Xenoblade Chronicles is probably the japanese game with the most cliches and stereotyped things I've ever played. Seriously, the whole time I was playing it felt like I was watching some generic shounen anime that comes out all the time, with various tropes you've seen in exhaustion before, it was kind of nostalgic in a funny way, it reminded me a lot of when I used to watch a lot of seasonal anime as a teenager. I don't mind that kind of thing, really, one of my favorite games is Persona, which is extremely weeb and has many stereotypes and cliches of the genre, it's just that in the case of Xenoblade I feel that overall it's a game without much substance, it's quite shallow. I really can't get anything amazing out of it when it comes to the narrative or the characters, is a bit uninteresting most of the time.

But despite the simplicity of the story and characters and not very creative narrative choices, the story has its moments and a few characters are endearing and charismatic, I really liked Shulk, Dunban and Fiora (especially Fiora). I won't give too many details because I don't want to spoil anything, but I really liked the chemistry between the three of them and how the game works with their relationship, making it very believable that they are very close, it really is like a family, it's nothing extremely deep or complex, nor does it need to be, it's just captivating and well-developed and I liked it, and in the end it's hard not to get attached to the main characters. Not only that, but the atmosphere and soundtrack are simply incredible (this game didn't deserve Yoko Shimomura), so exploring the map was very relaxing and comfy, it really manages to convey the feeling of the immensity of that world and immerses you in it in a very pleasant way, and it's a very interesting world conceptually, I really thought the whole Bionis and Mechonis thing was super cool.

The combat is very fun and engaging too, although I didn't like the fact that the game gives you very little exp, forcing you to grind, and grinding in this game is a bit torturous since the main missions don't give you any exp and most of the side missions don't either. I did all the side missions that the game put in front of me before moving on to the main story and defeated literally every enemy that came my way, but it still wasn't enough and I found myself underleveled in most of the main boss fights, so all you can do is spend an abnormal amount of time killing enemies with a higher level than yours until you level up, classic grind moment and it's fucking boring.

I really hoped that I would finish this game and write a much longer and more interesting review, but it's just that there's not much to say about this game, but in the end it's a good game and it has its charm despite everything. I'm just disappointed, as I was expecting one of the best jrpg's ever made due to all the acclaim and praise from the fanbase, but it doesn't come close to being everything they say it is. I honestly think that the Xenoblade fans should play more games.