My Full Thoughts On Xenoblade Chronicles 3 At Launch

​Since its launch at the very end of July to almost the very end of August, I was consumed by Xenoblade Chronicles 3. It took me 100 hours to roll credits and I knew I was far from done as I still had so much of the game to see and experience myself. I ended up putting another 42 hours in before reaching my current stopping point. Across my first 142 hours with Xenoblade 3, I mapped out every corner of Aionios except for the very last level 95+ cave, I completed every quest in the game I could find, and I maxed out affinity with every location. I made the decision to stop when I did in large part due to waiting to see how the DLC expansion content will be integrated into the game, not for a lack of enthusiasm to fully wrap it up.

As I did for Xenoblade Chronicles X, I’m excited to share my full thoughts on the game fresh off my first playthrough. The Xenoblade series has meant so much to me since before the first game even released in the US, so I’m very excited to both put together and share this blog. Given just how enormous and complex this game is, I needed to write this blog to properly sort my feelings out on the game. Even so, I still feel hesitant to make definitive statements on certain fronts, so please forgive me when that happens here. I think it’s a great problem to be so overwhelmed by this game and I was always pleased to find it truly challenges the almost impossible to overcome throne the original Xenoblade Chronicles sits on in my mind. I’ll say it upfront, I do think Xenoblade Chronicles 3 ultimately edges out Xenoblade Chronicles as the best game in the series, though in my heart it’s still battling it out to become my favorite. I’m just too close to the experience still and the story of Xenoblade 3 is far from over as we have three more rounds of DLC ahead which will add new heroes, which I’m very curious to see how they will be implemented, a new challenge mode, and a significant story mode expansion so it may be a while before I know for sure.

​Before I dive in, I’d like to lay out how this blog is organized and to set spoiler expectations. Let’s start with the latter. In this blog, I ultimately want to discuss the story of the game in detail. It’s so wrapped up in my feelings on the game that talking around it would do a disservice to the game and just make for a weaker blog. I also want to feel comfortable talking about combat mechanics and the game’s structure and again dancing around details just seems ill-advised as that’s where the depth of the game lies and my overall thoughts evolved throughout my full journey. So yes, there will be full spoilers for Xenoblade Chronicles 3 in this blog beyond this paragraph and if you haven’t finished the game yet I encourage you to return to this blog after you have rolled credits and dived into the post game, a first for the series. If you want to hear my mostly spoiler free thoughts on the game, I encourage you to check out my Twitter thread of my first playthrough. If you are unfamiliar with Blue Reflection Second Light, an RPG from last year I loved, you are good to go there. I noted a major connection the two games share which I will bring up again in this blog so watch out! By nature as well, expect full spoilers for the rest of the Xenoblade series in this blog, it is just unavoidable. For this blog’s structure, the rough plan from start to finish is to cover my initial expectations walking in, discussing the premise of the game and its structure. I’ll then cover individual elements including exploration, combat, music, the characters and story, and then finally discuss my overall feelings. There is a ton to discuss so let’s dive right in!

To properly kick this blog off, I have to discuss my expectations walking in. Xenoblade Chronicles 3 is the sixth Xenoblade Chronicles experience and my reactions to the first five thoroughly informed my expectations. The original game was my 2012 game of the year and won me over by being the complete package. Every element is excellent and works in harmony to create an unforgettable experience. When I replayed Xenoblade with the Definitive Edition, I wrote a blog laying out my full thoughts on the game like I am here. My thoughts on Future Connected are included as well. Xenoblade X was another game of colossal importance for me that I considered at the time a messy masterpiece. Its level of execution could not always reach its absurd ambitions, but darn if X isn’t so loveable and always arresting all the same. I strongly yearn for Xenoblade X to be brought over to the Switch, not just because my Wii U will one day fail me, but to have an excuse to play it again and hopefully check out the multiplayer with friends.

The largest factor hanging over my expectations for Xenoblade 3 was the infamous Xenoblade Chronicles 2. While it was still one of my favorite games the year it came out (at 9th place), the more distance I had from it, the more it personally felt like a relatively big disappointment. It was obviously a step back in quality and ambition from both Xenoblade Chronicles and Xenoblade X with flatter environments and a less dynamic combat system. The pacing of the game is thoroughly mixed for the first thirty hours until it largely gets its act together for the back forty or so. While the story and characters did win me over ultimately, the juvenile and horny tone never sat right with me. To this day, I’ve never recommended Xenoblade Chronicles 2 to anyone. In fact, I’ve largely discouraged people to check it out given its worst content and given the first 30 hours are a slog. It’s a shame given there are elements of Xenoblade 2 I do really enjoy including the majority of the characters, the excellent ending, and the largely awesome soundtrack. So of course, with such a marked shift in tone and quality, I wondered what the next main Xenoblade entry would be like for years. The two smaller experiences following Xenoblade 2, Torna and Future Connected, gave me immense hope that the series was back on track as they more closely resembled Xenoblade Chronicles and Xenoblade X. My hope was that Xenoblade 2 would stand as the black sheep of the series and now with Xenoblade 3 I can thankfully say yes, it is.

Xenoblade Chronicles 3 properly begins showing two nations at war, Keves and Agnus. The goal of the war is to kill as many of the enemy soldiers as possible as the two sides are literally harvesting the embers of life that leave slain soldier’s bodies. The war is being fought across the world of Aionios, between organized groups of soldiers called colonies. Each one has a Flame Clock that shows the amount of energy each colony has collected and each soldier’s life is tied to their colony’s clock. If the clock were to deplete, every soldier would die so they are forced to fight. There’s little questioning of the structure of this world by the majority of the soldiers themselves as they are literally born and raised to fight for their ten years of life. In the initial battle, we see one colony being wiped out entirely, and it is here that we meet three of the main characters, Noah the main protagonist, and his friends Eunie and Lanz. Noah is an off-seer who sends off the lives of departed soldiers so they can rest peacefully. While Noah has some questions about the structure of his world, the weight of the flame clock prevents him from acting on them.

By the end of chapter 1 the story begins to shift as an urgent special operation Noah’s colony is sent on sets Noah and his friends lives on a different course. They are tasked to destroy an unknown force and Noah’s squad happens to reach them first alongside a squad from Agnus ultimately composed of the other three party members, Mio, Taion, and Sena. While the six soldiers are battling it out, a giant monster appears and wreaks havoc killing some of their friends who had come to assist them. In the middle of this confusion, that unknown force led by a man named Vandham, activates the Ouroboros Stone which transforms the party into Ouroboros. This frees them from the shackles of the flame clock and allows them to Interlink between each other in set pairs which basically temporarily transforms them into giant robots of immense power. This allows them to overcome that giant monster who identifies as a Moebius and gives them insight into the memories and emotions of their partner. After a series of events, the six soldiers alongside two Nopon, Riku and Manana, decide to team up and search for a city in Swordmarch (the sword of the Mechonis from the original Xenoblade that pierces the land) that will hopefully give them more answers about Moebius and allow them to live beyond their ten years of life.

In chapter 3 the greater structure of the game comes into focus as you are able to explore the world of Aionios with more freedom. Noah, armed with a sword called Lucky Seven, is able to destroy Flame Clocks in a way that actually frees the people of each colony rather than kills them. From this point you are able to continue advancing the story or break off at any time to dive into various side content including huge optional zones to explore, hero and later ascension quests, and a vast array of side quests mostly attached to each colony you have liberated. Every colony liberated has a hero character to recruit that fills a rotating seventh slot in your party (the main six characters are locked in your party) and is heavily tied to the story of each colony. Zeon for example, the leader of Noah’s Colony 9, is a childhood friend of Noah, Lanz, and Eunie, and tries to address the food shortage his colony faces by growing crops. These characters are not just important to recruit because they flesh out the world and story, but because each one has a unique job that the party can learn and master.

I love the structure of Xenoblade 3. For the first time in the non-X games there truly is an overwhelming amount of quality side content to pursue beyond the main story. For exploration, my favorite element of the Xenoblade games, you no longer just have small optional parts of the main story areas you are in to explore, but often huge distinct areas to get lost in and have your own adventures in. As I played through the game, I often kept mental notes of optional areas I should explore once my level closed in on them. While there is no reward to mapping out the world, it was addicting filling in the map myself by wandering through it and seeing every last inch of the beautiful and fantastic world. I often wondered and was often satisfied with how the world connected itself together and figuring out how to reach certain places was as immensely satisfying as exploring them. I can’t speak to Xenoblade 2 since I don’t remember how it worked there, but at least in Xenoblade 3 compared to the original game I appreciate that you no longer whiff attacks on monsters more than three levels above you. With the right equipment, ability spread, and tactics then you can take on monsters many levels above you and come out on top. It’s such an empowering and deeply satisfying feeling that enriches the thrill of exploration into unknown territory when there is no artificial failure barrier because the amount of danger you can risk is far greater. 

Recruiting heroes and experiencing the greater stories that develop across locations is another excellent source of quality side content. Having recruited everyone along my journey, I could not imagine having not and ultimately seeing their stories through given how much it adds to the greater experience. While I waited until after I rolled credits to finish all of them, I’m also especially glad I saw every colony story through while maxing affinity. I’m always a huge fan of when you tackle side quests that introduce characters that later all come together as a community for a final quest. Xenoblade 3 does have a few quests with tons of crossover including building the giant robot together with Colony 30 and their neighbors, but more often it is one hero character or prominent side character working together with one another or the people of the individual colonies coming together. I don’t think I’ve had a game that’s ever had as many quests like these with such a fun range in scale, so I felt especially catered to and loved how they enriched the world. There’s a lot of a-ha moments in being confronted with a problem and then knowing who you need to turn to for help whether it’s an individual or a full community.

With the premise and general structure covered, I’d like to move on to discuss more specific elements of Xenoblade 3 starting with exploration. My favorite part of the Xenoblade series is unquestionably exploring the amazing and truly fantastic worlds Monolith designs and brings to life. I was skeptical of the strength of Xenoblade 3’s exploration element during my journey because while Aionios lacks some of the impossible fantasy landscapes that define the series and straight up reuses imagery from both Xenoblade and Xenoblade 2, I ultimately walked away deeply satisfied. Aside from X which reigns uncontested with its open world structure, Xenoblade 3 became my otherwise favorite game in the series for exploration. Walking into the experience from the prerelease information I was unsure whether Xenoblade 3 would be open world or have open zones like 1 and 2. I was initially disappointed to find out it was open zones again, but what I could not tell early on was exactly how huge, dense, and complex these zones were.

On three separate occasions, I was ultimately blown away by Xenoblade 3’s world. The first was the Fornis region which in chapter 2 is a guided experience. However, once you reach chapter 3, you quickly stumble upon my favorite area of the game that I dubbed the Crossroads. While it obviously has a proper name and is connected to a major area, the Crossroads are special to me because when you enter them the music fades away and the stunning scale and vision of Xenoblade 3 is fully revealed. The Crossroads is the intersection of four different areas of Fornis. The North where you came from leads to Colony 4, the Eastern path leads to Dannagh Desert, the path to the West leads to a deadly valley called Elaice Highway, and right before you to the South lies Ribi Flats a verdant, peaceful cliffside that you’ll have to scale. Even then, what I still could not imagine about Fornis was that there were still distinct biomes to find, two more colonies to find one of which is literally hiding inside a mountain, and two substantial dungeon-like caves. When I made each discovery one by one, I felt each time no way can Monolith make this land more complex and yet they did.

Since I’m talking about Fornis, I might as well bring up the new to Xenoblade 3 party skills which once found grant you new abilities like being able to ride down wires or walk over hazardous ground. There’s so few of them it’s not much of a Metroid element, but even so I did get a great kick out of getting a new one and knowing where to run back to explore new areas. Fornis has perhaps my favorite use of one as there is a mountain in the lower Western corner of the Dannagh Desert that I just did not know how to climb. Walking around the perimeter of the cliffside didn’t help as the only ramp was a sand flow that prevented you from climbing up it. At this point I found my first trick door dungeon which was a pleasant surprise and from there tried to figure out how to enter the two seemingly random door icons on the map to no avail. When I gave up, I returned to the Aetia region you begin the game in and ended up heading towards Mio’s colony, Colony Gamma, where I ended up learning an ability to climb up sand flows from the commander/hero Teach. Now the adventure was back on so I happily scaled and explored that mountain that thwarted me previously. It was a great moment in my adventure.

I mentioned I was blown away three times, so let me move on to the second time, the Cadensia region with the Erythia Sea. At this point in the journey, I thought Fornis was going to be the exceptional standout area after the Pentalas and Keves Castle regions were more linear. When you first enter Cadensia you are basically at the base of Swordmarch and the home of the Lost Numbers simply called, City. They task you with the next part of the journey of sneaking into Agnus Castle and give you a boat to cross the Erythia Sea. The port for the boat is inside a cave inside a small mountain, so when you emerge out into the Erythia Sea it feels awesome seeing the full sea before you. There are many islands scattered about to explore at your leisure with my favorites being Daedel Island, Corne Island, and the Levi Sandbar. The whole sea in general is just classic Xenoblade as most of the islands offer satisfying mini adventures. Take Daedel Island for example which after climbing up the beachside leads to a fortress of Gulkins, a sea themed offshoot of Tirkins. After you blast through them you can repel into the central core of the island that is filled with humongous dinosaurs and other seemingly prehistoric beasts. If you are properly leveled, you can fully explore this central core area including battling enemies in the lake, near a small cave, and later on the cliffside tackle a boss to reach the giant plant at the island’s center. Levi Sandbar offers similar thrills as there are rivers of sand to navigate, an underground spider den to find after falling in quicksand, a military base to conquer, and castle ruins to explore atop a small ridge. Throughout the sea there are sealed treasures to discover, tons of unique boss monsters to defeat including two superbosses, some very interesting caves to find, and, most impressively, the base of Agnus Castle is part of the same map. There’s so much adventure to be had in the Cadensia region and I was happy it remains relevant to the end of your adventure because it was the region I was most happy to be in.

The final moment of exploration that blew me away was the return to the Aetia region which is also my favorite long term payoff in Xenoblade 3. When I first approached the edge of Cadensia and saw it say I would return to Aetia I thought it was a mistake since I had definitely finished mapping out the Eastern edge of Aetia earlier. Prior to this, I had noticed that the remains of the Gormott Titan from Xenoblade 2 hung above Aetia and thought it’d be cool to explore up there, but I thought it was just decoration. Well it absolutely wasn’t! When you return to Aetia you are in a snow filled region called Upper Aetia and while it isn’t required for the main story you can complete the full loop of your journey around the world by climbing down into Cooley Lake, which was a portion of the map that haunted me throughout the adventure. I had so many ideas for how to reach Cooley Lake including what ultimately turned out to be an unconnected high level cave and a mysterious cliffside I couldn’t reach, as well as the edge of the battlefield at the beginning of the game. I had just ruled out the battlefield before heading to Upper Aetia for the first time. When I reached the Cloudkeep of Upper Aetia and turned around and saw the fantastic view of the battlefield where the game began and knowing it was all one huge level was such a wild moment I won’t forget.

​To wrap up my discussion on exploration, not only was I constantly compelled to push forward and see everything, I just ultimately came to really appreciate the world of Aionios to an extent even more than the original Xenoblade game whose best maps are also seared into my memory. I came to know Aionios like the back of my hand especially as I ran through side quests in the post game. Often, I’d be sent somewhere in the world to address an issue and feel yes, I know exactly where I’m heading and I’m excited to head back there. Along the way I’d often look into other things I had left unfinished like tackling unique monsters that were above my level prior to open up new fast travel points. I loved exploring so much that when it came time to fight the final boss and I wasn’t ready for my journey to conclude just then, I of course jumped right back into exploring and in this case fully mapped out the Lower Maktha Wildwood.

Ok, that covers exploration, so time to move on and discuss combat. I’d like to discuss the combat system itself of course and, in the process, I’ll discuss both party building and the job system as well. Xenoblade 3 thankfully returns to a combat system closer in spirit to Xenoblade and Xenoblade X where positioning matters more than ever. There is no question in my mind, this is the best combat system in the series yet when you are in the middle of it as there is so much more to immediately manage as well as more systems and strategies possible to tap into. When the game begins for the character you control, you simply have three basic Arts assigned to face buttons and a powerful Talent Art that fills up as you perform tasks that support your combat role. For example, attackers need to mix in positional attacks, attacking from the front, back, and side with specific Arts, to fill up their Talent Art’s gauge. Arts from Keves classes fill up after a time based cool down while Agnus classes fill up every time you auto attack. This distinction is important because ultimately you can equip up to three more Arts from classes from the opposite nation. In other words, you’ll have three Arts where Arts recharge over time and three that recharge through auto attacks which is especially interesting to juggle when they have a range of cooldown lengths. The second set of Arts is mapped to pressing up, right, and down on the d-pad and here is where an interesting decision comes into play. Arts that line up on the UI horizontally (Up and X, Right and Y, and Down and B) can be activated at once as Fusion Arts by holding ZR. In a Fusion Art, the main Art of your current class triggers and combines both the damage and bonus effect of the other Art, like Power Charge or Bleed, to it. Somewhere in there is some kind of damage multiplier as well given how easy it is to spot as your damage increases throughout the adventure. There’s another bonus as well because Fusion Arts help power up your Ouroboros form while the downside of course is that you must wait for both Arts to be charged which might leave one Art sitting unused for a while.

Ouroboros is the other main part of the combat system to manage and plan around. When the set pairs of characters Interlink, Noah and Mio, Eunie and Taion, and Lanz and Sena, they fuse together to form a powerful robot that is impervious to damage. Each Ouroboros also has its own set of arts and eventually when the Agnus crew get their own leading Ouroboros forms you can swap between the two to take advantage of even more Arts. Each form has their own role and purpose. Noah’s Ouroboros form is generally amazing at dealing damage and setting up big combos for example while Eunie’s Ouroboros form is good for healing allies and can even revive them. While a general goal of combat for longer encounters should be to charge the Ouroboros gauge to level 3 for max damage, sometimes activating it early to dodge a hit to keep a character alive is crucial. It’s important to remember that when two characters Interlink you might lose out on key roles in your party like your healers so you need to account for that when party building.

​While normal combat and Ouroboros combat are the most regular features of combat to consider, they aren’t the only ones. For the first time you can swap to any of the six main characters at any time which is great if you need a specific thing to happen that the generally good AI is not addressing. In addition to positional attacks, there are buff fields your party lays down that you can take advantage of if you move your party into them like attack up, healing, and haste/art recharge. This can be done individually or by making use of orders to cluster everyone together. There are also two limit break attacks to consider implementing. First is Chain Attacks, which I generally avoided in regular combat since they deal an absurd amount of damage. I did like using them occasionally as a get out of jail free card however since it is a very good way to completely refill your health. The second limit break is by far my favorite and one I enjoyed working towards. You need a lot of charges to build it up, but if you can manage to fill it without dying, Noah’s second unique talent art, Unlimited Sword, is incredible. When activated, Noah draws forth Lucky Seven and gets access to six unique Arts that grant buffs and debuffs consistently and a unique Talent Art that guarantees a very powerful Smash combo. You obviously draw a ton of aggro, but if you properly time the Smash combo you can interrupt enemy attacks. Alternately, you can hide temporarily in your Ouroboros form which grants easier access to Noah’s special Ouroboros talent art and maintains the timer for Unlimited Sword. Since it is so difficult to build and maintain, I had no remorse attempting to work Unlimited Sword into my longer fights unlike the absurdly powerful Chain Attacks that have little drawback beyond the long animations.

I want to briefly talk about one of my favorite fights I experienced as an example of how this all comes together. Around 15 hours into my adventure, I picked a fight with an elite scorpion monster four levels above me. Early on I swapped between characters to get everyone in position since we didn’t start the fight united. This set me up to take proper advantage of buff and healing fields for my whole party. From there I swapped to Noah who was using the Flash Fencer job to power up his attacks including his first Lucky Seven special talent art (not the limit break) and I took advantage of fusion arts to charge my Ouroboros as best as I could. I was able to dodge some of the biggest hits of the scorpion by swapping to Ouroboros, but unfortunately when he was at 25% health left my two healers went down. Unless you have a special item equipped or have access to Eunie and Taion’s Ouroboros revive, when your healers die you can no longer revive people. With my last four members, I did a hail mary Chain Attack and in the last round barely managed to kill the scorpion. My reward for the battle wasn’t just the thrill of it as it turned out this scorpion was guarding a secret location oasis in the top left corner of the Dannagh Desert. It was so satisfying to triumph here and see such an awesome spot. Most of my favorite fights in Xenoblade 3 would resemble this one as I regularly tapped into many of the combat systems at key points in order to triumph.

I’ve touched on it throughout my discussion of combat, but let’s talk about party building and the job system. I think even considering X which had a deeper range of possibilities, Xenoblade 3 despite ditching proper equipment is the most fun to build parties with since it readily presents interesting choices to play with. For the six characters always in the field, you are directly in charge of choosing their class, arranging their arts and fusion arts, and equipping three skills, three accessories, and finally three gems. The first choice for a long part of the game isn’t necessarily the most interesting in itself, but rather for how you plan your character growth. There are many weird quirks of the job system to consider when it comes to learning and mastering classes. First you have to complete the hero quest to recruit someone with a new job into your party. Upon doing so, one of the main six characters instantly becomes the class inheritor and has access to it as well. In order to teach the job to your other five characters you’ll need to have either the hero or someone who has mastered the job in your party with the job equipped. The more characters who have the job equipped the faster the other characters will learn it, but the game doesn’t tell you that you must also fight monsters at or ideally above your level to really move the process along. Since you permanently learn skills, arts, and eventually talent arts for your effort, it’s best to learn every job and master them as you play. When you don’t have jobs to learn and master, choosing your seventh hero can become quite strategic as they can make a surprisingly huge impact on keeping your party healthy vs dealing a lot of damage. I was mostly focused on leveling efficiently so I didn’t play around with possibilities of the job and hero systems as much as I’d have liked to, but every once in a while, I’d randomly assemble really cool and effective combinations which considerably raised my opinion of the system as a whole.

​To talk about how these choices all interact, I’d like to discuss my favorite build. While there are many jobs I enjoyed playing, like the Flash Fencer, Sword Master, and Full Metal Jaguar, my absolute favorite was Ghondor’s class, the Martial Artist. What makes the Martial Artist inherently special beyond its high critical hit rate is that most of its attacks I favored have inherently short cooldowns. This meant I could regularly sneak Arts in while my Arts drawn from other classes were recharging and, in the process, really charge my selected Talent Art quickly. One of its best Arts has an Evade effect which makes you entirely invulnerable to damage and lets you turn Xenoblade 3 into more of an action game where you can dodge the most devastating attacks. The Martial Artist’s Talent Art is particularly interesting as it boosts its strength by draining the power from charged Arts which can be weaker than just using Fusion Arts, but is sometimes more powerful especially when an enemy has high defense. While the Martial Artist has a lot of inherent strengths its real strength is that with a solid build to accentuate its strengths it becomes absurdly good. For Fusion Arts, I mainly picked Arts with short cooldowns and made sure I had the Flash Fencer’s Power Charge. For equipment, including accessories, skills, and gems, I prioritized choices that sped up attack and boosted critical hit rate. I also made sure to equip my absolute favorite accessory that doubles Fusion Art damage. Finally, I always made sure my healers had access to the fast art recharge field of Miyabi’s Troubadour Class and regularly brought along Miyabi herself as well which meant my Arts practically instantly charged. All of this together let me regularly fire off Fusion Arts as much as possible which could easily deal around 50,000 damage or higher in the right conditions. My Talent Art could also charge very quickly which was especially great if it was Noah’s unique Unlimited Sword Talent Art.

I’d like to move on now to briefly discuss the music of Xenoblade 3. In general, I was greatly pleased by the battle themes while I felt underwhelmed by the field music. It feels like there is less unique battle music overall in Xenoblade 3 compared to Xenoblade 2, but it does make up for it by having cool variations for the boss battle themes that speak to the tone of the fight at hand. On the quality front, I think Xenoblade 3 is my new favorite for battle themes. Keves Battle and You Will Know Our Names Finale are particularly cool for featuring the flutes used in the main story. My two favorite tracks are definitely, A Formidable Enemy, which is the theme of all elite monster fights, and Battle! Vs Moebius, which plays for all Moebius fights. The Moebius boss fight theme in particular gives me chills every time I hear it as it’s truly on another level. I also have to give a shoutout to the post game battle theme remix of Drifting Soul which takes one of my favorite themes of Xenoblade 2 into a very cool new direction.

On the other hand, we have the exploration themes for Xenoblade 3 which left me disappointed. In a vacuum they are all generally fine, but the songs that play when you are exploring are just so muted compared to the bombastic themes I loved from past games. There is no equivalent at all to something like the Gaur Plains theme from the original Xenoblade or Gormott, Mor Ardain, and Tantal from Xenoblade 2. Most of the songs in Xenoblade 3 are just generally wistful and melancholic which does work very well to accentuate the story and themes of Xenoblade 3, but I’m sad it all kind of fades into the background without a range of tones. The one exception is the Erythia Sea theme which is still quiet, but the melody of the piano is just catchy enough to stand out and it feels fitting for being leisurely at sea. While the general exploration themes let me down, I do like the town themes. The one for the City in particular is especially distinct and reminds me of the Nier soundtracks. I’m not terribly familiar with the names of the music for event tracks yet so I can’t give many shoutouts here, but to wrap up my music discussion, I will say I especially enjoyed, Remnants of Memories, and the end credit’s theme, Where We Belong.

​For my final section before my overall wrap up, I’d like to discuss the characters and the story. I can confidently say this is my favorite cast of core characters in a Xenoblade game. For the main eight there are no weak links at all. Eunie and Lanz are definitely my two favorites. Eunie is just incredibly funny with her rude remarks and regular exasperation, but she does truly care about all of her friends and has some good drama with remembering and overcoming the trauma of her past lives. Lanz is definitely the heart of the group and has meaningful moments with all of the main characters and a good number of hero characters. He also has my favorite repeated line of post battle dialog in the game “And I was the MVP…You’re all thinking it!” The second half is delivered with such amusing conviction that I always laugh when thinking about it. I like Noah and Mio a lot too. I had become iffy on Noah during the events of chapter 5 and 6 and later how he forgives his dark counterpart N, but those moments just seem weirdly out of character mostly in regards to how thoughtful and insightful he is in every other part of the story. Mio too suffers in the same story sections as Noah and again shines everywhere else, but I do give Mio the slight edge over Noah because the story really does a great job when focusing on how she spends her remaining time left both heroically and when she is more vulnerable. Riku and Manana are probably my next favorite pair. Riku always has the best wisdom and truly cares about all of his friends and I love his super deep voice. I was skeptical about Manana since she doesn’t get much to do in the main story, but her bubbly personality really shines in side quests and she gets so many of the game’s best silly lines. Sena and Taion definitely get less to work with than the other characters (Sena even gets robbed during her own ascension quest!), but I definitely love what each brings to the team. Sena has a ton of energy and wants to prove herself even as she is haunted by self-doubt and Taion alternates well between thoughtful analysis and snark.

​I greatly enjoyed the cast of hero characters overall. There’s a truly surprising amount of variety between them despite most of them being leaders of a Colony or faction and I was obviously thrilled both Nia and Melia returned. For new characters, I already mentioned Miyabi was definitely the MVP in my group in battle for fast Art recharging, but I also really enjoyed her relationship with Mio and her ascension quest, a cooking contest with multiple contestants and judges, which was very fun. Zeon was excellent too. I initially confused him with Garvel, the bully from flashbacks, and was very relieved to find out they were different characters because Zeon is an excellent friend and I love his intense passion for growing crops, especially potatoes. I also enjoyed Ashera who has by far the most amusing entrance in the game as she asks you to fight off her own colony who both hate and love her. Ashera’s ascension quest really fleshed out her character and the lore of the game as we learned prior to the main game the Homecoming ceremony was a brutal affair rather than a sad, celebratory one. My favorite hero character was definitely Ghondor. Her filthy language and aggressive personality make a bad first impression, but I was fully won over when she very amusingly returns to rescue the party in chapter 6. I became even more endeared to Ghondor the more side quests I played as we see many different sides of her across them.

​While the main party and hero characters are awesome, sadly Moebius, the villains, are not. While Moebius starts off with a great first impression with the maniacal D and that incredible boss theme, the ones you regularly encounter in normal side quests are just so mustache-twirlingly evil and even sometimes just downright incompetent that you lose all respect for them as adversaries. While it’s kind of the point that they are drunk on power, when the rest of the game is confidently presented with so much thoughtfulness, it’s just a real bummer most of the villains are just a parade of jokers. Perhaps if they leaned into camp more it would work out. The Moebius for Colony Tau for example sounds like an evil British grandma which is very amusing. Aside from D, there are three other villains who stand out in Xenoblade 3, Shania, N, and Z. Shania is probably the best in the game. She begins the game as a regular human and betrays the entire party to escape her mortal existence. In Sena’s ascension quest Shania returns as a Moebius and you learn how her upbringing drove her to only see her failures and the worst in people despite the support she did have. I really like N’s tragic backstory and his villainous actions in the plot have the most impact, but I do think he loses massive points for just being incredibly dense for 1,000 years. His redemption arc thus fell completely flat for me. Finally, I have to talk about Z, pronounced Zed, the ultimate villain of the game. In discussing the game online, I realized I may have misunderstood Z’s backstory. I think he existed prior to Origin, but regardless if he did or didn’t I do think in either case the idea of Z being powered by humanity’s fear of the future is pretty cool and his obsession with cinema is amusing. Unfortunately, the final, very dragged-out boss fight with Z is such a letdown, that I do think less of his character.

As for the story, I definitely enjoyed the biggest beats. The opening in particular is presented with such confidence that you really feel you are in for the adventure of a lifetime. The end of chapter 2 where the party really teams up for the first time is also very exciting. Things start to drag a bit in chapters 3 and 4 as the game settles into a predictable rhythm, but thankfully chapter 5 is incredible. The party meeting the Lost Numbers in full and seeing the normal human life cycle is such an incredible, wondrous moment. Of course, the best moment in the game, even with parts I disagree with, is when the party rescues Ghondor from prison, but ends up getting captured themselves. N’s twisted actions that seemingly culminate with the death of Mio and Noah is incredibly shocking. I mentioned it above, but I really liked N’s backstory revealed here as he was ultimately broken from all of the time loops he experienced. When Noah returns to reality from his dream journey and truly pulls Lucky Seven for the first time is an incredible, empowering moment. Rescuing Nia at the end of Chapter 6 is another fantastic moment, as Nia presents herself to the party as someone of legendary status and importance, but we the players know she is just winging it completely and constantly on the verge of being discovered. The final ending is definitely the most affecting moment of Xenoblade 3 for me. Seeing the two parties running after each other as the worlds begin to separate is so simple in concept, but is executed so effectively I definitely got misty eyed knowing they seemingly won’t reunite easily if truly at all.

While that covers the big moments, I do have to touch on the backstory of Origin and Z which has been contentiously received. Personally, it never really bothered me. I’ve played so many games and seen so many anime where the universe has to be rebooted that I wasn’t fazed beyond Tora from Xenoblade 2 seemingly being the idea guy behind Origin (incidentally, Tora is the worst!). I mainly thought it was incredibly amusing that the final dungeon name and concept were identical to Blue Reflection Second Light from not even a year ago considering it was rumored Xenoblade 3 had a chance to be launched at the same time. I know there are only so many JRPG stories out there, but it’s a bizarre coincidence two developers came up with the same ideas likely simultaneously. As for Z, I’ve also played many games where an evil being was created or empowered by the negative thoughts of humans so again, I remained unfazed. For me, I really think the stories of the characters coming together, the main party, the heroes, the people of the Colonies etc., are going to be what I remember most about the story of Xenoblade 3.

With all of the major elements discussed, it’s time to finally share my overall feelings and wrap this blog up. Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed Xenoblade 3. When I rolled credits at 100 hours, I really did not want to leave Aionios just yet, because I enjoyed exploring it so much and enjoyed hanging out with all of the characters. It’s such a cozy and deeply satisfying experience from start to finish. Xenoblade 3 was the first Xenoblade game where I knew early on I had to do everything and I basically have since I completed the post game outside of clearing the final cave and super bosses which I’m saving for when the DLC drops. With possible exception of X, I think Xenoblade 3 has the most compelling game structure of the series and on many fronts easily the best side content. Again, outside of X, Xenoblade Chronicles 3 is my favorite in the series for exploration as its world is just so wondrous, vast, and shockingly dense. It blew me away on three separate occasions and offered so many more surprises beyond that. I felt incredibly compelled to map out the full world and outside of the Erythia Sea, I basically have. The combat is easily the best in the series with so many interesting tools and systems to draw on including more action elements if you want to tap into them. Party building may not have as much depth as X, but it does bring the most generally interesting decisions forward and make them easier to play with. While I didn’t play around with its possibilities too much, I still had great fun with the job system and stumbling upon really cool combos. The music in Xenoblade 3 may not have satisfied me for field music, but I thoroughly enjoyed the combat music including one of the all-time best boss battle themes with Battle! Vs. Moebius. Finally, I really enjoyed the characters, especially the main cast and heroes, and the story overall. While some of the backstory is a bit whatever, the big ideas and themes landed for me and I adored the ascension quests and colony stories.

I think Xenoblade 3 overall is definitely the best game in the series even if it doesn’t excel on every front like the original Xenoblade Chronicles. But while it may be messier, I definitely had the most fun playing Xenoblade 3 and I did not want to put it down until I saw nearly everything the game had to offer. I’m very glad it is a huge rejection of Xenoblade 2’s vision for the series and is instead back on track with what Xenoblade Chronicles and Xenoblade X started. Xenoblade 3 is absolutely a huge evolution for the non-X games and raises the bar for what I expect from the series. I do hope after Xenoblade 3’s DLC expansion releases we’ll see either a return to Mira or an entirely new world divorced from Xenoblade and Xenoblade 2, though I do think there is potential to return to Xenoblade and Xenoblade 2’s worlds in the future. Even if it isn’t as open as Mira, I also hope we’ll see a return to an open world structure. I feel Xenoblade 3 is the peak of open zone design, but another game as phenomenal as Xenoblade 3 would be hard to complain about. Regardless, Xenoblade 3 fully reawakened my love for the series and I can not wait to play Monolith’s next adventures.

​That concludes my latest and longest blog to date, thank you so much for reading! I’d love to hear what you thought about Xenoblade 3, so definitely share your thoughts with me on Twitter @JustinMikos. Until next time!