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“Join the fight between man and machine in the definitive edition of this critically-acclaimed RPG.”

Xenoblade Chronicles: DE for the Nintendo Switch

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Xenoblade Chronicles: Definitive Edition was released on May 29th, 2020 for the Nintendo Switch and is a remaster of the original 2010 Wii release, containing many graphical, quality of life, and gameplay improvements as well as an added epilogue that tries to connect the Xenoblade games. This remaster makes the large areas in the game, like Gaur Plains, so much more beautiful to see. Every area in the game is unique and memorable, and the world, even though it’s on top of a giant robot’s body, flows together perfectly and is a joy to run through. 

Monolith Soft’s music team shines in Xenoblade Chronicles, with every area having unique music and creating some of the most popular RPG songs in the world. Even ignoring the area songs, other things like character and battle themes, or songs that play during emotional cutscenes, never fail to deliver. Famous songs like Mechanical Rhythm and You Will Know Our Names even made it into Super Smash Brothers, which people love. The excellent OST is a perfect fit for the masterfully crafted story that is such a joy to play through. Even if I can’t spoil anything, know that the story is one of the biggest reasons to play this game.

Xenoblade Chronicles has excellent characters who all feel connected to the world and each other, with little to no one-note characters. The main party, especially, are very complex characters, and watching the many affinity events to see the interactions between them makes you care more and more about them. The main hero, Shulk, is one of the best main characters in any RPG and has excellent character growth; I loved seeing him grow and change throughout the story to become the hero the world needs. While the characters are fantastic, a great game needs to have good voice actors to back it up, and Xenoblade, once again, has some of the best voice acting I’ve ever heard in an RPG. Every voice actor in the game fits their respective character perfectly, and the voice actors truly put their full effort into their work. 

While this game is nearly perfect, sadly the gameplay side of things needs some work. While the game wasn’t difficult, I felt the battle and the side-quest system felt boring and did not motivate me to interact with them. As the characters attack automatically, the player just needs to press which special skills to use and when to use them, but apart from some combos to make an enemy fall over or heal your allies, there wasn’t too much to do. Also, a mechanic in the battle system introduced halfway into the game nearly ruined my opinion of the battle system, as I felt like it denied the player any option or decision and forced players to do one specific thing only for nearly every single boss. Xenoblade Chronicles: DE has 480 side quests, and almost none are unique or interesting. Most are collection or kill monster quests, which ends up getting boring fast. Sadly, unless playing on casual mode, doing these side quests is nearly required to gain enough levels to defeat certain bosses and beat the game.

Xenoblade Chronicles: DE has an amazing story, characters, and world-building, but the gameplay department lacked so much that it affected my enjoyment of the game. Even being the first in the Xenoblade Chronicles series, it has raised the bar high, making it very difficult for Xenoblade Chronicles 2 to reach this level of storytelling. Xenoblade Chronicles: DE is a beautiful game that will get you hooked onto the Xenoblade world and is 100% worth a play.