I know that this is just Xeno-whore wishful thinking, but I can still see it being somewhere in the realm of possibility.

After finishing up on Chrono Cross, the CC team probably stayed mostly together and moved on to something else. We'll assume that it's a PS2 RPG, since that's what the team knows how to do. With the FF games coming out, I think that Square will want to fall back on another franchise so that they at least have a name out there to hopefully sell some more units. What would the CC team work on that's a sequel? That's right, Xenogears, presumably Episode VI. Some of the key makers of the first game still work there, such as the script writer, many of the artists and designers, Tanaka (the guy who thought the game up), and the producers. In addition, Yasunori Mistuda is working freelance, so he could always hop aboard.

Since Square usually likes to spring surprises on people (CC, the Millenium Conference that revealed up to FFXI) I doubt that we'd hear about this game at E3, but maybe at the next TGS. Maybe we'll have two Xenogears games, published by two different companies, released within six months of each other. Or maybe I should stop smoking crack...

However, I still want to know what the CC team is up to...

--The Steve

Nintendo followers (Is that the best word to use? I don't want to say "fanboys" because it's too strong a word) have been able to put up with the company's shortcomings for the past 4 or 5 years, but the loss of Square was a major blow.

It would be awesome if somehow Yamauchi's acid-filled comments about Square were a cover tactic to keep a Nintendo-Square relationship underwraps. Nintendo is an infamously secretive company, but think about it:

Nintendo has repeatedly stated that they're going to pull out their big guns for the E3 show, and Square has repeatedly and publicly expressed interest in developing for systems other than PS2. Gamers everywhere would win, for everybody would receive Square's goodness.

Of course, this is only speculation and highly wishful thinking, based on the facts that very few third parties have confirmed their showing of Gamecube titles (which may just be Nintendo's doing), and that Nintendo is unlikely to let third party titles upstage their first party titles.

But we can hope..

Adam Baker

-Fares

P.S. I refuse to believe all that space at Square's booth will be for one PS2 game and two games from a generation long gone.

Based on Square's performance last year, I believe the question should not be "What do you hope Square shows at E3?" but "What do you hope Square *doesn't* show us at E3?"

The answer, of course, is "Vivi's butt."

Thank you, and good night,

- Fritz Fraundorf
Tilmittie No. 1

I disagree with the statement that RPGs would need to be dumbed down to appeal to a mass audience. Or maybe it's just that I misunderstand what's meant by "dumbed down."

Anyway, I hear a lot of complaint in this column that RPG's have become tedious hack 'n slash trips through inane dungeons. I guess we should all congratulate ourselves on the intellectual superiority we display by progressing through games of that type, eh? God knows the TRL squad could never manage to fight their way through Memoria; it just requires too much brain power.

But maybe that's not the part that needs to be dumbed down. Perhaps it's the intricate plot lines, complex characters, and philosophical meanderings. I suppose you'd have to make it through Moby Dick before you could grasp the instant love affair between Squall in Rinoa.

Really. When was the first time you played an RPG? I was probably around 10 or 11. Sure, games were simpler back then, but I had no problem playing my way through FF1, or any number of other games. Maybe I didn't appreciate certain plot nuances as well as I would now, but I doubt I enjoyed the game any less for that loss. At 10 was I smarter than TRL's 15-17 year old target audience?

Hardly. Most members of the TRL studio audience could make it through a novel, and so could handle the plotline of any Final Fantasy game, which is no more complex than that of an X-Men comicbook. And the gaming itself? How hard is that?

It strikes me that the only difference, and this is perhaps what you mean when you say dumbed down, is that a teenager steeped in the mainstream wouldn't want to play Final Fantasy any more than she would want to work her way through Huckleberry Finn. It's not that she'd intellectually implode if she tried, it's just that neither topic holds any interest for her.

At this point, perhaps my argument becomes a matter of semantics, for in place of dumbed down, I'd say mainstreamed. Of course I don't think you could mainstream an RPG any easier than you could Huckleberry Finn or Moby Dick, but not for a lack in the mainstream swimmers' intellectual facilities.

Re-reading your comments, I see nothing you say contradicts anything I've said, I guess I'm just reacting more to the tone of the statements, and the reduction of TRL viewers to intellectual second class citizenship. Without taking a few more things into consideration, I don't think it's fair to draw a line and put TRL viewers on one side and RPG gamers on the other, and then make intellect judgments based only on which side of that line you happen to stand.

Oh, and I predict that Square's going to reveal Chrono Trigger Online and Unlit Chocobo Farm at E3. Shows how smart I am.

Daniel McNamara

Arcade culture is dead or dying. What was the cornerstone of social gaming (and for some of us, sociality in general) seems all but gone now.

It didn't hit me fully until a few days ago. I walked into the local arcade (one, where there used to be three or four!) and noticed that there weren't many people around. As a matter of fact, there were three- A friend fof mine, an employee, and myself. Not too shocking at first, but this was a friday. Not that many years back- five or six at the most- on any friday there would have been a considerable crowd in there.

I blame the evolution of consoles. Don't get me wrong, I love my Playstation as much as anyone else, but with games not only becoming more acessable to the budding gamer (a task once left best to Arcades) but becoming increasingly cinematic; I fear that there's no real reason for gamers to get out to the arcades anymore. This trend is also reflected by the attempt made by newer arcade games to be more involving and seperate froma console gaming experience- take opur arcades newest additions for example: Final Furlong and Police 911. Anything to break away and re-establish themselves as a unique gaming experience.

I don't know. Could it be that I'm just a grown-up arcade child trying to come to terms with the fact that arcades just aren't where it's at anymore, or is arcade culture really on the deathbed? I'm interested in hearing what you, or other readers think about this.

-Pisces