No matter how hard you try to break us, the future is ours to shape! Always!

The premise of Xenoblade Chronicles is simple, yet effective. Atop the colossal Bionis, the three childhood friends Shulk, Reyn and Fiora are living their best lives, until one day a particularly evil robot shows up to disturb the local peace. With the help of the legendary sword Monado, Shulk embarks on a journey across the Bionis to track down the unknown assailant and get his revenge. Not only is the Monado arguably one of the coolest weapons in fiction, it's also especially useful in combat against the machines and allows the wielder to see into the future. The theme of fate is ever-present, as Shulk has to deal with visions involving the people close to him dying several times, and only he can change the future to prevent these events from playing out, while also pursuing his own goals. I'll not take away any more from the story, since I found it to be pretty intriguing and well written until the end, despite having quite a few tropes here and there and also some predictability to it. Even with the sheer amount of downright meme-worthy lines or shonen shenanigans, the core narrative is still surprisingly solid and doesn't fall flat in terms of twists either. Yes, Dunban being "over there" is actually important to the plot. The setting of the two titans is incredibly unique and memorable, but also just straight up cool at the same time, the area progression is really satisfying here. As for the main cast, they all have their reasons to join Shulk in his fight against the Mechons and their voice acting is superb. It's a shame Adam Howden never got any major roles besides Shulk, since he especially nailed those screams and emotional moments. But honestly, the rest of the cast is just as good and I like how many unknown voice actors are featured here (and their British accents).

While the main storyline is not as long as I expected it to be, Xenoblade is still jam-packed with side content, rocketing up the overall possible playtime by a significant amount. Most of the side quests are just fetch quests or "kill x amounts of these monsters", but there are also several skill trees or other cool rewards locked behind others. It never crossed my thoughts until I beat the story, how much Xenoblade rewards interacting with the world on the side, as there's even a whole chart accessible through the main menu where you can see the relations between every single named NPC and the locale they belong to. There's an entire trading mechanic I didn't even pay attention to in my playthrough, but it's cool to know it's there, I think little things like this or the info you can read up on the named NPCs on the chart improve the already impressive worldbuilding by a lot again. Now, one of my biggest regrets is not interacting with the Colony 6 side-story at all, there were many side quests related to it and I couldn't complete any of them because I somehow didn't do the initial one. Honestly, it's a shame it took me so long to properly appreciate those aspects, so I'll definitely focus on them on my eventual New Game+ playthrough.

Amidst the fierce battle cries of "Now it's Reyn Time!", "Electric Gutbuster!" and "Star-searing flames of ABSOLUTION!", I actually ended up liking the combat very much and was surprised by how unique it was. By the end it devolved into chain attack spam for me, but before that point, I think the MMO-style approach is really fitting and fun overall, while the cheesy battle lines of the cast add a whole layer of entertainment as well. Here, good preparation is half the battle already, as you will need to decide which skills your AI-controlled party members should use and how to efficiently combine those with the tactics of the rest of the team for optimal results. I said the combat is "MMO-style", because skills are locked behind cooldowns and your active character is using auto-attacks in the downtime to fill the special bar, like in the case of Shulk it's used for the Monado Arts. His signature sword not only specializes in slicing through machinery, but can also buff him or his party in various other ways, like shielding them or granting everyone the ability to hit the Mechons. Each of those abilities uses different amounts of the special gauge, so it's up to you to decide what's the best approach for certain combat situations. It would be pretty unwise to keep throwing out Arts which use your full gauge, as enemies and especially bosses can counter those by attacking with so-called Vision Attacks. Those come in three forms, Red, White and Purple. By casting the Impulse Art on a party member, they can dodge a red attack, which is pretty straightforward. Things get interesting for the white attacks, as they require you to have a properly leveled Shield Art to even block the move - so if an enemy uses "Attack VII", you need the skill level of your Shield Art atleast at 7, anything below will not block. The use of haptic feedback is also really underappreciated from what I've seen, every time you hit with a chance attack you get vibration on hit and everytime you break an enemy's vision attack the controller emulates this "breaking" effect with a stronger rumble. There's also a pulse while seeing the animations for vision attacks playing out, resembling a heartbeat, and that's pretty cool if you ask me.

Teambuilding is a central mechanic in Xenoblade Chronicles, and also one that is handled in an interesting way. First of all, you get access to most of the cast fairly early into the story already, so you can experiment with different teams through many different areas and see who has your favorite playstyle, who you want to main and who you don't actually like at all. This availability of being able to build around your team without even getting to the meat of the main story yet is such a nice change of pace, since I know so many games where you get party members so late, that they're basically unusable, as you have probably already have a good team composition at that point. Looking at you, Fire Emblem. But Xenoblade doesn't have this issue and it's just really nice, so I hope the other two games in the trilogy adapt this approach as well. As for their actual involvement in gameplay, each teammate has an unique role and playstyle, so you can basically play any possible combination of party members together and it will work somehow. Another neat feature is the ability to choose any character besides Shulk as the leader, allowing you to control them in the overworld and battle, it's very handy for certain encounters (or if you're just a big fan of the character). Like personally I played Melia on Mount Valka so I could have an easier time reaching the airborne enemies and it ended up being a really pleasant change of pace! There is also a whole layer of customization here besides the current party setup, since you can tweak individual characters to your liking by equipping them with gems, certain armor pieces or adjusting the skill trees. I really like how skill trees are handled here, like you still can normally unlock character-specific skills of individual branches through EXP, but you're also able to make use of the skills of other characters if you raise the friendship between them accordingly. This is not a metaphorical statement, raising the affinity between two teammates comes with a nice amount of extras - you unlock new heart-to-heart events across the world, the possibility of extending chain attacks is higher and as mentioned before, you gain access to a bunch of the opposite character's skills. Very nice!

As for the soundtrack, the Definitive Edition features an (almost) entirely revamped OST with new arranged tracks. I've only heard a few of the original tracks in Smash before, so I won't compare the new arrangements to the original compositions. With that out of the way, I'm a big fan of the musical score for DE and especially the more emotional songs here really hit me at times. Hearing Engage the Enemy for the very first time in-game with the corresponding cutscene is an ethereal feeling and gave me shivers in combination with Adam Howden's performance there. Gaur Plain is also one of my favorites, even if that one's a basic pick - maybe because it's just a memorable, good song. My final nomination goes out to Mechanical Rhythm for just being a pretty sick standard battle theme, which could easily pass as a boss theme elsewhere.

Considering I'm planning to do a NG+ one day to catch up on the content I missed, it's needless to say that Xenoblade Chronicles left quite the impression on me, even after finishing the game. Now onto Future Connected and I'm looking forward to playing Xenoblade 2 in a while too. Here's hoping that the rest of the trilogy will be just as fun!

This is a game of choice. All outcomes are dealt by your hand. There is no room for error, no mistakes to be made, no extraneous activity set up to prey on your downfall. All that is asked of you is to select a case.

Are you confident in your decisions? Do you trust yourself enough to follow through to the end? How long do you believe you can stay confident in your selection? That is not what matters now. At the moment, you have six cases to eliminate from the pool.

One falls. Another. Then another. Four. Five. Six. Some lucky drops. Some higher than you would have liked. Out of obligation, you are now given the choice to finish the game immediately, taking a definitive offer totaled from your remaining potentialities. Usually no higher than ~70,000 dollars. The choice is yours. Deal, or No Deal?

Well, that's ridiculous. Look at the board! You still have several hundred thousands awaiting you! You would be a fool to accept that puny an amount with such high odds of success! No deal, banker.

Continue forward. Please remove five more cases from the stage. One... two... oh, dear. A major hit to your possible winnings. This will not go over well in your next offer. Nevertheless, all you can do is continue forward. Three, four, five.

The banker has returned with a new offer. You have gained an additional ten, maybe fifteen thousand to your deal. All you have to do is accept. But that is not what you are here for. You are behind the podium because of the big one million that still eludes you. It could be sitting right next to you, for all you know. This is another deal you cannot make.

As the game progresses, you start to feel it. Your confidence is waning. Your options are diminishing, and so, too, are your prizes. Your decisions have led you to exhilarating highs, and heart wrenching lows. You have lost your chance at the fabled one million dollar prize, but that does not mean you are out just yet. You can keep going. $750,000 is still a fair amount. If not that, then 500,000. Do not let this one instance tear you away from victory.

The banker has returned. You have done well, and are rewarded with the promise of a definitive 200,000 dollars, at the least. Deal, or No Deal?

Not good enough.

You have made it this far. You can go higher. There is still that non-zero chance of half a million. Do not accept the deal. Do not settle for mediocrity. Is that how you want to live? To spend your restless nights tossing and turning over what could have been? No deal.

Ahead of you lies four more cases. Choose one.

Your best bet crumbles.

The banker is not pleased.

The deal is dropped, and it is now clear to you that perhaps you should have left when you were given a satisfactory result. But that is not what you are here for.

One more case.

Down goes your saving grace. There is nothing left for you.

The banker has given you one final chance. Will you count your losses, accepting the perfect in-between of your last two cases? Or do you still think you can beat the odds?

At what point would you still consider it worth it? The only thing keeping you going anymore is your ego, which has tumbled time and time again as you decline each and every out. If you leave now, you will not only leave unhappy, but unfulfilled. Despite it all, there is still that looming sense of achievement that comes from taking your shot, and making it out stronger than you could have.

Do not accept the deal.

Your odds are now 50/50. There is no middle ground anymore. There is no settlement to be made. You refused what was given to you, because you held out hope. Hope that got you nowhere. You have one final decision. Will you swap your case for what is left on stage, or will you stay true to your first choice, the case that has stayed by your side since the beginning?

Your confidence is what pulled you through to begin with. You promised to see it through to the end. You will not let anything tell you otherwise. Win or lose, you have always stayed true to yourself. You have what you want. You know what is best for you. With no one to blame but yourself, you have lost everything, but you know there is still more waiting for you.

---

I chose to keep my case. Given the possibility of one hundred dollars or five, I decided not to swap.

I walked out with five dollars. I won five dollars. Nothing brought about this result against my wishes. Everything that happened in this game was under my hand. I have trouble even calling myself a winner, given that there was no opponent to beat, no loser to be seen. I can't blame the game, or another person, or any other outside force. I chose this outcome, and I did everything in my power to keep it that way. Myself. Such is the thrill, and the horrors, of Deal or No Deal.

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