Having to micromanage 6 characters in real-time with no way to pause or slow down combat (outside of chain attacks) makes Xenoblade 3 one of the most chaotic and execution-heavy JRPGs I've ever played! Pair that with a strong emphasis on spacing/positioning, and Xeno3 easily has the BEST combat system in the series.
However, there are 3 massive design flaws that hold it back from being truly great instead of just relatively better than other JRPGs.
First is its poor implementation of cooldown combat -- most games that rely entirely on cooldowns are built so that playing efficiently means spamming every ability as frequently as possible. Every second an ability is spent off of cooldown is a second of wasted healing or damage.
Basically, cooldowns reduce combat from a series of tactical decisions to a rigid 'schedule' of button presses, hitting every attack at set intervals to maximize effectiveness.
The only way to make these systems engaging is to create situations where the player is encouraged to withhold their abilities, calculating risk/reward and waiting for the perfect opportunity instead of turning everything into a spam fest. This can be accomplished through enemies that try to disrupt your rotation with their attacks (raid bosses), stringent resource management (mp/stamina/whatever), or situationally useful abilities (extra effective when the right conditions are set).
Apart from a handful of conditional abilities, Xeno3 doesn't really do this. In fact, since the most powerful super attacks in the game are fueled by the number of abilities you use, the player is actively rewarded for constant cooldown rotations instead of deliberate decision making. You want to activate interlinks/chain attacks/talents as frequently as possible? Just spam, dude.
Most enemies can't even interrupt your attacks, so you don't have to worry about waiting for an opening before commiting to an animation ie. Monster Hunter.
It doesn't matter what class or flavor of dps you're using, whether you're a hammer wielding heavy hitter, a long-range gunslinger, a crit-based dual wielder, a bleed-based archer, a buffing healer -- you're hitting all your cooldowns as fast as you can.
The second design flaw is the godawful party a.i. that is constantly ignoring your orders, running into enemies' attacks, or placing their buffs where no one can use them. The game gives you tools to micromanage your party members, but there's only so much you can do when they randomly disobey orders like using the opposite status effect you tell them to use or randomly repositioning themselves away from where you placed them.
I imagine some of this can be fixed in upcoming patches, but I doubt Monolith can totally redesign the A.I. so they're not constantly sabotaging you. At least, not without some sort of customizable flowchart akin to FFXII or Deadfire.
The third and arguably most damaging flaw is the chain attack. This powerful super move forms the cornerstone of your strategy, letting your team safely dish out millions of points of damage, fully heal your party, and even apply status effects to enemies without fear of retaliation.
Anyone familiar with XB1 or 2 will have a decent understanding of how it works: time pauses and you will get to pick one of 3 randomly selected party members to provide a passive bonus to the chain attack (damage penetration/ aggro resets/ stat buffs/ etc.) Afterwards, every party member gets to use one attack against their target, with each attack filling an on-screen gauge.
Once the gauge is full, the character chosen for their passive bonus unleashes a powerful super attack and the chain attack starts a new round where you pick a new passive bonus and some characters are given a chance to attack again. If done properly, an efficient strategy will let you go 5 rounds in a single chain attack!
There are all sorts of secondary rules where the class of a character affects the rate at which the chain attack gauge fills, and how your optional hero characters have their own perks, or how overfilling the gauge lets more characters attack each turn… I'll admit, learning this mechanic is pretty tricky and took several hours for me to form a consistent strategy. So why is it bad???
Problem is, chain attacks RUIN the flow of combat by replacing the real-time chaos with a turn-based minigame where you spend most of your time watching flashy cutscenes.
As I said, the minigame has a lot of convoluted rules that dictate the length and effectiveness of the attack, but once you settle on a good strategy, it's just a matter of running through the motions, mindlessly picking the optimal attacks every chain attack. It quickly devolves into 'pick the same attacks in the same order you always do, watch 2 minutes of cutscenes as you wail on a defenseless enemy.'
In fact, there are some fights where the majority of an encounter is spent watching chain attack cutscenes, making me question the point of combat in the first place! For many boss fights, I feel like I'm just buying time until I can use my chain attack to chunk 40-80% of their health bar. Xenoblade's biggest strength is that it plays out in real-time! If I wanted to pause time and slowly micromanage, there are much better alternatives!
These flaws have been around since the first Xenoblade released 10 years ago. And every time Monolith makes a new entry, they come up with a bunch of convoluted combat gimmicks instead of fixing the series' shaky foundation. After XB 1 introduced Chain Attacks, later entries had Overdrives, Elemental Combos, Fusion Combos, Interlinks, Fusion Arts, Field Abilities, etc. etc.
Learning these systems is fun at first, but once you understand how they work, it's obvious that these mechanics have one or two optimal strategies that are repeated ad nauseum through hundreds of samey, repetitive battles.
Monolith is making the combat flowchart longer and longer but they aren't changing the fact that it's still a flowchart.
I would be remiss to not acknowledge Xenoblade 3's deep character customization, combining Final Fantasy 5's mix and match job system with the customizable movesets and game-changing armor that Xenoblade is known for. For people with a min-maxing mindset, you could argue that customization is the REAL game and the combat encounters are just an excuse to test out new builds.
And you know what? I can totally see that argument. Xenoblade's emphasis on optimizing numbers isn't that different from the efficiency simulators/machine building seen in city builders/tower defense/programming puzzlers.
The big difference is that these games don't make you sit through the boring stuff. In games like Monster Train or Opus Magnum or Cities: Skylines you make some decisions, speed up time, then see the results of your actions, tweaking your build based on feedback. If combat is just a means to an end, then there's no reason for me to sit through dozens of hours of it when I'm just here for the number crunching.
Despite my complaints, I still enjoyed the game in the same way I enjoyed most jrpgs, begrudgingly pushing through hours of samey combat just so I can enjoy the narrative, party customization, and beautiful presentation. I don't consider it to be peak fiction, but Xenoblade 3 hits some emotional and thematic high points that match some of my favorite PS1 jrpgs, easily cementing it as 'one of the best in the genre.'
I'm just tired and burnt out on a genre that sucks up so much of my time for no good reason. A genre where the majority of the runtime is wasted on deeply flawed combat systems that are rarely engaging. Maybe the upcoming dlc will introduce some tricky boss fights or give some QOL updates that speed up chain attacks! But for now it's a 7 for me! I hope one day I can return to this and give it something higher.
However, there are 3 massive design flaws that hold it back from being truly great instead of just relatively better than other JRPGs.
First is its poor implementation of cooldown combat -- most games that rely entirely on cooldowns are built so that playing efficiently means spamming every ability as frequently as possible. Every second an ability is spent off of cooldown is a second of wasted healing or damage.
Basically, cooldowns reduce combat from a series of tactical decisions to a rigid 'schedule' of button presses, hitting every attack at set intervals to maximize effectiveness.
The only way to make these systems engaging is to create situations where the player is encouraged to withhold their abilities, calculating risk/reward and waiting for the perfect opportunity instead of turning everything into a spam fest. This can be accomplished through enemies that try to disrupt your rotation with their attacks (raid bosses), stringent resource management (mp/stamina/whatever), or situationally useful abilities (extra effective when the right conditions are set).
Apart from a handful of conditional abilities, Xeno3 doesn't really do this. In fact, since the most powerful super attacks in the game are fueled by the number of abilities you use, the player is actively rewarded for constant cooldown rotations instead of deliberate decision making. You want to activate interlinks/chain attacks/talents as frequently as possible? Just spam, dude.
Most enemies can't even interrupt your attacks, so you don't have to worry about waiting for an opening before commiting to an animation ie. Monster Hunter.
It doesn't matter what class or flavor of dps you're using, whether you're a hammer wielding heavy hitter, a long-range gunslinger, a crit-based dual wielder, a bleed-based archer, a buffing healer -- you're hitting all your cooldowns as fast as you can.
The second design flaw is the godawful party a.i. that is constantly ignoring your orders, running into enemies' attacks, or placing their buffs where no one can use them. The game gives you tools to micromanage your party members, but there's only so much you can do when they randomly disobey orders like using the opposite status effect you tell them to use or randomly repositioning themselves away from where you placed them.
I imagine some of this can be fixed in upcoming patches, but I doubt Monolith can totally redesign the A.I. so they're not constantly sabotaging you. At least, not without some sort of customizable flowchart akin to FFXII or Deadfire.
The third and arguably most damaging flaw is the chain attack. This powerful super move forms the cornerstone of your strategy, letting your team safely dish out millions of points of damage, fully heal your party, and even apply status effects to enemies without fear of retaliation.
Anyone familiar with XB1 or 2 will have a decent understanding of how it works: time pauses and you will get to pick one of 3 randomly selected party members to provide a passive bonus to the chain attack (damage penetration/ aggro resets/ stat buffs/ etc.) Afterwards, every party member gets to use one attack against their target, with each attack filling an on-screen gauge.
Once the gauge is full, the character chosen for their passive bonus unleashes a powerful super attack and the chain attack starts a new round where you pick a new passive bonus and some characters are given a chance to attack again. If done properly, an efficient strategy will let you go 5 rounds in a single chain attack!
There are all sorts of secondary rules where the class of a character affects the rate at which the chain attack gauge fills, and how your optional hero characters have their own perks, or how overfilling the gauge lets more characters attack each turn… I'll admit, learning this mechanic is pretty tricky and took several hours for me to form a consistent strategy. So why is it bad???
Problem is, chain attacks RUIN the flow of combat by replacing the real-time chaos with a turn-based minigame where you spend most of your time watching flashy cutscenes.
As I said, the minigame has a lot of convoluted rules that dictate the length and effectiveness of the attack, but once you settle on a good strategy, it's just a matter of running through the motions, mindlessly picking the optimal attacks every chain attack. It quickly devolves into 'pick the same attacks in the same order you always do, watch 2 minutes of cutscenes as you wail on a defenseless enemy.'
In fact, there are some fights where the majority of an encounter is spent watching chain attack cutscenes, making me question the point of combat in the first place! For many boss fights, I feel like I'm just buying time until I can use my chain attack to chunk 40-80% of their health bar. Xenoblade's biggest strength is that it plays out in real-time! If I wanted to pause time and slowly micromanage, there are much better alternatives!
These flaws have been around since the first Xenoblade released 10 years ago. And every time Monolith makes a new entry, they come up with a bunch of convoluted combat gimmicks instead of fixing the series' shaky foundation. After XB 1 introduced Chain Attacks, later entries had Overdrives, Elemental Combos, Fusion Combos, Interlinks, Fusion Arts, Field Abilities, etc. etc.
Learning these systems is fun at first, but once you understand how they work, it's obvious that these mechanics have one or two optimal strategies that are repeated ad nauseum through hundreds of samey, repetitive battles.
Monolith is making the combat flowchart longer and longer but they aren't changing the fact that it's still a flowchart.
I would be remiss to not acknowledge Xenoblade 3's deep character customization, combining Final Fantasy 5's mix and match job system with the customizable movesets and game-changing armor that Xenoblade is known for. For people with a min-maxing mindset, you could argue that customization is the REAL game and the combat encounters are just an excuse to test out new builds.
And you know what? I can totally see that argument. Xenoblade's emphasis on optimizing numbers isn't that different from the efficiency simulators/machine building seen in city builders/tower defense/programming puzzlers.
The big difference is that these games don't make you sit through the boring stuff. In games like Monster Train or Opus Magnum or Cities: Skylines you make some decisions, speed up time, then see the results of your actions, tweaking your build based on feedback. If combat is just a means to an end, then there's no reason for me to sit through dozens of hours of it when I'm just here for the number crunching.
Despite my complaints, I still enjoyed the game in the same way I enjoyed most jrpgs, begrudgingly pushing through hours of samey combat just so I can enjoy the narrative, party customization, and beautiful presentation. I don't consider it to be peak fiction, but Xenoblade 3 hits some emotional and thematic high points that match some of my favorite PS1 jrpgs, easily cementing it as 'one of the best in the genre.'
I'm just tired and burnt out on a genre that sucks up so much of my time for no good reason. A genre where the majority of the runtime is wasted on deeply flawed combat systems that are rarely engaging. Maybe the upcoming dlc will introduce some tricky boss fights or give some QOL updates that speed up chain attacks! But for now it's a 7 for me! I hope one day I can return to this and give it something higher.
6 Comments
I think modern rpgs are getting better at this (Deadfire/Final Fantasy Xii can be fully automated AND have super fast forwards), but it's still a massive issue, for sure.
In terms of narrative pacing, even games that let you avoid 90% of combat (Chrono Cross, Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines, Fallout) have too much downtime between plot beats. Cyberpunk had solid pacing, but that's only because it's a borderline Visual Novel (and there's still too much driving).
You're not missing much by ignoring the genre 😑
In terms of narrative pacing, even games that let you avoid 90% of combat (Chrono Cross, Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines, Fallout) have too much downtime between plot beats. Cyberpunk had solid pacing, but that's only because it's a borderline Visual Novel (and there's still too much driving).
You're not missing much by ignoring the genre 😑
Agree on the issue of enemy encounter design HotPocket and you have mentioned here. There's an interesting variation of this issue where instead of wanting to speed up fights you want the number of encounters overall mitigated. That was my experience with FF13, that game has notably awful early game pacing, but once of the reasons why is a repetition of encounters, none of them are too long in fact in terms of that tension they feel great, its the abundance of them that wears you down. Despite being a game built out of hallways you can sort of 'trick' the enemy AI and skip like 60%+ of the fights in that game.
There's one other interesting issue with the puzzle game speed up comparison you mentioned: Monster Train and Opus Magnum can be sped up x12 because of the way the game is designed, limited visual assets. In Zachtronics whole catalogue you can notice that their visually most simple games like Spacechem can be sped up to almost instantaneously, whereas Infinifactory can only go x4, the processing power especially for a game meant on the Switch is not strong enough to speed the fights up that much. In my view, thats an issue of the fights being almost too long to begin with. There may be difficulty related balancing reasons for why: if the fights didn't last too long a more min maxxed play style would take the punch out of those fights. Like, weve all been there where an epic turn based JRPG boss was basically 3 shot before their song could even start. Alternative notations on the idea of a more minimal design space for the number of combat encounters and their balancing can be seen in games like Mother and Sweet Home.
There's one other interesting issue with the puzzle game speed up comparison you mentioned: Monster Train and Opus Magnum can be sped up x12 because of the way the game is designed, limited visual assets. In Zachtronics whole catalogue you can notice that their visually most simple games like Spacechem can be sped up to almost instantaneously, whereas Infinifactory can only go x4, the processing power especially for a game meant on the Switch is not strong enough to speed the fights up that much. In my view, thats an issue of the fights being almost too long to begin with. There may be difficulty related balancing reasons for why: if the fights didn't last too long a more min maxxed play style would take the punch out of those fights. Like, weve all been there where an epic turn based JRPG boss was basically 3 shot before their song could even start. Alternative notations on the idea of a more minimal design space for the number of combat encounters and their balancing can be seen in games like Mother and Sweet Home.
Damn that's a really good point I didn't think of before - the presentation can actually limit the mechanics. This game is already pushing the switch to its limits, so a fast forward wouldn't be feasible
This actually reminds me of final fantasy 12 where you couldn't cast spells if there were too many particle effects on screen - the impressive presentation actually slowed the pace of combat
This actually reminds me of final fantasy 12 where you couldn't cast spells if there were too many particle effects on screen - the impressive presentation actually slowed the pace of combat
Yeah and now you know why I spend all day playing obscure PC games that can run on a toaster XD
The technological limitations often burden the mechanical operations of the story, and I can count the number of times a games visuals mattered to me on 2 hands.
The technological limitations often burden the mechanical operations of the story, and I can count the number of times a games visuals mattered to me on 2 hands.
"...and I can count the number of times a games visuals mattered to me on 2 hands." Idk why I said this part, visual design matters a lot, i was twisted up :P
HotPocketHPE
1 year ago
Haven't played XC3 but speaking generally I totally agree, this is the killer point IMO. Because of this I've basically lost interest in the entire genre, it just seems like way too pervasive of a problem. And even from a story perspective I find these types of games often have awful pacing compared to other mediums.