Topic: Xenoblade Chronicles 2

@horizonisland Have you done Ursula yet. That's the grindiest of all blade quests by far.

@Matt_Barber Yes. It’s bad and extremely Grindy and disappointing with little payoff, however I got Ursula decently early so I just kept doing the Merc Missions while killing unique monsters and fully exploring the map, making sure things never got too repetitive. You kind of have to zone when doing the merc missions over and over again but I’m good at that so it probably wasn’t as bad of an experience for me as it was for other people.

My only issue with the blade quests were ever getting KOS-MOS which i wanted the most and never got till the end of the game. I haven't done a new game plus run though, yeah and Ursula took time...There was enough to do to keep me busy as well though, so it was similar to me that i never had to explicitly wait for Ursula. But its all tied to luck and that is annoying with blades like these, i found it quite fun to talk about with friends though since our playstyles differed a bit by getting different rare blades at the beginning

The best thing about Ursula's quest is that if you time it right you'll get to grind up all your other rare blades in the process by sending them on the merc missions. Fully leveled up, she's one of the best healers in the game, just not quite as good as one the game gives you for free and, once you get to the post-game dedicated healers are trash anyway.

I was lucky enough to draw KOS-MOS as my third rare blade, so had her through most of the main story. She's only really OP in the post-game once you've ground out her affinity chart and have access to all the good equipment though.

Dahlia was the one who took me forever to pull. Definitely the most WTF bit of fan-service in the game but I still liked how the localization rolled with it to give her a Dolly Parton persona.

Not sure if it’s just because it’s a new outfit or not but to me it does look a ton better.

I started replaying Xenoblade 2 because Pyra and Mythra were both released for Smash, and it was a very strange replay, because the game now feels much better than when I first played it. I skipped most of the cutscenes but the art style's grown a little on me now, considering I thought it was pretty horrendous a year ago.

The gameplay's alright too. The combat's steady, not too fast or slow, and has a decent difficulty. I already had the DLC so I tried Bringer of Chaos difficulty... I suck at JRPGs. I suck at Persona, almost got off the original Xenoblade Chronicles because of the difficulty spike near the end, and I grinded for so long to beat Dragon Quest. Not a problem, I was perfectly adequate on Normal before Easy Mode came out in March 2018. The physics are less floaty compared to the original and X but they don't feel too broken.

The music's great. It pops, and has a lot of power. The Counterattack Smash arrangement... just sucks. And for people that say that COVID stopped the composer's artistic drive, I'm almost certain the Bowser's Fury soundtrack was recorded entirely during the pandemic, and that had such a connected feel to it. It was just amazing, and only gives one more ammo to criticise this remix. There's just no punch to it at all, the percussion is the worst part of that remix. The original Counterattack feels very complete and just... hits harder.

It made me appreciate the original soundtrack a lot more, and reminded me just how talented ACE are as a musical group. Their work was so good on the original that the only people that could make arrangements even marginally close stylistically and in terms of quality, were ACE themselves, as shown with their Xenoblade Chronicles 2 Medley, which incorporated themes from all over Alrest. The area themes in the original are awesome, and almost get better as you progress. I don't like Gormott that much, because structure-wise it's almost identical to Gaur Plains; so much so that I'll break it down;

It starts with an ascending string sequence. It has three tom whacks, then a note of silence, before the main chorus kicks in. It has a choral section that bridges the reprisal of the chorus, and the point where the song is looped. The ascending string piece is repeated once, and then the song loops shortly after. These particular songwriting techniques make the song good, (it's ACE, come on!) but after playing Xenoblade 1 it feels a bit derivative.

Other themes like Uraya, Tantal (both day and night), and Yggdrasil are for the most part relatively quiet pieces (save for Tantal day) that highlight the beauty of the surroundings (which by the way are as beautiful as say, Satorl Marsh, Gaur Plains, Valak Mountain, or Eryth Sea). I'm a sucker for the Tantal night theme, because the acoustics mixed with the electric guitar, is harmonious to the point of catharsis.

Lastly, characters and acting. Rex's English voice has grown on me a lot recently. I don't have his accent, far from it. I honestly prefer a neutral English accent, exactly like what Adam Howden has for Shulk. But Al Weaver has this fascinating youthful quality that makes Rex sound extremely immature and beyond his years at the same time. His screams are dubious, and granted it was his first voice role, but his inflection in battle and in some cutscenes (the confrontation with Mòrag comes to mind in Chapter 2) he's awesome. I also grew on Pyra as a character, and she feels much less like an oversexualised top-heavy half-nude anime sword girl, and more like an actual person with insecurities, likes, dislikes, fears, and otherwise. Her voice acting, by Skye Bennett, is just... amazing. I don't know what to say.

Nia similarly has some decent acting, and though the friendzone scene in Chapter 7 makes me cringe even thinking about it, her Welsh accent's also grown on me. "I'll bash ye propa next time I sweear!" In my old playthroughs I always liked Zeke, and I have a feeling I'll be watching every single one of his scenes. He's like Reyn in that he's comedic relief, and can be dense at times, but he's very good at reading people, bringing them together, and just having a good time with everyone. His voice acting brings him to life and I love his character. Pandoria similarly, has some fun moments and some really good scenes in Chapter 7. Jin... god he's amazing. His story arc was already alright in the original game but the details fleshed out in Torna make him a truly likeable character at times.

Other characters I'd give some good mentions to are, to start, Addam. In Torna he's so charming and has such a charismatic air that I instantly took to him when I saw him. I'd probably replay the whole DLC again, including all those side quests, just to hear Addam's voice again. Lora is not fleshed out at all in the base game but she shines so brilliantly in the DLC, and comes off as an extremely strong, sensitive and kind woman. She is a great character and her interactions with Jin were enough to melt my heart. Same with Hugo, he was a little timid just like Emperor Niall, but his blade is unbending. Reply if you get the reference.

One thing I'd like to address is the fan service. It can be at times grating, but it's easy to just.. ignore it I guess. MONOLITH developers were conscious of the fact that they chose to implement more female character designs than male, and it shows. There's one Rare Blade for everyone. Do with that statement as you will. There's cute Blades, like Ursula, Electra, to some extent Praxis, and Floren. There's kind blades like Vess, Wulfric, Gorg, and Pyra. There's sassy, entitled blades like Dagas, Sheba, Vess and Mythra (though Mythra's half in it because she can be rude, but it's an insecurity, and good writing instead of a fundamental character trait). There's warrior blades like Zenobia, T-elos, KOS-MOS, and Herald. And then the ones that are the AAA fan-servicy Blades like Brighid (do correct me if I'm wrong but there's no story choice for her clothing, it feels a bit forced), Dahlia, and Nim. They feel like the most blatant ones.

Sometimes there'll be some good moments that contrast these traits, but otherwise hopefully I've covered everything.

I’ll be giving this another play through once I get finished with XB1DE. I’m in chapter 12 or 13 ( can’t remember off of the top of my head ) and it’s been supremely enjoyable. Wish I would have played this when it first got ported to Switch and I don’t know why I waited so long. Monolith has become one of my favorite developers.

@TheJGG

Hadn't heard the Smash arrangement until you mentioned it.

It's... I 'unno. It's lacking the passion and emotion from the original piece. It's Counterattack on mood stabilizers. Roundly inferior to the original version, I agree.

Although I usually feel that way about remixes. You can't just arbitrarily change the way a song sounds without messing with the mood it evokes, the pacing of it, and so on. Very rare is it that I find a remix that's not worse than the original piece it's based on.

@Ralizah As in my longer post; the percussion was so bland and had no impact on the song. The guy who arranged it must have had a really lame drum kit, if it was recorded. But if the drums were programmed, there's almost no excuse. We've seen some extremely good soundtracks recorded during COVID, including Bowser's Fury, and Tenet. The composer for Tenet, Ludwig Göransson, took advantage of the musicians' isolation to enhance the soundtrack, giving it a very disconnected feel. Just because one is stuck at home doesn't automatically mean the soundtrack sucks, or should.

The choice of music for this DLC was pretty awful overall. It could have been very good, though as you point out the remixes usually aren't as good as the original. I agree but this rule only applies in part to JRPG music. Anything that isn't will be easier to beat.

I played through Torna again in the lead up to the Smash release and it really does hit harder the second time, very tempted to replay the main game again it's going on two years since I last did that.

The remix of Counterattack just feels so lukewarm and aimless, I can kinda see the groove they were going for, but as ye are saying the percussion really lets it down. I wouldn't say the songs chosen are bad but I would say it's not as good as it could have been. Happy with the fact that I got "Acting God" in and the medley is a huge step up from the first Xenoblade medley but baffled by the inclusion of Argentum. Of all the area themes why Argentum? Such a strange choice.

@mr_somewhere Argentum doesn't feel like a battle song so I was baffled too by its inclusion. It's almost like putting "Environmental Noise" in Smash... oh wait. I can imagine a fight to it but it's an area theme, not a battle theme.

@TheJGG Especially considering they had Tantal Day right there or even the World Tree theme itself which was slow but a jam, I could see it fitting at least fitting more than Argentum.

If the rumours about Switch Pro rendering in 4K are true, who else thinks Xenoblade 2 will possibly be the biggest beneficiary in the entire Switch library?

@Dezzy Hmm... I don't know about Xenoblade 2. It has an art style that works in 720p as well as it does at 540p. There's things like increased draw distance, but I honestly feel like it looks fine in 720p. I can see it looking much better in 4K though; increased texture definition and all. But even in handheld mode for me it's perfectly playable.

If anything I think Xenoblade Chronicles X will, because it has the most realistic art style in the whole series, and therefore would benefit more from 4K. Games that imitated realism would profit more, although there aren't many games like that on Switch because Nintendo already knows that cel-shaded graphics are good irrespective of image quality.

I'd think that a bump in performance that keeps XC2 close to a consistent 720p@30 - like XCX was - would be most welcome, regardless of any further upscaling. Oh, and not having things like titan weapons pop in at point blank range would be nice.

The main thing letting XCX down is the character models, and they could use a serious rework if the game ever comes to Switch. Seeing the landscapes in fabulous 4K would rather lose its edge if everyone still looks like a plastic doll. (And yeah, I know that's a tell for later in the game...)

In terms of the Switch games that would look best in 4K, I'd suggest Bayonetta 2 and Astral Chain. I already know that the potential is there from playing Platinum's other games on the PC. Oh, and maybe we'd get a less sad looking version of Outer Worlds.

@Matt_Barber Mate don't spoil it! That was a very good pun but still!

The games that imitate photorealism will get the best gains from this upres. Who knows, maybe XCX would be able to run at 1080p60...

Good point. Spoiler tag added.

@Matt_Barber No problem, though retrospectively I have no idea how people wouldn't see it coming. Those eyes... they're not human or anime!

@Dezzy I'd guess DOOM 2016 if it's an automatic improvement. If it requires a patch for the improvements to be present then yeah, XC2 would probably be the one (with Bethesda now owned by Microsoft there's no way Switch would get an upgrade patch as it would devalue xCloud).

@Grumblevolcano

Yeah, I've played that one PS4/Xbox already though, so it wouldn't mean very much.