This review is oriented to those who have played Final Fantasies 7 and 8, but are interested in Xenogears. As such, I shall avoid giving away spoilers from Xenogears�I am thoroughly glad I did not stumble across any spoilers for the plot of this game before I completed it. Small spoilers will be unavoidable, of course, but they will not be moments that affect the plot or the gamer�s perceptions of the characters unduly early. Spoilers from the FF games, however, may be present.

These three games are all of a generation of Squaresoft. Final Fantasy 7 and Xenogears were released within a year of each other, and similarities in both plot and characterization are apparent. Recall, even, that FF7�s Cloud Strife, while in his Lifestream-induced vegetative state, says the word "Zenogais." This has absolutely nothing to so with the plot of the game�it seems, rather, to be a little in-house advertising, and yet another reward for the careful and observant gamer.

Most importantly, however, and a real signifier of this generation of games, is the use of 3D. FF7 came first, with 3D battles and rendered backgrounds. For the first time, also, the gamer could change the camera view of the overworld�this is the first truly 3D world. I remember seeing for the first time the eternal sunset over the peaks of Cosmo Canyon; that was incredible beauty. FF8 followed similar lines, with its chief accomplishment increased resolution and detail of the overworld, with soaring mountains, drifting clouds, and seemingly endless stretches of golden beaches. Xenogears took the 3D work to a different level, by making everything 3-dimensional. Nearly every game scene could be manipulated, showing the viewer any angle they wished of their characters. When the camera would rotate, so would the sprite characters (albeit jerkily), to fully enhance the 3D experience.

But there is far more to these games than rendered polygonal backgrounds, and I would like to offer my opinions on how these three games�all astounding in their own right�compare. As I said above, I am creating this chiefly as a reference for those gamers who have played Final Fantasies 7 and 8, but not Xenogears. I shall break the games down into several categories, and give my evaluations of each. Find your favorite elements, and see how Xenogears stacks up, and if it sounds like your kind of game. As a review, I will give my own personal takes on these factors, and select what I feel to be the best overall game.

STORYLINE DEPTH

Final Fantasy 7 explores threats of world destruction and the confusion of the main character. Cloud lives in his own world through much of the game, and it is his ultimate task to sort out what is true about his experiences and existence from his false memories and beliefs. Thrown into the mix are the characters of Aeris and Tifa, who in their own way cut like a knife through this confusion. As for the party system, there are nine characters, all of whom have large roles, even the hidden characters, Yuffie and Vincent.

Final Fantasy 8 makes the world around the characters less significant, choosing the maturation of a person�s psyche as its major theme. Squall starts out as a consummate loner, but through the aid of his friends from the orphanage and Rinoa�who plays a far larger role than anyone else�he manages to sort through what life is all about, and quite literally find himself and how he feels about his environment. Less important here are Squall�s comrades, as nearly everyone save Rinoa fall into bit roles by the end of the game. Square narrowed its focus, choosing to plumb the depths of a single consciousness rather than group interactions. There is, of course, the standard save-the-world mentality, but in FF8 it seems to be almost irrelevant to the main story.

There really is no contest in this category. Xenogears reigns supreme. Individual character depth for Fei rests somewhere between the befuddled Cloud and the electron microscope under which Squall�s perspective is run. Fei also has personality problems that make Cloud�s look like a bout of indecision over what restaurant to choose for lunch. Fei and friends do indeed embark on a quest to save the world, but it takes more twists and turns than you can shake a stick at it. Heck, good luck even finding it to shake that stick. I cannot even begin to try to dissect the storyline of Xenogears in a brief paragraph, nor do I want to. It is no less than astounding in its scope and depth�every little mystery created at the beginning is answered, and eventually you realize that even those answers were mysteries which are solved by the conclusion.

STORYLINE�CLARITY
Final Fantasy 8 probably has the clearest storyline imaginable. There really is no mystery that goes unanswered�any doubts the gamer has in the beginning are assuaged by the end. Squall moves from Point A to Point Z with surety, if not ease. There are no nagging doubts to speak of.

If FF7 does not have the most confusing plot in the history of gaming, it is certainly in the running. It is entirely possible to play the game without stumbling across a problem�though not an inconsistency�but look beneath the surface, and you can never see the bottom. The writers do an admirable job of avoiding loose ends while creating this behemoth of a plot, but there are simply some questions that cannot be answered. That tends to turn me off, for though I love debate, I don�t want to have to debate about major plot points, such as who the REAL villain of the game is. If you start at A, you can get to Z. If you start thinking about what Points H, M, and Q REALLY mean, God help you.

Xenogears, for its titanic plot, offers great clarity by the end. For that reason, it is my pick for this category. The game gives you things to figure out for yourself without lapsing into the befuddlement created by FF7. You have freedom for interpretation, yet the story subtly guides your mind and manages to deftly get its point across. That is not to say that it is as straightforward as FF8 tends to be�to continue the analogy, you get from A to Z, but you are at T before you realize that you better go back and look at it one more time.

ESTIMATED TIME OF COMPLETION (STORY LENGTH)
Xenogears runs around sixty hours of pure story�that is, no hours spent increasing levels by fighting random battles. Final Fantasy 7 is considerably shorter, running about 30 hours of storyline (not counting the time you spend beating your head against the wall wondering what the hell Professor Gast has to do with anything). FF8 is a happy medium; I estimate that you can spend about 40 hours actually playing the plot. Now, all of this isn�t to say that Xenogears is too long, it simply says that you have a LOT of work to do to get through it.

However, if you really decide you want to suck the marrow out of all of these games, and do absolutely everything, you�re looking at about 100 hours across the board. There is less extra stuff to do in Xenogears than the FF games.

BALANCE (LEVELS VS. EVENTS)
When I go into the final dungeon, I like to make sure I�m going to come out alive, so I tend to max out my characters. For balance, I hold up Final Fantasy 4 (2 in the US) as supreme�you never need to "level-up" in that game.

FF7 can take a long time to master all the materia you need to utilize the giant materia, and quite often learning all of the Limit Breaks for every character eats up the game clock. However, if you choose to only max out three characters to get yourself to the end, it happens fairly quickly, especially if you know the enemies to use. When I completed the game, I had Cloud at l. 99, and supporting characters at ll. 85-98.

Xenogears is balanced very nicely; I did a little levelling in the beginning, and my characters cruised until right up to the end. At the end of the game, I chose to spend a LOT of time and money (I estimate 2 million Gold) on Chu-Chu, but I feel it was well worth the trouble and expense. When I completed the game, I had Fei at l. 92, and the supporting characters at ll. 84-87.

For FF8, I was so enraptured by the characters and the butt-kicking Guardian Forces, I decided to fully maximize them. It wasn�t really necessary, however�the game balanced itself out fairly well. The only problem I had was Eden. Coming so late in the game, it is a fairly lengthy process to have this GF reach her full potential. At the end, I had every character and GF at l. 100.

GRAPHICS�CHARACTERS
This is one of the very few stumbling blocks of Xenogears. It is sprite-based, and the sprites are amazingly articulated, but with poor graphical resolution. They look nice from a distance, but the game doesn�t keep its distance. Virtually every time you walk through a door, the screen zooms in for a moment, and the close-up turns the sprites into something that would make Rorschach gag. The same goes for the Gears. The costumes of the characters are very spiffy, however, and Xenogears also employs anime-style face shots for the dialogue boxes. Those are beautiful and each character has several different expressions. The Gears are another saving grace, for they are beautifully designed and simply radiate power. About the only Gear design I really disliked was Stier (both forms), but the rest were fantastic.

FF7 was the first of these games to try to use polygons, and the effect is a little disturbing. Not only are they blocky, and in the Playstation version devoid of mouths(!), but it makes movement and articulation rather poor. Cruddy polygons overlap themsleves in ways that shouldn�t happen. I also had a problem with Vincent in the City of Ancients. This is one of the most emotional scenes in the game, and Vincent has one leg sticking straight up�as if he decided to closely examine his shoelaces without bending over. Yikes!

FF8 reigns in this category. The polygons that were so troubling in FF7 are largely perfected here. There are still occasional problems, but it is obvious that the design team tried to rectify the troubles of the earlier game. Motion has been nearly perfected; the characters move fluidly and with precision. Squall hangs his head, Rinoa claps her hands and giggles, Quistis taps her foot, and you are completely caught up in this world. They even look good in close-up, a far cry from the sprites of Xenogears.

GRAPHICS TOWNS/DUNGEONS
FF7 features pre-rendered backgrounds are very well done, even though some of them strike me as a little plain. The designers also seemed to have some problems with lighting throughout�though there was not much that was too dark, many backgrounds were too light. There were also problems with characters interacting with backgrounds, but that�s another category.

Xenogears uses polygonal backgrounds, since the vast majority of them have to be rotatable in three dimensions. This created, at best, some boredom, and at worst, some downright confusion over where I had just been and whether I was just here or not. I particularly noticed this in the Duneman�s Desert, and it disappointed me. The backgrounds, though well-created (particularly the final dungeon) also suffered from the same "zooming in" problems that the characters did, becoming simply messy for a long second. The coloring was also a bit of an issue for me�some underground levels, and especially the Sewers of Nortune, were simply too bright. Or perhaps "washed-out" is the better term.

Once again, Final Fantasy 8 takes the prize. This game consistently amazed me with the attention paid to every last detail of the towns, and even Ultimecia�s castle. If a dungeon is supposed to be dark and dirty, it�s dark and dirty (King�s Tomb). If it�s clean and futuristic, light sparkles off of every surface (Esthar). The pre-rendered backgrounds kept things from being too repetitive.

GRAPHICS BATTLES
All three of these games feature stunning battle sequences.

FF7 has some polygon problems, but these are more than made up for by the camera movement. This is executed deftly in this game, and is one of my favorite elements of it. Enemies are nicely detailed, and vividly, beautifully, colored. Spells are just plain spiffy, and the summons as well. The only criticisms I have for this one is that the Bahamut summons look too similar to each other, but that�s very minor criticism. As for the characters, they were nicely drawn, and well-animated. End-of-battle "victory dances" were fun, particularly Cait Sith and Cid�s lighting up after a hard battle.

FF8 pretty much masters the polygon-tearing difficulties of 7. The enemies are wonderfully drawn, if not colored as nicely. Guardian Force castings are simply mind-blowing; I never got tired of watching Diablos. The regular spells are nice, as well, and lighting effects are handled with a beautiful subtelty, particularly when you Draw magic. The camera movement was a bit over-the-top, and there are times when I wished it would settle down. However, this is more than made up for by the over-the-enemy�s-shoulder shots. We finally get to see our heroes as the baddies do, and it was my favorite camera position in any game. For the characters themselves, the polygons are very nice. The only problem I had was with the victory sequences, where the dances were mostly boring (except for Irvine and Selphie) and the camera would zoom in on a character, revealing a hideous face shot.

When I think of battles in Xenogears, the first thing that pops into my mind is lighting effects. When Fei slings his Chi attacks, they are supposed to be bright lights, and sure enough, the rest of the screen darkens to provide the contrast, a very nice touch. Also, backgrounds, especially in the Lighthouse and the ice caps, provide exquisite interpretations of the lighting. The rest of the magic was fairly boring however, except for a few nice bits, such as the Coin Toss of Bart and Emeralda�s Anemo Wave. The Deathblows and Gear Attack Combos (especially Kishin) are stunning, and the fact that the characters pick up and toss around the smaller enemies, but not the bigger ones, is a wonderful touch.

CHALLENGE�DUNGEONS AND BOSSES
I must say that I don�t look for great amounts of challenge in these games. When I play an RPG, I do it for the storyline and the game itself�whether any given boss is difficult or not matters less to me. In fact, sometimes easier is better.

I�ll start with Xenogears. Really, if you take a little time at the beginning to level up a touch, things aren�t too difficult. In the beginning, the Gears are absurdly powerful, but then the bad guys start matching that strength. One of the things I noticed about most of the game is that Gears barely get out of major boss battles (if your levels are even slightly low). Many times I would die fighting a boss, or have that boss bring me to an inch of my Gears� mechanical lives. It was pretty fun, and provided its share of adrenaline rushes. If you like figuring out specific tricks to beating bosses, Xenogears is your game. Several bosses heal themselves frequently, so you have to use your head before your fists. There are no hyper-difficult battles (a la FF�s Weapons) in this game.

In FF7, I found most of the bosses to be pretty easy. This is by no means bad; in fact I enjoyed the fact that I only died once through the vast majority of the game. It wasn�t discouraging, and it kept me in touch more with the characters, I feel. Then I met Mssrs. Ruby and Emerald Weapon. These beasts, particularly Emerald, took me a while. The fact that they were optional was a brilliant move on the part of the design team�if I was forced to face them, I would have hated it, and stomped off complaining about how hard it was. Instead I kept coming back for more, until the one time Emmy didn�t pummel me.

FF8 also had fairly easy bosses, in my opinion, although there were some sticky moments. Omega Weapon was great for the same reasons as the other Weapons. This game also had its share of mental battles, where a sound strategy was more important than sheer strength. It�s probably my favorite for this category.

CHALLENGE�SECRETS & MINIGAMES
No RPG would be complete without tons of hidden objects and secrets to explore. I thought FF8 had some REALLY difficult ones, particularly the Obel Lake side quest. I wouldn�t go outside for a week, for fear the rocks would talk to me. One of the nice features is that almost every side quest and hidden dungeon was available right up until Disc 4, when you no longer dealt with the overworld. Triple Triad, and its host of related items and such that you could Card Mod, is absolutely my favorite mini-game.

Xenogears has secrets? What secrets? No, seriously, there are a few treasures to dig up (took me forever to find Midori�s Ring), but not as much as the other two games. The reason for this is fairly obvious �sheer story length; there wasn�t much room for anything else. Another reason is an interesting side-effect of the 3D manipulation�you can peek into corners and behind walls to find goodies in chests. Of course, you may never reach them (see the next category). There is really only one mini-game: Speed. And it makes me retch. I absolutely hate it�I didn�t think there was really any learning curve, unlike Triple Triad. Also, you couldn�t play very many matches, especially after leaving the Thames. Why bother? You get really good stuff by winning the games�if you can.

FF7 had, in my opinion, an almost ideal balance of fun and sweat for the secrets. Sure, some of them were obnoxious, but most of them were reasonable enough that they didn�t have you running for the strategy guide. The sheer variety of mini-games (snowboarding!) and levels like the Crashed Gelnika were great touches. And I don�t think I could ever say enough about Chocobo Breeding. These are some of the few reasons I really replay this game, rather than just looking at select cut scenes.

GAMEPLAY PLAY CONTROL
I included this category for two reasons, both of them dealing with Xenogears; therefore, I�ll start with that game. When I say it�s a 3D game, I mean it�you can even jump nearly everywhere. I couldn�t get enough of this when the game started; I swear I spent half an hour just jumping around tree branches. "Yay! I can jump!" Sure, the jumps weren�t exactly precise, but so what? Then I got further into the game, where they started constructing vertical dungeons with moving platforms. For these, the game turned into Mario Bros. (except no self-respecting Mario Bro would jump so poorly). That�s not something I look for in an RPG. I cannot tell you how many times I screamed aloud in the Tower of Babel. "Yay. I can @%#$ing jump." Then there�s the airship. I always take a nice deep breath when I finally get an airship in an RPG, for it heralds new freedom in exploration�to zip around the world map like a maniac, to freely seek out new towns and dungeons, to boldly split infinitives no one has split before. Then I got the airship in THIS game. It handles like, well, a boat (which it was, before being retrofitted). Acceleration is nil, and the handling is just depressing. If you play Xenogears after FF8, you will find yourself longing for the good old days of the Balamb Garden. You think I�m kidding.

What can I say about play control in FF7 and 8? Not much. It�s decent. You may be upset that you can�t jump, but count your blessings. And the Highwind and Ragnarok can fly circles around Xenogears� contribution (I�d tell you the name, but it�s a bit of a spoiler). If you feel the need for speed, stick with FF.

GAMEPLAY�BATTLES
Battles were good in FF7, and they used the tried and true menu-based combat system. You could turn it on Active if you wanted to duke it out with the bad guys, or set it on Wait and have your lunch while you played (just don�t get anything on the controller). There were lots of things to improve, between mastering materia and gaining levels, so there was the possibility that after almost every battle you would get a little exp.-related surprise.

FF8 would have been as good as FF7 if it weren�t for the Draw system. I didn�t mind having limited quantities of any given spell; what I minded was having to sit for half an hour in front of a Bite Bug or running around The Island Closest to Hell like a mental patient in order to get those last two Ultima spells. Aside from that, it�s the usual turn-based stuff.

Xenogears breaks the mold for these games. The fights are truly interactive, for you select combinations of attacks, or use those combos to execute Deathblows�this can be done both on foot and in Gears (sort of). It certainly keeps you more in tune to the battles, and is far more immersive. My only objection is that, for some Gears, getting the Infinity Level attacks seemed to be a totally random thing. But they were well worthwhile.

FMV CONTENT/QUALITY
Someone said to me one time that they thought Square forgot to put the FMVs (Full-Motion Videos) into Xenogears. I would have to agree. I like them a lot, though some complain that they are a waste of disk space. Most of the major characters are introduced with FMVs, which is nice, but I wish the Gears were. You never see a Gear like that until late in the game. The format is a little different from the FF games�here, the movies are anime. They are very well drawn, and featured voices. My chief complaint is that sometimes the mouth movement (Japanese) is VASTLY different from the dialogue (English). It seems as if a bit of creative editing could have remedied that, but what do I know? Oh, and speaking of voices (ha!), the casting flat-out sucked. The visual quality is decent enough, but sometimes grainy.

FF7 also featured anime movies, but they leaned more heavily on CG, rather than the hand-drawn style. Really, the differences are not large. The FF7 FMVs tend to be longer than Xenogears�, and there are no voices. After playing Xenogears, however, that�s a good thing. Subtitles were used in lieu of actors. The FF7 FMVs are action-packed, and really very well done. The movies were used liberally, and to tell the most dramatic portions of the story, whereas Xenogears was stuck with polygonal cutscenes for the same moments. Like its companion game, the quality can be grainy.

I cannot say enough about the FMVs in Final Fantasy 8. Some may call it little more than eye candy, but oh, what eye candy it is. The opening movie is simply stunning, and there are no wasted moments. The love of Squall and Rinoa truly unfolds through the movies, and we see them often enough that they almost make the whole game look that good. The visual aspects of the movie are breathtaking in clarity (like watching TV), but where they truly shine is in the presentation. The SeeD ball is incomparable, and the space scenes are incredibly emotional. Square transcended the need from voices or printed words in this game; the faces of the characters were far more expressive than anything they might have actually said.

MUSIC
Each of these games has incredible music, and it�s very difficult for me to rate them.
The gems of FF7�s soundtrack are unquestionably Aeris� Theme and One-Winged Angel. Listening to a fully orchestrated version of the former is enough to bring a tear to my eye. The overworld music is decent, and the battle music is good, though I find it one of the more repetitive tunes in the game.

FF8 is studded with wonders, including Eyes On Me. The use of that song in so many different ways throughout the game is truly revolutionary, in my opinion. Breezy shows off the ability of the synthesizers in creating a classical guitar sound, one of the hardest instruments to duplicate. About the only disappointment on the soundtrack is the overworld music�it doesn�t seem to fit the rest of the game.

Xenogears has the best overall music (but it�s darn close!), though the only pieces that can compare to the titles above are A Far Away Promise and Pieces of Two. I did not find a single dud on the soundtrack, and often lingered in an area to hear more of the music (especially Shevat). This game�s music is not done by Nobuo Uematsu of Final Fantasy fame, proving that Square has more than one excellent composer.

CHARACTERS
If I were to make a list of my favorite characters in these three games, it might be a while before I got to one in Xenogears. This doesn�t mean that the characterization is lousy, rather, it�s a testament to the power of the FF games. I have a soft spot for the female characters, so Elly seems like a good candidate, but she�s a victim of circumstance here. I thought she was a potentially dynamite character, but I didn�t really like the way she was treated throughout the game. If I could disentangle her from that, I would, but I cannot. Fei is great (all of them), and Chu-Chu would almost always make me smile, but that�s about it. The rest of the characters seemed a little too predictable, or did things that were completely out of character for them up to that point. Granted, you don�t know as much as you think you do about them� The villains are always important, but the real star of the evil show was Ramsus. I didn�t really think he was that decent when I first met him, but the more time I spent with him, the more I enjoyed his ranting and raving, and the way he ends up.

Final Fantasy 7 has my favorite video game character of all time�Aeris Gainsborough. She is perfect in nearly every way, and though her direct appearance in the game is fairly brief, she anticipates so much of the rest of the game (Cloud going psycho), and is so powerful, that the rest of the adventure is summed up by Cloud�s declaration before the final battles: "For Aeris!" She is truly the driving force of the game. I am also a big fan of Vincent, but aside from him, none of the rest stand out particularly for me. That is not to say they are not excellent; it says that there is a whole field of excellence. With one more exception. Sephiroth is my favorite villain in these three games�he is the one I love to hate (for reasons which are probably easily guessed). The argument can also be put forward that he is something of a tragic character, and that strengthens my approval.

FF8 is absolutely loaded with fantastic characters, even the ones with smaller roles. Rinoa is my second favorite of all, and Squall drew me in enough to yell at him in frustration, or laugh when he did. Irvine and Selphie provide fantastic back-up players, with the best one-liners since FF6. As for villains, Ultimecia is a bit of a downer, but Edea makes a good villain, at least in Disc 1. Seifer is a wonderful ego-driven baddie (almost an archetype for these games�Ramsus and Sephiroth are the same), even if his considerable characterization pales to the masterful Ramsus.

ENDING
While I most certainly won�t go into many specifics, the ending is really one of the major reasons anyone plays an RPG. It�s essential to see how the characters turn out, and whether everyone really DOES live happily ever after.

The ending of Xenogears befits the rest of the game. It solves the last few remaining mysteries and presents a solid conclusion to the storyline. It�s almost all FMV, like the other two games, so it�s visually good. All of these things combine for a good conclusion. But the Final Fantasy endings are better than good, and Xenogears simply can�t stack up.

The ending of FF7 can leave you with more questions than answers if you don�t know exactly what you�re looking at, but that�s par for the course of this game. The reappearance of Aeris elicited cries of surprise from me, and up to that point, those were almost the most emotional scenes of any game (though it still didn�t compare to the end of Disc 1). "The Promised Land�I think I understand now." Cloud is looking into the abyss of Lifestream, and he finally figures it out. The Meteor and Lifestream scenes made for the most tense ending of any game, and the epilogue featuring Nanaki and his grandpups was touching indeed. All of this puts it above Xenogears, but I�m not done�.

Final Fantasy 8�s closing minutes are absolutely incomparable. I laughed and cried, and experienced emotions never solicited by a game before. I took part in Squall and Rinoa�s and Laguna and Raine�s love, and shared both their joy and their sorrow. To see Seifer smiling up at the Garden did my soul good, and that�s the moment when I realized what could truly be done with a villain, to make him far more than he seems. There was comedy in the "home movie" sequences, and it was wonderfully tempered by the last scene between Squall and Rinoa. It was footage that any director should be proud to create, and is proof indeed that video games aren�t just for kids.

OVERALL
So, after all that, what�s the best? All of these games are totally unique experiences, and all of them are in many ways fuller than what I have described here. Each is certainly worth playing, and I recommend all three to anyone even remotely interested in them.

But the moment of truth: Final Fantasy 8 is my favorite game. The storyline and battles of Xenogears and the power of a few characters of FF7 is not enough to sway FF8 from its throne. From the prologue to the epilogue, it is simply spellbinding.



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