In my previous post, I said that I would talk about anything that crosses my mind regarding my work on the Xenosaga videos. And what's been crossing my mind at the time of writing this, is something that is making me question the quality of Xenosaga's story and my whether or not I should continue this project.
I've mentioned before that I haven't finished the game, or have watched all the cut-scenes before I started this project, so I didn't really have a total understanding of the plot. I know that saying this is going to make me look like a total dumbass who is impatient, but I think that it's better for me to be honest, rather than lie. So a good portion of my knowledge of Xenosaga's plot has been coming from my work on further episodes in this series.
However, working on the most recent episodes has been bothering me quite a bit. You see in the setting of Xenosaga, there are a lot of things that's needed to wrap your head around to get a full understanding of the plot and the world Xenosaga has created. Up until now Xenosaga did a good job of expositing; keeping things vague, while at the same time making them simple and understanding. At the part of the story I'm in now, they use that same exposition technique, but they're trying to provide exposition for too many things at once. I suppose I could just remove the scene I'm talking about here, hoping that it would have no real impact further in the plot (it's not like it's the first time I've made that decision woking on this series).
It also doesn't help that there are actually quite of number of plot-holes I've noticed. The first one I saw is in the first episode I made. At one point Shion mentions that she used to live on Miltia, and that nobody is allowed to go back there. Although later on in a scene where she is talking to her brother over the phone, Shion said that she would visit him eventually. Thing is, Shion's brother lives on Miltia. I thought that nobody outside that planet was allowed to go there? I don't know, maybe I took that statement out of context, or it could've been a translation error. Plus, it didn't really seem to affect the main plot so I let it slide when I posted it, thinking that things would've been better explained later.
After that, I haven't really noticed any other plot holes while working on further episodes. That was until recently. Later in the story, we're introduced to a character named Junior. Even though I haven't gone through the story in completion, I can tell that the writers for Xenosaga were trying to set up a romance story between him and MOMO. Problem is that in one point in the story, Junior indirectly calls MOMO's "father", Joachim Mizrahi, insane, leaving MOMO upset. Later on, you see Junior asking his friend and co-worker not bring up Mizrahi when he's around her due to her being a realian. Than why did you go on that rant about him in front of her earlier!? He knew MOMO was a realian, but that still didn't stop him from his diatribe!? In fact you never see Junior confronting MOMO about that situation. Next moment their together, Junior tries to put the moves on MOMO, without ever apologizing or consider if she's still a little upset over what he said earlier. Ass-hole.
Then there came another plot hole that just blew my mind in how stupid and ridiculous it was. I'm still a little confused about this scene, so excuse me if I get some things wrong in this explanation. Anyways, our main protagonists are under arrest, and while awaiting questioning, they are introduced to this woman whose working on the inside, trying to prove they're innocent. To summarize this event, here's what she asks them to do. She asks our heroes to knock her out, run away and retrieve video footage stored in KOS-MOS' memory bank and give it to that same woman from earlier. THAT..DOSEN'T..MAKE ANY FUCKING SENSE! If you want to prove them innocent, than why do you want them to knock you out and attack every guard in the way!? That would just add to their list of charges! Secondly, this woman seems to be the one in charge of the soldiers that arrested our heroes, so why couldn't she just escort them to KOS-MOS and receive the footage from there!? What's the point!? Why create this elaborate stage when it makes NO FUCKING SENSE!!!
Sigh.... Now I think I've given a good explanation on what I said earlier about having second thoughts on this project and on Xenosaga as a whole. I mean, I really did think that Xenosaga had a really good story to it, but after seeing how confusing it is, and how gaping the plot-holes are, I'm starting to think that my admiration for Xenosaga's story and this project as a whole is a total lie. However, even with that I'm still determined to finish this project. Why? Because I've spent so much time and effort into this, I'd hate to see it end up being worthless. And who knows, maybe things will start to make sense in the end. And if it dosen't, I could try to edit these scenes out.
