With JRPGs at an all-time high right now, it is easy to forget how the genre was lagging in the 7th generation. There were good games here and there, but the genre was overall going through a bit of a nadir. The worst of this was how many JRPGs, including the FF 13 trilogy, were becoming extremely linear and had little room for exploration and deviation. It seemed to be the direction the genre would continue in, until the arrival of Xenoblade Chronicles.
Xenoblade Chronicles brought the scope of both wide-open sandbox games, Western RPGs and MMO style quests and hubs to the JRPG genre. You could go truly anywhere, and thanks to fast travel, you didn’t have to worry about backtracking as much. What is really interesting about the game, is that from the beginning, you are shown that you are not living in your normal round, or even flat world, instead, you live in a gigantic God-like being called the Bionis. The characters reference the Bionis quite often throughout the story, but you won’t only be hearing about it as you will visually witness the being as you roam the fields that lie on its body. There is also the Mechonis, who is another being from the same veil that houses machine like beings, who war with the Horns, the people living on the Bionis. Bionis and Mechonis warned with each other in the past and became locked in a stalemate.
As mentioned above, the quests were very different from what we typically had an a JRPG. They took on a new quality here, and played more like those found in western RPGs, or MMO’s. These included the big quests and small quests that dotted the landscape. You could wonder the world and constantly find something new to do, and this was a turning point for a genre that had been getting so incredibly linear. Xenoblade indisputably influenced almost all later JRPGs and is rightly hailed as one of the best ever in its genre.
The story itself starts out seemingly simple, but quickly becomes an epic scale on the level of titles like Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy 6, Persona 5 and Dragon Quest 8. It asks some serious questions, but also has true heart wrenching moments, and plot twists you will not see coming the first time but will appreciate well on a second playthrough. By embracing a non-linear approach to gaming, Xenoblade managed to show how much more could be done with story in an RPG. Xenoblade is a game played at your pace, at your decision, and the path it laid out for all later JRPGs sets it at the top of the pack. This is a game that changed the genre for the better. Many are excited about the upcoming remaster on Switch, and for good reason, since the original Wii release was very limited in North America. Despite its limited release however, its North American sales were great, and it inspired two more entries in the Xenoblade series that are also considered amazing. There is just something about Xenoblade that clicks right away.