Xenoblade Chronicles 3 News and Discussion

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

alright, gatcha

I mean if the game introduces backtravel quests, I expect to be able to do it at this moment.

It felt weird because then it was not really necessary then to explain this at this point.

[Etrurian emperor]

I suspect that a collection of statues you come across might just be a set up for the DLC. At one point you find statues of the previous heroes with the text saying that nothing is known about one particular hero.

So I'm guessing the prequel DLC might have a player created main avatar like Xenoblade X, with history conveniently forgetting all about the heroes looks, personality and gender to justify the full customization. 

[Etrurian emperor]

Some general observations about Xenoblade 3 compared to the rest in the series.

-Xenoblade 3 probably has the best main cast in the series. I think a common problem in the series is that the parties get so large that some characters just fall off in terms of relevance. Sharla in Xenoblade 1 is the most common example but I'd argue it also applies to Reyn, Riki, Tora, Dromarch and to some extend even to Morag or Dunban. In Xenoblade 3 that's not the case since of the six characters they very deliberately pair the characters in three different teams. Throughout the game Noah and Mio, Eunie and Taion, and Lanz and Sena all develop into tightly knit teams of two who's friendship keeps growing through the entire game. This setup ensures that its far harder for any character to fall off. Granted, Sena's obviously the red haired stepchild of the group but even she's kept somewhat relevant if only as an accessory to Lanz.

I also think the game has a somewhat playful attitude to the archetypes. Eunie's a foul mouthed tomboy but she's also the healer of the group, yet the classes she inherits tends to be those from weirdo's who's crap she barely tolerates. Taion the dorky strategist meanwhile often gets attacker classes, and Lanz with his rough edges keeps getting healing classes to reflect he's secretly a softie big bro sort of guy.

-In terms of tone and vision Xenoblade 3 is a massive step up from Xenoblade 2. The setting is more grounded compared to the over the top anime foundation of Xenoblade 2, and Xenoblade 3 is much more self aware about its story and clear to convey what it wants. Xenoblade 2 was often a somewhat confused game when it came to its writing. I found it very peculiar that Xenoblade 2 just failed to notice that the villain who was secretly a splendid soul all along, and the villain who's supposed to be completely irredeemable where the exact same character. The game also strongly tries to paint Torna as the lesser evil even if it staffs complete psychopaths like Malos and Akhos and ultimately aims to destroy the world. 

Xenoblade 3 is much more confident about what Moebius is, what they're all about and doesn't try to force sympathy towards characters who obviously don't deserve it. Even the most sympathetic members of Moebius get depicted as reprehensible and deeply pathetic persons who's comeuppance is richly deserved. 

On the other hand Xenoblade 2 is the more complete game. I might not like all the plotlines and characters but they are completed plotlines. Xenoblade 3 in comparisons feels very rushed at the end. Plot points such as Chrys, Consuls W and Y and the final chapter in general just feel unfinished. 

-The villains of Xenoblade 1 were consistently great with Metalface, Egil, ''noskcid'' and Zanza all being great or at least functional villains. The villains of Xenoblade 2 were a story of high and lows where figures such as Malos, Amalthus or Bahna were expressive, personable villains with great presence, and many of the other Torna members being among the weakest villains Xenoblade has to offer.

Xenoblade 3 is between the two extreme in that the villains are consistently average. There's no villain who's outright bad but outside of consul N few of them are really memorable. I guess K's a very memorable Xord but aside from that most are very forgettable. Thematically Moebius' theme of ''the endless now'' is very interesting, their hedonistic tendencies make for good villain material and their gimmick of having monstrous forms with very human theatrics is very clever. But in the end many Moebius members are just episodic filler bad guys who show up for a small quest and then get defeated. It diminishes the villainous threat level that previous villains like Metalface or Malos thrived on. Them all wearing very similar outfits and all being just named after letters from the Albabet might also have been a bad decision since it makes it much harder to tell them apart or remember them. Even the more prominent Moebius members are somewhat weak. Consul D's completely fine but in the full context of the series he's easily the weakest ''Mumkar''.

-The world of Xenoblade 3 is sadly the least interesting of the bunch. Previous games have areas like Satorl Marsh or Uraya which greatly changes between day and night, but Xenoblade 3 barely has any of those regions. The regions feel much more realistic and conventional which I don't think is a good thing. 

It might be thematically fitting that Aionius feels like a dead world but it just being a barren wasteland also makes it kinda dull. There are no real settlements, politics or dynamic factions.The colonies have their own bonds and rivals between each other but aesthetically they're mostly copy pasted which is a shame. And while its thematically fitting that Aionius is a dead world Its simultaneously thematically inaccurate for it to be that way. The consuls are all about vices and hedonistic desires so they should be fought in pleasure houses, casino's, coliseums or gaudy palaces but none of those things can really exist in the world of Xenoblade 3. 

[joevar]

On 9/18/2022 at 2:28 AM, Etrurian emperor said:

Some general observations about Xenoblade 3 compared to the rest in the series.

-Xenoblade 3 probably has the best main cast in the series.

Xenoblade 3 is much more confident about what Moebius is, what they're all about and doesn't try to force sympathy towards characters who obviously don't deserve it. Even the most sympathetic members of Moebius get depicted as reprehensible and deeply pathetic persons who's comeuppance is richly deserved. 

On the other hand Xenoblade 2 is the more complete game. I might not like all the plotlines and characters but they are completed plotlines. Xenoblade 3 in comparisons feels very rushed at the end. Plot points such as Chrys, Consuls W and Y and the final chapter in general just feel unfinished. 

-The villains of Xenoblade 1 were consistently great with Metalface, Egil, ''noskcid'' and Zanza all being great or at least functional villains. The villains of Xenoblade 2 were a story of high and lows where figures such as Malos, Amalthus or Bahna were expressive, personable villains with great presence, and many of the other Torna members being among the weakest villains Xenoblade has to offer.

Them all wearing very similar outfits and all being just named after letters from the Albabet might also have been a bad decision since it makes it much harder to tell them apart or remember them. Even the more prominent Moebius members are somewhat weak. Consul D's completely fine but in the full context of the series he's easily the weakest ''Mumkar''.

-The world of Xenoblade 3 is sadly the least interesting of the bunch. Previous games have areas like Satorl Marsh or Uraya which greatly changes between day and night, but Xenoblade 3 barely has any of those regions. The regions feel much more realistic and conventional which I don't think is a good thing. 

There are no real settlements, politics or dynamic factions.The colonies have their own bonds and rivals between each other but aesthetically they're mostly copy pasted which is a shame.

the fact all 6 core member permanently deployed is also nice imo. altho that makes the battle even more chaotic and loud. i've always got this small annoyance in any JRPG where we got many members benched despite them plot-wise always there but we got game over screen when deployed unit downed (and the reserve cant be called). thankfully its not like that here.

unfortunately like you said plot in xeno 3 is mostly finished, but the mystery is not. which lead to all kind of problem when someone like to dig deep into the plot.

wish we got more iconic boss place like the Theather with Z, just to reinforce their theatrical villainous act. but we got a mixed up of previous two world which is cool for nostalgia and place hunting but also bad since we dont have any completely new big-iconic-landmark

i feel we got more characters in xeno3, but somehow still feel like its sparsely populated due to the fact the colonies actually just mobile soldier camp realistically. even "the city" feels like it should be called colony

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

I beat this game yesterday.

It took me 85 h (the second longest game to beat after Persona 5), and seriously I enjoyed every single minute!

The characterization was detailed as authentic, the gameplay was simple and fun and the music was fantastic (as usual for Xenoblade).

Unlike other games I always was motivated to do sidequests to get to know more about the main and side characters.

The result was that I was totally overleveled at the end, but still skipped the one or other hero.

This means how much longer this game could be.

After all it was a superpleasant experience and besides Forgotten Land my Nintendo highlight of 2022 for me.