Took years to finish this one because I kept putting it down, but the ending chapters go so hard and I’m grateful I finished it.

Cons: The blade mechanic is more interesting in concept than fun to use. Overwhelming menus. Blade side quests that take literal ages to get through to fully level your blade. Hate the anime tropes and most of the character designs. Also the characters are hit or miss.

Pros: I warmed up to the Gacha system as theoretically I would use different blades on another playthrough. The world is very cool (inferior to XC1 but unique). Story is intriguing and its morality conversation is fascinating. Incredible music. Breathtaking moments.

I love the Xenoblade series and have grown to love this one. It’s complex and swings so hard. It misses on some things, but overall I enjoy it!

I really tried to give this game a fair try, but I couldn't do it. I still remember exactly why I stopped playing it. I was laying on the floor while a 5 minute long cutscene was playing, waiting for gameplay to start again, and I realized that the gameplay I was waiting for was not worth my time. The gameplay is uninteresting, the cutscenes are long and boring, the characters aren't engaging, the voice acting is grating (yes I know why), and sometimes you get sniped from across the map by an enemy that is 60 levels higher than you. After 10 hours of play, I put the game down and never looked back. The only thing that I really did like about the game is the world design, but that wasn't enough to keep me around. Least favorite game I have ever played.

There are 3 games that really made me fall in love with the medium of video game's and this one is in that category. It should be illegal with how good this game. Besides Rex's dumbass design for the first 3/4 of this game, there is almost no flaws.

I can understand the combat being hard to understand, but once you do it is probably one of the best combat systems I have ever played. The soundtrack is my second favorite ost of all time right behind Persona 5. The characters are definitely the best in the series with the Aegis, Zeke, and Nia definitely highlighting the group. And the story is also the best in the series and is just so tasty. The villain's are absolutely sensational with Jin headlining some of the best conflict in the game.

There are multiple cutscenes in this game that bring me to tears and others that make me laugh so hard. It is such a wonderfully constructed game that has some of the most memorable moments in any media. I can't fucking wait to replay this game this year.

Xenoblade 2, is bursting to the brim with potential, with so many interesting ideas and concepts for a game. Which is why this is just such a frustrating game to me. So many of its ideas and mechanics just fall flat on their face, and usually trip over their own ambition. Yet, in an age where I think each game release becomes more predictable, safe and ultimately boring, I keep going back to Xenoblade 2 with more respect for what it tried to do, and the things it did right.

Xenoblade 2 is a JRPG (which you should already know by now considering you're reading a strangers review of it online) that consists of 10 chapters. Across those 10 chapters you meet a variety of characters that quality varies greatly, just like the chapters they are a part of. For me personally in an RPG, characters act as the spine, if you don't have good characters everything else in the game just kinda falls apart and stops working. While this is a very broad and way oversimplified metaphor, it should paint a picture in your mind. Everywhere I go I keep hearing "Oooh! Xenoblade Chronicles 2 has one of the best casts out there!" and "I got so attached to everyone in Xenoblade 2... all the characters in it are so endearing." If you think this way, Im glad! I honestly am. I just do not understand that sentiment at all. So much of the cast feels like they were underbaked, under explored, and most importantly, lack any real chemistry with each other. The relationship between Rex and the other characters joining him on his journey often felt really forced, especially with Pyra and Mythra. So often it felt like their relationship just kinda... happened? They don't really work off of each other that well and I never really saw any chemistry between them. This goes for most of the rest of the cast too, with some exceptions I will get into later. On the topic of Rex, they did him pretty dirty. I understand what they were trying to do with him, have a coming of age story where he learns to mature and grow up. While they do that, it again feels underbaked. The parts of the game where it feels like it's meant to highlight his growth just feel like they pass by too soon, like chapter 7. I also felt like he rarely acknowledged his mistakes, until they have dire consequences on him. I think Rex actually had a ton of potential, and they could have done a lot of interesting things with him, especially around chapters 6-8 but his execution was just not done properly like so much of the rest of the game. There is so many better examples of protagonists like Rex that he just ends up feeling lost in a sea, with not much to make him stand out. Mythra was another character I was pretty disappointed by, they had some really great ideas for her and her story, the execution just wasn't handled that well. And, like with Rex, she ends up lost among a sea of similar characters with not much helping her stand out. (Aside from her design, of course.) Not to mention characters like Tora who don't even have any interesting ideas and just end up being so annoying that they want to make me rip my hair out.

So, what is the point of this journey? Well, it's to go and find Elysium, at Pyra's request. Pretty simple set up, but I actually enjoy it quite a bit. It's something endearing, yet mysterious for you to journey towards. The issue I have with the plot of Xenoblade 2 is pretty much everything on the journey from A to B. The pacing of the game is just... egregious. It is plagued with long stretches of nothing followed by moments that feel like they went by way too fast. The plot is also full of cliches, and can be downright annoying like the entirety of chapter 4. With that being said, some of the ideas the game has are just really fucking cool. The last stretch of the game from the end of chapter 7-10 has a ton of really interesting and unique ideas in it that I really haven't seen anywhere else. These ideas are so good in fact, that it frustrates me that the game did not end up doing more with it.

The combat I feel like is one of the games most interesting aspects. Unlike most RPGs (mainly Persona) the combat is awesome at first, really fun and pretty exciting. Yet, as those games go on, the combat never really evolves and begins to overstay its welcome. Xenoblade 2 on the other hand has the exact opposite problem. When you first boot up the game, the combat feels unbearably awful. It's extremely slow, you are locked out of so many options and the game just does not explain any of its mechanics in a remotely understandable fashion. The auto attack time is slow, and since you can't move while attacking, for a lot of the early game you are just there standing still, and waiting. Once an art pops up, you cancel into it and then wait some more. I could not stand the combat during its early hours... but then the impossible happened. I started to have a ton of fun with it. The more the game opens itself up, the more blades you get, the more party members you get, and once you finally understand chain attacks... the game just clicked. The feeling of waiting went away, and I felt like I was always involved, doing something. Arts recharged faster, and new skills made the game just a lot mote fun to play. It eventually became one of the most interesting and involved RPG combat systems I've ever played.

The worlds of Xenoblade have always been something I felt like the series has done better than most other RPGs, and on paper I should feel the same way about 2. There are so many beautiful and intricately designed landscapes in the game, and each one is pretty diverse too. The poor implementation sadly strikes again however. A lot of little things about exploring bug me in this game, like how to get resources you have to huddle over a pile and click A, and then watch a quick animation of your blades field skills go by, and then finally the resources pop out and you can collect them. While it something that sounds so minor, it really does affect my enjoyment of exploring and collecting resources. It just psychologically does not feel good to always stop and wait and then go back to playing, that's why so many games slow you down upon taking damage. It's not meant to feel good, and the same thing applies here as well. That however, really is small fries compared to the biggest issue with the games exploration, field skills. Whenever you are exploring you will often find locations locked behind these field checks. In order to bypass them you need blades with specific skills on them and up to a certain level, in order to bypass the check. So many of the field checks that you'll find, have stats that are way beyond what you'll have gotten normally at that point. So often you'll feel like you are exploring, about to find something awesome and then see that the game just blocks your way from finding that cool thing with these field checks. It eventually just conditioned me to not want to explore at all because I felt like anytime I would explore, I wouldn't find anything interesting because it would be locked behind a field check I couldn't pass. This isn't even mentioning that a big way of getting blades that will bypass these field checks is from utilizing a dacha like mechanic where you open core crystals hoping to find a good blade. Some of them being INCREDIBLY hard to find, like Kos-mos. The worst part of all of this is that these aren't just required for cool secrets, eventually the main story requires them and will block you out of continuing it until you have the necessary field skills. This happens at vital moments in the plot and just murders the pacing.

So at the end of the day, what do I think about Xenoblade 2? I think it's a game with some pretty stellar music, lots of great ideas, great combat once it gets going, and some really beautiful locals. The game is just plagued with so many problems that it can often be hard for me to see what is there, and what it does so well. Zeke and Pandoria have really great chemistry, but not much else of the cast does. The best characters come into play far too late into the game, and so does so many of its best ideas. It's all just too little too late. Xenoblade 2 has so much ambition, so much passion, so much unique ideas it brings to the table, but it just was not ready for it. The game really did need more time in order to really bring out the best of its ideas, and make it the special game that it deserved to be.

Xenoblade Chronicles 2: 6/10 - Okay

While I don't think this is the objectively best entry in the series (that title goes to Xenoblade 3), it is my favourite despite the flaws. To get the issues out of the way, tonally it is a mess at times (chapter 4!!!). The sexualisation and objectification of Pyra and Mythra, along with other female characters through design and the very rare camera angle is a problem. This is especially the case when a cornerstone of Rex and Pyra + Mythra's relationship is that he views them as people rather than a weapon or object to be obtained. It is quite conflicting in its message for the sake "fan service" and sales. If this is a deterrent to play for some, then that is more than reasonable. But, to argue that is all this game has to offer is viewing it in bad faith. Tora sucks and I will not elaborate but he is forgotten about past the highly problematic chapter 4 which is a blessing. Thankfully, Poppi is the focus of their duo and is an absolute sweetheart. The voice direction and hence acting is hit or miss early on (besides Malos who kills it the whole way through) but the VAs get more comfortable in their roles as the game goes on which leaves it at decent to good in some parts. There are some quality of life issues in the UI and menus with blade equipping for field skills but that is only minor.

With the major negatives accounted for, wow does this game have a lot going for. An excellent cast of party members and antagonists that examine the struggle to find purpose in a world that constantly reinforces nihilism. What drives someone to their breaking point and how do they come back from that? Can they even? Jin, Malos, Pyra, Mythra, The Architect, Amalthus, Nia, Morag and Zeke all reflect different perspectives on this idea as well as highlighting others in conjunction with unmentioned characters. However the one that brings all this together is the main man Rex. His optimistic world view shines a light on everyone and he is the perfect protagonist for such a story.

The soundtrack is the peak of the series, the world building is rich and full of depth to explore and the gameplay inspires creativity in an incredibly satisfying manner. Finally, the narrative presents so many revelations and has countless details informing character motives and their many layers that even upon a replay you might not catch it all. There are many great parts in the first 4 chapters but from chapter 5 onwards, this game is a roller coaster of emotions and a masterclass in story telling. 10/10 on what it does right and in my heart, but those flaws are hard to ignore.