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[_S4MUR4I_]

Pre-orders, pre-orders everywhere.

 

[MR ARCADE FOREVER]

720 p....

 

[Rikkori]

Best part: sales will still be unstoppable.

The 99%, sadly, don't give a f#$%.

 

[Smiles and Cries]

well that is the sales killer I was waiting for something for the fanbases to feel mad about 720p

 

[SidViscous]

Noticed he corrected his tweet, docked can go down to 504, not 540.

Oof

 

[Coolwhhip]

We need a Switch Pro badly. Who on earth wants a remaster at sub 720p on their tv?!?!?!?!??!?!?!?!??!

 

[royox]

Resolutions(Dynamic):
Docked 540p-720p
Handheld 378-540p

I expected better.

What the fuck are those resolutions for a Wii-game port?

 

[Coolwhhip]

It's hard to get hyped about graphically intense games like Metroid Prime 4 if a game like this runs so poorly.

 

[Smiles and Cries]

what do I need to hack and overclock my Switch?

wait for Switch Pro?

panic!

 

[Quezacolt]

It's about what I expected, when it comes to Nintendo I don't expect the bleeding edge in graphical fidelity and I get the frustration that may bring, hell I wish they would release strong hardware but for what we got I'm pretty content with it. What has me puzzled is why these Xenoblade games preform so badly BotW is a more demanding game and runs better and so does dq11 maybe it's something with the engine?

Could be the engine or the fact it was a small team. XB2 also had a small team working on it, if i remember, 40 or so devs from monolith, while the rest of the studio helped with breath of the wild.
Right now the studio is working on BotW2, xenoblade DE and their new unannounced game.

 

[yet_another_alt]

Those crisp looking trailers tho...

 

[Touch fuzZy. get BizZay]

I don't think I could ever really get the rhythm of the combat. Any tips with that?

Yeah, let's talk about it while we wait. For days!

I've been thinking about the combat too. I think I did get the rhythm pretty well back when I played it, but there was a lot of depth I didn't really grasp and I would have enjoyed combat more if I had understood the things I was overlooking properly. I want to do better this time. My experiences diving deep into Xenoblade Chronicles X's combat will help, and I've been reading stuff and watching vids too leading up to this big release we've been hyping.

1st, the basics. I think all of us who played the game more or less got this part just fine, but it doesn't hurt to go over it so we can build on that knowledge.

Your party members all auto-attack in real time, but you'll only defeat very weak enemies that way. To win a real a battle you utilize special moves in combat called arts. Each art is represented by an orb with an icon and a colour designating its type. So for example, Shulk's "Backslash" is a physical attack and is therefore coloured red. His "Shadow Eye" is a buff that removes enemy aggro from Shulk so enemies are less likely to attack our skinny little future boy, that's why it's coloured blue. One tip is to keep in mind that just about every art has some kind of extra effect beyond just the obvious. Backslash famously does double damage if Shulk hits the enemy from behind. But you shouldn't stop there - shadow eye doesn't just remove aggro, it boosts the damage of your next art by 50% for 5 seconds. So standing behind an enemy and doing shadow eye then backslash will do more damage. But you would get more damage still if you stood to the side of the enemy and did Shulk's other physical art, "slit edge" beforehand, which lowers an enemie's physical defense by 50%. So move to the side, perform Slit Edge then move to the back to perform Shadow Eye and then Backslash would be a way to do damage with Shulk early on, but doing damage draws aggro and the ability that lowers aggro was part of that combo and would therefore now be on cooldown, so the player would need to think about other ways to keep Shulk from taking too much heat from the enemy. Like equipping Reyn with a lot of arts that draw aggro to him so he can tank damage, for example.

Other basics are toppling and chain attacks. Pink arts like Stream Edge can inflict the enemy with "Break." All break means is that green arts can inflict "Topple." Topple is very useful as it knocks an enemy down for a short time, and makes all attacks against them 100% accurate. It also allows yellow arts to inflict daze, which extends the time they're down and cancels whatever powerful attack they were charging up. The next tip is: strong enemies can resist break status, but unless they're completely immune, they can't resist it during a Chain Attack. Chain Attacks are like your limit break or all-out-attack, you charge up a meter and unleash it at the right time. The perfect noobie strat would be something like, wait for a vision of the future showing a boss doing a devastating art, then activate chain attack and go break, topple, daze or pink, green, yellow to erase that future completely and give yourself the advantage.

I more or less used Chain Attack that way back when I played the game, but I could have gambled more and got more rewarding damage as a result. The gamble being that you are only really guaranteed 3 links in a chain attack, and you would need 5 to build a maximum chain multiplier damage bonus and also use your strongest attack after building it, more if you are going to topple the enemy 1st. Getting those 4th , 5th and other additional attacks is based in part on luck, and other factors, so back in the day I didn't focus on using the same colour arts to build the chain multiplier or on saving my most damaging art until later, since I might not even get to use it. But now I want to pursue ever crazier damage numbers aggressively as I've been taught to do by Overdrive mode in Xenoblade Chronicles X.

And there are ways you could hedge your bets a bit, which leads me to the next tip. Topples stack. So it's still a good idea to use topple on an already toppled enemy, as it will make them toppled for longer. You could give all 3 party members a green art (some bosses are immune to daze anyway) and start the Chain Attack with a pink break art. Then you do 3 green arts and build a chain multiplier of x3. Even if the Chain Attack suddenly ends there and you don't get to extend it, at least the boss is toppled for a long time. But if it keeps going you could use a character's talent art next. Talent arts are the grey art in the middle of all your arts on the screen. They are usually a very special move, but they are extra special during a chain attack, so that can be the next tip: during a chain attack, talent arts count as any colour and can connect different colours without breaking your colour bonus. So you could do 3 green attacks for a multiplier of x3, do a talent art for x4, then switch to red arts for x5 and the maximum bonus of 700% damage. Now imagine next up in the Chain Attack is Shulk, and he's been standing behind the enemy all this time. He could hit the enemy with Backslash for ridiculous damage with the damage bonuses from being behind the enemy and from the chain multiplier stacked together. I want to see that boss's life bar take that massive hit!

Anyway I've talked too much for how little I know, but the combat related mechanics we need to focus on besides those basic ones of arts, toppling and chain attacks are: tension, skill trees, affinity and of course, crafting and equipping gems suited to the strategy you are using.

 

[JORMBO]

Handheld mode:

 

[Coolwhhip]

Handheld mode:

Is this the N64 version?!

 

[Touch fuzZy. get BizZay]

Those crisp looking trailers tho...

It looks good in the streams of people who got a copy early as well. It's good looking, but it's a 720p-ass game

 

[Ass of Can Whooping]

Handheld mode:

Jesus. Remastering efforts have gone to waste thanks to dogshit resolution. Should have just done a basic port

 

[wvnative]

Just in time for a day off tomorrow

Oh, this is neat

Spoiler: Bonus

Free starting cash!

I'm really feelin it

Since you have the game, can you confirm rather or not there is an easy mode? I just wanna enjoy the story

 

[Zannegan]

Yikes. I'll wait until there's a patch or a Switch Pro if true. It looks nowhere near good enough to be running at that low a resolution.

Maybe they should wait until next gen before they try to tackle an X remaster.

 

[AeonGaidenRaiden]

There is no easy or hard just "New Game".

 

[jshackles]

Since you have the game, can you confirm rather or not there is an easy mode? I just wanna enjoy the story

There is a setting in the options called "Casual Mode". It says it makes combat easier. After I died a few times, it suggested turning it on.

 

[wvnative]

There is a setting in the options called "Casual Mode". It says it makes combat easier. After I died a few times, it suggested turning it on.

Thanks.

I mentioned this earlier in the topic but i have never enjoyed MMO style combat with the auto attack style with cooldown abilities, but I heard so many great things about this game's story and I love xenogears so much. Hopefully this allows me to enjoy the game more.

 

[Herr Edgy]

Thanks.

I mentioned this earlier in the topic but i have never enjoyed MMO style combat with the auto attack style with cooldown abilities, but I heard so many great things about this game's story and I love xenogears so much. Hopefully this allows me to enjoy the game more.

Honestly you are just doing yourself a disservice by trying to skip through the gameplay.
Xenoblade is one of the rare games that is balanced extremely well, with accessible combat that lets you explore quite a bit of depth without being overbearing, and most importantly, the story ties into the gameplay a lot.

It's one of the games where the gameplay enhances the story and vice versa. Doing certain story progress that unlocks new specific gameplay related mechanics for story bosses is an amazing feeling, and so is overcoming an armada of enemies that you accidentally aggroed because in some areas enemies are more densely packed, which makes sense for story reasons and immerses you more due to the somewhat increased difficulty.

 

[digital_ghost]

If Amazon discounted it, that would mean Nintendo and Monolith Soft will still get the cut they should have gotten at full price. Amazon eats up the difference.

Now the question is will Amazon ship on time?

I didn't know that. Thanks for the information.

I got mine online from gamestop. Hoping they deliver on time. I am jealous people have the game already.

 

[Smiles and Cries]

I am not going to listen to any more of these resolution talk until the ugly hits me in the face on my own screen. Until that time I will enjoy the game and that mellow sad music


\\

HYPED

 

[wvnative]

Honestly you are just doing yourself a disservice by trying to skip through the gameplay.
Xenoblade is one of the rare games that is balanced extremely well, with accessible combat that lets you explore quite a bit of depth without being overbearing, and most importantly, the story ties into the gameplay a lot.

It's one of the games where the gameplay enhances the story and vice versa. Doing certain story progress that unlocks new specific gameplay related mechanics for story bosses is an amazing feeling, and so is overcoming an armada of enemies that you accidentally aggroed because in some areas enemies are more densely packed, which makes sense for story reasons and immerses you more due to the somewhat increased difficulty.

You might be right.

I may give it a shot normally. I played a few hours on the wii but found it boring. But that WAS nearly 10 years ago. My feelings may have changed.

 

[-Arcadia-]

Handheld mode:

As much as I hate this news, there’s at least a bit of solace in that handheld mode seems much improved from 2.

That game’s portable mode had crazy sharpening artifacts everywhere, and looked completely messy, like someone had ran a rough 3DS game directly on Switch.

 

[plasticpassion]

Yeah, let's talk about it while we wait. For days!

I've been thinking about the combat too. I think I did get the rhythm pretty well back when I played it, but there was a lot of depth I didn't really grasp and I would have enjoyed combat more if I had understood the things I was overlooking properly. I want to do better this time. My experiences diving deep into Xenoblade Chronicles X's combat will help, and I've been reading stuff and watching vids too leading up to this big release we've been hyping.

1st, the basics. I think all of us who played the game more or less got this part just fine, but it doesn't hurt to go over it so we can build on that knowledge.

Your party members all auto-attack in real time, but you'll only defeat very weak enemies that way. To win a real a battle you utilize special moves in combat called arts. Each art is represented by an orb with an icon and a colour designating its type. So for example, Shulk's "Backslash" is a physical attack and is therefore coloured red. His "Shadow Eye" is a buff that removes enemy aggro from Shulk so enemies are less likely to attack our skinny little future boy, that's why it's coloured blue. One tip is to keep in mind that just about every art has some kind of extra effect beyond just the obvious. Backslash famously does double damage if Shulk hits the enemy from behind. But you shouldn't stop there - shadow eye doesn't just remove aggro, it boosts the damage of your next art by 50% for 5 seconds. So standing behind an enemy and doing shadow eye then backslash will do more damage. But you would get more damage still if you stood to the side of the enemy and did Shulk's other physical art, "slit edge" beforehand, which lowers an enemie's physical defense by 50%. So move to the side, perform Slit Edge then move to the back to perform Shadow Eye and then Backslash would be a way to do damage with Shulk early on, but doing damage draws aggro and the ability that lowers aggro was part of that combo and would therefore now be on cooldown, so the player would need to think about other ways to keep Shulk from taking too much heat from the enemy. Like equipping Reyn with a lot of arts that draw aggro to him so he can tank damage, for example.

Other basics are toppling and chain attacks. Pink arts like Stream Edge can inflict the enemy with "Break." All break means is that green arts can inflict "Topple." Topple is very useful as it knocks an enemy down for a short time, and makes all attacks against them 100% accurate. It also allows yellow arts to inflict daze, which extends the time they're down and cancels whatever powerful attack they were charging up. The next tip is: strong enemies can resist break status, but unless they're completely immune, they can't resist it during a Chain Attack. Chain Attacks are like your limit break or all-out-attack, you charge up a meter and unleash it at the right time. The perfect noobie strat would be something like, wait for a vision of the future showing a boss doing a devastating art, then activate chain attack and go break, topple, daze or pink, green, yellow to erase that future completely and give yourself the advantage.

I more or less used Chain Attack that way back when I played the game, but I could have gambled more and got more rewarding damage as a result. The gamble being that you are only really guaranteed 3 links in a chain attack, and you would need 5 to build a maximum chain multiplier damage bonus and also use your strongest attack after building it, more if you are going to topple the enemy 1st. Getting those 4th , 5th and other additional attacks is based in part on luck, and other factors, so back in the day I didn't focus on using the same colour arts to build the chain multiplier or on saving my most damaging art until later, since I might not even get to use it. But now I want to pursue ever crazier damage numbers aggressively as I've been taught to do by Overdrive mode in Xenoblade Chronicles X.

And there are ways you could hedge your bets a bit, which leads me to the next tip. Topples stack. So it's still a good idea to use topple on an already toppled enemy, as it will make them toppled for longer. You could give all 3 party members a green art (some bosses are immune to daze anyway) and start the Chain Attack with a pink break art. Then you do 3 green arts and build a chain multiplier of x3. Even if the Chain Attack suddenly ends there and you don't get to extend it, at least the boss is toppled for a long time. But if it keeps going you could use a character's talent art next. Talent arts are the grey art in the middle of all your arts on the screen. They are usually a very special move, but they are extra special during a chain attack, so that can be the next tip: during a chain attack, talent arts count as any colour and can connect different colours without breaking your colour bonus. So you could do 3 green attacks for a multiplier of x3, do a talent art for x4, then switch to red arts for x5 and the maximum bonus of 700% damage. Now imagine next up in the Chain Attack is Shulk, and he's been standing behind the enemy all this time. He could hit the enemy with Backslash for ridiculous damage with the damage bonuses from being behind the enemy and from the chain multiplier stacked together. I want to see that boss's life bar take that massive hit!

Anyway I've talked too much for how little I know, but the combat related mechanics we need to focus on besides those basic ones of arts, toppling and chain attacks are: tension, skill trees, affinity and of course, crafting and equipping gems suited to the strategy you are using.

This is very helpful. Thank you.
I think part of the reason I struggled is the speed of the combat, or at least from what I recall. I started playing it again a bit on the 3DS recently (which may be part of the problem) but I kept dying to mobs when there were multiple aggroed because it was hard to see what was going on and who was being aggroed etc. Each party member was attacking random mobs and I kept getting aggro. I think I just need to practice more and learn the controls better.

 

[BusierDonkey]

Everytime I read about how ugly a Switch game is going to be I chuckle a little because every time I end up playing them they look fine.

Maybe it's because I started playing in the 80's. Maybe it's because compared to the 3DS, the Switch is multiple generations ahead graphically.

Either way I'm super excited to play though this again.

 

[TNT Sheep]

Handheld mode:

Oh my... Just when I decided to bite the bullet and buy the game. I guess I won't be playing a lot in handheld mode.

 

[Danjin44]

I guess most people here are bothered by resolution. Personally highly enjoyed Xenoblade 2 even despite its resolution, there is no way in hell I will skip this game over that.

 

[JORMBO]

I guess most people here are bothered by resolution. Personally highly enjoyed Xenoblade 2 even despite its resolution, there is no way in hell I will skip this game over that.

It is disappointing. I am a bit surprised docked can’t hold at least a steady 720p. Hopefully it doesn’t drop too often. I did play XB2 in handheld a lot and it’s not the end of the world. I wouldn’t let this stop a purchase.

 

[Solarstrike]

Never played the first game, so can't wait to give it a go. Preordered the Definitive Works set and standing by

 

[Jooxed]

Well then, I officially hate your guts

Not to scare you but my amazon got delayed until June 2nd lol

 

[Danjin44]

Not to scare you but my amazon got delayed until June 2nd lol

 

[Vawn]

It wouldn't be Xenoblade Chronicles if it wasn't trying to push beautiful art direction on hardware several steps behind the competitors.

 

[MR ARCADE FOREVER]

Good think I have a Mclassic!

 

[JORMBO]

A saw a thread on Gamefaqs earlier where people were also saying their Amazon orders got delayed until June 2nd.

 

[Danjin44]

A saw a thread on Gamefaqs earlier where people were also saying their Amazon orders got delayed until June 2nd.

 

[Smiles and Cries]

Amazon is giving discounts because they know they are delayed in shipping

 

[Naibel]

Disappointed about the lack of improvements resolution-wise compared to XC2. Hoping it doesn't look too bad on my Switch Lite (XC2 looked OK in there) and that we get a less grainy image.

This is the sort of stuff they could've fixed really. It's really a bummer.

 

[Danjin44]

When I go to tracking in Amazon, this what I get and still no delivery date

 

[JORMBO]

When I go to tracking in Amazon, this what I get and still no delivery date

Best Buy still has free release day shipping.

 

[Wunray]

When I go to tracking in Amazon, this what I get and still no delivery date

If it makes you feel any better I'll be getting those joycons you recommended me tomorrow..............

 

[Danjin44]

Best Buy still has free release day shipping.

Devil tells me just cancel this pre-order and just buy it digitally. I was not able to get the collectors edition anyway because....

Amazon.ca

 

[Guiberu]

Right.

Well. I've played a few hours now.

As a huge Xenoblade Chronicles fan, I'm rather disappointed.

The cutscenes look beautiful, and you can really see the effort that has gone into the new models and textures. Then the moment gameplay hits, it all turns into a blurry mess.

It's extremely soft. To the point where if you're anything other than zoomed directly into Shulk's anus, you may as well be playing the original game. The framerate is also unstable, making matters even worse.

It's not quite got that awful haze-like blur of XC2, but "clarity" does not exist in this game's vocabulary.

I would have genuinely preferred a 30fps option, minus the awful, low-resolution motion blur and depth of field, with a bump to 1080p.

I'd say I'm hoping for a patch, but they never bothered to address the issues with XC2, so I'm not holding my breath.

Boo. Hiss.

 

[Smiles and Cries]

Boo. Hiss.

 

[Danjin44]

Right.

Well. I've played a few hours now.

As a huge Xenoblade Chronicles fan, I'm rather disappointed.

The cutscenes look beautiful, and you can really see the effort that has gone into the new models and textures. Then the moment gameplay hits, it all turns into a blurry mess.

It's extremely soft. To the point where if you're anything other than zoomed directly into Shulk's anus, you may as well be playing the original game. The framerate is also unstable, making matters even worse.

It's not quite got that awful haze-like blur of XC2, but "clarity" does not exist in this game's vocabulary.

I would have genuinely preferred a 30fps option, minus the awful, low-resolution motion blur and depth of field, with a bump to 1080p.

I'd say I'm hoping for a patch, but they never bothered to address the issues with XC2, so I'm not holding my breath.

Boo. Hiss.

I guess if someone like me who didn’t have issue with XC2’s resolution should be fine.

 

[S77]

Right.

Well. I've played a few hours now.

As a huge Xenoblade Chronicles fan, I'm rather disappointed.

The cutscenes look beautiful, and you can really see the effort that has gone into the new models and textures. Then the moment gameplay hits, it all turns into a blurry mess.

It's extremely soft. To the point where if you're anything other than zoomed directly into Shulk's anus, you may as well be playing the original game. The framerate is also unstable, making matters even worse.

It's not quite got that awful haze-like blur of XC2, but "clarity" does not exist in this game's vocabulary.

I would have genuinely preferred a 30fps option, minus the awful, low-resolution motion blur and depth of field, with a bump to 1080p.

I'd say I'm hoping for a patch, but they never bothered to address the issues with XC2, so I'm not holding my breath.

Boo. Hiss.

You're talking about handheld mode? I played about 4 hours and I'm super happy with how it looks and plays in docked mode, never tried handheld as im not going to play it like that. Didn't notice any framerate drops either. I didn't play the original so I can't compare it but so far I love the game, didn't expect it to be this good.

 

[Guiberu]

I guess if someone like me who didn’t have issue with XC2’s resolution should be fine.

You're talking about handheld mode? I played about 4 hours and I'm super happy with how it looks and plays in docked mode, never tried handheld as im not going to play it like that. Didn't notice any framerate drops either. I didn't play the original so I can't compare it but so far I love the game, didn't expect it to be this good.

Yeah if you were fine with XC2's resolution, this will be no problem. It's an improvement on that, for sure. But not great, imo.

All docked gameplay experience. Played on a 50" Panasonic 4k TV, calibrated to get the best out of my Switch, and most games look lovely. This however - not so much. Framerates dip/stutter quite regularly. The snowy mountain flashback with Shulk looked to almost hit single digit frames for a while.

I've played the original Wii release, 3DS version, and an emulated 4k version with an HD texture pack. The latter of which I would still recommend over this.

 

[Nankatsu]

Handheld mode:

That's pretty much the same as XBC2 undocked.