I got this game when it came out back on the Wii because of all the hype around it finally coming out in the United States. I really didn't care for the combat so I bounced off it. It's always been one of those games that kept coming back up and hearing people talk about it like it's one of the best RPGs ever made. I wanted to give it another chance so I got Xenoblade Chronicles 2 when it came out and...the same thing happened. Didn't like the combat so I bounced off after about 6-7 hours. I don't know why I couldn't just let it go with this series and chalking it up to it just not being for me but I wanted to give it another chance. So I had some points saved up at Best Buy and Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition was on sale so I paid half price for it and gave this series another shot! Well I'm really glad I did cause man I fell in love with this game! As of now with 1 play though done I consider this game to be one of the best RPGs I've ever played and it's masterpiece level good with it's storytelling!
Before we get fully into this I want to say that this is just covering the main game. I have't played the dlc Future Connected yet. I will but just wanted a break from this game and some time to pass then go and play it. I also won't be going into spoilers about anything in this game cause it would take me writing a book to fully explain what happens in this game!
So I want to start with the gameplay side of things since that's what kept me from playing this game in the past. I realized that I just wasn't putting enough attention into the combat to fully understand it. Also playing on the newly added Casual difficulty helped but still. This game has very fast combat but it doesn't seem like it at first. Once you engage an enemy you auto attack but then you use moves called Arts to do the bulk of the damage. You aren't meant to kill big enemies with auto attack but build up attacks with it while also doing damage. I didn't get this at first but when it clicked it really opened up for me. By the end of the game I fully understood what I was doing and it's a lot to keep up with. You pretty much have to see moves cool down and make sure to use the Manado to debuff enemies and it becomes a whole thing but it works.
And there is A LOT of combat in this game. If you aren't in a cutscene you are pretty much constantly in fights while exploring so liking that style is pretty important to liking this game. This is the first game with this kind of combat that I've finished so I'm hoping that this will open up other games to me like Final Fantasy XII since it has real time combat and I've never finished it. I will add that it's cool you can play as any of the characters, not just Shulk. I played different ones depending on the side quest I was doing cause using a long range weapon is kind of a must to get some creatures attention. I overall think the combat feels great but it takes a while to get it down.
The most impressive thing about this game is the look and scope of it. It looks so good and crisp on the Switch and I found myself constantly thinking "How the hell did this game originally come out on the Wii?" There are so many areas that you go to and they are massive and the structures are right there in sight and it's epic on a scale that few other games are. It really reminded me of the first two God of War games with that. I think the last time I took this many screenshots on the Switch was when it first came out and I was playing Breath of the Wild for the first time. It's unreal how beautiful this game is and to only take up like 13gb of memory on the console to pull that off. I would go as far as to say it's one of the best looking games I've ever played! And I had no slowdown or frames dropped during my play time. I'm blown away how good this games looks/runs on the Switch!
To me, the best thing about this game is the story and the characters. It's so well written and acted it's insane! And the level of depth they go to tell this epic story is Final Fantasy level and left me very emotional in spots and was a mess by the end. So the non-spoiler story is that you live on a Titan called Bionis that is dormant after a battle hundreds of years against another titan called Mechonis. Mostly humans live on the Bionis and mostly machines live on Mechonis and they have been in a long standing war by the time the game starts. There is a blade that Shulk is studying called the Monado and it so happens that Shulk is one of the only people that can wield the blade and it's the only weapon that can harm the machines. So one day the machines attack Colony 9, where Shulk lives, and things happen and him and his best friend Reyn go off to seek retribution for the attack. Along the way you meet some awesome characters and my God a lot happens in this game. That's all I'll say but it's very good and if you like JRPG stories then this is one of the best!
I'm a huge Kingdom Hearts fan and there were some big time KH moments in this game and I loved them. I really liked Shulk as the main character cause he changed over the course of the game but still kept who he was at his core throughout and that's hard to do in a long story. I would say who my favorite character in the game is but that's a spoiler so I won't but how they change from the start of the game to the end is magnificent and something rarely seen in games. And really the ending of the game is something you don't see in games much. You go places that are unreal and it has the prefect ending in my opinion!
I want to touch on some smaller things I liked before getting to some of the things I didn't care for. I know that the HD rumble that some games say they have is stupid and gimmicky but it works really well here. It's very subtle but it's nice. Like falling down a long distance the controller shakes slightly in a way that I rarely feel it ever shake. Its great! I also think how everything is so streamlined is great. Like when you accept a side quest you can choose to make that your main objective and it will show up as a blue point on the map but it will also just show up as a solid read one even if you don't. Like if you need to kill a certain creature that creature will just have a red point on it in the wild so you know it's for a side quest. That's so amazing and I can't believe more game don't do that! One last thing is being able to save and fast travel whenever you want to. I know that's not that big of a deal but it's very nice to have with a huge game like that.
When it comes to things I didn't care for they are minimal. There are sooooo many side quests and that can be a bit of a grind and some are pretty boring. I get that we couldn't have everything in this game but none of them are voice acted and that takes a tad away from some of them. One thing that was annoying was buying books to upgrade Arts for characters. There are specific vendors that sell them for specific characters and that's a bit much. Just let all vendors sell them all cause going back to older areas just to see which one is selling the book you need is a bit much. That's about it haha. Those are mainly just minor annoying things rather than complaints but still.
I can't end this without praising the music. This is one of the best/most memorable soundtracks I've ever heard. Loud and epic when needed and extremely emotional and gripping at the same time! If you have somehow never heard any music from this game I highly recommend going to YouTube and searching for Xenoblade Chronicles soundtrack and you'll be glad you did. They did an update to the soundtrack in this version and I thought it sounded amazing. I never went back to the original one during the course of the game so I'm not sure how much of a difference there is other than the new being orchestral.
This game is an example of give it another try for me! I never really thought I'd give this game another go but I'm so glad I did cause I've found one of the best RPG games ever made in the process and I'll honestly do a new game plus play though before another year goes by. I won't say that it's prefect but damn does it get real close. I've never experienced anything like this before and I have a feeling it will be the best game I play this year! Too bad I waiting a year after it came out to play it or it might be my game of the year for 2021...screw it, it might just be my game of the year anyway!
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