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Xenoblade Chronicles 3


bellow
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Fired this up yesterday and fought my way to the first map destination, and then into the introductory chapter.

 

First things first, it looks, as usual, like a bit of a dog's dinner. I don't know what digital foundry were on about. To my eyes it's just as blurry, fuzzy and framey as any other Xenoblade game. Stick this on your big telly and it's rather disappointing, in my opinion. Not unplayable by any means, but a jarring step back from what I've become used to with the Xbox. You sort of have to 'tune in' to it.

 

Once you've managed that, though, you can just fill your boots with the stuff Xenoblade always does well, gameplay, exploration, and a combat system that starts off basic, but has room (hopefully) to grow into the combo happy monster of the former game. 

 

Good news is I'm already thinking about the game when I've put the switch down. The characters are well done, but the narrative premise is instantly gripping. They've set up a really interesting plot, with much promise for twists and reveals, and epic heroism. If they deliver it could well be a most memorable adventure.

 

Just a pity it's on the Switch.

 

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I started this tonight. Literally just got to Colony 9 so in the first hour so nothing real to say yet

 

First impressions are so far so Xenoblade. This game is more somber/depressed than the others.

 

I’m playing handheld OLED where stuff like the colour looks great, and might help with the resolution by condensing it, but yes the image is still soft. Doesn’t help that the first environment is uncharacteristically brown, yellow and ugly for one of these games. So it’s a soft image on low, smudgy scenery. 
 

Overall it isn’t bothering me, though. Looking forward to playing more of it later 

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I'm a few hours in, I've left the home base to head towards the first proper mission. So far I don't know what I make of it, I mean I know I don't really like the characters or art style. Why have they got wings on their heads? It's dumb and just looks shit. The main characters all seem to be absolute pricks too, and for some reason they all have the same haircuts from when they were kids, I know that's not a huge deal and I'm not going to claim it's game breaking, but I do think it speaks to Monolith Soft's design flaws.

 

Again, I'm really early, but I'm hoping the combat becomes a bit more involved, so far I'm just repeating the same tactics against every enemy. It's why I fell off the first game, the combat was fine in and of itself, but not enough to carry the 100+ hours

 

Like I said, I'm still really early, I'm not writing it off, in fact I'm sacking off exercising tonight to make a dent in playing it

 

what a bunch of jokers 

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I'm not sure I'm going to be able to play this. It's just too familiar. I'm only a couple of hours in and already I'm peering across these vast blurry fields of bunnits and volffs and feeling my heart sink. 

 

I just don't think they've done enough here. The world is basically the same as the other games, same vistas, same flora and fauna, right down to the mega level giant gorilla roaming about. And while I'm sure there will be constant additions to the combat even that seems very familiar, and rather ill judged in the early game with just a huge mess of blurry shit on screen as no less than 8 'heroes' fill the combat zones with confusion. 

 

I don't know. It's early but I'm disappointed. And I speak as one who, relatively recently, played more than half a dozen FF games in quick succession without ever feeling I was being asked to repeat myself within the series. Fucks sake, even X and X-2 felt different to actually play. I sort of wish I were playing those now. So that's not good, is it.

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I also started this last night and only got as far as reaching Colony 9 right at the beginning, but contrastingly to everyone else here it seems, I've loved every minute so far. 

 

The opening cutscenes that set up the story were just absolutely epic and stunning, almost had a cry already with how melancholic and sombre everything thing is immediately after those opening scenes. Without giving anything away, so far everything gives me a kind of Hunger Games vibes with the whole colour palette, that harsh dark industrial look to a lot of the game, including the uniforms the party wears and the look of Colony 9 so far. 

 

Combat system immediately reminds me more of XC2 and not XC which is a huge positive as the latter was too simplistic a combat solution for such a long game and grew boring after many hours in, whereas with the former the combat system grew and grew, learning new mechanics and systems even 90 hours in that completely changed the dynamic. This is very much in the XC2 mould to me, in that it starts off simple so as to not overwhelm the player when it asks you to connect about 18 different combo prompts between the different party members, so far it's just the main character, Noah, that I have control of. 

 

So yeah, not too many conclusions to be drawn at 45 minutes in, but it's off to a great start to me. Think I immediately like pretty much everything about it more than XC1 already which is a good sign, it's a 150 hour game (reportedly) so I don't think it's right to make any knee jerk reactions to things at this time. Let it slowly build its combat systems, story, party interactions and all that JRPG good stuff over the course of the game and not throw me in at the deep end, the right way of going about things in my view.

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Ive played this a bit too, generally enjoying it so far, but not without reservations. Think the story starts a bit slow but picks up a lot imo. The combat sort of starts slow too with not much to do, but its just added loads of stuff you can do into the combat and left me a bit confused, and its hard to practice to understand it as most enemies die so quickly, not complaining about that mind. Ill have to look at some youtube guides or something for the combat, similar to the second game. Think the graphics are technically impressive with everything going on and the scale of it all, its pretty smooth considering too, but the art style isnt great so far, a bit dull, seem to remember the older games having some more impressive looking landscapes so hopefully theres more to come. The extra teammates make the combat a bit more confusing too. But yeah overall enjoying it.

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17 hours ago, spatular said:

. The extra teammates make the combat a bit more confusing

A bit?

 

I tried to play this handheld but it's just too hard to see anything in combat. Might have to just go docked on this one. I've also reached the point where the game really piles on the RPG systems - gems, cooking, fusion arts, chain attacks...

 

My head is spinning a bit, and after this point the combat screen is filled with so many battle and art options it's almost comical.

 

Strangely tho, after considering jacking the whole thing in at the weekend I'm more inclined to carry on. I'm trying to play the game as the Devs intended, using the systems, creating gems, cooking up stuff and, most importantly, letting the characters speak. I think in this game, if you don't connect with the characters and story you might as well give it a miss.

 

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Have been playing this in handheld mode completely, but not had any issues seeing anything in combat as of yet. There's a lot going on for sure and I can see why folks could find it confusing, but being so au fait with XC2's system some years ago now, this just feels almost like muscle memory kicking in so far, all the crazy shit going on just feels normal to me. I am playing on the OLED too so that could make a difference.

 

I do expect to be bewildered when all the crafting, rpg type stuff gets thrown at me in a little while but yeah, all relatively straightforward at this point. I'm finding the colour palette, landscapes and combat about the same as XC2 which were all pretty great so far.

 

Will say as well, that the music has been better than XC1 already.

 

Some pics:

 

Spoiler

425B9E0A-2208-4060-88D9-0F8BC0560ACA.jpeg

 

CBD04247-741B-448E-AD6A-6E816BED12B1.jpeg

 

D227FD77-7C75-4647-A347-5BEBC9ADD5A4.jpeg

 

E815EEA8-245E-4A57-8FE1-7791445F15D6.jpeg

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It looks really bad when blown up like that. The textures and colour are really yuck. It doesn’t look that bad in handheld (Not that it looks completely different, but it does mitigate the grunge a fair bit)

 

Although that basic environment layout looks like a PS2 game no matter how small the screen

 

I was really enjoying playing it on the OLED with headphones. Nice and relaxed. Hope all the extra party members and everything don’t rock that boat too much. Both in terms of too much for the screen and overloading with mechanics. I was having a nice, chill time with it on Sunday 

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I'm now investigating a more lush and green area, I'm probably not too far behind @bellow . The characters have started talking about cooking and crafting, but unless I've missed it I've not been told to do it yet. I can change characters now but I think I'll just stay with the main guy. The story getting more interesting has really improved things, although the characters are so awful still

 

I've also been handheld exclusively. It doesn't look amazing, but I've found it readable enough, except for choosing between enemies, I'm struggling to see which is selected, but I'm also probably over levelled so for most fights it's actually more interesting to have a few enemies involved

 

This being said, I think I might switch to Live A Live, that's more immediately appealing

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Just met Möbius and did that whole cutscene and stuff. Wow that has got me so in to this game. Loved it. Exactly what this game needed. The music in this game is also amazing. Very, very nice.

 

I was enjoying this game already but that bit just turned it up a huge amount. Hope the new mechanics and stuff don’t bring it back down 

 

This is a wonderful morning game. I don’t know if others are like me where some games suit different times of day but this is a great morning game.

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I think the class thing is designed so you can have something other than 2 tanks, 2 healers, 2 attackers when a high level enemy requires something other than the normal team set up. I can fight with 6 healers now if I want. Of course it's bullshit. I can't imagine any scenario where you'd want any set up other than the normal one. (Maybe post game).

 

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I feel the problem with the combat in this is that you're never trying to counter what the enemy is doing. The screen is so confused and everyone is piping up with looped inanities it's hard to know what's going on. So really each battle is just you running around trying to perform position relevant arts, or setting up that break topple combo, which I've realized is rather easy to do 

Spoiler

If you have break and use it as your second performed art after a battle starts.

I played the game last night after a few nights off and I wasn't really feeling it. Got a bunch of collectable type side quests (which are good for one thing, ignoring) and then found myself in a colony quest, which played out almost identically to the previous 2. I'm still not sure this is for me. 

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i find the combat pretty confusing, especially with so many people on screen (the chaos is sort of cool too though), theres so many different systems, ive read a few combat guides and picked up bits from each but theres still lots more i dont understand than i do.

 

im quite far in so probably some combat spoilers here (just had a crazy long cut scene at the end of chapter

Spoiler

5

) but this is my current basic plan for longer fights, no idea if its a good idea mind. 

Spoiler

Wait till your arts on both buttons and dpad are charged, then use the fusion versions where you hold the trigger, this charges up the interlink level, so when thats at 3 Press left on dpad and do some damage in that mode, then during or after (think after is better) that the chain thing might be charged so use that.


i should be using the break/topple/etc combos but havent really been. And no classes setup really because i keep changing them because that unlocks stuff or something.

 

i usually avoid optional missions but the hero quests can be quite good so been doing those.

 

edit- been playing on easy and it has been mostly easy, but one recent fight i nearly died, after i realised i had no tanks so having a mix of classes is important, who'd have thought!

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And there it is. I'm done. I've traded the game in and moved on.

 

I think there are people on this very forum who will love this and enjoy every one of its 100 hours. But it's not for me. 

 

I think it's the combat that really annoyed me. I just can't see what's happening. I resorted to looking at the little positional cursor above the arts 'wheel' just to find out what position I was in to the enemy. Not that I could ever see the enemy, although if my character was performing combat actions I was able to assume he/she was close enough to someone to hit then. Fucking sham if you ask me.

 

And from that, l was able to formulate a good bunch of reasons why this game deserved to be abandoned - the stereotypical characters, the horendous looped battle dialogue, the Saturday morning cartoon villains, all of which I've been able to forgive in jrpgs before, but not here. Because the actual gameplay was a mess. A big fuzzy, eye bleeding mess of light and shite.

 

And that I can't forgive.

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I totally see what you’re saying, but I still kind of like it. But then I like trashy, mashy, 6/10 games and so far this is about where I’m at with it. 
 

I’ve not played any since last week but the thing I don’t like the combat is it’s just unsatisfying because I don’t know what’s going on or how to handle it, but at the same I don’t seem to need too, I’m progressing anyway. I’m only in chapter 2 so maybe I’m speaking too early but games are unsatisfying when you’re winning/losing and don’t understand why. It’s why I like my JRPG battle systems simple. It’s your turn, and then my turn. Shit I understand.

 

I also expect it to be annoying when I hit a brick wall of a boss and the game expects me to know how to play and I be like err…

 

It has got me wondering if I actually like Xenoblade series, though. I’m a slight fraction more positive on this than XC2 (though haven’t played as much yet), and as much as I really liked XC1, that was 10 years ago and it was the first one. I wonder if I would have a different reaction if I played it today.
 

Either way at best the series is currently going 1 for 3 which is not great

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