Xenoblade Chronicles is the evolution that JRPGS need.

It's a huge mystery to me why it's so highly praised. When I first started playing it, I was pretty shocked at how bad it looked, but that didn't stop me from continuing. Then soon enough I found that the dialogue and voice acting was horrible. I thought maybe I wouldn't continue but I stuck with it for a long time, kind of got used to the characters, dialogue, and voice acting, and the story seemed decent. The main problem I had was the combat. I just couldn't fully get into it and got stuck on a boss. I wasn't really enjoying the game, so I let it go.

I did like the music though.

Im sorry but I whole heartly disagree. Besides ryan and sharla everyone was a bore to be around. I really could less if they lived or died. I mainly kept going cause the universe itself was interesting and I wanted to learn more about it. The people in it not so much.THe gameplay was also fun. Its a good game but imo its way overrated.

Yeah it's a good game. I still haven't finished it yet, but I intend to pick it back up this holiday. But man, it also makes me excited for X.

I liked it a lot. Not sure if I want most jrpgs to adopt its mechanics but I wouldn't mind a couple more like xenoblade.

The single player mmo gameplay was nice and usually fun, but did have some dips in quality if you were trying to beat the game completely. Luckily I was pretty compulsive on this game, so I didn't mind completing the side quests even if some were really tedious.

I have a physical copy, but i also have a PC capable of playing it at obscene resolutions under emulation. :P

Brilliant game definitely worth checking out. I'm sure there's somewhere you can get a cheap copy.

Shulk is pretty much a generic jrpg hero...

The biggest issue to me was the side quests, I'd rather have quality > quantitive side quests. Most Xenoblade side quests are very mmorpgish. Yeah there are thousands of them but most are like "Hey I'm on top of a cold mountain starving to death. Bring me... 2 chickens, 3 bananas and a cup of milk"... Or like the dude in the starting town "I'm scared of X monster, go kill 3 of them. "Now I'm scared of Y monster, go kill 3 of them" "Oh also, these Z monsters sound dangerous, go kill 5 of them."

In other word, it was a very big game but the whole world felt rather... mechanic... and lifeless. Like, yeah sure the town changes depending on the time of the day but nothing fun really happened happened anyway.

@p3anut:

One of my top 5 games of all time. The world is just too awesome. Yeah Shulk isnt a great character or anything, but the others make up for it.

After playing Xenoblade and putting countless hours into I would say hell no.

The game is as archaic as older JRPGs and the plot was laughable at midpoint, although it started strong. The battle system was also shady at times to. Exploring was cool I do give it that but a big world map, or return to world maps doesn't grant it a pass. This game is basically for the nostalgic at best. I had more fun with The Last Story more than Xenoblade.

I'm looking forward to the "X" project on that final note.

Don't worry, you'll get your Xenoblade 2.0. Sounded like you REALLY loved the first one. :P

Yeah if you want Jrpgs to go backward. I am still waiting for Japan to realize they can make Wrpgs and still keep the anime artstyle, that seems to be the main issue with why they are not improving their actual RPG area of their supposed "RPGS".

Not all of them have to look like Betrayal at Krondor, granted, they should all play similar or better than it since it is the factually peak of turn based rpgs period.

JRPGs don't evolve, everybody knows that !

Actually there is a trick to it. If you talk to an NPC you get a sidequest. If you linger around the quest giver for a second or two you will see they will get the quest icon above their heads again. You can take multiple sidequests from 1 NPC like this (5 or more at a time!).

My advice is to stock up on as many side-quests as you can like this and then instead of putting time aside to actually do them you will find you will come close to doing 80% of them anyway as you naturally progress. You'll kill 8/10 of the monsters for a quota anyway so it hardly takes effort to kill 2 more.

If you play the game this you end up being rewarded for stuff you would have mostly done anyway and you don't have to dedicate time and effort (well, not much) towards getting those rewards.

Anyway, back on topic; I definitely felt that Xenoblade was a forward thinking game; save anyway, time skip, location jumping. integration of battle/field exploration. It was like it took every good idea in the JRPG genre over the last few decades and then put them altogether in one game. Sadly it is way too combat heavy for my liking and doesn't have the characters/story I'd really want.

Sold my copy for £30 without playing it. Paid nothing for it.

The ****? Why you do that?

@AznbkdX:

Couple reasons. 1) Was dating some Lass and needed some extra cash to take her out (B!tch was playing me along) and 2) Needed a couple of pound to pay tuition fee's for BJJ / MMA.

I also sold the Metroid Prime Trilogy in fantastic condition for £30 when i paid £20.

Haha. :P

Damn man... Metroid Prime Trilogy as well? That sucks. :(

@AznbkdX: Also 2x Master Systems on Tuesday. Only have left a Amiga to sell and that be going next week as some hot milf wants to take me out.

Yup Prime Trilogy and Other M. Bad times.

For the low low price of $90 at Gamestop............

that's how I feel about the Persona series, but I feel Atlus is shooting themselves in the foot limiting the exposure to just one system, they should build a fanbase first then see about making it exclusive to the highest bidder

though in the case of Xenoblade Chronicles, Nintendo published it, it will be restricted to one console simply for that reason

@MonsieurX:

You can gamefly it? I have yet to play it, but maybe someday i will.

I don't know if it is the evolution of JRPGs, but i do know that the game is amazing and one of the best this gen. It was the first JRPG in years that made me feel like in the old days, when i used to play games like FFVI or Chrono Trigger.

However i still enjoyed more "traditional" JRPGs like Eternal Sonata, that game is pretty underrated IMO as far as gameplay goes...also the music is on par with Xenoblade Chronicles.

Not available.

Looks like it is to me:

http://www.gamefly.com/Rent-Xenoblade-Chronicles/5003708/

Hopefully not,that game is like a single player MMO for closet MMO lovers,that´s not where I would want the genre to go.

Available only in US

Bugger! Thought you was over here. Sorry mate ;)

Going to continue my second playthrough on my Wii U GamePad. I put 90 hours into my save. It just doesn't get boring for me. Could listen to that soudntrack forever!