Fei Fong Wong discovered late in his journey that his “true” personality had been fractured into separate pieces, and he only obtained Xenogears when he reckoned with all of the parts of himself. While such an ordeal would be confusing for anyone, this was particularly crazy for Fei, as he had also lived multiple lives through the centuries. And now he had memories of all of those lives. So can Fei (and us) learn from his multiple lifetimes of adventures?
Abel was Fei’s first incarnation. At the dawn of humanity, there was Cain and the Gazel Ministry. This gang advocated for the resurrection of Deus, and the majority of the freshly hatched population was into that nonsense. Abel opposed it, because he believed man should be more independent… which makes a certain amount of sense, as Abel was literally the only “real” human in this solar system. Of course, this led to some conflict with Cain and friends, and Abel was murdered. But an incarnation of Elehayym attempted to save Abel… before taking a fatal energy blast to the chest. So Abel and Elly died more or less together, though Elly likely bled out on the prehistoric floor first.
About 6,000 years later, “Abel” was reborn as Kim Kasim. Kim was an accomplished scientist and horrible date. Despite being a brilliant man who invented nanotechnology and could literally create life from nothing, he was one of the most cantankerous people in the Zeboim civilization, and spent an entire Deusmas dinner talking about how everyone on the planet was a jackass (except him, of course). Luckily, that era’s Elly was a nurse, and she fell hard for the misanthropic Kim. Together, they went on to birth/build an immortal nanotech woman named Emeralda. Unfortunately, this process was fraught with political danger, and, when Kim attempted to hide his new lifeform with a terrorist organization, that era’s government showed up, and murdered the heck out of everybody. Oh! And Elly died horribly in a hallway attempting to defend Kim that time, too. Presumably, Kim died slightly later than her, as he sealed himself in a room with Emeralda, and likely just mundanely starved to death inches away from where his baby mama’s blood painted the walls.
But do not worry, as the wicked society that led to Kim and Elly’s horrible deaths was wiped out by nuclear annihilation anyway. The survivors went on to establish the nations that were more familiar to modern Fei and Elly, and, about 3,500 years later, Sophia was born. Sophia was the latest incarnation of Elly, and, with her metaphysical connection to Deus, she possessed high etheric abilities. Unfortunately, she was also sickly, and… Well, we covered this before. She met Lacan, the reincarnated Abel/Kim. She met Krellian, the man who would go on to try to create god. She met Roni & Rene Fatima, who were just a pair of good dudes. But, in the end, this Holy Mother decided she had to sacrifice herself to save everyone (Lacan particularly included), and she died in the fiery, suicidal crash of the Excalibur. But this time her “Fei” lived much longer… which led to him killing 98% of the population in pursuit of -the power-, and then trying to kill everybody left a few centuries later. So, in this case, Sophia/Elly sacrificed herself for her friends… but most of her friends turned out to be murderous dicks, and the world she loved mostly got obliterated by those same friends. Kind of a downer for a generational martyr.
About five hundred years later, we reach the final incarnation of these star-crossed (usually) lovers. Fei and Elly now lived in a world that was generally obliterated by the previous generation (though, now, a whole new obliteration was on the table. There were zombies!), featuring the final remnants of humanity shambling around and maintaining a giant robot battle arena for some reason. The most interesting place on the planet is a desert containing a dead dragon (that really should have been mentioned somewhere in history), and the most prominent remaining human is a centuries-old Elvis impersonator with amnesia. But Fei and Elly have a chance for a happy ending this time, as at least they are both still alive as Fei enters the belly of the beast in an attempt to rescue his millennia-old damsel. Have they finally learned that martyrdom has only ever made things worse? Will there be a happy ending for these two? Well, the scripture tells us about the tale in the next chapter…
Even Worse Streams presents Xenogears
Night 17
Original Stream Night: June 8, 2021
Night of the Schools’ Rivalry
Random Notes on the Stream:
- Fanboymaster brings us the best introduction in this whole Xenogears project with Kishi and BEAT also immediately available.
- Caliscrub arrives shortly thereafter with a welcome to the open/destroyed world of Xenogears.
- And then Abby Denton! And Ample Vigour!
- Let’s talk about our favorite Lou Bega moments!
- “This is Big League Chu.”
Jeanie joins as we visit the completely wrecked world of tomorrow.- Welcome to an underground city that Hammer apparently mentioned once! Let’s see Rico and Emerelda’s Gears in use for maybe the first time.
- Fanboymaster mentions that he is surprised the Golgo 13 author, Takao Saito, is still around. He died three months after we recorded this stream…
- “Please tell me the full story of Big Joe.”
- “Who the hell is Kim?” “Fei’s Kim!” “Fei’s Kim!” “Fei’s Kim!” “Fei’s Kim!”
- We’re heading to the desert triangle island. And maybe Gogo is Adlai Stevenson. It really cannot be disproven.
- “They’re trying to steal our precious sand!”
- Ample Vigour discovered that Breath of the Wild is good once he started running around and doing nothing. We’re also doing nothing while exploring this desert, so it’s surprisingly relevant.
- It momentarily appears that I managed to get the glitch where I parked my airship on the Duneman Isle, but we overcome.
- We get a history of BEAT being blocked on twitter as we revisit the fighting arena to see all the Gear weirdos.
“Nobody would try to make Xenogears nowadays. Because game development costs money!”- When did we rescue Ramsus!? I have been paying attention! And I don’t remember it happening! Don’t lie to me, Xenogears.
- Is Violent Ken more violent than regular Ken? Who knows. Let’s talk to Dan.
- Did I mention Bongo Bill has been here for most of the night? I can’t remember when he showed up.
- At least he sticks around for dolphin family relations. It… is hard to explain.
- Oh, hey, there’s that sword forge/unequip thing just like we would eventually see in Xenosaga.
- And then we close with a entering the final dungeon. Get ready for a big ol’ finale!
Next time on Xenogears: The end! Part 18/20
Chrono Trigger is one of the greatest videogames ever created… but it is hard to convey that in an advertisement in the pages of Gamepro. So Square USA Advertising had to focus on some less hyperbolic bullet points. Chrono Trigger: It is about time travel! It has character designs from the Dragon Ball Z guy! It was produced by the people behind Final Fantasy! And, most of all, Chrono Trigger has multiple endings! More than ten! That is an amazing number of endings!
But wait! There’s more! Spanky has multiple endings! Every duo in Aero Fighters 2 has an ending that is specific to the two characters in question. And this is not a simple “fit the same pieces together with slight variations” deal like 
Games have gotten better at this! In much the same way that videogames identified that they do not have to be all bullet hells all the time, many gaming narratives have grown and matured to the point that there is time for the characters to have fun within their own games. 
System: Nintendo Switch or Playstation 4 now, Neo Geo back in the day. This also makes it an arcade game by default.
Did you know? “Steve” is “Angela” in the original, Japanese version of Sonic Wings 2. However, Steve/Angela notably appears naked with male characteristics in at least one of their endings. And damn near every other ending involving “Steve” comes off as queer-bashing, and… and I don’t even know how to describe it when “Angela” is involved. Steve/Angela is apparently based on a Rose of Versailles character that was a woman raised as a man, so there is definitely a trans origin to the character, and… Ugh. Let’s just say it is probably offensive by any standard, and call it a day.
“Let’s hear your idea.”
“Woof… can he just be a dolphin? Swimming? Like the point is just to survive in the ocean? Breathing and eating fish and stuff?”
“How is that a problem? The ocean takes up three quarters of the Earth! You literally have 75% more options than every other game that takes place on Earth.”
“Yeah, Ecco goes back in time to get help with fighting the aliens, and then comes back to the present. Oh! Ecco gets the power to travel through time in Atlantis! City level!”
Ever actually beat this game? Yeah, either with cheat codes or save states. The final boss is completely impossible, requiring some precision “shooting” and dodging, and then literally flinging Ecco right into the maw of death repeatedly, and any mistake means starting over a stage back. I have a hard time thinking of an action game with a more difficult, unfair finale.