Xenosaga has been in a very odd place with an uncertain future for the better part of a decade. The developer of the series, Monolith Soft (not the same as Monolith Productions, the developer of the Middle-earth: Shadow of series) is now owned by Nintendo, despite the Xenosaga trilogy being PS2 exclusive (kind of. It’s complicated). The original publisher of the series, Bandai Namco, now presumably owns the rights to the Xenosaga games, and that presumption may just be proven right if a recent trademark filing is anything to go by.
Bandai Namco recently trademarked the term “also sprach Zarathustra” in the US. Also Sprach Zarathustra is a piece of music that was composed by Richard Strauss in 1896. Of course, before it was a piece of music, it was a book by Friedrich Nietzsche written in the 1880s. Translated from its original German to English it means Thus Spoke Zarathustra, which refers to the main character of the novel that mixes philosophy with comedy.
Gamers are probably more familiar with Also Sprach Zarathustra as the subtitle for the third and final installment of the Xenosaga trilogy. Released in 2006 for the PS2, Xenosaga Episode III: Also Sprach Zarathustra would be the last Xeno game that PlayStation gamers would see on their platform as Monolith Soft was swept up by Nintendo.
The recent trademark by Bandai Namco tosses fuel on the fire for a long awaited Xenosaga remaster or remake. While we haven’t yet been able to find Der Wille Zur Macht or Jenseits von Gut und Böse (two more Nietzsche books, and the subtitles of Xenosaga Episode I and II respectively), it would be odd for Bandai Namco to only do something with the third entry in the series.
Without anything else to go on, there’s no telling if these will be remakes, remasters, or even what consoles they will be coming to. Of course, there’s also the possibility that this has nothing to do with a Xenosaga remaster. Maybe Bandai Namco just really has a thing for Nietzsche and wants to reuse the subtitle elsewhere, but our money is on hearing something Xenosaga related here pretty soon.
[Via: Gematsu]
