This review contains spoilers
NOTE: The ranked score is judging this games quality as the best way to play XC1, though this written review is more critical of the game as a remake, in particular its new features.
I find it very hard to express my feelings towards this game because of how I developed my relation to the franchise in the first place. As far as the game goes yes its the best way to play Xenoblade 1 but beyond that I find it hard to praise. Most of the new additions fall rather flat, Future Connected being unfocused, way too short, and just making the combat less fun, while Time Attack just straight up sucks especially after the extremely high standard that was set with XC2s challenge battle. In particular the changes to the music are EXTREMELY hit of miss, for the most part the majority of the songs are better but anything involving vocals feels way off, and notably the vision theme which was already in contention due to interrupting music has had its drop DRASTICALLY changed and, in my opinion, is worse off. Additionally "Expert mode" is a complete joke, merely giving the game the XC2 experience system and making no changes to actual game difficulty, which honestly is fairly well needed since, outside of the endgame superbosses and certain story fights, this game is piss easy.
To cut the game some slack I feel like showing off Alvis's neck piece redesign in the reveal trailer set my expectations way too high as to what the remake would be changing, in addition to a leaked copy of the special edition artbook containing images of Tora which, when paired with the new challenge battle mode, promised the idea of character crossover, like XC2s DLC. Additionally the changes to the UI are absolutely fantastic and the addition of vanity slots is greatly appreciated.
At the end of the day this remake only really offers the easiest, best looking, most polished way to play the original Wii classic, and nothing much more than that. If you played the original on Wii or 3DS and either disliked it or thought it was just OK, this unfortunately isn't going to change your mind.
I find it very hard to express my feelings towards this game because of how I developed my relation to the franchise in the first place. As far as the game goes yes its the best way to play Xenoblade 1 but beyond that I find it hard to praise. Most of the new additions fall rather flat, Future Connected being unfocused, way too short, and just making the combat less fun, while Time Attack just straight up sucks especially after the extremely high standard that was set with XC2s challenge battle. In particular the changes to the music are EXTREMELY hit of miss, for the most part the majority of the songs are better but anything involving vocals feels way off, and notably the vision theme which was already in contention due to interrupting music has had its drop DRASTICALLY changed and, in my opinion, is worse off. Additionally "Expert mode" is a complete joke, merely giving the game the XC2 experience system and making no changes to actual game difficulty, which honestly is fairly well needed since, outside of the endgame superbosses and certain story fights, this game is piss easy.
To cut the game some slack I feel like showing off Alvis's neck piece redesign in the reveal trailer set my expectations way too high as to what the remake would be changing, in addition to a leaked copy of the special edition artbook containing images of Tora which, when paired with the new challenge battle mode, promised the idea of character crossover, like XC2s DLC. Additionally the changes to the UI are absolutely fantastic and the addition of vanity slots is greatly appreciated.
At the end of the day this remake only really offers the easiest, best looking, most polished way to play the original Wii classic, and nothing much more than that. If you played the original on Wii or 3DS and either disliked it or thought it was just OK, this unfortunately isn't going to change your mind.