Xenoblade Chronicles X Review

Xenoblade Chronicles X

An RPG’s battle system is more important to me than its story. That’s why 2003’s Baten Kaitos was one of my favorite RPGs. Coincidentally, co-developer Monolith Soft is also responsible for Xenoblade Chronicles X, which is quickly becoming another one of my top picks. The real-time battles here are very engaging and surprisingly complex as you dig deeper into them. I love that you can target and destroy a monster’s appendages, thereby eliminating some of its abilities. When you also take into consideration the size of the monsters and the fact that so many of them—hostile and otherwise—freely roam the world, Xenoblade starts to feel more like the game Monster Hunter 3 should have been. Yes, I know, Monster Hunter is different on many levels, but damn… Xenoblade is just so good at what it does.

The scope of the game’s world, for instance, is enormous. This feels like a genuine planet with its own ecosystems. Running around the world of Mira is like exploring a national park. The environments are gorgeous, and there are few limits as to where you can go. You can head straight into the most dangerous parts of the world during the first chapter if you so choose. I also appreciate that you can jump, which means you’re able to scale tall mountains and can sometimes find shortcuts to important areas with some clever ledge hopping. You will have to play with the Wii U gamepad, though, in order to fast-travel between locations. Running on foot may give you a better appreciation for the game’s details, but most missions require a good amount of backtracking, which can get tedious if you forget about the fast travel option.

The only thing I don’t like about the game (aside from the tiny text that forces me to sit closer to the TV) is that, once you’ve accepted a story or “affinity” mission, you can’t cancel it or take on any other missions until you finish it. Some of the affinity missions, however, send you on ridiculous scavenger hunts without giving you much guidance on where those resources are located. Similarly, story chapters can turn out to be much harder than anticipated, and it would be nice to fall back on the affinity missions as a non-grindy way of leveling up. I almost quit while on the final chapter for that reason, which made me terribly sad, because there were still many more affinity quests I wanted to do. Seriously, Xenoblade is the most fun I’ve had charting a digital world since Wind Waker, and I honestly don’t want it to end.

Reviewer

Clark
I love gaming so much, I wrote a book about it.

Published by

Clark

I love gaming so much, I wrote a book about it.