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How Does One Make A Direct Sequel to an MMORPG? (XBCX)


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I know I'm late to the party, but I just completed Chapter 12 of Xenoblade Chronicles X today. The fights were cake, mostly because I did some grinding and spent all my funds on one of every Medium and Heavy level 50 Skell. Plus some of those Fuel consumables I loaded up on from the Division Rewards let me maintain Skell use into the final phase, breaking it with Meteors and Busters. But a year and a half after getting the game, I just wanted the story done at last. Now I can play with builds not Longsword-Assault Rifle and casually complete all the quest lines, affinity quests, heart-to-hearts, recruit Mia, and tackle the Global Nemesis.

Although I though Lin and Tatsu were too prevalent, and the villains were generic, I felt the feel of the plot and the world was good. The Avatar was handled decently (they weren't overly special or praised to high heaven), barring the strange lack of choice on that one C11 moment. Elma was the real main character and was handled pretty well, but the plot wouldn't work if the player could see inside her head from the get go.

Here are my speculations by the way- (Xenogears and Xenoblade Chronicles spoilers)

Spoiler

How has humanity been alive since the crash on Mira if the Lifehold Core's memory and consciousness storage was totally destroyed from the start? That, and Lao's survival (which is of less interest to me, but reminds me of the recent complaints regarding a character in Persona 5 and their future) are the cliffhangers at the end of XBCX.

I haven't played Xenosaga, but I have played Xenogears and Xenoblade Chronicles. And if the Father of the Xeno series Tetsuya Takahashi is still a Gnostic and using Gnostic concepts in his games, then this points me towards one answer for explaining the Lifehold mystery. The Monad.

A being, is keeping humanity alive and forcing them to remain on Mira (Luxaar mentions the Ganglion can't get off the planet, and Professor B is even kept from time traveling due to some mysterious force), along with the Ganglion and their slaves and the Ma'non for some reason. Furthermore, it rendered all the species on Mira capable of understanding each other verbally and surviving on the planet.

What is this being? I don't know. "The Great One" of whom Luxaar speaks? The loving god of the Samaar? Perhaps, if the Samaar were so wise and advanced, they invented a machine designed to insure that at least some Samaar or their descendants would always be preserved somewhere in the universe in some capacity (a "Lifehold Core 40000000.0"). This would be like Alvis/the Monado. Or perhaps this being I call the Monad is wholly apart from humanity, and is only using the lifeforms gathered on Mira for its own interests. This would be like the Wave Existence.

Elma says she's agnostic on the existence of souls during C12, but perhaps what happened was the Monad was capable of saving many of the White Whale's mimeosomes and the things they needed to survive, but not the Lifehold Core (some NPC conversation IIRC suggests something odd affected the crash of the White Whale and without it, it wouldn't have survived). And instead, the Monad through its incomprehensible powers that connect the material and the immaterial transferred the souls/consciousnesses/memories of humanity into the mimeosomes. Or, the Monad still has the immaterial aspects of humanity tucked away in an immaterial storehouse, which is safer than leaving them in a material storehouse- the Lifehold Core.

This Monad is clearly very aloof if it let the Earth be destroyed, and let humanity argue with itself even after crashing on Mira. Just as one would expect from a being operating at the cosmic plane of existence, a being which is also capable of interacting with the immaterial and thus not so concerned with material deaths and pains and whatnot.

Of course, if we have a Monad, we should also have a Sophia and a Demiurge.

The Sophia in Xenogears was Elly (and maybe Miang), and the Demiurge was Deus. In Xenoblade Chronicles, the Sophia is Meyneth, and the Demiurge Zanza.

Both XG and XB had Sophias whose role was important in the grand scheme of things, but they weren't anywhere near as important as the Demiurges and Monads, or so it felt to me. The Sophia in Xenoblade Chronicles X is however extremely important, and her name is Elma.

Our xenoform Sophia came to Earth alone from the heavens above and afar, and bestowed it with the mystifying intergalactic Knowledge, Wisdom, and Insight which allowed it to survive its material extinction through Project Exodus. The Lifehold Core which could only have been created with Elma's guiding hand and which she is the sole administrator of, can move the immaterial (consciousness, memory) in and out of the material, which it can manipulate at will. Unfortunately, our Sophia, though aloof from the material to a degree (she had no problems with abandoning humanity's birth bodies), is not wholly aware of the truly immaterial/spiritual, she is the bridge betwixt the two, but only the Monad fully understands spirit.

So then what is our Demiurge? Luxaar, the Vita, this "The Great One" are all possibly the Demiurge, and Luxaar is pretty evil as the Demiurge was in XB and XG. However, in Gnostic myth, the Sophia created the Demiurge. And Elma, our Sophia, created the Lifehold Core, it is her Demiurge. 

Like Deus, the Lifehold Core is a machine, albeit with less sentience in this case. But remember that Deus was terraforming the planet at the end of the game. And even more importantly, remember it had Kadomony, its biological brain and biological labs where it created humanity after crashing onto the planet. This is exactly like the Lifehold Core! The Lifehold Core is a master of the material, able to create anything material it desires, like Zanza and Deus. The final boss, Lao the Chimera, is a monstrosity born of purest and most destructive material manipulation. The Lifehold Core is by default benign, and it is certainly not a true god because something else created it. Zanza was apparently nice when he became a god initially, and Deus was originally inert until it suddenly and inexplicably gained a consciousness. The Lifehold Core is ignorant in that it attacks its creators, just as Zanza is ignorant of his origins and reliance on the Monado, and Deus is of its dependence on the Wave Existence as its power source.

 

And thus with my discussion of the Demiurge, I end my speculations. May there be an XBCX2 to continue the plot, regardless of whether I'm proven right or wrong.

P.S. Lao better have lived due to the Monad's will, and for a good reason. Otherwise, some people are really going to hate him when he shows up again.

 

Now I get to my topic question. I've never played any other MMORPG before, so I don't know how they handle sequels set in the same world (not expansions- I don't think it'd work here). But Xenoblade Chronicles X begs for a sequel at the very end. So I'm wondering, since humanity probably won't be leaving Mira in a sequel, and the planet seems completely explored and is no longer exotic to the player at least, how would a sequel work from a gameplay perspective? How could a fresh MMORPG experience be maintained?

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Xenoblade Chronicles X is an MMORPG? Huh, well, I guess I never really played the multiplayer aspects of it.

Spoiler

Your theories on the Gnostic inspiration are quite interesting, though unfortunately the Monad-Sophia-Demiurge concept doesn't quite fit in as well as it does in Xenoblade Chronicles (I have not had the chance to play Xenogears). There is no specific revealed Monad in the game, and Elma seems to know just as much about the Ganglion and Samaar as the player does, which is not very befitting of a sort of "wisdom incarnate." However, I do like your theory on the Demiurge. I never enjoyed the last battle with Lao, as it felt forced to seemingly just make the story more interesting. But if the Lifehold is the Demiurge, it makes it a more symbolic ending.

However, if I may be so bold, might I suggest Mira itself is the Monad? My memory is slightly fuzzy, but throughout the game, whether in sidequests or the main story, it is always mentioned that Mira is strange and unusual. So, might it be that Mira itself is translating every language, and keeping the Mimeosomes alive? I think this was all basically confirmed, but it may be that Mira intentionally brought humanity to the planet and forced everyone on the planet to be trapped. Why? I don't know. Perhaps these questions will be answered in a sequel.

So, to the main question. First off, I don't think Xenoblade Chronicles 2 will have much to do with X. I mean, it may have a few small references like Lin's Monodo hair-clips and Tatsu's (when will they finally eat him?) subtle mention of Hom-hom at the end of the game, but nothing beyond that. 

Instead, X's sequel will likely be a hypothetical "Xenoblade Chronicles X2." And I'm not certain what they would change. I've thought that, in order to make new unique settings, it may follow the adventures of another ship after the destruction of Earth that lands on another planet (or a different part of Mira). However, this would mean that the story would likely involve the same stuff as in this game, with them fighting some remnants of the Ganglion and/or the other race that the Ganglion fought against, as well as

Spoiler

that their real bodies aren't in the Lifehold.

Another possibility is a theory of mine that Mira is a machine. In the hypothetical X2 the crew of Elma, Lin, Doug, etc. might find this out and find a way to enter the inside of Mira, possibly finding an entirely new setting and areas to explore. But that's just a theory.

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