1 to 3, and was the most explicit of the ongoing scheme, afterall, it wasnt dealing with a planetary scope, but a entire galaxy one. Being explicit, it was very interesting seeing how humanity tried to usurp Zohar for any mundane reason, as well the U-DO/God influence to humanity. Resulting in an attempt to humanity to seize Gods power and surpass it, becoming God themselves.

- Xenoblade 1 and 2 retold part 5, or retold Xenogears. After the attempt of seizing Gods power, humanity ends in a devastated state, and try to recover the injuries, by re-populating a new planet. But this time, the events in history were profoundly influenced by Zohar and the will of the original people who tried to seize Gods power. In case of XB1 and XB2, Klaus managed to seize the power and decide to create two worlds with it. Thus, XB1 and XB2 are two interpretation of the same part 5/Xenogears story. Looking now, kinda disappointing having two games to tell the same story. In both cases, God ceases to exist and humanity is supposed to be free from it, and can return to the very same ending point of Xenogears ending, or the pre-Zohar humanity stage. Or no?

- Xenoblade 3 was supposely to be the part 6, after the Zohar/God reign, but I dont quite think so. Because its motivated by the force trying to re-unite XB1 and XB2 worlds, maybe this concept not being explored in the original Xenogears. To respond to the imminent colapse, both worlds try to make a backup to restore the worlds after the collision. And thats why I feel like XB3 is the weakest of all Xeno-franchise in terms of story:

As Xeno-franchise is about humanity evolving, XB3 is a mere attempt to retain a same state after a major occurence (the colapse of the world). The entire game can be interpreted as a "dream-like" adventure, where the humanity's fear of change (Moebius) is confronted by the humanity's desire to change (Ouroboros). Given statistics, in infinity, a small chance becomes garanteed, so at some point, humanity break free from the resistance to change and return back to the evolution. And thats like the beginning and ending of XB3, maybe not more than mere seconds in a game that tells the story of milleniums ahead in the future of humanity.

Well done, Rex. I think its a first i see in a big seller game when the main protagonist