Xenoblade Chronicles 3

[AceGrace]

probably been asked 1000 times already. I have Xenoblade Chronicles1 , 2 and 3 on Switch and X on Wii U.

Should I start with 1 or X first i.e. should I play them in the order they were released?

 

[Strafe]

I’m enjoying it a lot more than I thought I would. I’m keen to see how I feel when I get to the 15 hour mark, which is about the point I bounced of XBC2 harder than a cheque from a former backing singer in a 90’s boyband (niche, I know).

 

Visually I think it’s a bit of a fuzzy mess and if the game wasn’t so preoccupied with having 10 million enemies on screen at a time you’d probably get a cleaner resolution. Maybe. I think the Steam Deck has spoiled me in terms of what I expect from a handheld now.

 

Still, I’m at the gym now and looking forward to getting back home to play some more so that’s good.

[Ste Pickford]

I don't think it matters.  New story, world, characters each time.

[Alan Stock]

Yeah the quips in and after battle can get annoying, and they have always been in the series. There isn't an option to disable them. There's one really grating one later on that's doing my head in! At least its not Xeno 2 levels of cringe, the cacaphony in that of wails and yells was insufferable. Considering how good the sound design is elsewhere, it still baffles me that someone thought it would be good to have this frequency and sheer repetition of voices in and after battle. And considering many critics panned the battle voices in Xeno 2 I'm surprised they didn't listen.

[Stanley]

1 hour ago, Strafe said:

I’m enjoying it a lot more than I thought I would. I’m keen to see how I feel when I get to the 15 hour mark, which is about the point I bounced of XBC2 harder than a cheque from a former backing singer in a 90’s boyband (niche, I know).

 

Visually I think it’s a bit of a fuzzy mess and if the game wasn’t so preoccupied with having 10 million enemies on screen at a time you’d probably get a cleaner resolution. Maybe. I think the Steam Deck has spoiled me in terms of what I expect from a handheld now.

 

Still, I’m at the gym now and looking forward to getting back home to play some more so that’s good.

Which model are you playing it on? I think it looks pretty impressive on the OLED. 

[Strafe]

16 minutes ago, Stanley said:

Which model are you playing it on? I think it looks pretty impressive on the OLED. 

I’m playing it on OLED too. The colours pop for sure but it’s not doing anything for the resolution unfortunately.

 

I’m sure the technical differences in the titles are quite significant but I think that you’d be hard pressed to argue that XBC3 looks better than Breath of the Wild (admittedly that has soft cell shading and a lot less going on but still).

 

Based on the digital foundry coverage I was expecting a much cleaner image but I do think it’s rather fuzzy in action. I don’t think the environmental  colour palette so far - which is very muted - helps matters.

 

Like I said, we can probably blame the Steam Deck, which I’ve been playing on almost exclusively since I got it, is to blame for putting my expectations up.

 

I have to add the caveat that regardless, XBC3 is great fun so far and hopefully I can look forward to playing it again on the Switch Pro! Possibly. Maybe.

 

 

[Stanley]

Well yeah I have no Steam Deck to compare it with of course but I think it looks very nice, I just love that screen for most games tbh. Although I’ve noticed quite a bit more detail on my TV, it’s nice having a game like this portable though, or at least the option. 

[Strafe]

I’ve briefly fired it up on my TV, I think it looks a tad better on that and I have the mClassic upscaler thing that cleans up the edges a bit. Probably still prefer playing in handheld mode too, though!

[Alan Stock]

It definitely looks way better in the cinematic cutscenes and the menus than when you're out and about. In those cases it looks nice and sharp. From what I've heard the environments get seriously massive which might make the lower fidelity worth it. On the other hand, in the overworld there are way more enemies than I remember from previous games, plus in combat there's so much more going on with many teammates and enemies in giant scraps. I guess I'm ok with the sacrifice from a gameplay/scale perspective. Would love to see what Monolith could do with a next gen console though.   

[deerokus]

3 hours ago, AceGrace said:

probably been asked 1000 times already. I have Xenoblade Chronicles1 , 2 and 3 on Switch and X on Wii U.

Should I start with 1 or X first i.e. should I play them in the order they were released?

 

Nah, it's basically like final fantasy or Persona, not an ongoing story although there are some overall connections in terms of lore and backstory between the games I think.

[Djx]

Nintendo Store has some XC3 themed wallpapers available for free. Just sign in to get them -

https://my.nintendo.com/news/f33b6b53a6f66742

Quote

Immerse yourself in the world of Xenoblade Chronicles 3 with these smartphone wallpaper and virtual background bundles! Show support for your favourite Kevesi or Agnian character with smartphone wallpapers, available in a variety of sizes, and add a sense of wanderlust to your video calls with virtual backgrounds taken from all corners of Aionios.

 

[Stanley]

I absolutely love this. Got home from work and I had barely got through the door and my daughter was asking if I was playing it, like straight away  

 

The production values in the cutscenes are just insane, it really is on another level, and the story is brilliant with excellent characters. 
 

That combat loop is just so, so satisfying, as it adds later upon layer. It’s just, oooh as things click into place. 

[mwaawm]

Not enjoying this much it reminds me way too much of chronicles X on the WiiU which I didn't really enjoy at all as opposed to the original xenoblade chronicles on wii which I absolutely loved.

 

The graphics look pretty poor to me thus far, nowhere near as impressive as the original game was. The player characters designs lack any individuality which is compounded by the drab identikit military uniforms (probably intentional as am guessing the story will shortly take an anti military industrial complex slant). Also don't like that I can't zoom the camera back (could you do this on the older games?) It feels way too zoomed in on the player for my liking.

 

Very disappointed by the gushing nintendolife review....I may have to hunt down a copy of xenoblade chronicles 2 and tolerate the cringe as it looks more in line with the first game than this one. 

 

 

[Stanley]

You can change the camera distance by holding ZL and moving the right stick.  

[mwaawm]

Thanks for the tip will try that and see if it makes things look better.

[Stanley]

1 minute ago, mwaawm said:

Thanks for the tip will try that and see if it makes things look better.

I definitely prefer it a bit zoomed out than the default view, makes everything feel more epic and you can see all your team. 

[shynra]

Really enjoying this, about 20hours in and glad to see so many small improvements carried over and new ones.

 

The navigation ball from x is back, have only used it twice but was a lifesaver and at least sets you in the right direction if you do not want to fully follow it. 

 

I noticed that they also reset the camera after battles to the pre-battle settings which is ace. Normally for big enemies I'll zoom the camera out at the start of combat. This returns it without me messing around. 

 

Also you could play the game first person I guess just by adjusting the camera

[dataDave]

9 hours ago, Ste Pickford said:

 

Thanks for this. I've only played about 2 or 3 hours, but 'cancelling into' something makes no sense to me, in terms of the meaning of the words, so my brain struggles to process the rest of the meaning of the instructions, as it's bristling about 'cancel' being the wrong term.

It sounds like they should have used the term “Link” instead, but wanted to be different and special and, traditionally speaking from a fighting game perspective, wrong. Still, it’s a very minor thing.

 

I’m really tempted to fire this up now. I need the boy to go to sleep or I won’t get peace.

[Strafe]

Just now, Fallows said:

It sounds like they should have used the term “Link” instead, but wanted to be different and special and, traditionally speaking from a fighting game perspective, wrong.

 

Traditionally speaking from an English language perspective, also wrong.

[dataDave]

Yeah, I agree, but fighting games are developed by Japanese with terms coined by Americans. English language has no relevance at all when people are “getting hype”. That said there’s nothing wrong with the term cancel - you’re starting a new action before the last one finishes, the last action was thus cancelled. A link is an action that follows on immediately after the last action fully resolves, and might have been less confusing if used here.

 

Edit: Alright so I started the game and got up to the screen where it explains canceling attacks into new ones. Maybe I’m just used to using this terminology for thirty years now, but there’s nothing out of the ordinary here at all (and IIRC exactly how things worked in the previous XC games). A ‘cancel’ in a video game is the premature cancellation of an animation, overriding it with a new one to create a chain. It doesn’t mean that the attack is cancelled and taken back like some kind of undo feature.

 

 

[revlob]

It made a bit more sense in XC2, where auto attacks were executed as combos of three, and triggering an Art broke that sequence. In XC3 though, nothing is actually "cancelled", as auto attacks all appear to be the same.

 

There's definitely no cancelling in the fighting game sense. Entire attack animations play through, and moves aren't prevented from landing when the "cancel" effect is achieved.

[Stanley]

You’re “cancelling” an auto attack into an art by interrupting it, that’s all.

[Ste Pickford]

I'm sick of this cancel culture.

[Stanley]

Yeah it snuffs the spark out of me! 

[dataDave]

I had to turn the voices over to Japanese. “Loverly jubberly!” was the tipping point. 😆 

[Stanley]

Arr, I love the localisation! 

[Nosejam]

Just finished listening to the Back Page pod about the Xenoblade saga. Xenoblade crafting ingredient or drug slang 😂
 

Not sure I can commit the time to XC3 right now, however the Torna dIc sounds much more manageable. Having sold my physical XC2, what’s the cheapest way to get hold of this? Had a quick look on eBay and physical prices are £60+! Don’t have my Switch with me this week, can someone check the eshop price for me?

[dataDave]

59 minutes ago, Stanley said:

Arr, I love the localisation! 

The phrases are far too repetitive, to the point of major annoyance. Things haven’t progressed at all in that department since the first game. That’s probably the only negative I can spring when it comes to this series.

[Kevvy Metal]

1 hour ago, Stanley said:

Arr, I love the localisation! 

 

I also love it, including the repetitiveness. 

[Stanley]

26 minutes ago, Fallows said:

The phrases are far too repetitive, to the point of major annoyance. Things haven’t progressed at all in that department since the first game. That’s probably the only negative I can spring when it comes to this series.

Oh God yeah the battle phrases become repetitive within the first half hour, although I like it when people join your party; new repetitive phrases! There’s a part of me that believes it’s deliberate, like they’ve listened to criticisms and just thought, nah leave it in, in fact up it!