Xenoblade U

Xenoblade Chronicles may have arrived fairly late in the Wii's life cycle, and endured a drawn-out release in the West, but it earned plaudits from gamers and boosted the profile of its developer, Monolith Soft. There's little surprise, in that case, that a particularly exciting reveal in today's Nintendo Direct was a trailer for the studio's new Wii U game.

Nintendo's press releases are shying away from giving this one a title, but we're making an early assumption that this could be a new Xenoblade release. Perhaps it was the big X at the end of the trailer, or the character near the end that looks an awful lot like Shulk from the Wii title. If it is a continuation of the Xenoblade series, then we're rather excited.

The trailer below features a fair bit of footage, which is encouraging in terms of the progress of development. It shows off impressive, sizeable environments along with some rather large monsters, with a futuristic bike and mech to travel around in. The gameplay, in terms of the fighting mechanics, seems to draw heavy inspiration from the Wii game, which cleaned up in the Wii category in the staff and community Game of the Year 2012 awards here on Nintendo Life.

If epic JRPGs are your kind of games, then we suggest keeping an eye on this one.