A fan campaign has begun on Twitter after Japanese developer G-Mode began the morning by polling fans and asking them what games they wanted to see be ported to the Nintendo Switch to celebrate G-MODE Archives’ 3rd Anniversary. The G-Mode Archives were a series of mobile games that were ported to the Switch.
🌟締切 4/30🌟
㊗G-MODEアーカイブス3周年㊗
復刻希望フィーチャーフォンゲームのタイトルを
このツイートに #GMODEアーカイブス タグをつけて・タイトル
・メーカー名を「1リプ1タイトル」で教えて下さい！
※開発の参考にさせていただきますが、
復刻のお約束はできないことをご了承下さい🙇 pic.twitter.com/n0Y2tFIxvt— G-MODE ジー・モード【公式】 (@GmodePR) April 14, 2023
In the tweet, G-Mode asked what game from their catalogue should be ported to the Switch. User @MBgov1133 caught wind of this and began asking Twitter to reach out and request a port of Xenosaga: Pied Piper. The once-exclusive title launched on Vodafone phones in Japan and has stayed there since. A fan translation is available and can be found online but is said to take several hours to read.
Xenosaga: Pied Piper is a prequel that takes place roughly 100 years before Xenosaga Episode I: Der Wille zur Macht and provides a backstory for Ziggy, a playable character in the mainline series. Unfortunately due to time, this spin-off has been lost and is hard to find these days.
While it would incredible to see this fan campaign through, it’s also disheartening to see Bandai Namco altogether skip out on porting the mainline Xenosaga to modern consoles. Granted, the series has always been considered niche and G-Mode would be able to port it if this campaign becomes successful. However, many people would still be missing out on three great RPGs that are currently stuck on PS2 and if Xenosaga: Pied Piper was ported, it feels necessary the trilogy follows suit.
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
I’ve always had a soft spot for the Xeno series and find a lot of enjoyment in Tetsuya Takahashi’s work. I wouldn’t hold my breath though as Tekken producer said in 2019 that a remaster plan progressed but failed internally after a market analysis said it wouldn’t be profitable.
