I had the opportunity to meet Nobuo Uematsu at DePaul University about 2 or 3 years after Lost Odyssey came out. There were so many people who were foaming at the mouth asking questions about final fantasy and his thought process regarding how he came up with the music. I stood up and asked him what went through his head when he created the music for Lost Odyssey and I swear, for about 10 minutes he could not stop talking about it. Ultimately he signed the inner part of the copy of the game and inside the owner's manual and I presented it as a gift to a friend. This game is just unbelievably amazing and the stories within it evoke so many emotions... My God, it makes me cry just thinking about it.
The one story where Kaim spent so much time in prison that his cellmate went blind when they were finally able to see the sun again definitely hits me in the feels…
Played roughly 12 or so hours of this game back around the time it released on the 360. I was 14 / 15 then. I always wanted to give it another shot, but didn’t want to go through the hassle of getting a 360. Tonight I decided enough is enough and tried out Xenia. Currently just rolled credits on the intro, that starts on the monorail. I’ve got a 4090 so I’m playing it in 4K w/ RTX HDR on and I swear to God I almost cried. What a time to be alive. I’m 30 years old now.
I am SO freaking glad you're talking about Lost Odyssey. A SEVERELY criminally underrated gem. The soundtrack is beautiful. The story is fantastic. The combat is engaging. The first Thousand Years of Dreams, Hanna's Departure never fails to choke me up and THAT SCENE with Lirum, to this day, still makes me legitimately cry. I unashamedly sob big manly tears. The fact that this hasn't received a sequel is a travesty! Thank you SO much for covering this. It honestly ties with FFX as my favourite game of all time, I'd happily pay full price if they ported this to PS4/5 as I don't have an xbox unfortunately. But I still have my copy of this game, when I had to sell my 360 and game collection when I fell on hard times, I REFUSED to part with this game. There are 3 moments total in all of gaming that never fail to get me. In reverse order is the end of FFX with the goodbye scene, the final conversation between Lee and Clementine at the end of The Walking Dead Season 1 and the worst of all for me, as mentioned earlier, is that scene with Lirum. It completely took me by surprise when I first played this. Plus the theme of Kaim being immortal, having lived for centuries, outliving every friend, every loved one, every family he ever creates, to the point of him becoming so numb to the world, is just truly, genuinely heartbreaking. I love this game SO MUCH. Thank you again for this 💙
You should play it on an Xbox Series X or S, the update for it gets rid of all the technical issues it had on the 360. It runs butter smooth, it's a great experience, as it should have been back in the day.
@@LegendarySkypenis That’s subjective you will find a lot of people love that game for good reason. I didn’t like the game when it first came out but I gave it a second try on my PC a few years ago and tbh I thought it was great however it’s not without flaws with its convoluted systems it has but there are ways around it.
@@radagonsoreseal3457 naw it was trash, hardly strategic. You have to match the games ambition to what you actually received. If it was some indie game I would of said it was okay. Square Enix made this and they made low effort trash once again. Same effort they put in forespoken, some of their remasters, in my opinion ff 15 was also trash. They just don't know how to make a good game play mixed with the open world story progression. Found my self closing my eyes and warp striking majority of the game. Secret turtle boss was a joke
Remembering that this was offered for free years ago on 360 and that's when I picked it up. It was due to an outage or something like that and was Xbox's way of making it right with the fans.
I just beat this game a few weeks ago for the very 1st time and man I'm glad I was being pointed at it by friends, this game was an absolute treat and it broke me literally every damn disc and the combat was super addicting also the music oh my gooooooood 11/10
I’ve always been debating if I should pick this game up, especially when it’s been discounted. This video finally has pushed me over the edge. I’ll 100% pick it up next time I see it discounted.
What an absolute treat to watch. Lost Odyssey is dear to my heart. Back in the day when it released me and a bunch of online friends went through the game at the same time, giving tips and appreciating the experience. It was one of the few moments where I felt a genuine connection that I was on a journey with my friends going through a masterpiece of a gem. Insane respect and props for making this video, reminding me of the old times where socialising was still a thing in console games, and for making a stand up retrospective review. Legend
I have never played this game and you explained it very well, I'm going to check it out, my Xbox series X is used as my retro console filled with mainly 360 games. GREAT video 📹 👍
If a sequel ever happens I wonder where and when exactly it would take place. It would be cool if we get to explore the immortal’s world as Seth or Gongora.
Even a remaster at this point just to get a lot of new eyes on it. A sequel wouldn't work as well because we just need it to get more exposure in general.
I've been waiting for this video for so long it feels like. This game was like nothing else at the time and I felt it was the Final Fantasy I was not getting at the time (especially during the 13 saga). This should have been Microsoft's Final Fantasy and we should be well on to a 3rd sequel by now.... but this would definitely be a drop that Mike moment if they came out and said Lost Odyssey 2 at one of their showcase!
I feel like sequels to Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey could happen. Mistwalker just works on mobile games nowadays. Microsoft should fund Mistwalker for a sequel to these games!
@@mhjmstultiens blue dragon was great to me as a kid, i dont think it would hold up as an adult in a lot of ways but i still think its a good game fundamentally
I really wanted to like Blue Dragon. I love Akira Toriyama, Hironobu Sakaguchi, and JRPG's and when that era of consoles (especially ps3) was starving for JRPG's, I could not even force myself to enjoy it. It was honestly pretty bad.
Matty, my dude, thank you for shining a light on this game. I had beaten every mainline FF by 2014, met Nobuo Uematsu that same year, and did not even know this game existed until 2018. This truly is the lost FF game, or the true FF13. Not that I dislike 13 or 13-2. It just feels like a natural follow-up or spiritual and stylistic continuation of FF 6/ 7 / 9 / 10. The overworld, camera design, and overall stylistic approach feels a lot like FFX to me and I love that.
And let's be real here my dude, the bad guy's themes/motifs are like a Seymour v2, or at least they result in a similarly-wicked end product like Seymour's did. "Distorted Space" has that same evil Seymour energy. (Uematsu is a god..)
Just got to disc 3 on my replay of the game. Im older and have a whole new appreciation for its themes now. Its made me laugh, beam, and even shed some tears.
This game is what brought me and a high school classmate together back on release. We would stay up way passed our bedtimes talking on the phone while we went through the game together. He and I still talk about this game 15 years later with the utmost fondness. :)
The one time Hironobu Sakaguchi (the legendary man behind Final Fantasy for those not in the know) made waves on the Xbox 360 and it was flipping fantastic, what an incredible game this was :)
If Lost Odessey, Tales of Vesperia. and FF13 didn't end up on xbox 360 i may not have found my love for jrpgs. Those games were the starting point for me and I have played a ton of jrpgs since
I loved this game so much back in the day that, when my save got corrupted by the beginning of Disc 2, I speedran through the entirety of Disc 1 to get to the exact point I was and keep playing.
This game got me into turn-based RPGs. Sadly, I came to find out that this was my unicorn. Such a brilliant game! I'd love to see MS fund another Mistwalker console exclusive. Sakaguchi-san does not like sequels so I'm sure he'd like to do something new. The skill-learning system is absolutely inspired and I've never seen it before. It would be perfect. LO is #3 RPG of all time and in in my top 10 games of all time. An absolute masterpiece that is sorely underappreciated.
@@Walamonga1313 I've been interested in the Trails series but I know that they're all connected. That's a long series to get into. I may do it if it gets a collection.
Man I remember tearing up at most of the dream stories! This game felt too good to be true for a 15 year old me, I still have really vivid memories of it even now. Appreciate you making this video my dude
Lost Odyssey really is an underrated gem. I wish they would port it over to PC, or even better, make a sequel. Kaim being an immortal, still has many stories to tell!
The short stories WERE in the original game, there's just a few extra short stories that came with a certain dlc which is super cheap and adds a few extra goodies.
Not only is Kaim not the standard stoic protag, it is shown time and time again in the game that Kaim is a genuinely kind person who puts himself out there to help others and offer guidance and wisdom via the Thousand Years of Dreams stories.
By this time I was so tired of the angsty main characters and the bullshit support they got from everyone around them. This was the first one that had a clear justification for the MC's behaivor and was done so well.
@@vaguedreams through the entire game it just shows him as "just trying to figure it out" this whole life thing makes no sense sometimes and even as an immortal with thousands of years behind you sometimes things just don't work how you plan.
I remember a gamestop employee recomending this to me since I liked final fantasy. He told he about it being made by the creator of FF, Sakaguchi, and that was enough to interest me. I fell in love immediately. All these years later, I still think fondly back on this game. When I sold all my xbox games in college, and then slowly started building my collection back up, this was one of the first ones I picked up.
I was a kid when I first played this game. I remember having such a hard time with the very first boss, the poison griffon. He kicked me hard. I got past him, but not by much. I would always get bored and get onto other stuff. I've tried picking it up after a year, then a few years, just on and off would pick it up, get bored, and do something else. The furthest I ever got was the beggining of Disc 3. I'm not saying the game is boring, I'm saying I as a kid just never got into it for long. However, as of making this post I Just beat the game about 15 minutes ago. Gosh, its a weird feeling beating a game you've picked up and dropped several times since you were 9 or 10. Absolutely loved it, amazing game. One thing thats always stood out to me was the music. I loved that as a kid, and I still love it now. The theme when you first arrive in Uhra and the cutscene plays showing off the city while you're traveling the monorail is so beautiful. Just, gah, great game
I liked the version of New Game + for this game where all the immortals start at level 50 but other than that the rest of the team start at 1 and you have to learn all the skills again. It just kind of fits with the immortal idea where they are tough as nails but have forgotten everything.
I know Sakaguchi said he’s not interested in remastering Lost Odyssey, or making a Lost Odyssey 2; heck I don’t know if Mistwalker is even alive anymore. But I thought Lost Odyssey actually had the best opportunity to tie-in to a sequel through the Immortals. I legit had thought up a whole future scenario where you play as a new protagonist in the far flung future of the same planet. Then it’s revealed you’re actually a descendent of Kaim and Sarah. Just have great-great-great-great-grandpa and grandma appear to save you, cos they’re keeping an eye on their descendants in the world. And it’ll be like more technological, closer to Gohtza’s industrialisation, and maybe a whole new set of Immortals arrive from the home world but they’re set on a full on genocide mission to kill the game world to save their home! I thought about it so long, about the sheer unique story potential LO can make. And it pains me that we’ll never see it 😢
I own this game but I can't remember ever buying it. Anyway I started it a few days ago and I'm really enjoying it. That opening cut scene was excellent.
Bought the discs used ages ago and couldn’t finish since it was scratched but with the current sale and after watching this I’ll definitely be revisiting this masterpiece.
Hironobu Sakaguchi, the man who is responsible for Final Fantasy 1-9 (tough i heard he is quiet involved with 10 and 12). After he left Square, he still making a lot of banger games like Lost Oddysey, The Last Story, Blue Dragon and Fantasian funny thing to note that some of his game title is literally just a synonyms of "Final Fantasy"
I think Last Story was bit dry and bland but Blue Dragon and especially Lost Odyssey were damn good. Blue Dragon was Dragon Quest for Xbox Lost Odyssey was Final Fantasy X for Xbox
Played it back in the day. I enjoyed what I played but just wasn't patient enough(because I was 21👴) to play it all the way through. Definitely gonna try to give it another shot.
It needs to be ported to pc & Switch so it can have life again instead of forgotten to rot by Microsoft/MW. Who makes a game for 1 systemand never ports it again? Especially when it can't be emulated, and the original system is prone to breaking
I played this game when it first came out.. it was AWESOME. Forgot the tile as it was over a decade ago but then recently stumbled onto this video and remembered it. Everything stated about its likeness to Final Fantasy is true, just a bit more grit and some slight twists. If you haven’t played it give it a try.
Man I loved this game. I remember the day my pre order came in, I was so excited I picked this up after school put in my 360 only to see 3 red rings appear on my 360😭, and I had to wait an extra month or so to play this baby.
I don't feel like "underrated" is the right word, because the vast majority of people who have played it absolutely love it. I have always felt that "underexposed" is a better word for a game like this since the real issue is that way too many people have not played it because they just don't have access to it. To this day the only way to play it is on an Xbox system. I can understand why they wouldn't want to put it on Playstation, but to not even release it on PC (Steam, Microsoft Store, etc..) to give more people access to it is what keeps it in the "hidden masterpiece" category. It's been 15 years and Microsoft is too petty to even release it on PC so more people can be exposed to a great game that doesn't really gel with the general Xbox ecosystem/audience to begin with.
I do want to add a under looked aspect of the game. The character designs of the main characters are so special because they were designed by legendary manga artist Takehiko Inoue. He created two of the best selling manga ever, Slam Dunk and Vegabond which are legendary
Lost Odyssey is the best game i have ever played (playing jrpgs since 2005), for me its the true Final Fantasy 13 (not badtalking FF13, but LO is created by the Father of FF and you see and hear it via Nobue Uematsus beautiful soundtrack at every turn)
Playing "Tales of Arise" really brought me back to "Lost Oddessy" sure the game mechanics work different, but I love both the stories and are both highly underrated JRPGs. I havnt played lost oddessy since 2009. I was 10 years old then with my 360 and only made it to the end of the second disk. Tales of Arise I did beat and absolutely loved.
I was way too young to appreciate this game when it came out I really struggled to understand the story at the time I was used to more simple things like the power of friendship. I wish I had a way to play it now after having a lot more jrpg experience.
I bought the game earlier this year for $9USD. It i going up and I will (one day) find time to give it a go. Heard nothing but good things about it. I also have Infinite Undiscovery on my backlog to tackle too
I loved the skill set aspect, especially when you get items that give you slot+5 and slot+10. The only thing that I found strange is that they didn't have an item that worked as a tent, but then I learned that if you reset the game at a save point, your entire party's HP/MP is filled. I would've preferred either a tent-like item, or that every save point also had those blue spheres to refill HP/MP.
Yeah, this game is something special. I need to finish it. I started it about a year ago. Played about 12 hours and stopped. No idea why. Matty, you just lit a fire under my ass. Looks like I'm diving back it :)
Love. This. Game. A Sakaguchi/Uematsu masterpiece. Actually, I love it more than any FF game since Sakaguchi's departure (12, 13, etc.). I believe this was my best reason for getting a 360 back in the day, aside from Halo. I re-played this in 2020, and actually got every memory that time. I still have the Standee for this, as well. Going to have to re-play this in the nigh future. Another reason I love it -- it has some of the same battle system devs as Legend of Dragoon & Shadow Hearts.
Sitting at home, due to work injury, I just broke the seal on this game. Lost Odyssey was a game I picked up 10 years ago, and never got around to playing. I am only 20 minutes in, and I thank you for this post.
I LOVED this game as a teenager! My favorite part back then was reading those Kaim stories, and just experiencing all the feels from each one. Was such a beautiful experience back then, during the 2 or so times I rented it from Hollywood Video. But I ended up stopping around the 3rd disc (probably in Gohtza City, even though I have no clue how I managed to get there back then). I finally got around to replaying it a couple years back, and made it all the way to the 4th disc where that giant creature is about to attack the one major city. My memory has been shot, since it has already been a couple years since I stopped THAT "recent" playthrough. Sooner or later I'll beat this game A SINGLE TIME 🤣❤
I’ve been an avid PlayStation (and more so FF fan) gamer since day 1. Never had any want or desire to play anything Xbox had to offer. I bought a 360 to specifically play this. Top tier game.
The 360 was low key a much better console for RPGs then the PS3 was. Fable 2, Lost Odyssey, Blue Dragon, Eternal Sonata, The Witcher 2, Mass Effect 1 and 2 were exclusive for years, Oblivion was exclusive, Skyrim on PS3 was totally broken.
The visual novel part (One Thousand Years Of Dreams) was so good, because it was a written by a really popular Japanese writer "Kiyoshi Shigematsu". :)
Some of the mechanics are maddening, the forced slowness of some of the movement (gathering stuff for a funeral, that bit on the tracks after a train crash etcetera etcetera.) and the story (The sneering Gongora who you IMMEDIATELY clock as the main baddie, one of the worst villains ever! The saccharine annoyance of Mack and Cooke) but other stuff (The memories, art design, ring system, skill system) is genuinely amazing.
You made me check this game out. I found a brand new and sealed copy for a reasonable price and bought it. I vaugely remmeber seeing an ad for this game on TV years ago. And I knew it exsisted, but then quickly forgetting about it again as quick as I emembered it:P This game looks to be a hidden masterpiece and I'm looking forward to play it. Besides it also makes a great addition to my collection. Thank you for making me more aware of this game, and deciding to try it out for myself:D
While showing a friend the trailer for clair obscur, I remarked about my excitement and love for turn based RPGs. Their response was 'Ever heard of Lost Odyssey?' I'm SOOOOO sold. 1. Turn based JRPG 2. Made by FF alum 3. Looks like it was made in 2001 with 2007 graphics and 4. NOBUO FUCKING UEMATSU! Nobuo's composer credit alone sold me tbh - the rest just makes this little 360 gem shine brighter. And the more I see it the more I wanna get my hands on it! I had no idea this game existed. Who knew Microsoft actually got a decent JRPG on the 360? I cannot WAIT!
This game was insanely good; the characters were enjoyable, the fights were amazing and the story and music was beautiful. Anyone who hasn't played this should. I'm hoping they port the game to pc to save me having to hook up my xbox just to play it again.
This was the first game I bought with my Xbox 360... Was working at Walmart and put it on layaway as a Christmas present to myself... Spent the next year trying to play it only to get halfway thru the first disc before getting busy with other things and not being able to finish but a BEAUTIFUL ass game...
I'm not the biggest Final Fantasy fan except for the Tactics games but after watching this video I scooped Lost Odyssesy CIB off Ebay for $20 Canadian and look forward to having it in my collection! Keep up the great work Matty 👍
Great Video Man. Really like ur content. Love that the game is getting attention and love these days. Time now to put respect back to another old game called "Front Mission 4". Hope u play it soon...
Agree with this regarding the Xbox 360 having many 360 gems with Lost Odyssey being at the top. Tried the recent Mystwalker mobile game and it has potential, but just can't get into mobile games at least yet. Still hope for a sequel or book on the Lost Odyssey IP, but yeah the recent news saying there is no plans was disappointing. Great video!!! May load this back up since I've been wanting to play a JRPG recently. Either this or NiNoKuni.
Great game to highlight and definitely underappreciated! If it were on the PS3 as well I think we'd hear more about this gem being the all time classic that it is. I would love a sequel but for anyone curious, this game is quite affordable, just buy it and give it a shot.
It took me 12 years to finish this game. It came in an XBOX 360 Bundle (Which included Assassins Creed & Halo 3) and only when I started streaming was I able to finish it. I actually gave up on trying to defeat 'The Immortal One' but I was more happy that I finally got to finish the story.
1000 year dreams was not DLC. I have the original, and play it on the 360, and those stories made me cry, and I am NOT ashamed. This game is the most criminally underrated game ever made. In my mind, it is the Final Fantasy 13 we never got.
