Topic: Xenoblade Chronicles X - OT

You just described video game settings, congrats.

I mean, I have a similar point about how Fire Emblem Sacred Stone's support system killed part of my immersion with the game because of how the support system don't affect anything in the actual narrative even when you do things that should blatantly lead to some sort of story (mainly the lack of reactions to character deaths), but I also have the self-awareness to realize that this doesn't somehow make it worse than literally any other high quality release in video games based on some highly questionable hopes for how much time a game developer is given to make their video game. I would like a Metroid Prime as good as Metroid Prime that also lasts 100+ hours, but I also live in reality.

Also, ALBW is one of my least favorite Zeldas arguably, but I'm not gonna pretend it's not high quality either, even if I find the LTTP overworld to be about as interesting as staring at a wall while listening to Daughtry and eating white bread.

First of all, A Link Between Worlds and Phantom Hourglass are 2D games. They have nowhere near the mechanical complexity and range of movement that most of the 3D games do and don't make a good comparison. I'm open to any good story, but the last 3D Zelda in almost a decade was Skyward Sword; so I'm worried. It doesn't seem terribly realistic not to be.

I reserve the right to hold any opinion; no matter how novel. And even if there isn't a popular precedent, people notice when there are NPCs in the world. Nowadays with HD (or even the wii's 480p) graphics that sort of realism matters more than ever. Games like Skyrim and Dragon Age Inquisition go to great lengths to make the world feel realistic. To place people where people live and animals where it makes sense for animals to live, each in the correct densities. Ecosystems aren't just built of 10 bears in a pack; that doesn't make sense. There's always going to be more plants than herbivores, and more herbivores than carnivores.

One of the most nonsense things in Xenoblade is Valak Mountain. An arctic region with no vegetation to speak of that is paradoxically teeming with life. That just doesn't make sense; everything there would freeze, starve, and die long before they reached the population numbers that are present in the game.

Stop. Right there, stop it. You don't get to rewrite video game history. Games like Majora's Mask, Tales of Symphonia, Paper Mario The Thousand Year Door, Skyrim, The Wind Waker, The Last of Us, and Super Paper Mario all made their settings feel plenty alive, sans excuses.

...but I also have the self-awareness to realize that this doesn't somehow make it worse than literally any other high quality release in video games based on some highly questionable hopes for how much time a game developer is given to make their video game. I would like a Metroid Prime as good as Metroid Prime that also lasts 100+ hours, but I also live in reality.

It's not my fault that Monolith chose to create a world structure that they didn't have the resources to fully realize; in fact, it's theirs. I'm not asking for a 100 hour Metroid Prime or Zelda, but I would take one hour of that over 30 of Xenoblade because I largely prefer quality over quantity. Open world games are among the hardest to make and Monolith took that on without the ability to pull it off. There has to be a greater range of action than kill, collect, jump, and deliver to make an open world at all realistic and they just didn't want to or couldn't do that. They failed where all of these other games succeeded. Don't blame me for having standards.

It's so nonsense that this game was praised in reviews for being a nonlinear JRPG when most to all of the side stuff is worthless in both narrative and gameplay. Consequently only the critical path is really worthwhile; making it a bad open world JRPG, but an alright linear one.

Lol how on earth do you notice this stuff? I would never even consider that sort of thing while playing a game. If that sort of thing really bothers you, well fair enough. I'm afraid I really write that sort of issue off as kinda similar to double-jumps or altering your movement in mid-air. Part of the problem with that sort of thing is that in a magical fantasy world, the developers could just invent some bizarro explanation that makes it all hang together if you challenged them (e.g maybe the amount of energy stored in plants and animals is somehow different to our own world and the animals also gather energy by other means). So I just kinda accept the background assumptions for the world I'm given.

Are you kidding? Wind Waker feels "alive" but Xenoblade Chronicles doesn't? Skyrim makes sense to you from an ecological point of view? How many times did bears and wolves attack at the same time? How many times were you attacked by two or more bears at the same time, when, in reality, bears are solitary carnivores?

Your points are, I'm terribly sorry to say, extremely wrong.

You reference one game to make a point, but indeed that game has many of the same flaws for which you criticize Xenoblade Chronicles.

Essentially, you did not like the game. You don't have to. No one is making you. But the arguments you present are either contradictory to the evidence you present to prove your point, or just plain wrong. Xenoblade Chronicles was about the most alive world I've played in a long time. Far more alive than Wind Waker, which felt closed and secluded. And really, most Zelda games have worlds that do not feel alive at all. Hyrule Temple Town in Twilight Princess tried to make the world feel alive by placing a ton of people in the city, but none of them had a place to live, so it really did not feel realistic at all. Same with Wind Waker, and really, pretty much every Zelda game ever.

But who cares?? The games are still good. Why does everything have to make perfect sense? It's a video game, not real life. If you want things to make sense, go spend some time outside. I think you'll come to discover that even real life doesn't always make sense.

It's not my fault that Monolith chose to create a world structure that they didn't have the resources to fully realize; in fact, it's theirs. I'm not asking for a 100 hour Metroid Prime or Zelda, but I would take one hour of that over 30 of Xenoblade because I largely prefer quality over quantity. Open world games are among the hardest to make and Monolith took that on without the ability to pull it off. There has to be a greater range of action than kill, collect, jump, and deliver to make an open world at all realistic and they just didn't want to or couldn't do that. They failed where all of these other games succeeded. Don't blame me for having standards.

It's so nonsense that this game was praised in reviews for being a nonlinear JRPG when most to all of the side stuff is worthless in both narrative and gameplay. Consequently only the critical path is really worthwhile; making it a bad open world JRPG, but an alright linear one.

Again, are you serious? Did you even play the whole game? Did you play Skyrim? IT'S THE SAME. Collect, quest, jump around, hack at monsters. Monolith took on a huge project, and they pulled it off marvelously. Sure, it would have come off better if the Wii had more under the hood, but for what they had to work with, they did an amazing job. The atmosphere, the music, the scenery ... if you can see it, you can go to it. And that's almost without exception. What about that is "not pulling it off"?

Again, just because you personally did not care for the game does not make your logic valid. Just say "I didn't care for it," but don't try to make opinions fact.

The only thing with which I agree with you was that Skyward Sword was a bad game. However, I have plenty of hope that Zelda U will be better, because the reason I believe SS was a terrible game was not the story or the world and how it was presented, but the gameplay. I felt the controls absolutely ruined the game. As that is very unlikely to be the control scheme for Zelda U, I'm sure it will go back to being a great game, like TP was.

Which is why we're all here in the first place!

Guys, @Haru17 simply doesn't like the game. I don't know why. But maybe it's because even he himself doesn't understand why he doesn't like it. Maybe he's just trying to find everything about the game that could be considered a "flaw" to try to back up his opinion on the game and that's why he's contradicting his standards so much.

Exactly. If games were like real life, I wouldn't play them. I play because it's an escape from reality. I can be a vampire, or hunt aliens, or fight dragons ... things that can't happen in real life. Why would anyone want an uber realistic game? It's called real life, and it isn't all that fun!

You win the thread.

Lol well no need to make it personal. That is pretty much what we all do when trying to justify an opinion. I point you to the psychologist Jonathan Haidt's research.

Well that's pretty much what I've always said. But for some reason this is considered a controversial view in the modern games industry.

Yes, because all of antarctica looks like that. It's not that the penguins huddle together for warmth and seasonal breeding, basically starving until their eggs hatch only to go off in search of food, it's because that kind of population density is sustained 24/7. Also I hope you realize that Valak Mountain is a mountain, with little liquid water, whereas that is a picture of a coastal region.

Back in a bit.

But why does a fantasy world have to fit the rules of our world? As I'd already suggested, surely you should also get really annoyed at double jumping in games as well?

And dragons and aliens and zombies and healing items and video games in general.

Valak Mountain is a place in an imaginary world where there are gorilla-like creatures that are 60 feet tall, flying manta rays, and ether. To say that "there would be no life in a place like Valak Mountain, and therefore the game is unrealistic and therefore I don't like it" is the worst possible argument I've ever heard.

Oh are they? Because I'm certain the only one who's objectively wrong here is you when you misunderstand the concept of subjectivity.

Again, just because you personally did not care for the game does not make your logic valid. Just say "I didn't care for it," but don't try to make opinions fact.

I wasn't trying to make my opinions fact. Because they can't be fact. Because they're opinions. Subjective. Opinions. I was just trying to make a case; an argument by presenting evidence. As one does when one wishes to discuss things, on an online forum. The kind of place where one discusses. But apparently I can't do that without being ganged up on by 5 aggressive replies at once, half of them with ad hominems. Because apparently we can't have nice things, chief among them, civil discourse.

Essentially, you did not like the game. You don't have to. No one is making you. But the arguments you present are either contradictory to the evidence you present to prove your point, or just plain wrong.

Subjectivity, etc, from my perspective my opinions are consistent. (How could they be otherwise? I would go insane.) And I don't particularly enjoy the game, but currently I am critiquing the world design. Largely how it's logic needs 10 people to apologize for it before one can be cajoled or coerced into viewing it as internally consistent. This opinion is somewhat independent from my views about the gameplay and plot. I am not criticizing these aspects because I have some irrational hatred of the game. That's not the kind of person I am. I don't hate the game, I just honestly find it ridiculous in places.

Are you kidding? Wind Waker feels "alive" but Xenoblade Chronicles doesn't?

The Wind Waker feels alive because of the NPC schedules that I found to be emphasized more than those found in Xenoblade, because the NPCs all seemed more unique and there were less of them, so they didn't all just blend together. Moreover, and this is important, the Wind Waker makes sense in the context it establishes for itself. There is only a small population because most of the population drowned or starved. Because there is only tiny mountaintops for land and largely barren seas, which have a very low carrying capacity, so there are only like 40 NPCs in the entire game. Basically, it makes sense in and of itself.

Skyrim makes sense to you from an ecological point of view? How many times did bears and wolves attack at the same time? How many times were you attacked by two or more bears at the same time, when, in reality, bears are solitary carnivores?

Skyrim makes tons of sense.The people live in the towns, have routines, sometimes travel. Plenty of times I've seen animal NPCs fighting one another. I rarely if even got attacked by a bear and wolf simultaneously. That's because the developers put a lot of thought into enemy placement so as to have the world make sense. I appreciate that in a game. Only occasionally did I fight two bears and that, too, makes sense if you think about it. It could be a mate, or something.

But who cares?? The games are still good. Why does everything have to make perfect sense? It's a video game, not real life. If you want things to make sense, go spend some time outside. I think you'll come to discover that even real life doesn't always make sense.

No real life always does make sense from a scientific perspective. It's also nice when video games are internally consistent. It tells me that another creative human being put some thought into making this or that make sense in the game world. Furthermore, I would not criticize Tetris for being illogical because it is not trying to be logical period. Xenoblade obviously is; evolution and population dynamics are absolutely central to the plot. So it would be the better for it if the ecology made more sense.

PS: Telling people to 'go outside' is SO 1985 soccer mom rote.

Dragons are usually in magical worlds. Xenoblade is not a magical world, it is a scientific world with some people like Melia altering the flow of ether (kinda like alchemy from FMA, really) to change the physical composition of reality. That's why dragons and giant monsters don't make sense. You can't just say 'because Zanza did it' and handwave all logic.

Double-jumping, in most games that have it, is explained by jetpacks (like in Metroid Prime). Or it's in a totally not serious world like Smash Bros. Xenoblade doesn't give itself that luxury. It's EXTREMELY self-serious. And it doesn't have to follow the rules of our world, but it chooses to. Things like gravity, evolution, etc don't come from a vacuum. Then come with a scientific context and, unless you replace that context with some alternate logic, it starts to not make sense.

You can change your direction mid-jump in nearly every self-serious game. Usefulness trumps scientific consistency!

Its not like we even know the creatures of valak mountain diet like for all we know they could live off eating rocks....or maybe there are little plants that can survive under the snow???? Unless nintendo explains this we will never know so there is no point.

There's nothing "scientific" about emotions or human behavior?

Way off topic, but no. We try to quantify emotion and human behavior, but by its very nature, it is unquantifiable. You can't measure "anger" or "joy" or "lust". Every single event in an individual's life will affect the way that person behaves and 100 people will have 100 different reactions to the same event.

By its very nature, human behavior and emotions are unscientific, because, how can we measure them?

Listen, I know we try to be as true to science as we can, as for a long time psychology has suffered from little-man syndrome, and so we have tried to appear as scientific as physics or geology or whatever other "hard" science you want to reference, but we can't. We study something that, by its very nature, can't be measured.

And that's fine. I don't mean to say our research should not be taken seriously or that psychology is hokum. I'm just saying that, if you really look at it, human behavior and emotion are not scientific, nor do they follow set rules that always apply.

Yes, science plays a part. We have ingrained in us certain instincts and characteristics that make us behave certain ways. But for as much as there are general guidelines and trends, there are no set-in-stone facts that govern either human behavior or emotion, as there are for other fields of science.

Science plays a role in behavior and emotion, but that doesn't make behavior and emotion scientific. I think that's an important distinction to make.