Ehh, I thought the story was absolutely fantastic in the first half of the game. I've never been so invested in game like I was in Xenoblade. Once you got onto the Mechonis I thought the story got a little bit too convoluted and a lot of the stuff towards the end was just a bit too out there for me. I accepted it simply because the ending allows for more games in the series to exist without having to have another convoluted story as to explain how a sequel or successor is possible.
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@Dezzy Ehh, I didn't mind it. It's a common trope in storytelling. Is the hero willing to murder people, even if they're bad guys? That said, Shulk does get more "hardcore" as the game goes on.
It is a common trope but you don't generally find it most adult stuff, unless it's tangled into the premise like in Batman. And I didn't think it fit the game at all. Like I say, he killed so many creatures without even a second thought, quite a few of which were humanoid-ish and probably sentient. They have no qualms about killing a demi-god. It just came across as a kind of really shallow anthropocentrism to me. Although maybe that's my real-life bias intruding.
@Dezzy: Well he didn't technically kill any creatures, the player did. Cognitive dissonance! Nathan Drake can go on and on in Uncharted about how he's not a killer in cutscenes even though he, as the player, has killed 1000s of faceless dudes with families and friends
But let's not forget that some of the Xenoblade creatures will attack you without a moments notice if they spot you! I'm just defending myself lol
He was talking about the bit in sword valley. He was referring to the part where...
snip
I'm just going to take (i.e. steal) this whole comment from OniLinkMinus from /r/Xenoblade_Chronicles, because it pretty much summed up why I had zero problems with that point in the story more eloquently than I could've.
I'm pretty sure Shulk being a complete idiot is a character flaw, not a story flaw.
Shulk and co. had just learned that Faced Mechon are Homs. Not only that, but the Fiora, the first Faced Mechon they learned the identity of, was definitely NOT acting like herself. She appears to be brainwashed. Mumkhar, however, doesn't seem to be brainwashed. Shulk is a scientist. His job is to figure out why, to figure out the rules of how things work. He has exactly two data points, and both contradict each other. It's possible that Mumkhar is brainwashed but with memories of his old life. It's possible that Fiora is the exception and lost her memories for some other reason. Xord said that when he became what we see now, that's when his eyes were opened. That hints very heavily towards brainwashing with memories being retained. If that's the case, then the Homs inside the Faced Mechon are innocent and should be freed if possible.
Dunban's response to Shulk is as thus: "Have you forgotten everything he's done?", clearly implying all of the points you laid out. Shulk's response: "I haven't forgotten, or forgiven, but Faced Mechon aren't like the others - they're people. I have to find out why." Shulk's having a drastic internal conflict - these are people, they're not at fault for this. Why are innocent people being forced through this? Even Mumkhar could very well be innocent if he has been brainwashed. If that's the case, it would be wrong to kill Mumkhar.
You [addressing OP] do bring up the fantastic point that they had just killed a few Faced Mechon moments earlier. Mumkhar even pointed out the dilemma right before the battle - "Who could be inside? Perhaps it's your dad? Your mum? Maybe even that special someone?", so it's not like the Devs didn't even think about that contradiction. The problem here is gameplay/story segregation. MANY games have this - the gameplay necessarily, in order to make sense and be enjoyable, has to contradict the story in some way. In the case of Xenoblade, I'm fairly certain that it's intended to be implied that Shulk and co. didn't kill the Homs inside the Faced Mechon. I think it's supposed to be implied that they destroyed the Mechon then got the Homs out. Of course, animating this and explicitly showing it would be tedious, time consuming, repetitive, and dull. Therefore, they didn't show it.
Granted, this more than likely won't change your mind. There definitely was plenty of thought put into why Shulk did what he did. Or, rather, didn't do.
@nacho_chicken A good response although one major flaw with it:
Their suspicion that they were being brainwashed was coming from Fiora (there's no indication they knew who Xord was as a human, although you can find out through conversations with NPCs). Well there was a massive difference there in that she had a different voice and didn't appear to know who she was (as she makes clear when they speak on Valak mountain). Whereas Mumkhar had the same voice and personality, was clearly self-aware AND had betrayed Dunban just before he'd supposedly died at the beginning.
I think it's plausible that they might have wanted to keep him alive just for the sake of figuring out how to help Fiora. But not plausible that they thought he might've actually been innocent. Not at that point anyway. They might've considered it later on when they realised Egil was at least trying to control them. Although I think it is indicated later on that that was really supposed to be Mumkhar in control.
Did you guys hear that apparently XCX will have BOTH American and British voice actors? It was supposedly confirmed by a NoE rep during the Gamescom Twitch stream. I can't vouch for the validity of that claim, as I didn't watch the stream, but that would be awesome if it's true. It would definitely give the game more variety.
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Did you guys hear that apparently XCX will have BOTH American and British voice actors? It was supposedly confirmed by a NoE rep during the Gamescom Twitch stream. I can't vouch for the validity of that claim, as I didn't watch the stream, but that would be awesome if it's true. It would definitely give the game more variety.
Heard that as well, pretty interesting (in a very good way).
Did you guys hear that apparently XCX will have BOTH American and British voice actors? It was supposedly confirmed by a NoE rep during the Gamescom Twitch stream. I can't vouch for the validity of that claim, as I didn't watch the stream, but that would be awesome if it's true. It would definitely give the game more variety.
Heard that as well, pretty interesting (in a very good way).
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Did you guys hear that apparently XCX will have BOTH American and British voice actors? It was supposedly confirmed by a NoE rep during the Gamescom Twitch stream. I can't vouch for the validity of that claim, as I didn't watch the stream, but that would be awesome if it's true. It would definitely give the game more variety.
I assume that means just a mix of the 2 rather than 2 different sets, right?
Did you guys hear that apparently XCX will have BOTH American and British voice actors? It was supposedly confirmed by a NoE rep during the Gamescom Twitch stream. I can't vouch for the validity of that claim, as I didn't watch the stream, but that would be awesome if it's true. It would definitely give the game more variety.
It feels liike it'd be really weird to have the protagonist sound like Shulk or Reyn when they clearly aren't them. lol
But yeah, I was really glad when I heard this. That was a really good video.
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