Nikolai Balthasar was a brilliant scientist from Shevat who was kidnapped and forced into creating Gears for the nefarious Solaris. Solaris was dead set on creating the most advanced mechs on the planet, and Nikolai’s genius in the field of neurological research was unrivaled. With his coerced assistance, Solaris was able to produce inhumane Gears that “swallowed” a person and their consciousness whole, creating a Gear without lag or human error. And, in the end, after losing his wife and life to Solaris, Nikolai became an unwilling victim of his own creation, and was bonded to the Gear Achtzehn.
Achtzehn was a formidable beast of a Gear. Fused with a Nikolai who seemed to lose all empathy for humanity, it was a monster set to destroy the whole of Nikolai’s former home. Fei and his friends stood up to Achtzehn, but it utilized an Anti-Gear Psycho Jammer that disabled all Gears controlled by traditional pilots. This left Maria, Nikolai’s daughter, and the Gear he had created for her, Seibzehn, the only Gears that could stand against this massive threat.
Oh, and there was Chu-Chu, too.
The scripture is… okay… A host of theologians have all but deemed this portion of “history” as… apocryphal. If taken literally, one is to believe that before humanity was ever on this world, there were creatures known as Dotesque Chu-Chupolin. These beings were intelligent, had their own culture, lived in the woods, and, most importantly, were larger than houses. However, those wily so and sos at Solaris found them to be a (gigantic) nuisance, so they installed limiters on the chus, causing them to shrink down to stuffed-animal size. But apparently Fei’s dad (?) was a researcher on these creatures, and he escaped with some chus (?) that had their limiters removed (?), and one of these chus became the companion/pet (?) of Margie. Margie was in Shevat when Achtzehn attacked, and this “Chu-Chu” grew to enormous size to fight alongside Maria.
And, look, despite how many artists love depicting a giant, pink puffball hanging on the cross, you do not need to believe in the “literal” history of the Chu-Chu to understand the parable here. Chu-Chu was little more than a teddy bear, and Maria was a traumatized teenager of barely 13 (standing in the shadow of a queen that was supposedly 522). They both banded together and repelled a man who had grown into a scientist that could no longer distinguish friend from foe. The “wise, learned man” was defeated by the meekest and most inexperienced defenders around. Whether Chu-Chu could become titanic is immaterial to the fact that this creature somehow assisted in saving people. It is meant to draw a metaphoric parallel between those that think they cannot succeed, and a similarly unsophisticated organism saving the day.
Chu-Chu and Maria worked together to be the heroes of Shevat. You can be a hero, too. That’s the moral. You do not need a mammoth rabbit-mouse thing to reinforce that concept.
Even Worse Streams presents Xenogears
Night 10
Original Stream Night: April 6, 2021
Night of Quistis Trepe
Random Stream Notes
- Welcome back to Xenogears! There are not glorious HD squats here.
- We immediately compare Final Fantasy Amano illustrations to Aqua Teen Hunger Force gags regarding pianos and MP3 conversions.
- Hey, remember The Granstream Saga? It is better than Chu-chu Land.
- Would you like a discussion of the comic strip BC thanks to Sega CD title BC Racers?
Please enjoy as I check a FAQ to figure out what the heck I am supposed to do to activate the next bit. Talk to a rocking chair?- We meet Queen Zephyr while we discuss how gachas should be illegal.
- Citan’s family is here. Grandia 3 includes your mom in a JRPG. These things are marginally related.
- Elly has been voted off the island as Maria joins the party. … Oh wait we kept Elly. Sorry, Billy.
- As we skulk through tunnels with Maria, talk of Final Fantasy 9 leads to talk of SaGa Frontier and Asellus being gay as heck.
- We discuss Breath of Fire 2, Oddworld, and other games that have influenced our views in weird ways.
- And Kishi arrives while we are still trying to find our way through these stupid tunnels.
- “Snowpiercer was in fact inspired by Xenogears.”
- I assume my Gears are going to survive the onslaught, but save anyway. This is good planning!
- Kishi brings up their notes for helping the fact that my Gears are a miserable failure.
“If you want to save fuel…” “Nope!”- After two or three game overs, I finally decide to upgrade my Gears. This may have been the issue!
- Now we can actually make progress. And, yes, despite my objections on the stream, this is uploaded without editing my many losses.
- “I wiggle in the air to assert dominance.”
- We are all, obviously, excited by Chu-Chu finally attaining maximum power.
- Kishi is quiet during the Chu/Giant Robot fight due to really liking the music involved. I can’t blame ‘em.
- Chu-Chu notes her pure heart as we close.
Next time on Xenogears: Remember Bart? Sure you do! He’s back! In Omni-Form!
Fei Fong Wong has seen troubles. A man who once fancied himself a simple artist has been forced to fight others. And, every time Fei has embraced -the power-, he and those around him have suffered. When he gained the Weltall, his home village was obliterated. When he saved his friend with that same robot, he was banished to a sandy Hell. Now, when the deposed prince and sand pirate Bartholomew Fatima asks Fei to fight for his noble cause, Fei denies his new friend. Fighting has gotten Fei nowhere, and it is clear that nonviolence is the most direct route to peace.
I compare Legend of Legaia to the 2020/2021 COVID response. I should write an article about that…
All Virtual Reality games are Wii games. This is my belief. At least for now.
I need a map for Xenogears. I need a map desperately.
Breath of Fire 2 is the story of Ryu, an orphan adventurer who starts out by rescuing a pig from a hungry old man, but eventually graduates to killing god. 
We’ll start with the obvious source of all this trouble: Evrai, the holy city of the Church of St. Eva. Evrai is a small town attached to a gigantic, magic-powered church/fortress. It is the base of operations for the whole of the St. Eva religion, and, likely because they’re responsible for recruiting people to worship an evil god, the place is just crawling with monsters. And church services are led by Habaruku, a Lovecraftian squid dude that apparently kills enough people during services that his congregation doesn’t even bat an eye when a tiger person is struck down by unholy lightning. The whole premise of BoF2 is that the St. Eva church has been masquerading as a benevolent organization this whole time… but there sure is a lot of blood splattered around their base.
And if you’re curious how anyone ever even gets to Evrai, there’s Bando Church, which supposedly takes the most dedicated believers to their grand home. The only issue? Bando Church is actually led by a skeleton demon that zombifies his followers, and then sends them out into the wild to be slain by adventurers hoping to gain a few zenny for herbs. Naturally, Ryu takes care of this issue through unrelenting dragon blizzards, and the one place on the planet that was offering direct flights to Evrai is also left abandoned. So, just to be clear, long before he discovered the secret truth of Deathevan, Ryu really did a number on church infrastructure.
We may as well start at the beginning, so HomeTown is first up. This is the adopted hometown of Ryu and Bow (oh, I just got that), and it’s a surprisingly affluent area for a pair of street urchins. The only two rich guys on the planet live here, and HomeTown is also home to the only school, magic or otherwise, anyone will ever see in Breath of Fire 2. There’s a church, too, but it is by no means the center of the city. It’s slightly left of the center. But HomeTown’s biggest problem is the same as 
Though if we’re talking about strange hobbies, we may as well hit Coursair. Coursair is home to a coliseum (and, depending on your transliteration, the whole place is just plain called “Coliseum”), and it’s a town that lives for bloodshed. Violent battles are held here as often as the plot demands, and gigantic lumberjacks can roughhouse with catgirls to their heart’s content. And it’s all a secret front for that evil church to get people to pray. Or… something? Look, there isn’t a clear connection between “church that publicly is all about peace and love” and “thunderdome”, but somehow it all works out for Deathevan and Augus, the local two-headed wolf monster. Ryu defeats Augus, but it’s not like anyone knew there was deception afoot. The coliseum isn’t even closed for renovations after Augus’ defeat, so Coursair is going to be business as usual before and after Ryu’s adventure. At least Katt has a job to fall back on.
But Coursair is where Ryu finds his horse-friend, Rand. And Rand’s hometown is FarmTown. FarmTown is interesting, as it is one of the few places that does not worship the Dragon God (good!) or St. Eva (bad!), but St. Namanda, an earth god. Daisy, Rand’s mother, appears to be the mayor (or… something?) of this town of horse folk (not centaurs. Never centaurs), and there is much concern about messengers from St. Eva attempting to get a foothold in FarmTown. Do they succeed? Well, they successfully forge Daisy’s signature (and kidnap the poor woman just for funsies), but that winds up being the inciting incident for Rand and Ryu invading Evrai and blowing the whole organization sky high. Dangerous blunder! In the end, Daisy winds up dead anyway, and it’s unclear why that wasn’t just everybody’s first move. I’m not saying murder is always the answer in real estate dealings, but when you’re running a death cult, it sure does seem like a viable option. Regardless, thanks to a shakeup-by-swordpoint in St. Eva management, FarmTown’s church never gets built, and the residents probably just went ahead and anointed Rand as Daisy’s successor, anyway. Back to plowing the fields, Shell Clan, the rest of the world needs you to drop turnip prices.
And speaking of places where the church has meddled (and everyone got over it), Capitan seems to be home to one of the few actually successful St. Eva operations. This tiny village has a well full of monsters (mostly of the face-hugging variety, which 
And speaking of terrible plans, it seems like the bad church has a number of bizarre irons in the fire. Is the traveling circus sowing discord by showing children turtles? Is Whale Cape’s titular whale frozen in rock so the local children can keep selling disgusting cakes? Does Guntz, home to the Iron Ogre Clan, not have anything to do with anything, so why even bother? St. Eva has one clear goal: gain more followers. How is trapping a grass man in a cage or threatening some dolphins going to help achieve that? Who knows, but it does mean there are a number of places on the planet that don’t even know they were ever being menaced, left alone that Ryu saved them from an evil god.
But maybe we’re not thinking big enough! We need to look at the real players in this world! We need to look at the kingdoms! Like SimaFort, a castle full of frog people living in the middle of a moat. What resources do they have? They’ve got a lot of cockroaches, worms, and flies! Is their national army powerful? No, they’re mostly just fun-loving, artistically oriented amphibians who would rather host a cooking contest. Is there absolutely anything of value in SimaFort? Well, there’s supposed to be a magically powerful sword in the basement, but, like SimaFort’s own Prince Jean, it’s very likely to make you croak. Regardless of having absolutely no strategic merit, Kuwadora attempts to infiltrate and conquer SimaFort through guile and trickery on behalf of St. Eva. Ryu defeats the fake prince via swords/vomit, and life in SimaFort continues on as normal, complete with Prince Jean wandering off again. At least 
And speaking of princesses, distant Highfort is being menaced by another usurper, Shupkay. This demon is taking a much more direct route, and has earned her position of leadership through leading the Highlander Tribe (monkeys, not immortals) as a general in many wars that you think you would see some evidence of somewhere else in the world. Maybe this is why the whole continent is a wasteland? Regardless, Shupkay threatens to take over Highfort through word and deed, and attempts to gain control of Highfort’s lost technology (I’m sensing a pattern here). This time, Shupkay is thwarted by party member Sten, who fakes his own death along the way because he missed two mortgage payments while he was out adventuring. It was the only way. Oh, and there isn’t a church or clergy to be found within Highfort, so no monkey is going to miss that meddling god.
You know what? Screw these Johnny come lately kingdoms, let’s look at the big boys that have been around since Breath of Fire 1. Now here are some locations where a Ryu made a difference! Like Tunlan! Back in Breath of Fire 1, Tunlan’s matriarch fell in love with the evil emperor, and the party had to commit a daring robbery to save a kingdom from the poor decisions of its own ruler. Surely, BoF2 offers a scenario that is just as thrilling and… Oh. Uh… apparently Deathevan made the queen fat. And I guess there’s a multipart quest that involves finding a weird old man, mushroom medicine, and eventually 
But Windia! There’s an old standby! And the Princess of Windia isn’t weighing down your sidequests, she’s an active member of the party! And there’s this whole, ancient prophecy about a princess being born with black wings, and how that will destroy the kingdom! And the king has been poisoned by the church, and he only gets better during the finale, after sealing Deathevan! So chalk this one up to a win for the party! Everyone in Windia is going to notice that the king is better!
System: Super Nintendo, then Gameboy Advance, and now available on the Nintendo Switch. There was probably a Wii version somewhere in there, too.
Feeling Bleu: Bleu/Deis, an immortal sorceress that recurs over the 
The first thing you see when you boot up Breath of Fire 3 is a mural of the heroes of Breath of Fire 1. This mural depicts everyone in the original BoF party fighting Myria, a nefarious goddess that threatened to destroy the world through war and destruction. This opening seems to say, “Here, player, here are the heroes you remember, who triumphed over impossible odds and won the day with guts and swords.” Breath of Fire 3 starts by showcasing the gallant and daring heroes of a previous BoF adventure, a group that literally saved the world and everyone in it.
Failure is an integral part of most videogames. Even before Dark Souls and alike made “death” a fundamental mechanic, there was always a learning curve. Everybody died to those opening goombas at least once, and everyone learns from that experience and changes Mario trajectory accordingly. You fail, death happens, you get back up on that Yoshi and try again. Meanwhile, JRPGs often make failure an essential and inevitable part of the narrative. You need to collect the six mipmaps or the nefarious ULTRA EVIL DEMON will awaken and destroy the world? Well, I’ve got some bad news: you’re probably going to collect those six mcguffins, but they’ll be stolen by the bad guys at the last minute, and you’re going to have to fight ULTRA EVIL DEMON anyway, because, come on, we didn’t design that three-screen high sprite for it not to get used. Besides, failure is basically a requirement for any game with a modicum of story. 90% of these tales are based on the basic “hero’s journey” plot outline, and what’s the point in winning if it’s not a comeback from some insurmountable defeat. You have to lose to rally and win, win, win!
Oh, and somewhere in there, Ryu had to kill Teepo, because of course he did.
But Myria is the antagonist of Breath of Fire 3. This is a JRPG, and, in the end, you need a final boss you can hit with a sword. There isn’t going to be a solution where you talk this one out, and Myria has got to go out in a way that makes the player justified in overleveling and collecting all the best equipment on the planet. These are the rules. But thou must.
… Except, this entire tale was one of unintended consequences and… failing. Had Ryu and his band of thieves succeeded in their first task, they’d be legendary, and happy, local heroes. Had Ryu found his friends in a timely, less fatal manner, they would have returned home and lived happily. If Nina was a worthwhile princess, she could have been, ya know, a princess, and lived happily. If Garr could be content with the function he was literally made for, he could have retired happily centuries ago. Ultimately, if the heroes of Breath of Fire 3 could just stop failing for ten seconds at any point in their lives, they could have had a happy ending that didn’t involve deicide at pretty much any time. But, no, they’re failures, so they collectively wound up on a path that would change the world.
Feeling Bleu: Deis, the snake-tailed goddess, doesn’t join the party for the first time in the franchise, and gets stuck in a room by her lonesome for most of the adventure. She deserves better! And, no, getting stuck in a sentient suit of armor is not an upgrade.