So We Started Xenosaga Episode I: Der Wille zur Macht

Good morning everyone,

Well last night's stream ended up featuring a game from the PlayStation 2 era in the form of Xenosaga Episode I: Der Wille zur Macht! Ya'll might remember a couple of years ago I went looking for Episode II and Episode III of the trilogy with the intentions of playing them... particularly when I found out that Katsuhiro Harada at Bandai Namco killed the entire prospect of a remaster to continue focus on Tekken 7. Anyway, I did play Xenosaga episode 1 20 years ago... but I found it to be quite difficult to get  a handle on things.

That was not the case last night, as I really caught on to the mechanics of how the combat system works and understood that some careful puzzle solving would be needed. With that in mind I really spent way too much time grinding out a few early levels to try and give myself a tactical advantage in terms of trying to over power enemies. The combat system is turn base with chances to either jump ahead a turn or (which also applies to enemies)

Perhaps what really stands out about Xenosaga Episode 1 is that the voice acting is solid, the musical score is incredible and the visual, despite being 20 years old, still hold up. For the stream, it's presented to viewers in a 4:3 aspect ratio, but as I'm playing it, it's 16:9, and let me tell you this, a remaster would just need to involve a proper up-scaling. Keep the original ratio, but a proper HD make over would do wonders.

Now this game does have something incoming with Persona 5 Royal... in that cut scenes, story and lore can take forever. We did a 6 hour stream (not my intention for a Tuesday night), and I figure maybe 2 hours were cutscenes to move the story along... and we only just got off the Woglinde (Which again also indicate that I did spend a lot of time farming enemies to level up).

I'm really looking forward to continue it, and I think it will end up being a Saturday night game starting next week because I'm not too keen on running the PlayStation 2 more than one night a week for extended periods of time. 

Twitch Clips

• Effective!
• Kos-Mos Shot Him In The Back! 
• Defeating The Minotaur!
  

For the raid we dropped in on x_lumineee as they were playing Final Fantasy XIV over at twitch.tv/x_lumineee!  

There were two small stream interruptions last night, but again the recovery was rather quick compared to previous issues. Of course at around 1015 AM this morning the internet went down fully, and I did report it directly to the Senior Tech at Xfinity.

The past, the present and the future walked into a bar. It was tense.

What did Eminem say when 50 Cent made him a sweater? "Gee, you knit?"

Song of the Day: Six Feet Under by Billie Eilish

Today's Fitness Boxing 2 daily workout featured Intermediate Combo #1, Difficult Challenge Combo #1 and Biceps Shape Focus Combo for 34 minutes.

If you're looking for tools to help with streaming or communicating from home with work, check out what Xsplit offers over at Xsplit.com, use the promo code CASDEN to save 10% on your order! If you're looking for just general stuff, of course you can swing over to Amazon using my affiliate link: https://amzn.to/3L8N1Yj.   

For tonight's stream we'll be playing Fallout 76, with the goal of progressing various quests. We may be joined by Iceman as well, we'll see in that regard.

So on that note we'll see you later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden!