Xenosaga: The Animation, Volume One Review

It’s been a few months since a sci-fi anime has gotten my undivided attention. Ergo Proxy was the last sci-fi anime that I devoted actual time to. Everything else out there is either too jiggly, too lame, too tongue-in-cheek, or poorly executed. Not just that, but one of my other fave sci-fi genres the space opera – a sub-genre which includes live action favorites Star Wars and Battlestar Galactica – seems to have dwindled away in favor of darker, more speculative sci-fi.

Speculative sci-fi is one of my all time fave sub genres, don’t get me wrong, but it can be kind of bland at times. Ah, my anime blog for a good blood stirring sci-fi anime that isn’t lame!

Xenosaga: The Animation has all the elements of a space opera. Based off the hit Playstation 2 games of the same title, Xenosaga: The Animation is a retelling of the first installment in the game series, Xenosaga Episode I: Der Wille zur Macht.

plot summary

T.C. 4768. The far future. Its landscape is vastly different from the one of today. Mankind has abandoned its cradle, Earth, and has successfully conquered and colonized space. Technologies that once seemed impossible are now common place: Artificial humans, Realians, work side by side with their flesh and blood counter parts. Gigantic ships hurtle effortlessly through hyperspace. And a dire threat, the Gnosis, is randomly wiping out mankind’s intergalactic strongholds.

Vector, a gigantic mega-corporation, is at the forefront of devising new ways to combat the Gnosis threat. Vector has created KOS-MOS, a powerful female android who holds the promise of being the ultimate anti-Gnosis weapon.

The scientist who helped create KOS-MOS, Shion Uzuki, is testing KOS-MOS’ abilities on board the battle cruiser, Woglinde when the cruiser comes under an overwhelming assault by the Gnosis. The Gnosis are after the mysterious artifact, the Zohar, which is onboard the Woglinde the time of the attack.

KOS-MOS rescues Shion, Lt. Luis Virgil, and Alan from the onslaught, but unfortunately, the rest of the fleet is wiped off the star maps.

Shion and company are rescued from death by suffocation when their escape pod is picked up by the salvage ship, Elsa. The crew of the Elsa numbers among itself the android Ziggurat 8, aka, Ziggy, and the Realian 100-series prototype, MOMO. Shion and her companions’ fates are now intertwined with those of the Elsa. There’s more to Elsa’s crew than meets the eye and intrigue is heavy in the air as the Woglinde’s survivors and their new shipmates take on the Gnosis.

Review

I’m going to state for the record that I’ve never heard of Xenosaga, the game, before I watched this anime. Thus you can infer that I’ve never played the game. I came to this anime with absolutely no expectations, no preconceived notions, nothing to compare and contrast the anime with.

So far, I like Xenosaga. It’s a fast paced story set in the far future that doesn’t dawdle around with excessive explanations. Information is dumped into the viewer’s head in large chunks; leaving the responsibility of sorting said info with the viewer. Whether or not a person can process any of these info-dumps coherently is solely up to them, I happened to have an empty head after a long day and had plenty of room for said info.

The downside to this is that some of the info seems to be missing components. I was scratching my head in a few scenes in which it seemed many details or background were missing. For example: Whose this Gatachman ripoff and why does he know this Realian? What are the Gnosis, and why is everyone ready to die for this Zohar thingy?

I wasn’t too miffed about these scenes, which left me wondering what the hell just happened, since some of them were explained in later episodes. If I watch the entire series, I figure much will be revealed and explained.

The story itself, so far, is very compelling. Writers have so many options and a lot of wiggle room available to them when they go this far into humanity’s future. The creators of the Xenosaga games have crafted a series that not only takes a look at where we’re at in the future, but addresses the issues of non-human rights; space territorialism, or should I say galactitorialism; mankind’s significance in the universe; and the repercussions that happen when we overstep ourselves. The studio then wrapped these heavy hitting concepts up in an attractive package and delivered them in an entertaining fashion.

Character Design

While I wasn’t too terribly fond of many of the character designs- the Gatchman guy; the loud, bright uniforms of the star fleet; the antennal hair, to name a few instances- they interjected some fun into the series. The technology in Xenosaga was well designed. The sleek ships and bulky A.G.W.S. had a realistic feel to them that some of the wardrobe lacked. I particularly liked the fusion of organic and synthetic design aesthetic for the Gnosis.

The color palette for Xenosaga was a bit loud in some places. The garish colors liberally used in the clothing would have been better utilized in smaller doses. Personally, I would have designed KOS-MOS a bit less conspicuously- white shows up really well against the black of space, F.Y.I. Yet, garishness and lack of color-sense aside, the colors did add an extra bit of excitement.

Animation

Xenosaga’s animation, done by Namco, was average. There weren’t many details added to it, nor was it highly polished. There were some shots that were just plain bad as well.

Technology, such as spaceships and A.G.W.S., were sometimes rendered in CG for wide shots. The CG scenes didn’t clash as much as they could have with the animation, and by themselves would be considered well done. I think it’s difficult to marry these two digital art forms together in a way that doesn’t detract or overwhelm one or the other.

Voice Acting

The Japanese voice cast was excellent. We tried the English dub but I found it to be overacted and almost comical. KOS-MOS’ seiyuu, Mariko Suzuki, delivered her lines in a flat monotone, which was perfect for an unfeeling android.

Music

The music for the series had a very gaming aura about it. While I haven’t played Xenosaga specifically, I’ve played enough games similar to this one to have a feel for video game music. Xenosaga: The Animation sounded like an RPG in “battle mode”. The ED, “In This Serenity” by Mayumi Gojo, was difficult to listen to since the singer’s English annunciation was noticeable.

Xenosaga has potential as an anime series to be a highly entertaining romp. The first four episodes have laid out the promise of more action, more intrigue, more mysteries, and more unique story. Enough so, that all four episodes whizzed by so quickly that I was left dazed and saddened that Volume Two wasn’t released.

If Xenosaga’s drawbacks are the omission of certain details, its unforgivingly fast delivery of info, and the redundancy of being an anime patchwork of the game, its strengths still outweigh its weaknesses. It’s an entertaining anime of the swashbuckling variety, perfect for those times you want to leave the mundane light-years behind you.

Rating

Xenosaga, Volume One gets three out of four Hammies!