Xenoblade Chronicles Developer Monolith Soft Reports Huge Profits, Up By 138.2%

I'm glad that they're doing well, I'll eventually be try out the Xenoblade Chronicles series.

It’s awesome to have such a highly ambitious external studio like Monolith working for Nintendo. Hopefully this is good signs that Xenoblade X will eventually get the Switch release.

XBCX sounds like it would help even more...just saying.

@Kyloctopus Or other Xeno games like Xenogears? Provided that XBCX is still too expensive to work with.

@Kyloctopus

Monolith, Nintendo, Koh Kojima and Hirohide Sugiura have ALL said, independently and at different times, that porting Xenobaldes X to switch is not something that they are interested in. It sold less then half the units Xenoblades 2 sold, it would be costly to port, and it was a pain to localize and get rated because people in the west are perfectly okay the graphic on screen torture and murder at the hands of the PC, games that give you extra points for killing children, or games where you blow up cities with nukes ... but a 15 year old you can buy a bunny suit for got the game NR.

On top of that, Nintendo is behind on Metroid, BOTW2 and Splatoon, and is moving move of Monoliths people to those titles.

Still, I would LOVE to see it happen ... but it looks like it's just not in the cards.

@Captain_Toad

Tetsuya Takahashi didn't take the rights to publish Xenogears with him when he left, so if that games gets a rerelease it's up to Square.

Xenosaga, while a cult classics in a lot of ways and games I personally enjoyed, were disasters that almost caused him to leave game development. They didn't sell well, they were not well received, and he cut the series from 6 to 3 games. I honestly don't know if Nintendo even got the publishing rights, or if they are still with Bandai Namco.

Even if they have them, given how important this studio is to Nintendo, making a case that updating and releasing them would be the best way to spend their time would be a real challenge.

Awesome I hope they port Xenoblade Chronicles X to Switch soon and later give us a Xenoblade Chronicles 3 or Xenoblade Chronicles X2 or Project X Zone 3.

I'm not overly keen on the number of Wii U ports that have come to Switch as opposed to original titles, but I wouldn't mind seeing a Xenoblade Chronicles X port announcement. I never could really get into 1 or 2, but I played over 200 hours in X and really enjoyed its Phantasy Star/Star Ocean vibes.

Love to see it! I really can't help but wonder what's next for the studio!

I would rather xenoblade chronicles 3 over any old port title.

Would love a remake of the original Xenogears!

Im glad, these guys make some of the best RPGs out there.
They also are on top of their game when world design is needed.
The 3 Xenoblades have some of the finest world designs I’ve ever seen…. And the cherry on top is Hyrule in BotW.

They deserve those profits

@fafonio nah, the cherry on top is XCX : )

Glad they are having success. The Xenoblade games are glorious. It's hard to believe some folk still haven't played them.

Xenoblade Chronicles is an all time favourite of mine so I am pleased for them. Two was good but not quite 1's level. X was good as well, better than 2 but not as great as 1.

Really looking forward to more of their work.

@moodycat from the 3 Xenoblades it’s definitely 3rd place…. But even the worst Xeno game is still a great game. Just like Skyward Sword.

I've been wanting to get XC2 for a while now, but Nintendo seems to has stopped shipments of retail versions and I don't want it digitally... I want to support Monolith Soft, and not buy a used copy. I thought for sure they'd make an other print run when Pyra and Mythra were annoucement for SSBU. sigh

I have still to finish XcX on WiiU. It's one on my summer goals !

@TsukiDeity where do you live? It's very easy to get in Europe...

Glad they are doing well. I still need to start the second game.

I got the Torna standalone used from a gamer group to try out the series and I liked it enough that I plan on getting XC2 sometime in the future. I just don't have the time for a long JRPG yet as there are tons of games in my backlog.

@TsukiDeity didn't know that physical copies of XC2 are scarce now. Retailers from where I am still have stocks of the game but the franchise isn't really known here. Looks like I gotta get it soon then.

They deserve it. They make great RPGs. Their games are with good graphics (not too much realistic and I like that way), too much fantasy, very good soundtrack and good gameplay. The only negative is that some times you have to learn too much to continue - eg in battles and it becomes chaotic. The difficulty is ok by the way.

Really glad to hear that, Monolith Soft is one of my favorite developers

Awesome news! It's to great to see how much they've grown since Nintendo's acquisition. Xenoblade has become one of my favorite RPG franchises and Monolith Soft themselves have become one of my favorite devs.

@HeadPirate It selling fewer than 1 million is even more reason to port it. The port would likely sell somewhere between 1 and 1.5 million copies which would help them a lot with investing in future projects.

The biggest difficulty with porting X would be how to handle the gamepad functionality and adding in the much needed QoL improvements. But it would still be cheaper to port than Xenoblade Chronicles 1. The ROI of porting a WiiU/Wii 1st party game can be huge. Looking at the impact of porting Xenoblade Chronicles 1 will show that.

@roboshort hey and it wasn’t even a port… it was a hybrid between remaster/remake/sequel which costed a lot of money.
If they pulled it of with that, they can totally do it for XCX for waaaaaay cheaper.
And Xenoblade now being an established and renown IP, XCX on switch could be a total success.

@Captain_Toad I don't believe nintendo has the rights for those.

I think they're working on a port for Xenoblade Chronicles X now. They probably did some of the pre work while they were finishing up on Xenoblade Chronicles Defenitive edition and I'd imagine the main team that did that game are now working full time on a XCX port. The main reason I believe that is because the studio has nearly doubled its headcount since the Switch first released (it was 150 employees and is now 272) so having a team working on a port wouldn't take too much resources away from the main team that would be working on their next new game.

We really do need that XCX port. Just imagine a whole new generation of gamers getting to marvel at Lao's sullenness and delight in making jokes about eating your Nopon companion for dinner. Most of the internet probably remains unaware that the game had a race of sexy cat-people in it and I think that they deserve to see them.

Glad to hear they’re doing well.

Have to say that I never understand why so many people who played the game ask for a port of XCX, rather than the sequel we deserve. It’s been 6 years, the ending begs for another chapter…bring on XCX2.

I already put 250 hours into the first one, I don’t need to do it again. But continue the story and I’m in.

XCX2 bundle with XCX port.

Releasing XCX2 would leave a lot of people asking where XCX is, and wanting to play it before they jump into XCX2.

I never actually finished X on WiiU so I'm in the camp hoping for a switch port.

Xenoblade Chonicles X will not be “ported”, but I wager XCX will get a remake treatment to include all those cut content and possibly expanded to include a bit more, sort of a XCX1.5.

@YoungLink64

My point isn't about the violence loving ... I mean video games generally deal with violent subjects and I don't personally see any problem with displaying it graphically. Done right, it can really add to the impact.

What I can't stand is that anime girls are seen as MORE offensive then a head exploding or playing a game as a literally murderer getting points based off how gruesomely you kill people. I'll be going though my steam recommendation and it's like Mortal Kombat, autopay trailer of fatalities, on to Hotline Miami with blood splattering everywhere, THEN I get the "you must confirm your age before viewing this game" and a big WARNING, MATURE AUDIANCES ONLY... for Hyperdimension Neptunia. Because ... ya know ... you can see her panties.

And that was the problem with X ... it got a NR in AU and US because you can buy a bunny suit for Lin. It might not seem like much, but going in and redoing that asset as well as having to pay to get rated again is a HUGE money sink.

@N8tiveT3ch LOL I’m expecting that to be ported over too. I figure it’s only a matter of time.

Love you Monolith Soft <3

I am feeling it.

@roboshort

I actually don't work for Monolith and I would love to see the game ported, so not much point trying to convince ME.

I'm just letting you know what all the people involved with the game have said, and they disagree with you.

Also ... not really sure what info you are using to say it would be cheaper then porting XB1. What type of data did you use to support that conclusion?

Because ... not only has Monolith flat out said that isn't the case, but if you've ever worked on a port that comes as no surprise.

Wii U ports are, as a rule, extremely difficult and time consuming. The code forced you to do a lot of really ... I'll go with "stupid" things with the machine level stuff, like writing to specific addresses and some crazy ways of handling I/O, making it one of the most environment dependent PIs ever, and making any real automation tools impossible. Toshiaki Yajima said it basically wouldn't be a port ... it would be easier to remake the game from scratch.

Porting a Wii game is hella easy, the first part (moving it to environment independent code) is almost completely automated. All you have to by hand is find the bugs and fix them, plus any asset updates ... another thing needlessly complicated to do with a Wii U game. A Wii game is going to have assets in standard 480i, so again, interpolation software can do a lot of the work for you. The abysmal non-standard 854 x 480 Wii U makes that process much harder.

You're also forgetting they already had XC1's code mostly environment intendent from when they ported it to the DS.

A Xenoblade X port could get that profit higher, just saying.

I am honestly hung up on Disaster Day of Crisis. It's probably not an amazing game, but it's a long lost game for the US audiences and I wanna play it!!

@Kyloctopus External? Nintendo owns 97% of the company

That said, Monolith Soft is still a solid studio.

@TsukiDeity I got my copy recently for £45 from cex which was only a fiver cheaper than new so I was happy. Copies on eBay go for 70+ quid so if you're British check out cex.

I would very much like to have XCX on Switch. I never got to play it back when I had a Wii U. I’ve always thought of this series as Nintendo’s answer to the Final Fantasy series. Not nearly as many entries, but high quality games.

@HeadPirate Moving people to Metroid? Where'd you hear that? Most rumors say Dread already went gold.

Also, MonolithSoft literally opened up a new support studio specifically to help on Nintendo games in addition to their previously existing one, and has opened up two new full studios (around a 3x growth), so they shooould have the manpower to keep working on their own projects this time.

@HeadPirate It would depend on the code. The thing is the XB port to the Switch contained major upgrades to assets and other QOL improvements and an expansion.
If the code is well written and modular it won’t matter too much if they used tricks on the WiiU.

Here’s what we know. Most first party WiiU games have been ported to the Switch. XBC2 uses an upgraded version of the engine used for XBX. Most major first party titles from the WiiU have been ported to the Switch. They’d likely get a much better ROI in it than developing a new title

I don’t give much weight to what developers say because they will hide such info out of the interest of the company.

I dunno though. We may not see it. But that’d be a surprise to me. I guess we’ll find out sometime

I wish SquareEnix would sell them the rights to Xenogears. I wish I could play that game again, remastered and with quality-of-life improvements... 🙏✝️

when do we can expect to see the medieval game Monolith Soft is developing since 2018? and Monolith Soft must be working on Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild 2 and Splatoon 3 beside this medieval game.

I bought Xenoblade Chronicles: DE last year. It was ok. I'm glad the company is doing well.

@Captain_Toad the other Xeno games are another headache since they are co-owned by square enix. Time is probably better spent working on their own games than trying to strike a deal with square

@YoungLink64 "not everyone in the west is some violence loving savage lol. your other points i like though."

If speaking specifically of the game and movie buying population, I'm going to need to see some evidence to back up that statement.

@mazzel @path4smash @Brummieendo90
I live in Canada, Walmart, Amazon, EB Games, Nintendo Store Canada, Toys R Us have none, only BestBuy has a copy for $200... No thanks. The local game stores I've seen have none either...
It would be cheaper for me to order off Amazon UK and pay the shipping fee!
No idea why Nintendo of Canada isn't keeping this game in stock at least on their own store.

@link3710

OMG, hilarious. I'm not talking about Dread, the Metroid game with a 2021 release date, I'm talking about the one with a 2018 release date ... Prime 4. A lot was being farmed out to Bandai Namco, but their work was completely scraped and now it's being developed by Retro, but they are getting a lot of help.

Not sure what you mean by "their own projects". They a subsidiary and if you work there your pay check says "Nintendo" on it. They operate autonomously because you don't want to mess up the "culture" of a studio, but at the end of the day they work on Xeno games when that's what Nintendo wants them to work on, and support Nintendo's other studios when that's what they want them to work on.

Also not really sure what you are talking about with "new studios". They have a Kyoto office that focuses on direct Nintendo support, and a Tokyo office where Xeno games are developed. In 2018 they opened a office in Iidabashi which was closed and replaced by one in Ōsaki. in 2019 the Tokyo office announced they would be working on "A new Zelda project", meaning both main offices were now directly supporting Nintendo. While they are adding staff, almost all new hires are for "Production 2", which is the Zelda title. "Production 1", presumably a Xeno title, is still hiring but the location is now the SamaGame office in Ōsaki. So based on the hiring they are doing and the job postings, its more accurate to say the majority of staff including their main studio office are now supporting Nintendo projects, with the new Studio housing people from the Tokyo office still on the Xeno project as well as some new hires.

And finally! What are you talking about with "3x growth?". Nintendo just gave a detailed breakdown of the staffing levels 2 weeks ago ... they went from 248 in April 2020 to 272 in April 2021, and plan to have that number at just under 300 by April 2022. I see no viable way to get a 3x out of that.

@roboshort

Tricks? No, that's not how it works. In an environment independent language, like C++, you can say things like "give me a variable" and the compiler will allocate memory based on the architecture it is compiling for. When coding for the Wii U you almost always have to give a direct memory address; "set aside 3FF4 to write this variable". The clock cycles also split between sending output to the external display and the pad, then getting input from the pad and other controls in a very specific and inflexible way you have to control directly, whereas in a EI language you just pass to a function. So "well written and modular", apart from being completely meaningless words, doesn't change the fact that at bare minimum you need to manually redo all your memory allocation and I/O, also know as "99% of your code". The ONLY thing you don't have to redo is your logic.

What we "know" is that the people who make the game told us they are not interested in porting it. That's just the fact. If you chose to ignore evidence like that and what the developers themselves are saying, welcome to the flat earth club! Are you honestly implying that developers HIDE the games they are working on because it's better to NOT hype up your audience the second you have something they are going to be interested in?

My 2017 pre-order of Metroid Prime 4 would like a word with you.

Dude, I get it. You want them to port the game. So do I. But I have first hand knowledge of what porting too and from Wii U is like, and we have comments directly from the developer. They might change their mind, and let's both hope for that. But making up a false narrative based on false assumptions isn't the way to go.

@HeadPirate ...you knew exactly what I mean by their own projects. I shouldn't have to write a dissertation to explain that their own projects mean projects on which Monolith Soft teams are heading development, as opposed to projects on which their teams are support staff.

They might be a subsidary, but that doesn't change the fact that their teams are their own.

Anyways, as for offices, you forgot they also opened one in Nakameguro. I hadn't heard about Idabashi closing, hence where I got 5 studios, even though the correct number is 4. Anyways, although the 3x number is clearly wrong, I was estimating based on the estimates I heard for each studio when it opened, though with Idabashi closed that explains some of the discrepency. But the 3x was referring to the employees in 2016-7 (when BotW and Splatoon 2 was being made) to the present (when BotW2 and Splatoon 3 were being made) where they only had 130 employees. But yeah, it's closer to 2x that, not 3x my bad.

Also, I totally forgot Prime 4 existed for a moment.

@HotGoomba awesome series and I suggest playing Xenoblade Chronicles X in the WiiU if you have one.

@HeadPirate Nintendo is not behind on Splatoon or BotW2 at all. I have no idea where you even get that. As far as Metroid they are releasing one Metroid game and the Prime game was scrapped and started over because Nintendo didn’t like the direction the devs were taking it. I would rather wait a few years than get a crap game.
As for releasing Xenoblade I highly doubt it sold miserably considering it sold 1.5 million copies as of last November . That’s not a number to laugh at especially for a remaster. Xenoblade Torna has sold 1.95 million and Xenoblade 2 sold 2.05 million.
None of these are numbers to laugh at for game sales.
Now if they would remaster Chronicles X from the WiiU.

@YoungLink64 Horizon 5 is set in Mexico, so if it's truly authentic, it'll feature lots of guns

@Captain_Toad

Xenogears is owned by Square Enix; Xenosaga is owned by Bandai-Namco. Even Baten Kaitos, a Nintendo-platform-focused Monolith Soft game with strong thematic ties to Xenoblade 2, is owned not by Nintendo but by Bandai-Namco.

So no, really, Xenoblade, Disaster: Day of Crisis, and Soma Bringer are their only series that are fully owned in-house. Otherwise, they're working on other Nintendo titles like Zelda, Smash, Pikmin, Splatoon, and Animal Crossing. And if they DO work on titles like Project X Zone or Super Robot Wars OG Saga, they have to both get permission from Nintendo to work with an outside studio and also get that outside studio on board.

There's a reason that Baten Kaitos hasn't been resurrected on Switch despite great interest from the devs at Monolith Soft. They just can't seem to get Bamco on board now that they're no longer owned by the company…

@Dirty0814

Of all stupid things people do in internet arguments, the constant assumption that because you haven’t heard something it’s not true is one of the best. It’s called confirmation bias; you search for information that supports you, but you never investigate anything that might show you are working on some false assumptions. If you just took a few seconds with a search bar you would learn that the Splatoon team (now the awsomeist sub-studio at Nintendo, the squid research lab) are the core team behind Animal Crossing, and that when AC:NH was delayed the entire team was moved to that project. All hiring for Splatoon 3 stopped, the team even physically moved. I mean, forget the confirmation bias, you are missing out on a GREAT set of stories by not reading up on this. Hisashi Nogami was PISSED because Splatoon is all he lives for now, which is why the first footage we saw of AC:NH was a villager in his traditional Squid Research Lab lab coat showing off a squid. Latter in the segment they are talking about how AC:NH is a game you can play forever and they ask Nogami (in an obvious set up) what game he would want if stranded on a island … and at this Animal Crossing promo he just flat out, dead pan straight face answers “Splatoon”. I'm almost sure you can find that video in English. You should watch it.

After that he was given a ton of money by Nintendo to put together a AC:NH interactive event at Nintendo Live. Basically a blank check with the mandate to promote animal crossing. What did he do? He put together the longest, most expensive live performance from “Off the hook” and “The Squid Sisters” to date … but had KK show up playing “Splattack” for a few minutes at the start ... so you know, it's to promote Animal Crossing. It was EPIC. Again, if you've never seen a Live splatoon concert go watch that RIGHT NOW. Use the JP Nintendo YouTube channel, for some reason the recordings are always better quality then the ones on the EN channel.

Now I shouldn’t have to explain in much detail that when you stop hiring for a project and move all the people working on it to something else for almost a year, you end up behind schedule. BOTW2 is behind because some of the BOTW development team was moved to Animal Crossing (they added “post development support of AC” to their online CV and changed their work location) and posts hiring for BOTW were delisted. Nintendo assigned the Tokyo office of Monolith (the one generally working on Xeno titles) to work exclusively on BOTW to make up for this, which was officially announced in 2019.

Another easy thing to look up if you actually care about holding correct beliefs by evaluating information that might not support your viewpoint over trying to "win" an argument is Xenoblade X’s sales numbers. It sold a pretty abysmal 400,000 units. XC:2 sold 1.5 million.

I love this argument the game is going to make a ton of money and it would be crazy profitable to release when the people who have ALL the information and have likely paid a lot of money for market research and feasibility studies say otherwise.

Again, I hope we get it, even if the port is just pawned off on another studio and on a long enough timeline maybe it will happen. But I deal in reality, and every bit of info we have says don't get your hopes up.

@TsukiDeity dam*n that's a pitty

@HeadPirate The argument of "poor" Wii U Sales is completely invalid. Why do you think Nintendo is porting over so many games? It's because the games were great but the potential customers too less.

Fine example is Bayonetta 2. It sold roughly 300k copies on Wii U and on Switch more then 400k copies already one month after it's release.

I've only just got my physical copy of the definitive edition... But... I can't find Xenoblade Chronicles 2 physically ANYWHERE here in the UK, it's just disappeared. Bought the Xenoblade Pro controller at launch thinking I'd get the game later and now I'm screwed. Anyone found it for sale, new, in the UK?

Played through Xenoblade 2 last year, great experience, despite some frustrations with menus and some overcomplicated systems, especially related to the sidequests I would get invested in that just came to a screeching halt because I didn't have my gacha characters leveled sufficiently. The main story was good, however, and rarely suffered from these hangups.

I've played all 3 Xenoblade games. I have chronicles on both my 3ds and switch. All three games are great. Would be nice to get a port of Xenoblade chronicles x for switch.

@Bobobiwan same here! I got a brand new copy of XCX last year and downloaded the data packs. Now I just have to start it!

It's good to hear Monolith Soft continues to do great. They are one of the best first party developers for Nintendo. The original Xenoblade Chronicles was regarded as the best JRPG of the seventh generation of gaming consoles. Hiroyuki Sawano won Best Music at the Annual Game Music Awards for Xenoblade Chronicles X. Xenoblade Chronicles 2 won awards for excellence at both the 2019 Japan Game Awards and the 2018 Famitsu Awards. Monolith Soft started this year on the next Xenoblade game. I am excited! Xenoblade games are day-one purchase for me.

Great news. I still need to buy Xenoblade Chronicles 2 myself though.

Where’s that Xenoblade X port though

So many people still port begging for xeno x, that will not happen! I know it´s sad, but that´s what it is. Just be happy if we ever get xenoblade x2.

I sold xenoblade 2 after playing like 10-20 hours as it was so much worse than the first one. Kinda up for the switch version of 1 at some point though.

@Gelantious

Or do it like Atlus(SMT III port then SMT V later this year).

I hope XC3 leans more towards XC1 than 2. Still great games.