Let's have it!
Let's have it!
#1
To quote the FFXV tagline, it’s been a long way coming. And in more ways than one! I apologize this took as long as it did, but I can now finally tie up all loose ends and present to you this long overdue game, that has also been long overdue with an English release. At least in the US – here in Europe we got it way earlier! Suckers!
XENOBLADE CHRONICLES
I guess this comes off as no surprise to many of you here. Yes, I’ve shared my love for Xenoblade Chronicles on multiple occasions, and I really can’t stress how amazing this game is. It may not have the incredible writing of, say Persona 3, or the fantastic symbolism of Silent Hill 2, but by God, does this game serve a spectacular balanced dish of cool story, memorable characters, fantastic presentation, huge, living, breathing world, with some amazing music thrown into the mix.
The first thing that you notice about Xenoblade is that it is beautiful, against all odds. It’s a Wii game, so no HD, and some of the textures seem bloated. But you soon discover that good art direction trumps HD graphics any day of the week. The world looks huge and colorful, with a really high drawing distance, so you can really see far away. The monsters are designed to look like they really fit into the natural fauna of the place. Each area has its own type of beauty, from the glowing trees of Satorl Marsh, through the vast plains of the Bionis’ Leg, to the steamy rainforest of Makna. Bionis is a living, breathing place, and you can see it with your very eyes.
Speaking of living worlds, there’s a whole lot more to Xenoblade’s than just the eye candy. The world is comprised of two huge bodies of ancient titans called the Bionis and Mechonis who froze mid-combat. It hardly gets more creative than that, if you ask me. You start off on the Bionis which is inhabit by animals and humanoid races a-plenty. You’ll have access to five main civilization centers, where there are a crapload of named NPCs that you will be doing quests for, influencing their relationships with each other in the process, depending on your actions, thereby developing the infrastructure of the cities, making more subquests appear. It all feels really organic and it’s nice to see that the people you do missions for actually have their own lives – they’ll only appear in certain areas at certain times, for example, going about their daily schedules. I have never been so immersed in a world before as in here.
The relationship building doesn’t stop there. What would a good RPG be without a party? Besides Shulk, your main character, you get six unique people, each playing differently, that you can slightly influence the relationships of. By performing heart-to-hearts at certain points in the game, the party grows closer together, allowing them to support each other more in combat. The heart-to-heart conversations act in a similar way Social Links in Persona or Support Conversations do in FE: Awakening. They’re all pretty charming and really help you get to know those characters better, making your journey more immersive. Each character can also act as a party leader if you so choose, much like in FFXII, but here, each plays completely differently. Which brings me to the battle system.
The battles play out in a very similar way to FFXII, so they’re kind of MMO-like. Battles progress in real time, but it’s not exactly an action RPG. The default action for everyone is to attack, but you get to perform different arts that have a cooldown period after you use them. You get to decide what ends up on your arts pallet, and you even get to upgrade those abilities. And like I said – each character plays differently. Shulk, for example, has arts that have different effects depending on which side he attacks his enemy from, Dunban has arts that help him be a fantastic evasive tank, Sharla has a slew of healing arts, while Melia is one of the most interesting executions of the mage class I have ever seen, since her magic arts work as elemental support and fill up her gauge which, upon release, unleashes the actual offensive spell which depends on how much the gauge has been filled. The characters also learn passive skills that they can share with each other if they have a high enough relationship value. And there’s a whole lot of equipment slots to fill and, like in for example Tactics Ogre, it’s not always obvious which piece of armor is better, because while it may raise one stat considerably, it will also lower the other by quite a bit. So you really get a lot of options when it comes to customizing your characters. Ooh, and did I mention that each piece of armor changes the character’s looks?
I don’t want to say a lot about the story, so I’ll keep this short. This is a Takahashi game and it shows… And yet it’s kind of the “safest” of his games. Sure, there’s tons of Xenogears/Xenosaga-ish twists, but there’s little of them in comparison and the story feels much more like a regular shonen coming-of-age story. Which is not a bad thing on its own! It’s still a Takahashi story through and through, so it’s still really well presented and incredibly well-paced, considering the amount of non-story content. It’s just not as ambitious or groundbreaking as Xenogears’. It’s still really memorable and has some really unforgettable characters.
The music is nothing short of amazing. Not only is part of it composed by Yoko Shimomura, we have Yasunori Mitsuda composing the ending song. Still, I think the biggest surprise about this soundtrack are the newcomers – Manami Kiyota and ACE+. I had not heard music from these guys before, so their amazing tracks in this game were a much welcome surprise. I’m kinda sad this group won’t be coming back for the sequel, but the new game also sounds nice so far, and I’m glad we at least got to experience this beautiful soundtrack.
I really can’t stress enough how good this game is. I actually had to beat it twice, since I accidentally erased my save file after getting really far in. I still had a blast both times. The game world is so expansive and immersive that I often spent days just fulfilling quests and exploring every nook and cranny of the huge maps. I’ve really only scratched the surface of this game’s greatness. I can only tell you guys to go play it. You can play it on the Wii or the New 3DS. It’s well worth it. I’d never imagined I could get so deeply immersed in a game world. This game is an adventure to remember.
Xenoblade Chronicles is my favorite game of all time.
It's a pretty awesome game! Still need to finish it one day, but I know the whole story and stuff. It's just loong to play
Great list Fynn
Huh, wouldn't have expected that. I might need to play it after all.
Really? And I thought everyone here was aware of my Xenoblade obsession
I forgot this list still existed.
Don't become like Square, Fynn.
Don't worry - everyone hasOriginally Posted by ToriJ
I forgot this list still existed.
Don't become like Square, Fynn.
But seriously, I wanted to finish it MUCH earlier. You have no idea how much work I had in the meantime. I don't get money from this, unlike you, so I can't really drop everything and make the list.
You just finished this? Well you're still better than BoB's track record so you have that.
True beauty exists in things that last only for a moment.
Current Mood: And it's been a long December and there's reason to believe. Maybe this year will be better than the last. I can't remember all the times I tried to tell myself. To hold on to these moments as they pass...
I only just added Xenoblade - it's been months since I added my number 2 at that point.
I've just been insanely overworked, people!
I shall have to read it all on my desktop, its too much for my poor old phone.
I shall have to read it all on my desktop, its too much for my poor old phone.
I see the boyfriend chipped in with a wager and made a self critical comment on page one of this thread. Bless
But yes Fynn, I shall play games and stuff.
Let's not be bumping year old threads going forward!
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