Wrong choice of words should have said replaced rather than reregister.

Rant time. (Spoilers for Chapters 1-10)

Just finished Chapter 10, and starting to get really sick of these uneventful chapters where barely anything happens.

Seriously, there's like 2 chapters to go, and it feels like we'd need another 5 to properly wrap things up.

We still don't know shit about the "Great One", the Tainted, why Mira is so important, who the other race that fought at Earth was, why they fought, why the Ganglion fear humans, what the deal was with that alien skell the Ganglion wanted so badly, etc.

So many questions, so few answers.

Entire chapters like 7 and 10 go by with no real development of the plot, and it's getting boring.

So to those who've gotten further than me, without spoiling anything, do chapter 11 and 12 actually bother to answer any of this, or does this whole mess of loose threads go unresolved?

Some things will be answered, some won´t, you will probably get mixed feelings with the ending

Thanks.

Does chapter 11 actually have story content, or is it another chapter that boils down to a boss fight with no substantial plot development, like 7 and 10?

Don´t worry, chapters 11 and 12 have story content and some very interesting plot developments

Thanks. Problem is, to do Chapter 11, I have to first do a quest that requires me to grind Affinity with that gormless noob Gwin.

I think I need a break from this game... (76 hours in and haven't played much else for weeks)

Funny story, I found an article called "thing I wish I knew before playing XCX" while searching for some items drop rates and the dude that wrote it said that affinity with Gwin was neccesary for chapter 11. I made some missions with Gwin and when I finally made it to the chapter I already had the neccesary affinity.

It is annoying to lock certain missions behind mandatory affinity (especially with characters like Gwin)

Yeah, while I really like the game as a whole, it does have a lot of small annoyances.

It's like 90% brilliant, 10% terrible.

I wouldn't say 10% terrible.  After playing Two Worlds, I reserve the "t" word for dire circumstances :P

More like 10% "why?"  You know, those design choices that make you scratch your head a bit.  On the one hand, I 100% welcome a game with a pace and structure that demands you think ahead, plan your approach, and play at a certain pace as opposed to the mamby pamby "play it your way" sandboxes.  On the other hand, progress gates make different degrees of sense.  Some are sensible, introducing characters or setting up situations.  The survay rate one makes perfect sense of course since FronteirNav is how you find the life hold and the story progressing without it would be nonsensical.  But others feel somewhat arbitrary.  I do think just removing affinity requirements for mandatory affinity missions when you reach their point in the story would be good.  Like make it so the req is 3 hearts of affinity OR complete [x] chapter.  

Okay, I was so disappointed with Chapter 10 that I ploughed right on and did Chapter 11, and wow, more than made up for it.

I can't remember who is was (spemanig?) who commented that cutscene quality improves dramatically improves in the last two chapters, but for 11 at least, it definitely does. Music and direction are night and day better than prior story chapters. Boss difficulty was well balanced too, with no really irritating behaviours or abilities.

You know, while it may be less consistent overall, there really are times when XCX's core brilliance shines through so brightly that it can proudly stand alongside its legendary predecessor. I think if they'd had the time and money, the whole game would've had this level of attention, but the scope of the project ran got away from them a little bit, and they had to choose where best to invest their full efforts so that it didn't end up a money-haemorrhaging decade-long production.