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Monolith Soft (Xenoblade Chronicles thread)



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Taochan

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I got my copy today. The art book is a pretty nice pre-order bonus. <3



Can you play the game with a GameCube controller? If not, I'll bite on the Classic Controller Pro.

No, you can't. D:
 

Taochan

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Oh darn. Not really trippin though, the classic controller pro looks pretty dope (I'd never heard of it before yesterday).

Oh really? I knew about it for a couple of years, but I've put off buying it because the games I had that could use it were also compatible with the GameCube controllers. But I'll be grabbing one for Xenoblade.
 

LordPhantomhive

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Got it and the artbook is pretty darn nice actually. I also got a black Classic Pro, and I love a lot more then the original, especially holding it. As for the game I loving so far, especially how smooth it runs when going to one area to another (at least so far; I only been around colony 9) and into battle. I also paused at the screen before the title screen where the mondo was in a field and listen to that amazing music.:p As for the VA I decided to use the JP VA, not because I don't like the english VA from what I heard of it, but well I feel like going through this game with the original language.
 
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Well I'll be using the English voices, as far as JRPGs go they're pretty good.

plus I just love those accents.
 

Zephyr

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Here are some of my advice for those who are just starting out. This is just something I barely realized and I fear some of you may easily skip these things as well. Make sure you check your Item Encyclopedia, for every entry you fill, you get some pretty useful gems for your weapons. Also, make sure you buy move upgrades from merchants because you can't buy them anywhere else when you progress through the game because the overworld map in Xenoblade is very huge that it could be a pain just trying to go back; finally check them in your inventory to learn it because it doesn't do it automatically the moment you buy them.
 

Mirby

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You can always just warp back to the town; seriously, you can warp from any landmark to any landmark. Even across maps.

This game is so much fun; I've advanced the story a little, but I've mostly been messing around.

And having waaaaaaaaaay too much fun jumping off of Outlook Park into the water below. GERONIMOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!
 

Zephyr

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You can always just warp back to the town; seriously, you can warp from any landmark to any landmark. Even across maps.

This game is so much fun; I've advanced the story a little, but I've mostly been messing around.

And having waaaaaaaaaay too much fun jumping off of Outlook Park into the water below. GERONIMOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!

Ahh really? Thanks Mirby! It's going to take a while to get used to this game.
 

Mirby

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Yeah, just choose the overall map from the menu (far left option), choose the area you want to go to (such as Colony 9), and then the landmark you want to head to (such as Outlook Park).

I mean, the map is said to be as big as the Japanese archipelago, so there's a reason they made that a standard feature.

Spoiler Spoiler Show
 

Zephyr

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Dunban has to be one of my favorite characters so far in the game lol. I just love the buff spells and the combos he has. I would use Melia more but she seems to be lacking in healing moves.
 

lilVon

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Finally got my art book the other day, is anybkdy else having trouble with the heart to heart system? Im in the swamp & ive only done like 3 :-(
 

Narukami

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Finally got my art book the other day, is anybkdy else having trouble with the heart to heart system? Im in the swamp & ive only done like 3 :-(

The Heart-to-Hearts aren't meant to all be done at once. Each one has a designated set of characters that are part of it, so if you don't have those characters in your party or their relationship isn't good enough, you won't be able to complete them. It's a small incentive to go back to these areas later in the game.
 

Evello

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I just got the game and the artbook a few days ago. I haven't had the time to really get beyond the exposition, but the game is loads of fun already. The sidequests, combat, and open world without any loading are fantastic. The characters and voice work have also been top notch so far.

On the other hand the graphics, particularly the character models, are really ugly. The horrible painted-on eyes are worse than KH's fishface, and everything is extremely low resolution. Not that it matters much, since you're usually zoomed out quite a bit. The cutscenes just bug me a lot, enhanced by the lack of lip-synching. The music is phenomenal, though I already listened to the soundtrack months ago, so I knew that.
 

Zephyr

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I just got the game and the artbook a few days ago. I haven't had the time to really get beyond the exposition, but the game is loads of fun already. The sidequests, combat, and open world without any loading are fantastic. The characters and voice work have also been top notch so far.

On the other hand the graphics, particularly the character models, are really ugly. The horrible painted-on eyes are worse than KH's fishface, and everything is extremely low resolution. Not that it matters much, since you're usually zoomed out quite a bit. The cutscenes just bug me a lot, enhanced by the lack of lip-synching. The music is phenomenal, though I already listened to the soundtrack months ago, so I knew that.

I've seen people who've played Xenoblade on an emulator called Dolphin and it runs the game much more smoothly, cleanly, in better resolution. Apparently it's because of the Wii's limited capabilities. I don't know much but it's evident that it seems to run cleaner there. Regardless, it's still a pretty nice game in comparison to other RPGs on the Wii.
 

Mirby

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I'm loving this game.

Spoiler Spoiler Show
 

Zephyr

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I'm loving this game.

Spoiler Spoiler Show

Spoiler Spoiler Show
 

Wehrmacht

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Xenoblade Chronicles

So despite how much hype this has gotten since forever, we never actually got a thread for it, which is somewhat puzzling. Oh well.

xeno5_372.jpg

Xenoblade Chronicles, known as just Xenoblade in Japan, is a Japanese role playing game for the Wii console, developed by Monolithsoft and published and produced by Nintendo. It is the In Name Only Spiritual Successor to the Xenosaga series of JRPGs for the Playstation 2 (which itself was a Spiritual Successor to the Square Soft RPG Xenogears).
In the world of Xenoblade, two continent-sized gods called the Bionis and the Mechonis fought an endless war against one another until only their lifeless corpses remained. Life flourished on the surface of these titans, giving birth to the human-like Homs on Bionis and the machine-like Mechon on Mechonis.
Peace would last until the Mechon launched an invasion, attempting to wipe out all life upon Bionis. With the power of a legendary sword known as the Monado, the only thing capable of piercing Mechon armour, the invasion was halted and peace regained for a time. That is, until one year later when the Mechon returned in even greater numbers than before.
The story follows Shulk, a young Homs male who becomes the new chosen wielder of the Monado. He chooses to use the power of the blade to seek revenge against those who destroyed his village.

All in all, this could possibly the best JRPG we've had in a long time, definitely a strong contender for RPG of the decade 2000-2010 all on mechanics alone. Xenoblade essentially takes all the annoying mechanics and design issues common to RPG's and streamlines it all to make for a really fun game:

- There are no random encounters. You can see all the monsters on the field and run away at any time, similar to FFXII.

- You can save anywhere, any time (except during battle). No crystals, save points, or any other BS.

- Similar to the above, going to other areas is as simple as selecting them from the map. You have this ability from the beginning of the game (all you really need to do to warp inside an area is find the "landmarks" on it, those are the warp points), it costs you nothing, you don't need any items for it. This means you can go between areas that are extremely far away from another quickly and effortlessly, which makes backtracking and going around doing sidequests much less tedious.

- Tying into the above, Xenoblade has an absolutely elephantine overworld, with little to no loading times between any of it. It's also incredibly beautiful, definitely one of the greatest I've seen in any game. You can go anywhere you see, there are no invisible walls. It's not an exaggeration to say you might be overwhelmed, especially considering how it's all running on the Wii.

- Any equipment you get shows up on your characters, which in turns shows up in the real-time cutscenes.

- The game boasts a positively phenomenal soundtrack, the majority of which was composed by Manami Kiyota and ACE+. People often mention Yasunori Mitsuda and Yoko Shimomura's contributions, which were no doubt excellent, but they were only a handful of tracks.

- It has a dynamic, position-based battle system which requires your characters to chain attacks together in certain orders. Each of your party members has a distinct role and playstyle which means you need to act completely differently depending on who your party leader is. With the tougher enemies, you never just mindlessly mash buttons.

With these and several other brilliant design choices, Xenoblade is an excellent game and deserves to be played for that alone. The story and characters are also by no means terrible; the dialogue can get often get pretty cheesy, but the narrative has some pretty interesting ideas going for it, and the characters have SOME definition and aren't just paper-thin cutouts.


Tragically, if you don't have the game already you're likely going to have to pay a LOT for it; the game saw a very limited release and copies now usually go for 90 USD and more. That's probably a bit too much to swallow even for a thoroughly excellent game like this, so if you can get it for a reasonable price, by all means snatch that shit up.

Currently I'm about 18 hours in and just beat the Telethia, about to head to Eryth sea
 
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