User Reviews (31 - 41 of 245)

Show these reviews first:

Highest Rated
Lowest Rated Newest
Oldest Most Helpful
Least Helpful

Xenogears...A Masterpiece

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: April 02, 2000
Author: Amazon User

First, many people are putting down Square because of these new games on playstation. (I even hear people that don't like FF7) I think most people here would rate FF7 as one of the best. Besides FF7, I think there is an equal or even better game out on the market. I think that game would be "Xenogears." A futuristic RPG epic, with most of the classic RPG features. It has a few twists for battling, an anime to through in there, and some large robots. Besides these features, you have nothing more than another FF. This game was created by the dream team of Square (makers of "Chrono Trigger" and "Chrono Cross"). I would not dwell on the negative drainers of these reviews. Most ppl liked the game overall. I would definetly recommend this game to everyone.

Gotta be the best RPG

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: April 23, 2000
Author: Amazon User

Of all the RPG I played, I enjoyed this game the most. Actually, I think Chrono Trigger And Xenogears are the best RPG game yet. When you play Xenogears, it's environment may remind you of Chrono Trigger. This game is so great because it keeps you is suspense. The story is awesome and keeps you playing to reveal mysteries. The music is overall best out of all Square's game. The soundtrack is worth owning. The graphic of this game is similiar to Final Fantasy Tactics. The short cinemas in this game contain some animation and FFVII type graphics. The Gears (giant mobile robots) are awesome. Gears have been nicely drawn. It makes you want action figures, if their is such thing. I loved the various characters and their personality. Each have their own style using magic and own gear. Using different combo for attacks is creative, unlike just one physical attack use in other RPG. Gears can use combo attacks too. This game possibly most enjoyed RPG.

Review

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: November 30, 1999
Author: Amazon User

Xenogears is probably Square's greatest attempt at an RPG since its days on the SNES. The game itself shines better than many other playstation games including Final Fantasy VII and VIII. The game outdoes most other RPG's in that it focuses more on plot and characterization than graphics. The graphics on the game has 2D sprites on a 3D rendered background. This is the complete opposite on most current RPG's. The game also combines CG and Anime FMV's/cutscenes to enhance the plot of the game. The plot focuses on the main character Fei Fong Wong and the events that lead after the discovery of a giant gear that lands in his village of Lahan. The plot is woven quite well, and answers many questions that the person may have about it, but at the same time opens a whole slew of questions afterwords. The game also goes deep into characterization, making the player enjoy and become attached to certain characters (if not all!). All in all Xenogears in an epic RPG that brings the player into its world, and is a must have for any RPG library.

BEST GAME EVER

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 4 / 6
Date: August 02, 2000
Author: Amazon User

Xenogears is the best RPG to have ever been made. The flawless combination of love, military deceit, genetics, extraterrestialist thinking, flashbacks and religion make the story the driving factor in this game. This is the best story I have ever read or experienced. The story is better than EVERY BOOK AND MOVIE I HAVE EVER SEEN BY FAR.If you like things like the X-Files and end of times thrillers, you will EAT THIS UP. I wouldn't recommend getting this for 10 year old, the story is too complex for little children and I wouldn't want them seeing all the Anti-Christian beliefs in this game. I don't recommend the game to those who are deeply Christian or in the clergy but if you enjoy science fiction and Final Fantasy you will love this. Final Fantasy VII and VIII were just save the world from evil with love element thrown in, although those two games were enticing, neither one still matches Xenogears.

The music was done by Yasunori Mitsuda off the Chrono Trigger music team and it is the best music I have ever heard in a video game. The music even beats Final Fantasy Tactics. The music does get repitive but you really don't even notice it because you are so involved in the story.

Both gear and player battle systems were great, but there should have been some way to revive downed gears in this game. The game takes 70+ hours to beat anyway and reviving gears could have easily shortened the game by 5 hours. That's 5 hours you would have spent backtracking through the game due to that one gear that died. The AP combos are a nice addition from the deathblows of the previous final fantasies.

If you like science fiction and religious stories, you will love this. This is good for people who are even mildly interested in who we are and where we came from. This game will give you some sort of an explanation and will leave you thinking about it for a long time to come after you finish it. peace out †

Possibly the most twisted plot-line ever!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 4 / 6
Date: November 16, 1999
Author: Amazon User

SquareSoft is up to its usual standards of excellence in XenoGears, a very unique RPG that combines one-on-one unarmed fighting with giant mecha combat. Occasionally even giant mecha versus unarmed fighters, which is ... interesting. Many early RPG's focused entirely on fighting and left the characters with no personality at all. Fei, the main character of XenoGears, compensates by having enough personalities for everyone! Throughout the course of this very lengthy game, Fei's sordid past is revealed piece by piece, explaining the mysterious voices he hears in his mind and his phenomenal ability with the Gears. You _will not_ get bored with the plot. You may need to play the game through twice just to get the story straight, but you definitely will not get bored. The opening and ending animation, and the many animated cut-scenes, are wonderful, and I will be surprised if this game does not spin off its own anime. I, for one, am looking forward to it.

a timeless story of fighting for what is right (and love)

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 4 / 6
Date: December 21, 2004
Author: Amazon User

After playing Xenosaga, I was quite eager to pick this game up in some way. Unfortunately, somehow Crash Bandicoot made the greatest hits collection, and great games like Xenogears are forgotten, but I was fortunate enough to drop the name near a kid who had a cousin who had a copy, which I was glad to purchase, since the cousin didn't like it.

I must admit, I was somewhat disappointed with the battle system. Although it can be fun at times, it lacked the luster that the Materia and Sphere Grid systems had in the world of Final Fantasy, simply making battles mediocre button pushing. The slightly dull combat system wouldn't have been so bad if battles had taken any strategy, but, for the most part and with a few exceptions near the very end, battles are mostly just using your strongest combo and healing yourself when necessary. Once you get Billy in your party, you become practically invincible, since he is able to heal the entire party for more than 300 HP for a paltry 4 EP. The best aspect of the game's combat system, however, would be the gear system. Although not used as well as in Xenosaga, Xenogears makes gear combat fun by separating it from the status of the characters, but also giving the gears abilities based on the abilities of the character riding them. Fighting in gears, however, is always done in a way that you can't win without them, or you can't use them. The only times you'll have access to your gears is on the world map and in places with large enemies that would crush a party on foot. This is once again a place where SquareSoft could have added strategic elements (benefits of battling in gear Vs. on foot, an element used brilliantly in Xenosaga), yet decided to opt for simpler battles for a more complex story line.

The music in Xenogears, composed by the brilliant Yasunori Mitsuda of Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross fame, was terrific for it's time, but with the quality sound that the PS2 is able to put out, Xenogears music will just get dull, especially to the ear of one who has played Xenosaga. Also, like in many other RPGs, Xenogears music is extremely repetitive, especially during the second disc. The theme song for this game was done by Joanne Hogg, and is very
similar to the theme songs from Xenosaga, using the exact same instrumentation and style, yet Hogg's voice just has that enchanting quality which I haven't yet tired of.

Xenogears' story is where it shines, and earns its entire five stars. Xenogears takes elements of religion, fantasy, and sci-fi and mixes them to create the uplifting, suspenseful story of young
Fei's search for the truth (and escape from it) in a world of lies. Enter the character of Elhaym, the beautiful soldier who happens to stand at odds with Fei due to her birth and origin, who changes Fei forever by showing him the joy of love. Each character has his or her individual motive, from the villains to the heroes, each trying to find what they most desire. Some wish for power, others for love, and others simply answers to life's most difficult questions. From the beginning of the first disc, you are propelled from Fei's quiet existence in a small village in the woods toward the flying cities of Shevat and Solaris to the paradise Mahanon. The second disc, unfortunately, falters, as the action is greatly reduced, and the game becomes almost a series of monologues telling us what happened and how. For a good example, imagine if the scene where
Luke and Han rescue Princes Leia in Star Wars were replaced with Luke and/or Han sitting in a chair saying, "We then traveled to the Death Star to save the Princes. We found out that she was being held in a certain cell and saved her, but on the way out, we encountered some guards (picture in background of the heroes and storm troopers engaged in fighting), we only survived by jumping down a hole into a trash compactor..." etc. This gets somewhat obnoxious, but I'm sure that this was only done to save space and avoid the obvious irritation of having a third disc for the end movies. If you're completely into the game's story, you won't mind the dialogue bits too much, since they allow you to skip over some annoying bits that would keep you from getting to the incredible conclusion.

For those Xenosaga Fans out there, this game will make a great hold over until Feb. 15, when Episode 2 comes out. I know I'm going to be at Wal-Mart at opening to get my copy.

One of the best Squaresoft ideas, but they missed it.

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 5 / 9
Date: June 19, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I absolutely love this game. People always review games and movies saying "This is the best ever!" Well, I will not hesitate to say that this is the third best game i've ever played. In rank: Tied for first place is Final Fantasy 7 and ICO, third place is Xeno. FF7 and Ico are just far to supurb to rank lower but to different in styles to say which is better. Xeno follows up so closely... here's the Lowdown.

Genre: RPG, Sci-fi. Mecha styled with Anime as it's foundation for themes and artstyle.

Graphics: PSOne level, entry level graphics. Uses 3d environments for moving around in with 360 view. Characters and such are depicted with 2D sprites with many many frames. 3 member party follows behind main player.

RPG/Square Elements: ATB. 3 member battle party. 4 euipment, 1 weapon 3 accessories (same for Gear). Support and Elemental Magic. Save Points. XP, EP(MP). CG and Anime cutscenes.

Battle System: The battle system is unique (one would think that this game was a beta test for Chrono Cross. There are two combat modes, walking or Gear. Walking of course is person to person fighting (sprite graphics). You have several options but what drives the entire walking combat system are death blows. At the beginning of the turn you have a full attack bar, anywhere from 3 to 7 points can be spent. Three attacks Easy, medium and heavy cost 1, 2, and 3 points respectively. After a certain combination is inputed, the character will execute a deathblow, given that it is learned. This is a major part of the walking combat system. If you do not spend these points in the attack bar, they go to an AP meter. After enough AP is acquired if can be spent for a chain of death blows. AP resets after the battle. The gear combat is similar except only one attack can be made. After every attack the characters gains an Attack Level up to 3 levels. At any level ther can be a combo pulled off for more damage that will reset the Attack level. Now Gear combat is also driven with fuel and it is used for every action except an ether attack (magic). Items help to add do the damage, quickness and other stats. DeathBlower items add the deadliest combos to the gear battles. Booster mode spends more fuel but hightens speed.

--

A very neat thing that Square did with this game was to make the HP's of the gears and the players relative. Players have a 999HP max while gears have a 99,999 HP max. While palyers level up with XP, gears only level up with parts. There is no part on a gear that makes it 99,999 though (scene once in a storyline battle). A character may cuase 200 poins of damage to a gear, usually a killing blow to many walking enemies, but a mere scratch to the gear.

Square really tried to make a great game here, and they have. I believe they made a great game... but that's becuase i can see its potential and really judge RPG's more from a storyline basis and a character basis than anything else. What really happened here? Square made a game that exceeded the PSOne's capabilities. Simple. What happened then? Square sacrificed so many things to make the game playable on the PS1 and thus almost ruined it. It lacks so many things that we now find standard. The controls are easy to get but there is no customization menu... no text speed control, just options for sound (Mono, stereo, wide stereo). The menu is easy to maneuver and the Save Menu allows you to copy games and delete games, even Non-Xeno games, which is a plus. What else... well they sacrificed the cutscenes too... for the legnth of the game they kept the wonderful Anime to only the most important scenes... and the CG only covers what seems to be just what is most cool looking. I found many moments when i was yelling at it saying "And you didn't Animate that scene? God, that was one of the most important scenes." After having beaten the game i can see that the truly vital scenes are what is animated.

There is a neat little battleling between gears. It's tekken like... kinda. Not really. It has 2 attack buttons, a jump, ether missile, dash and block. It's a neat little minigame that will let you acquire two of the greatest items in the game... DeathBlower 3 and the GNSR(summ'n-or-other)50 which increases the Gear attack by 50%. The strength of your gear does not effect the gears performance in the battle arena though.

What really bothered me was the text storyline sequence in the second disk... Just about all the second disk is key battle to key battle. I would assume that this was to save room in the story, maybe it would have been too long any other way, but it just seems less fun... more movie-ish-like in the second disk.

And about that storyline... it's really good. I liked it. But the way it is expalined and handed to you is so confusing... even when they go to explain it to you, you're confused. I'm pretty quick and got it, but boy my roommate mind boggled. It's kinda good in a way... gives you a reason to play it a second time.

It is essentially a good game. But it seems that it could have had more to it... though it was long i would have liked to see the rest of it first hand instead of through the words of the characters invovled. It is really twisted plot that holds many mysteries and ultimately will make sense. But just as you think you understand you really don't. I would highly recommend this game to those with patience. Power gamers would like this game too. I would also highly recommend this game to Square's Re-release board... for a remake, adding more to it now with up to 7 times more space on the PS2 dvd... and better graphics... such and such. It is a good game. Has a little anime blood in it, but nothing really big. A common violence package that Final fantasy games are used to seeing. Has a religious context, but really isn't.

If you know Chrono Trigger, Lucca makes a Cameo appearance.

Happy Gaming.

Great Storyline with an Anime look

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 4
Date: July 09, 2000
Author: Amazon User

With the popularity of Anime on the rise, this title will do nothing but help. Xenogears is an amazing RPG. Its dual battle system (with or without Gears) is great. The point system used to gain powerful attacks is very interesting too, if a little complicated.

The game covers a large world with a lot of characters. The storyline is great. It's one of the best that I've seen, comparable to Final Fantasy VII and much better than VIII.

The only complaint I have is with the save and repair systems. Saving only occurs on the world map or at save points (like most Squaresoft RPG's) that are spread much too far apart. Repairing Gears can only occur in gear shops (same with refueling). Combining this with the save system can make the game very difficult, especially the very end.

Other than that, this game is great. I highly recommend it to any RPG fan. It's has a new twist to the RPG theme and has a great story driving it throughout.

Bust out the reading glasses.

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 4
Date: January 11, 2003
Author: Amazon User

This is a game that a lot of people will hate. Players are going to find themselves reading a LOT of text over the course of the 60-75 hours that a first play through will probably take. When you get to disc 2, you'll quickly notice that the whole game is turned into an apparent "cob-job" of a game. Apparently this huge, ambitious game was too much for the producers to take, and they patched together some text, a few levels, some more text, and an ending. This has turned many people off in the past, but I just want to say this. Despite all of these "flaws", THE ENTIRE EXPERIENCE IS WORTH IT.

With the exception of the Shenmue series, there may be no game that was ever as ambitious as this one, and it shows. The storyline is loaded with great amounts of mystery throughout the first half of your epic adventure. Then the last half is just one bomb shell revelation after another. This is a character driven plot that is simply amazing. It will blow your mind. They set out to make THE game against which all other games would be measured, and, even if it's not perfect, they certainly succeeded in a few ways. This is THE story-driven RPG if you're looking for that.

The graphics in this game are not that great by today's standards, but they are by no means horrible. The character models could have used a bit of polish, but are detailed enough to pass. Use some imagination if you must!

The 3D doesn't take long to get used to, and the rotation with the R1+L1 buttons becomes second nature in minutes. The only real complaint I would have is that the platforming sections (like the Tower of Babel) can be a bit difficult to navigate, but otherwise, there aren't really any major issues in my mind.

The sound in the game is superb. Most notably, Yosunori Mitsuda's score will continually impress you with how appropriate and how beautiful it is. "Bonds of Sea and Fire" was enough to convince me to buy the game AND the score after playing the demo. A great composer, and his other work including the Chrono series and Shadow Hearts is well worth checking out also.

So...Is it fun? Resoundingly, yes! There are plenty of opportunities to explore and crawl dungeons. There's no shortage of mini-games and mech battles. There are some fairly nice anime cut scenes. And, on top of it all, there's one of the best stories to ever survive the game-making process.

If you like the modern trend to towards dialogue-intensive RPG's in the Japanese style, then I think you will definitely like this game. However, if this trend has not been to your liking, there is still plenty that this game has to offer. Just be prepared for what you're getting into.

xenogears

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 5 / 10
Date: January 20, 2000
Author: Amazon User

ok here is the deal. i liked ff7 & ff8 but of all the rpg games i have played this one by far kills the rest of the compition. the fact is the story behind this game will capture anyone. this is a must for all gamers and besides the story has a lot to do with god or the lack there of one.

Review Page: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Next 

Actions