Monolith Soft Celebrates 10 Years Of Xenoblade Chronicles With Some Special Artwork

This is a nice piece of art. Can anyone tell me how Xenoblade X fits into the greater timeline? I know how XC1 and XC2 are but not X.

This artwork is frame worthy!

@Thundertron55 X is its own thing for now. Although if the end of 2 was anything to go by, it'd probably fit in like that.

Beat X, beat 2/Torna, playing 1 for the first time thanks to Definitive Edition.

This is, without a doubt, my favorite RPG franchise ever. So many wonderful characters, story themes, music tracks, and amazing setpieces to look at. Not to mention Shulk in Smash Bros is one of my favorite characters to use. In fact, that's where I first learned about him from and it's what got me into playing the series starting with X. But above all, the gameplay and fun aspects of all three are what really cements this as my favorite franchise. Nintendo's purchase of Monolith Soft was the best decision they ever made because franchises like Xenoblade, Fire Emblem, and Astral Chain give the "kid-friendly" Nintendo an image of variety.

While they have the cutesy Mario, Pokemon, and Animal Crossing on one end, games like Xenoblade are on the other. Themes of death, loss, revenge, hatred. Characters that endure life-changing trials of hardship from Shulk, Fiora, Dunban, Reyn, Melia, Riki, and Sharla's desire to purge the world of the mechon to end this eternal conflict of man vs machine, Elma and Lin fighting off the alien race that want to destroy them, and Rex forming a relationship with a Pyra in ways he never knew before. All of these games offer something new and different from your typical "Nintendo" style of "here's the thing, do the thing, happily ever after."

In the end, I can't wait to see the future of this series and what it'll look like in ten more years. Hats off to Takahashi and all of Monolith, and may their endeavors continue to flourish under Nintendo's guidance!

Genius game, a true masterpiece.

I just rescued Juju from Xord. This game is so good! I love XC2, but I think I prefer this one, at least so far.

@JR150 Fire Emblem is a Nintendo's franchise since ever (developed by Intelligent Systems, not Monolith) and Astral Chain was developed by Platinum

@Franz It gets even better, trust me. The story and characters in the first game much surpass the second game in my opinion.

You'll eventually run into your next party member and there are many more themes introduced that you wouldn't expect from the game.

@RCGamer I think he was listing in-house Nintendo IP's, not games made by Monolith Soft to prove a point that Nintendo has games with heavier themes to counterbalance the more playful "games for kids".

Wonderful artwork.

Xenoblade is hands down my favorite JRPG series. The world building, characters, lore, everything about these games is endlessly enjoyable. Easily one of Nintendo's best franchises and their partnership with Monolith Soft is something they need to protect greedily! They can't let it go like they did with Rare.

@Thundertron55 As probably has already be said, it is its own thing. But I could see them finding a way to connect it in a future sequel.

@RCGamer
Yeah I know that. I'm just happy to see a variety of games from the publisher.

Currently playing XC2,fantastic game,have struggled to find a good method for unlocking rare blades though. 90hrs in and at the world tree now. Not sure how much there is left to go but I'm certainly enjoying it. I'll be jumping straight into Torna once finished so i doubt i'll get the XCDE for a while yet. Love the worlds in these games

Happy anniversary Xenoblade! Really wish Xenoblade Chronicles X is released for Switch. The Xenoblade Chronicles Remaster sold far better than the original, why not give X a chance? Especially with the online function.

@PlayedNSlayed It's easily a 90-100 hour game just like the first one. But unlike the first game, you can put so much hours into post game in XC2. Already reaching 300 hours on mine and it's still a lot of fun.
But in terms of gameplay length, I think X takes that cake IMO.

These are the games that made me love RPGs, a genre I'd mostly stay away from. Playing the first XC on the Wii is a summer I'll never forget!
Then the hype and anticipation for XCX - ever since the first trailer that sent absoulte chills down my spine, I knew that'd be a Day 1 game. Little did I know that finding it would turn into a quest itself. And they, getting it and having to keep it sealed on the shelf for 6 months, until I wrapped up my final semester at university so I can really immerse myself in it.

XC2, was also a day-1 purchase, but unfortunately, it left a bit of a sour taste in my mouth. While the gameplay and the environments were as beautiful as ever, I really didn't enjoy the humour and a lot of the character designs, which easily made it the weakest game of the bunch for me. Not bad by any means, just not exactly what I was hoping for. But I did get Torna too and liked it a lot, for the most part.

My CE of the Definitive Edition should finally be here tomorrow and I cannot wait to revisit Shulk and friends - first time I'll ever be replaying a game that's THIS long. But won't be the last if they do port over XCX to the Switch, as that one was my favourite!

I think it's the first image I have ever seen where the female character has the epic pose while the male is doing the brokeback pose, usually Rex and Elma's roles would be reversed.

Amazing art! Here's to many more years of this incredible series!

Currently playing XC DE, first time enjoying this entry. What a game!

Wait five games? I can only count 4 or 6:
XC
XCX
XC3D
XC2
XC2TGC
XCDE

I'm confused lol

@AuroraBoreale Look at the European cover of BotW, Link's pose is pretty similar to Rex's.
Look at almost any MCU poster of Black Widow, pretty much Elma's pose there.

These are pretty common for promotional material.

I think I've just found a new wallpaper for my phone

Beaturiful. I like the "monolith" (lol, but I don´t remember the name of it; anyway, it´s a monolith) in the background, like a conection of all the worlds, all the games and stories of the Xeno series (not just the Xenoblades, I think).

@PcTV yes, they are common, so common that there is even a name for some of them, but the strange thing is that if you have the combination of one "epic" pose and a brokeback pose it's always epic male and brokeback female. This time is the opposite, and it's a nice change.

BTW, european BOTW it's not brokeback pose, that is when the character shows both chest and butt in a usually anatomically impossible pose

@PcTV XC XCX XC3D XC2 XCDE. Torna is dlc, though released as a standalone. So yeah it's confusing you could count then in several ways. You could say there's 3, 4, 5 or 6.

I'm really feeling this artwork

Elma confirmed as true X protagonist. 😎

Happy anniversary, one of the most ambitious and thrilling JRPG series in existence. Live long and prosper.

Love monolith soft.
Now port X to the switch.
While you’re at it, remaster a Baten Kaitos collection for the switch! Loved those games.

Amazing Phone wallpaper For Xenoblade Fans!

Too bad they ruined XC2 for me with its overly anime art style and the way the characters act.
XC1 however is fantastic and I'm loving replaying it again with the remaster.
Wishing X gets ported so I can finally give it a try.

Xenoblade is great but we all need a Day of disaster definitive edition and Yes I’m serious!

@the_beaver the Zohar. And that didn’t make an official appearance in one or two (I believe one guest character in 1 has it as a necklace), not sure about x as I didn’t finish it. But if it didn’t and they’re showing it here, I’m wondering if they will connect it to the Xenosaga games. I loved those!

Port XCX to Switch, might as well have all the Xenoblades on one console. And you don't really need to do much, just do a resolution bump. Gives us a slider to turn the music up or down, and to make texts bigger. Along with any other problems, that people have with this game. And lastly, Elma for Smash!!!

Really only just become a fan of the games, im 20 hours into Xenoblade definitive edition, already bought chronicles 2 for once i complete the 1st, see a bit of game play of X and hope they bring that out to. Im really loving the Combat in this game, any other game like this anyone ?

I'm sure I'm gonna get so many differences of opinions as I can see them already in these Xenoblade comment sections.

Which game would you recommend starting with?

I've never played a Xenoblade, save for (I'm almost certain) a demo of Xenoblade Chronicles X and even I could be misremembering that. But regardless, I'm a virgin to the series. So if I were to start playing the series tomorrow, what game would everyone recommend starting with. Not necessarily for story chronology purposes (though I guess that would be important as well). But what game do you think would best capture the attention of newbie and prompt them to try the others? Or are there stark differences in gameplay/battle systems that it would be hard to come to that conclusion?

I wouldn't mind spending another 700 hours in XCX.

Xenoblade will always be in the favorite zone

@Nalverus and @Heavyarms55
Thanks for the info. I thought that was going to be the answer but I wanted to make sure there wasn't something in the lore that tied all three together.

I wonder if this means that their next game will also be set in the Xenoblade universe.

combat on 2 sucked, for me, unfortunately i put it down 30 hours in. 1 is amazing though beat on wii, beat on 3ds and just beat on switch

@King-Demon I feel the same way about 2's combat. Hated it. But I loved the story so much I did play it through twice. Then I dropped off Torna when it became apparent they had made combat I didn't care for worse in the added story. Too bad, because I loved the idea of a prequel story to 2. In any case, my favorite games in the series are 1 and X and how awesome to be able to replay 1 on my Switch. Now if only X could get a port/remaster on Switch as well. As always, I'll happily take XC3 and XCX2.

@RPGamer Owari no Seraph / Seraph of the end.

@KidBoruto
That would be wonderful. Have you heard or seen anything to lead you to believe that's a possibility...?

Pretty nice artwork.

How we dont have a remaster of this yet is beyond me.