The Xenosaga trilogy is, indeed, a masterpiece. Anyone who can't appreciate it is mentally defunct, and cannot be pardoned. That's what I say at least. Xenogears, however, I have not played. This being the case, I cannot offer an opinion on the game in comparison to Xenosaga. Shawn, on the other hand...

My name is Lusipurr. Get it right or pay the price, foul minion.

Far be it for me to contradict the uncultured dolt my esteemed colleague, but Xenogears is superior to Xenosaga in nearly every way. The music and battle system are truly top notch, and the story is interesting and engaging without descending into the convoluted mess that is Xenosaga.

This is not to say that Xenosaga is, on balance, a bad game--quite the opposite, it should be praised for its excellent voice acting and impressive cutscenes. However, it is not superior to Xenogears, and anyone who thinks so--you included, dear reader--is worthy only of the utmost scorn.

With derision, my good man, is how I look upon your argument; with derision.

How can you be a fan of Xenosaga II's battle system? It is all but irredeemable. Also, your comparison to Persona 3 holds some water, but is still riddled with leaking holes. Persona 3 allows you to exploit specific weaknesses a given enemy may have in order to knock them to the ground. But, if you were to employ this tactic every time you would soon run out of SP, and not every enemy has a weakness. In other words it's not always the most advantageous tactic, and consequently, not every battle in P3 boils down to flooring the enemy and then annihilating it in a single turn. In XS2, this was the one and only method employed in every single battle, be it a normal encounter or a boss. Oh, and battles in P3 don't take hours to complete.

I agree, however, that it is an incredible shame that the Xenosaga series was cut short. How I would love to see one in glorious hi-definition, with the graphical capabilities that this generation has to offer. And yes, to answer your question, I CAN imagine!!!

(P.S, don't abuse the question mark. It's our friend.)

Oliver, don't abuse, or even use, the exclamation mark. It is not our friend; rather, it is a scourge to be avoided.

The battle system in Xenosaga II is the weakest point of the entrire trilogy. I would say more about this, but it would mean condescdending to intercourse with someone who opinions are (as we behold) utterly wrong. I refuse to take such action. Your comments must suffice.

I hate to say it, but I actually never gave a twopenny damn about the various minigames the series threw at me. I thought most of them were quite ridiculous. HakOx (or whatever Episode III's minigame was) was somewhat amusing, but that's about it. I acquired Erde Kaiser in the first and third game, but the requirements for obtaining him in Episode II were so ridiculous, I gave up after reading an online FAQ. Yet another point in the game's disfavor.

No.

I have played Chrono Cross from beginning to end and simply cannot agree with what you are saying. The music is excellent, to be sure, but I found the battle/element system unwieldy. Yes, if only we could erase our minds and forget about the greatness of Chrono Trigger but it isn't possible. Held up to its illustrious predecessor, Chrono Cross fails to deliver, but this is in spite of its excellent story and soundtrack, and not because of it.

I have not played Chrono Trigger or Chrono Cross, so I cannot comment. Shawn generally knows what he's talking about when it comes to these things I suppose, so I'll let him go unchallenged. FOR NOW.

I also feel a sort of pity for these people. Much like the pity you would feel for a soaking wet puppy dog, who insists on sitting in the rain and becoming wetter still, rather than accepting the warm invitation to come indoors.

Did that make any sense? No? Oh well. Thank you for the letter Matt, it's nice to have another Xenosaga fanboy fan around these parts.

Similarly, I feel a sort of pity for people whose hopelessly wrong ideas continue to cloud every aspect of their being to such a degree that they feel the need to write into internet celebrities noted for their sagacity and circumspection in hope of obtaining some sort of approbation.

I fear your search must continue. For my part, earning the scorn of lesser men is rather the order of the day, and no longer fazes me one jot.

YOU ARE A HOPELESS CLOT. If you cannot enjoy Xenosaga, then you are mentally defunct, as I stated earlier. But begone, I will no longer discuss the games with you. You have proven it to be a worthless endeavour.

Ignore MetaRidley, he is a fellow incapable of experiencing joy and the best thing that we can say about him is that he has not, in fact, burned down an orphanage.

Frankly, when I play RPGs I do not consider the presence of giant robots a sure guarantor of quality. You are familiar with the origin and traditional setting of the genre, are you not?

When Shawn Cooper is close at hand, there is no joy to be experienced.

So it has been said.

This means little coming from a fellow who has so emphatically stated his love for Xenogears in the past. But hey, why not. Here's your chance to be all curmudgeony.

It sounds frustrating, yes. Continue!

Admittedly, the controls and possibility of being randomly attacked (whilst jumping!) is a significant drawback to an otherwise excellent game. However, this trivial flaw is hardly worth denigrating Xenogears over when other equally lauded games suffer far more glaring shortfalls.

I've heard many complaints about the second disc of Xenogears, but they seem to come from the same type of people who complained about the length of Xenosaga's cutscenes. You know, the people who say silly things like "omg, this one cutscene was so long I had the time to make a sandwich, do the laundry, jerk off, and when I came back, it was STILL going!" I have little tolerance for such people, and I enjoy watching lots of cutscenes and reading text.

I thoroughly enjoy novels, and thus found my approach of Xenogears disc two a 'consummation devoutly to be wish'd'..

What he means to say is that he became so enraged, he actually ate the game disc. It was quite shocking.

...and crunchy.

Is this a complaint? What is your beef? Please explain. Oh, too late. Oh well.

Shawn has a "cute, fluffy critter" fetish. It is best not to speak of them around him, be it in a positive or negative light.

More ridiculousness from the Village Idiot, I see. I merely wish to know whether this declaration is some sort of complaint or simply information. I do not think that is too much to ask of our readers who are meant to be soliciting our responses.

Well, nothing actually, since your letter is a week old. But that is my fault and not yours, so please, go right ahead.

What is an RGP? Rather Gigantic Penguin? They are only called Emperor Penguins, you see. They are actually much smaller than a bus, or a planet.

All of the girls I know--and I know many--play video games. Of course, all of the guys I know play video games, too. Except for MetaRidley, because he doesn't play anything that wasn't invented tomorrow.

LIES AND MISINFORMATION.

See, that's the thing - not only do I not know any girls that play videogames, even the guys I know disdain them. I honestly think it has something to do with my location. This is the "game-hating belt," or whatever you'd like to call it. People in middle Tennessee are far too preoccupied with horses, straw hats, and banjoes to care about games and the playing thereof.

And why does that man keep spelling my internet name with a capital "R?" It's Metaridley. Not MetaRidley.

Trying to imagine meTARDley wearing a straw hat, playing the banjo, fills me with mirth.

This seems to conform to my appreciation of the situation in re. Nintendo's production schedule.

How about a StarFox game that doesn't suck, Nintendo? How about a localisation of Mother games? Oh, that's right, they're not listening to us anymore.

Indeed, they are not. They've lost interest in us. Why? They've discovered that there are far more of them out there, and that in many cases, they have even more money than we do. There is an inexhaustible supply of the so-called "casual" gamers in the world, which is unsettling, because it means that Nintendo can continue in their current business model as long as they wish. After all, as somebody once said, "a sucker is born every minute."

I found Nintendo's GameCube to be a far more entertaining system. There are many, many good GameCube games, far more than there are for the Wii at this time. Perhaps this will change. Perhaps it will not.

I still own more Gamecube games than Wii games. This is inexcusable considering the widespread success of the Wii, and the length of time it has been available. Where are the third-party titles?

I have never seen a Wii sitting on a store shelf. Ever. In any store.

I went to reserve a Wii approximately a month before it was released, thinking I would claim one on release day. AFTER I put the money down, the GameStop clerk informed me that my Wii would be arriving weeks, perhaps months, after the initial release. I was most wroth, but decided to let it slide. After a month had passed, I called every other day to see if my system had arrived, and was always met with a a firm (and eventually, slightly annoyed) "no."

Well, one day, I was out and about. I decided to stop by my local GameStop in person and pop the question once again. Much to my delight, they had it for me. Much to my UN-delight, they had it SITTING ON SHELVES, AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE.

"What's the meaning of this?" I asked. I was informed they'd had my Wii for the last three days, and since I had not come to claim it, they had made it available for purchase. "You stupid frackers didn't CALL me," I said, furious at the very thought of a COMMONER snatching up MY WII. Naturally, they swore up and down that they had. LIES. ALL LIES. I received no such call.

(That's not a verbatim transcript, of course. I was much more calm, not being the type to grow angry in public.)

A large number of my good friends work in the local GameStop stores in our area, and so I have a good idea about how many Wiis are available to those establishments. When they get any in, they are gone within hours. Many people in the area have been unable to get one ever since they were announced. As for seeing them on store shelves, well, it goes without saying how unlikely that is.

Demand is significantly greater than supply. If that isn't the definition of a shortage, I don't know what is.

In the following order: FF4, FF6, FF12, Lost Odyssey.

See, that's now so hard, is it?

Like always, Shawn is attempting to lead you astray. Here is the order you should go in: Final Fantasy XII, Persona 3, Radiant Dawn, Final Fantasy VI. (Good Lord, you've yet to finish FFVI? Perhaps that should be number one...) Anyway, talk to me once you've completed those four, I'll tell you where to go from there. FOCUS. DO NOT LET THE NUMBER OF GAMES YOU HAVE DISTORT YOUR VISION! If you do, then you truly will be consumed by the ravenous beast known as The Backlog.

I doubt that there will be much gaming in heaven, so it would be best to get it all done now.

Meat-a-riddley is not to be trusted in these matters. He has never even played Final Fantasy IV, and has probably not played a number of the other games on your list. Take my advice, not his, lest you find yourself, like him, uninformed and the butt of jokes on forums far and wide.

I have too played FFIV!

Well Ken, if it makes you feel any better, your letter was most definitely not on the "short side." But like all of your letters, it was well thought-out, well-written, and rich with material for discussion. For that, I thank you. Please, write again soon.

Once again, Oliver demonstrates his inability to be firm with the readers. Instead of mollycoddling them, he should adopt a policy of resistance. Do not tell them to write again soon! Insult them, criticise them, tell them what a lot of useless blighters they are! It builds character! And that's what RPGamers like--character, hence the success of games such as Final Fantasy VI.

Please, do not misunderstand Lusipurr. He is cruel, yes, but it is only because he harbors a sort of malice towards all of humanity. In other words, it's nothing personal. I don't think.

Oliver is a useless git;

A fool, a dolt, a poop.

An idiot, a blathering twit

Least important of our group.

Ignore him!

Abhore him!

And otherwise deplore him!

With love, Lusipurr.

I have forgotten my Universal Translator at home and am incapable of understanding this trendy gibberish. Moat-A-Really will have to address it.

(WRONG person to speak to with slang terms...)

Well... perhaps I was a bit rash when I made that statement. But there are some truly delectable ice creams out there, you know. Chocolate moose tracks from Purity. Makes me smile every time I take a bite. And I don't mean a simple smirk, I'm talking about a big, toothy, gleeful grin. That's good stuff right there.

I love my 60G PS3, but having said that, I think Sony's increasing disregard for backwards compatibility is only going to hurt them. The PS1 and PS2 represent an enormous library of excellent games which provide, along with the current and upcoming library of PS3 titles, a motivation to purchase Sony's most recent console. By effectively dropping that backwards compatibility, Sony has reduced the appeal of the PS3. It's a shame, and difficult to understand considering the overall market trend towards including backwards compatibility.

Now, whilst I get some pie, listen to whatever rot Oliver has to say.

Can I have some pie, too? Apple, perchance? With a tall glass of milk?

I agree with Lusipurr 100% on this one. In fact, I'm quite positive that most of the gaming community does. Which makes you wonder all the more: why the hell is Sony doing this? What is the reasoning behind it? If only they'd come out and tell us. It wouldn't make it suck any less, but at least we'd know the twisted reasoning behind their madness. PS2 games actually look great upscaled on the PS3, although funnily enough, you don't really notice this until you make the mistake of playing on your PS2 again. As for Remote Play, I've found it to be an amusing, though fairly useless feature. And I'm afraid I have to call you out on this one: you cannot Remote Play PS2 titles at this time. Hopefully that will change in the future.

I am certain it will change in the future... for a price.

Rhubarb, with Darjeeling tea. Sorry.

Damn.

EWNB, I enjoy speaking in casual tongues from time to time, but I often have no clue what on earth you're saying. What the bloody hell is an O-bamb? Ah well. I'm glad you feel comfortable enough around here to speak as you do. Maybe if I socialized more often, I'd be more familiar with your manner of speech.

What?

Penguin the oviraptor your omnibus, too, bub

Behold, a reader after my own heart! Or rather, would be if I had a heart. Pray continue.

Damn you, Chapel of Resonance. Damn you.

That I should be defamed in a such a way, in my own column, is the cruelest of fates.

Defamed? Looks like clearest truth to my studied gaze.

PAH. You lazy sods can come up with your own topics of discussion for once.

*eats popcorn*

Do I get ANY food?

When you earn food, you will get food. I suspect it may be some time. Moreover, I have eaten all of the popcorn.

**Lusipurr waves a pennant reading 'BELMONT'.

*sob*

I run everywhere. It's the only way to maintain my girlish figure on a diet of pie, popcorn, and sausages. In fact, I'm going to have a jog whilst MiltonBridley tries to put words together into sentences.

I despise running in real life, but it is a necessity to move quickly while playing a videogame. That is one of the many things I loved about Lost Odyssey - by simply holding down a button, you are given the ability to sprint, no matter where you are. Quite useful, quite useful indeed.

On the flip side, the speed at which the main character in Persona 3 moves has annoyed me for the entirety of the game. He doesn't move SLOW, per se, but he also doesn't move fast enough given the amount of WALKING you have to do in the game, particularly while exploring Tartarus.

Oh, this one was from Max? You should have told me before we started. Alas. Next time, there will be blood!

No. No blood. We need to keep this T-rated, after all.

There go my plans for a new Digital Orgasmic Rape Simulator feature.

Don't you mean Virtual Orgasmic Rape?

Virtual Digital Brutal Orgasmic Rape Simulator, Mk. II. Now with realistic panting!

Oh, God...