Current Progress: 9.5 Hours Played
As I've invested more time into Xenoblade Chronicles, I'm seeing the amount of thought that went into the development of this RPG. It's almost as if they asked gamers for a list of the things they hate most about RPGs and made a point to address all of them. Here is a list of common sense conveniences incorporated into Xenoblade that other RPGs can't seem to embrace:
- Save anywhere, anytime
- Dying sends you back to the last checkpoint and retains all items collected and XP gained, removing needless do-overs
- Battles occur in real-time, without a separate battle screen
- Health automatically regenerates outside of battle (this has been implemented in other RPGs as well)
- No Magic Points - instead, special attacks have a "cool down" period, removing the need to carry countless ethers
- Ability to pull up a quick summary of the current story at any time to remind you what's happening
- Quest arrows to lead you to the next objective. You can stray wildly from the quest arrow too, if you're the explorer type
- Serviceable voice acting, likeable characters, interesting universe.
With all these innovations, the story still hasn't got it's hooks in me yet. I'm certainly staying on the horse, but as of now it's going at a slow trot, and I'm just enjoying the breeze.
I'm excited to here what this game is like. I loved Xenogears as a kid, most underrated story and soundtrack of the Squaresoft glory years.
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