Xenosaga Episode II: Jenseits von Gut und Bose

"A truly terrible battle system masks an otherwise fantastic sequel"

Xenosaga Episode II is very much like any other "middle of the trilogy" movie; it starts from the middle, stays in the middle, and ends in the middle. A few questions will be answered, a few questions will be raised, but on the whole these middle-of-the-roaders are often filler that bind a great trilogy together. Xenosaga Episode I was a home-run of a game, featuring a mind-blowing level of production values that could arguably make even the most dedicated Final Fantasy enthusiast weep in shame. Where Xenosaga I fell apart, namely the battle system and pointless skill upgrades, is exactly where Xenosaga II falls too. Both games try their hardest to make their gameplay take a back seat to the unbelievable storyline (conveyed in lengthy cutscenes that rival modern cinema). The problem with Xenosaga Episode II is that, in an effort to "improve" the battle system NAMCO made the game excruciatingly difficult to understand (and the game goes to no lengths to explain it to you). There's absolutely nothing wrong with the "Xenosaga" aspect of Episode II, as its filled to the brim with outrageous cutscenes and plot, but the "game" that would otherwise take a backseat has decided to backseat-drive. Getting past the obnoxiously unbalanced, broken battle system reveals a game that's every bit as endearing as the first, if a bit less polished around the edges. The changed soundtrack is also a bit of a disappointment to those who loved the Zarathustra-inspired soundtrack of Episode I, in all its London Philharmonic glory.

Graphics

All of the character models have been altered to look somewhat more realistic, for better or worse. Some characters, like chaos and Shion, look far better now than they did before. Other characters, like KOS-MOS and MOMO, seem to have lost what made them so unique in the transition to realism. Beyond that, the game looks nearly the same as the original Xenosaga and that's not bad. The in-game engine cutscenes look as fabulous as ever, and the new mechs are a sight to see.

The character animations seem more lifelike now than they did in the first game, but inherent in that change is the less-cartoony feel, which isn't always a good thing.

The menus and fonts are tough on the eyes compared to the original Xenosaga, but after a few hours it shouldn't be a problem.

Sound

The soundtrack is somewhat of a disappointment, although it does have its moments. Gone are the fully-orchestrated tracks of the first game, and in their place are very Phantasy Star Online-inspired tracks which, unlike the first game, play in areas where you're under direct control of your character. Granted, one of the biggest complaints of the first game was that music rarely played during gameplay, but the quality of Episode II's music leaves a lot to be desired.

The voice acting has been changed up a bit, mostly for the better but occasionally for the worse (the new KOS-MOS is just awful). None of the new actors sound all that different from their previous ones, although I found Shion and chaos's new voice actors to be superior to their predecessors.

Sound effects are just as before, which is to say they're very sci-fi inspired.

Gameplay

Here's where the game crashes and burns. When it's at its best (much like the first game) the player isn't in control of the game. When it's at its worst, the player's in a battle.

On paper, the battle system is superficially similar to that of Xenogears, although any similarities between the two games end there. You can select an individual attack and "chain" them together with other attacks in one turn. If you've stocked attacks, you can chain more than just two. Sounds fine, doesn't it?

The problem is that each enemy has a random weakness to a random character in your party, and unless you've got a FAQ or the intuition of Alexander the Great, you'll have no clue what combination of attacks and characters will cause the enemy to "break". This makes for a horrendously frustrating experience, and the complaints don't stop there.

Worse, each character has a sphere-grid-like Skills system where you essentially spend points giving your characters new abilities. The problem is that every character starts at the same spot and has the same exact skills to access. It would seem like not a bad idea to have each character branch off into their own specialized path, and indeed the system seems outwardly designed to do so, but the severely restricting "class point" system basically prevents anyone from doing anything other than starting from the beginning of the ranks and working up. This basically means every character will learn the exact same skills, at the same time, with hardly and variation. Thus, characters who should be healers (like MOMO) won't be any better at healing than, say, Ziggy or KOS-MOS.

Fortunately the main gist of the game (as with the first) is watching lengthy cutscenes and delving into the absurdly confusing plot. Much like the first game, Xenosaga II tries to alleviate the sub par gameplay with incredible cinematics, and to that end even Xenosaga II manages to overshadow it's humongous game-breaking problems with the sheer awesomeness of its presentation. It's rare that presentation alone can save a game, but Xenosaga II pretty much rewrites the book on how to impress a gamer with horrific gameplay.

Overall

Despite its faults (and there's many of them) Xenosaga II maintains the most important traditions of the original (production values, storyline) and even manages to improve on them in ways I wouldn't have imagined. Nevertheless, the nearly unplayable battle system and disappointing soundtrack make the experience a lot harder to swallow, and the game is nowhere near as long as the first (which is probably a good thing).

Xenosaga II is well-intentioned, and for people who want to continue the Xenosaga series to Episode III it's an absolute must. Nevertheless, its many faults may prevent some avid Episode I fans from ever finishing the second. If one has enough resolve to learn the battle system and chug through the game, there's incredible story sequences to be had.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 07/24/06