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I am finding Xenoblade extremely tedious and repetitive

L

Lothar

Banned
mrk8885 said:
In my <admittedly limited> experience with EB, I feel like you'd be significantly underpowered for many battles without grinding. I played it somewhat recently and I don't feel like that's a crazy sentiment. Anyone else wanna weigh in?

I also don't see how not having a penalty for death somehow helps you get stronger and win battles for which you are ill equipped. But I'm no EB expert so I admit I could very well be wrong.
Click to expand...

No penalty for death means there's no harm in trying. If you head straight to the first cave and die on the first boss, you didn't lose anything but you gained a lot of experience. The second time through the cave, it'll be much easier. Perhaps after that death, you'll even have money to get a better weapon.

Try it that way if you ever try EB again.
 
D

Dr. Worm

Banned
futanari-porn-stars.jpg
 
I

Iva Demilcol

Member
Thud said:
Calling the music generic is just wrong.

That something is predictable does not make it bad. You even bring in Persona 5...
Click to expand...

It is Tales of level of generic. That means there are like 3 or 4 nice tracks and the rest are forgettable.

Also I didn't bring up P5, other user did. Still story and music there are leagues above Xenoblade.
 
F

Firenze1

Banned
The Hermit said:
lol no

XC is one of the best JRPG ever.

XCX is a terrible and repetitive pseudo-MMO with awful music and confuse gameplay, with layer after layer of mechanics. After 80 hours enduring it I still couldn't feel in control of the gameplay like I did in Xenoblade


XC2 seems like an apology for that shit.
Click to expand...
This man gets it
 
F

Firenze1

Banned
Iva Demilcol said:
It is Tales of level of generic. That means there are like 3 or 4 nice tracks and the rest are forgettable.

Also I didn't bring up P5, other user did. Still story and music there are leagues above Xenoblade.
Click to expand...
Ost in original xenoblade blows p5 ost out of the water. As much as i love persona 5, the overworld music is getting reptitive.
 
B

bomblord1

Banned
I made it to nearly the end of the game without doing a single non-mandatory side quest. Couldn't beat the last boss though and gave up because I was like 10 levels under leveled.

My advice to you is to stop doing the side quests unless you feel underleveled. They are boring, repetitive, and the story pacing works a lot better if you don't bother.
 
Ultimadrago

Ultimadrago

Member
iRAWRasaurus said:
True. The combat sucks.
Click to expand...

Indeed, while some fights proved more challenging than others I never had a great time exploring the mechanics or fighting in general (including progression and real-time). The story isn't all cracked up, really adding the signature "Monolith Soft Plot Twist&#8482;" to a middling story with very few standouts in the cast (ex. Dickson was fun throughout).

Sidequests were painfully simpleminded, as someone said before, poor like Final Fantasy XV's really. The Affinity system is a solid idea to add dialogue dynamics between various party members, but was really dull in practice (and mostly not even voiced, making them even more akin to Fire Emblem's largely static Support scenes).

Worst part is Xenoblade Chronicles 2 isn't necessarily imbuing me with confidence on the combat side of things from what I saw of the Treehouse footage.
 
M

mrk8885

Banned
Lothar said:
No penalty for death means there's no harm in trying. If you head straight to the first cave and die on the first boss, you didn't lose anything but you gained a lot of experience. The second time through the cave, it'll be much easier. Perhaps after that death, you'll even have money to get a better weapon.

Try it that way if you ever try EB again.
Click to expand...

Sounds good. Will do
 
N

night814

Member
Ignore early quests until later. You're better off just going through the story for at least the first half. Run around and discover stuff instead of looking for quest items.
 
S

Sgt.Pepper

Banned
There's a bunch of side quest that you can simple accept and you will complete them without noticing sometimes.

-from a player with a 100% save
 
D

Devilgunman

Member
If you think XC is bad, wait until you play XCX. One of the worst game I've put 100 hrs in and has no desire to finish it. The only good things about XCX are the mech and world map. Everything else from story, characters, gameplay, UI, etc are downright terrible.
 
F

Freddo

Member
The Greek Freak said:
Xenoblade X was honestly awful in every way except mech design. I wish I had that time back.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I agree. I absolutely adored the first Xenoblade Chronicles, but boy, was Xenoblade Chronicles X a disappointment. Probably my biggest gaming disappointment in, uhh, 15 years or so?

And what I've seen and read about Xenoblade Chronicles 2 doesn't make me hyped either, far from it.
 
A

arturo2666

Banned
The Hermit said:
lol no

XC is one of the best JRPG ever.

XCX is a terrible and repetitive pseudo-MMO with awful music and confuse gameplay, with layer after layer of mechanics. After 80 hours enduring it I still couldn't feel in control of the gameplay like I did in Xenoblade


XC2 seems like an apology for that shit.
Click to expand...

From someone that only played the first one, your description of XCX literally sounds just like XC.
 
M

Malyse

Member
OP isn't wrong. Xenoblade can be underwhelming, especially if you have have expectations from the massive overhype it gets or were expecting something in line with Xenosaga. At least Xenoblade X is fun to play and you get a damned mech.
 
A

AdropOFvenom

Neo Member
I'd say this is the kinda game you want to do ~20% of the sidequests. Don't get too bogged down in that stuff. It's there if you want it, but thats where the "tedious and repetitive" usually comes into play.
 
T

TrueBlue

Member
I find it hard to take claims that X was uniformly awful seriously. The traversal options and world design alone was an upgrade over the original. I also contend that the sidequests were well written and added a lot of meat to an otherwise anemic narrative.

Granted I never finished it, but that was due to unrelated circumstances. Still, there was a lot to like that I hope takes on and further refines.

Anyway OP, I suggest you cut the side quests and persevere. If in another 10 hours the game isn't clicking, it probably just isn't for you. I hope it does click, because I think it's a wonderful experience.
 
E

Elfforkusu

Member
1. stop playing as Shulk
1a. start playing as Melia
2. stop doing side quests (accept them, but don't try to finish them all)
3. explore

It's not the case that XB is for everyone, but I don't think there's a game, full stop, that does exploration better. Beyond the main quest, it never asks you to explore, but rewards you handsomely for doing so.

It has too many side quests, the inventory management is stupid, and the game is too long for its own good. But that is pretty much the entire scope of what's wrong with the game. It's a classic.

e: X, on the other hand, is an 8/10
 
A

Alchemy

Member
I must be the only person who felt like playing through XC felt like being stuck in a shitty WoW group for 80 hours. Only thing I really liked was the basic story but the twist wasn't really my thing.
 
B

Bobo Dakes

Member
mrk8885 said:
Man.

I was literally about to start this game tonight. And now I'm like hmmm maybe not!

I love JRPGS but I found the tediousness of earthbound a major turnoff and I couldn't finish it. Now I fear that with this game too! I've platinumed FFXV and beat persona 5 after putting 100 hours into BOTW. I can play long games. But I'm afraid this won't keep my attention

:/

Tell me not to worry!
Click to expand...

If you like the idea of an 80 hour JRPG, jump right in.

I was ready for it to end after 60 and it was like, let's throw in some twists and went on another 20 (though I spent easily half of that grinding). Grinding for those last two boss battles really soured me on the game that I at best thought it was pretty good. But that was a one and done for me as far as this series goes.
 
E

EhoaVash

Member
Combat in these xenoblade games always confused me. Looks simple but half the time I have no clue what I'm doing is effective or not lol especially in XCX

Wish they revamped the combat system to something completely different kinda like FFXV

._.

Btw I never finished xenoblade Chronicles. Got halfway maybe ?

But I did finish xenoblade Chronicles X.

Found XCX to be more fun mostly cause of exploration and how fast traversal is in that game.
 
Wildo09

Wildo09

Member
Don't talk shit about my favorite game of all time!

Seriously though, if you don't like MMO combat you won't like the game, but try around different character and art combinations maybe you will find a style that you like.
 
D

Dreamwriter

Member
EhoaVash said:
Combat in these xenoblade games always confused me. Looks simple but half the time I have no clue what I'm doing is effective or not lol especially in XCX

Wish they revamped the combat system to something completely different kinda like FFXV
Click to expand...
Xenoblade Chronicles combat is basically MMO combat - play Final Fantasy XIV, you’ll know how to play Xenoblade. Aside from the multiplayer skill chains - they had that in FFXI, but not XIV. When I play Xenoblade, I mostly don’t worry about what the other characters are doing, I choose the role I want to play and do so.
 
R

RubberLuffy

Banned
Not every game is for everyone.

For me though I've beaten Xenoblade twice, both times with 140 hours on the clock, with as much side content as I could do (maxed Colony 6, all skill trees, maxed team affections), and I'm halfway through a third playthrough (finally on Dolphin, so it looks super nice), where I'm gonna do all that shit again.
 
T

Thud

Member
Sgt.Pepper said:
There's a bunch of side quest that you can simple accept and you will complete them without noticing sometimes.

-from a player with a 100% save
Click to expand...

Respect. I missed a few things, but still put in 150 hours.

Did all the post-game content before the final boss, so it was a cinch.
 
K

Kuro

Member
As beautiful as Xenoblade was I absolutely hated the characters and did not like the combat system at all. I was coming off getting burnt out on MMORPGs and it really rubbed me the wrong way. It didn't feel like I was in the action it felt like I was navigating menus if that makes any sense.
 
Z

ZeroX03

Banned
The number one piece of advice I give every person playing Xenoblade is to accept side quests, but DO NOT GO OUT OF YOUR WAY TO DO THEM. It's basically a linear game set in huge maps and the side quests kill the pacing and unnecessarily overpower you. If you want side content, explore the maps. Learn the game systems and there should be no need to for a grind.

OP, you're playing the game like it's an open world WRPG. It's not.

Iva Demilcol said:
That spoiler is totally wrong. Story and music are not as good as Persona 5's: Xenoblade's music is generic AF and the story is so predictable you could shake the game's case and the cliches would start to fall to the ground. When I played it I literally predicted most of it without effort.
Click to expand...

If you've seen an Ocean's movie you know everything that's going to happen in Persona 5. That game is full of every heist story cliche in the book, which is fine, but lobbing cliche as a criticism at Xenoblade while propping up P5 is pretty funny. And hell, P5's ending is the exact same as about twenty other SMT games. I predicted the final boss a year before even playing the game lol.
 
O

Opa-Pa

Member
I loved the game. The world and music were beautiful, the group dynamic was damn great and the combat was surprisingly engaging. I think the only thing I found unnecessary was the crafting, but you could ignore it for large chunks and only do it every now and then.

I wasn't much of a fan of the side quests, so I did like 3 or 4 when getting to new areas. Still I'd recommend to not listen to people saying to ignore them completely because they're the only truly reliable way to gain exp (farming monsters takes way too long), and actually the moment I started ignoring them completely I got into a lot of trouble against the final bosses, which are literally impossible ig you're underleveled.

This is what I mean:

bomblord1 said:
I made it to nearly the end of the game without doing a single non-mandatory side quest. Couldn't beat the last boss though and gave up because I was like 10 levels under leveled.
Click to expand...

Avoid overleveling though, because otherwise the combat will look like an automated chore. It's pretty clever and fun once you realize how everything works, and trying new party setups and trying new characters to control (you can play as anyone) is a blast.
 
X

xealo

Member
Alchemy said:
I must be the only person who felt like playing through XC felt like being stuck in a shitty WoW group for 80 hours. Only thing I really liked was the basic story but the twist wasn't really my thing.
Click to expand...
The twists could be seen coming from a mile away with those characters, it was more a question of when rather than if. Didn't really ruin my enjoyment of the overall narrative though given the main party members being pretty good.
 
M

moustascheman

Member
The main advice I can give for someone not to burn themselves out is to not do all the side quests, just accept them and go on with your time exploring the world. Half the time you'll be able to get all the materials or items you need simply through exploring and progressing through the game. When it comes to grinding, I don't think that you should ever need to grind. In the 200+ hours I've put into XB1 I've never really felt that I was ever underleveled for the current area despite sometimes being a few levels underneath some enemies. If you have a good understanding of the combat system, have a party setup that's well optimized, and a good gem setup you can afford even being 4-5 levels behind any enemy. Gems, party, and arts matter much more than your level ever could. If you're getting bored with the combat, remember to mix up your party every once in a while: every character plays differently and you can get some really interesting setups going once you experiment (Melia+Riki DoT builds are incredibly entertaining). Just remember to take things at your own pace and have fun with the exploration, which really is the main attraction of the xenoblade series.
 
S

shark sandwich

tenuously links anime, pedophile and incels
I loved the game but I can understand your frustrations. It doesn't get better. There are hundreds and hundreds of generic side quests, many of which require tons of tedium if you're not using a guide. And sadly you have to do them if you want to unlock some of the best rewards (4th and 5th affinity chart for each character).

So yeah, if you're not feeling it, just stop.
 
N

Neoleo2143

Member
As I note in my Xenoblade 2 combat breakdown here,

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1396044&highlight=

Xenoblade Chronicles strengths in its combat are the unique aspects of each character's playstyle, position relative to enemies being rewarded properly and introducing situational strategic twists like Spikes at a reasonable pace. Some ambiguous timing elements were also particularly neat though not as emphasized as I would like (they're much more prominent in XC2 however). The removal of long term item management is appreciated for a long form game with a lot of unfortunate Junk Items. Most Turn based games and real-time action games screw up healing and make it boring mechanically and while I would say XC's healing mechanics aren't particularly novel (once again, XC2 is more interesting here seemingly), they're far more functional than many games.

The Weaknesses are in weak party play outside chain attacks, battles often being reduced to topple locking because of Chain attacks refreshing all the available options, the UI not being well suited to a controller and the Monado overcentralizing party combinations, particularly against mechon and Telethia type enemies. There's also a good argument for the fact that combat does not open up quick enough for experimentation which is a life blood aspect for many exploration games.

Exploration-wise, Xenoblade is largely bested by its predecessor which has one of the lengthiest exploration driven gameplay of any game and one of the enjoyable areas to grace an open world game in the whole generation (Noctilum). But there's a lot to like in the first game thanks to several areas being blocked off by stronger monsters and weaving around the unique monsters and different enemies. Plus the feeling of being able to reach what you thought you previously could not is intrinsically satisfying. The vertical layers of monolith soft areas make them much more enjoyable to traverse and even when going across flatter plains, the game does make sure to generally give some nice sights.

There's an unfortunate amount of bloat in both XCX and XC1 though I think XCX is generally better about this by containing most of its needless bloat to a single quest board plus there's generally more payoff to sidequests such as the Water Plant. XC2 also seems to continue streamlining this aspect by mostly having only named NPCs be able to be talked to which generally had what one would describe as the "good stuff" in both games. Generally ignore stuff by nameless NPCs and go into stuff occasionally by named ones.

While I think the plotting isn't as absurd as QuixoticNeutral feels it is (though the last fifth or of the game is very much more the symbolism of the Monadology taking shape than the greater character dynamics of before which can be a turn off though a good bit of that is still around), I do feel that he is on the nose about the camaraderie of the cast and the allure of the world. They bounce off each other really well and the general maturity of the playable cast is quite a step above many JRPG casts and means that XC2 has a lot to work towards. For its length, I like the pacing quite a bit, there are enough twists and details added over time to keep going though some of it is predictable and some aren't. It's still rather satisfying I found which at the time was a rare proposition by most JRPGs in the generation and even continuing into this one (even XCX isn't satisfying here which casts some doubt upon XC2 to reach the same goal). In the end however, the world is the star of the show and it seems to have become a thing with Monolith Soft and their awe-inspiring settings as continued by XC2's living titans above a sea of clouds.

The Soundtrack is also a great effort by a newer set of composers which while having Big named stars like Shimomura and Mitsuda on the box, the work of ACE+ is simply outstanding and a delightful surprise (and it seems many connect their work with the series now with their return on XC2) and though Manami Kiyota's work isn't as strong as the others, it's still a fine effort.

The series has a great niche as exploration driven JRPGs aren't really around much. FFXV was there but I found XCX's Mira to be vastly superior. Though it has a ways to evolve, the series and its creators seem to know their strengths well which gives me confidence for its future.
 
A

Alchemy

Member
xealo said:
The twists could be seen coming from a mile away with those characters, it was more a question of when rather than if. Didn't really ruin my enjoyment of the overall narrative though given the main party members being pretty good.
Click to expand...

I dunno what you're talking about but the fact that
everyone was human scientists that basically obliterated the universe and restarted it
didn't seem obvious to me.
 
JayBabay

JayBabay

Member
The only JRPG I played that naturally got me into a level of high 70's - low 80's just by playing normally. It never ends OP, heads up from now. Just remembering how many sidequests some places had and that you had a time constraint to finish them is giving me anxiety.
 
G

grumble

Member
Arthea said:
old designed JRPGs? Xenoblade is designed nothing like old JRPGs, it's designed more or less like a MMO, so yeah most sidequests suck, and it is boring and repetitive, but a world is nice and instant fast travel helps a lot, it doesn't feel restrictive really, not sure what you mean by that.
Click to expand...

MMO quests are typically pretty bad due to the limitations of the genre. In a single player game, the bar should be set much higher.
 
E

eliochip

Member
Grinding kind of killed this game for me. The combat can be interesting but having to shelf certain characters because the AI sucks at using them is straight up bad.

The inventory system sucks. Messing with gems is fun though. The music is great. The visuals (aside from the resolution making my eyes bleed) is good.

I keep trying to get back into this game for the good things it has but I just don't like the story or characters enough to keep up with this.
 
T

Toxi

Banned
QuixoticNeutral said:
The endearing camaraderie of the party members and the magnificence of the Bionis and Mechonis as a setting do a ton of work to disguise how shoddy the plotting in Xenoblade really is.

I wrote a huge post about the game back when I finished it, which I'm consulting now to jog my memory as I write this, and while the specifics have faded, my overall impression of the experience remains unchanged: the first ten hours or so were a slog, but the game started to settle in once I had a full party, and the further in I got, the more I liked the complexities of the battle system and the less I liked the story. Xenoblade is blessed with a superb mid-section large enough to devour most other games several times over, particularly once you find your own personal level of tolerance for the collectibles and side quests (which in my case was low). I'm glad I experienced it once, but I'm hoping for a leaner and less bloated adventure out of Xenoblade 2.
Click to expand...
I think the one thing I really didn't like about the story is the ending.

MAJOR SPOILERS
The whole setup is so played out. The protagonist obtains great power and is asked how they will use it. The hero chooses not to abuse it and instead chooses to fix everything, which is somehow surprising when they're the hero.

It feels cheap. It never actually comes with significant sacrifice from the hero beyond sometimes giving up their godlike power and then living happily ever after anyway because the world is now totally fixed.

It's also overused as an actual choice for the player in video games. "Will you save the world and live a happy life, or do you want to become Space Hitler?" Well no shit I want to save the world, live a happy life, and not be Space Hitler.
 
M

Meia

Member
texhnolyze said:
It's boring because it feels like an MMO. Get quests from NPCs in a hub/city, finish them, report to NPCs, move on to the next hub/city, repeat 50x. I've been doin the same thing since WoW era.
Click to expand...


Largely this. The game is pretty damn good, but if you've played an MMO at any point in your life your tolerance for the game structure may not be something you can get past. I got quite a bit into it, but catching a spoiler coupled with the nature of the quests in the game killed my interest to finish.
 
cheebdragonite

cheebdragonite

Member
Interesting to see many different opinions here, especially in regards to combat. I thought XBC's was engaging, and if you get past XCX's complex layers of its battle system, it's highly engrossing. Did people just stick with Shulk, Reyn, and Sharla throughout the entire game? Did people not take the time to learn and explore the different options the games had to offer? Some games aren't everyone's cup of tea, but I guess it's easy to say the combat sucks instead of accepting that some games aren't for them.

Neoleo2143 said:
[Snip]
Click to expand...

Great post.
 
M

moustascheman

Member
cheebdragonite said:
Interesting to see many different opinions here, especially in regards to combat. I thought XBC's was engaging, and if you get past XCX's complex layers of its battle system, it's highly engrossing. Did people just stick with Shulk, Reyn, and Sharla throughout the entire game? Did people not take the time to learn and explore the different options the games had to offer? Some games aren't everyone's cup of tea, but I guess it's easy to say the combat sucks instead of accepting that some games aren't for them.



Great post.
Click to expand...

Yeah sticking to only Shulk, reyn, and sharla is probably the worse way to experience the combat. Hell, I'd be inclined to say that shulk is one of the less interesting characters in terms of gameplay, only really getting more interesting when he gets all the monado arts. That being said, I can understand why some people would stick to such a rigid setup since you fight a lot of mechon in the early parts of the game and so you're kinda forced to play as shulk early on. It's probably the biggest fault with how the game teaches you its systems since you get so used to how someone like shulk plays that playing as someone like melia or riki feels incredibly hard to adapt to.
 
O

ozfunghi

Member
XC is a great game. Loved the characters, the music was the best of any game i've played, had an engaging story i wanted to find out more about and the world was breathtaking and interesting. I also loved the two world premise. The combat is deeper than you would think at first. I knew when Nintendo first showed the game at E3 almost 10 years ago, that it would be something special. I think back then it was called "World of Monado" or something, and very little was known, and it got very little attention.

Accept all sidequests you happen to encounter, don't go out of your way to accept or finish sidequests, and you'll notice you'll finish a lot of the sidequests you accepted with no effort. If you really feel a certain sidequest is interesting, knock yourself out, but don't do it if you don't feel like it.

Just try to move on with the main quest. It's what drives the game, the story, the world, the characters...

Now, XCX on the other hand, is a complete and utter turd. I really feel hustled buying this game and the special edition no less. I waited years for a follow up to XC but whatever XCX was, it sure wasn't that. Horrible music (the worst tracks are litterally the tracks you will hear roughly one thousand times), no story, no soul, bad characters... and the main quests are about as interesting as the sidequests from XC. It's a shame really, because this could have been great. Mechs (which turned out to be more tedious than going on foot), huge world with some great regions, nice graphics... I wish they would rerelease the game but this time, added an actual story/quest. So much work went into the world and creatures, it really is a shame. There was little sense of accomplishment, there was no real incentive to keep playing. I bailed somewhere in the third or fourth world. I think i had put in a good 40 to 50 hours and didn't enjoy any of it.
 
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