Bandai Namco has decided not to proceed with a remastered collection of the Xenosaga RPG series, according to the producer who requested that fans support the project.
In 2014, Katsuhiro Harada, a director and producer at Bandai Namco and most recently the producer for Tekken 7, tweeted about the possibility of a Xenosaga HD collection. He said at the time that in his research into remastering the Xenosaga games, he “was not able to find the necessary market size” to justify the development costs for the project.
Harada requested for “the voices of many fans” to show significant interest in a Xenosaga HD collection, in order to get the project off the ground.
More than five years later, Harada received a question on Twitter regarding the status of the Xenosaga HD collection. Unfortunately for fans of the series who may have been waiting for the remastered versions of the classic RPGs, it appears that the project will no longer be happening.
This actually progressed to the remaster's plan, but failed in a profitable market analysis.
Sorry guys, This plan will be difficult to resurface… https://t.co/0CRJJDPl5Z— Katsuhiro Harada (@Harada_TEKKEN) December 26, 2019
In the thread, Harada mentioned that he had been talking to Monolith Soft, the developer behind the Xenosaga series, for “a long time,” but it looks like the fans that expressed interest in a Xenosaga HD collection were not enough for Bandai Namco.
The Xenosaga series, which is comprised of three main episodes that were all released for the PlayStation 2, was a spiritual successor to the 1998 PlayStation classic Xenogears. Xenosaga Episode I was released in North America in 2003, followed by Xenosaga Episode II in 2005 and Xenosaga Episode III in 2006. Xenosaga I & II, a remake of the first two games, was released for the Nintendo DS in Japan in 2006.
KOS-MOS, a prototype battle android who was one of the main characters in the Xenosaga series, appeared in Xenoblade Chronicles 2, which was released for the Nintendo Switch in 2017. The Xenoblade series followed the Xenosaga series, and its first game, Xenoblade Chronicles, will be remastered and released for the Nintendo Switch in 2020.
With the popularity of Xenoblade Chronicles 2, players are looking into the lore behind KOS-MOS. It remains to be seen if Bandai Namco will ever reconsider its decision to not proceed with the remastered Xenosaga games, but fans should definitely not give up in showing their interest for such a collection.
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