Xenoblade (Wii)

[MisterBubbles]

What's in your golden 10 JRPG's Sketcz??So far ive done 5 hours and its great, got good feelings about it, and going back to landmark's when you die is genius.

[Ryall]

Weird, everyone keeps saying it's sold out and going to be uber rare, but I saw a fair few copies in Cwmbran gamestation and game
today!

umm, I hadn't actually considered trying the High St. I'm so used to buying online...

Did they have the normal edition in stock, without the controller? Will have to hunt it down when I'm in town tomorrow.

[Cornflakes]

I think i am going to take a break on those sides quests.

->Open Spoiler<-

Frontier village is quite annoying, not only is the city is made up from multiple layers, but those plush things look all the same to me. I wished that the bond diagram actually shows you where in the cities you can find the people, same with the map. Although you do get red exclamation marks showing up on the small map, it only is useful if you have an idea where to look for it

[Sketcz]

What's in your golden 10 JRPG's Sketcz??

Crikey, off the top of my head? Something like this, roughly in order:
Panzer Dragoon Saga / Skies of Arcadia / Valkyria Chronicles / The World Ends With You / Phantasy Star I + IV / Suikoden I + II / Yakuza 2 / Secret of Mana / Ys IV: Dawn of Ys (PCE)

Technically I'm cheating by clumping a couple of games together, but that's probably the other 9. Maybe. Mystical Ninja on the N64 probably wants on, though it's more action adventure than RPG. Tons of other stuff that comes close.

I'd say the game Xenoblade is most similar to is Skies of Arcadia, in terms of visual style, thematics, exploration, and general feel. Mechanics are greatly improved in this though.

I keep wanting to play it, and am annoyed when I have to stop - which I haven't felt for a long time. Normally I have to force myself to complete a game during those dull empty periods, but here I'm thinking about it even while driving.

TIP: get into using the crystal furnace as soon as possible. I left it for a while and had a whole bunch to go through and smelt into cannisters. Also, periodically go through gear and offload the junk. And keep an eye on the skill trees - characters can share each other's skills!

See what I mean? So much depth to the system, it's fantastic juggling this with the general exploration.

I found a super secret area in the valley today, by going super far north, then west, finding a tiny cliffside path which I followed to the other side of the map, to a cave, and BOOM. A secret area where it said "Secret Area" and I got an EXP bonus. I didn't know it was there, I just thought: hmm, where does this tiny path lead?

[yesteryeargames]

Weird, everyone keeps saying it's sold out and going to be uber rare, but I saw a fair few copies in Cwmbran gamestation and game
today!

how much are they instore please? im really hoping to pick up a copy around the ?29.99-?35 mark

everywhere seems sold out online

[Fader209]

All the talk in here is making this game a very tempting buy for me if I'm not careful >.<

Must resist and save money.

[Cornflakes]

Just want to let you guys know that some of the quest quests, that lets you decide what path you want to take, are a bit weird. Specifically the side quest "Sweet Seduction" in frontier village.
Ask soon the quest is triggered, make sure you don't have 5 or more walnut grape in your inventory or 2 bitter kiwis, when you talk to kufoko, or else it won't let you decide which path you want to take with the quest. Once the announcement pops up that you have collected X many of a certain item, you cannot change it.

[MrKirov]

how much are they instore please? im really hoping to pick up a copy around the ?29.99-?35 mark

everywhere seems sold out online

?39.99! Seen another 3-4 in Game/Gamestation Newport today as well!

[Sketcz]

Just want to let you guys know that some of the quest quests, that lets you decide what path you want to take, are a bit weird. Specifically the side quest "Sweet Seduction" in frontier village.
Ask soon the quest is triggered, make sure you don't have 5 or more walnut grape in your inventory or 2 bitter kiwis, when you talk to kufoko, or else it won't let you decide which path you want to take with the quest. Once the announcement pops up that you have collected X many of a certain item, you cannot change it.

Thanks for the warning.

Does the path you take greatly affect the outcome? I mean, does it result in a wildly different new skill tree opening up (some quests do this), or does it simply alter your final reward slightly? As in one pair of boots over another?

[Cornflakes]

Thanks for the warning.

Does the path you take greatly affect the outcome? I mean, does it result in a wildly different new skill tree opening up (some quests do this), or does it simply alter your final reward slightly? As in one pair of boots over another?

By doing the side-quest, you build up those relationship stars with the towns, that will grand you access to new side-quests. Eventually you will gain enough to trigger a quest, that unlocks a further branch of the skill tree for one of your characters.
Having said that, depending on the relationship between the NPC themselves, it maybe grants you access to different quests. But so far as i can tell there is no way to get all the side quest done in one go.
For example, in colony 9 there is one quests, where a man ask you to help him find a job. You can either to talk to the artist guy or the chef. Each of them will tasks you a specific(?) quest, before they will accept him as an apprentice. This will also then unlock the links between the NPCs.
The way they have incorporated the NPC is kind of unique, imo, and i have not seen it done in any other game before, at least not as complex as this.

[jimtendo]

how much are they instore please? im really hoping to pick up a copy around the ?29.99-?35 mark

everywhere seems sold out online

All the talk in here is making this game a very tempting buy for me if I'm not careful >.<

Must resist and save money.

cheapskates! Buy it while you can.
Worth every penny of the brick and mortar RRP of ?39.99

I can see this being another Tales of Vesperia situation where there is going to be a limited run and not before long you'll have to pay a premium to those ebay hawkers for the privilage. It's made even worse as pretty much every American JRPG nut are depleting the UK stocks. No thanks to the Joystiq article about how to soft mod your Wii article, and pretty much putting NOA on blast. Nice one Reggie.

... The way they have incorporated the NPC is kind of unique, imo, and i have not seen it done in any other game before, at least not as complex as this.

I'm quite in awe of the amount of effort Monolith Soft has given to these NPCs
I was expecting them to have two lines or so of dialogue and that's your lot (well, in most cases they do) but there are quite a lot of characters that progress through the games storyline, depending on whether you talk to them and do their quests for them. Even talking to other related characters (on the off chance) will lead to other conversation trees for other people.

[Sketcz]

And don't forget the ability to trade with unique NPCs. At the refugee camp several side-quests can be completed without having to leave the cave, since a different NPC will have an item another needs. Sure you can go hunting for the items, but it made me think: bunch of greedy basts. They've holed up in this cave and clearly aren't sharing, so I had to trade off my garbage for the needed items to give to those who needed them.

I like to think this scenario of all required items being right there was intentional, and a commentary on human nature. Even if not, easiest quests so far. :P

Am still astounded at how gorgeous the environments are, especially with the long draw distance. The random weather changes are also neat, especially when you get into a big fight and it's a thunderstorm.

Went back to Colony 9 and discovered some more quests, plus really got into the gem crafting process. There's some pretty neat effects you can get, like invisibility to enemies and HP charge when using Arts. The % are still quite low, I'm hoping as I progress I can craft some more powerful ones. It's basically the Materia system from FF7 - almost.

Should be getting a new PC today or tomorrow, so hopefully I'll be able to enjoy this in HD on my sofa. I'll be plugging my PS3 pad into the PC and using GlovePIE (what a name!) to emulate the controls.

If this doesn't get a US release, I can foresee a Panzer Dragoon Saga style price hike as a result of collectors. Which is a shame, because it wants to be played by as many people as possible.

['Press Start']

So Sketcz what do you think of regenerating health in an RPG? :P

I started my game last night and as usual when I start an RPG I watch the title screen for a while. The music was beautiful and the day changed to night, I knew I was about to embark on a truly great game.

I have played nearly all the great RPGs and I get the same sense of excitement with this as I did them. I won't write too many impressions as I am only 2 hours in but am excited to be playing my once fav genre.

1) Chrono Trigger
2) FF VI (3 in US)
3) Secret Of Mana
4) Dragons Quest 8
5) Valkyrie Profile
6) Vagrant Story
7) Xenogears
8) Suikoden 1 & 2
9)Star Ocean 2 : Second Story
10) Terranigma/ Chrono Cross

[edit] By the way, nearly went ballistic when I saw how short the classic controller pro cable was. I thought how can I sit on the sofa with that plugged into the wii. I looked around the Wii and couldn't find anywhere to put it. Then it hit me, it goes into the wii mote!!!!

*slaps forehead*

[Brad]

This is great. Other than graphical fidelity it exceeds ffxiii in every level. Square should be ashamed. I'm enjoying the battle system, as insane as it gets at times (with just 3! Does the party get any bigger?)

Only put 4 hours in but can't wait to play again.

[Atticus]

Managed to pick up th controller pack at GAME I'm just a couple of hours in and it's pushing all the right buttons. Looking forward to my next sesh too ... even if my last saw me getting continually beat down by

->Open Spoiler<-

some unique critter in Tephra Cave