Xenoblade Chronicles 2

 Switch
User Score
8.5

Generally favorable reviews- based on 2500 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 2,077 out of 2500
  2. Mixed: 183 out of 2500
  3. Negative: 240 out of 2500
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  1. Renzokuken
    Dec 4, 2017
    6
    Xenoblade II is an decent JRPG, but a huge step down quality wise from it's predecessor. The game has a rich world, an in depth story and complex nuanced systems. However the story is tainted by a one of the worst protagonist voice actor choices I've ever seen, the undocked mode looks offensively low quality with resolutions dropping as low as 386p. Acquisition of your blades is locked toXenoblade II is an decent JRPG, but a huge step down quality wise from it's predecessor. The game has a rich world, an in depth story and complex nuanced systems. However the story is tainted by a one of the worst protagonist voice actor choices I've ever seen, the undocked mode looks offensively low quality with resolutions dropping as low as 386p. Acquisition of your blades is locked to a gatcha style randomized system meaning building a meaningful party setup as you play is all but impossible without massive amounts of grinding. Many areas and sidequests in the game are gated behind field skills tied to blades, and as blade acquisition is totally RNG, your ability to progress is heavily determined by your luck, or willingness to grind. Some of these field skill gates are in the middle or end of a side quest meaning you can potentially waste hours on content you can't actually finish yet.

    Xenoblade II is still well worth a look if you can stomach it's glaring problems, but the further I've gotten into the game, the less I find myself wanting to pick it back up.    … Expand
  2. Kaprawiec
    Dec 11, 2017
    7
    Update - was 10 now its 7 from me. Great/ now ok RPG.
    Ill leave that its like playing Ghibli Studio animated movie. Idea behind this world is so good that the only thing I can say is that I just love it.
    Now on to what changed my mind - boring, bad designed combat! Its basicall just same combat system as the one in Final Fantasy 12. You run around, and the combat pretty much is getting    Update - was 10 now its 7 from me. Great/ now ok RPG.
    Ill leave that its like playing Ghibli Studio animated movie. Idea behind this world is so good that the only thing I can say is that I just love it.
    Now on to what changed my mind - boring, bad designed combat! Its basicall just same combat system as the one in Final Fantasy 12. You run around, and the combat pretty much is getting done by it self. Im usually not even looking on the screen, because it really doesnt matter in most of fights, they are either to easy or just imposibble to win. Oftenly they also piss me off with stupid crap - example:
    Im on lvl 10, fight with couple of lvl 5 bunnies (hitting them with ridiculously big swords obviously made from cardboard because 1 hit takes 5 lvl lower than me rabbit 5% of its health so the fight drags on forever) and then out of nowhere flies a bird or runs some gorilla on lvl 78 (!?) and one shot kills me. FUN...not... really wtf.
    I was hyped, after reading so much praise about the combat system, but really its bad for me atm. You cant just git gud when enemies oneshot you out of nowhere, and its not like I could run away either, because even when I try they will kill me from mile away.

    Ill update this when I finish the game, but hell, this game doesnt deserve 10.
    And for this stupid Tora character which I really start to hate with all my heart and this dumb infantile "mememe" or what the hell hes yelling all the time when fighting I would rate this even lower, but the game is actually good.    … Expand
  3. mattlarrubia
    Sep 24, 2020
    7
    Delete Rex and the game would be really great. The gameplay is one of the best in the genre.
  4. Mistoltean
    May 14, 2020
    7
    The open-world, MMORPG-like offline game, and gacha that you can get with grinding or in-game currency. XC2 looks ambitious and promising, but the execution is kind of awkward. The following issues are
    1. Mobs can unfairly overlevel and kill you without being provoked. Some can fly and no way to run from it consistently.
    2. Battle system is innovative but lacks proper tutorial and    The open-world, MMORPG-like offline game, and gacha that you can get with grinding or in-game currency. XC2 looks ambitious and promising, but the execution is kind of awkward. The following issues are
    1. Mobs can unfairly overlevel and kill you without being provoked. Some can fly and no way to run from it consistently.
    2. Battle system is innovative but lacks proper tutorial and cannot look back again. PPl who don't want to rely on external help might be turned off.
    3. The field skill relies on Blade, which relies on gacha and luck. The other annoying thing is you can equip only 3 blades then have to swap them around to get the needed skill to unlock or obtain the items from the field. Kind of clumsy, unpolished system.
    4. The story is dropped down for the sake of open worldness.

    In conclusion, the new ideas in the game are promising, but it lacks polishment and unfriendly to newcomers of rpg and non-hardcore players. I feel they are keeping it for a remake or definitive version. If you are into MMORPG, you can check this out. If not then might wait for the remake with quality of life improvement.    … Expand
  5. MadMaxxieXD
    Mar 1, 2020
    5
    I want to love this game so badly, the gameplay is very fun and the story is mostly, engaging, but the fan service, the sheer level of cringe, unnecessary fan service, just ruins the story and makes me actively want to stop playing. Pyra is supposed to be this powerful, ancient weapon, but she acts like a 12 year old trapped in the body of a magic stripper, constantly having cringe sexualI want to love this game so badly, the gameplay is very fun and the story is mostly, engaging, but the fan service, the sheer level of cringe, unnecessary fan service, just ruins the story and makes me actively want to stop playing. Pyra is supposed to be this powerful, ancient weapon, but she acts like a 12 year old trapped in the body of a magic stripper, constantly having cringe sexual interactions with Rex. So many scenes that just close up on female characters chests, or are weirdly pervy and sexual for no reason while grinding the story to a halt and ruining what these characters are supposed to be in the story by forcing them to be cringe, cliche anime waifu, wank bait for neckbeards and it's really a shame.. it actually gets to such a level that it ruins the experience.… Expand
  6. Xaphnir
    Jul 11, 2020
    6
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. A strongly mediocre game.

    The story is decent. Pretty standard JRPG fare, doesn't really hold a candle to Monolith's previous work. Good concept for a world, but it's lacking in development.

    The characters are a mix of good and bad. Rex is annoyingly optimistic, Pyra/Mythra barely have personalities, Nia brings some much needed sarcasm and cynicism to counter Rex, Mòrag is cool, Zeke's an idiot, but not in an annoying way.

    Then there's Tora. Tora somehow managed to take the title of Most Obnoxious JRPG Character away from Zell, a feat I never thought could be done. He has an annoying voice, talks in an even more annoying way than the rest of his race, and is generally an idiot in the annoying way. And then there's his constant string of Meh!Meh!Meh!Meh!Meh!Meh!Meh!Meh! in battle.

    Overall, I'd say the story is probably the most enjoyable part of the game, but it's not going to rank anywhere close to the greats of the genre.

    The battle system is by far the worst I've ever experienced in a JRPG. It's designed as if the developers went to painstaking lengths to remove as much control from the player as possible. Each character can have up to three other characters called blades equipped that they may switch between them in battle. Each blade is of a different element, and using the right elements is key to performing combos. It's centered around using your driver arts to charge your specials, then using your specials to perform driver combos, then using completed combos of different elements in a big chain attack to finish the boss. Problem is, you can only control one character at a time, and cannot switch in battle. The only control you have over the other characters is to tell them when to use their special. You cannot control which blade they have active, leading to frequent frustrating situations where you want them to use a specific blade and they simply will not use them. You also cannot control the AI's positioning in any way, meaning that you cannot include positioning of party members in your strategy. Now, what are you allowed to do in battle beyond what I described there? Nothing beyond reviving downed characters. No items, no magic, no other abilities whatsoever. This leads to very binary difficulty in the combat. If your characters are high enough level and set up right, the battle is near-effortless. If not, the battle is impossible or only possible with very good RNG rolls. There is no in-between. If I were basing this rating solely on the battle system, this game would be rated around a 2 or 3.

    As for the gatcha system for blades: I'd long wanted to see a gatcha system without the pay-to-win and other monetization mechanics games such as Brave Frontier and Fire Emblem: Heroes have. it worked fairly well for this game. You have a bunch of blades to pick from and if you like grinding and leveling things in RPGs, you will love this mechanic. The drop rates are reasonable (except for one particular blade), and your ability to resonate with more blades is limited by your ability to grind them and how much time you spend, and not your bank account. That said, I'm not sure I want to see any other games experimenting with a system like this. It felt more limiting than anything while playing through the main story, and fortunately by far the strongest blade for the main story is tied to the main character.

    Overall, this is a game that could have been good but is held back by an atrociously bad battle system.    … Expand
  7. Neku_Tennyson
    Jun 26, 2020
    6
    Xenoblade Chronicles 2 (XC2)

    XC2 is a mixed bag I love the story and the characters but I despise the gameplay you play as a treasure scavenger called Rex and met his humanoid blade called Prya, you only have 5 playable characters that can switch between their blades Rex, Nia (a catgirl from a race called Gormotti) a Nopon called Tora who makes a robot that is his only blade and there    Xenoblade Chronicles 2 (XC2)

    XC2 is a mixed bag I love the story and the characters but I despise the gameplay you play as a treasure scavenger called Rex and met his humanoid blade called Prya, you only have 5 playable characters that can switch between their blades Rex, Nia (a catgirl from a race called Gormotti) a Nopon called Tora who makes a robot that is his only blade and there is a 4th + 5th member I won't reveal who they are. The Problem with XC2 it takes until chapter 4 to finally start going as a game if you didn't like Legend of Zelda Skyward Sword's Proluge damn. XC2's prologue exceeds it in lengthwise, oh, and a lot of tutorials like EVERY FLIPPING 10 steps. One mechanic is you have to have multi-blades due to them have special overworld abilities that are required to progress and at least in my game I had to have them equipped some require like fire mastery rank 7 very late game so I think 40 hours of 180+ Hour playthrough was grinding and DLC was good but not that great, this review is not counting XC2: Torna in this review because it's also its own game tbh and that will get reviewed someday. But the Soundtrack in Xenoblade is always so great. You have different element blades btw and element enemies you can have 3 blades on all blade masters except Tora which elemental battles are a slightly fun but get repetitive really fast. The Overworld is you exploring these giant creatures called Titans up in the clouds and some maps are great some are average at best    … Expand
  8. SaintJames012
    Jan 22, 2018
    7
    Xenoblade Chronicles is a good game riddled with issues and problems. As a JRPG on the Switch, it is a definite recommendation for anyone who wants a solid game; however against other JRPGs across multiple platforms, it falls flat in its appeal. The issue with XC2 is in the game outside of the main story. The side quests are either laughably bad or frustratingly boring. They consist of oneXenoblade Chronicles is a good game riddled with issues and problems. As a JRPG on the Switch, it is a definite recommendation for anyone who wants a solid game; however against other JRPGs across multiple platforms, it falls flat in its appeal. The issue with XC2 is in the game outside of the main story. The side quests are either laughably bad or frustratingly boring. They consist of one of two different formulas, the first is either a glorified scenic route in which you are required to go to point A only to be told to go to point B then C, or it is a boring fetch quest that requires you to either get ingredients or get loot. What makes the fetch quests especially boring is the game won't tell you where some of them are, so you will end up running in circles trying to find the drop spot for these items. The voice acting for the English setting is pretty bad, as the actors must not have known what emotions were supposed to go with what scene. This is especially a problem for the character Nia, who in some scenes will be animated as hysterical or animated, but the voice actor will deliver the lines in a calm demeanor, undermining the entire point of the scene or otherwise diminishing the emotions that were supposed to occur. The game does boast some pretty fun characters and is smart enough to have them evolve both emotionally and combat-wise over time. The chemistry between the characters is also fairly strong, as cutscenes and dialogue between the many party members is always fun to listen and watch. Combat-wise, the game separates classes into 3 basic types: Attack, Tank, and Healer. These are the baseline for all party members. Added on are elements that allow for combos not only among individuals, but the initiated between the party as a whole. The sense of scale and the world are extremely fun to explore, although there are moments where the game does feel a little unfair. A great example is in a world a couple hours into the game, most of the creatures are fairly low level (about 4-17 for range), but included is a freaking bird that is a level 75. Mind you this is a starting location as soon as the game starts teaching you the more complex aspects of its mechanics. This dumb ass bird moves across most of the map, and if it spots you will attack indiscriminately. Since this is the location for many story and side quests, there are moments where you are stuck, since the bird can kill you one shot, and you cannot run away. This is not the only issue. Combat against creatures can also draw in others in the vicinity. While this does cause many fun brawls and struggles for survival, the enemies will never target each other even if they would do so by the world building standard. If mercenaries attack you on the road, and a herd of big buffalo type creatures join in, the buffalo will not attack the mercenaries as well. Rather everyone ends up attacking you. There are plenty of instances in other titles where the use of the environment and its habitat can be used to your advantage, but in XC2, this does not exist. Sometimes getting from town A to town B is a monotonous, frustrating endeavor because if a single enemy spots you, then you will end up fighting the entire colony of rogue death bees or hungry wolves. Still the game is not all problems. It is still a fun adventure to partake in, and the characters are for the most part likable and interesting enough to carry the story. While the side quests are a drag and grinding is going to be an issue, it can still hold itself as a competent JRPG. The problem is is it not a 10 by any means. If we are being completely honest, this game benefits from being on the switch. If it were to be on the Playstation for instance, it would not hold up against titles like Final Fantasy or Persona. This game is fun, but it is a 7 at best.… Expand
  9. friendzone215
    Mar 2, 2018
    5
    Pros: Initially the game was really charming -- fun music, the story is entertaining and funny enough, the characters have colorful personalities and there are huge animated boobs bouncing around all over the place. So in short -- the setting is a pretty traditional JRPG

    Cons: Where do I begin... to start, the menus are redundant and extremely convoluted. Just getting to the world map    Pros: Initially the game was really charming -- fun music, the story is entertaining and funny enough, the characters have colorful personalities and there are huge animated boobs bouncing around all over the place. So in short -- the setting is a pretty traditional JRPG

    Cons: Where do I begin... to start, the menus are redundant and extremely convoluted. Just getting to the world map is tedious and the map itself does not serve you well. Combat is clunky and tries to be super complex -- so much so that 10 hours into the game you're still getting lots of tutorials. In the end, it doesn't really matter and all the upgrading and stat boosting feels super irrelevant. The battle controls are just over done and the movement feels like it's from older generation systems like the Gamecube -- glitchy and clunky. Sometimes it has very poor & simple "dungeon" & level design that looks like late ps2 era graphics and I KNOW the Switch is much more capable than this. It makes some levels very boring to explore.

    Not the best comparison, but After playing Zelda on the Switch it set a standard for beautiful smooth gameplay that showed us what the Switch can do. XC2 is a game that could be played on the Wii or possibly even the Gamecube -- all in all this game was a huge letdown for me because systems are too deep, redundant and convoluted.

    I really wanted to love this game and looked forward to it for months, I even pre-ordered it. At the end of the day - Monster Hunter World turned out being everything I wanted XC2 to be and I'm much happier with it.    … Expand
  10. Brentinitis
    Jan 24, 2019
    7
    An overall pretty good but disappointing game. I've been playing these games all the way from Xenogears till now and this is definitely my least favorite of all the games in this franchise. I will say I did enjoy the Story despite a few criticisms I have for it and I like all the main characters... except Rex that is. Unfortunately this game suffers from a lot of really bad game design.An overall pretty good but disappointing game. I've been playing these games all the way from Xenogears till now and this is definitely my least favorite of all the games in this franchise. I will say I did enjoy the Story despite a few criticisms I have for it and I like all the main characters... except Rex that is. Unfortunately this game suffers from a lot of really bad game design. Convenient and streamlined features that were in previous games are just gone with no reason or explanation. For example the loot system was improved going from Xenoblade 1 to Xenoblade X, but in this game they took more than a few steps backward with that. When an enemy drops items and money they fly everywhere and more often than not land somewhere unreachable. This means you could end up spending a long time trying to get an enemy to drop a specific item only to have it fall off a cliff once it finally drops; this is incredibly frustrating and is a problem for the entire game. I could write a book on all the problems I have with this game but I'm deciding to look at the positives. The story is pretty good, I like the characters, I like the music, and the gameplay is fun sometimes. Overall 7/10, if you liked the first one give it a try.… Expand
  11. MrAptronym
    Jan 16, 2018
    5
    Note: I haven't beaten the game, but have >36 hours logged in my save, so I think I can form an opinion at this point.

    I genuinely don't get the praise this game is getting. I've been playing RPGs (Japanese and otherwise) for 20 years, since I was a kid, and I just think this game is a mess, I can normally understand the appeal, even in games I don't like, but not here. I do think the    Note: I haven't beaten the game, but have >36 hours logged in my save, so I think I can form an opinion at this point.

    I genuinely don't get the praise this game is getting. I've been playing RPGs (Japanese and otherwise) for 20 years, since I was a kid, and I just think this game is a mess, I can normally understand the appeal, even in games I don't like, but not here. I do think the environments are lovely and the music is good. However, the writing is boilerplate, the characters are bland things I've seen done better before, the voice-acting is mostly pretty bad and repeats endlessly in combat. (THINK YOU CAN TAKE ME? DON'T FORGET ME!)

    The maps are open world, but lack both the proper waypoints towards objectives modern games have and the narrative directions and in game signposting older games used. Instead, exploration is tedious guess and check. Exploration is rewarded primarily with boring collection spots where you gather bland, lifeless icons. Occasionally you find a Heart-to-Heart spot where you get a fun cut-scene and this is actually pretty great, but also pretty rare. I will also note here that the map system is abysmal. especially when the map frequently features height variations as obstacles. I can enjoy exploration in games, Morrowind is a contender for my favorite game ever, but XC2 doesn't seem to get that its not enough to make navigating your game obtuse. You have to encourage exploration by making an interesting world where I genuinely wonder about what will be around the next corner. XC2's world is pretty but ultimately boring.

    The gameplay takes a solid basis and proceeds to ruin it in innumerable small ways. Combat starts out bland, but builds up to something more engaging if somewhat overcomplicated for what depth it has. takes a longer term, strategic view for the most part. You use normal attacks to build up your bars for your special moves which build up your super moves which you chain together with your teammates super moves of specific elements to land debuffs and elemental orbs on your opponent which you then burst with moves activated by a party-wide gauge to cause massive damage. There are plenty of small complications to timing for these and your choice of both specials and elements but this is the overall flow and it honestly is just a bit too much watching bars slowly creep up for me. Plus, sometimes your allies, needed to execute the most damaging of charged bars, are just not cooperative. Still, it isn't a bad system overall.

    What is bad is the way you acquire blades. Blades are characters that are bonded to your main characters (drivers) and determine your element and provide your specials as well as various field abilities. The game focuses heavily on how important and sacred the bond between a blade and their driver is, and your male and female lead are a romantically involved driver+blade pair. Imagine my surprise when it is revealed that drivers generally form bonds with tons of different blades. Imagine my further surprise to discover that you get new blades through a lootbox/gacha system that is inexplicably in a game that doesn't seem to have any microtransactions. Blades are divided into common and rare varieties, with the common ones all being generic looking robots while the more powerful rare blades are designed by a huge team of guest artist with varying degrees of success. Yes, the roles and elements available to your character are up to RNG lootboxes you open from the menu screen. Remember that elements are pretty key to forming these important party combos. My surprise was further maxed out when I started recycling my blades into element boosters to try to aim for rare blades of the elements I needed. The gameplay and world here just do not match up, and furthermore this system is miserable.

    More lore friendly but perhaps most annoying of all, with one sort of major exception, your blades are bound to whatever character you chose before opening the lootbox. You can transfer them using an incredibly limited item you get a few of throughout the game, but if you happen to randomly get that great rare tank on your healer? Well, it isn't of much use to you outside the automated missions you can send unused blades are. (this is just Progress Quest)

    The annoyances go on and on. The game just seems insistent on not explaining what anything does outside of the combat tutorials, the menus are sluggish and the game doesn't even run consistently or well on the switch. I have sunk a complete day and a half of my life into this game and I have to say it has only gotten progressively less fun as it goes on. XC2 has tons of small, mostly insignificant systems that don't ever form a larger whole. I went into XC2 with high hopes thanks to countless recommendations, but I do not get it. The game is an inelegant mess and probably the least fun I have had with a JRPG in years.    … Expand
  12. SailorWave
    Jan 6, 2018
    5
    One of the most time wasting games I've ever experienced. If you dig mobile games, mmo's and flavor of the week anime you might really get a kick out of this game. Otherwise, I highly advise staying away. While the original Xenoblade Chronicles had a very compelling plot that brought back memories of epics like Star Wars, Lost Odyssey, and even the original XenoGears, Xenoblade ChroniclesOne of the most time wasting games I've ever experienced. If you dig mobile games, mmo's and flavor of the week anime you might really get a kick out of this game. Otherwise, I highly advise staying away. While the original Xenoblade Chronicles had a very compelling plot that brought back memories of epics like Star Wars, Lost Odyssey, and even the original XenoGears, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 does nothing but slog through a mediocre anime trope story that brings back memories of the worst of the Tales series or even Hyper Dimension Neptunia. The gameplay feels like an immense time sink, with redundant open world concepts such as long winded fights and RNG loot box style dice rolls for new party members. I wanted desperately to like this game - I beat it with a 120 hour playthrough, but my time spent was entirely in the name of integrity. How could anyone like a game where the combat has next to no user input? Where even the easiest of mobs take 8 minutes each to fight? Fights where there are upwards of 12 characters SCREAMING THEIR MOVES AND BARKING THEIR TAUNTS AT THE SAME TIME? And where there exists no actual area map except for the local fast travel map (I played before the patch which didn't even add a map but made the fast travel menu simply start on the area you are in)? I just had to know what everyone was going on about. And I never saw eye to eye with any of these other players, which has never happened to me before. I simply see so very little to enjoy. I can't even comment on the music because I never got to hear it over the battle commands, which can't be turned off without disabling the voice acting outside of cutscenes entirely.

    The game feels half baked, which is a shame because I wanted so bad for it to rival Persona, Final Fantasy, and other RPG's in terms of quality and I felt that Xenoblade 1 came close. But I feel completely gypped of my time and money and can't recommend this game for anyone looking for a good or serious plot with any good characters, or anyone looking for a game with compelling gameplay.    … Expand
  13. DreamCore
    Jan 8, 2018
    7
    + Great story
    + Interesting combat system
    + Beautiful environments and level design - The map is utterly useless, worst I've ever seen. - Side quests suck and are all the same (gather resources or salvage) but with different "story". Unfortunately you have to do them unless you want to grind. - Enemies has way too much hp. Killing regular enemies with the same or even lower level    + Great story
    + Interesting combat system
    + Beautiful environments and level design

    - The map is utterly useless, worst I've ever seen.
    - Side quests suck and are all the same (gather resources or salvage) but with different "story". Unfortunately you have to do them unless you want to grind.
    - Enemies has way too much hp. Killing regular enemies with the same or even lower level can take up to 5 minues which is the reason why this game is so long. Enemies aren't hard but just takes forever to kill even when using Specials, Blade Combos etc. Three characters beating on a tiny little lizard 5 lvls lower for 5 minutes is just ridiculous.    … Expand
  14. vahn
    Feb 14, 2018
    5
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. This is the most mediocre JRPG I've ever played in my entire life.
    Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is...neither good or bad, it's just mediocre, and I'm going to give my literal 2 cents about why:
    1)Bad story and characters: the game starts incredibly fast, WAY too fast, and in less than 2 hours your dull main protagonist - called Rex no less - will become the next savior of the earth...nothing too different from your general jrpg plot so far.
    The problem starts at chapter 4 because the plot literally stops and instead of giving us a good presentation of our main protagonists and antagonists and their backstory, we get to do literally nothing until chapter 7: this is when the plot decides to come back and explains all the motivations and the reasons for their action, at about 70-80 hours.
    Suffice to say, this is really bad pacing and writing and I recall getting bored most of the time because nothing was happening: all I was doing was just filling the time with pointless and meaningless cutscenes, which explained nothing to me!

    Add the fact that the main plot is quite literally two bad guys wanting to destroy the world "because", I really couldn't bother to follow it and I just rushed through to the end. 110 hours of gameplay, but it felt like it was triple at least...

    And to top it all off, the main protagonists are just dull and uninteresting, to say the least: Rex is the usual boy with a big heart and no brain, and Nia is just your generic tsundere cat-gurl who has a crush on Rex because...she likes blandness I guess. Morag - a potentially good character, great even - is just another bland soldier with no character development at all and will remain the generic "tough woman in male clothing", without much else to add. And Tora is Tora: He's a nopon, the comic relief, so you either like him or hate it. I prefer Riki: Nuff said.
    But among all this blandness, I'm glad to say that Zeke is probably the best character of the bunch and it's odd to say this, because he starts off as a comic relief himself and will get himself defeated twice for silly reasons, only to show his true nature later during the filler chapters. He is quite literally the representation of "don't judge a book by its cover", because he is far smarter than he looks and has something that the rest of the cast hasn't: a personality.

    To be honest, also the rare blades have great personality and their sidequests are probably the best bits of storytelling you'll get from this bland of a game, so not everything is lost. Just look for their quests: you won't regret it.

    2)First and foremost, I did play Xeno 1 and X, and both combats had their issues but it wasn't so big to be bad - at worst it was unbalanced. Xenoblade 2 combat, however, is just too slow, lacks the adrenaline and the impact that 1 and X had, it heavily tunes down the arts and overall it's an objectively worse combat than its predecessors.

    I could explain how the combat is slow, the cooldown for each of the 9 arts are slow and how you can't auto attack while moving, but it doesn't matter: all that matters is racking up orbs after doing elemental combos and doing chain bursts to kill bosses: that's really all there is to it, because you can't kill enemies or bosses with normal arts due to their enormous hp pool.
    Meanwhile, a full burst can do up to 6m+ damage within few minutes so, it's probably just best to look for the right elemental blades and rack those orbs up!

    that is if you have enough luck to find the right blades since they had the great idea of locking rare blades into lootcrystals (it's actually core crystals but do you care?), which makes the entire ordeal frustrating. Seriously, why random lootcrystals? Did they have microtransaction planned? I think so because you can get 3 kinds of lootcrystals (common, rare, and legendary) and even then it feels useless: I've wasted about 30 legendaries and I've had zero rares before I called it (I have about 25 blades now, give or take). Not cool Nintendo/Monolith, not cool.

    What wasted potential...I spent money for the collector's edition and after playing Xeno 1 and X, I expected greatness from this,Instead all I got is a piss poor jrpg that was clearly rushed to meet a deadline and just not enough polish in the story and content.
    Do I recommend it? Barely, because it still has enough content to get 40-50 hours going, but wouldn't recommend it at full price: it's not worth it and you can find much better jrpgs about anywhere and on any platform.

    Or if you didn't, just play the original Xenoblade Chronicles and forget this travesty of a sequel: Xenoblade Chronicles X is a far better sequel than this, and that game had nothing to do with Shulk and the Monado!

    At least it has quite the Xenoblade in it!    … Expand
  15. SuperDylan
    May 2, 2018
    7
    I feel like i am fairly qualified to review this game. I've got every rarer blade. beat the game twice. and i feel as if i have experienced the game with everything it has to offer. so do i recommend it. thats tough
    for a average person who hasn't played that many JRPG's this is a fairly good entry. it as a descent, but cliche story. and the story is probably the worst out of the series.    I feel like i am fairly qualified to review this game. I've got every rarer blade. beat the game twice. and i feel as if i have experienced the game with everything it has to offer. so do i recommend it. thats tough
    for a average person who hasn't played that many JRPG's this is a fairly good entry. it as a descent, but cliche story. and the story is probably the worst out of the series. But it is still an amazing story and it has pretty good characters.

    one of the biggest turn offs for people is that the game has a lot of fan-service. many of the character designs are skimpy and the girls are overly exposed, besides Mia. There is also a lot of **** moments in the game design department. These flaws are the reason why this game is a 7 and not a 10. let me list all of the bs aspects of this game at the end.

    The music in this game is nowhere near xenogears, or xenoblade 1. It sounds pretty forgettable. also the voice acting is borderline tolerable for a lot of characters. while that could be attributed to having boring cringie dialog, there are some really good voice actors such as Pyra, Mythra, sometimes Rex, Zeke, Mia, and the villeins. everything else seams flat and boring. Tora is especially annoying.

    1. there is a level 80 monster that can one shot you in the opening field. this is not only one time. this is many times and over level monsters are a reacureine appearance in this game. in fact Mor Ardain is crawling with level 80 monsters

    2. some of the boss's are bs as well and require shear luck to beat.

    3. the mini game Tiger Tiger is to tedious and boring. this game is used to level up and get new skills for a couple of new party member's (poppi, I'm not naming this a spoiler because its so early in the game. Its in chapter 1)

    4. Some rare blades (like KOS-MOS) require an obserd amount of grindeing, If you want to get every rare blade its going to be tough.

    5. Mercenary missions are boring and they should have had a mini game for them instead of a real time timer.

    in the end i do recommend this game, but it will sometimes test your patience, and durability, take brakes with it, and have a fun time.    … Expand
  16. ImperialKnight
    Dec 7, 2017
    7
    This is a very classic JRPG with an "open world" shoe horned in. It's not bad, it's just average. And what's worst, it comes out AFTER Breath of the Wild. It contrasts how well BotW was designed with the world in mind and how in Xenoblade, it's an after thought. The minor irritations within Xenoblade slowly adds up, and eventually you just want to tear through the main campaign and forgetThis is a very classic JRPG with an "open world" shoe horned in. It's not bad, it's just average. And what's worst, it comes out AFTER Breath of the Wild. It contrasts how well BotW was designed with the world in mind and how in Xenoblade, it's an after thought. The minor irritations within Xenoblade slowly adds up, and eventually you just want to tear through the main campaign and forget about the rest of the game.

    The battle system is over complicated. It throw dozens of mechanics at you, but ultimately none of them really makes much of a difference. The mechanics don't allow you to take out much higher level enemies and in the end, it's still a classic JRPG grind for levels to match the enemies    … Expand
  17. dennislam
    Dec 29, 2017
    6
    Pros:
    - Wonderful music
    - Exciting story and animation
    - Astonishing and attractive open world setting

    Cons:
    - Extremely boring and repetitive combat system (Currently in chapter 7 with over 80 hours in into the game)
    - Combat pace is slow. At level 20, it still costs over a minute to KO a level 12 monster
  18. Kenmei
    Jan 12, 2018
    6
    I personally wasn't a fan of the first two games in the series, both Chronicles 1 and X, but I was hoping that this game would buck that trend. And, while I thought this game was better then the first two, it still didn't do enough for me to stand out from the crowd in a very cluttered JRPG scene. There are tons of similarities from the previous two games in here that fans of those willI personally wasn't a fan of the first two games in the series, both Chronicles 1 and X, but I was hoping that this game would buck that trend. And, while I thought this game was better then the first two, it still didn't do enough for me to stand out from the crowd in a very cluttered JRPG scene. There are tons of similarities from the previous two games in here that fans of those will enjoy. However the series continued reliance on a very inactive battle system, very similar to an MMO battle system, and the horrible side quests that mostly focus on extremely random RPG elements to complete did nothing to hook me. Even if the storyline here was more interesting then the previous two entires, with a good cast of characters (even though they all were seemingly ripped straight from a Guy Ritchie movie with how British they all were). I was hoping to see a bit more change with the elements from the previous games that everyone admitted were just tedious. Instead those elements are very obvious from the start and I could never get over them. Thankfully for the Switch, this wasn't the game that needed to sell consoles during the holiday season. I was really hoping for more from this game but the series in general seems to be a bit stagnant at this point.… Expand
  19. Risax
    Jan 13, 2018
    7
    I got Xenoblade Chronicles 2 because I heard good things about the first Xenoblade Chronicles and felt bad about never getting it on my own Wii. Overall, this is the first game in the Xeno series I got. Mainly because I don't think Xenogears and the Xenosaga games ever got released in Europe.

    Anyway, on to the review. I got Xenoblade Chronicles 2 about a day before release, and I    I got Xenoblade Chronicles 2 because I heard good things about the first Xenoblade Chronicles and felt bad about never getting it on my own Wii. Overall, this is the first game in the Xeno series I got. Mainly because I don't think Xenogears and the Xenosaga games ever got released in Europe.

    Anyway, on to the review.

    I got Xenoblade Chronicles 2 about a day before release, and I don't think I played for more than an hour. The English voice acting got on my nerves too quickly. The voices didn't seem to fit most of the characters and their shouts during battle sounded flat and easily started to grate on me. It also felt like I was watching an old Kung-Fu flick dubbed in English with how badly the movements of the mouths of characters synced up with what they were saying, but when the patch for Japanese audio was released the next day I found that it was still kind of "iffy"

    Speaking of combat, throughout the game whenever I had to fight I was just...bored. You had to slowly move over to an enemy with you drawn weapon before you could attack, since your character wouldn't swing his weapon while moving. While auto-attacking you do load up skills that can give benefits if you attack at certain times or from positions, but combat never really got exciting. Even when your Blades performed certain moves. Usually that was just a mess of QTEs. Not that your skill level at handling any of this really mattered, because the difference in level between you and your enemy usually determined how easily you would win or lose anyway.

    As for the Blades I mentioned, they are what made me interested in Xenoblade Chronicles 2 in the first place. Now, I have a weakness for sentient weapons. Whether they can talk to their wielder, or have some sort of body of their own like in this game. I just really like it. And I was not disappointed. Aside from the Blades you get through the main story, you can also gain new ones through Core Crystals. And each Rare Blade has a personality, quest lines and Heart-to-Heart scenes of their own.

    Unfortunately, GETTING said Rare Blades is a mess that determines heavily on RNG. I've wasted plenty of Rare and Legendary Crystals, that supposedly up your chances of getting Rare Blades, to get nothing of importance.

    And raising the affinity of said Rare Blades and gaining better skills and actually getting to their quests can be a pain in the ass too. Expect a LOT of slay x amount of monsters in y place. Gather this amount of wood. Deal that amount of damage in one hit. And so on and so forth.

    Aside from the Blades the parts of the game I loved where the music and the areas you got to explore, which all looked beautiful in their own way. Exploring and gathering stuff could be a bit annoying with the way you had to organize your Blades, however. As they can only use their Field Skills when equipped, but it's something you have to deal with.

    Now, I'll try not to spoil much of the story but honestly I thought it kind of dull. If you played RPGs before, the plot and characters probably feel rather clichéd with the all-loving hero that only sees the good in everything and wants to save everyone. The Tsundere chick that keeps tagging along for some reason. The cute mascot character. The serious one and the comic relief. I did like some of the party members and Blades, but honestly I don't think I really ever grew attached to anyone.

    That being said, there are some fairly good twists and darker parts that caught my attention, but those didn't happen until I'd gone about half way through. It also isn't really necessary to play the first Xenoblade Chronicles, but there were some damn important things related to at the endgame that I had to look up. So I probably spoiled myself a little on Xenoblade Chronicles should I want to play it. But that's my own fault.

    Anyway, I've rambled for a while so I'll leave some PROS and CONS before giving my verdict and ending this review.

    PROS:
    +Amazing music
    +Beautiful areas to explore
    +Some good lore and world building
    +Blades

    CONS:
    -Bad English voice acting
    -Boring combat
    -Uninteresting characters and plot
    -GETTING Rare Blades
    -Raising the affinity of Rare Blades

    Overall, Xenoblade Chronicles isn't a bad game. Unfortunately, it isn't great either. I had fun with it, don't get me wrong. I'm sure I easily spent over a 100 hours playing it. But I don't see it sticking in my memory as a game I should pick up again some time to play for the beginning.

    I'd say, get it on sale if you're a big fan of JRPGs and don't have anything else to play.

    Final verdict: 7/7.5    … Expand
  20. ObjectiviTea
    Feb 18, 2018
    6
    This game is horrible. It has made me cringe so many times. I made an account on this website just to warn anyone that is looking to play this game... Don't buy it. If you do buy it, don't buy the DLC. I played the original Xenoblade and I loved it. The original Xenoblade had a great story and great characters. Most importantly the original Xenoblade had a feeling that it wasn't justThis game is horrible. It has made me cringe so many times. I made an account on this website just to warn anyone that is looking to play this game... Don't buy it. If you do buy it, don't buy the DLC. I played the original Xenoblade and I loved it. The original Xenoblade had a great story and great characters. Most importantly the original Xenoblade had a feeling that it wasn't just another Japanese RPG, it had a very European feel. And the mouths didn't move like I was watching some old Bruce Lee English Dubbed movie (as it does in Xenoblade 2 :( ). I can tell that there is still a bit of Monolith Soft in there. There are good things scattered throughout this game. But Nintendo put some... person... in charge of the team for this game or something and they just screwed everything up. I really wanted to love this game as I did the original but it is just so bad that I can't. I got to this cutscene in the third world and I was watching it with my sister and it was just so painful to watch and she agreed. I couldn't play it anymore after that and I don't know if I can pick it up again.… Expand
  21. Garbagio
    Jan 19, 2019
    5
    As a huge fan since Xenoblade and I went back and played almost all the developer's library this is probably the weakest game they've put out since saga II. That being said it's worth a play if you're a fan of 1 not so much X though. The combat is dumbed down from X with many combat features being removed/downgraded. Auto Attacking in previous games served little purpose besides interimAs a huge fan since Xenoblade and I went back and played almost all the developer's library this is probably the weakest game they've put out since saga II. That being said it's worth a play if you're a fan of 1 not so much X though. The combat is dumbed down from X with many combat features being removed/downgraded. Auto Attacking in previous games served little purpose besides interim damage while you waited for arts to charge on a timer but now they charge with it instead. There's ways you can change this with the new pouch items which is basically a brand new kind of equipment except it's on a timer and you can only hold an incredibly limited amount of them (Until late game you gain access to shop deeds) Auto attacking is now restricted to when your character is standing still so now positioning yourself in combat is now tedious instead of challenging. Because of this height no longer matters in the game. This slows down combat A TON in the early game. You wont get that familiar speed until well after the midway point of the game. But when you finally hit NG+ you'll enjoy almost instant arts charges and ridiculous combos faster than even X. Also removed: the soul voice mechanic but now instead we get... a button press. party members get a button you can push to do a super move. This is probably one of the bigger losses combat wise. Aura arts are also all gone. There's no more build variety now everyone fits solidly into Healer, DPS, or Tank, while characters can maintain multiple roles between them you're gimping yourself a bit by doing so. Returning from 1 though is Chain attacks which are now INFINITELY WORSE, made more powerful by the orb mechanic. when you set up these easy to execute blade combos that inflict orbs onto enemies. You can now control EXACTLY how long your chain attack lasts with these and these ALSO has a damage bonus. if it wasn't for mid-battle cutscenes you could easily just take a boss from nearly full health to dead with just one chain attack, given you aren't severely under leveled. To make matters worse you don't execute specific arts now you execute specials which are super moves that normally take a little while to charge but if you successfully bust orbs while in a chain attack you steadily progress until you're literally unleashing super moves after super moves. New to 2's mechanics is the Blade system, which is a generic Gacha system. you're given a core and you awaken a random blade and just hope it's a unique one and not one of the random generic ones. Thankfully they don't charge for these but it's still incredibly obnoxious. Other removed features is the UI customization, the affinity chart (Instead we get these skill trees that are called affinity charts but are nothing like prior affinity charts), the collectopedia, the quest system is revamped for better or worse I couldn't decide, 1 and X's incredibly robust equipment system (most characters get at max 3 slots with no visual changes except for weapons), The amount of arts was reduced significantly, there is FAR less options for long range weapons as well. Weapon switching is now on a cooldown (this one is timed). As for the world there isn't much to say here. It's not nearly as nice to look at as X or even 1. The areas aren't connected. you just sail to different continents. There's one area that's literally just a massive field with nothing but enemies in it. It's just a huge step down there. The story is infinitely worse than X or 1. Say what you want about X but it at LEAST showed promise and a cohesiveness that a sequel could easily fix. 2 has some great ideas but it is executed so horribly and it turns into the MOST generic shonen plot you can think of which becomes worse because there's multiple chances for it to break but the characters make the MOST inane choices to drag the plot back onto the generic shonen rails. Not to mention how obnoxiously contrived it is. Near the beginning 3 characters decide to take the direct approach and go right to the final area of the game, BUT it's guarded by a beast and a giant hole in the sea that are both well known about. Except one of them knows a way to go almost DIRECTLY there and she literally forgets about it until the last 10 hours of the game. Literally everything between the party setting out to the World Tree in ch 3 and when the characters land on the Cliffs in ch 7 is just complete filler, because one character forgot that the place existed. They turn around and immediately get swallowed by a Titan which is INCREDIBLY CONVENIENT because it has a mercenary group whose leader just so happens to have a dead son who the main character reminds him of and he just so happens to know a guy who has an in with the effin Pope who just so happens to know how to get past the void but not before he sends you out on his filler quests. And that's just 1of the contrived plot points, there's at minimum 3 points the party survive a huge fall because of a random updraft.… Expand
  22. p1nky
    Dec 14, 2017
    5
    My first attempt in XENOBLADE series. I decide to give it a try. Before chapter 3 all good, but then for new player is hard. Map is horribe, get some where without proper map is impossible for me. It take ages to get some where, because in quest log is not clear to how to get there + horrible map where you cant open in it in full and view the whole titan to figureout how to get some whereMy first attempt in XENOBLADE series. I decide to give it a try. Before chapter 3 all good, but then for new player is hard. Map is horribe, get some where without proper map is impossible for me. It take ages to get some where, because in quest log is not clear to how to get there + horrible map where you cant open in it in full and view the whole titan to figureout how to get some where is not pleasent experiance. I start to google thing to make it faster, but then after few quest I just gave up. It not fun to google and play this game. And its just hard time getting into it for me. Most of the time, I didnt know what to do or where to go. If you are not a fun of this series, please avoid. Enjoy Zelda!… Expand
  23. Kvr
    Dec 2, 2017
    7
    Bought the game and brouth ik back. The optimalisation is really bad ... lot of fps drops and pop up, also the UI is so demanding.. when you walk in a town the only thing that you see are the icons of the several shops, for me this really takes away from my immersion, also the graphics of Xenoblade X on WiiU looked strangely enough better then this title.
    I can see that this game can be a    Bought the game and brouth ik back. The optimalisation is really bad ... lot of fps drops and pop up, also the UI is so demanding.. when you walk in a town the only thing that you see are the icons of the several shops, for me this really takes away from my immersion, also the graphics of Xenoblade X on WiiU looked strangely enough better then this title.
    I can see that this game can be a good game but for me the technical problems are too much in front of that... the game feels rushed tbh, I will buy it again in a few months when Monolith has optimized it more. For now it not worth my 60 bucks... In this state i give this game a 7.0..    … Expand
  24. Fenriswolf
    Dec 25, 2017
    7
    At this point the game is so unpolished I can't give it the Rating it could have.
    Hope they will fix it.
  25. LocustOfChiron
    Dec 4, 2017
    7
    This game feels like it's one step forward, two steps back. The changes to Xenoblade Gameplay we've come to love over 2 games are interesting, Specials comboing with the now expanded Topple mechanics are provide nice bursts of extra damage and extend CC, but enemies have huge amounts of HP past a relatively early point in the game and the extra duration really only breaks even with pastThis game feels like it's one step forward, two steps back. The changes to Xenoblade Gameplay we've come to love over 2 games are interesting, Specials comboing with the now expanded Topple mechanics are provide nice bursts of extra damage and extend CC, but enemies have huge amounts of HP past a relatively early point in the game and the extra duration really only breaks even with past stuff like daze. Cool ultra customizable party member, but actually getting the stuff you want to customize him as you want means grinding a minigame until the RNG gives you the thing you want, the list goes on and on. All in all this game is a let down as a member of the Xenoblade family. It's still good enough by it's own merit to be worth a purchase for a JRPG fan, but by bearing the Xenoblade name it'll inevitably have to be compared to the original Chronicles as well as X, and in that regard, it comes up short.… Expand
  26. lilkillpappy
    Dec 18, 2017
    5
    The greatest and most obtuse and opaque game I have ever played. This really is a great game, but figuring out how all it's mechanics work can take more time and effort than your average gamer wants to invest. I thought this game would be more accessible, but don't be fooled, it is not accessible unless you are an experienced JRPG and Xenoblade gamer. If you can use all of its systems andThe greatest and most obtuse and opaque game I have ever played. This really is a great game, but figuring out how all it's mechanics work can take more time and effort than your average gamer wants to invest. I thought this game would be more accessible, but don't be fooled, it is not accessible unless you are an experienced JRPG and Xenoblade gamer. If you can use all of its systems and understand how to buff all your stats and figure out everything that is going on in combat then you will probably love this game.… Expand
  27. Siggy88
    Mar 2, 2018
    7
    +0- Little brother to Xenoblade (Wii), playing XC first is recommended, but not vital -0+

    A game that feels closer in style to XC than XCX. The game offers an original universe: a sea of clouds on which titans live (some of them are only a few meters, some others are literally organic continents on which people live!). There are several species (humans, Nopons...) living on titans, but    +0- Little brother to Xenoblade (Wii), playing XC first is recommended, but not vital -0+

    A game that feels closer in style to XC than XCX.
    The game offers an original universe: a sea of clouds on which titans live (some of them are only a few meters, some others are literally organic continents on which people live!). There are several species (humans, Nopons...) living on titans, but there are also Blades. They are immortal beings that other living creatures can summon for help.

    +++Good+++

    + good story, although with more clichés
    + team consist of up to 3 characters and one Blade each. You can assign 3 Blades at a time for each char and switch them during battle to adapt your strategy
    + superb OST
    + several amazing characters
    + great variety in environment. Although each individual titan feels a bit useless outside of one or two story-related places (mostly one main city per titan)
    + convenient cutscenes viewer, but you need to restart the game to use it
    + the game gives you the same sense of wonder and curiosity as XC. Every new titan, every new character, every new chapter is a discovery.

    000Meh...000

    0 many QTE and some button mashing in battle. Sometimes even a mix of the two. Erk!
    0 combat system kind of discourages you from moving. You will spend a lot of time in battle just standing around waiting for skills to charge up
    0 devs took good note of all the praise they got for the British VA in XC and decided to do that again. Sadly the cast in unequal in skill and some chars have very thick accents.
    0 oversexualized female characters, you like it or you hate it. Poor Pyra can't even see her feet :'(
    0 a character whose role is so cliché that he complains about it himself (RIP 4th wall) and another character complains about wasting time right after a padding section of the game. That's a bit frustrating.
    0 the game keeps receiving patches, but clearly it has been released a couple months too early for Christmas
    0 tutorials are not great and can only be seen once
    0 the game keeps giving you low tier stuff (lowest level cores for the Blades, notably) nearly until the end. Drops and chest feel underwhelming too often.
    0 resolution is low in handheld mode, but AA is surprisingly good
    0 a lot of menu navigation

    ---Bad---

    - if you don't like games where everyone keeps shouting for no reason this game is not for you. (chars comment on practically everything: sunrise, sunset, fast travel, opening a chest...)
    - the fighting mechanics seem to have been designed with complexity in mind, rather than depth (slow, hard to learn, messy GUI...)
    - a RPG that tries way to hard to be a platformer at times. The jumps are terrible and the collisions are sometimes treacherous.
    - likewise, physics applies to loot too! Items can fall off cliffs and be lost for ever (WTF?)
    - AI is probably as good as in other games in the series, but the more complex geometry of the levels will make your team mates run around, get stuck or jump over cliff often. It gets old real fast.
    - padding!
    - bosses are big bags of HP, fights take forever
    - ridiculous difficulty spikes on some story bosses that will halt your progress and force you to level-up. Then you will tear through everything for the next 3 hours...
    - the way you unlock new Blades is a disaster. It is a GATCHA! And a very bad one. You will have to collect cores in fights and from chests. Using one leads to an unskippable cutscene (nearly 40 seconds total!). To be fixed soon apparently?
    - most of the time you will get a basic Blade from your gatcha. Good luck collecting all the unique ones!
    - upgrades for one of the Blade are locked behind a 8bit minigame. It is not fun, but since it's mandatory...
    - the game spoils many things due to poor design and oversights. For example, you can tell which enemies will become allies later on by looking at the silhouettes in the Blades menu.
    - some cutscenes are just too long
    - inconsistent names of main chars between Japanese and English localization. You can have JP VA with EN subs if you want, but it will be hard to follow.
    - I can tell that at least the French localization tends to be very inconsistent with the English one at times. Overall quality of translation is sometimes amateurish.
    - some weird design decisions: just like in the other games, you heal automatically out of fights, but now there are inns. Their only real purpose is to level-up chars, instead of doing so immediately on the field. Ins feel shoe-horned in the game.
    - very predictable lines of dialogue and many classic character archetypes
    - the game keeps introducing new rules for the universe, but it never takes very long until a new character arrives to brake that rule before you even had time to get used to it
    - ended sooner than expected. I was expecting the game to pull a "Ha! You thought it was over, but there's 15 more hours to go!". It did not.
    - some cryptic things to do to unlock some rare blades...    … Expand
  28. WolvenAshes
    Mar 8, 2018
    5
    The story is great and the world itself is vast as well, but this game is far from great. Combat is slow to get into, doesn't really get that engaging until late game honestly. Bosses were ok at best, and the music was pretty decent. The quests were a nice change of pace, but the characters in the game are a strong point. Overall, I enjoyed Xenoblade Chronicles X a lot more than this..butThe story is great and the world itself is vast as well, but this game is far from great. Combat is slow to get into, doesn't really get that engaging until late game honestly. Bosses were ok at best, and the music was pretty decent. The quests were a nice change of pace, but the characters in the game are a strong point. Overall, I enjoyed Xenoblade Chronicles X a lot more than this..but it's worth a play-through. Just don't 100% before doing new game +, I did that and quickly shelved the game after restarting due to boredom. Not game of the year, for sure.… Expand
  29. vince14_evil
    Jan 16, 2018
    7
    How can I say ? It is not a game of the year like Zelda but I had good time played it.
    If you want a kinda like solo-mmorpg, it's the game for you!

    The graphic and the presentation are very disappointing comparing of the first X.
  30. jcvandan
    Feb 13, 2018
    6
    First of all, the combat system in this game is incredible. I really enjoyed getting to grips with it. Western RPG's could learn a thing or two from this game about implementing deep combat that takes many many hours to master. However the combat is the only thing that kept me playing to the end, as I don't think this is a particularly good game. The storyline is total nonsense with a hardFirst of all, the combat system in this game is incredible. I really enjoyed getting to grips with it. Western RPG's could learn a thing or two from this game about implementing deep combat that takes many many hours to master. However the combat is the only thing that kept me playing to the end, as I don't think this is a particularly good game. The storyline is total nonsense with a hard to understand plot that has nonsensical twists and turns constantly. Characters seem to behave in odd ways at random times, and many of the characters motivations are completely impenetrable. There are also waaaaay too many cut-scenes. I don't mind long cut scenes, but the way they are done in this game is totally obnoxious. You watch one cut scene which lasts 5 minutes, then it goes back to the game, you run forward for literally 30 seconds, then there is a 2 minute cut scene, then so on and so forth. This got a lot worse in the last few chapters of the game, and this is when I really stopped enjoying it and just started ploughing through to finish it (as I had already sunk so many hours into it I felt the need to complete it). One thing I will say though is I quite enjoyed the banter between the main characters earlier one when it wasn't so serious and exposition heavy, and despite what other reviewers have said I quite liked the english voice acting and it's nice to hear regional British dialects in a game like this.

    In terms of graphics it can be a wonder to behold at times, with a very pleasing anime art style and incredibly vast open areas. This all changes in handheld mode though, as the resolution drops to something close to standard definition and the frame rate chugs along even at this low res. It also has some weird artifacting effect round the edges of models in handheld mode which makes it look very amateurish. Graphics aren't everything but when it's this bad it actually takes you out of the game. I think they should have been less ambitious with the textures etc so as to keep the resolution up.

    This is the first JRPG I've played since FF8 on the PS1, but I don't think I will be playing another tbh.    … Expand
  31. Orz233
    May 14, 2018
    6
    Auto save feature of this game serverely destroys my game experience. I definitely support the developers to use auto-save feature to prevent players to use Save&.Load to repeatdly draw crystal and the developers actually done well on this point [1 save per draw]. But... please do not just let your auto-save feature only works here... I have used 5 hours to upgrade my Zenobia's KizunaAuto save feature of this game serverely destroys my game experience. I definitely support the developers to use auto-save feature to prevent players to use Save&.Load to repeatdly draw crystal and the developers actually done well on this point [1 save per draw]. But... please do not just let your auto-save feature only works here... I have used 5 hours to upgrade my Zenobia's Kizuna Circle to full and when i almost done the game crashed. No even 1 time auto-save worked during this duration even i killed several dozens of Elite monsters for Zenobia. Originally i prepare to score 8 to this game but now only 6. This game can be better if the developers can pay more time to improve the game experience [not only auto-save].… Expand
  32. BrettSiebenhaar
    May 24, 2018
    6
    This game was good, just not Zelda good. The game was too big for its own good in my opinion. There were plenty of times where I wandered around endlessly not knowing where to go because the game doesn't really help you with directions. The game was fun and emotional, but it lacked that X factor, funny saying this because the games name starts with an X! The game did get repetitive atThis game was good, just not Zelda good. The game was too big for its own good in my opinion. There were plenty of times where I wandered around endlessly not knowing where to go because the game doesn't really help you with directions. The game was fun and emotional, but it lacked that X factor, funny saying this because the games name starts with an X! The game did get repetitive at times, and the lack of customization ruined it for me, but I did still enjoy it for the most part...… Expand
  33. SwitchReview
    Dec 28, 2018
    6
    Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is sadly a game that I cannot recommend. One of the first highly rated games on here that I did not enjoy on the Switch. My initial reaction upon starting the game was that the graphics are pretty blurry compared to other big titles on the Switch. This problem becomes especially noticeable in handheld mode.

    The story is what you'd expect from a JRPG, and it    Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is sadly a game that I cannot recommend. One of the first highly rated games on here that I did not enjoy on the Switch. My initial reaction upon starting the game was that the graphics are pretty blurry compared to other big titles on the Switch. This problem becomes especially noticeable in handheld mode.

    The story is what you'd expect from a JRPG, and it definitely picks up later on. The voice acting was interesting to say the least, I downloaded the Japanese voice pack DLC and played with that for the most part. Really the only strong points that I found were the music and story, which is disappointing for a game as hyped as this.

    There is about 50 hours of gameplay packed into this game, or 36 if you subtract the 14 hours of cutscenes. There's a lot of content in Xenoblade Chronicles 2, some of which is interesting and may help to distract you from the long and grueling combat. The combat system isn't as bad as people say, a couple of short YouTube tutorials will set you on the right path. The actual length of the combat itself is the problem, many of the enemies feel as if you are fighting a tank. Usually, when I play an RPG I like to explore every part of the dungeon and defeat all the enemies. Xenoblade Chronicles 2 was probably the first game I decided not to do this. Eventually, it became a hilarious game of "how fast can I sprint past these enemies to get to the next cutscene?"

    I will give credit though, a lot of games tend to drag out the ending with useless stuff but Xenoblade Chronicles 2 did not do this and the pacing was very good. Overall, I give Xenoblade Chronicles a 6/10.    … Expand
  34. monmon
    Oct 11, 2018
    5
    This sequel title has unfinished, contradictory, and choppy main story especially compared to the previous "Xenoblade Chronicles" and "Xenogears" title. There are "too much" boring side quests, and I found it's difficult to empathize with main characters and villains. These three main issues ruin the best quality of music and massive landscapes/worlds. I suppose this title could becomeThis sequel title has unfinished, contradictory, and choppy main story especially compared to the previous "Xenoblade Chronicles" and "Xenogears" title. There are "too much" boring side quests, and I found it's difficult to empathize with main characters and villains. These three main issues ruin the best quality of music and massive landscapes/worlds. I suppose this title could become another masterpiece as a "legitimate sequel of Xenoblade Chronicle" if staff could invest more time to make the story more persuasive and give more emotional reality on the main characters.
    I feel very sorry about the staff who tried to cover the incomplete quality of its main story with less-interesting side stories of rare blades and side quests which force players to work on boring routines over and over again without strong emotional motivation.    … Expand
  35. RdeRuben
    May 1, 2019
    7
    Nice game.
    Best: Combat system
    Worst: Sexist with the female sex.
    Infinite Movie Scenes
    It's an easy game but when it wants it becomes in a wall and u must search guides to continues.
    About 80 hours finish it.
  36. DoctorCalamari
    May 17, 2019
    6
    Overall, do I think Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is overrated? Yeah. It has subpar Graphics, a complicated-yet uninteresting battle system, way too much play time for just the story mode, mediocre characters, and Voice Acting that is MegaMan 8 levels of bad.
    However, it has enough pros for me to say that I still recommend it to RPG fans and even those interested. I'm relatively alone on this.    Overall, do I think Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is overrated? Yeah. It has subpar Graphics, a complicated-yet uninteresting battle system, way too much play time for just the story mode, mediocre characters, and Voice Acting that is MegaMan 8 levels of bad.
    However, it has enough pros for me to say that I still recommend it to RPG fans and even those interested. I'm relatively alone on this. I'll just give it the coveted "Not My Thing" award.    … Expand
  37. foofaloop
    May 26, 2019
    6
    Personally not a fan of the new anime-esque aesthetic that this game tries to portray compared to the others in the series. The game tends to lay several anime tropes on pretty thick which for me made it hard to get invested in the plot.

    Combat in the game is significantly more linear compared to the previous entries and leaves a lot to be desired. Additionally there is a gachapon    Personally not a fan of the new anime-esque aesthetic that this game tries to portray compared to the others in the series. The game tends to lay several anime tropes on pretty thick which for me made it hard to get invested in the plot.

    Combat in the game is significantly more linear compared to the previous entries and leaves a lot to be desired. Additionally there is a gachapon system for obtaining essential equipment for your characters and the game forces you to save beforehand so you cannot reset for what you want despite the game being an offline single player game.

    While I do have my issues with this game, I wouldn't call it outright bad, just kind of disappointing compared to the previous entries.    … Expand
  38. Poochingus
    Nov 14, 2019
    7
    I love xenoblade games. So why a 7? Well, I'm a realistic person, I don't rate everything a 10 just because I like it.

    Xenoblade 2 is a great game with a lot of rough edges. The most difficult part is the English voiceover. The main character "Rex" has the most embarrassing fake yelling I've ever heard. I have no idea how the director didn't storm into the booth, slap him in the face    I love xenoblade games. So why a 7? Well, I'm a realistic person, I don't rate everything a 10 just because I like it.

    Xenoblade 2 is a great game with a lot of rough edges. The most difficult part is the English voiceover. The main character "Rex" has the most embarrassing fake yelling I've ever heard. I have no idea how the director didn't storm into the booth, slap him in the face and when he yells "ow" tell him, good, now yell like that. He isn't the only one who gives a lackluster performance, "Gramps" the dragon looking creature and animal familiar of the party is just some old guy who reads his lines in a voice. That is it.

    The game's graphics are honestly really good, but like breath of the wild, probably pushes the graphics to the limits of the console. I wish I could have lowered some settings to get fewer frame drops in some cases. I would love to see this game on PC for this reason, so I could max out the settings and see it in its full beauty.

    Storywise this game is quite compelling thankfully, so it can make up for some of the poor acting. Not much else to be said without major spoilers.

    The depth of the RPG elements is what will make you want to play or not want to play this game. If you like complexity, you will enjoy this. If you want a simple straightforward system, you might want to skip this. It has lots of stuff that you will probably forget about.

    In terms of characters, the catcha system is what KILLS the game's fun. You have to open silly little crystals to get new characters to use, and getting good ones is almost impossible. Worse still, each one is bound the party member you open it on. This means you might open a great tank character on your healer party member. It feels bad. Only Rex, the main character is able to use any character you open, which you won't want to do anyhow, because he by default has the objectively best character anyhow.

    Getting over that slog, the ability to chain together elements and combo into huge amounts of damage is even more satisfying than xenoblade 1's chain attacks which were already fun to pull off at the right time. The combat early on may seem slow and boring, but that is to give you time to warm into it, which is good for players who aren't deep RPG players. Once you get a full loadout and party, you will find yourself being mindful in hard fights of when to change, attack, and use combos. With the right line up you can create some really powerful and engrossing parties.

    In the end, I was sad that it ended, and sadly this is one of those games with no post game content like the old days where you load back to the last save before you beat the game. But considering this game was such an early title for the console I can forgive that along with the already large amount of content.    … Expand
  39. neko555
    Sep 17, 2022
    5
    Es una autentica pena lo de este juego. La historia, sin ser gran cosa, no es mala, y la jugabilidad de los combates, una vez lo pillas, es muy divertida. Pero tiene puntos negativos que, al menos a mí, me han hecho plantearme dejar el juego a medias en varias ocasiones.

    Quizás el más grave es que te hace perder el tiempo, muchísimo. Las primeras horas pensé que simplemente tenía    Es una autentica pena lo de este juego. La historia, sin ser gran cosa, no es mala, y la jugabilidad de los combates, una vez lo pillas, es muy divertida. Pero tiene puntos negativos que, al menos a mí, me han hecho plantearme dejar el juego a medias en varias ocasiones.

    Quizás el más grave es que te hace perder el tiempo, muchísimo. Las primeras horas pensé que simplemente tenía mecánicas algo anticuadas, falta de pulido, que se solía ver más en juegos de PS1 o PS2. Después te das cuenta que es totalmente deliberado. No se si querían ostentar el récord de juego offline más largo de la historia, pero es lo que parece. Algunos ejemplos:
    Cada situación que requiere de habilidades de blade tiene que reproducirse una animación de cada uno de los blades, cuando avanzas algo en el juego esto puede significar hasta 15 animaciones solo para extraer un mísero material.

    Muchos de los artículos, en lugar de poder venderse en bloque, hay que ir vendiéndolos de uno en uno, artículos que los enemigos sueltan a patadas, 99,9% repetidos y casi inservibles, he llegado a estar 10-12 minutos vendiendo equipamiento hasta que me he cansado y lo he dejado.

    Creación de blades lo mismo que el anterior punto. Hay que ir de uno en uno, haciendo varias selecciones de por medio y luego aguantando otra animación. Esto sumado a la ridícula probabilidad de que no te salga un blade genérico lo convierte en un auténtico dolor de cabeza. Con cheats he llegado a usar más de 100 cristales legendarios sin obtener un solo blade raro, a pesar de faltarme un tercio de la lista. Añadir también la imposibilidad de eliminarlos en bloque y, de nuevo, necesidad de aguantar una animación de 2-5s por cada eliminación.

    El juego triger, necesario para una adecuada evolución de varios de los blades, requiere de miles de partidas (cosa que ya me parece totalmente innecesaria). Cada maldita partida tienes que ver la animación de inicio, las puntuaciones, la recogida de "premios"...

    Cada blade raro requiere de misiones secundarios propias para su desarrollo. Misiones que son en su práctica totalidad insufribles por aburridas y por largas, como repetir un millón de veces la misma misión de mercenario para que, al terminar, te digan que tienes que repetirte otro millón de veces otras 10 misiones; tener que patearte todos los continentes 1000 veces probando una y otra vez puntos de extracción cada una de las veces, y así un largo etc. Si a esto sumamos que cada blade tiene 0 profundad de personaje e historia y que no se molestan en que estas misiones tengan el más mínimo interés esto no es más que un suplicio.
    El punto anterior lleva a las misiones secundarias. No pido que tengan la calidad de las de The Witcher 3 (no es ni mucho menos de mis juegos favoritos, pero en este punto era brillante), pero al menos pediría misiones que no despierten en mi ansias asesinas por largas y aburridas. Diría que en todo el juego a penas han despertado en mi algo de interés las misiones de Blades de Dagos y algún otro más.
    Llegamos a encontrar misiones secundarias en las que los puntos de transporte no funcionan, con el único objetivo de hacernos perder el tiempo recorriendo el mapa entero.
    Con respecto a la pérdida de tiempo en este juego podría hablar casi tanto como el tiempo que hace perder el juego, por ello no me extenderé más.
    Otro punto negativo es lo irritante que puede ser el juego en muchos momentos, diría que precisamente con la intención de prolongarlo. Por ejemplo, poniendo enemigos que multiplican por 2-10 tu nivel en lugares de tránsito habitual con el añadido que se mueven casi buscándote. En cuanto te matan, vuelta automática al punto del que venías.
    Otro ejemplo que a mi me saca de mis casillas es la cantidad de enemigos que están al borde de precipicios, al borde del agua, en cuestas...intentas farmear algo y pierdes la mitad o la totalidad del botín por este motivo. Si intentas sacarlos de estas zonas con el método de llamarlos, además de tirarte un buen rato, encontraras que el enemigo ni se inmuta, que practicamente no se mueve nada o que cuando se mueve se desvanece y vuelve a su punto de origen.
    Por último, y mira que es algo que me suele dar bastante igual, lo de este juego con el sexismo es de juzgado de guardia, y mira que no soy ningún woke. Misiones como la de "Femineidad" entre Mythra y la otra eléctrica, las proporciones de Dahlia o el hecho de que en plena escena dramática solo se preocupen en sacar planos del culo y las tetas de un personaje, incluso recreándose haciéndolas botar como flanes en ese preciso instante...no se a los demás, pero lo único que produce en mi es ganas de agachar la cabeza por vergüenza ajena.

    Como ya he dicho, creo que podría ser un grandísimo juego, pero se cargan lo que podría ser una experiencia de juego genial con estas decisiones tan absurdas.    … Expand
  40. sarakyuuri
    Mar 12, 2020
    7
    The game mechanics and the RPG action is quite fun. However there are quite some holes in the story telling and it kept bothered me. For example, when characters had ability to fly in one part of the scene then right after they just suddenly falls down from sky in the next scene. I tried to ignore these plot holes but ultimately there were multiple minor things in the story that was justThe game mechanics and the RPG action is quite fun. However there are quite some holes in the story telling and it kept bothered me. For example, when characters had ability to fly in one part of the scene then right after they just suddenly falls down from sky in the next scene. I tried to ignore these plot holes but ultimately there were multiple minor things in the story that was just like this. It is still a good game if you can ignore unreasonable story telling plots.… Expand
  41. Mhaaad
    Aug 25, 2020
    7
    I played this game right after finishing XC;DE (which is a fantastic game. 10/10) , this game's like an MMORPG but for single player, same as the first game,
    I would have given it a 9 if not for the sheer number of unnecessary hindrance and inconveniences this game has, it's like the developers thought: this game is too good, we can't let that happen, let's shackle the players and piss    I played this game right after finishing XC;DE (which is a fantastic game. 10/10) , this game's like an MMORPG but for single player, same as the first game,
    I would have given it a 9 if not for the sheer number of unnecessary hindrance and inconveniences this game has, it's like the developers thought: this game is too good, we can't let that happen, let's shackle the players and piss them off!!
    here are the cons:
    - helpful tips that teach you how to fight and interact with the game are displayed once only, you don't have access to a menu to check if you are stuck later or need a reminder, you have to look it up on google.
    - enemies will detect/fight you unless you are 10 levels higher, it makes exploring sucks.
    - fighting system is too complicated, refined but complicated. (remember, no HELP menu)
    - [[[[ Ursula's side quest, you send her on missions to collect 99 pieces of each three different key items, these missions range from 1 through 5, mission 1 gives you 1 piece of key item, mission 2 gives you 1 piece key item, missions 3 and 4 gives 2 key items , mission 5 gives 3 key item ,,,,, WHY?!!! why doesn't mission 5 give 5! (Ursula isn't even worth it! she's a nightmare to completionists and a proof of developers being bullies!) ]]]]
    - Tiger! Tiger! , a mean mini game.
    - some of the requirements to increase a skill are displayed as question marks [??????] the game won't tell me how and no NPC will tell me what do they want! google everything.
    - no guide to tell you what collectable are where and nothing to keep record of what you collected and what not, just walk in the dark, if an NPC asks you to collect something, go to every region in the game and hope you find it soon by chance, or google it.
    - the menu controls are all over the place, I finished the game and still not used to it.

    I said I would give XC2 a 9 if the above mentioned problems are not present in the game, that's because some problems can't be fixed,
    - music tracks and sound editing in this game is not good. (a region named Tantal has the most intense music ever (day music) it's like you are facing the last boss), (some environmental sounds are just annoying and not immersive (Spirit Crucible Elpys), (sound effects when summoning a blade).
    - voice acting is not the best, weird accents and sometimes it's hard to understand what the pronounced word is (the game Ni No Kuni had different accents but was amazing).

    that's the cons, now let's do the pros:
    - Vast open world to explore (like the first game but better because treasure chests and secret areas)
    - Great detailed world building, you would know how this world came to be when you finish the game.
    - blades are designed by different game designers, cool designs (except Nim).
    - Nopons are hilarious in this game more that the first game, especially their dialogue in side quests.
    - the Gacha system is fun in this game.    … Expand
  42. emeyece
    Dec 5, 2021
    5
    I don‘t get it. This is a masterpiece for many? The story is dumb and flat, also the characters are one-dimensional. And then they are constantly shouting the same one liners at you. Like „with the power of friendship“. Oh Man! Graphics are mediocre and stylewise it’s that typical Japanese obersexualized anime look; horny but desperate. Man, I don‘t know where to start. The map and evenI don‘t get it. This is a masterpiece for many? The story is dumb and flat, also the characters are one-dimensional. And then they are constantly shouting the same one liners at you. Like „with the power of friendship“. Oh Man! Graphics are mediocre and stylewise it’s that typical Japanese obersexualized anime look; horny but desperate. Man, I don‘t know where to start. The map and even the compass are the worst. You‘re constantly running around, don‘t know where to go. And these things just don‘t help. The fights are sooooo boring and most of the time you’re loosing because, yeah why exactly? Because you don‘t know what is happening. Wtf!?… Expand
  43. LuckyMeybFan
    Dec 10, 2021
    7
    After 150 hours of gameplay, I figured it's time to write a review for Xenoblade Chronicles 2.

    Sadly, XC2's story failed to amaze me. It was a good emotional ride; there were goosebumps here and there but there was nothing that made me think that the story is exceptional. The pace was not good in my opinion, and the overall tone of the game is a bit inconsistent with the narrative.    After 150 hours of gameplay, I figured it's time to write a review for Xenoblade Chronicles 2.

    Sadly, XC2's story failed to amaze me. It was a good emotional ride; there were goosebumps here and there but there was nothing that made me think that the story is exceptional. The pace was not good in my opinion, and the overall tone of the game is a bit inconsistent with the narrative.

    The world was very good, but it's not as good as the world of XC1 which was incredible.

    Most of the characters have enough quirks to be memorable... but I didn't appreciate the anime character archetypes that were a bit too cheesy at times.

    I don't like Rex as much as I like Shulk from XC1. To me, Rex is a stale, typical Shonen protagonist fighting against the odds with the power of friendship, recklessness, stubbornness, naivety, and optimism. There is a sweet spot in every character that lies between ideal and flawed. Rex is a character more skewed towards the former, which I didn't like simply because I couldn't connect with his struggle. His struggles were only ever fleshed out whenever the "boy meets girl" theme comes into place. I loved how Shulk reacted to the things around him the same way me and other people normally would; Rex lacked that authenticity. Also... Shulk's growth with the monado is incorporated in the gameplay which I think is very cool.

    I love the music! I really hated the background music for two locations but aside from that, the music in this game are EARGASMIC.

    The gameplay is nice. I just hate the grind because some of my experience with it are ridiculous... jump from a high point, jump 6,000 times, walk a lot. What the heck, game? Can't you think of something else to do? (I grinded hours to unlocked all blades, except for the ones you can get from new game plus.)

    Overall, I think the game is mediocre because of the emotional but average Shonen story and the main character BUT...
    The sheer amount of work put into this game is amazing. There is a ton of side content in the base game, and I am looking forward to playing the DLC. If you love JRPGs, you should not miss this one. It's great, but it's far from being a masterpiece. I don't hate the game, I was just a tad disappointed with the main character, the grind, and the story; the most important RPG elements to me... I felt like they could've been executed a lot better.

    I thought the English dub was horrible in general... but Japanese voice DLC fixed it for me, at least there's that.    … Expand
  44. cfc1998
    May 17, 2022
    7
    Good game with lovely characters and great open world, combat system its very complex and the story is confusing. Overall not my kind of game but enjoyed it a lot.
  45. Vinzkill
    Sep 16, 2022
    7
    Im almost 40+hours in the game and I cant push myself further to finish it. I wanted to love it and finish it because I wanted to finish xb1 and 2 before i play XB3. Too much emphasis on boobs and sexy body of the female characters (can be good for some folks) but for me its like drinking coffee with ten spoons of sugar. Rex's voice acting is the worst. The only thing "good"in the VA isIm almost 40+hours in the game and I cant push myself further to finish it. I wanted to love it and finish it because I wanted to finish xb1 and 2 before i play XB3. Too much emphasis on boobs and sexy body of the female characters (can be good for some folks) but for me its like drinking coffee with ten spoons of sugar. Rex's voice acting is the worst. The only thing "good"in the VA is the accent, other than that there is no emotion. storyis uninteresting and unable to hook my attention and make me want to play it nonstop. I personally dont like the blade driver style of gameplay, map navigation is a mess which Im glad they fixed on 3.Xeno 1 and xeno 3 are GREAT. 2 is meh meh meh. Its not a bad game, its just not for me.… Expand
  46. Traumvita
    Apr 30, 2021
    6
    Not horrible. Rex is annoying, combat is meh. Appeals to sex addict weebs too much. World is cool tho
  47. Lucas359
    Feb 17, 2022
    7
    Luego de que Monolith Soft nos entregara su magnifica y aclamada obra Xenoblade Chronicles en 2010 uno vería con demasiada expectativa y emoción su 2da entrega de la saga luego de 7 años en su lanzamiento en 2017.Contradictoriamente esta secuela toma casi todo lo que logro convertir a su anterior entrega en una de semejante calibre y lo vuelve un juego mediocre en todos esos aspectos. LaLuego de que Monolith Soft nos entregara su magnifica y aclamada obra Xenoblade Chronicles en 2010 uno vería con demasiada expectativa y emoción su 2da entrega de la saga luego de 7 años en su lanzamiento en 2017.Contradictoriamente esta secuela toma casi todo lo que logro convertir a su anterior entrega en una de semejante calibre y lo vuelve un juego mediocre en todos esos aspectos. La historia se vuelve la de un anime (me gusta y veo mucho anime/manga) estándar sin una premisa interesante o llamativa que ofrecer, los personajes son planos con personalidades sacadas de los prototipos que cualquier historia de anime te puede mostrar sin nada único o carismático en ellos, la sobre sexualisacion/ecchi y fanservice puestas en las 2 protagonistas principales (y en otros secundarios mas) sumado a las escenas y momentos clichés con el MC y en el resto de la historia es algo que implementaron para atraer mas a este tipo de publico y consumidor pero que la esencia y encanto de la saga nunca necesito,ni hablar del bajon impresionante de calidad en el villano principal. Curiosamente lo que mejoro fue su sistema de combate al volverlo mas dinámico, pero nada mas.
    Como fan de la saga, esperando que la nueva entrega prevista en septiembre aprenda de estos errores y nos ofrezca un 3er titulo a la altura de lo que fue el 1ro y a lo que el potencial de la serie puede dar.    … Expand
  48. Cinept
    Mar 7, 2022
    6
    6/10. Tutorial lasts 10 years, story and characters are uninteresting. Combat gets relatively fun and engaging once an understanding is reached which takes 25 hours. JRPG shenanigans.
  49. Gutoso
    Jul 31, 2022
    5
    This game is a shame in so many ways that is hard to say. The storyline is childish. The story is **** The gameplay is confusing. I don't know what the hell happened from the frist game, which is a masterpiece. But I would feel ashamed if I was the director of this.
  50. stupidopinion
    Oct 23, 2022
    6
    There is so much to love here which makes the pitfalls of this game so utterly painful to me. The story and gameplay mechanics are strong, but cringey dialogue and moments make me question why I'm playing. I took several month long breaks from the game throughout my playthrough because of this, which may have further contributed to my negative feelings about the experience as a whole. I'mThere is so much to love here which makes the pitfalls of this game so utterly painful to me. The story and gameplay mechanics are strong, but cringey dialogue and moments make me question why I'm playing. I took several month long breaks from the game throughout my playthrough because of this, which may have further contributed to my negative feelings about the experience as a whole. I'm still glad I got to the end though, it's conclusion impactful and beautiful in a way, retroactively improving the first Chronicles game, which I love. Has its issues but if you can sit down for a 60 hour game and get past the bad moments, there is something truly enjoyable here.

    Also this game has the worst tutorial of all time, I'd recommend Chuggaaconroy's "Everything I wish I knew about Xenoblade Chronicles 2" guide video as it clears up a ton of stuff the tutorial utterly fails to properly explain.    … Expand
  51. kinsang
    Oct 11, 2022
    7
    ยกระดับเกมเพลย์จากภาคแรกขึ้นมาได้น่าสนใจ โครงเรื่องและไอเดียดี แต่กลับเขียนบทออกมาได้แย่และโบราณไปหน่อยในหลายจุด
  52. ZYMROD
    Nov 24, 2022
    7
    Un gran juego que se ve menoscabado por su horrible tutorial y protagonista que le quita gracia a la historia.
  53. hinst
    Mar 7, 2021
    5
    Pros:
    + Character design; and I mean not only visual but all together: voice, personality, story and such
    Cons: - Blurry image & stuttering because of underpowered hardware of Nintendo Switch - Territorial Rotbart runs wild around the green plain and kills you with just one hit. Is there any sense in this design decision? Any at all? - To find items required for a quest you have run    Pros:
    + Character design; and I mean not only visual but all together: voice, personality, story and such

    Cons:
    - Blurry image & stuttering because of underpowered hardware of Nintendo Switch
    - Territorial Rotbart runs wild around the green plain and kills you with just one hit. Is there any sense in this design decision? Any at all?
    - To find items required for a quest you have run around and guess where they are
    - Level grind level grind level grind; as soon as the 2nd chapter starts, you have to grind from level 15 to level 35 to progress further. Why???
    - Only one save slot. Why?
    - Random blades -> lootbox mechanics bad. Get the same blade 6 times? Yes. Exactly what I want to see in a game (no it's not).
    - Most battles are boring because you're either level above so you kill the foes easily or the foes are level above so you run away which is not fun. When the level is close or the same then it's not boring but it happens rarely

    Overall the two biggest problems are: poor tech (blurry, stutter) and level grind. Both need to be solved for this game to be even considered remotely good. Perhaps SwitchPro will fix the tech side but it's too late anyway for a 2017 game. It should be good when it's released and not 4 years later. Level grind is awful, it needs to go away. From all games, not from just this one!    … Expand
  54. moothemagiccow
    Aug 29, 2020
    7
    =OVERWHELMING.=
    I loved Xenoblade 1 and Xenoblade X but this game is overwhelming. If there was a player's guide, it would be the size of an encyclopedia. There are too many options, too many items, too many things to upgrade, too many menus to manage.
    Even watching the battles is overwhelming. You control one character, who has a partner character ("Blade"), and you're on a team with    =OVERWHELMING.=
    I loved Xenoblade 1 and Xenoblade X but this game is overwhelming. If there was a player's guide, it would be the size of an encyclopedia. There are too many options, too many items, too many things to upgrade, too many menus to manage.

    Even watching the battles is overwhelming. You control one character, who has a partner character ("Blade"), and you're on a team with two other people who also have partners. Often the people you are battling also have these partners. It's a mess to watch.

    Each of these characters and each of these partner Blades have items/weapons you can equip, with skill trees that you upgrade.

    You don't just get those items from beating enemies or doing quests. After you get them from enemies or quests, you have to find spots around the map, press the buttons right on time, and dig up materials that activate the items you can equip. To dig up materials, you have to buy a kind of digging license. You can sell excess materials at a specific shop, but there's no real way to remember which materials are important.

    You can upgrade your skill trees by simply playing the game, or you can do discrete tasks like "go talk to people" or "collect and use this kind of potion."

    You can also use multiple "Blades" in the same battle, and there are more Blades than you can realistically manage. You get them in a kind of lottery system that is similar to micro-transaction RPGs (which does NOT cost real money, just in-game items). One goal is to get "rare" blades rather than throwaway, weaker blades. The lottery is another dimension to the game that no one really understands.

    There is a lot more - quests, where you collect items or talk to characters or go places or kill things, then Mercenary Quests where you deploy your blades for 10-45 minutes at a time and can't use them, pouch items that give you temporary upgrades, and I'm sure I'm forgetting like five things!

    =NO EXPLANATIONS=
    I have no idea how much all of this effort actually has on playing the game, because the game is so overwhelming that no player really understands what they're doing. Is this weapon better than the other? Is this skill more worthwhile? It's often too complicated to figure out. When I look something up on google, I see contradictory answers in the same thread. That means people who think they know how to play and are giving advice don't actually know.

    This is because the game RARELY EXPLAINS what is happening or how to play. In the first ten or so hours of the game, you're bombarded with new systems, and the tutorials don't really give you a baseline understanding of what you're doing. Even some of the terms have really similar names. A skill with a Smash effect has a particular effect on enemies, but many skills are called "Quick Smash" etc without having the Smash effect. There are Blade Arts and Blade Combos and Arts Combos and I can't remember which is which.

    =MISSTEPS=
    What's strange is that the game is lacking in a few basic areas. You can't control the rest of your party (much different than previous Xenoblade games) and their AI is stupid. They will, for example, walk off a cliff and die in the middle of a battle. When enemies drop items, sometimes the items will fall off a cliff or fall onto a spot that you can't jump to because you're still fighting. The map is a total mess, and the great little arrow from Xenoblade 1 is replaced with a kind of countdown radar that I regularly get lost with. The big map when you hit X is also really bad. It's very small and has no real detail on it.

    =FUN=
    Despite all this, I like the game! It's fun, I like watching the numbers go up and pretending I know what I'm doing. I play it on Normal and it's actually not that hard! My characters die with some regularity, but it's not often frustrating. I would say among the Xenoblade games, this is my least favorite. It seems to ignore a lot of the steps forward in playability that Xenoblade X took (e.g. the quest menu and map is worse now), and the story is very awkward, dull, and cringeworthy.

    If you have nothing to do during, say, a pandemic, and nowhere to go, you could easily lose yourself inside this game. You could probably play this for 4 hours a day for years. I am baffled that there is DLC because there is so much to do. I don't know what they would add.    … Expand
  55. Cougargames
    Nov 1, 2019
    7
    Overall a good game with a beautifull world and a somewhat good combat espacially the chain attacks
    (even thoe the tutorials are never ending and dont really teach you the mechanics that well)
    a good soundtrack and a somewhat emotionall ending. The bad part bad: writing is non beliavable
    and characters which is espacially bad considering this game is a long game that focuses mainly on story.
  56. Gerard51MX
    Aug 1, 2020
    6
    Honestamente no entiendo porque el juego está bien posicionado. Soy fan de los juegos RPG y sabemos que este género tiene una piedra angular, su narrativa... En el caso de xenoblade la narrativa es un cliché, y aunque muchos RPG ya caigan en lo mismo, estos si son señalados por eso, pero a xenoblade parece que se le está perdonando. La historia es la misma, eres una persona normal, teHonestamente no entiendo porque el juego está bien posicionado. Soy fan de los juegos RPG y sabemos que este género tiene una piedra angular, su narrativa... En el caso de xenoblade la narrativa es un cliché, y aunque muchos RPG ya caigan en lo mismo, estos si son señalados por eso, pero a xenoblade parece que se le está perdonando. La historia es la misma, eres una persona normal, te encuentras un artefacto que te mete en una disputa entre personas poderosas y ahora tendrás que salvar al mundo y a una chica linda. Las misiones secundarias no aportan nada nuevo, las mismas de cada RPG, la música llega a ser muy buena y hay melodías bastante rescatables, por otro lado hay algunas combinaciones de música instrumental con sonidos industriales que son un dolor de cabeza. Gráficamente es pasable, se ve borroso en modo portátil y se sigue viendo borroso en modo rock, los que dicen que se ve hermoso me imagino que se refieren a los paisajes o que nunca han visto un juego bien pulido. El entorno está lleno de vida, pero el mapa me parece aburrido. El sistema de batalla es complicado de dominar, lo cual es un acierto y a decir verdad hace divertido al juego, pero solo hasta que te van introduciendo cada comando, una vez que ya te enseñaron todo, pues... Se vuelve aburrido, con batallas largas hasta con los enemigos más débiles, eso si, puedes experimentar con muchas opciones, personalizar tus armas y, elementos de la misma y eso le da variedad. En conclusión lo recomiendo para los fans del RPG, pero no es un juego destacable, ni merece ser llamado joya, como muchos lo han hecho… Expand
  57. freshtodhef
    Feb 23, 2019
    7
    While the game design can be frustrating at times, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is a must own for any JRPG fan.
  58. Revoltado
    Jul 20, 2020
    6
    Como eu gostaria de gostar mais desse jogo... Trilha sonora linda, gráficos bonitos apesar de baixa resolução em alguns momentos (em modo portátil piora), história +ou- boa. Mas decididamente não gostei do sistema de luta apesar de similar ao 1, as lutas não são fluidas, são demoradas mesmo com inimigos de níveis bem mais baixos que dos seus personagens
  59. WakeUpJeff
    Feb 18, 2021
    5
    Xenoblade 2 is simply "ok" at almost everything it tries to do and is bogged down by convoluted and tedious systems. It's soundtrack is the only thing I would call a standout (Torigoth Day is a particularly nice song). While not a bad game, it does not, as a whole, do anything remarkable enough to warrant the 60 hour time-sink.
  60. Dazar
    Dec 6, 2019
    7
    Honestly, this game does improve from the last two in many ways, but its gatcha mechanic is horrible. The combat is also pretty stale. Once you can get 8 orbs on the boss and you have Pyra's final form, you win. No question. You win. This applies to even the Superbosses. I know that the orbs do something individually when they are rotating around the boss, but I don't know exactly and itHonestly, this game does improve from the last two in many ways, but its gatcha mechanic is horrible. The combat is also pretty stale. Once you can get 8 orbs on the boss and you have Pyra's final form, you win. No question. You win. This applies to even the Superbosses. I know that the orbs do something individually when they are rotating around the boss, but I don't know exactly and it doesn't matter. Cause you win. I do like that there is a healing, tank, and DPS roles. That is not everybody's cup of tea, but I do like that it is an option. Pity it doesn't matter much due to the orb thing. Honestly, I didn't pick the blades for their specials or passives at one point because you really don't need them, because the orb breaking is so overpowered compared to everything else.

    The characters themselves are pretty good and enjoyable as is the story. The ice rabbit annoyed me but not for the reason other people didn't like her... Her feet, hands, and ears bothered me. Her very fake southern accent was also irritating and didn't fit the design anyway. Music was also good but I liked X more.

    Overall, I would give this game around 6.5, but given how metacritic works I will bump it to a 7.    … Expand
  61. Shulknoblade
    Sep 4, 2019
    6
    Interesting entry for the franchise. Worst than the original, but with some great additions. Tutorials are BY FAR the worst thing this game has, a lot of them, and soo bad explained. Story is interesting but a bit too much "anime alike" and the music is AMAZING. Good game.
  62. Ewall198
    May 3, 2020
    6
    The gameplay is fun. But the mechanics aren't explained well and the story is absolutely awful.
  63. MazrimTaim14
    Oct 15, 2019
    7
    Great battle mechanic although it took a long long while for it to come to fruition. Doing battles without access to combos at the start of the game made battles tedious.

    Voice acting could do better. Storywise not that too memorable and a gatcha system in a single player game? the only redeeming quality of it is they at the very least didnt made money out of it by selling cores thru    Great battle mechanic although it took a long long while for it to come to fruition. Doing battles without access to combos at the start of the game made battles tedious.

    Voice acting could do better. Storywise not that too memorable and a gatcha system in a single player game? the only redeeming quality of it is they at the very least didnt made money out of it by selling cores thru microtransactions.

    Map navigation was hell. made looking for the mission spots hard and grueling.

    A nice experience though and a great addition to the library of Switch    … Expand
  64. Eienmatt
    Feb 5, 2021
    6
    Anyone who gave this game a 10 has never played more than 20 hours of it. This was the RPG for my switch that i was most excited about and after over 120 hours in, i can say that the game has so much charm but just falls to pieces under its ridiculously messy systems. Xenoblade Chronicles 2 starts off and really wows you with the sheer size of the titans and the interesting storyline. ForAnyone who gave this game a 10 has never played more than 20 hours of it. This was the RPG for my switch that i was most excited about and after over 120 hours in, i can say that the game has so much charm but just falls to pieces under its ridiculously messy systems. Xenoblade Chronicles 2 starts off and really wows you with the sheer size of the titans and the interesting storyline. For a majority of the game, the storyline remains decent though a tad predictable. As you start to approach Chapter 7, things start to fall flat and the tedium really starts to weigh you down. The battle system (once you finally figure out how it all works - probably with the help of a youtube video or 2) starts to feel a bit boring. This sounds crazy as it really shouldn't be since you're constantly busy doing driver combos, blade combos, fusion combos, breaking elementals and moving around to flank enemies. However, it turns into a wash/rinse/repeat process that drags on as you consistently run into enemies with tons of health even though they may be several levels beneath you. To mix it up, get ready for bosses and enemies who do things like 'burst damage' with no obvious heads up or information that this damage is happening differently from normal damage - nor a tutorial on what it is and how to stop it. Imagine my surprise when i kept dying and had to consult the internet to figure out why i suddenly went from winning a battle to dying in about 5 seconds. This continues with bosses that start to interrupt your combos by sealing you in the most wonderfully inconvenient of times. There are also weird glitches such as enemies/yourself falling to a lower level and becoming unreachable, hard won rare items falling off the side of structures only to be uncollectable as they've landed in water or on a ledge that is hard to reach (not to mention, they only last onscreen for a short period of time so you'd better be close enough to reach them somehow).

    The weapon collection/blade system is a gatcha game (albeit, no real money is needed) that feels out of place and unhelpful to the purpose of gaining new blades. Locking them behind subquests would at least have been more logical as the several sidequests in that vein work well and provide backgrounds for each blade. Transfering them amongst team members is complicated and limited. Which makes it hard to really enjoy blade collecting.

    The map is awful. Figuring out where you need to go (for side quests in particular) is just brutal. I cannot stress this issue enough. The mapping system in this game is atrocious.

    The UI is so cumbersome and unfriendly. Managing blades and then needing to go back into the character select menu to equip them made no sense to me. Nor did the million different items with near identical effects that could be bought from the many stores (yay - two different things that reduce damage by 1.0%! thanks?). Nor did the various key items that give bonuses when you get them but seem to be trivial in application (increasing my item collection reach by 50cm? That sounds tiny - and you're right it is! I still need to be on top of an item to pick it up!).

    I was so saddened by how messy this game was and am praying xenoblade chronicles definitive edition is not burdened with the same issues. Really saddened by how this turned out.    … Expand
  65. TrustedReviews
    Feb 4, 2020
    7
    Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is an excellent addition to any JRPG fan's library, albeit one that has some severe problems holding it back from true greatness. Released globally on December 1st 2017 for the Nintendo Switch system, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is the latest entry in Monolith Soft's perceived expanded Xeno series, a sequel to the original Xenoblade Chronicles and a spiritual successor toXenoblade Chronicles 2 is an excellent addition to any JRPG fan's library, albeit one that has some severe problems holding it back from true greatness. Released globally on December 1st 2017 for the Nintendo Switch system, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is the latest entry in Monolith Soft's perceived expanded Xeno series, a sequel to the original Xenoblade Chronicles and a spiritual successor to the earlier Xenosaga and Xenogears games.
    Starting off with the game's positives; The soundtrack is soaring and immersive, its wonderful and vibrant and lends considerable strength to establishing atmosphere in the title's many visit-able locales. The characters, although very tropey, are still enjoyable, and over the long course of the game (80 hours for our play-through), you should come to have really bonded with them and their exploits, and enjoy their presence... hopefully. The story, although nothing really special on a surface level, really picks up in the closing chapters, which we will avoid mentioning for the sake of spoilers.
    The exploration and combat is also very solid, if not poorly mismanaged. With this, our gripes with the game must be brought to light.
    The combat is complicated and introduces a lot of mechanics not at all standard in JRPG's, and expects you to learn them quickly, but then offers you no in-game means of double checking the tutorials, an inexcusable feat of incompetence in game design. This was fixed in the expansion, Torna - The Golden Country, but was never fixed in the base game.
    The first explorable area of the game, Gormott, in an area where you're expected to be anywhere between about Level 3 and Level 7, there is a Level 84 monster running around that will one shot you and shoot you back to whence you came upon respawn. This is just not good game design.
    This title is split into chapters, and although we enjoyed our time with the first 50 or so hours of the game, the quality of the title gameplay-wise takes a nose dive off a cliff after that time, although this is the part where the story really picks up. Chapters 7-10 are a nightmarish slog, one that seriously makes us reconsider ever wanting to go and do a New Game +. Bosses are broken, there's a huge difficulty spike seemingly out of nowhere and the crawl through "dungeon-like areas" never, ever seems to end. Needless to say, it's a mess.
    Despite that, in those horrendous boss fights, if you switch the difficulty to Easy (added in an update), you might actually be able to have fun in them. Graphics are serviceable, but blurry in handheld mode.
    Overall, a solid game that any Switch JRPG fan should consider having in their library, but one that falls short from being called a must-own in our books.
    7/10    … Expand
  66. abYss123
    Jan 27, 2021
    7
    This is one of or the best arpg on the switch. The characters are fun and well developed. Get this game now! You won’t regret it! The voice actors in English aren't the best and the nopons are super annoying.
  67. sergio123456
    Feb 19, 2020
    7
    El juego es bueno, gráficamente es espectacular, es muy intuitivo a la hora de llevarte por el mapa, pero el problema es su sistema de combate extremadamente complejo, eso le hace bajar bastante mi forma de verlo.
  68. ipenstein
    Apr 28, 2020
    6
    Great production values, story and world building are somewhat marred by an unintuitive battle system, overcomplicated pathfinding and tedious quests. Oh, and the oversexualized portrayal of several female characters is just annoying.
  69. Jrson
    May 12, 2020
    6
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Game has an amazing soundtrack. The battle system is also pretty fun and unique. Outside of those, the summoning system was pure RNG and was extremely annoying. Field skills were also a hindrance because part of the story is gated by field skills and if you don't have the right blades, or you didn't farm field skills, prepare to waste a lot of time. For the most part, the story was pretty enjoyable. Xeno games usually have very character driven narratives, as a result, some people may not be impacted or even remotely enjoy the ending which requires the player to actually like the characters. Character driven narratives like Xenoblade 2 are hit or misses because of that. Finally, just like it's predecessors, combat can be really slow early onto the game.… Expand
  70. Gramscci
    Jun 22, 2021
    7
    Un juego que de inicio me dio la impresión de ser un doble AA; sin embargo nadie me había calladonla boca tan rápido y contundentemente, es una delicia poder perderse en un mundo tan grande como el que ofrece este juego, respecto al sistema de combate en realidad no es tan complicado como muchos analistas se quejan, aunque efectivamente pudo explicarse de mejor forma, sobre quieres perderUn juego que de inicio me dio la impresión de ser un doble AA; sin embargo nadie me había calladonla boca tan rápido y contundentemente, es una delicia poder perderse en un mundo tan grande como el que ofrece este juego, respecto al sistema de combate en realidad no es tan complicado como muchos analistas se quejan, aunque efectivamente pudo explicarse de mejor forma, sobre quieres perder en una historia genia y disfrutar de un juegazo no lo dudes y prueba está joya.… Expand
  71. RenXCDE
    May 31, 2020
    7
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. As someone who loves the original Xenoblade Chronicles, this game is somewhat of a disappointment. It takes a lot of steps back in my opinion, and has problems that weren't even present in the original.

    To start off, I don't find the combat to be all that fun. Xenoblade 2 is a lot more auto attack centered than the first game, which I don't really like. Most of the time, I was just auto attack cancelling for my arts to fill up so I could use them just to do the same thing again, and after that do a blade or driver combo. The game's combat is really repetitive, and gets incredibly dull, and boring.

    The story is also something that's a huge step down from the first Xenoblade. The first few chapters are really boring, nearly nothing happens in them that's really exciting or fun (aside from the awakening of Mythra). The late game isn't much better either, the story by then gets really cool and interesting, yeah but you're stuck in this really lame and generic space station, with generic robot enemies, far from being unique like the Mechon from Xenoblade 1. I think the final area genuinely killed some of my excitement I had going in to fight the final boss. Most Xenoblade 2 areas are really cool, but again, they're brought down by just being worse than the original Xenoblade's areas. The original had much better and memorable areas, on top of just being a whole lot more unique than Xenoblade 2's in my opinion.

    Xenoblade 2 has really cool characters, that's a bit of a given seeing its a Xenoblade game. The party in Xenoblade 2 is really awesome, and their interactions are really cute, and charming. Heart to Hearts in this game are really good, just like in Xenoblade 1, but this time they have Heart to Hearts voiced, which is a huge plus. I think my favorite characters were Zeke and Pandoria, they are really funny, awesome, and have a unique charm. Rex gets way too much hate, by the end of the game, he's changed a lot, and I really like him then. Mòrag kind of reminds me of Jotaro just a bit from the outfit, she's just as badass as Jotaro. Nia is cute and always had me laughing. Tora was my least favorite, and honestly kind of irritating sometimes, but I adore Nopon, and he had some good lines.

    I think this game doesn't live up to Xenoblade 1 at all, but that doesn't mean it's a bad game. It had a lot of expectations to live up to, and it just didn't meet those expectations to me. If you're a fan of JRPGs or RPGs in general, I recommend just buying Xenoblade Definitive Edition first, and then playing Xenoblade 2.    … Expand
  72. Zethor
    May 25, 2021
    7
    Xenoblade 2 retains many of its predecessor's great traits, such as a beautiful open world to explore, and a (mostly) fantastic soundtrack. The combat remains strong, with some major improvements to things such as auto attacks, and major downgrades such as the time-wasting, irritating chain attacks. The mechanic also comes with a great perk in the new overkill feature, which curbsXenoblade 2 retains many of its predecessor's great traits, such as a beautiful open world to explore, and a (mostly) fantastic soundtrack. The combat remains strong, with some major improvements to things such as auto attacks, and major downgrades such as the time-wasting, irritating chain attacks. The mechanic also comes with a great perk in the new overkill feature, which curbs xenoblade chronicles' 1's only notable flaw in forcing exploration for the sake of not having to grind, but also makes the game a bit on the easy side. Overall, I see this as a bit of a sidegrade, and the series retains a similar level of quality here to before.

    However, the game falls flat on its face in the story, a core element of JRPGs, and delivers a story I'd expect to see out of only the most horrendous anime the world has to offer. It truly feels as though you're playing through something like Sword Art Online, and I detest most of what this story has to offer. There are still some enjoyable characters, but just as many irritating, annoying ones on top of it. Overall, I understand the shift in style, but I feel it to be a bit of a betrayal to those who fell in love with the well-crafted story and incredible characters of the first game. The game's still enjoyable despite this, thankfully, but it serves as a major hit to the game's quality.    … Expand
  73. thilg881
    May 1, 2021
    6
    The Good:
    - The art style;
    - A bit slow at the beginning, but it get better; - Great soundtrack; - Tons of side quests; - A fantastic world to explore; - The story and the characters; - If you liked Xenoblade Chronicles 1, you will like this sequel too; The Bad: - Even after beating the game, I can't see a good reason why Rex is the protagonist instead of Pyra; - Tutorial    The Good:
    - The art style;
    - A bit slow at the beginning, but it get better;
    - Great soundtrack;
    - Tons of side quests;
    - A fantastic world to explore;
    - The story and the characters;
    - If you liked Xenoblade Chronicles 1, you will like this sequel too;

    The Bad:
    - Even after beating the game, I can't see a good reason why Rex is the protagonist instead of Pyra;
    - Tutorial heavy;
    - Combat system takes a really long time to get into it;
    - Combat takes extremely long, even against weaker enemies;
    - Some game mechanics are not explained in game;
    - Excessive use of grinding in almost every aspect of the game;
    - Getting rare blades is extremely luck dependant, some blades, have a 1/1000 spawn chance;
    - Terrible voice sync, but the voice actors did a great job;
    - The line: you win the boss fight, just to lose in the cutscene right after it, happens too many times and gets really frustrating/annoying later on;
    - Some graphics elements could be better;
    - The textures takes some time to load randomly.    … Expand
  74. MaddoxWhite
    Apr 25, 2021
    7
    Here I am again, trying an RPG, and not understanding why people like RPGs. Putting aside that I don't care for these kinda games and anime women, (sword things...?) it seems pretty good in terms of design and graphics. Not for me at all though. You guys do you.
  75. fsq111111
    Oct 10, 2021
    5
    I think the plot of Xenoblade 2 is well written, and the performance and music are very good. On the contrary, the map and combat system are not very good. It's really boring in the first 10 hours. If it is optimized, it can sell better.
  76. Sensou
    Jul 23, 2023
    6
    Strong First Impression but....

    Many things to hate or dislike from Xenoblade 2 but I can still say I enjoy my time with it. Although, I will never play it again. Things that went wrong in my opinion: - The Worst Navigation system in gaming I've ever experienced so far. - Rough texture on handheld mode. If they go with Zelda kind of art style, it should be fine, but they go with    Strong First Impression but....

    Many things to hate or dislike from Xenoblade 2 but I can still say I enjoy my time with it. Although, I will never play it again.

    Things that went wrong in my opinion:
    - The Worst Navigation system in gaming I've ever experienced so far.
    - Rough texture on handheld mode. If they go with Zelda kind of art style, it should be fine, but they go with realistic kind of look and it's make things worst from visual perspective.
    - Way too complex for Blade/ Drive/ Combat mechanic. Many features should be always good for players but in this case, it's not necessary in my opinion.
    - Weird EXP system where they separate the one you gain from combat and the one you gain from Quests. You have to rest at the in to claim that EXP from Quests
    - One of the worst quest design. You can accept some side quests and somehow you are not able to complete that, yet. Why don't you unlock the side quests once we are fully compatible for it? On top of that, way too many "subs" in those side quests which makes it very lengthy + with that bad navigation system, it's a complete nightmare to do the side quests.
    - Story is debatable but I skip it after Chapter 6 due to overloaded dialogues here and there, lengthy cutscenes and overload of information as well which left me with "huh?". So, it's just unappealing story for me. All I know is we are trying to get to Elysium with our lovely blade but some bad guy got in your way by wanting to stole your lovely blade. The end of the story.

    Besides that, it's a great game that I believe for JRPG fans, you'll definitely able to enjoy it. But this game completely kills of my intention to try Xenoblade 3.    … Expand
  77. CyberPhoenix1
    May 16, 2023
    7
    Xenoblade Chronicles 2 suffers from a lot of problems such as the bad tutorials and the field skill system, but even still it's not that bad. The story is great, the characters are great, and the combat is great. I would not recommend this game as a starting point, however. Start with Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition.
  78. megabusterx
    Jan 25, 2023
    6
    Rex is pretty unbearable as far as main characters go, and a lot of the dialog feels like typical anime schlock. The gameplay wasn't that engaging but the music is very good.
  79. aaronsanders769
    May 12, 2023
    7
    A solid sequel with its flaws. Right off the bat the art style and mechanics are completely different from the first. This isn't a bad thing by any means but it took a second to get used to. I feel like at the start of the game there a good amount of cringe moments but as you progressed they were far and few in-between. For me personally it took about 10ish hours to really get hooked butA solid sequel with its flaws. Right off the bat the art style and mechanics are completely different from the first. This isn't a bad thing by any means but it took a second to get used to. I feel like at the start of the game there a good amount of cringe moments but as you progressed they were far and few in-between. For me personally it took about 10ish hours to really get hooked but once I was I couldn't put it down. Just as the first one the the story is immersive and a joy to get through. I wish that the after credit scene wasn't there but I get why it was put in, just a personal preference is all. If you like the first game you'll find enjoyment in this as well.… Expand
  80. Cehanson
    Aug 29, 2023
    7
    Solid game. Story was not as good as xc1, but I still enjoyed it. Combat was a lot of fun, better than xc2. Problem is the game has arbitrary game mechanics that seem to only hurt the player and make the game artificially longer. Such as the whole gatcha mechanic for getting new blades. Would be a solid 8/10 without these meaningless mechanics
  81. thompmi
    Jul 16, 2023
    7
    Really fun and endearing, but it's definitely got problems. Some sections of the story and gameplay really drag on, and there is much more awkward delivery and dialogue than you can find in any of the other MAIN Xenoblade games (we don't talk about X). However, the gameplay may be even better than the original and story-wise, the ending is fantastic.

Awards & Rankings

25
#25 Best Switch Game of 2017
3
#3 Most Discussed Switch Game of 2017
3
#3 Most Shared Switch Game of 2017

Critic Reviews

All reviews »
Metascore
83

Generally favorable reviews - based on 92 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 78 out of 92
  2. Mixed: 13 out of 92
  3. Negative: 1 out of 92
  1. Game World Navigator Magazine
    Mar 2, 2018
    73
    A fight with an ordinary enemy whose level is slightly higher can drag on for minutes, especially if you’re fighting it alone. The combat itself is also rife with problems: sometimes main character even fails to draw his weapon, or locks onto a far-off enemy, while another already is eviscerating him in close combat. [Issue#226, p.64]
  2. Nintendo Force Magazine
    Feb 26, 2018
    80
    Despite some rough patches, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is a worthy addition to any Switch owner's library, especially if you have a predilection for RPGs and enjoyed either of the previous entries in the series. [Issue #32 – March/April 2018, p. 75]
  3. LEVEL (Czech Republic)
    Feb 16, 2018
    80
    Extensive and massive JRPG. Although with a rather cliché story and characters, it comes with a beautiful world and a fighting system growing more and more complex with every hour played. [Issue#282]
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