Xenoblade Chronicles: Definitive Edition (2020)

Enjoying my first steps into the jrpg genre! Spent an hour in xenoblade which is no time at all really, but learnt some of the combat, controls, characters, and map navigation!

Entered the city area and took on some quests. I figured there would be some kind of party system but didn't expect to be switching characters completely! I've been roped into repairing some dudes watch, finding ingredients, clearing out a monster from a pool... I'm collecting all the quests!!

Some things I instantly liked was the music, it has it's own distinctive style and I like how it changes to be more subtle and slower at night time. The camera is also really nice to control and customise, even going first person if I want to. I was worried the combat would be turn based but it's real time whilst still being strategic. Took some getting used to as it kind of just throws you in.

The story seemed to take off relatively quickly, was worried I wouldn't care for how dramatic it was considering I had no context for who the characters were, but actually I found myself liking them pretty quickly and caring about what was going on! Overall really enjoying the feel of the game!

Released in 2012 for the Wii and then in 2020 for the Switch, Xenoblade Chronicles was the first game of one of the most underrated franchises of Nintendo.

Xenoblade Chronicles is an action JRPG about living beings that reside over two Titans, Bionis and Mechonis, one made of organic matter and the other made of mechanical parts. The protagonist is Shulk, who after a tragedy decides to explore the world, meeting new allies and enemies along the way. There is much more than that, but that's the basic premise.

This game is heavy on themes, like philosophy, the meaning of life, religion, revenge and betrayal, etc., which are important for the plot. You will never know what will happen, especially after important moments that shake the entire foundation and beliefs of the characters.

Talking about characters, not all of them are complex or have that much to do in the story, but the relevant ones have complex and amazing backstories and development. Fate can be cruel to them, and you can feel their suffering and pain after facing tragedies that they didn't deserve, but in the end, make them better people.

However, aside from the plot and characters, the gameplay is also solid. It isn't as complex as it could be, and some bosses can be frustrating if you don't understand its quirks, but overall you can understand it pretty quickly and defeat enemies without much trouble. This is an action RPG, which means you fight in real-time but your attacks have patterns and cooldowns, so you have to choose them carefully and not just spam buttons, although the difficulty isn't that high, so don't expect a lot of strategizing aside from some specific battles.

Sadly, the game isn't perfect. The exploration can be tedious, as the world is huge and your walking speed isn't that quick, even with gems that boost the speed, which makes backtracking and sidequests a chore when quick travel doesn't work or the thing you need is far from warp zones.

And sidequests are easily the worst part of the game. Most of them are getting the same material and defeat the same type of enemy over and over, without much story or incentive to do them aside from experience and money, and they are the best way to level up, so you have to do hours and hours of boring fetch quests unless you want to do bosses under level and have a hard time.

Still, I don't think these elements hurt a lot the overall experience, which for me was amazing. I loved the story, the characters, and the gameplay, so much that I even did a 100% run of the Extra Story, a post-game mode that wraps up the story of a secondary character and has much better sidequests and exploration than the normal mode. I'm even interested in playing the other games of the franchise, which is great, as I wasn't expecting a lot from Xenoblade Chronicles, but I was left with a very positive impression.

Due to some last minute housing issues on his end, one of my friends moved into my spare room last fall. It's kind of a weird dynamic, but we've just been watching/playing through some shows/games in the evenings that either one or both of us never got through. I'd been wanting to play through XC again, and he'd only ever played a small chunk of it, so that was our latest game project over the past month or so.

Just finished up the Future Connected DLC this evening. It's been almost four years since my first playthrough, so revisiting this game after so long and getting to see someone else experience it in full for the first time was great. I just love this game so much, and Melia is still one of my all-time favorite characters.

Edit to add: I've only played through the series with Japanese VAs before, so I decided to suck it up and try the English dub this time. (Friend is usually multi-tasking with a mobile game or something, so it helped there.) I still prefer to play with Japanese VAs when available, but I can't complain too much about this one.

I can't do back-to-back JRPGs, so even though I'm honestly looking forward to playing through XC2 again, we're taking a break for now. For our last project, he played through the first Phoenix Wright game since I'd never played any of them before and he's run through them a million times. We're gonna go through the second one next.

So, as a fan of Xenoblade, this is my least favorite.

I wouldn’t say it is a bad game, because I enjoyed it – but its flaws are very obvious and as time goes by they get kind of worse.

The plot is interesting, and its themes are very thought-provoking. It isn't always presented in the best way, but it could be worse, definitely.

The gameplay does have some innovative features (such as the see-the-future in battle sequence). However, that is not enough to me.

The maps are big but empty, mostly nothing to do. The sidequests are boring and add little to no value to the overall experience.

Some of the characters are well developed, and some others are just… there.

The music is great, nevertheless.

As a fan of Xenoblade, I would say that if you are planning to play all the Xenoblade games you need to play this one to get the full picture of the overreaching themes. However, if you are not that much into the plot, just move ahead into Xenoblade 2.

And the DLC expansion… ew. I mean, it does fix the gameplay issues, but it feels like a big polished nothing.

I actually played and beat Xenoblade 2 before I played this one. I enjoyed Xenoblade 2, but I didn't love it. I will say that it has some great fiction writing. I think what's getting me that the game is extremely long and the gameplay is nothing crazy. It's challenging, but it's not engaging. I love JRPGs and Turn-Based RPGs, but this game and it's series so far I'm not so sure. It plays like Final Fantasy 12 when it comes to the gameplay and how you auto attack, but there's little bit more you do in Xenoblade.

I'm not sure if this really series is really for me. Xenoblade 3 is out and I might get it due to the Nintendo's voucher program. Or maybe I'll go on youtube and watch the cut scenes so I can finish what I think is a great story and I'll see its end.

Play it. (But if it's not for you don't force it.)

Xenoblade Chronicles is JRPG at its best! This is a remastered version of a 13 old game that did its own thing back then but remains in top shape to this day.

I'll start by stating the obvious. The thing that defines this game: Xenoblade Chronicles is an epic gargantuan JRPG!

The world is massive! Not only in scope, scale and in-game content, but also in its presentation. Just the ideia of a story taking place atop two endlessly clashing giants makes it as epic as it gets. And besides the well-told lore, you'll also come across many other imaginative surprises. XC is filled with well-written twists, incredible characters, great villains, good story development, nice pacing and a fantastic ending. XC's tale is, quite honestly, the best thing in this whole package.

But it doesn't end there. Complementing this colossal journey, Xenoblade packs a VERY addictive combat system. It may look weird, since it doesn't work like most action JRPGs, but it functions well. I thought I wasn't going to like it at first, but it clicked faster than I thought. In fact, one of the reasons why I spent around 100 hours playing XC is probably because the combat is just so smooth. It reminded of old PS2 gems like Rogue Galaxy, Radiata Stories and (somehow) even Kingdom Hearts.

All that happening on beautiful environments, urging for you to explore and take on enemies and objectives. This game already looked good back on the Wii, but this re-release made it untouchable. From character design to the most gorgeous landscapes and weirdest bosses. Add that to a pretty good soundtrack, as well.

Now, this game could be perfect, but to me, the thing that made this game incredible was also its greatest enemy. Xenoblade Chronicles more than overstays its welcome.

I can't fathom how obnoxious the sidequests were. They brought almost nothing new or interesting to the main quest, they were very repetitive, mostly unrewarding and just uninspiring. AND THERE ARE JUST TOO MANY OF THEM! It felt endless. The worst thing is that, although optional, without them, you'd end up underleveled, underequipped and missing quite a lot of places, bosses and etc. It's really a shame.

And the more you spend time with it (and you will), the more you'll notice a few cracks. The UI could use some work, enemy variety is lacking, you can easily get mobbed by monsters out of nowhere, the affinity system sucks, having to change time to find NPCs is a chore, you can miss out on a lot, Mechonis is bland and unbalanced as hell and Shulk is a VERY slow kid.

Also, the Future Connected expansion is alright, but it felt a little unnecessary. It's a solid new short story with a cool focus on Melia, but nothing to write home about. I'll just blame the writing and the Nene/Kino duo.

If I could trim a lot of this game, it'd easily transform into one of the best RPGs I've ever played. But the flaws are there and they're noticeable.

However, Xenoblade Chronicles gave me a feeling that few RPGs do and held me tight from beginning to end. I won't forget it so soon. It is intimidating, for sure, but it is worth it. Wether you play it for the story, characters or gameplay, you need to try this game someday at least once.

The ending was interesting and a fitting twist to everything else that happened in the game. I might need to sit with this one for a bit to decide how I ultimately feel. I do know the following:

• I enjoyed the story and the characters quite a bit. Even though the story is a bit nonsense it’s also really compelling. It’s just so weird that you can’t help wonder what will happen next. I think the story gets a shot of adrenaline from great characters. They are just so darn likeable that I almost forgot I wasn’t playing Final Fantasy XIII ;-)

• The one exception to the fact that I enjoyed the story and characters is that I don’t have a lot of patience for the very cliche love triangle and bare bones romances involving Shulk. I just don’t care about his live life. I know this is a frequent component of JRPGs, but it’s probably why I like FFXIII as much as I do, every relationship among the playable characters was platonic. Don’t get me wrong, games can tackle romantic relationships, but they felt shallow in this game and I feel the game would be better served if it focused on the bonds of the entire group without muddling that up with romantic subplots. It especially bothers me that every time Fiora is predicted to die from an attack in battle, her death cry is “Shulk!” It felt like the game was undermining her a bit every time because it contributes to an overall reduction of her character to her romantic pairing.

• The game could stand to be about 10-15% shorter. The ending really feels like it drags and despite wanting to know how the story will play out when I start revisiting locations during the last few chapters I knew they really should have edited the game. It doesn’t help that they throw mini-boss after mini-boss at you in the final two chapters. Perhaps if it was a bit more challenging, but by the end it feels like my team of choice are simply flattening everything, and I’m not even over levelled for the content.

• Despite that last point I did enjoy the combat, especially once Melia joined. I know it replicates a lot of MMORPG elements with cooldowns and so on, and maybe that’s why I dug it, but I had fun with it. I do find it annoying that for a portion of the game you are forced to have Shulk in your party to deal with Mechon enemies, however. I wish the Monado was not the only way to deal with them. Furthermore, I wish more teammates had the ability to counter enemy sets the way Shulk can. I know you can use things like topple to interrupt predicted attacks, but Shulk alone has such a great toolset that I feel like the devs wanted to force him into everyone’s parties.

• I thought I might want to play another JRPG or even Xenoblade Chronicles 2 after this but I recognize that’s a big mistake. I think I wore out my patience for big JRPGs with this that it will take some time before I want to play another, least of all another in this series. But my curiosity is peaked in regards to where the story goes next.

• Boy did someone on this game design team have a fetish for robots. Like big time.

Realized I posted my earlier status on the original game and not the definitive editions. Oh well.

Discovering that there’s a number of missable elements in this game that I, uh, definitely missed. Just learned, after being locked out of an area crucial to obtaining extra skills, that there are in fact extra skills. And simply because I didn’t talk to the right sequence of people, within the right timeframe, and with the right party member, I missed out on getting one of Dunban’s skill trees.

Also affinity is a bit annoying. I did every quest I could in every area I could yet somehow I’m still only at two and a half stars with Colony 9 while I’m at five stars with The Hidden Village. Yet I definitely don’t think I did more side quests for the Hidden Village. Which leads me to believe somehow I’ve missed key things for growing affinity, which is keeping me from other skill trees.

It’s all a bit tedious, systems that feel like they are there to create busy work yet none of them are transparent or obvious enough to pick up on. I’m kind of hoping there’s a new game plus where I can keep my existing skills, gear and arts and that I can build on them with a second play-through wherein I meticulously follow a guide. Sounds fun, no?

Xenoblade Chronicles is one of those games that seems to rule people’s lives. There did not seem to be a standard fan of the game but people who LOVED IT. Despite putting it off for a long time I finally got down to playing the Definitive Edition on the Nintendo Switch.

First impressions that the game looks great, I loved the art style and how your weapon and armour are included in cutscenes. The battle system started off relatively easy to understand, the starting area was a nice area to explore and the quests were quick and easy to complete. However as the game carried on it exhibited some traits to me that was holding it back from being this almighty amazing game everyone makes it out to be. During battles the camera is zoomed right in on Shulk meaning it’s easy to lose what’s going on in front of you and around you. While I was fighting the larger enemies towards the end of the game you’re essentially fighting a pair of legs rather than seeing the whole enemy. Although I do appreciate the game slowly opening the battle system up as the game progressed rather than chucking you right in I just ended up just using the same 3-4 moves over and over. Speaking of the moves, or “arts” as they are called in the game. I found it difficult to strategically equip and level up the supporting character’s arts as I never directly used them due to only controlling one party member at a time so didn’t know what to prioritise. I did enjoy some of the quests auto-completing meaning less back and forth with handing in quests.

The added features such as the skill tree and gem crafting I never fully understood. I get gem crafting is a mini-game of sorts but it was more of a tedious chore than it was a fun game. I always just used Reyn and Shulk for crafting as everyone else’s affinity was low. That was another thing, affinities. Normally in games I want to be friends with everyone, which is one thing that makes me sad about Fallout is that you need to make enemies out of someone. However in this game I genuinely could not give a fuck how friendly I was with everyone. That just seemed like a mechanic that was going to add another 50 hours onto my playtime. So I never bothered with it.

Xenoblade Chronicles has a large expansive world but exploration wasn’t something that I felt enjoyable in the game. Things such as not being able to jump up small ledges despite shulk jumping higher than them, large areas of nothingness and confusing maps. I’m not going to hold it up against such games as “Breath of the Wild” but better ability to move around the areas would have been greatly beneficial.

Being a JRPG you shouldn’t go into this game expecting BAFTA award winning voice acting but I found it very awkward and unbelievable. Don’t get me started on Riki.

The story I thought was OK, just not overly exciting, however I did really enjoy the cinematic ending and the big reveal at the end.

I understand why people love this game and this is to them what BoTW is to me and how I bang on about how great it is but they disagree. As with most games Xenoblade Chronicles is not a “Bad game” it just did not appeal to me the same way it appeals to others.

Xenoblade Chronicles has you follow Shulk and friends as they try to change the future of the world they live in. With humans living on one of two colossal beings that perished in a war, they live in peace until machine life forms living on the other colossal being begin attacking and abducting humans. Your journey will lead you traveling all over both of these colossal beings learning all about the history of the world, different races located on different areas of these beings, and the mystery around the Monado, the legendary sword found by the main character Shulk.

Easily one of the best jrpg games within the last few console generations, the world in which Xenoblade Chronicles takes place is fully fleshed out with interesting characters, beautiful landscapes, and more quests than necessary. The battle system takes a bit of time to get used to, with it being a hybrid of real time battles seen in the more recent final fantasy games, and MMO games in the sense of just being near the enemies to attack. The battle system does leave a lot of room open to experimentation. You can only take 3 characters with you into battle at any time, and have more than that to choose from once you get to about 10 hours into the game. Within those characters, you can choose what jobs to have (to an extent) with what abilities they have equipped. This makes about any party you choose a good party as long as you can adjust to what your objective is. The story by the end gets a bit far out, but that's about par for the course when it comes to most jrpgs. All in all, if you are a fan of the genre, you can't go wrong with this game.

As for the definitive edition which came out for the Nintendo Switch versus the original version on the Wii, there have been quite a few changes which all work for the better. While still not graphically as sharp as FFXV or other recent jrpgs, there's a new coat of paint with updated textures which makes this game look like it could have come out brand new this console generation. The UI has had some major improvements, making the text much easier to read and menus easier to navigate. Sidequests now have markers that will lead players to the right areas or items. Both a casual mode and expert mode have been added to make the game more accessible. Combat arts (your selected abilities in battle) now have a marker show up when the player is in the right position for that attack (such as a side attack). Most songs in the soundtrack have been re-recorded, and you can select between the remastered or original soundtrack. The biggest change though is the addition of Future Connected. This is an epilogue which takes place one year after the events of the main game. It's a much smaller adventure (I finished my first playthrough of it in around 15 hours versus 100 hours for the main game), but there are some gameplay changes and other fun differences to discover.

My main complaint around Xenoblade Chronicles is the amount of content. There are a total of 480 quests, which is a nightmare for completionists. A lot of these quests are either the main story or fun and interesting side stories, but a large number of them are very repetitive go here and kill x enemies or collect these items. There is also an overarching rebuild mission that starts around hour 15 and supposed to be worked on throughout the entirety. You need to find a number of more rare items or ingredients to rebuild, which these can become incredibly difficult to obtain. One item in particular, had a drop rate of around 15% (already pretty low) in only one location as long as you weren't to a certain point in the main story. After that point though, which I was, the drop rate goes down to 2%. No way am I going to grind out an item with that low of a drop rate.

I started this game back on the Nintendo Wii. I managed to get about 40 or 50 hours into it before I moved on from it probably due to getting rid of the Wii or getting a new game. I'm glad Nintendo released a high quality upgrade to this game for the Switch so I could revisit it and finally complete it. Despite some of my gripes with the game, this is easily one of my favorite JRPGs I've experienced.

Xenoblade Chronicles on the Wii almost never made it out of Japan without the work of some really passionate fans. The story of how a group of fans convinced Nintendo to localize a 60+ hour JRPG on the end of Wii’s lifecycle is a story of legend, but I digress. The original game did not run well. It had poor framerates, long loading times and was in a sub HD resolution. Ten years after its initial release on the Wii, the Definitive Edition on the Switch adds many graphical enhancements and quality of life improvements that truly fulfills the original game’s ambition. The game is a wildly imaginative epic. The designers at Monolithsoft have created a world that easily rivals the productions from Bethesda and Rockstar.

Unfortunately even with the Definitive Edition makeover, the game feels sorely dated: There are a plethora of boring MMO style fetch quests. The writing is painfully verbose. And a large swath of the game is padded with time consuming mechanics. Despite all of this, there is no other Nintendo exclusive quite like Xenoblade Chronicles. The gameplay is complex, the world is fantastic to explore and the major story beats are profoundly interesting.

The entire Xenoblade universe takes place in a boundless ocean populated by two enormous titans, the Bionis and the Mechonis. Eons ago, these two titans fought each other in an endless duel until they mortally wounded each other at the same moment. Both titans became dormant and as the years passed, life thrived on both giants.

As if to repeat the endless battle of the titans, the Homs, beings living on the Bionis are at war with the Mechons from the opposing titan. The Mechons have the advantage, they are plated with armor so strong that it renders most Homs weaponry useless. Luckily the Homs have a secret weapon to defeat them, the Monado. The Monado is a beam sword capable of easily slicing through Mechon armor. The Monado is so powerful however that it injures the wielder. The Homs were victorious but with a heavy cost, Dunban, the strongest Homs warrior, was left crippled after using the Monado.

You play as Shulk during a time of peace. He lives in Colony 9 located on Bionis’s shin. He is a strange fellow who would rather dig through old Mechon scraps and research about the Monado than socialize like a normal young adult. After completing routine maintenance work with his childhood friends, they witness their colony being attacked yet again by the Mechons. Unfortunately, Dunban can no longer wield the Monado and Shulk gets the opportunity to use the mythical blade. Despite not being a seasoned warrior, he is able to wield the Monado with ease. Even more interesting is that the Monado grants Shulk the ability of foresight, giving him an uncanny advantage fighting the Mechon. All is well until Shulk and friends encounter a special faced Mechon. Oddly enough, the Monado is useless against this foe. They were still able to drive the Mechons away, but the colony sustained severe casualties. Shulk and his friends, with the Monado in tow, decide to pursue this faced Mechon to avenge their fallen comrades.

The gameplay in Xenoblade most resembles those found in MMORPGs. The maps are wide open fields with enemies of various levels strewn about. There is a day and night cycle as well as changes in weather that determines what monsters spawn. Shulk and his teammates engage in combat by entering the enemies’ field of vision, making noise in their vicinity or intentionally attacking them. You only control Shulk or the party leader, with the rest of your members controlled by the AI. In combat, attacks are automatic with the option to use Arts that run on cooldowns. Using too many Arts in succession will draw aggro towards that user. In addition, some Arts grant special bonuses such as double attack damage when facing an opponent’s rear or dazing an enemy if it has been toppled. There is also a Chain Attack gauge that can be used to momentarily pause combat to dish out even more damage or used to revive teammates. This is only the surface level description of the combat mechanics and the game provides a staggering amount of tutorials to explain it all.

A recurring theme in Xenoblade is that every system in the game is complex and expansive. This is not a beginner’s RPG. There are unique Arts to configure per character, Skill Trees to assign, numerous pieces of armor to equip and dozens of gems to socket. Each system is intricately designed so they have an intentional purpose and do not overlap with one another. A boss battle that seems impossible at first can be won by tuning the party with the appropriate loadout. My favorite moments of the game were challenging optional bosses, losing multiple times, only to be victorious at the end after making tweaks in my party lineup. I personally find it innately satisfying to overcome a challenge through clever customization versus mindlessly grinding monsters to eventually outlevel any opponent.

As much as I appreciate the complexity in the game, some aspects feel unnecessarily drawn out. An example is that you can level Arts up to 12 times. Leveling up Arts only adds benefits like increasing damage or decreasing the cooldown. The maximum level for an Art could have been reduced to say 6, since the upgrades don’t add any meaningful differences. In another example, crafting gems is a laborious process. First you have to go to specific areas of the map to mine for gems. Next navigate back to Colony 9 to the Gem Factory. And then play a mini-game where you have to pair characters together to craft the gems.

A wide range of mechanics in the game is solely introduced for padding without meaningful depth. There are dozens of collectibles in the game to fill out the Collectopaedia. Hundreds of fetch quests involving killing X monsters or collecting Y items. And an unnecessarily complex Affinity System. The Affinity System tracks your party members’ relationships as well as all of the NPC relationships. Building the affinity between your characters enables you to view cutscenes. These cutscenes range from comedic banter to plot development. The problem is you barely get to view these Heart-to-Heart cutscenes until about 40 hours in. These scenes require a high level of affinity between characters and most are only viewable after certain story points. Affinity is built by having characters participate in combat, complete optional side quests together or by gifting dozens and dozens of collectibles based on a character’s preferences. And even after you complete all the requirements, you have to navigate your way to the exact location to watch the Heart-to-Heart cutscene.

At first glance, Xenoblade seems on track to be another typical JRPG but with more of everything. The protagonist wields a ridiculously large sword. There is a childhood love interest. There is an enigmatic godlike figure who wants to destroy the world (or in this case Bionis). And in the end, the power of friendship is used to overcome evil. What sets Xenoblade apart from its contemporaries is the setting and the moment to moment story beats. Shulk isn’t simply going from point A to point B but scaling a massive titan. The environment and level designs are wonderfully creative. It is often possible to see the limbs of Bionis or the dormant body of Mechonis in the horizon. This isn’t just the famous Skyrim adage of “You see that mountain, you can go there”, but more along the lines of “You see that very large bridge? That’s actually Mechonis’ sword and you can walk on it”. There were countless times where I traveled out of the way to explore the environments and flora. And the game often rewards you for it by granting bonus EXP or an optional boss. Another subtle but cool effect is how cutscenes take into account the time of day, weather conditions and outfits the party is currently wearing.

The story and its characters are wonderfully complex and interesting. Each character Shulk meets along the way has their own personal backstories and motivations for defeating the Mechons. There is wonderful chemistry between characters such as Shulk and Fiora, and Reyn and Sharla. However Riki stands out as a major sore thumb. Riki is a Nopon, a race of hamster-like rabbit-eared furballs who live in a giant tree and speak with broken grammar. Riki is the comedic relief in the game. The only reason he joins Shulk is because he is in financial trouble and forced to be a “Heropon” to repay his debts. Personally I found the voice acting for Riki and the Nopons to be chalkboard scratching bad. Riki is not charmingly goofy like Teddie is from Persona 4. He is just plain annoying to listen to and not funny. Essentially he is this game’s Jar Jar Binks. This problem can be remedied by switching to the Japanese vocals, however you won’t be able to listen to the excellent English voice acting from the rest of the cast.

The Definitive Edition is a much needed upgrade to the original Xenoblade Chronicles. The characters have been overhauled to more closely resemble the Anime style of Xenoblade Chronicles 2. The resolution and framerate has improved drastically. There are quality of life improvements like automatically marking objectives on the map and a dotted trail to help make it easier to navigate to the next quest marker. A much better and cleaner UI helps make the complicated systems more decipherable. There is the inclusion of newly arranged soundtracks. A casual mode for players who simply want to enjoy the story. A bonus area where you fight in time trials for unique costumes and gems. And a new epilogue chapter called Future Connected.

The overall upgrade is good, but not great. Xenoblade Chronicles: DE does not look like a game built for the Switch. Character faces are remarkably detailed and emotive, but many of their clothing designs are low textured. There is a noticeable amount of pop-in in large environments. The handheld mode does not run very well and the framerate takes a hit when there are a lot of effects happening. The AI is not good. They will sometimes fall off ledges or stand in hazardous areas during combat. The AI also has trouble controlling spellcasters. It often places them right in harm's way. It has them spend Arts way too quickly drawing aggro away from the tanks. The AI also seems to make them avoid using specific Arts altogether. The only way to address this is to either never include spellcasters in your lineup or to manually play as them. To be clear these AI problems are minor nitpicks and only noticeable when you are underleveled.

Future Connected is a meaty epilogue chapter running around 6-8 hours and helps bring a closure to Melia’s arc. It's an interesting piece of content because it simplifies a lot of the mechanics in the original game. The quests are moderately paced. Chain Link attacks, Skill Trees, the Affinity System and Gem Crafting are removed entirely. Earning gems is as easy as going to the nodes and mining them. Quiet Moments replace Heart to Hearts and are all fully voiced. The simplification is welcome especially since you are only limited to 4 characters and the epilogue is relatively short compared to the main game.

The bonus epilogue also introduces unexpected problems. It is much more Nopon heavy than the base game, with the playable Nopons, Nina and Kino as well as the Ponspectors. So if you didn’t like Riki, be warned because you are going to have to deal with more Nopon nonsense. The quest rewards are less substantial. Most quest rewards are costumes with worse stats than what can be purchased from stores. And the plot itself features a generic JRPG villain that doesn't match the nuance and complexity of the antagonist in the base game.

I was immersed by the main plot and enjoyed the combat in Xenoblade Chronicles: DE but also disappointed on how long it takes to complete this game. Not all of my time spent with the game was particularly engaging and entertaining. The main problem is that it is easy to be underleveled in the late game if you skip side quests. It is near impossible to even hit enemies once you are about 8 levels behind. Unfortunately most of the side quests are not interesting and I often found myself mindlessly grinding monsters or picking up collectibles. I would navigate back and forth through waypoints to get monsters and items to respawn. And constantly change the time to get the right weather condition so that a specific monster would appear. It’s the kind of busywork suited while listening to a podcast or on a long commute.

The writing and dialog is terribly long and repetitive. Characters have a tendency to over explain everything. A running joke is that Reyn is a meathead and constantly needs difficult things explained to him. It’s funny the first time it happens, but gets old quick when it happens for the 5th time. There are dozens of occasions where characters will melodramatically shout out someone’s name and ask if they are okay. The same quips and lines in battle are repeated too often. The game desperately needed an editor to tighten and vary the script.

The acquisition of side quests is incredibly dated. It does not make sense why I have to talk to the same NPC consecutively for 3 times to get all of their side quests when talking to them once should suffice. Getting all of the quests in a town is a tedious process. First you have to go through the town during the day, then change to night time and repeat the same process because different quest givers appear depending on the time. A quest board would have easily streamlined this process.

Xenoblade Chronicles: Definitive Edition is one of the most memorable, epic games I’ve played. It is also a dated game and I felt like my time playing it was not valued. I spent countless hours mindlessly grinding away to complete side quests, playing a mini-game to craft gems, filling up the Collectopaedia, maximizing the Affinity with other characters and listening to how Shulk can predict the future for the 20th time. I spent just as much time doing these boring side activities than actually enjoying the main storyline. I regret not turning on Casual Mode sooner to speed through these frustrations but my ego got the better of me. The journey and the payoff at the end in Xenoblade Chronicles: DE is worth it, but be prepared to trudge through a lot and I truly mean a lot of pointless filler.

I first bought Xenoblade Chronicles back in the Summer of 2015 and I loved it. I played it for about 50 hours and was just about to unlock the gates to prison island when life happened, so I fizzled out and stopped playing.

I always wanted to get back to the game, so I was very excited when I heard about the Definitive Edition coming out on the Switch. It was a day one purchase for me. I finally started playing a little over a month ago and 67 hours later I have just completed the journey that I began 6 years ago.

I really love the combat system in this game. I've heard criticism that the game plays itself and you can just walk away and come back to find the battle won. Sure, maybe you can do that with some low level enemies, but that is definitely not the case with most battles, especially major battles. I loved having to come up with a strategy when facing an enemy that I was a bit too under-leveled for. Timing was everything and you have to really put thought into not only when to perform a specific attack but also where you are standing when you perform it.

I almost rage quit on a couple especially annoying bosses (I'm talking about you and your stupid mist buddies, Lorithia), but I was mostly having fun. Unfortunately, I did need to jump into Casual Mode for two boss battles near the end of the game. I was under-leveled enough that none of my attacks did any damage. Other than those two battles, I played in normal difficulty mode.

The new graphics are a huge improvement. The foggy graphics of the original had always bugged me. The new UI is very intuitive. The original soundtrack was already amazing, but the newly orchestrated tracks usually make them even better. I never had a problem with the English voices. I think the voice actors do a great job. Some of the repeated catchphrases during battle become a little comical after the thousandth time (occasionally annoying if I am in a bad mood). The plot and characters are good and the twists kept things exciting. I was invested in the story.

I plan on continuing to play in order to fight some of the post-game bosses that are walking around. Come on, with a name like Immovable Gonzalez he is just begging for a fight, and I am sure everybody dreams of the day they can finally beat the Territorial Rotbart from the moment they step onto the beautiful Guar Plain. Maybe after that I'll try Future Connected... and then on to Xenoblade 2!

Highly recommended :)

I really enjoyed Xenoblade Chronicles 2 when I played it nearly three years ago, as I did its Torna expansion a year or two later. So I knew I'd eventually give the original a try.

I think I might like it even better?

Everything I liked about the first game is here: Grand and interesting landscapes to explore, fast-paced combat, plenty of sidequests and collectibles, endearing characters and similar vibes to games like Skies of Arcadia and Chrono Trigger. But I found this entry's story easier to grasp, the minimap functions a lot better, and I didn't miss bonding or switching blades.

I really only have two complaints. As with its sequel, a lot of the game's sidequests feel like unnecessary padding... I finished a lot of them, but eventually grew bored. And later in the game, I hit a difficulty spike where I seemed incapable of defeating enemies without leveling up, but I couldn't seem to gain experience fast enough to level up without many hours of grinding. I eventually found a solution in gem crafting, a mechanic introduced far too early considering how many hours later it became relevant.

But overall this may be one of my favorite JRPGs ever. I'll definitely give this edition's "New Story" expansion a try at some point.

I was planning to do a detailed review on this when I finished the game a few weeks ago, but I've forgotten a lot of what I wanted to say. :( So I'm going somewhat more basic:

Locations: What an insanely beautiful game. I took a ton of screenshots while exploring and during cutscenes. I love seeing all of the maps at different times of day, and how it's actually reflected in cutscenes. I thought Satorl Marsh was gorgeous, and then I got to Eryth Sea. Shittttt.

Music: Every time I was like, "Damn, this song is definitely my favorite track," another one popped up that I liked even more. I think I preferred the night-time version of the majority of them. An incredible soundtrack.

Characters: I like everyone in the party. It's nuts. That rarely happens for me. Even big, dumb Reyn is lovable. Okay, Riki isn't my favorite, but he's not bad. MELIA IS BEST GIRL I LOVE HER. But I also love Fioraaaa. (I honestly just love that there are so many GOOD female characters with personalities and different strengths and backstories.) Melia was the only character apart from Shulk who I used regularly. Her attacks were fun!

Outfits: I am a huge sucker for customization, so I really, really loved that you could change your armor appearance without changing the actual armor. The combinations of parts from different sets were also really well done, because I built a ton of great outfits from different sets that blended seamlessly with each other.

Story: So much to love here. The struggle of each party member and their reasons for joining; every reveal about the Mechon or the Bionis and how the Homs are actually in the dark about a lot of things; the twists, the ending! Ahhh, man, just so good.

Battle: This isn't quiiite the type of battle system I would typically go for. I don't like MMOs (not that this is one) for a lot of reasons, but I honestly had a lot of fun with these battles, probably because the abilities on the action bar and the cool down feature are one of the few things I don't mind about MMOs. I feel like the controls are very fluid and easy to get the hang of. Some might not like the auto-attack, but you have the Monado abilities to consider, like using Shield if the enemy is gonna use a powerful attack, or Enchant if you're fighting mechon, because your party can't hit them otherwise. You're also moving around to use Arts that do more damage from the back or side, and paying attention to HP. You also want to focus on whether you've used Break on an enemy, to open it up to a Topple from someone in your party with an appropriate move, and then a Daze attack once they're toppled. You're also keeping an eye on the Party Gauge, so that you can use a chain attack when it's full. Shulk is simply auto-attacking at a set interval in between you doing all of this.

This might make it sound way more complex than it needs to be, but once you've got a handful of battles under your belt, it goes quite smoothly and it's really not difficult to manage. Point is, if you were also having to press A to do a normal attack, it WOULD get frustrating. I'm glad it's set up the way that it is.

Map: If you've seen my updates on XC2, you've seen that I HATE THE MINI MAP SO MUCH. Especially when the one in this game is SO GOOD. It's easy to maneuver, the icons are clear, the layers are an amazing feature, and navigating using it is a breeze. With all of the fast traveling that you do for quests, it's a must to have a functional map.

Collectopaedia: I love this! As you pick up collectibles from around whichever given area you're in, it's not technically auto-logged in your collection. You manually go into the collectopaedia and add each one into the slots provided for the area, as long as you still have it in your inventory. When you fill all of the slots in each row, you get goodies.

Quests: I did EVERY. SINGLE. QUEST. Minus one. I didn't do one of the Replica Monado quests at the very end because I didn't feel like it, haha. Some were a bit tedious, but for the most part, I was enjoying every minute that I played this game, and I didn't mind doing them all. And there are a SHITTON.

Quest indicators: Whether it's the monsters that you need to target for a quest, or an item that you need, you can set active quests or simply look for the markers when you expand the map. Some people might not want all of this readily available, but this game is enormous, the first main area alone is expansive, and I personally like that feature when there are like 50 quests available in the first few hours. I think they can be turned off in the settings, but I'm not positive.

My one, single complaint about this game is the section just before you go to the final dungeon(s). The majority of your experience in the game comes from completing quests, and, as I said, I did them all. This kept me on par or above standard-level enemies in every given area (meaning not including the occasional super-high level big bois walking around some areas). You reach a point of no return, and suddenly you have a new slew of quests, requiring you to kill monsters that are a good 10-15 levels higher than you. But the problem lies in the fact that there's an unaddressed aspect of the game in which you can't even hit enemies that are that many levels higher than you unless you boost the shit out of your agility through equipment (or otherwise). I had to look this up because I was willing to try fighting them to get the quests done, but found that attacks weren't landing.

My problem with this is that, as I said, most of the xp throughout the game came from quests. I never had to grind, ever. I don't mind grinding in JRPGs, but I never needed to in this one up to this point. Suddenly every quest requires that I be a much higher level via grinding or basically redo all of my equipment and do this agility garbage. This is NOT post-game content, which I could probably expect to be more tedious.

So, I dropped it down to casual mode for this small part of the game. I was able to fight all of those monsters while I was a lower level. This made them like boss fights, so they were more challenging and took longer than normal enemies, but I was able to whittle them down and actually hit them. I completed all of the quests, got my level up to those monsters, and then went into the final area with the difficulty back on normal.

That was just so frustrating for me, because it was a total departure from the way I'd been playing/leveling for over 100 hours at that point.

In short, I love the hell out of this game. An easy 5 stars. I finished at around 130 hours, including Future Connected, which, being Melia-centric, was great story-wise, but not as enjoyable to play. It felt pretty tedious and something about the battles felt off/different because I kept getting my ass kicked.

Note: I have this on the Wii, as I got it for like $80 years back, but I never finished it. I was in Makna, so not super far. I'd wanted to come back to it for a long time, and ended up waiting on the DE. I'm so glad that I did. Also, I've been playing XC2 since I finished this, and while I like a lot about it, it's not as good to me. The combat is insanely slow and I don't enjoy it most of the time because of that.

Yahooo! I think it took me around 100 hours counting both the main game and the Extra Story. I had some negatives about the game but I am very happy that I finished my adventure and I felt it was completely worth the purchase price.

The setting of Xenoblade Chronicles is one of its best features. I loved journeying from one land to the next and I always felt compelled to see what kind of environments I would be in next.

The music is catchy and fun and even funny in parts. It can be a little repetitive but it is varied enough. You can tell it is a bit dated but I enjoyed the music. I'm sure I will get a bit of nostalgia when I listen to the songs later.

Graphics are very good, this is my second time buying the game, the first version was on the 3DS. Wild to think I spent $100 over a lifetime on one game but in retrospect I suppose its worth it and games used to cost plenty more.

Story is decent and compelling. Can drag a little bit but not bad at all, I was always interested to see what was going to happen next. Some things started to get foreshadowed maybe too much so I saw them coming but that was intentional.

The negative is unfortunately the game play. Sometimes I would really enjoy the combat and the positioning and ramp-up style of the combat but other times it would become a real slog when fighting normal monsters.

Then I encountered a more glaring problem, I listened on a review of the game, they said you don't have to grind in this game just do side-quests and when you get tired of those do the mainquest. That was fine up until chapter 10 or so. Around chapter 9 I got tired of doing all these sidequests (which are just kill X or Y mob, fetch X or Y, mmo style quests) not only because they were repetitive but also because I kept outleveling the boss monsters so the bosses were always a cakewalk.

So, being a bit tired of the sidequests and just facerolling the bosses, I skipped them around chapter 9. Then in chapter 10 I hit a point in the story where I couldn't go back in the game at all to do any of the sidequests and I could only move forward. Fine... but unlike all the previous bosses I was under-leveled this time and got my ass kicked... With no alternative but to go back to a save 8 hours ago. Yes I should have done all those quests I skipped but well I went over why.

So I drank the cool-aid... and I turned on Easy Mode. And unfortunately I beat the game on Easy Mode for the last 3 chapters of the game. I just couldn't take it upon myself to turn it off, grind up on monsters in a combat system by then I was sick of, to try to beat the next bosses on normal difficulty. And that is really not my style, I usually don't mind grinding to beat a boss.

That brings me to the extra story. I thoroughly enjoyed it. The story was a bit more compact, less gear and leveling obviously, and a fun experience overall. A good way to finish the game.

I have just finished this game. Put more than 150 hours into it, including Future Connected, and I can only say wow. It really feels like the predecessor of BOTW, both in terms of world discovery and the feeling of being very, very small (and many small things, such as the comparison between Colony 9 and Tarrey Town). Obviously, BOTW polished many aspects (changing the small blue orbs to actual items, or being able to interact more with the environment), but the overall feeling for me was quite similar, and that is an accomplishment for a game that has almost 10 years. I really clicked with the world (and the music is just amazing), the story and, while many of the side quests were repetitive, fetch stuff, never felt like a chore. Most likely, because of the system allowing you to have a ton of active quests and the map signaling your objectives.

Future Connected is a bit worse than the main story, though. Where XC succeeded, for me, at least, was in the endgame part of the story and the explanations of the universe. Future Connected had nothing of this. None. It was just a bad guy that tried to wreck everything with no ulterior plan or reasons or anything, just a guy that was there. I haven't played XC" yet, so it might have a connection with that (future connected, I suppose). The main formula of the game, however, was kept intact: unique combat system included. And the soundtrack of this module is even better than the original one.

Combat system deserves a small paragraph on its own. It is definitely something that I've never experienced before and took some time to get used. Auto attacking feels kinda strange at the beginning, but when you start getting more and more arts, it becomes an absolute necessity. It allows also for very complex attacks without the need for sick reflexes. It is a good change of pacing from most of the non-turn RPGs.

If I have to critique something, I'd say that the final bosses are quite easy, or at least that it is pretty easy to arrive over-leveled to them. This is true for both the main game and the extra module. Just damage sponges that keep getting up after you beat them. In terms of difficulty, I'd say that the hardest boss fight was Xord at level 25, that was the only time that I felt I had to go get some more experience. That talks well of the pacing of the game, I suppose, as there are not large grinding periods.

Knowing that there was quite a fanbase of this franchise, I bought one of the limited editions of this game. Pushed by the hype, I admit, but I thought that, in the case of not liking it, I would be able to sell it afterwards and cover my costs. After finishing, I'm glad I got that limited edition.

Xenoblade Chronicles is a strange game that initially only saw a Wii release in Japan back in 2010. It was a niche game and I’d even like to say it was obscure considering how expensive it is to get physical copies of it and how little people seemed to know of it. Even now I want to say the only reason people were made aware of it outside of its cult-like status is because of Shulk being added to Smash 4. The release was a decade ago so maybe I’m remembering it wrong though. I played the original when it saw a US release but I never finished it. I remember having fun but I also remember it was basically a single player mmo and the appeal wore off fairly quickly. This time around with the definitive edition I decided to finish it for good and see if I’d like it more or less than I did back then. It turned out it was neither.

The highest praise I can give this game is the music is just as good, if not better, than the original game. I loved the soundtrack back then and still do even now. Everything else however, falls just short of pulling me in. Right off the bat, I’d like to say that I care VERY little for story in generally any game that isn’t purely narrative driven. This goes doubly so for JRPGs, as after playing countless of them it’s very clear that Japanese storytelling in JRPGs is very simplistic in nature. And while I do generally enjoy them, it’s never what I’m looking out for when playing games. Xenoblade is honestly no different. The story is nothing new and going through it now it’s also very… slow? Character dialogue either goes by very fast in cutscenes sometimes that it feels unnatural even or you get bombarded with a large number of cutscenes with quick battles in between that you “lose”. Coupled with how easy it is to just not do the story and instead do sidequests, the pacing can vary greatly between people. The affection/bonding system I feel was supposed to help develop characters more naturally but it’s quite frankly useless. Until you get your final party member, which isn’t for quite a while into the game, you’ll almost never interact with this system as the game will often tell you that you don’t have the party members to view said bonding event. And even if you do, unless you’re constantly switching up your party, you’ll likely not have the affection necessary between characters to view said event. It’s honestly bad and meaningless. Even after getting your final party member, going back and grinding affection to view events feels like a waste of time and a huge hampering on the pacing of the story if you care about it. The sidequests also feel like your run of the mill mmo sidequests. A majority of them have very little bearing to the world or its story, with most just being fetch quests or kill x number of enemies. They can easily wear you out not just because of the exorbitant amount there is, but also because many of the objectives and even accepting or handing in quests are based on the time of the day or even weather, something that gets tedious very quickly.That said, story wasn’t my concern to begin with but I wanted to point it out at least. I don’t really have much of anything to say about the “Futures Connected” epilogue as that probably requires me to talk more in depth about the story and include spoilers. Quite frankly I didn’t really care for it and it felt a bit meaningless to add.

The combat is quite fun to mess around with and very familiar if you’ve played mmo’s or FFXII. Much of how the arts, skill, and gem system works is designed to give you an advantage against higher level enemies than you which often make encounters, especially against unique monsters, fun and sometimes difficult. That said, it’s also ridiculously easy to overlevel or cheese many of the game’s bosses and unique monsters. Due to the nature of the chain system and party composition, it’s super easy to endlessly topple/daze an enemy even if they’re higher leveled than you. I won’t say this is a con to me since the flexibility of the system lets me play how I want to, whether it be breaking the game or giving myself a challenge. The addition of expert mode aids me in doing this, while the addition of casual mode caters to those who have more difficulty grasping how the systems work or want to simply enjoy the story and combat as is. Unfortunately, and while I loathe to say this, the combat still feels like a downgrade from XBC2 as that game, while DREADFULLY slow, gets very intricate in it’s systems thanks to how much you can do with the Blade system. I won’t talk about the Blade system, but while XBC1’s combat was fun, I wish there was just a bit more to its customization that wasn’t just choosing a different character for the sake of appearances, as many of the characters not called Melia work very similarly in their combat styles or are just inferior to another character.

While a fun game, XBC1 feels a bit aged compared to what they’ve done with X and XBC2, even if those games have their own set of problems. The definitive edition is still worth checking out as even on the switch the visuals are quite pretty and the remastered music is fantastic. It might be difficult to get into if you’ve never played mmos or ffxii, but if you’re interested and have the time to give it a chance, especially if you’ve never played the series, I’d say it’s well worth a shot, despite my grievances about the game.