Xenoblade X Eurogamer Preview: Maybe 2015's Most Impressive Open World

I wonder how the game is going to do here. It's Nintendo's only real big fall title so it might get some push because of that, but missing Black Friday seems like a huge mistake.
 
I am so excited for this game. Ordered the game from Amazon but it will arrive 4 days later. Why can't they ship it before December 4?

A friend from Best Buy has their order say that they will get it by December 4.
 
I can't decide if I want to get the guide or not. Normally, I don't buy gaming guides because I'd rather just play through the game without it, but this might be a special case. lol
 
I wonder how the game is going to do here. It's Nintendo's only real big fall title so it might get some push because of that, but missing Black Friday seems like a huge mistake.

In a November with COD, Halo, Fallout, and Battlefront, four major titles with mainstream appeal, launching early probably would've been even worse for Xenoblade. Even Tomb Raider doesn't seem to have emerged unscathed from the chaos.

December is nice, quiet, and away from the major heavy hitters. People who were interested in the game would get it anyway and let's face it, at this point in time Xenoblade isn't likely to have swayed most casual buyers on the Wii U. I think they did a good call releasing it when they did.

I can see maybe around 500k being a decent number for the game. I dunno how well Xeno1 did but I'd imagine the total numbers would look more or less similar.
 
I can't decide if I want to get the guide or not. Normally, I don't buy gaming guides because I'd rather just play through the game without it, but this might be a special case. lol

I'm also debating whether or not to get the guide. For this kind of game having a guide might be really beneficial.
 
I'm also debating whether or not to get the guide. For this kind of game having a guide might be really beneficial.

I'm mostly curious what all types of information it gives. If it tells you where to find characters or enemies at certain times of the day for certain quests or just finding NPCs for quest turns in, that'd be soooo handy. I constantly had to check the xenoblade wiki to turn in quests back when I played the first one. And if the guide book gives hints on where to find certain items for quests, that'd be nice, too. But I don't know if it does that (like the gathering quests).

Plus honestly, the guide has a hard cover which is nice and I'm sure there's lots of gorgeous art inside.

I wish there was like a youtube video of someone having the guide and showing off a little bit of what all it contains.
 
Yeah, every time you want to switch characters you need to find where they are in the city and talk to them. Every time. And there's no easy way in-game to even look that up, so you have to remember where they are every time. And since there are apparently a lot of characters, that can be problematic.

Okay. Who the fuck thought that was a good idea? Like how in the fuck could anyone possibly think that is a good idea? Patch the fuck outta that shit immediately.
 
Okay. Who the fuck thought that was a good idea? Like how in the fuck could anyone possibly think that is a good idea? Patch the fuck outta that shit immediately.

Yeah, it seems a bit silly. People say it might be for "immersion" to help the world feel alive and the characters having schedules and all that BS, but it's a game first. The characters could have still been out in the world having schedules and letting you go talk to them to start quests/etc, but when I want to switch a character in, it really should just be as simple as going into a menu. They have so many other quality of life additions to the game (Xenoblade did, too), so it's a bit perplexing.

After reading a few previews more, now i am pretty sure that this game is going to get some 10s.

I'm not really. I think it'll get between 7 and 9 mostly.
 
Yeah, it seems a bit silly. People say it might be for "immersion" to help the world feel alive and the characters having schedules and all that BS, but it's a game first. The characters could have still been out in the world having schedules and letting you go talk to them to start quests/etc, but when I want to switch a character in, it really should just be as simple as going into a menu. They have so many other quality of life additions to the game (Xenoblade did, too), so it's a bit perplexing.

Its backwards. I havent played a JRPG where that has been the case. Like its stupid and serves no purpose but to annoy the player. I cannot grasp this at all. Xenoblade was so good because it removed tons of the dumb tedium like that.

Also, not being able to change the time whenever you want is stupid. So many backwards things compared to the original game.
 
I'm mostly curious what all types of information it gives. If it tells you where to find characters or enemies at certain times of the day for certain quests or just finding NPCs for quest turns in, that'd be soooo handy. I constantly had to check the xenoblade wiki to turn in quests back when I played the first one. And if the guide book gives hints on where to find certain items for quests, that'd be nice, too. But I don't know if it does that (like the gathering quests).

Plus honestly, the guide has a hard cover which is nice and I'm sure there's lots of gorgeous art inside.

I wish there was like a youtube video of someone having the guide and showing off a little bit of what all it contains.

I would assume it would have that information and more. I mostly want the guide for material lists and locations for certain stuff. I don't feel like scouring gamefaqs for locations for random crap.
 
In a November with COD, Halo, Fallout, and Battlefront, four major titles with mainstream appeal, launching early probably would've been even worse for Xenoblade. Even Tomb Raider doesn't seem to have emerged unscathed from the chaos.

December is nice, quiet, and away from the major heavy hitters. People who were interested in the game would get it anyway and let's face it, at this point in time Xenoblade isn't likely to have swayed most casual buyers on the Wii U. I think they did a good call releasing it when they did.

I can see maybe around 500k being a decent number for the game. I dunno how well Xeno1 did but I'd imagine the total numbers would look more or less similar.

EDIT:Info taken from videogame chartz , for unknowned reason, i cannot copy the direct link?? is this site banned from this forum?

First one manage to nearly sell 1 million (920k). Hoping fans of the franchise will follow up and get similar numbers.
 
Yeah, every time you want to switch characters you need to find where they are in the city and talk to them. Every time. And there's no easy way in-game to even look that up, so you have to remember where they are every time. And since there are apparently a lot of characters, that can be problematic.
Umm that's inexcusably bad, holy shit. I hope I find don't like most of the characters because I'd rather stab myself than have to find my fucking party members.

I have to find my party members, how ridiculously stupid is that.
 
Okay. Who the fuck thought that was a good idea? Like how in the fuck could anyone possibly think that is a good idea? Patch the fuck outta that shit immediately.
Actually, it says on the GamePad segment map where playable characters can be found. It's not immediately obvious but once you know it's there, it's easy to use that to find peeps.
 
Actually, it says on the GamePad segment map where playable characters can be found. It's not immediately obvious but once you know it's there, it's easy to use that to find peeps.

Oh. That's not as bad. Still, it'd be better to be able to switch them on the fly.
 
Umm that's inexcusably bad, holy shit. I hope I find don't like most of the characters because I'd rather stab myself than have to find my fucking party members.

I have to find my party members, how ridiculously stupid is that.
You see, I find that interesting... at first. But later on I'll get annoyed trying to look for them.
 
Regardless, Nintendo published Baten Kaitos Origins and they have a rather healthy relationship at the moment with Bandai Namco, so I don't see that being the issue for why there wouldn't be a third Baten Kaitos game.

I think the issue is -- sadly -- no one would buy it. :-(

kickstart?
 
Actually, it says on the GamePad segment map where playable characters can be found. It's not immediately obvious but once you know it's there, it's easy to use that to find peeps.

That is moderately better. Does it tell you what character or just a playable character? Since I assume you can fast travel to NLA if you can know what character exactly than it would be manageable I guess.

Its still bad though. In the original being able to change my party on the fly and right near unique monsters was a huge bonus.
 
EDIT:Info taken from videogame chartz , for unknowned reason, i cannot copy the direct link?? is this site banned from this forum?

First one manage to nearly sell 1 million (920k). Hoping fans of the franchise will follow up and get similar numbers.

Yeah, chartz is banned here. They have a nasty habit of making their numbers up.

Based on the Nintendo Sales Data thread that's on this very forum though, it did under a million - what are the Japan figures again? 200k? Considering its international release has a larger audience but the US was limited by gamestop exclusitivity and the update was limited to N3DDS only, I'm going to be conservative and say between 400k and 500k. I know nothing though, this is all uneducated speculation.

Speaking of which, I dunno if anyone else has had this problem, but I have never, ever seen Wii Xenoblade in stores in Canada. I only ever bought it when I was in the US and saw it in Gamestop and had a now-or-never moment of truth.

Yeah, every time you want to switch characters you need to find where they are in the city and talk to them. Every time. And there's no easy way in-game to even look that up, so you have to remember where they are every time. And since there are apparently a lot of characters, that can be problematic.

Actually, it says on the GamePad segment map where playable characters can be found. It's not immediately obvious but once you know it's there, it's easy to use that to find peeps.

I didn't know about this. Thanks for the headsup.
 
I would assume it would have that information and more. I mostly want the guide for material lists and locations for certain stuff. I don't feel like scouring gamefaqs for locations for random crap.

Yeah, same here. I hope it does have all that stuff.

Actually, it says on the GamePad segment map where playable characters can be found. It's not immediately obvious but once you know it's there, it's easy to use that to find peeps.

Oh that's good at least. I still think it's a big silly to have to go talk to them, but better than not knowing where they are at all.
 
Actually, it says on the GamePad segment map where playable characters can be found. It's not immediately obvious but once you know it's there, it's easy to use that to find peeps.
That's not as bad but I still don't understand why they don't keep it the way it was, I don't care that it's unrealistic.
You see, I find that interesting... at first. But later on I'll get annoyed trying to look for them.
Yeah it's the kinda thing where you go "Oh that's interesting" but after the tenth time you have to do it you start getting extremely annoyed.
 
Couldn't a lot of these things be added via patches or something in the future?

Conceivably, but it's also possible that the staff at Monolith have moved on to other projects. It's hard to keep the team going forever when they've already invested so much. Remember that the game was supposed to be out in 2014 (which didn't happen), so Ninty and Monolith would already have been spending more time and resources on the project than they'd have originally planned.

The thought of Ninty just wanting the game out of the way would make sense if their goal is to free up Monolith. They've started hiring recently so it's obvious they're working on something.
 
I do wonder if at some point Nintendo just went "Yeah, this game has to come out" and a lot of convenience things that come up in playtesting didn't get added.

If so that's depressing. It'll be obvious after I've played through it whether that's true or not, but after how polished and complete Xenoblade felt it'd be a huge shame if X felt rushed.
That's why I'm going to buy the guide lol.

I like going into my first playthrough knowing nothing, then replaying the game going for a 100% optimal run. Of course, you'd have to really love a game to want to do another ~100 hour run though. In Xenoblade I did 2 back to back runs without ever getting burned out, I love that game so much.
 
If so that's depressing. It'll be obvious after I've played through it whether that's true or not, but after how polished and complete Xenoblade felt it'd be a huge shame if X felt rushed.

Xenoblade has similar issues like with quest NPCs walking around town with no good way to find them when you need to turn something in.
 
What about that one menu then, the one where you have 4 main characters and 4 reserve characters? Can't you just use that to switch some party members out on the fly or is that menu only there to add a member to your party whenever you come across a new one?

edit: I mean this menu.
 
Conceivably, but it's also possible that the staff at Monolith have moved on to other projects. It's hard to keep the team going forever when they've already invested so much. Remember that the game was supposed to be out in 2014 (which didn't happen), so Ninty and Monolith would already have been spending more time and resources on the project than they'd have originally planned.

The thought of Ninty just wanting the game out of the way would make sense if their goal is to free up Monolith. They've started hiring recently so it's obvious they're working on something.

Very interesting. I think I can forgive them ; ) . Game looks great and I'm finally starting to get on the hype train! Excited to see what their NX project is :p
 
Xenoblade has similar issues like with quest NPCs walking around town with no good way to find them when you need to turn something in.

I agree, some of the quests almost require you to look at a guide(especially the colony 6 quests) and the NPC locations issue was awful, but that's bad design. Like I don't think that would have been any different even if they had 10 more years to work on the game.
 
I'm really having a hard time believing how beautiful this game is. HD has been so kind to the artists at Monolith Soft. I can't wait for them to have something to show on the next hardware.

Question for anyone familiar with the game: are there any elements of the game that I can plan in advance? The ones I know of currently would be what division I will join (leaning towards Pathfinder, depending on how the HP perk works) and what class/artes I'd like to focus on (haven't looked into this enough).
 
I'm really having a hard time believing how beautiful this game is. HD has been so kind to the artists at Monolith Soft. I can't wait for them to have something to show on the next hardware.

Question for anyone familiar with the game: are there any elements of the game that I can plan in advance? The ones I know of currently would be what division I will join (leaning towards Pathfinder, depending on how the HP perk works) and what class/artes I'd like to focus on (haven't looked into this enough).

I thought you auto healed after battle so why is the HP perk even a thing?
 
I like that the U.S. commercial states "but one ship managed to escape" when we know multiple ships escaped before the planet blew up. I guess to be fair trying to condense that fact into a short commercial wouldn't have much of a point.
 
I'm playing through Xenoblade Chronicles 3D as my first Xenoblade experience.

At ~20 hours in I just made it to the Bionis' head and I pretty much stopped giving a damn about any of the sidequests at all. Unless I'm missing something, most (edit: named quests do) don't even award XP and half are like "go kill this monster somewhere" and then I go looking for it and can't find it, then wander around lost for a while before giving up and going back to the relevant main quest (whatever the little story memo tells me to do).

Am I missing anything important by playing this way?
 
I thought you auto healed after battle so why is the HP perk even a thing?

I'm really unclear on it right now. I'm mostly looking forward to the exploration and data probe stuff in this game, so that's why I'm leaning towards Pathfinder. However, if the perk sucks, I might want to choose a different one. Maybe it's more related to Soul Voice or you get a regen function during battle? I really don't know.
 
I'm playing through Xenoblade Chronicles 3D as my first Xenoblade experience.

At ~20 hours in I just made it to the Bionis' head and I pretty much stopped giving a damn about any of the sidequests at all. Unless I'm missing something, most don't even award XP and half are like "go kill this monster somewhere" and then I go looking for it and can't find it, then wander around lost for a while before giving up and going back to the relevant main quest (whatever the little story memo tells me to do).

Am I missing anything important by playing this way?

The best thing to do is only go out of your way to do quests that don't have a generic name, those actually provide small amounts of backstory and lead to more interesting quests. Sadly the more interesting quests are locked away until you raise your affinity with an area, like the amazing Nopon quest chain that has an amazing payoff.

But it's completely fine to just do the main quests and leave the sidequests for when you need levels or if you feel like it.
 
I'm playing through Xenoblade Chronicles 3D as my first Xenoblade experience.

At ~20 hours in I just made it to the Bionis' head and I pretty much stopped giving a damn about any of the sidequests at all. Unless I'm missing something, most don't even award XP and half are like "go kill this monster somewhere" and then I go looking for it and can't find it, then wander around lost for a while before giving up and going back to the relevant main quest (whatever the little story memo tells me to do).

Am I missing anything important by playing this way?

Not really, but you might find yourself getting underleveled toward the end if you don't do some sidequests every now and again.
 
I do wonder if at some point Nintendo just went "Yeah, this game has to come out" and a lot of convenience things that come up in playtesting didn't get added.

A lot of? Seems there are only one or two "things" like the "character switch". And it is arguable if these are oversights or design decisions. I never liked the instant character switch in the first game, and it was only necessary because of the "healer" class.

And it is not even as bad as it sounds because some people missed the Gamepad features (is able to show characters on the map). I think many reviewers who rush through this game (or a little part of it) will miss many of its features.
 
I'm playing through Xenoblade Chronicles 3D as my first Xenoblade experience.

At ~20 hours in I just made it to the Bionis' head and I pretty much stopped giving a damn about any of the sidequests at all. Unless I'm missing something, most don't even award XP and half are like "go kill this monster somewhere" and then I go looking for it and can't find it, then wander around lost for a while before giving up and going back to the relevant main quest (whatever the little story memo tells me to do).

Am I missing anything important by playing this way?

Not really, but I could have sworn that most quests from named NPCs give EXP
and a quick glance at the Wiki reveals that I was right! :D
I have a feeling that you've only been seeing the generic Monster/Challenge/Material/Search quests which don't give EXP, just Gold IIRC.

Again, you don't necessarily miss out on that much from not doing all the quests, but the quests from named NPCs are generally better since they provide some world building and character commentary.
 
Hmm, if I remember from streams I watched, Blast Fencer looked really fun. I think I might go with the Enforcer route to begin with to unlock that first. I'm glad you aren't locked into any classes.
 
I'm playing through Xenoblade Chronicles 3D as my first Xenoblade experience.

At ~20 hours in I just made it to the Bionis' head and I pretty much stopped giving a damn about any of the sidequests at all. Unless I'm missing something, most don't even award XP and half are like "go kill this monster somewhere" and then I go looking for it and can't find it, then wander around lost for a while before giving up and going back to the relevant main quest (whatever the little story memo tells me to do).

Am I missing anything important by playing this way?

You can ignore the generic quests and don't miss anything (generic quests are given by npcs with no name)

Named NPC quests give EXP, and build the affinity chart between characters involved in that quests and the affinity rank of that particular town, which in turn opens up more sidequests, some lead to useful stuff like
extra monado arts
, but is nothing I'd really bother with if you are not having fun with those. I ignored most sidequests on the first playthrough, and concentrated on doing that stuff on a new game+
 
Xenoblade has similar issues like with quest NPCs walking around town with no good way to find them when you need to turn something in.

Yeah, I liked the mechanic itself, but also hated it cause the very few times I had to turn a quest into somebody and they weren't there left me slightly frustrated and I didn't really have the patience to find out where they would show up at that spot because I more than likely caught them when they were walking home or something.
 
What about that one menu then, the one where you have 4 main characters and 4 reserve characters? Can't you just use that to switch some party members out on the fly or is that menu only there to add a member to your party whenever you come across a new one?

edit: I mean this menu.

I'm not exactly sure how this works. My understanding is that there are far more than 8 characters though. I hope it is in fact some sort of system to at least keep 8 with you more or less. But I'm not sure.
 
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