WMG / Xenoblade Chronicles 1

WARNING: Unmarked spoilers ahead. Go on at your own risk.

Xenoblade's possible No Export for You status in America, despite having an English-language localization, was Nintendo trying to see if Americans still gave a shit about jRPGs are aren't Final Fantasy.

jRPGs haven't been doing as well as they used to, some American commentators even declaring it a "dead genre", and Nintendo consoles haven't the strongest showing when it comes to them, either. And the Wii's on its way out and has built a reputation as a "kiddie" console. It's not really the most ideal situation for releasing a big title. So Nintendo decides to make it a European release first, complete with an English-language version, and dangle it in front of American gamers, and see if they start chomping at the bit and complaining about how they're not getting it. And boy howdy, did they ever. Had it not had that reaction, Nintendo would've went "meh" and No Export for You; but since there was such a massive reaction, Nintendo used the already-existing English localization and released it.

Maybe this wasn't the plan, but it sort of seems that way.

The name Metal Face is a joke that Shulk and his party inadvertently started

Initially Mumkhar's Mechon identity may have had another name (and it may very well have been Black Face), but Xord and other Faces took to calling him the name the Homs kids and the cripple used because they whooped his ass in spite of his nigh invulnerability. This is one of the few rational explanations as to why a robot would call another robot Metal Face, since they all pretty much have metal faces...

• His Japanese name is indeed Black Face, and it was almost certainly changed for the English/International release because of the unfortunate implications behind that moniker, something that is pretty much unknown in Japan.

Metal Face didn't talk in his first incarnation because he was scared of Dunban.

Mumkhar didn't necessarily like Dunban but he was obviously aware of his skills, having fought along side him for some time. He didn't want to risk giving away his identity as he wasn't sure he could beat Dunban and he was right, obviously. He has no trouble talking when confronted outside Colony 6, however.

The Nopon are a deconstruction of Ridiculously Cute JRPG Races

For starters, they appear to deliberately be aware of their own cuteness, as revealed in many sidequests, and use it to their advantage, which may explain their widespread trade empire. At least one Nopon is convinced that his cuteness justifies killing Hodes because he would look cuter riding on an Orluga than they would, and it's amazing how frequently they use their cuteness and helplessness to convince the party to kill loads of monsters. Finally, Riki's Heropon status is granted by the chief not by virtue of his skill, but because he owes the village a considerable sum of money. Far from the idyllic paradise their society seems to be at first glance, the Nopon probably have more deep-seated issues than anyone else on Bionis save Zanza himself.

• Further shown by them smuggling drugs to the High Entia in one of the most memorable sidequest chains in the game.
• While it doesn't say anything about the Bionis or Mira Nopon, this is confirmed for Alrest's Nopon in Xenoblade Chronicles 2. The Nopon used to speak normally until Captain Nopopon realized how far playing the cutesy card could get them, and the rest is history.

Xenoblade Chronicles is the distant past of Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann

Just in case the super-sized Humongous Mecha that comprise the game world didn't make it obvious enough, the game seems to have a strong emphasis on Heroic Willpower, screwing destiny and exploring the stars. Fiora pilots a "Mobile Artillery" (mech suit) , the Faces are all mecha pilots (in mech suits), and Zanza's 2nd Form even resembles his Shulk-like form wearing an improbably organic-looking mech suit. The settings are even similar (part 1 - heroes in ground battles, part 2 - heroes versus an insanely huge robot, part 3 - heroes fighting nearly omnipotent beings IN SPACE). There's a similar theme, too, in that the hero relies on a weapon (Lagann/Monado) for most of the series for his power, but at the climax of the story, wields the same power on his own.

• When Shulk declares "a world without gods" in his "End of the World" Special, he's actually taking the power of creation and destiny and giving it to every sentient being in the world - i.e. Shulk invented Spiral Power. Or at least re-invented it after Zanza revoked it.
  • Also, the Monado(s) are not drill-shaped because galaxies don't exist within Zanza's pocket universe. Shulk invented that, too, when he returned the universe to its original form.
  • Dunban totally plays Kamina to Shulk's Simon, and he's certainly something of a Radioactive Badass. Reyn is Kittan, Sharla is Yoko (complete with the iconic BFG), and Fiora and Melia are basically each half of Nia (Melia with the tragic destiny and royalty bit, Fiora with the Brainwashed and Crazy love interest bit).

Zanza left a piece of his personality inside Shulk

• At the end both Zanza and Alvis state that he just wanted friends. yet Zanza's action state otherwise. *cough*Generic Doomsday Villain*cough* He also shows no real sign of his humanity just his ego, something Shulk is the almost exact opposite of. Another thing is that he states that Shulk is a clone that gained its own personality. How would a clone develop its own personality, especially when the very mind of the original is inside of the clone? The anwser is Shulk did not develop his own personality but leeched it out of Zanza!
  • Could be the part of Shulk that loved Fiora didn't want to leave. Psychology's weird like that. Zanza was a psychopath long before Shulk came into the picture, but what if he's been leaving pieces of his humanity in ALL of his hosts?
  • Shulk wasn't a clone though—he died in Ose Tower, and Zanza brought him back to life to act as his host. Without Zanza's intervention, he would have stayed dead. Zanza may have acted as life support as well, but Shulk was eventually able to fully revive himself with help from Alvis (and maybe Meyneth).

Xenoblade is a distant prequel to Xenosaga, just as Xenosaga was to Xenogears

Zanza's experiment to create a new universe involved the Zohar, and is what lead to the disappearance of Earth. The whole of Xenoblade is set in a self-contained reality overseen by Alvis and controlled through Zanza and Meyneth, much like the encephelon dives featured in Xenosaga.

• Except wasn't Xenogears suppose to be Xenosaga Episode V? Xenosaga was suppose to be a 6 parter with Xenogears being part 5, but poor sales lead Namco to tell Monolith Soft to cut the series off after 3.
  • Stuff that happened in our world doesn't preclude the worlds of the games from being the same.
• Xenoblade Chronicles 2 seemingly confirms the part about Klaus using the Zohar (now called the Conduit but essentially the same), and the fact that KOS-MOS in that game as a Guest Fighter and yet knows something about how the Orbital Station was built implies some form of Canon Welding may be going on.

If that's the case, then Zanza isn't just an Expy of Deus...

Zanza IS Deus. Consider this, after the end of the game, we see the remains of the Bionis' head in the distance. It's therefore not impossible that other parts of the Bionis, including at least pieces of its Monado, may have survived its destruction as well. What if the Zohar is simply a piece of Zanza's Monado, containing the remains of his spirit until it creates a new host for itself. This host becomes the bioweapon that destroyed the Eldridge in Xenogears' intro, and set off a plot to regain its former strength in much the same way Zanza did with the Bionis.

• According to Xenoblade Chronicles 2, the Zohar/Conduit isn't part of anyone's Monado, but it does seem to be the power source behind Klaus' experiment, and by extension the true power behind both the Monado and the Aegis. Whether Zanza is related to Deus or not is still an open question.

Meyneth is a benevolent goddess because she's not a biological creature.

We learn that the biggest reason Zanza wants to invoke the apocalypse is because if the creatures of Bionis ever migrate away from it, the Bionis will eventually wither and die. This is not the case for the Mechonis: since it's essentially a humongous mecha up to eleven, it doesn't require the same kind of sustenance that a biological being like the Bionis would need. A few Machina even note that all they need to survive is a little water every now and then. Naturally, Meyneth wouldn't be concerned about Mechonis dying, so she doesn't mind the sentience of its people.

• Problem: They need water and some doses of ether every now and then, so it's not too much of a stretch to assume Meyneth and Mechonis also need the ether that composes the Xenoblade world.
  • Meyneth outright states that the Machina leaving would kill her, but that she accepted this.

Meyneth used to be just as evil as Zanza until this point in the Vicious Cycle.

Consider what Zanza said before the final battle, that he has caused the apocalypse many times before. Considering the backstory of the fight between Mechonis and Bionis, and the conversations between Zanza and Meyneth, it is to assume that this is the first time Meyneth fought against Zanza.

Fridge Horror time: This means that either Meyneth participated on the massive genocide of all living creatures until this point in history, where she had a Heel Realization and decided to put a stop to the senseless slaughter and let her creations live; or she begrudgingly "played along" with Zanza's slaughter to avoid a massive conflict, until she finally got fed up and decided to stop it. Whatever the motive, this caused the wrath of Zanza and his attack to Mechonis; if she wouldn't continue the cycle of destruction and creation, he'd have to do it himself.

(Different Troper): My guess is that Meyneth begrudgingly went along with Zanza so long as it was only Bionis' life that was consumed in each cycle, and that the truce was broken when Zanza started killing her people as well. It would explain the much-longer lifespans of the Machina as well as their technological advancement compared to Bionis' races.

The Machina going into space would not have meant abandoning the Mechonis.

The Mechonis is a giant robot. They would have just modified it so it could fly into space and taken it with them, as a mothership.

The Monados take the shape of whatever weapon their owner wants them to be.

Consider this: When Zanza takes his Monado back, it undergoes a massive change of shape. It could assumed it is a result of some sort of power overload. Then, when Meyneth (in Fiora's body) reveals her Monado, it takes the form of the dual blades Fiora has been using the entire time; but when Zanza takes that Monado, it becomes a single BFS, similar to his own. It wouldn't be too much of a stretch to asume that anyone that owns a Monado can make it change to any form they wish.

• Logical, since the Monado is a Sword of Creation, as stated by Zanza during the final battle.
  • That's not really a WMG. Not only is it visually evident but Zanza literally says it "morphs to conform to the will of its master" when he claims to have fought the Mechonis and Reyn says the Monado is too small.

The following is a guess of how Vanea turned Fiora into a Mechon:

• Step #1: Send servants to get to Fiora's body
• Step #2: Fully scan Fiora's body.
• Step #3: Knowing the hole of the Fiora's arm that had her hand missing is too small for her to do look, she decide to Fiora's cut on the back.
• Step #4: Vanea temporary becomes Fiora's barber to cut her hair.
• Step #5: Vanea cuts a huge slash into Fiora's back.
• Step #6: Vanea removers all of Fiora's Homs' organs with the exception of Fiora's brain.
• Step #7: Place Fiora's body in Face Nemesis.
• Step #8: Scan both Fiora and Face Nemesis to see how to rearrange Fiora's Homs' blood system to help power up Face Nemesis.
• Step #9: Remove Fiora's body from Face Nemesis
• Step #10: Rearrange Fiora's Homs' blood system.
• Step #11: Input the Mechon's systems.
• Step #12: Stitch up the big cut in the back of Fiora's body
• Step #13: Armor and weapon up Fiora's body.
• Step #14: Short fighting test with using a mind control machine.
• Step #15: Inputting Meyneth in Fiora's body.
• Step #16: Putting Meyneth/Fiora into Face Nemesis.

A Guess of how the High Elita Regeneration Chamber de-Mechon-ized Fiora

• Step #1: Put Fiora's body to in a deep sleep.
• Step #2: Took off the entire Sliver Mechon Armor she had on.
• Step #3: Turn Fiora's body on her backside.
• Step #4: Cut into her backs
• Step #5: Remove her rain.
• Step #6: Put Fiora's brain in a jar.
• Step #7: Start removing the Mechon's system.
• Step #8: Using a muscle sample, recreate Fiora's body's missing Homs organs. This takes about 3 months.
• Step #9: Put the recreaeted Homs organs into Fiora's body.
• Step #10: Straight out her Homs' blood system
• Step #11: Remove Fiora's brain from the jar.
• Step #12: Place Fiora's brain back in her body.
• Step #13: Using skin sample and some High Elita magic, the Chamber active Fiora's blood cells to restore her Homs skin. This takes about 3 months.
• Step #14: Waiting for the magic to do it's work, the Chamber looks over Fiora's brain and go though trying to find out what armor and weapons she had on as usual wear as a member of Colony 9 before the big attack by Metal Face. His work recreates the first outfit Fiora wears in the game as well as her pair of twin daggers.
• Step #15: Get notice that the skin has finish restoring itself.
• Step #16: Put the the creation outfit on Fiora on her and put her twin daggers on her.
• Step #17: Awaken Fiora up.

The following were Meyneth's plans if Metal Face hadn't butted in.

Lady Meyneth was going to talk to them. Explaining why she took over Fiora's body — which was to sink Prison Island with out Zanza getting wise — and offer to join them. If they were still angry at the events of Prison Island — not surprising with the death of the High Entia Emperor and the reveal that Face Mechon are Homs — she would have fight the group defensive — using her god-like powers as shield and full HP restore until she get a change to add her own Monado to the Shulk in order to weak Zanza's soul via her own. If calmer heads show up, Meyneth will give them her Monado to Shulk — at the same state as Zanza's Monado.

The following is a guess at the reason why Xord was able to be eliminated by the Monado at the Ether Mine's Freight Elevator, despite being a Face Mechon.

When Xord fell into the Ether River, all of his still remaining Homs organics were completely eliminated with the exception of his brain. The brain is sometime called "an organic computer". And all you Tropers know that a computer is a type of Machine.

• One of the Machina Non Player Characters mention that the "red light" Shulk noticed on the Face Mechon was the blood of the Homs pilot being pumped through the machine. The Monado couldn't cut them because it was bouncing off the Homs blood. So when Xord took a dip in the ether river, his Mechon's circulation system was damaged, and blood was no longer being pumped through his armor, so the Monado could cut him again.

The "red lights" that Shulk notes as being the reason for Faced Mechon's invulnerability to the Monado are actually the blood of the "pilot" running through transparent tubes.

• Only the Faced Mechon have them.
• Shulk hints as it being the reason why the Monado can't damage Metal Face.
• Later on, when the party meets Xord, the same happens. He has them as well. Also during the first encounter, some malfunction causes them to turn blue, and Xord immediately chickens out, even when he was winning the battle by far.
• When Xord falls into the ether river and comes back out, he no longer has the "red lights". The Monado can then damage him just like a regular Mechon, as can other party members with Monado Enchant. A possible reason would be that the ether river seriously damaged Xord's internal machinery, including the piping system for the Homs' blood.
• We see how the "lights" aren't actually lights during the final battle with Metal Face: his upgraded claws contain the anti-Bionis chemical and you can see that the lines present in his arms are now green, the liquid's color, instead of red, again confirming that they are pipes, not lights.
• Later on, Linada reveals the process of turning a Homs into a Faced Mechon: their blood vessels are surgically altered so that their blood can go through the Mechon as well. We also see how Fiora is seriously weakened after being removed from Face Nemesis for an extended period of time, to the point of requiring Linada's assistance. The reason might be that she was suffering the effects of anemia, since some of her blood might have been left inside the Face's wreckage.
• The only exception to this is Yaldabaoth, since its pilot (Egil) is a Machina, not a converted Homs, and therefore it has no Homs blood to protect it from the Monado. However, Yaldabaoth is never seen in battle until the Monado has been upgraded to get around the blood restriction. Egil may have been holding back on using Yaldabaoth in combat until it was clear that the Homs-made Face Mechon were no longer invincible to the Monado, and by then he had the Apocrypha Generator to compensate for it.

I guess this sums up how Egil exploited the loophole in the Monado's power with the Faced Mechon: by running Homs' blood through the Mechon, the Monado senses Homs' biological fluids, and is unable to cause damage (until Zanza's upgrade). The fact that it's a Mechon body prevents damage from other weapons.

• I believe one of the Machina Non Player Characters spells this out, so it's not WMG. The red lights are blood, possibly mixed with ether or something, and since it's living Homs tissues, the Monado can't cut it.

Zanza limited the Monado's power in the first place to prevent it from being used against him.

Leaving the Monado around for just anybody to pick up while he rested would have been a huge gamble, so Zanza created the blood restriction to keep anyone who found out about his true nature from turning the Monado against him. It's only after Egil exploits this loophole that Zanza removes the restriction, and by then, the Monado is in the hands of Zanza's chosen vessel, anyway.

Melia is a fragment of Clara Oswald from when she jumped into the Doctor's timeline.

Because Jenna Coleman and because why not?

As a kid, Klaus played with, and was therefore heavily inspired by, BIONICLE.

Perhaps he liked the idea of a world taking place on the body of a titan, and decided to double it — one for mechanical life, one for organic. The Faced Mechon themselves were made with the Toa in mind.

• To be fair, the mechanicle body had nothing to do with him—that was all Meyneth.

The Sentient Genesis was the Fading Sun.

If you can see it, you can go there. No exceptions.

Alternately, Sentient Genesis is where Earth is supposed to be.

It's where both Zanza and Meyneth came from and where the experiment that turned them into gods was performed, making it the origin point for all sentient life in the Xenoblade universe. What better place could there be for a showdown with Zanza?

Alvis was there when the Bionis attacked

On Chuggaaconroy's lets play, Episode 76: History of the Machina starting at 13:25. Look at the child in the crib.

• No machina has hair or skin like that.
• Could be related to Meyneth's pattern on his jacket.
  • Looks like every other child machina to this troper.

Yaldabaoth has a Homs inside it

Not a Homs piloting it, Egil is clearly the pilot, but he does keep a Homs inside to protect him from the Monado, that's why it has the red lights. He just never bothered to remove it after the monado got upgraded and never considered it relevant/tactful to mention it to the party. This Homs is completely trapped and stuffed full of tubes with absolutely no idea where it is or what's happening to them.

• Somewhat confirmed by the Monado Archives. Yaldabaoth has Homs parts inside it, maybe not a full Face Unit, but definitely enough to block the Monado if it was fought before Prison Island.

Egil was Meyneth's vessel

Meyneth needs a vessel just like Zanza does. Given Egil's position, power and relationship with Meyneth, it makes sense he was the one she choose as her vessel to fight Zanza and Arglas. Given that it was his friend doing the attacks Egil probably volunteered. It would make sense of how he knows how to control the Mechonis without Meyneth as it's something he has done before.

• I think the gods only need a vessel if they want to run around as Homs-sized creatures. Their natural bodies—the titans—are just too big for that, and that's why they need a vessel.
  • If that were the case then Zanza could have just hung about inside the Bionis and rested there instead of waiting for Shulk to be born. We also clearly see Zanza controlling the Bionis while using Arglas as a host.

Klaus did not destroy the universe

He successfully created a new universe inside the space station's Monado computer. The universe getting destroyed was how the Monado perceived getting integrated into the simulated universe. That's why it can predict the future, because the whole universe is a program. The Zanza and Meyneth running around that universe are just copies created by Monado itself or more likely created by Klaus or Meyneth, like the fake party members Shulk talks to briefly at the end of the game. Shulk and co. defying fate is really about a computer achieving true sentient AI and defying it's program, and over the course of the game the real Klaus is running around the lab, bragging and rubbing it in Meyneth's face.

• I wouldn't be bragging if the sentient AI I developed just killed my avatar who was literally on God-Mode...
  • You would if you were trying to create a computer program that can think on its own.

They didn't destoy the universe—they created a new one.

Alvis says that he was part of some kind of "phase transition" experiment. When Klaus hit the metaphorical big red button, it looked like he destroyed the universe, but what really happened was him, Meyneth, and Alvis went out-of-phase with our universe and into a space between realities. As they were the first and only sentient life there, they became the gods of this new universe.

• At the end of the game, Shulk either A) changes the new universe so it more or less matches the old one, or B) moves every one back to the old universe, but to a different planet (the epilogue is at least six months after the move, it would be obvious if they were on modern day Earth). This would mean that, at the very least, Klaus and Meyneth existed in the world of Xenoblade Chronicles X. Plus, if Shulk moved everyone back to the original universe, you might visit their new planet in the game.
  • (IMPORTANT NOTE: Since this is the page for Xenoblade Chronicles, please spoiler tag any confirmation/ Jossing we get from Xenoblade Chronicles X.)
  • Sorta-confirmed by Xenoblade Chronicles 2. The experiment didn't completely destroy the universe, but it did shunt large parts of Earth (and who knows where else) into parallel universes, including the one where Meyneth and Zanza ended up. Human civilization as the Architect knew it was still effectively destroyed, but there was enough left of Earth for him to rebuild it into Alrest.

A world without gods means a world with workable physics.

In the new universe, the sun fades in and out instead of rising and setting, the titans stand in an endless flat ocean (which should result in super storms but doesn't) and not a planet, changes in altitude have no effect on living beings (not air pressure or atmospheric make up changes), etc. This is because, even though they're scientists, recreating the original universe's physics was far too complicated for Meyneth and Zanza to pull off. So instead, they simplified how the world worked, and we wound up with the wacky physics I mentioned above.

• Because of all that, the new universe needed gods. Without them, the sun wouldn't work right, nor would anything else. Shulk's wish for a world without gods was basically a wish for physics to work like it does in the real world. Whether he changed how it worked in the new universe or just transported everyone to the old universe is unknown.
  • (IMPORTANT NOTE: Since this is the page for Xenoblade Chronicles, please spoiler tag any confirmation/ Jossing we get from Xenoblade Chronicles X.)

Alvis is based on the computer's original acronyms.

Alvis state's he was the experiment facility's computer before the original universe was destroyed. The computer could've just been called an ALVIS (Artificial Lifeform Virtual Intelligence System) and then adapted that as a regular sounding name.

Metal Face didn't talk during the attack on Colony 9 because he couldn't.

From a storytelling standpoint, preventing him from talking is practical because hearing his voice so soon after the prologue would allow the player to more easily realise who he is, but an in-universe explanation is also possible: Whenever a Faced Mechon does speak, they have a very conspicuous, muffled echo effect, implying that they need some sort of voice transmitter in order to be clearly heard while piloting their Mechon. It's possible that Metal Face's voice transmitter was malfunctioning or had not yet been installed, hence why he couldn't talk even when he very likely wanted to.

The Telethia spawn Alvis uses to teach Shulk Monado Purge are Melia's guards.

Telethia are High Entia exposed to great ether, and they were last seen being exposed to Melia's Burst End... Mostly, though, is that the game is unclear on how and if Telethia are capable of reproduction, and there are four of them...

Meyneth's original name.

Either tying into the above theory of Meyneth giving into godly egoism, or simply due to leaving her old life behind, Meyneth wasn't her original name (because, c'mon, compared to Klaus it's pretty out there).

Based entirely on Xenoblade's use of Gnosticism, Meyneth's original human name might have been Sophia.

In Gnosticism, Sophia was (basically) an angel-like being who created the Demiurge (false god, represented in-game by Zanza, Meyneth, and to an extent Egil). This is pretty fitting for a woman who worked on the new world project with Klaus, and ended up becoming a false god herself.

The name of the Demiurge was (in some traditions) Yaldabaoth, the name of Egil's mecha. This is pretty fitting as Egil saw himself as trying to fulfill Meyneth's will.

Right that Meyneth is an alias like Zanza, but Xenoblade Chronicles 2 states that Meyneth's human name was Galea.

Tyrea will play a role in Future Connected.

Whether as an ally or a villain, having Tyrea appear again would be a good way to give her more closure.

• Confirmed. Tyrea does appear in Future Connected, but it's uncertain if she'll be playable or not.

Meyneth will be in a Xenoblade 3

...as the Big Bad. Much like how Klaus was split into both The Architect and Zanza, so was Galea. One was Meyneth and one was someone else. Meyneth is her good side, whereas her evil side will try to genocide humans.

The Fog King is the remnant of Zanza

The rift could have been an opening to the old world. The Fog King could be a fragment of Zanza's soul that only seeks revenge against Shulk for "robbing" him of his perfect world.

Meyneth was never a normal human.

Meyneth in the past had an unusual hair color of white. Other characters such as chaos, Wilhelm, Alvis, Elma, etc also has hair color and turned out to be quite different. Perhaps Meyneth was a synthetic human.