Poll of the Day > Xenoblade Chronicles 3 comes out next week...are you getting it?

(+) Yeah! (+)

I kinda like my RPGs figured out <_< , so I probably won't play it until next year

As much as I ended up loving Xenoblade X, the first month or so was annoying as fuck.

Day 1. I'm going to be thoroughly Xenoblade'd out by the time I finish it, given that I've spent the last month or so playing through Definitive Edition, replaying 2, and now working my way through Torna for the first time, but I'm pretty hyped.

MechaKirby posted...

As much as I ended up loving Xenoblade X, the first month or so was annoying as f**

What got me about the early days of X was how much important information (particularly collectible locations) came from the Japanese Prima Strategy Guide, of all things. I expect user-generated information to be pretty sparse in the early days of games of that scale, even with the Japanese version being out for ~7 months beforehand, but people relying on a paper strategy guide in 2015 was wild.

I'm leaning on no, if only because having eight active party members seems like a bit much to me, but we'll see. The catgirl is cute, of course; but how do you not make catgirls cute?

Nope Ive never played a xenoblade and I dont know what it is

I think I'll get it... hopefully I actually play it for more than 5 hours. Nothing seems to hold my attention these days

not day 1 because i don't have the money to day one buy shit anymore, but maybe eventually on a sale

Day 1

Haven't preordered it yet, though. No bonus for doing so, the collector's edition is honestly pretty lame for $90, and...I don't know... They just haven't really promoted it that well, I'm getting it just b/c I love the series and know it'll be good, but none of the trailers or info has really wowed me like prior games did.

adjl posted...

replaying 2, and now working my way through Torna for the first time

When you say "replaying 2" do you mean another fresh playthrough, or NG+???

Also, what do you think of Torna? (IMHO, the actual STORY of Torna was fantastic, but they put so many artificial grinds to lengthen the game that I ended up watching the final cutscenes on Youtube. Some people overlooked the grind, but even by Xenoblade standards, it was almost unforgivable. But, that's just my opinion, of course.)

I still haven't beaten the first one, but I'd like to get to it eventually.

shipwreckers posted...

When you say "replaying 2" do you mean another fresh playthrough, or NG+???

NG+, my first time doing so after playing through regularly back in early 2018 (drifting away roughly when they added the NG+ patch). I picked up the expansion pass before doing so, so it's my first time experiencing any of the DLC. I already had every pre-NG+ and non-DLC blade's affinity chart completed (or thought I did, apparently I missed the last couple of crafting nodes for Gorg, Vess, Vale, and maybe a couple others, but they don't really matter), so I've been maxing out the DLC/NG+ blades as I go. I haven't quite finished the last couple, and I need to do a bit more Love Source farming to get everyone I care about up to S+ trust, but I opted to take a break from that to make sure I had time to enjoy Torna before next Friday (and also because it's just a matter of repeatedly doing challenge battles to max out Shulk and letting merc missions max out Elma, so the interesting part is done).

shipwreckers posted...

Also, what do you think of Torna? (IMHO, the actual STORY of Torna was fantastic, but they put so many artificial grinds to lengthen the game that I ended up watching the final cutscenes on Youtube. Some people overlooked the grind, but even by Xenoblade standards, it was almost unforgivable. But, that's just my opinion, of course.)

I'm generally liking it so far. I'm just at the point where I've got to farm up some materials before crossing the desert (an example of your complaint, I'm guessing), and there has definitely been a lot of "we're going there next to deal with an apocalyptic emergency, but first we'll handle this minor errand" padding out the story, but the combat system feels like it's starting to really come into its own. If anything, I'm actually kind of minding the lack of spongy enemies to give me an opportunity to try out more complex combos, since everything dies so fast that I rarely have time to get even a level 2 special off, but I expect that will improve as I get access to more art/special refill pouch items, fill out skill trees, and get better accessories (I also only just got chain attacks, and that was the trigger for the base game to start throwing HP sponges at me, so perhaps that's about to change). It generally feels more fluid than the base game's combat (especially compared to the early game; early-game Torna obviously doesn't compare as favourably to endgame stuff), which is nice.

I only played the first one but I loved it. I'll probably get it but hopefully I'll have time to actually play through it. Haven't had any time for games lately

Torna was far superior to the main game, especially for game play. Really felt like how XC2 should have been. Plus all the characters were good and voiced well, no Rex or Tora.
Story was still terrible, possibly worse than XC2's.

OhhhJa posted...

I only played the first one but I loved it. I'll probably get it but hopefully I'll have time to actually play through it. Haven't had any time for games lately

Well, if you've played XC1 but are going to skip XC2 before going into XC3 and want to make sure you're caught up on the plot in case there's any tie-ins in XC3, I would suggest watching (spoilers, duh) all of the cutscenes for Chapter 10, including the one that starts it off. That's basically all you need from XC2, I think.

streamofthesky posted...

Torna was far superior to the main game, especially for game play. Really felt like how XC2 should have been. Plus all the characters were good and voiced well, no Rex or Tora.
Story was still terrible, possibly worse than XC2's.

Well, if you've played XC1 but are going to skip XC2 before going into XC3 and want to make sure you're caught up on the plot in case there's any tie-ins in XC3, I would suggest watching (spoilers, duh) all of the cutscenes for Chapter 10, including the one that starts it off. That's basically all you need from XC2, I think.

I may do that but I also hate skipping ahead. Maybe I should hold off and play 2 first. But that may take me 6 months at my current rate of gaming lol

OhhhJa posted...

I may do that but I also hate skipping ahead. Maybe I should hold off and play 2 first. But that may take me 6 months at my current rate of gaming lol

XC2 is a very long, grindy game.
You can speed things up a lot if you do research on its actually very basic but dressed up as super complex combat system. But it's still very long, and for most of the game the plot is bad.

XC2 combat in a nutshell:

• Every blade has an element (color)
• A "blade combo" is painting by color in specific arbitrarily chosen sequences (see chart below; one of many things Torna fixed, btw)
• You put an orb of the last color from a blade combo on the enemy; it can only have one orb of each color (so make sure you have all 8 colors amongst your eventual 9 blade slots)
• Once a bunch of orbs are up, chain attack
• Need to break at least one orb each "round" of chain attack to get another round. Orbs are targeted randomly (there's an equip item to target damaged ones instead) and take 3 hits. Except... if the opposing color orb is up (like fire/water), it will be auto-targeted and do 2 damage.

Orb color flowcharts (seriously, just keep it up on a screen while playing): imgur.com/a/HO3oT

That's it. That's the entire XC2 combat system for 90% of the game (first 10% you won't have all of the combat system "unlocked"). People call it deeper than XC1's, but I found it extremely hollow. Characters and blades/weapon types don't matter, just colors. Everyone effectively plays the same. While as in XC1, every character plays differently and there's a bunch of tactics to build around.

(oh, and if you "overkill" enemies w/ chain attacks in XC2, you get massive XP boosts for all the extra damage dealt, which can be used to "power level", so..yet again, you basically want every single major fight to go the same way: load up orbs, enter very long chain attack, the end)

streamofthesky posted...

XC2 is a very long, grindy game.
You can speed things up a lot if you do research on its actually very basic but dressed up as super complex combat system. But it's still very long, and for most of the game the plot is bad.

XC2 combat in a nutshell:
* Every blade has an element (color)
* A "blade combo" is painting by color in specific arbitrarily chosen sequences (see chart below; one of many things Torna fixed, btw)
* You put an orb of the last color from a blade combo on the enemy; it can only have one orb of each color (so make sure you have all 8 colors amongst your eventual 9 blade slots)
* Once a bunch of orbs are up, chain attack
* Need to break at least one orb each "round" of chain attack to get another round. Orbs are targeted randomly (there's an equip item to target damaged ones instead) and take 3 hits. Except... if the opposing color orb is up (like fire/water), it will be auto-targeted and do 2 damage.

Orb color flowcharts (seriously, just keep it up on a screen while playing): imgur.com/a/HO3oT

That's it. That's the entire XC2 combat system for 90% of the game (first 10% you won't have all of the combat system "unlocked"). People call it deeper than XC1's, but I found it extremely hollow. Characters and blades/weapon types don't matter, just colors. Everyone effectively plays the same. While as in XC1, every character plays differently and there's a bunch of tactics to build around.

(oh, and if you "overkill" enemies w/ chain attacks in XC2, you get massive XP boosts for all the extra damage dealt, which can be used to "power level", so..yet again, you basically want every single major fight to go the same way: load up orbs, enter very long chain attack, the end)

Whereas so much of the first game was, "Are there machines? If yes, waste time on the one ability so everyone else can do basically anything, or your face gets pounded by the mobs because neither tank can take aggro. If no, do basically anything else." So, so much of the game. Oh wait, High Entia? You have a second ability to use at the start now.

When I could finally pick up weapons that hit mechanical entities just fine, but were weaker than one or two rounds of weapons I'd already been using by that point, I put the game down and told myself I'd come back to it. Still haven't.

Entity13 posted...

Whereas so much of the first game was, "Are there machines? If yes, waste time on the one ability so everyone else can do basically anything, or your face gets pounded by the mobs because neither tank can take aggro. If no, do basically anything else." So, so much of the game. Oh wait, High Entia? You have a second ability to use at the start now.

You can topple them or use Enchant. Either works, obviously the latter is much easier. it requires all of...having Shulk in your party... Which it literally isn't even possible to have enough characters to exclude him until Dunban joins (with an anti-mechon weapon), and literally right at the point where you spend spend like the next 10 hours not encountering a single mechon enemy unless you go back to prior areas. And by the time it does matter again, you have Melia and Riki, who both have Ether arts that work just fine on mechon.

When I could finally pick up weapons that hit mechanical entities just fine, but were weaker than one or two rounds of weapons I'd already been using by that point, I put the game down and told myself I'd come back to it. Still haven't.

Dude, having the highest attack really doesn't matter. I pick 3 slot gem weapons over stronger ones all the time. Using anti-mechon weapons, which are widely available by the time they're a frequent enemy, isn't much different. They're better despite the lower damage number.

Your complaints about XC1 just seem like super-stretching, desperate to find something to complain about... AI-controlled Shulk will put up Enchant, no problem.

Ah that's lame. I do really like the visual side and exploration of the games too though. Shallow combat is lame but i could probably still enjoy it if the story is ok

Nah, havent played the other .. 2?

Definitely would if the female characters were topless or something

streamofthesky posted...

Your complaints about XC1 just seem like super-stretching, desperate to find something to complain about... AI-controlled Shulk will put up Enchant, no problem.

I wouldn't call it a complaint so much as an inconvenience that didn't do me any favors. Generally speaking I like the game, but I look at some of the choices like that and shake my head, feeling as though they could have done a little better. And I do intend to return to the game eventually, but... I have so much else to do. lol

streamofthesky posted...

XC2 combat in a nutshell:
* Every blade has an element (color)
* A "blade combo" is painting by color in specific arbitrarily chosen sequences (see chart below; one of many things Torna fixed, btw)
* You put an orb of the last color from a blade combo on the enemy; it can only have one orb of each color (so make sure you have all 8 colors amongst your eventual 9 blade slots)
* Once a bunch of orbs are up, chain attack
* Need to break at least one orb each "round" of chain attack to get another round. Orbs are targeted randomly (there's an equip item to target damaged ones instead) and take 3 hits. Except... if the opposing color orb is up (like fire/water), it will be auto-targeted and do 2 damage.

Orb color flowcharts (seriously, just keep it up on a screen while playing): imgur.com/a/HO3oT

That's generally a horribly inefficient way to approach combat, as much as that's how the game suggests it should be played (the tutorials are awful, you'll pretty much need to use outside resources to understand it because of how vague the in-game stuff is and the fact that you can't reread it once you have some experience to help contextualize it). It's enough to get through the main game and even some of the superbosses on normal, but that's because the main game on normal is pretty braindead easy. Get into Bringer of Chaos difficulty or some of the harder challenge battles, and you will get your ass handed to you if you take that approach (and not just because of the Elemental Awakening mechanic that buffs enemies considerably if they have any number of orbs on them). Instead, there are basically three different approaches you can take:

• Art spam - As the name suggests, you just spam arts. Specials usually make for a DPS loss with this approach, so you often just leave them out. Driver combo support can be helpful to keep incoming damage down, but may not be necessary (such as with Corvin's evasion art on Zeke, which has virtually 100% uptime and renders him all but invulnerable)
• Special spam - Use your most powerful special as often as possible, interspersing with a 1-orb chain attack after each completed blade combo to avoid Awakening and get rid of the elemental resistance buff orbs give (20% less damage from that element). Depending on how strong the blade's level 1/2 specials are, the chain attack might not be worthwhile, so you may want to use supporting blades to start a blade combo that your main one can't contribute to to avoid actually completing one
• DoT's - Set up one of the level 2 blade combos with a damage over time effect (Volcano (earth-->fire) being the strongest) with the most powerful special you can, then cycle through driver combos to extend the duration indefinitely and increase the damage. This is a particularly popular strategy for BoC, since it doesn't rely on party meter at all and keeps incoming damage low by locking them down with driver combos, and you can get them ticking for the damage cap pretty readily if you're set up properly

In all of these strategies, you should also consider fusion combos, specifically applying Break before starting a blade combo so that all damage dealt while that Break (or a subsequent Topple or Launch) is active receives a very substantial multiplicative damage boost. Fusion combos are largely why blades with multi-hit specials are considered better for chain attacks, since it makes it pretty easy to hit the damage cap for single-hit ones and waste a huge amount of damage potential. Which strategy works best will depend on which blade (and driver, to a lesser extent) you use.

streamofthesky posted...

Characters and blades/weapon types don't matter, just colors. Everyone effectively plays the same.

This just isn't true. Characters and weapon types dictate the arts you have available, which single-handedly defines how effective pretty much any approach is going to be. Damage ratios, recharge rates, animation speeds, secondary effects... Even if you are exclusively taking the generally-inadvisable approach of "get 8 orbs and use a chain attack," faster animations with faster recharges (or better yet, innate recharge abilities, like Axes on Zeke or Rex) will help you build specials faster so you can get those orbs sooner. And then there are all the various abilities blades have, which are variable enough to completely define their optimal playstyles, in many cases. Element really only matters if you're trying to match a weakness (and in that case, running Adenine and/or Patroka as a support is a good idea to increase the bonus from doing so) or get a specific DoT effect (like Volcano); it's very rare that trying to build more than 1-2 orbs is actually a good idea.

Of course, as I said, none of this matters for the main game. I only know any of this because I've put some effort into min/maxing endgame play, since that's the sort of thing I like doing. Even then, though, stacking orbs is generally a waste of time compared to just setting Mythra up for level 3 special spam and popping 1-orb chain attacks whenever she lands three of them. Exploiting the overkill bonus is often a good idea to help speed up levelling, but you can get a decent bonus just by popping a 0-orb chain attack right before the enemy dies, which is much, much more time-efficient (not to mention less tedious) than trying to load them up with a full burst to hit the full 1000% overkill.

Entity13 posted...

When I could finally pick up weapons that hit mechanical entities just fine, but were weaker than one or two rounds of weapons I'd already been using by that point,

The anti-mechon weapons are a bit of a bummer in that they throw a wrench into the "bigger numbers=more happy" philosophy that drives progress in RPG's, but they become available at a point when almost all of the enemies you'll be fighting are Mechon (as opposed to <5% of them, aside from the Ether Mine), so they're kind of a necessity if you want any sort of flexibility in the combat for the next 30-odd hours. You still have the option of relying on Enchant, if you'd rather use the strongest available weapons instead, but that locks you into using player-controlled Shulk continuously, which you may not want (especially where Melia really starts to come into her own around that point and switching to her is a nice way to shake things up). I do get that having to downgrade your weapons is a buzzkill, but it's well worth pushing past that because the most interesting parts of the story happen after Sword Valley (plus you pretty quickly get anti-mechon upgrades that are on par with or better than the stuff you replaced with those vendor ones, so it's not like progression stops).

JixHedgehog posted...

Nah, havent played the other .. 2?

Definitely would if the female characters were topless or something

Some of them aren't far off it in 2, and at least Sharla has quite a few armour options in 1 that aren't exactly subtle with the fanservice (heck, she's got exactly one style of chest armour that actually covers more than 90% of her boobs). Neither game is light on the fanservice, though X is the king in that regard with how skimpy some of the cosmetic gear gets.

adjl posted...

I do get that having to downgrade your weapons is a buzzkill, but it's well worth pushing past that because the most interesting parts of the story happen after Sword Valley (plus you pretty quickly get anti-mechon upgrades that are on par with or better than the stuff you replaced with those vendor ones, so it's not like progression stops).

Right, I figured.

I thought this was going to be a September release. Whoops.

No.

I got Live a Live instead, it looks much better.

yes but not now, I have way to many bills currently so it can wait till later.

I've stopped halfway into XC2 because the story is bad(I heard it gets better towards the end, but fuck that) and has a shitload of pacing issues. The combat is actually pretty fun, but I'm not slogging through dozens of hours of shitty story just for that.

Plus, it's coming out on the same day as Digimon Survive.

I'm waiting for the Collectors Edition to get restocked

lihlih posted...

I've stopped halfway into XC2 because the story is bad(I heard it gets better towards the end, but f*** that) and has a s***load of pacing issues.

It's very back-loaded with the exposition. A sizable chunk of the game is basically just "rawr we bad!" "oh noes don't take my girlfriend!" before it finally starts delving into deeper world-building and character explorations (especially on the villains' side, which is actually where the vast majority of meaningful character development/exposition happens), which is when the story starts to feel like it actually has a point. Strip out the pacing issues, and I would actually say that the story's roughly on par with the first one's, but the pacing is indeed a bit of a slog, and there's never much by way of character development (most of the party is the same person at the end of the game as they are at the beginning), compared to that being a huge part of the first one's story.

You may find it worthwhile to look up the cutscenes and watch everything after you gave up. In that form, it doesn't take very long to get to the good stuff (especially if you skip around a bit to avoid filler), so you could enjoy it without nearly as much time investment. That could also let you get back into the game and skip cutscenes as desired without worrying about missing anything, letting you enjoy the gameplay more.

Nope. The series just isnt for me these days. Played the first one and enjoyed it well enough, but I dont imagine Ill revisit it any time soon.

Did not care for X. Never even bothered with 2.

Not sure if I should get it now or wait. But I haven't played any others yet.

I played through XB2 again a few months ago and played the DLC campaign for the first time to prepare for XB3. Now I'm ready.

Its almost out!

i don't like it, i just don't think i like the xenoblade battle system

and the voice acting, but that's whatever

and yes, i have been playing it, had it for a few days now

Got bored with the first one like 10 hours in and never went back

I finished Torna last night. I knew I wasn't exactly in for a happy ending, because prequel, but damn. Really not a fan of how they pulled an X and forced me to do an arbitrary number of sidequests to progress the story (especially where I wanted to do most/all the sidequests anyway, I was just hoping to power through the story first to make sure I finished it before 3 came out), but it worked out. Dunno when I'll get back to it to finish everyone's affinity charts and kill the superbosses, since I'll be moving on to 3 after I pick it up later today and will presumably be Xenoblade'd out by the time it's done, but it was a good time.

rexcrk posted...

Did not care for X. Never even bothered with 2.

For what it's worth, 2 is a lot more similar to 1 than X. X was very much a departure from what seems to have become the norm for the series, placing a much larger emphasis on open-world exploration (for which it was an absolutely fantastic game) than more linear storytelling (for which it was pretty bad), so if you would have preferred the latter, disliking it is to be expected and doesn't necessarily mean you'll dislike 2. I like 1 better than 2 overall, and that preference is even stronger as far as first impressions go (2 takes a while for the battle system to come into its own, and even longer for the story to go anywhere meaningful), but it's still an excellent game.

Revelation34 posted...

Not sure if I should get it now or wait. But I haven't played any others yet.

If you're interested, I'd say your best bet would be to grab the Definitive Edition of 1 when it's on sale, rather than diving into 3. My understanding is that 3 can be played standalone (I obviously haven't confirmed that yet), but that having played the first two will enhance the experience, so you might as well start with one of the other ones that are cheaper and enjoy them until 3 gets a sale (or you decide you like the others enough that you don't mind paying full price).

I greatly enjoyed in the first two Xenoblade games, so Ill definitely be getting 3. Not day 1 (today?) though. I still need to work my way through Triangle Strategy before I invest in another game.

adjl posted...

I finished Torna last night. I knew I wasn't exactly in for a happy ending, because prequel, but damn. Really not a fan of how they pulled an X and forced me to do an arbitrary number of sidequests to progress the story (especially where I wanted to do most/all the sidequests anyway, I was just hoping to power through the story first to make sure I finished it before 3 came out), but it worked out. Dunno when I'll get back to it to finish everyone's affinity charts and kill the superbosses, since I'll be moving on to 3 after I pick it up later today and will presumably be Xenoblade'd out by the time it's done, but it was a good time.

For what it's worth, 2 is a lot more similar to 1 than X. X was very much a departure from what seems to have become the norm for the series, placing a much larger emphasis on open-world exploration (for which it was an absolutely fantastic game) than more linear storytelling (for which it was pretty bad), so if you would have preferred the latter, disliking it is to be expected and doesn't necessarily mean you'll dislike 2. I like 1 better than 2 overall, and that preference is even stronger as far as first impressions go (2 takes a while for the battle system to come into its own, and even longer for the story to go anywhere meaningful), but it's still an excellent game.

If you're interested, I'd say your best bet would be to grab the Definitive Edition of 1 when it's on sale, rather than diving into 3. My understanding is that 3 can be played standalone (I obviously haven't confirmed that yet), but that having played the first two will enhance the experience, so you might as well start with one of the other ones that are cheaper and enjoy them until 3 gets a sale (or you decide you like the others enough that you don't mind paying full price).

I already own that but never played it.

In that case, "already own it" is one of the best prices ever. I strongly recommend it, it's one of my favourite games ever.

I have no plans right now. I've never played a Xenoblade Chronicles game so will probably buy the first one before I even consider buying any of the others. The series has my interest.

A bit off topic here..., I know some people hated it, but I REALLY wish they'd do a remaster ("definitive edition") of Xenoblade Chronicles X. That game was severely underrated, and its biggest crime was releasing on a doomed console. I think it would look and play phenomenally on a Switch!

The story is the worst part of Torna though, lol
(other than having all likable well voice-acted characters unlike the main game)

It has the gameplay that XC2 main game should've had. And the areas are much better laid out for exploration than most of XC2's.

And even though I own XCX, I'd love a port/remaster (still looks fine, so doesn't really need the latter).
Needs volume controls, new battle and NLA themes, ability to add NPCs from a console once you've unlocked them for use, tiny text fix, and other stuff like that.

XCX needs a laundry list of QoL features

I'd probably still buy it day one even if it was a straight port

shipwreckers posted...

The western censorship didn't help XCX either.

I don't think too many people actually based their purchasing decision off of what percentage of a 12-year-old girl's buttcheeks you could see in half a dozen optional costumes. As much as a handful of people got really upset over the censorship for the principle of the matter, I'd be very, very surprised if it had a measurable impact on the game's sales. The WiiU's low install base was pretty much entirely responsible for limiting the game's sales.

Though, that said, X sold almost as many copies as XC1 did on Wii (840k vs 913k). 1 has since eclipsed that (560k on 3DS, 1.52 million on Switch), but as far as the initial releases went, they saw similar sales. Now, that's despite NoA doing everything they could to pretend 1 didn't exist (DE really was the first release where they actually made an effort to sell it to people), while X was actually promoted, but again, the WiiU's install base held it back. Quite a few people wanted to buy it, but didn't want to buy a WiiU just for it.

shipwreckers posted...

Somehow that "filler" was bearable to me

It really only bothered me leading into the chapter where Skells were unlocked and the chapter where the flight module became available. X really wasn't story-driven so much as the game was about exploring and building up the world of Mira, so most of the time I was pretty happy to just explore and do side quests and fit the story missions into that as felt natural. The affinity missions were a bit more of an issue because grinding affinity sucked (especially where swapping party members to do so was such a pain, so cycling through everyone regularly wasn't overly attractive), but overall, it wasn't too bad.

With Torna, though, I wanted to do all the sidequests and stuff (and eventually did), but when I wanted to get the story first out of the way in case I ran out of time, that got really annoying. I liked the sidequesting well enough, and I understand the push for "Look at all the friends you made and then murdered!" to help flesh out the world and drive home just how tragic the whole situation was, but the community level requirements were just a bit too high to flow naturally with my approach to sidequesting. At the same time, though, they didn't take that long, so the padding wasn't a huge problem even with my desire to rush through the story.

shipwreckers posted...

The story hit hard indeed. IMO, it gave some much needed context as to why Mythra was the way she was (as opposed to her simply being another distant / emo JRPG trope girl).

I'd say that context was already there, since it was pretty well explained what happened in the Aegis War and they were pretty clear about why Pyra existed (namely, as Mythra's dissociative trauma response), but it was cool to see it happen, build attachments to all of the characters that were affected, and watch them and the world develop into their future selves. Most of XC2's story progression (once it finally starts progressing for real) consists of building up the world to explain the motivations of the characters involved, and that world/character-building gets really quite interesting once it gets rolling, so more of that was great. Hugo's death hit me particularly hard. Despite only seeing the character for a short time, they did a really good job of communicating just how important a person he was in everyone's life. Between Addam sobbing as he held his body and the Special Inquisitor trembling silently as he accepted the core crystals, it was made heart-breakingly clear how much of a loss his death was for the people around him, and that's just good world-building.

streamofthesky posted...

It has the gameplay that XC2 main game should've had.

Eh, I don't think I'd say that. Stacking up orbs for a big chain attack was much, much smoother than in the base game (although Orb Master is a thing if that's the route you want to take), but in turn, that meant things revolved a little too much around doing that, unlike the much larger array of options the base game gives. Driver combos were kind of awkward, especially with such high Break resist on most of the enemies you'd actually want a Fusion bonus on, so relatively few Art Recharge pouch items (and the ones that are available are very lategame, unlike being able to buy Narcipear Jelly 20 seconds after taking control of Rex), and the combos being tied to Switch Arts for so many. It was still a great time, but I wouldn't say it was unilaterally better than the base game (though I say this not having done a particularly deep dive into endgame combat like I did with the base game, so my experience may be lacking).

Xenoblade Chronicles is in a weird spot for me. The premise of each of the games is exactly what I look for. But the most interest part for me is the concept that ties the games together with XenoGears and XenoSaga. From what I understand there's scientist doing something that divided him and makes him several Gods in different universes (or something like that). The problem is I don't see myself playing the games to see how much of that gets explained.

Uh, you should probably spoiler most of post 44 or delete it and re-post if you can't edit anymore...
And by probably, I mean definitely.

@SKARDAVNELNATE

This makes the game sound terrible to me

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/357204-xenoblade-chronicles-3/80113084

Revelation34 posted...

This makes the game sound terrible to me

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/357204-xenoblade-chronicles-3/80113084

There's level 40+ dudes in literally the starting area.
Xenoblade games always have high level mobs in various places.
It's a minor inconvenience, it sounds like.
But yeah, I guess don't get overleveled. I just used the camp to get to 20 so I could get the new unlocks, but I guess going ahead I'll be very careful about using it. Honestly, the enemies being so damn aggressive when I just want to explore and pick up shinies is the bigger issue w/ this overleveled situation. I miss how earlier games had indicators on whether enemies were aggressive and whether it was sight/sound/ether. Or XC2's DLC and XC1 DE that just let you turn off enemy aggression besides uniques/bosses entirely...

streamofthesky posted...

But yeah, I guess don't get overleveled.

That's basically impossible if you're the type to finish all the sidequests in an area and find all the locations, while also enjoying the combat.

The ability to lower your levels in XC1DE was a great solution to this.

They didn't bring it back for XC3?

T0ffee posted...

That's basically impossible if you're the type to finish all the sidequests in an area and find all the locations, while also enjoying the combat.

The ability to lower your levels in XC1DE was a great solution to this.

They didn't bring it back for XC3?

Nope
Apparently like XC2, it's locked to NG+
Granted, XC DE's system could be abused to power level so maybe they wanted to prevent that. But it's not hard to gain levels in XC in general and especially XC3, so that seems unnecessary to protect against.
(also guess I should stop going for 400% bonus XP overkills on chain attacks, lol)

streamofthesky posted...

Uh, you should probably spoiler most of post 44 or delete it and re-post if you can't edit anymore...
And by probably, I mean definitely.

Xenoblade Chronicles is in a weird spot for me. The premise of each of the games is exactly what I look for. But the most interest part for me is the concept that ties the games together with XenoGears and XenoSaga. From what I understand there's a scientist doing something that divided him and makes him several Gods in different universes (or something like that). The problem is I don't see myself playing the games to see how much of that gets explained.

Okay... though I'm not even sure how accurate it is.