Yet all this does make combat harder to decipher. The command bar takes up more of the screen and zooming out to better frame the action makes it hard to judge enemy positions – a key tactical point, as some attacks do extra damage from the side or behind. Larger boss creatures are prone to serious frame rate drops when all three party members start launching special attacks that better resemble firework displays. It generally makes for rougher battles compared to the Wii version, but it’s manageable. Much is fixed by having the camera sit closer to the action, though this does require you to adjust it more often to keep darting enemies in the frame – easy enough, due to the New 3DS’s analogue nubbin.
And it’s a battle system worth staying for. Taking inspiration from Final Fantasy XII – you pick fights at will with free-roaming creatures – you control a single hero, balancing auto-attacks with special Arts. Some Arts need correct positioning to work, others combine with your chums’ for added damage – keeping an eye on the flow of a fight and Art cool-down times creates thrilling, urgent scraps. Hits also charge up team chain attacks which grant brief command of all party members to queue up specific moves. As affections deepens between your team these chains grow ever longer. Running circles around a snarling robot fiend using only the power of friendship is pretty rad (though it’d end in nothing but tears in the office…).
On this rock-solid foundation, Monolith build all kinds of cleverness. Like a mystical soothsaying sword that alerts you to incoming fatalities and gives you ten panicked seconds to alter your grisly fate. Or the ability to change your party leader at will, giving you a whole new set of Arts to master. Then there’s the substrata of minor bugbears that have been wiped out: the party auto-heals at the end of every battle, there are no potions or items to manage and, most importantly, death merely boots you back to the nearest landmark, all character progress intact. As so many JRPGs struggle to find their place in the 21st century, Xenoblade delivers one of the most confident visions in years.
It’s as if Monolith created a giant list of everything you hate about JRPGs and banned it outright. You can save anywhere, anytime. You can warp to any landmark, instantly – the impressive loading-free jumps of Wii are intact on 3DS. You can pick your fights and run away from any battle. You don’t have to return to a quest giver for a reward, as it’s gifted to you the second the task is complete. Even better, your Mystic Meg-like sword will warn you if a random object will be used in a future side-quest, so you don’t accidentally bin it. That sound you hear is the Final Fantasy XV team desperately rifling through Monolith’s bins. And if they’re not, they should be.
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Xenoblade Chronicles 3D review - App Review 4u
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