I'm remaking Xenogears. I'm calling it Project Animus.

It is my favorite game of all time. I started playing it when it came out in 1998, and I still play it at least once every year. At this point, going back to it is part of my life.

I was already a die-hard RPG fan when I first played it. Even with that background, my reaction was essentially: “Holy shit. This shit is deep as fuck.” It made me question existence, religion, life, and things I had accepted without thinking very hard about them.

And then there were Fei and Elly. Their love story became something of a standard for my relationships. I wanted something like that. A game managed to get into both my understanding of the world and my idea of the love I wanted to find in it.

That is a lot to carry into a remake. It is also why I want to do it.

An enhanced view of Lahan's village square in the work-in-progress Project Animus build.
Lahan, 25 September 2026: an earlier development checkpoint. The project and its artwork continue to evolve.

A story I want more people to experience

I want more people to enjoy the complete story. The difficulty is that recommending a game I know intimately is different from asking someone to encounter it for the first time today.

I can look at its old graphics and immediately see the places and people I love. Someone new might see an old game whose appearance, controls, or pacing asks for more patience than they are willing to give. That does not make them wrong. They do not have my years of attachment helping them through the rough edges.

Project Animus grows out of that gap. I want to make the world easier to enter while keeping the things that made me return every year. The familiar places, characters, atmosphere, and emotional weight have to survive the work.

The two priorities are faithful modernization and an expanded Disc 2. Everything else should support the experience of being there and following that story.

What Project Animus is

The name comes from something already in the game. I liked it and went with it. There is no elaborate naming story behind it.

The current project runs natively on PC, using a recompilation of the original game as its foundation. Around that foundation, I am working on graphics, controls, presentation, dialogue, and the options needed for a larger remaster and expansion.

The visual direction keeps characters as 2D sprites while rebuilding environments, scenery, and Gears in 3D. I want the characters to remain recognizable in their poses and proportions. A clearer face or a more detailed room should still belong to the same game.

I also want players to have choices: the original story or an extended version, original or reworked gameplay, and the original English translation or a corrected option grounded in the Japanese text. Those choices are goals with different amounts of work behind them. They are not all finished features.

Starting with a village I know by heart

Lahan is the first place where I can put those ideas next to the original and judge them. Houses, paths, rocks, fences, and small props all contribute to whether the village feels familiar.

The outdoor work has gone through several rounds of textures, materials, geometry, lighting, and atmosphere. A sharper surface can help, but the shape of a roof, the placement of a wall, or the way a path meets the ground can matter just as much. There are many small decisions hiding inside a screenshot.

The images below show stages of that process. Some are earlier experiments. They belong in this diary because they show how the direction has developed, and because work that looked promising at one point can still need another pass.

Lahan, through successive passes

Browse paired original/enhanced views from September. These are development snapshots, and the direction continues to change.

Lahan's market square with original assets.
Lahan's market square — original assets, 25 September 2026. PC runtime capture from an earlier development checkpoint; the artwork continues to evolve.
Lahan's market square with enhanced assets.
Lahan's market square — enhanced assets, 25 September 2026. PC runtime capture from an earlier development checkpoint; the artwork continues to evolve.
Lahan's western house with original assets.
Lahan's western house — original assets, 25 September 2026. PC runtime capture from an earlier development checkpoint; the artwork continues to evolve.
Lahan's western house with enhanced assets.
Lahan's western house — enhanced assets, 25 September 2026. PC runtime capture from an earlier development checkpoint; the artwork continues to evolve.
Lahan's well and nearby houses with original assets.
Lahan's well and nearby houses — original assets, 25 September 2026. PC runtime capture from an earlier development checkpoint; the artwork continues to evolve.
Lahan's well and nearby houses with enhanced assets.
Lahan's well and nearby houses — enhanced assets, 25 September 2026. PC runtime capture from an earlier development checkpoint; the artwork continues to evolve.
Lahan's trees and laundry with original assets.
Lahan's trees and laundry — original assets, 25 September 2026. PC runtime capture from an earlier development checkpoint; the artwork continues to evolve.
Lahan's trees and laundry with enhanced assets.
Lahan's trees and laundry — enhanced assets, 25 September 2026. PC runtime capture from an earlier development checkpoint; the artwork continues to evolve.

Inside the houses

The rooms need the same care. Alice's house, the shop, the bar, and the other interiors are places players move through, talk in, and remember. Rebuilding them means keeping their layouts and character while giving their furniture, walls, and details more presence.

There are two different kinds of comparison here. The first shows actual in-game views: the original presentation beside the current build. These are the rooms the game can display now.

Inside the running game

Original PC and Remastered views, captured in the game during 11–12 October. Each room appears first with original assets, then in the Remastered build.

Chief Lee's house as seen on entering the room in the Original PC edition.
Chief Lee's house — Original PC edition, actual in-game capture from the 11–12 October 2026 session.
Chief Lee's house as seen on entering the room in the Remastered edition.
Chief Lee's house — Remastered edition, actual in-game capture from the 11–12 October 2026 session.
Bar, ground floor as seen on entering the room in the Original PC edition.
Bar, ground floor — Original PC edition, actual in-game capture from the 11–12 October 2026 session.
Bar, ground floor as seen on entering the room in the Remastered edition.
Bar, ground floor — Remastered edition, actual in-game capture from the 11–12 October 2026 session.
Alice's house, upstairs as seen on entering the room in the Original PC edition.
Alice's house, upstairs — Original PC edition, actual in-game capture from the 11–12 October 2026 session.
Alice's house, upstairs as seen on entering the room in the Remastered edition.
Alice's house, upstairs — Remastered edition, actual in-game capture from the 11–12 October 2026 session.
Save-point house as seen on entering the room in the Original PC edition.
Save-point house — Original PC edition, actual in-game capture from the 11–12 October 2026 session.
Save-point house as seen on entering the room in the Remastered edition.
Save-point house — Remastered edition, actual in-game capture from the 11–12 October 2026 session.

The next slideshow gives a cleaner look at the room artwork, with the original models and textures beside the rebuilt 3D rooms. These rebuilt rooms are playable. I took these views in Blender to remove the people and let the rooms themselves take the attention.

They are rendered views rather than direct game captures. The original-side renders omit the game's native vertex shading, and a few rooms have slight framing differences.

Ten rooms: original assets and rebuilt scenes

All ten original-versus-latest comparisons from 12 October. These are clean Blender views of playable rooms, with people removed to show the artwork. Original-side shading is simplified, and four rooms have small framing shifts.

Chief Lee's house: original room assets on the left and the rebuilt 3D scene on the right.
Chief Lee's house — original assets left, latest rebuilt scene right. Clean Blender comparison, 12 October 2026, with people omitted to show the room artwork.
Chief Lee's cellar: original room assets on the left and the rebuilt 3D scene on the right.
Chief Lee's cellar — original assets left, latest rebuilt scene right. Clean Blender comparison, 12 October 2026, with people omitted to show the room artwork.
Save-point house: original room assets on the left and the rebuilt 3D scene on the right.
Save-point house — original assets left, latest rebuilt scene right. Clean Blender comparison, 12 October 2026, with people omitted to show the room artwork.
Shop: original room assets on the left and the rebuilt 3D scene on the right.
Shop — original assets left, latest rebuilt scene right. Clean Blender comparison, 12 October 2026, with people omitted to show the room artwork.
Bar, ground floor: original room assets on the left and the rebuilt 3D scene on the right.
Bar, ground floor — original assets left, latest rebuilt scene right. Clean Blender comparison, 12 October 2026, with people omitted to show the room artwork.
Bar, upstairs: original room assets on the left and the rebuilt 3D scene on the right.
Bar, upstairs — original assets left, latest rebuilt scene right. Clean Blender comparison, 12 October 2026, with people omitted to show the room artwork.
Alice's house, ground floor: original room assets on the left and the rebuilt 3D scene on the right.
Alice's house, ground floor — original assets left, latest rebuilt scene right. Clean Blender comparison, 12 October 2026, with people omitted to show the room artwork.
Alice's house, upstairs: original room assets on the left and the rebuilt 3D scene on the right.
Alice's house, upstairs — original assets left, latest rebuilt scene right. Clean Blender comparison, 12 October 2026, with people omitted to show the room artwork.
Rock-paper-scissors house: original room assets on the left and the rebuilt 3D scene on the right.
Rock-paper-scissors house — original assets left, latest rebuilt scene right. Clean Blender comparison, 12 October 2026, with people omitted to show the room artwork.
Rock-paper-scissors cellar: original room assets on the left and the rebuilt 3D scene on the right.
Rock-paper-scissors cellar — original assets left, latest rebuilt scene right. Clean Blender comparison, 12 October 2026, with people omitted to show the room artwork.

These rebuilt rooms make the progress tangible. Their materials, lighting, and details will continue to evolve with the project.

The people have to remain themselves

Faces and sprites are especially easy to get wrong. More detail does not automatically preserve a character's expression, posture, or personality.

The character images here include earlier portrait and sprite studies. The direction is currently evolving, and these designs will change. I am revisiting the pixel work and how closely each pose follows the original.

I want Fei and Elly, and the rest of the cast, to feel like the people I have been returning to for years. The same attention goes to villagers whose few lines help make a place feel inhabited. A development diary should leave room to show the studies, the revisions, and the decisions still being made.

Portraits and sprites in development

Earlier studies, rather than final character designs. The art is evolving and will change.

Original portraits above and earlier redraw studies below for Fei, Alice, Timothy, Chief Lee and Citan.
Portrait studies, 16 September 2026. Original artwork above, redraw candidates below; this earlier board does not establish acceptance of every portrait.
Earlier battle sprite studies compare original and enhanced frames for Fei and four enemies.
Battle sprite studies, 1 October 2026. Original on the left of each pair, enhanced on the right. Offline frame previews, not gameplay; this visual direction is being revised.

There is a whole world beyond Lahan

The scenery and Gear work reaches beyond the opening village, although the amount of refinement varies considerably. Broad geometry passes provide groundwork; individual locations still need their own attention.

I am interested in materials, silhouettes, lighting, and scale that make the world clearer while respecting its identity. A Gear should retain the shape that makes it recognizable. A place should still make sense to someone who knows the original.

Scenery and Gears beyond the village

October geometry checkpoints. Broad automatic passes establish groundwork; individual scenes and models still need refinement.

Paired geometry views of Citan's house, Shevat's entrance, Citan's workshop and Blackmoon Forest.
Scenery geometry, 8 October 2026: reshaped on the left, original on the right. Native runtime comparisons with unchanged textures. An automatic groundwork pass, not a finished visual overhaul of every area.
Weltall in the opening Gear battle, with adjusted geometry on the left and original geometry on the right.
Weltall geometry, 8 October 2026. The same battle checkpoint with the automatic shape pass on the left and original geometry on the right. Later surface-painting work is not shown here.

Camera and widescreen work, readable dialogue, smoother interaction, combat changes, and translation work are part of the broader effort too. A finished screenshot answers a visual question. A playable section has to answer many more, which is why these images should not be read as a claim that the whole game is complete.

Disc 2, and a little of what I want to change

A few broad spoilers follow. I will leave the important details for later updates.

The expanded Disc 2 is one of the main reasons I am making this. I want more of the story to unfold through places players can explore, conversations they can have, and events they can play through. The parts presented through narration give me a lot to work toward.

That means building areas and encounters, connecting scenes, and thinking about how the expanded material fits the original. It is a substantial body of future work. The images in this post do not mean that expansion has already been completed.

I also want room for a different ending. A playable Elly and Weltall-Id are part of that vision. I am keeping the precise changes to myself for now, but the possibility matters enough to mention here.

Alongside those ambitions, I want an original-story path for people who want to revisit the game as they remember it. The expansion gives me a place to explore the things I have wanted to see for years, with that distinction clear.

A public project, and a diary that will continue

I intend to make Project Animus available to the public as a mod that runs on top of an owned copy of the original game. Players will need their own copy. The plan is to distribute the remaster and expansion work rather than a copy of Xenogears; the release packaging still needs to be completed.

I do not have a release date to announce here. There is still integration, refinement, and a great deal of playable content ahead.

I will post updates on this website as the project develops. Some will focus on a place, some on a character, and some on the systems that make the game feel better to play. I also plan to make a YouTube video later and bring it into a future update.

For now, this is the beginning of the public diary: a game I have loved since 1998, the work already taking shape, and the version of it I want more people to experience.