Xenoblade Chronicles X

Xenoblade Chronicles X
File:Xenoblade Chronicles X - Boxart.jpg North America cover art
Developer(s)	Monolith Soft Nintendo SPD
Publisher(s)	Nintendo
Director(s)	Koh Kojima Genki Yokota
Producer(s)	Shingo Kawabata Hitoshi Yamagami
Designer(s)	Koh Kojima
Programmer(s)	Toshiaki Yajima
Artist(s)	Norihiro Takami Kunihiko Tanaka Koichi Mugitani Takayuki Yanase
Writer(s)	Tetsuya Takahashi Yuichiro Takeda Kazuho Hyodo Mamoru Ohta
Composer(s)	Hiroyuki Sawano
Series	Xeno
Platforms	Wii U
Release date(s)
Genre(s)	Action role-playing
Mode(s)	Single-player, multiplayer

Xenoblade Chronicles X, known in Japan as XenobladeX (Japanese: ゼノブレイドクロス, Hepburn: Zenobureido Kurosu, pronounced as "Xenoblade Cross"), is a science fiction, action role-playing video game developed by Monolith Soft and published by Nintendo for the Wii U home video game console. Part of the Xeno series of video games, it serves as a spiritual successor to Xenoblade Chronicles on the Wii. The game centers on the player's customizable avatar, who works to coexist with the indigenous creatures on a hostile alien planet while striving to protect humanity. Similar to its predecessor, the game features an open-world design that strongly emphasizes exploration. It was released on April 29, 2015 in Japan and in December 2015 internationally.

Gameplay

File:Xenoblade chronicles x gameplay.jpg

The player's party fights a giant enemy arthropod with the battle information on-screen. Clockwise from left: the party members' blue health gauges and green and blue experience points, the enemy's level and remaining health, the mini-map, and the "arts palette" with various special attacks.

In a similar fashion to the original Xenoblade Chronicles, the game plays as an open world role-playing video game, with an emphasis on exploration. Traveling can take place on foot, or in large humanoid robots, approximately four times the height of the average playable character, called "Skells" ("Dolls" in the Japanese version), that the player may opt to control. The Skells have the ability to fly, traverse water, and transform into vehicles such as motorcycles or tanks. Aerial battles also take place in the game.

During the game, the player seeks out and recovers the stasis pods that were ejected from the White Whale's hull during its emergency landing, which land in various places across Mira. In order to search for places with stasis pods, the player must expand the "Frontier Navigation" information system by installing data probes at places called "Frontier Nav Spots". By establishing data probes at various points on Mira, the Net obtains information on the related areas and expands its scope.

The game's battle system works similarly to the battle system found in the original game, with some improvements. The "Arts palette" returns from the previous game. Each special attack, or Art, from the palette enters a "cooldown" period when used. This forces the player to wait for it to fully charge, at which point they can either use it again, or let it re-charge twice, at which point its use will deal even more damage, keep its charge, or induce extra effects. Specific targets on an enemy's body, such as body parts or external weapons, can be targeted and destroyed in the midst of battle, denying the enemy use of certain attacks or increasing the chances of certain drops occurring.

The past game's quest log will also return in an improved form. The Wii U GamePad is used as an "information terminal" for data the player gathers about native organisms, a map, a way to warp to previously-visited locations, and for Off-TV Play.

Synopsis

Setting and characters

The setting of Xenoblade Chronicles X takes place on Mira, a distant planet located far away from Earth. It is divided by five continents: Primordia, Noctilum, Oblivia, Sylvalum, and Cauldros. The human settlement known as New Los Angeles is established in the heart of Primordia. New LA serves as the hub of the entire planet, usually containing the majority of the NPCs, sidequests, and other important features. There are several alien races that reside on Mira beside the humans, such as the greedy Nopon race, the technologically-advanced Ma-non people, and the hostile Ganglion.

The avatar is the game's main character, a survivor of the crash who has no recollection of the events prior to his or her arrival on Mira. The player character is shortly joined by Elma, a BLADE colonel who serves as the central protagonist of the main story. After their arrival in New Los Angeles, they meet thirteen year old Lin Lee Koo, a girl who is known as a genius Skells mechanic. Somewhere along the way, they rescue a Nopon known as Tatsu. Several BLADE members who join the team during the course of the story include: Doug Barrett, Irina Akulov, Gwin Evans, Lao Huang, and L. The team first confront the Ganglion, the antagonist organization, through Goetia in Noctilum. Later on, a pair of Ganglion executives known as Ryyz and Dagahn attack New Los Angeles. The two proud Wrothian warriors called Prince Ga Jiarg and his servant Ga Buidhe, work under Luxaar who the main antagonist and the head of the Ganglion organization.

Plot

The game begins in the year 2054, as two alien races engage in battle near Earth, causing significant collateral damage to the planet. With governments warned of Earth's obliteration beforehand, humanity is forced to evacuate in enormous interstellar ark ships, one from every major city on the planet, though only the American Los Angeles evacuee ship, the White Whale, and a small handful more, manage to escape before the planet is destroyed. The story picks up two years later as the White Whale is found and attacked by the Ghost, one of the alien races responsible for Earth's destruction, causing the ship to crash land upon the planet Mira. From there, the passengers attempt to establish their new home of "New Los Angeles" (New L.A.) and coexist with the planet's native races. The player character serves as a member of the BLADE task force, tasked with helping them to explore Mira and protecting New L.A. from threats, with the assistance of mechas known as Skells.

While serving BLADE, the player character has many tasks. The player is forced to confront other races on Mira, some friendly and some hostile, alongside helping New L.A. survive the harsh environment. They also build up a special team loyal to them, including Elma, the woman who found them in their stasis pod, Lin, a young engineer; and a sniper named Lao. After building the team, the human forces are attacked by the Ganglion, who were among the forces that fought the Ghost in the battle over Earth and arrived on Mira after seeing a "strange light" shortly after Earth was destroyed. During a battle, the player character's arm is lost, revealing them to be a sophisticated android known as a Mimeosome; Mimeosomes were a safety measure taken by Earth's people to protect those in the arks during the unknown journey times, and the entire human population is made up of them, controlling them from their real bodies. BLADE's primary duty is to seek out the Lifehold Core, where their real bodies are apparently stored in stasis. The Ganglion, allied with other alien races, continues to attack New L.A. BLADE ends up dissolving the alliance by convincing the other alien races that they can hold their own. During one attack, Lao reveals that he is a Ganglion spy, working against humanity due to the circumstances of his family's death and steals information vital to locating the Lifehold Core. Though defeated, the BLADE squad convince Elma not to execute him, and he gives back what he stole. During this time, the power source for the Mimeosomes has been slowly depleting, threatening their existence.

After finally locating the Lifehold Core, the BLADE team arrive at the chamber in the Lifehold Core with their real bodies. Luxaar, with his powerful Skell, penetrate through the Lifehold Core's outer defenses. Luxaar reveals that humans are the descendants of another alien race called the Samaarians; Despite what their legends claim, they will not acknowledge humans as their superiors, which is why they want to destroy humanity. After they defeat him, Elma reveals that their consciousnesses, and the essences of everyone on the White Whale are digitized and recorded in a computer known as a seventh-generation quantum mainframe and that their original bodies were destroyed along with the Earth, but can be re-created using the Lifehold Core's DNA banks and store of genetic material. Luxaar, having survived, attacks the system, but Lao double-crosses and kills him. As the BLADE team fights monsters the malfunctioning system creates in defense, both Luxaar and Lao fall into the DNA pool, and merge into a monstrous being that the team must kill. Before dying, Lao, having become one with Luxaar's memories, reveals that the Samaarians created the Ganglion and designed into humanity a genetic failsafe that would allow them to destroy the Ganglion should they ever rebel. Though Lao's death saddens them, their actions have preserved the DNA banks and given them the chance of restoring him. With the Lifehold Core safe and the power system stable, Elma deactivates her Mimeosome and revives her true body from stasis, revealing to the team that she is in fact an alien. She provided the aid to humanity that enabled them to escape the attack on Earth.

In the post-credits scene, Elma leads an expedition into the Lifehold Core. However, she finds the database for preserving humanity's memories was destroyed when they crashed onto Mira, and realizes that the planet itself is keeping them alive by unknown reasons. Lao, alongside an unknown armored being, is also shown to have been reborn on another part of Mira. The final message leaves the plot in an inconclusive cliffhanger.

Development

"I'd like to make an HD game that will wow the players. I want to show that Japan can still keep up with the USA when it comes to next gen technology. Our goal is to become something like the developers of the Fallout series, Bethesda Softworks"

- Monolith's Michihiko Inaba, expressing the team's motivation for their post-Xenoblade project

The game was first revealed in January 2013 in a Nintendo Direct video under the tentative name X. The game was further demonstrated in June 2013 at E3 2013, with Nintendo aiming for a 2014 release time frame. The game was shown again at E3 2014, revealing that the game had an official title, Xenoblade Chronicles X, but had its release timeframe delayed into some time in 2015. Despite the similarity in name, and the appearance of a character strongly resembling Shulk in the original 2013 trailer, the game is not a direct sequel to Xenoblade Chronicles, but rather a spiritual sequel. The game largely retains a similar battle system, quest log, and philosophical elements of Xenoblade Chronicles, as well as other story elements such as the presence of the Nopon race of creatures, and even contains similarities to other past games in the Xeno series. While the protagonists of Xenoblade Chronicles do not appear in the game, the game's character creation tool allows for the player to create characters that look similar to them, even allowing for the character to be voiced by Shulk's or Fiora's respective voice actors, Adam Howden and Carina Reeves.

The game was directed by Monolith Soft president, co-founder, and Xeno series director Tetsuya Takahashi, with character designs by Kunihiko Tanaka, the artist behind the character concept artwork and design on Xenogears, directed by Koh Kojima, and music by Hiroyuki Sawano. Nintendo president Satoru Iwata stated that the game was developed with the goal of creating a large-scale open world with "seamless exploration", with the development team working on expanding on the knowledge they learned in developing, Xenoblade Chronicles. Takahashi stated that his aim was to create the biggest game world possible for the Wii U; at one point, the developers considered releasing the game on two discs due to its size. In addition to the freedom to explore the game, the player is able to customize the appearance of the main playable character, including gender, shape, height, skin, color, voice, and facial tattoos. The game supports online co-op play for up to four players. In an interview with Famitsu, executive director Tetsuya Takahashi revealed that due to the game's sheer scope and volume, implementing the online functions was a challenge when they originally used “very basic technology” for the functionality, opting it over "cutting edge technology" because, according to Takahashi in the interview, he said, "HD and online were new experiences for us and rushing has no use. It’s a bit similar to boxing: if you stand till the end, you will win. We faced the development with this in mind." Nintendo had to step in and assist with the online support, with Takahashi taking in what he learned from the development process to implement in a potential next project.

In November 2014, Monolith Soft announced that they had entered the final stages of development, morale within the team was high, and they planned to release the game in the first half of 2015 in Japan, and the second half of 2015 in North America and Europe. The development team also revealed that they had decided to create their own website for the game, something they created without Nintendo's permission, but was given approval by the time it launched. The team blogs about the game's development on the website. They revealed that the game would have "online elements", but did not reveal any further details. Takahashi suggested that the game would feature a 'deep' and distinctive sci-fi story compared to its predecessor's 'basic' fantasy story, and stated that he asked Tanaka for his cooperation to bring out the "Xeno-ness" in the game's character designs. On December 4, Takahashi tweeted that after 15 years since the founding of Monolith Soft, he finally felt he had successfully created an RPG in which humans and robots could co-exist, something he stated as being a long held vision of his.

Since its release, Chronicles X received software updates via download: the first was minor adjustments to in-game text, while the second added Spanish and French subtitles.

Scenario

Takahashi stated that he always believed the setting is important in RPGs so it became the game's first pillar. Takahashi said that the team was unable to connect the Bionis and Mechonis into one field in Xenoblade Chronicles; this resulted in the team wanting to step up for this game by creating a completely open world. Upon starting the project, the team discussed creating an entire planet, but in the end, they developed a field on a realistic scale by creating five continents around 400km². Kojima said that the team put in real effort to creating the setting so that players wouldn't feel disappointed when they put in the effort to go to hard-to-reach locations. Takahashi said that "when the player needs to go from point A to point B to progress the story, for example, however hard we may try to create something really worthwhile to be explored between these two points, it would be meaningless if the player could not realize that something might be there in that part of the world." They believed that adding the pioneering feature between points would naturally encourage players to explore while traveling to their destination. Takahashi suggested implementing hexagon-shaped fields called "Segments" into the maps to make it easier for players to figure out where they were going.

After establishing the game world as the foundation, Monolith Soft focused on creating the base of the story. From there, Takahashi and Kojima had several meetings about the story with the scriptwriters Yuichiro Takeda and Kazuho Hyodo as well as Genki Yokota. According to Takeda, Takahashi had already written a large amount of the plot beforehand and was even suggested as novel-like by Kojima. Takeda mentioned that he carefully picked out the stories that fit with the game's content and scale and turned them into scripts. Since Takeda was the originally the only scriptwriter assigned, he asked Hyodo to assist as the volume was too large for one person to handle. Known for his work on several anime productions, it was Hyodo's first time being fully involved in a video game production. As Hyodo wrote several quest scenarios, he was approved by the staff members to create additional characters. Despite Takeda preferring middle-aged male characters, he thought it would be a good idea to recruit Hyodo for young female characters with important roles. According to Takeda, the scenario including the main story and quests took about a year and a half to write out. Yokota said that they intended to increase the number of quests by 3,000% compared to the quests from Xenoblade Chronicles, but instead, they put 3,000% of their hearts into creating them.

In the middle of development, the team partially re-hauled the story to implement an online mode. This caused them to do a "mass construction" to change the main character into an avatar and rewrite bits of the story to match with the content. The decision to add the online functionality was because the team felt that playing in such a large open-world environment would cause the players to feel lonely. They focused on making the online mode "loosely connected" so that players can feel the presence of others. However, due to the RPG elements of the game, they also consciously made it for players to focus on playing alone without any disruption.

Takeda said it was a challenge to adjust the story from a pre-defined protagonist to avatars as the main character. He stated that it drastically changed the flow of the story. The team felt the game should continue the tradition of having characters talk during battle as it made the original game stand out. Compared to 3,000 battle lines from the original, the amount of battle dialogues increased to 11,000 lines for this game. Prior to this project, Takeda had never seen a professional voice actor to lose their voice during a recording.

According to Takahashi, the second pillar for this game was including robots. He said that it was a challenge to have human characters and robots coexist and function in this world. They designed these robots known as "Skells" as a vehicle to freely roam the large environments. The creators purposely made "Skells" expensive as they wanted the players to experience a feeling similar to buying a new car in real life. They also designed an insurance for every time the "Skell" gets destroyed in battle.

Monolith Soft put a lot of meaning into the "X" in the title of the game. Yokoto believes that it represents a lot of different aspects of the game. Yokota explained that it is a symbol for an unknown factor. It also symbolizes alien life of the unknown and exploring an unknown planet. In the Japanese version, the "X" is referred as "Cross" as in a place that can serve as a crossroad where people can come across one another unexpectedly. The Skells and humans being able to fight together is also symbolized by the "X."

Music

Xenoblade X Original Soundtrack
Soundtrack album by Hiroyuki Sawano
Released	20 May 2015
Genre	Video game soundtrack
Length	Disc 1: 1:16:14 Disc 2: 1:17:42 Disc 3: 1:16:22 Disc 4: 32:26 Total: 4:22:44
Label	Defstar Records

Xenoblade Chronicles X was composed by Hiroyuki Sawano, who is known for his work on Attack on Titan, Guilty Crown, and Kill la Kill. Takahashi had been a long-time fan of Sawano, so he personally insisted on having Sawano compose for this game. Upon their initial meeting, Takahashi showed a concept video of the game to Sawano, which later became the source of inspiration and motivation for his music production. After producing the recording demos, Sawano started working on the scores for orchestra and band. For the orchestral score, he made the broader parts of it on his computer, then added the playing styles and other smaller details by hand to complete the total score. At the end of this, he went to a musical copyist and had them create the scores for each individual instrumental part. He stated that it is important work for him to produce the musical score so that he is able to perform his final sound checks. Sawano composed the music based on the musical selections and resources provided to him. After composing the music, he recorded in the studio with large orchestras and bands. He started by composing and recording the theme song and several other main pieces of music, then produced the rest of the music (over 90 tracks) over three different periods. Since Takahashi had listened to his music before, Sawano was given free rein to produce music using his own style as he had done in previous projects. During their discussions, they thought it would be fun to include some vocal tracks, so Sawano arranged a group of vocalists to join the recording process.

David Whitaker, who is credited as the rapper of the battle theme called Black Tar as well as Melancholia, said that he was given typical American commercial rap as a source of inspiration. He claimed that he wrote the song in about two hours and recorded it.

Reception

Pre-release

Initial reception of Xenoblade Chronicles X was largely positive. Following the trailer shown at E3 2013, Official Nintendo Magazine offered strong praise for its visuals and open world. In April 2014, Eurogamer featured Xenoblade Chronicles X in an article about their "Most Anticipated" games, stating that even non-Japanese role-playing game fans could find something to enjoy due to its "[mixing of] action, strategy and narrative into a delicious, idiosyncratic concoction with broad appeal." In January 2015, GameTrailers ranked Xenoblade Chronicles X as its ninth-most anticipated game of 2015, looking forward to piloting the mech through the skies and exploring the game's "massive" world. Prior to the game's English release, the game received positive press for having a larger game world than other open world games, such as The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, and Fallout 4, the latter two being released on the more powerful PlayStation 4 and Xbox One consoles.

Sales and critical reaction

Reception
Aggregate score Aggregator Score Metacritic 84/100 Review scores Publication Score Destructoid 9/10 Famitsu 34/40 (9/9/8/8) GameSpot 8/10 IGN 9.5/10 (Italy) Nintendo Life Nintendo World Report 9.5/10 Hobby Consolas 93% Time 5/5
Awards Publication Award Eurogamer Essential Metacritic #6 Best Wii U Game of 2015 Metacritic Most Shared Wii U Game of 2015

Japanese gaming publication Dengeki gave the game a positive review, referring to it as a masterpiece; they praised the gameplay, detailed world, story direction, and music, and said it has a "very high degree of perfection". Japanese gaming magazine Famitsu gave Xenoblade Chronicles X a score of 34/40, with scores of 9, 9, 8 and 8 from the four reviewers; they praised the gameplay, plot, large open world, and sense of freedom, but two of the reviewers criticized it for having an abundance of cutscenes.

Upon its Western release, Xenoblade Chronicles X earned an aggregated review score of 84/100 at Metacritic, indicating "generally favorable" reception. Nintendo Life praised the game's battle system, deep upgrade pathways, vast world size, and graphics, but criticized the occasional difficulty spike and fetch quest. IGN Italy scored it 9.5/10, stating that it is "a deep, huge videogame", "very rich in content, with extraordinary care to recreate an entire, wonderful ecosystem" and a "great masterpiece for all RPG fans." Nintendo World Report scored it 9.5/10, stating that it is "required playing for anyone with the slightest inclination toward RPGs, and if you need to buy the system then do it" as it is "an essential part of the Wii U library." Hobby Consolas scored it 93%, stating that that if "you value a long experience in which great satisfactions come little by little, you should consider getting a Wii U for this game."

Destructoid scored it 9/10, stating that it "feels like an MMO world I've been living in for several weeks now" though the "more grimdark theme isn't quite as charming as the original Xenoblade, but everything else makes up for it." GameSpot stated that, of "all the open-world games to come out this year, Xenoblade Chronicles X may be the most formidable" as a "truly enormous game, both in scale and scope," praising the landscapes, creature design, unlockables and quests, combat, and character progression and customization, but criticizing the inconsistent soundtrack, ambiguous systems, and disappointing story. Metro scored it 8/10, stating that it is the "best Japanese role-player of the generation and arguably the best open world environment of the year" and "deserves to be spoken of in the same breath as The Witcher 3 and Fallout 4" but criticized "a disappointing story and some arcane systems." Jim Sterling scored it 9/10, stating that, despite moments that "make me cringe," when "I consider the layered mass that is Xenoblade Chronicles X, all I can think of" is "how damn arresting it is." Eurogamer said it is "Japanese RPG-making at its most ambitious and determined." iDigitalTimes scored it 4/5 stars, referring to it as the "Best Wii U Game Of 2015" and a "candidate for game of the year". Time scored it 5 out of 5 and referred to it as the "best role-playing game of 2015 hands down".

The game was the third best-selling game during its release week in Japan, selling around 85,000 copies. During its second week and third week, it sold over 11,000 and 2,000 copies respectively. In addition to its physical copies, the game garnered nearly 23,000 digital copies during May 2015. It was the most downloaded title in Japan for the month of May, largely surpassing other titles such as Minecraft, Bravely Second: End Layer, and The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. As of June 2015, 110,000 physical copies had been sold. By the end of the year, a total of 114,665 were sold in Japan.

Upon its release in the United Kingdom, the game managed to secure 28th place in the charts. Despite its modest position, the game's launch sales was 73% higher than its predecessor, Xenoblade Chronicles. After two weeks, the game sold over 40,000 physical copies in France. In the United States, the game sold over 200,000 physical copies during the month of December, nearly doubling the then-lifetime sales in Japan.

External links

• Official website