Author Topic: And Now For Something Completely Different (.hack Question)  (Read 532 times)

Silvercry

  • Enlightened One (+200)
  • *
  • Posts: 241
    • View Profile
    • The Great Silvercry's Blog
And Now For Something Completely Different (.hack Question)
« on: December 27, 2005, 10:21:11 am »
This thread has nothing to do with Chrono Trigger/Cross.  Nothing at all.  This thread is about the .hack video games.  I’m coming here with this question because the members of this forum are some of the most insightful I’ve come across on the internet, even though I disagree with about half of what is said on any given topic.  But that’s what keeps me coming back.  :wink:

(Of course, the other reasons I’m coming here for this are because the gamefaqs forums are full of a-holes, the 1-up.com forums are the most useless game forum ever coded, an my usual anime/video game haunt, the Shoujo-ai Goddess Heavens, have devolved into an asinine power struggle that is positively Jr. high school-esque in its scope.  But I digress…)

After working (note I said working, and not playing) on all four games for the better part of a year and 100 hours of playing time, I finally finished .hack//quarantine yesterday  (Btw, am I the only that thinks Skeith was the hardest boss in the whole game?  Even the final boss was a joke).  I’ve also watched all four parts of Liminality.  I have also read .hack//AI buster.  I should mention I’ve never seen //Sign or //Legend of the Twilight.

Ok, now that we’ve established all that, here is my question:

What the hell was the point?

I get that Data Bug monsters were using Data Drain and putting players into comas, like Orca and BlackRose’s brother and Seig from Liminality.  I still have no idea why they wanted to cause comas.  Little help?

I get that Harald had an unrequited thing for Emma, and the whole purpose of The World was to create a ‘Child of the Mind’ if you will (Orson Scot Card reference – look it up) with her by combining her life’s work, Epitaph of Twilight with his mad programming skillz to produce Aura.  What I don’t get is why The World was dead set on killing Aura, or at the very least fragmenting her and scattering her to the winds.  I think it was mentioned in the last chapter of Liminality that if Aura was ever ‘born’, The World would not longer have a purpose, so it sought to prevent her birth. Oh, and why would Aura need to be ‘born’ if she already existed from the moment you boot up the game???

That brings me to Morganna.  Who the HELL is Morganna???  In .hack//AI buster, Lycoris  (a flawed early version of Aura) claims that Morganna is “god”.  This initially lead me to believe that Harald was Morganna, since he was the ‘creator’ of the game.  Upon receiving Harald’s Note, it became clear that wasn’t the case.  After having NO other clues as to who she is, the best I can guess is that Morganna is The World, or at least the consciousness of The Wolrd.  Am I on the right track?

What was the point to Cubia?  I get that its existence was tied to the Twilight Bracelet, sort of its mathematical opposite, the Agent Smith to the bracelet’s Neo, if you will.  It wanted to keep Kite form restoring/meeting Aura, and could only be killed if the bracelet was destroyed.  Was it merely just another tool at Morganna’s disposal (again assuming Morganna is consciousness of the word The World) to prevent the birth of Aura?

Lastly, why did Aura come between Kite and Corbenik when he tried to land the deathblow on it?  Kite afterwards seemed to think that Aura had to "die before she could be born". Wiseman also mentioned something about apoptosis (the main type of programmed cell death - again, look it up).  This also makes no sense since Morganna and Aura were clearly both alive through the course of the game.  How does her death initiate her birth?

Any clarification on these points are most welcome.  I want to make sure I fully understand the game before I allow it to replace Mickey’s Mousecapades as the worst game I’ve ever played.

Mystik3eb

  • Dimension Crosser (+1000)
  • *
  • Posts: 1022
    • View Profile
    • http://www.geocities.com/dfscanl/index.html
And Now For Something Completely Different (.hack Question)
« Reply #1 on: December 27, 2005, 01:42:23 pm »
Wish I could help, but I couldn't get into .hack. I didn't like it, and if that's how the story ended up, I'm pretty sure I'll never go back and try to play it again.

Silvercry

  • Enlightened One (+200)
  • *
  • Posts: 241
    • View Profile
    • The Great Silvercry's Blog
And Now For Something Completely Different (.hack Question)
« Reply #2 on: December 27, 2005, 03:53:50 pm »
In that case you are a wiser man than me.  .hack//GU is supposed to be infinitely better in every aspect, but i remain unconvinced.  I might rent it first when it comes out.  Once bitten, and all that.

It couldn’t possibly be any worse than the previous four games.  Which really should have been one game in any event.  If I had played full price for all of them I'd really be kicking my own ass right now.

Radical_Dreamer

  • Entity
  • Zurvan Surfer (+2500)
  • *
  • Posts: 2778
    • View Profile
    • The Chrono Compendium
And Now For Something Completely Different (.hack Question)
« Reply #3 on: December 27, 2005, 05:41:16 pm »
I played the first two (after recieving the first as a gift) and while they were alright games, it clicked in that Bandai was asking me to pay $200 for what is essentially one game. I beat the first one in 14 hours, and the second in about 10. Halfway through the overgame, and it's looking to be only slightly longer than a $50 Final Fantasy, and no more satisfying, so I gave up.

Silvercry

  • Enlightened One (+200)
  • *
  • Posts: 241
    • View Profile
    • The Great Silvercry's Blog
And Now For Something Completely Different (.hack Question)
« Reply #4 on: December 27, 2005, 09:59:13 pm »
Nevermind, guys.  I was just looking through the extra features of the fourth Liminaity disc when I accidentally hit the right button instead of the down button on my DVD remote, which highlighted a previously invisible gallery option.   Though the courses of the ensuing 20-somthing slides and captions, all the questions above were answered.  

What a cop-out.  Instead actually telling the story right in-game, they cram the explanation into an invisible add-on?  What if I had bought the game used and it didn’t come with the anime?  I guess I would have been screwed.  Its really too bad, because once all the pieces fit, its a pretty decent story, all told.

So .hack isn’t the worst game I ever played after all.  It still gets the Fei Fong Wong award for "Good Idea That Becomes Hopelessly Lost in Crappy Execution."  At least it has past winners like Xenogears and Chrono Cross there to keep it company.

I think this thread has served it purpose.  If there is no more to be said in the next few days, feel free to lock it.

saridon

  • Mystical Knight (+700)
  • *
  • Posts: 720
  • eater of cows and small fuzzy animals since 1991
    • View Profile
And Now For Something Completely Different (.hack Question)
« Reply #5 on: December 28, 2005, 11:12:16 pm »
you really have to see /sign to get some of the stuff in the first 4 games the hidden extra in the Liminality dvd was prolly for the people to lazy to go out and buy/rent /sign.

its just confusing unless you watch/play the series in its chronological order.