Topic: Xenoblade Chronicles 3

@Ralizah
Yup, I agree.

@XandertheWise
Once again, this is perfectly explained in the tutorials but here goes anyway.
You need to have either the Hero themself or one of your main party members equipped with the class to have it unlock for others. The battles you do this way need to give you class experience though, so you can't be overleveled for this.

I'm happy to hear that your wishes for the game came true as well! The gacha system in XC2 was the main reason why I didn't go for 100% completion for that game. I'm also extremely happy to hear that there isn't any missable content! Now I won't need to reference a guide nearly as much 😅

Shame about ng+ though. I was hoping for at least some unique features but it's alright. I'll probably do a ng+ playthrough anyway once I'm done with my completionist playthrough.

I'm quite curious if they're going to keep the campfire conversations moving forward. Perhaps I should've seen this coming since this is how it was in Torna 😅. Maybe they'll add something new in the story expansion for XC3 that will be used again in the future who knows lol?

Still just on the beginning of Chapter 4 myself.

Went back to previous colonies to complete any new side quests that popped up & have defeated the named monsters I'm strong enough to beat now. Currently my party is in the high 40's (level 48 I believe) and I've started to explore the western reaches of the second area that has the low to mid 40's level enemies.

I'm kinda glad I bought a Switch OLED to play this game on. Granted, I still play a fair bit docked (story bits just feel like they need to be on a TV), but the use of this color in this game can be really breath-taking at times, and it's a lot more fun doing this side content in a more leisurely fashion.

Which isn't to say that the resolution doesn't still become noticeably soft at times, but XC3 is the first experience in the series I feel I can honestly say has been good as a hybrid experience.

I'm deep into chapter 5 right now. This is a really exciting turn of events. After all, everyone loves a good prison break, ammirite?.

Gonna hang up the controller tonight. Time for bed. I just met Monica's daughter and got separated for fighting, then saved at the rest spot

I've avoided this thread and any media about the game since the announcement trailer dropped, but I've just beaten the game so I can finally drop the hiatus. I'll try to keep this as spoiler free as possible.

I loved my entire time with this game! It's possibly my favourite Xenoblade game now, but that might be recency bias so I might need to let it sit a little while longer.

I think the cast of characters in this game is the strongest yet. Among the main 6 I don't think there's a weak link, loved their personalities and they each have a special place in my heart now. Their designs are great too, feels like the perfect mash between Xenoblade 1 and 2. Also, Riku and Manana are easily the best Noppon in the series.

The combat system is pretty solid, the new Hero system is like a more refined Blade system from Xenoblade 2 without the gacha. It's fun to mix and mash skills, and I enjoyed the differences between Keves and Agnus classes. Similar to the Blades from Xenoblade 2 we also get fully voiced story quests for each hero which is always a bonus too. Chain attacks are satisfying in this game, although they can be kind of time consuming and feel a bit too easy to pull off.

Sidequests are a huge highlight in this game. I still have to go back and finish a lot, but I really love what they did here. Simple fetch quests were delegated to Collectopaedia Cards, so all the sidequests felt like they developed the world, and even a lot of the non-Hero quests have been pretty interesting. Having all 6 main party members active at all times also allowed for every character to chime in with meaningful dialogue, as opposed to Xenoblade 1 which just had some pre-set phrases reused for every side quest.

The world is beautiful, although my expectations from playing the other Xenoblade games were extremely high and I don't think it quite lives up to those games in this department. There weren't any areas that completely wowed me, like with Uraya in Xenoblade 2 or Satorl Marsh from Xenoblade 1. That being said I did love the mish-mash between the 2 worlds, with various callbacks and Easter eggs. Filled me with wonder when I first started playing, imagining how the world became like that. The music was nice too, but similar to the world design I have extremely high expectations for Xenoblade Chronicles and there weren't as many tracks that stick out in my mind for this game. Some of the remixes were really fun to hear though. A minor note, but I do wish the discovered locations were written on the map screen, not just landmarks.

So many of the cutscenes were soooo good! Definitely one of the biggest positives in the game for me. They were pretty frequent at times, but I didn't really mind since most of them were really entertaining. Certain scenes like when they first interlinked felt really epic, and a lot of the scenes later in the game filled me with emotion. I can honestly say the ending cutscene of the game probably made me cry more than I have in any game I've played.

Any other negative points I have are pretty minor, but here's a few:

• I wish there was more things to spend money on, or at the very least make shop accessories more worthwhile. I mostly used accessories I found in containers, so I have an abundance of gold stockpiled with basically no need to spend it.
• I don't think separate menu music was necessary, it can get a bit repetitive when you're constantly opening the map
• It would be nice if each character had a unique Art they could learn per class when they max it out, just to give more motivation to max each one.
• I liked the Colony idea but it did end up making most of them blend in together and lacking their own identity visually, but that said I still think they tried their best making each one look and feel as unique as possible given the circumstances.
• So far there's only been one quest that I wasn't a huge fan of. This being Juniper's first hero quest. I just feel like they change their core ideals way too quickly. The events that happen in their story quest just don't seem to justify such a sudden change, and there really wasn't much time at all to sit with what Noah said. Maybe their second Hero quest will change my mind though.

All in all I absolutely loved this game though, and I'm happy I can finally hear others' thoughts on it.

Here's a tip for you all: do not waste your time filling out the map in the Cadensia region. Once you've found all landmarks, the map fills in by itself, including that massive sea. I discovered this while hunting for Aionios' strongest and coming upon the last landmark inside a high level cave.
Apparently, this works for the other regions as well, but I guess I never took notice because I filled them in organically.

@Cynas
Welcome to the thread!
I agree with a lot of what you said but a couple of things stood out to me.

The world design, to me, is the best of the main trilogy so far. There are a couple of places in the game, mainly "secret landmarks" that offer a stunning view of Aionios. I love how all the biomes flow into each other, creating these massive regions to explore. They're also very diverse from rocky mountains, to grassy planes, deserts, city ruins and a massive open sea.

The soundtrack is a bit divisive among Xenoblade fans it seems. I love the inclusion of the flutes. It makes some of the scenes much more emotional given what they stand for. There's a lot more quiet, down-tempo music in the game than in previous games perhaps, maybe that's why people seem to be mixed on it? Not sure.

Agree on your points about the main cast, heroes, side quests and cutscenes.
My goodness those cutscenes! 😭

I also agree on money spending, but that's an issue every Xenoblade game and most JRPGs runs into.
And yeah, I too could have done without the dedicated menu music. It tends to kill the immersion sometimes.

And finally about the colonies not standing out, I sorta agree, but given the story of XC3 I thought it worked very well. In fact, I thought the cities in XC2 were always a slog to get through seeing if any of the NPCs had anything new to say. I tend to do that a lot and in XC3 every colony only takes a minute or two to run through, which is a plus in my book.

Anyways, hope to see you again on this thread. Always nice to have more people around to discuss this masterpiece of a game. Because that's what it is to me. A masterpiece!

@Mioaionios Good to know the map fills in after finding all the locations/landmarks. I was hoping it would work that way since the other Xenoblades did the same thing.

I still have a lot of exploring to do so I'm excited to see all the secret locations I missed! My opinion on the locations could definitely change after exploring everywhere. I still love what I've seen so far, so if I see a few more locations that really stick out in my mind it'll probably bring the game up with Xenoblade 1 and 2 in my mind.

I enjoyed the flutes in the soundtrack too. Actually my favourite instruments in game soundtracks are often piano, violin, and flutes, which is part of the reason I love the Makna Forest music in Xenoblade 1 so much. It's possible it's because the music was a bit more understated in this game that it doesn't stick out in my mind as much. I'll definitely have to listen to the soundtrack by itself when I'm at work, I might learn to appreciate it more over time too.

Good point on the smaller colonies making it easier to find people! Now that you mention it, I remember it being a bit of a slog to run around Alcamoth in Xenoblade 1 every time I finished a quest to see if anyone had anything new to say, since that would possibly trigger an affinity chart change and new quest to appear.

Man, it sucks that Mio's consul consume becomes unavailable after you select her hair-style. It looked really good on her.

Patch that back in, Monolith.

Anyway, XC3's small colonies make sense given the war-torn landscape. The world isn't stable enough to support larger-scale civilization. Also, they provide an interesting contrast with the City where the Lost Numbers reside.

With that said, if there's a Xenoblade 4, I hope it goes back to XC2's larger scale cities and towns. They were a lot of fun to explore.

@Ralizah Hopefully they might add it as a part of the expansion pass. I would also like to rock Noah's long hair.

@TommyTendo I'd love to see a larger focus on wearable costumes via the expansion pack. The consul costumes should be obvious, but weirder ones would be fun too. Let me dress Noah and Mio up as Shulk and Fiora. Nia's outfit from XC2 would be a lot of fun for Mio as well. Actually, I would die laughing if I could dress up someone in Rex's diving outfit.

@Ralizah Link is cosplaying as Rex, so why not the cast of XC3? 😂

Still on chapter 3, and a little over 21hrs in. Did a few side quests last night that took up the majority of my gaming session. So far, the games on par with the 1 and 2 for me. The ONLY thing I can see I sorely miss is the QTE for arts. That's what I loved most about XC games.

@Ralizah @TommyTendo
I know I'm in the minority on this, but I never cared for costumes. I like to dress my characters in their standard outfits like they appear in the official artwork. Regardless of class, my Mio will always be dressed in her Zephyr outfit.

I was over the moon when I found out you could change the outfit in XC:DE regardless of the armor you're wearing. And I kinda hated the way XC2 forced the Master Driver outfit on Rex at the end of Chapter 7. You could give him a swimsuit or a different colored set of his standard outfit but not his blue one. Aaaaghhh!!!!

Lol, dumb nitpick, I know. 🤣😅

I like the outfits, but don’t like that you need to reach rank 10 to equip them outside the class, they should just unlock instantly. Also, Taion looks so good in the Medic Gunner outfit that I legit forgot it wasn’t his default.

Anyone else find that once in a while a cutscene will give the characters their default outfits instead of the equipped ones, or is that just a glitch I’ve been experiencing?

Can't help you there because like I said, I keep my party in their default outfits.
I have noticed though that in some cutscenes they use their standard weapons regardless of which class you have assigned them to. Maybe their outfits change as well in those? Not sure.

This is intentional. When you first get the outfit tutorial it even says in some cutscenes the selected outfit won't be displayed.

Ah, that explains it. Didn't remember that tutorial.

@Munchlax I've seen that too. And weapons I believe.