ゼノギアス // Week 11 // Chapter 18 & 19

[Voi]

ゼノギアス // Week 11 // Chapter 18 & 19

Week 10	2026 January 02
Last Week	Week 10
Next Week	Week 12
Home Thread	ゼノギアス

Ending Point
Save at the screen prompt.

Screenshot

Gameplay

Gameplay notes

• Hold down the sprint button while pressing jump to clear wide platforms. No matter how tempting it is, do not put a hole through your TV.
• Suggest you don’t select the third option when talking to the repair bot NPC. It kills him, leaving you to have to find one in random encounters.

Unique Missables

• None, but in Ch18 you can get a MagneticCoat for your gears (response+25) as well as buy them here, and a gold nugget to sell if you’re hurting for cash.

"FMVs”

None.

Walkthrough

English Guide Ctrl+F WK17
Japanese Guide

Vocab

	Script	JPDB
CH18	Here	Here
CH19	Here	Here

Discussion Guidelines

Everybody should feel free to post and ask questions–it’s what makes book clubs fun! But please do not post until you are familiar with Spoiler Courtesy!

Spoiler Courtesy

Please follow these rules to avoid inadvertent ネタバレ. If you’re unsure whether something should have a spoiler tag, err on the side of using one.

1. Any potential spoiler for the current week’s reading need only be covered by a spoiler tag. Predictions and conjecture made by somebody who has not read ahead still falls into this category.
2. Any potential spoilers for external sources need to be covered by a spoiler tag and include a label (outside of the spoiler tag) of what might be spoiled. These include but are not limited to: other book club picks, other books, games, movies, anime, etc. I recommend also tagging the severity of the spoiler (for example, I may still look at minor spoilers for something that I don’t intend to read soon).
3. Avoid posting any information from later in the game than the current week’s reading. If it is necessary to doing so, it needs to be hidden by spoiler tags and labeled as coming from later sections.

Instructions for Spoiler Tags

Click the cog above the text box and use either the “Hide Details” or “Blur Spoiler” options. The text which says “This text will be hidden” should be replaced with what you are wishing to write. In the case of “Hide Details”, the section in the brackets that is labelled “Summary” can be replaced with whatever you like also (i.e, [details=”Chapter 1”]).

Discussion

• Platforming hell strikes again

Participation

Will you be playing with is this week?

• I am playing along.
• I’m still playing but I haven’t reached this part yet.
• I am no longer playing.
• I’m just here for the discussion

Don’t forget to set this thread to Watching in order to stay abreast of discussion!

[Sasabonsam]

Look at me, getting my club reading done early. Now that the holidays are over I feel so free

Chapter 18

Had a much easier time of the language so far compared to some of the stuff last week.

Don’t judge me but I resorted to save state scumming to do some of those long jumps. Both the cliffs and the encounter rate are too damn high!

I’d forgotten that Elly’s gear looks like a magical girl out of a 少女 anime, and had especially forgotten that little hearts come out when it hits something. I think I blocked it out to protect myself psychologically, but now I’m aware again and it’s terrible. Could someone kindly hit me very hard so I forget again, please?

In general I hate the scenes with the goon squad walking all over Elly, their commanding officer, and her just letting it happen. On one hand it seems necessary to show she’s not currently playing a role she’s fit for, sure. On the other hand, how can someone trained in the military be such a doormat with their subordinates!? From their first scene they’re disrespecting her and she remains silent about it, what the heck??

On a happier note, Mason’s silly rescue of the castle infiltration party is still very charming. And he does all that just because a cup breaks. Go Mason, go!

Chapter 19

I spoke too soon about having an easier time, all these technical commands and return callouts from officers have brought the reading headache back. I’m letting some of it just pass over my eyes without fully understanding, but that also bothers me. I may replay this part after reviewing some new vocab just to see if it flows a bit better.

The whole sequence with the red gear is over the top (in a fun way), but I’d forgotten about Ramsus showing up in a flashy, winged, golden gear only to get completely destroyed. Good stuff

[Akashelia]

@Sasabonsam

Look at me, getting my club reading done early. Now that the holidays are over I feel so free

Nice! I played for a while yesterday but didn’t manage to finish, it was a bit tough.

Week 11

@Sasabonsam

Don’t judge me but I resorted to save state scumming to do some of those long jumps. Both the cliffs and the encounter rate are too damn high!

I have no shame, I completely abused it too. Wasn’t that bad but I would have probably been frustrated without.
Ran into my first repair robot in combat so that was fun!

When Eri said “next time we meet, we will be enemies”, I didn’t think it would be that soon :o oh no!

雪辱戦 is a funny vocab, what does the snow have to do with a return match?
Not an easy fight either. I lost the first time around and had to try again, was happy for the save point right before.

@Sasabonsam

I’d forgotten that Elly’s gear looks like a magical girl out of a 少女 anime, and had especially forgotten that little hearts come out when it hits something. I think I blocked it out to protect myself psychologically, but now I’m aware again and it’s terrible. Could someone kindly hit me very hard so I forget again, please?

I was going to comment on that too, then deleted my comment instead… I just want to forget it ever happened already!

@Sasabonsam

On a happier note, Mason’s silly rescue of the castle infiltration party is still very charming. And he does all that just because a cup breaks. Go Mason, go!

Silly is the perfect word I feel like xD
Look I save you! Oopsy. Wait I try again. What are you doing you’re just walking around?! I got this, just watch! * jumps around and escapes * xD

I also thought it was fun to see Ramsus and Myan in bed together. Adds a bit to the side characters, that they have their own lives. Also it seems like it was implied that moonlight guy (グラーフ?) is Fei’s dad and is looking for him, but they had met before and he had told him he knew about his dad, not was his dad? Might just be me remembering wrong or being confused though.
I really wonder what / who エルル is too.

Can’t wait to play next week and find out what’s left after the dust of the battles settles!

[simias]

So the lady commander is given a barbie pink Gear called “vierge”?

Subtle and tasteful.

EDIT: and her attacks generate little hearts, amazing:

[Akashelia]

Haha the cross over with NANA would definitely belong more over there…

[simias]

w11

The visuals are as impressive as ever but the sound mixing and SFX are all over the place. So many sequences have no music and weird sound effects that seem either too loud or too quiet. The music is good but there’s too much reuse, I feel like I hear the same 3 tracks in a loop.

I enjoy the relationship between Elly and Fei, I wonder where it’s going. Hopefully they’re not siblings.

The succession of events this week feels very dream-like. Just stuff happening in quick succession that doesn’t really seem to mesh together really well. So we have the butler saving the day in tachikoma? Ok, I guess. I was a bit disappointed that we weren’t given control, but fortunately I can just boot up 攻殻機動隊 (Ghost in the Shell) to scratch that itch:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wS9OhsvMcB0

I stills don’t understand how they expected this plan to be successful. They almost got destroyed in their home base days ago, but now they expect to be able to blitz the capital?

I love the goofy visual of Barto’s mech behind a huge wheel:

The concept of a ship that operates in a desert in exactly the same way as a u-boat would in an ocean is obviously absurd, but I like that they just refuse to question it and 100% commit to the bit. It really gives the game a lot of character.

Not sure what’s happening but it’s badass!

[Akashelia]

Week 11

@simias

So many sequences have no music and weird sound effects that seem either too loud or too quiet.

Now that you mention it, at some point the “alarm” sound was really annoying because I spent some time deciphering what they were saying, it got to the point where I decided to take my headphones off until I was done with that scene.

@simias

I enjoy the relationship between Elly and Fei, I wonder where it’s going. Hopefully they’re not siblings.

Haha that made me smile. You never know with games… Hopefully she’s not his mom…

@simias

I was a bit disappointed that we weren’t given control, but fortunately I can just boot up 攻殻機動隊 (Ghost in the Shell) to scratch that itch:

Oh fun. I read the manga last year, didn’t know there was a game.

[eagleflo]

@simias

Hopefully they’re not siblings.

LOL at this, you’re safe here – we are far away from リベール王国.

[VikingSchism]

This week had a lot of technobabble that I mostly skimmed through

Week 11 already

The section with Elly remembering her past was difficult, autoadvancing text my beloathed. At least I can pause to catch up.

Got dangerously close to dying in the fight against roided-out Elly, but managed to just scrape by. The other boss fights weren’t too bad, I just stuck booster on and focused on doing as much damage as quickly as possible

This section overall was a real climax - the end of part 1 perhaps. So much going on.

[Voi]

Week 12 has come

ゼノギアス // Week 12 // Chapter 20

ゼノギアス // Week 12 // Chapter 20 Week 11 2026 January 17 Last Week Week 11 Next Week Week 13 Home Thread ゼノギアス Ending Point After attempting to , save in the room Screenshot Gameplay Gameplay notes Unique Missables "FMVs” Walkthrough English Guide Ctrl+F WK19 Japanese Guide Vocab Script JPDB CH20 Here Here NPC Here [Missing?] Discussion Guidelines Everybody should feel free to post and ask questions–it’s what makes book clubs fun! But please do not post un…

[eagleflo]

Week 11

Wow, what a week! It feels like almost every story thread advanced all at once. Immense payoff for many weeks of buildup.

But before that, did you go say hello to the dog in engine bay?

I remember this scene from my first playthrough, being a little taken aback – oh, games can depict realistic things like a man and woman sleeping in the same bed, NAKED?? Back then the mere appearance of a scene like this instantly made me think that ok, this is for adults, unlike Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy.

Dude just loves to pose in front of the moon. Always. Yeah, about being for adults… this game is also very much a mecha 少年 with 中二病 stuff in it. I love it. Takahashi and Soraya just writing whatever comes to their mind.

I remember getting pretty satanic, hellish vibes from this in my teenage and I guess I still do? Very… red.

At this point it’s kinda obvious that ミァン and グラーフ are playing a separate, higher level game on top of all the other shenanigans going on.

---

And then we get some of the worst gameplay in this game, sheesh. Platforming and random encounters combined. It’s amazing that you can get a random encounter midway through a dash jump and lose momentum. This is just shit game design from 90s, really happy they stopped doing these things. Really does not stand the test of time. Anyway, back to the story!

---

You know shit’s bad when the director uses this camera angle…

These probably went too quickly for most of us to read. Screenshotting moments like this just to be able to dive deeper afterwards. We’re getting more background for エリィ’s moment we’ve already seen flashes of.

Feels funny to be on the receiving end of this attack.

It’s always funny to me when the mecha somehow become direct extensions of the pilots in scenes like this.

Yeah…

I didn’t remember this whole scene at all, which is surprising since it’s so… off the wall. Heroic rescue didn’t fumble after all!

Being able to grant powers is pretty out there.

Just love it when a bully gets shown their place by something unfathomably stronger. Like… never mind your one hand, your mech lost its head. ミァン doing the reasonable thing.

I just giggled through this moment just like I did the first time I played the game. They one-upped the 9999 damage by doing it twice! This was the first JRPG ever where I saw five whole digits of damage… Just the perfect way to make エルルの悪魔 seem overpowered. (エルル is a place name, wiped out by this guy.)

Perfect place for this act to end, getting my second memory card full. Can’t wait to forge ahead soon!

---

@simias

Mmm, love the scanlines, so I won’t even post my versions of these screenshots. Also two highlights of the week for me.

@Sasabonsam

I’d forgotten that Elly’s gear looks like a magical girl out of a 少女 anime, and had especially forgotten that little hearts come out when it hits something. I think I blocked it out to protect myself psychologically, but now I’m aware again and it’s terrible.

Oof… yeah, it’s not just mecha shows they’re religiously copying here, it’s also 魔法少女 stuff. Even when you know what it refers to it still doesn’t work.

@Akashelia

I also thought it was fun to see Ramsus and Myan in bed together. Adds a bit to the side characters, that they have their own lives. Also it seems like it was implied that moonlight guy (グラーフ?) is Fei’s dad and is looking for him, but they had met before and he had told him he knew about his dad, not was his dad? Might just be me remembering wrong or being confused though.

Yeah, absolutely! Adds depth to these characters. グラーフ is the one who brought フェイ to ラハン three years ago, but he isn’t his dad – this is what he had to say when they met again for the first time in the game:

Interesting observation that something in the desert scenes this week just obliterated DuckStation. FPS dropped from locked 29.91 to ~10 in places. I have all sorts of enhancements on but still… there’s something that’s done in a very ineffective and probably inaccurate way that’s triggered by these desert scenes. The absolute worst were the ones where you advance as フェイ in a pseudo-弾幕 style section.

[simias]

@eagleflo

I remember getting pretty satanic, hellish vibes from this in my teenage and I guess I still do? Very… red.

I didn’t see it this way. Has red such associations in Japanese culture? After all it’s usually a positive color in Japanese contexts.

@eagleflo

Mmm, love the scanlines,

I have the unscaled versions of my screenshots here if you want the full 4K goodness (I do use JPG and not PNG to reduce the size slightly however):

ra - pCloud

(There are some screenshots of the final boss of FFII in there by the way, club participants beware!).

I also have taken this one:

[eagleflo]

@simias

I didn’t see it this way. Has red such associations in Japanese culture? After all it’s usually a positive color in Japanese contexts.

Not usually, but this time it’s combined with just seeing inspired-by-Sagrada Familia-cathedral moments before. There is also the burning battleground… then the kind of fade to red and also lots of black. This game is explicitly evoking Judeo-Christian touchpoints. The nickname also has 悪魔, although that’s not exclusively a Western reference by any means.

[Voi]

@eagleflo

But before that, did you go say hello to the dog in engine bay?

Why is there a dog in the engine bay??

@eagleflo

FPS dropped from locked 29.91 to ~10 in places

I didn’t have this problem in Duckstation, so perhaps something in the differences in our settings? I really only have CRT and CD speed 4x enabled.

wk11

Got to say I do like that we were unsuccessful. All that build up and we got outsmarted. (Myan is hilariously mean to Citan about it). The rescue scene was both cool and embarrassing. But also like…just shoot Shakhan with the gatling gun and be done with it?! The snipers gave you ample time to take cover…

Ramsus is ridiculous

It is interesting that he seemed to be pretty close with Sigurd–enough to be upset about his throwing off the brainwashing jumping ship and to go easy on Bart at first.

I caught a closeup pf the red gear. Not sure if the markings mean anything or are just deco

Citan yelling after Sigurd I do think he’s actually pretty sincere about caring for people (like the NPCs from a few weeks ago). Still don’t trust him tho.