Moving along, there will be some spoilers, but it's a two-book series and probably anyone who is reading this has already played the games anyways. The manga began with one major changed that sort of ticked me off, Cubia's not a monster you fight, he's your party member! LOLWUT? So he can Data drain too, and Kite and him go off to destroy the phases to save the Lost Ones. Because of this change, portions of the plot where screwed with royally, including the Mia/Macha fight, Corbenik, amongst various other moments. Not only was the four-game and insanely-long series squished into two books, but it was altered to fit into said two books.
I honestly don't get why they even made Cubia a PC in X-Fourth. It didn't even make sense. His character was a pain and to any .hack fan it's obvious that Cubia working with Kite is just going to end badly for the party. Cubia ends up kidnapping Kite and wants to suck him up and use is power to make sure he never dies. Hey, at least BlackRose still destroyed the bracelet. Roll in the final battle, which isn't against Corbenik, it's again Morganna! Excuse me? She's never made an appearance save for voice, why would she suddenly appear to fight them, skipping Phase 8? Oh and Azure Flame God? Trying to turn it GU on us? But then again, at that point that was probably the only way to end it properly.
With this series, it's obvious that CC2 and Square-Ennix are having some competition to see who can milk their golden series for more money. They know the old .hack fans will still buy it because it is what it is, and because it's .hack they'll say they like it no matter how screwy they make the plot. Though I have to hand it to CC2, they've made the most alternative realities for their cash cow.
