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I just replayed Mass Effect (Legendary Ed Trilogy) and as I sat watching the credits, feeling that hollow feeling games used to give us when the credits rolled and we didnt know what to do with ourselves after 200 hours of immersion, I thought of Xenosaga. The two series' have a TON of the same themes and ideas. And I thought about how it was the first series that made me feel that. Sitting and watching the credits, just a teenager, sobbing in my bedroom because the endings of each game were so touching and mind bending, and when theyre over and theres no more installments to come, they just leave a void. Xenosaga was my obsession as a teen. I bought the first one on a whim because the Microplay store was out of Kingdom Hearts copies. I was only 12. These games shaped me, gave me early onset existential crisis, and I loved every minute of it and will never forget it. As an artist and also a perfectionist, the idea of failure and self criticism is more than familiar to me, but, its funny, as a consumer, I could never ever call Xenosaga a failure.

Hi!! I found your IMOQ video a long time ago, I played both of these games as a kid. They are so intensely ingrained into my background noise of things I love (The OSTs are always there, I swear...) that I'm glad I saw someone giving these games a genuine analysis <3 The thing that really, truly draws me in about this series is nothing manages to get that mix of mystical, mundane, and almost unknowable digital horror all in one. I'd say my biggest "problem" that isn't really a problem with G.U as an entry in the series is it sometimes seems to forget that these people are playing a game. I think that's on purpose, but that's one thing about the older entries that, sure, can swing the other way sometimes, but was a big draw for me. There's something about this world, and the almost mythological way that the internet seems to work in it, spawning entities of great power that bring, in auras words "salvation or destruction", mysteries hidden behind textures and random bits of code, all of it. IMOQ delivered this alot, //sign delivered it alot, and G.U when it hits it hits it hard. I hope any return we get to it can emphasize the feeling of regular people, the thing G.U does well with its main cast at least, mixed with the horror and mystical theming around IMOQ, the folk tale esque dream logic of a digital realm that's built to cater to you but has something else happening underneath it. If those two elements can come together into a cohesive story, there's...so much.

If I am correct, after Ryou Misaki awoke from his coma, all his memories of The World were wiped out somehow and due to the incident, his parents forbade him from playing the game. Jump to 2017, Ryou is now 17 years old, and from an email chain from one of the greeting cards, you learn that Haseo lives by himself, meaning he must have moved out of his parent's house shortly before a friend of his (either from school or possibly from his part time job) recommended he try out The World

Also, 2 things when it comes to Saku and Bo. 1st is that it implies a few times throughout the games that Saku and Bo actually dont have different character designs like the game has you believe, and that one or the other's design is the only one there is. One of these implications comes from when Haseo first meets Saku, there are plenty of very noticeable changes in Saku and Bo's designs, but Haseo doesnt realize it isnt Bo until he notices that the personality of the person in front of him was entirely different. The 2nd thing is that on one of my many playthroughs (back in the PS2 version) I decided to see what happens if you actually tell Saku to disappear. I was expecting Saku to claim Haseo was actually a jerk and that she couldnt trust Bo to him, so she would decide to stay anyway, but as it turns out, no, she really does disappear, in fact, in one of the later scenes, when everyone shares their power with Haseo, Bo is there and Saku is like a floating Spirit next to him, but tell Saku to disappear and she will not be present in that scene. Next time I play the games, I might tell Saku to disappear again, cuz I want to see what happens to your Party List, since in the PS2 version, Sakubo was only one character slot and it was random whether you would get Saku or Bo in the list, while in Last Recode, both of them are given their own space, so you could choose which one you wanted at any time. I want to see if Saku would become dimmed like when someone is offline or if her contact wouldd just disappear all together

Go to Theta: Galloping Wrath's Blue Cloud. You'll find something cool there. I've played G.U. so much, it's the game(s) I have the largest amount of playtime in between the PS2 versions and Last Recode, and I can easily say I've done EVERYTHING one could possibly do in these games, and I'm just gonna point this out, I think Alkaid was 100% supposed to be Haseo's true love interest, but due to him needing to choose Atoli over Shino at the end of Vol 3, they made her a Lost One because they had no idea how to make that happen if Alkaid was still around the entire time. One of the reasons I feel this is the case is the fact that of all the female characters, plus Endrance, Alkaid has THE most email chains that end with something romantic, this includes the Promise Card Marriage Event, with a total of 4, (all the others having either none or at most 2) one of which being a full-on marriage proposal outside the Promise Card. Another reason is because of all the wedding events, Alkaid is the only one who receives a full loving embrace from Haseo

What do you mean most people have never heard of Final Fantasy 10?

Also this was so great to see i love this video

i liked reading some of the extra data but i never watched online jack. so years later im finding out that sakaki a 10 year old edgelord

No, I want IMOQ to get a simple graphical HD Remaster with the gameplay left alone

Got this game back on relase because the big manga Magazine hyped it to be the first real Anime MMO game for offline play. And to this day not a single game made you feel like you are really playing a MMo like Dot hack. I really loved the random mails from npcs players, the fake forums that discussed things and random players running around. Played till part 3 and then part 4 was not available here in germany and was delayed. Got the 4 Games a year ago for around 200€ (jep it hurts but for someone who plays wow and such this is a fair sum of the hours you can have fun with it) and it was still awesome. I think this series together with the Breath of Fire series is one of the lost childs of JRPGs that do not get a rerelease what so ever

SAO is worthless .hack is the og goat

I just stumbled across this video and had to break it up but it's so phenomenal I wanted to leave some of my own thoughts. I've only ever seen people play GU blind or as mega fans consuming everything .hack has to offer, so it was interesting to see your perspective as someone who played the first games but had little connection with Roots or the all consuming outside media. Atoli has long been one of my favorite characters in this franchise since playing Volume 2 as it came out. I don't think I can as elegantly as you mention my feelings on her. With .hack it blends the line between anime and video game and I think CyberConnect2's body of work shows they love anime so much. So in that spirit I think a lot of part 3 fell on shonen tropes rather than just letting a story be a bittersweet ending. Ryou Misaki's identity as Haseo was something that wasn't well guarded, many of the outside media outright state it and with ReCode's Switch Import also came with GU Begins, which is a supplemental manga that also is just about Ryou Misaki. The games never outright state this and I feel like this was intentionally a decision to make them to a degree standalone. It's why Kuhn, Yata and Endrance all feel like they're missing a huge part of their potential. I'm glad you were able to find it with Yata, but CC2 seemed to want to keep it all behind data books and the multimedia project of it all. .hack//IMOQ was also a multimedia project, but with GU it seemed that they wanted a huge undertaking of making a ton of content for GU and wanted you to have to experience it all for the fullest picture, even if content contradicted itself, much like how GU and Roots have slightly different interpretations of Haseo vs Azure Kite or the final episode of Roots just not caring about spoiling content from the games.

When these games first came out, I quit halfway through the Cubia arc. When the remaster came out, I picked it up, not sure why it was I had never finished it the first time. And then, once again, I quit halfway through the Cubia arc. "Oh yeah," I remembered, "the Cubia arc sucks."

Wish they gave this franchise more love

having grown up with the .hack series and GU itself primarily actually keeping me from committing self harm. atoli yes is a top favorite among the fandom. alkaid has a friendly tie since we all love our tsundere.

Best combat system of IMOQ was Fragment, which allowed to link skills and items to certain buttons so you could actually fight without pausing, as the game did not pause for selecting skills or items because it was meant to be online

I don’t know why this video didn’t get more views-it’s very well written and put together!

Heart of the cards. Lmfaooo

Looking back, these games remind me of jrpg hack n slash dungeon crawlers such as diablo or baldurs gate. But 3rd person vs isometric.

I want this either remade and also have a PC port

Wait... Someone on TH-cam that actually gets Shion's betrayal in Ep III? They understand it instead of hurling abuse at a young woman that carries _ALL_ the PTSD? May wonders never cease. Good video.

What probably needs to happen is someone to adapt the .hack games into an anime to bring some populairy. Perfect time for an anime since SAO, videogames, and isekai are popular.

my biggest gripe with GU is them pronouncing Morganna the way they do xD

in all honesty, while it is clunky af, i damn love the combat and i had very little struggle on my first pt getting used to it. I MUCH prefer it to GU and my only fear of a remake is that they'll mess with the combat, which kinda messes with the vibe a bit... i have always called this game a "menu based NON-menu based rpg" because you basically HAVE to menu xD but i really love that, honestly. this isnt a dis towards those who find it a turn off, but i just really hope they nyever change it much i think the best change might be to make it like .hack//FRAGMENT (the mmo that was japanese only), where they made it so the game doesnt pause while in a menu so you can move while menuing.

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After Sailor Moon Crystal and PSO2, I doubt we need a remake. Maybe a reboot if it's really clever. Praise Jesus and his Holy Son, Jesus.

This is my favorite game ~ i couldn't get to play the final chapter on PS4 tho :(

Anyone else find it wierd that in the game universe they use a vr type head set indacating a first-person prespective, but we the player play in third person.

I loved .hack infection. Good game. Or infected? Always wondered where it went from there. Found some DVDs years after with some of the shows recorded on it. Still haven't gotten all the mystery on it. Still confused about the general plot.

They lost the original master copies they can't remake it the "easy way"

.hack is superior to Sword Art Online in every conceivable way. My mind will not be changed.

As someone that read all novels/manga, watched the anime, and played the remastered all around G.U. in a very short period of time. The novels are by far my favorite telling of this part series. They tell the story in a different light using features of it in completely different ways that I personally really enjoyed! Also Kuhn's character is the best in them compared to the rest of the media that showcases him. Always, greatly enjoyed this as a recap as I debate another 90 hour playthrough of the games, but now I just want to reread the novels instead aha

About .hack//roots being spoiler heavy. The first volume came out while the anime was airing, and the second volume came out the day after it ended. So for those who followed both contents in parallel/ in real time, it gave them just the right amount of supplementary materials, and sometimes spoilers. I was a high schooler in Japan at the time, and I remember the reveal of O-van being Tri-edge right before vol.2 came out made fans online crazy and confused.

th-cam.com/video/9ulUhubUdYc/w-d-xo.htmlsi=j1QNi2PQlSIPYWlt happy 20 years hack🤩. Too bad but the game dont have a remasterd 😢. Ps: why bandai make first the second game remastered but no the first?

1:53:00 huh. yea thats kinda true. Its just known knowledge at this point that i didnt question it.

I loved your video-it perfectly captured the essence of the story. I had this game as a child and made it all the way to the final boss, but I couldn't beat him. Eventually, I stopped playing and never revisited the game, especially after my younger brother sold my collection at a flea market. :cry: Fortunately, I can now use an emulator to relive the game as an adult. I hope they consider making a remake, though I'm not sure the fan base is large enough to justify one. Time will tell.

I loved your first retrospective on .Hack. Somehow I’m JUST now seeing this in my recommended. Great video!!

So, I grew up on the .hack games, played the first tetralogy and such, and grew to love it. But GU? GU became my personal fav childhood game along with KH2 and pokemon. I only played (back then) Vol 3 of GU. I didn't know we had a sequel series and the moment I did, vol 3 was out. But I was able to figure things out by playing Vol3. I put SO many hours in Vol3, restarted it many times, did different game runs and more with what I had. Even when I got a 360 and PS3, I would continue to play with it, until my ol ps2 finally broke down. So when Last Recode was announced? I was happy and hyped as hell and I still own my copy and a switch copy of it too. Platinumed it as well. Its still one of my fav childhood games to this date. I do admit it does have issues, especially Vol4. I just find that so short, not to mention not enough content unlike the last 3 vols. I just wished they gave us more, ya know?

Bro it's 2024. Aura is a real, living being now. Artificial Intelligence has reached human levels of sentience and capabilities, evil mega corporations run the world and are slowly being dismantled, and virtual reality technology has reached beyond the levels of what was promised to us without most of the downsides (people still have a lot to learn from SIGN though). Growing up in this world has been the best thing that ever happened to me, and being a fan of dot hack gave me life lessons that prepared me for the world in ways I never could've comprehended. Don't be a pessimist. Life is just now getting good.

In all Honesty, the Dot Hack G.U. series is where the whole Franchise Ended right here, everything else that came after it like "Link" and "Quantum" never happened.

I appreciate that you took the time to process these games as a whole when writing and framing your video. Most others give a direct, linear summary of the games with whatever insight they have at the end of the video. The way you contextualize everything throughout makes this a very satisfying and enjoyable watch.

It really needs a remake - I'd kill for it.

Bamco doesn’t give af.

My biggest regret to this day is that I got rid of the original 4 .hack games a few years after I finished them.

This channel should be mandatory viewing for every JRPG fan

Only a remaster and added dialogue or catalogs about the events in . Hack SIGN I don’t want them f up this story with in w remake with wokeness making Morgana some frustrated lesbian AI or that the players are people of color frustrated with a hetero biological male patriarchy and complaining about white cis men all the time while trying to escape it in virtual space and that the programs like Skeith are just oppressive straight white males.

Only complaint so far is the misgendering of Tsukasa since he is trans, but love the synopsis otherwise.

Looking online currntly i found outbreak and infection both for around $100.

thank you for your video. Greetings from Argentina

I just stared playing GU last recode on switch and it is good so far but it makes me want to play Final Fantasy 14 instead lol