Finished my 100% run of the game; still the greatest game I have ever had the privilege of playing. Kinoblade still my all timer, I love every single character in this game with every fiber of my being, and when Riki said "Shulk real Heropon" I felt that in my soul.

Real talk though, I cannot advise finishing all side-quests in this game unless you are a masochist. I was using a spreadsheet to track my progress with 100%ing the game and let me tell you; even with that I was still walking on eggshells that I would accidentally trigger a timeout on a quest due to certain story progressions. I think some of the sidequest chains are absolutely fucking hysterical, and I am ashamed I had never done the Bana sidequests til this playthrough.

Great game, Shulk+Reyn+Dunban dogwalking the final boss with one chain attack is a new highlight of this series for me lmao

A beautiful game. Wonderful characters and story, love how everyone can really emote in the Definitive Edition, and the world is a fantastic character in itself. It really grabs that old JRPG feel, that promise, of losing yourself in an immense, vivid world packed with colorful characters, societies, and sights to see. The crazy plot was a lot of fun, and the nonstop hype train ride of the third act was legendary among JRPGs I've played.

I have a few gripes that mar this game from getting the extra half star or so. While the towns were impressive in how vivid they were, I just couldn't get into how drab the NPC dialogue presentation felt. It's a little better with bigger text boxes in XB2, at least. Building on that, the sidequests. On one hand, they were fine as brain-off, I-just-want-to-grind-while-listening-to-three-hour-long-youtube-videos activities, but on the other hand, there were... simply too many of them, and not many had much narrative pleasure to them.

Another gripe is a bigger one - the combat. I found it okay to bad for much of my play. I think it works for the game Xenoblade Chronicles is - the lack of a loud transition to a seperate screen into menu-based turn based combat, opting instead for a seamless, cooldown-based real time system is a boon to the exploration. The game would be much worse off with a system like, say, Final Fantasy 10's-and I think FFX's battle system is fantastic.

Unfortunately, the game's battle system (and that's not even getting into the crazy level scaling, or how I had to grind for a few hours just to beat a miniboss that was incredibly easy but unhittable because I was 5 levels below it) discouraged me from really wanting to bite into the side content of the game. I missed out on a lot of bond talks, a lot of the later bosses, a lot of the post-game areas... but, I was satisfied with my time. So, so satisfied. When the changed title screen came up after the post-credits cutscene, I teared up a bit. I'm tearing up a bit writing this sentence now. What a journey. Just... man.

It took 5 games, but I finally found what I thought was impossible: a Xeno game that feels like a complete, coherent experience in one package.

Xenoblade doesn't really revolutionize anything, but it executes so well most of its ambition. A likeable cast of characters (special props to Shulk being an amazing MC!), fantastic world design, great music and a strong story with very enganging twists, ending with a meaningful message.

If I had to point out one thing I didn't like about the game, it was the difficulty balance towards the end - the way the combat system handles level gaps is deeply frustrating, pushing you towards grinding. Even with that, it didn't ruin my enjoyment of the overall package.

I'm curious to see where this series goes after this one. I hope I can play the sequels at some point!

Xenoblade 1 has a lot of issues, especially compared to its sequels. The combat's pretty simplistic, the worlds can feel a little too big for their own good, the side quests suck, and besides Shulk and Melia, the characters aren't the most interesting.

That said, it still has a lot going for it, and it's impressive how many of the ideas it established still work in later games.


Edit: Also, the Wii version does not look better than this

Xenoblade Chronicles, arguably one of the greatest JRPGs of the past 2 decades, a game that I never got to play when it came out but I always wanted to play sometime, which is why I'm really glad the Definitive Edition for the Switch came out.
Now, to be honest, I couldn't get into the game at first because it felt slow, but I tried pushing through the story recently and I finally managed to finish the game.
The story does feel quite slow at times but the premise and the build-up are so intriguing in this game, they kept me playing for many hours even when the story was getting slow. Aside from the pacing though, the story is actually one of the best I've experienced in a JRPG, a massive surprise that I didn't expect at all.
The gameplay feels a bit dated in some instances but it's pretty enjoyable for the most part and it has some interesting mechanics.
The characters are very good; they're surprisingly grounded, smart, funny and self-aware, and their dialogue is very coherent without relying on generic tropes. I'm very impressed!
As much as I liked the story and the characters in Xenoblade Chronicles though, the highlight of the game is the concept of the game's world and the premise of the story, a world made from 2 frozen Titans; it's one of the coolest and most epic things I've seen in a videogame, period. It's an absolutely fascinating idea and it makes up for breathtaking environments and world design.
Also, the music in this game is absolutely fantastic for sure!
The side-quests are uninspired, unfortunately, but it's not a big deal though.

Pros:
+ Compelling story with many twists and turns
+ Great characters
+ Fun gameplay
+ Incredible concept and world design
+ Awesome music

Cons:
- Slow pacing
- Boring side-quests

Narrative: 9/10
Gameplay: 7/10
Content: 9/10
Characters: 8/10
Music: 10/10
Art Style: ?/10

Final Rating: 9.5/10
- Outstanding -
Xenoblade Chronicles is one of the best JRPGs of all time and a wonderful videogame experience even to this day.

Do I recommend it?:
Must-play for JRPG fans and highly recommended for Switch owners.

As of writing this review, I have just completed Chapter 9, since this is supposedly the "peak" of this game from what I've been told. Honestly, I'm not sure what I expected. This game combines 2 things that I hate - open worlds and Action RPGs so I really shouldn't have gotten my hopes up lol. While the story is fine enough so far, no amount of good writing can save this abysmal faux-MMO gameplay. In addition to having a good story, games should also actually be fun, which I feel many devs seem to forget lol. I'm unsure whether or not I'll keep playing because I feel really tempted to just finish it by watching a YouTube playthrough or something - all I can say is that I don't think I've felt this bored playing a video game in a while.

Sorry Zetta, but this game is fucking ass lmao.

original visual style was better and less generic (nintendo Wii version)

aside from that - this is solid JRPG entry with a good story

Tetsuya Takahashi won't dissapoint