Xenoblade Chronicles 2

Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is a 2017 action role-playing game developed by Monolith Soft and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Switch. It is the third installment in the Xenoblade Chronicles series and the sixth main entry in the Xeno series, and was released on December 1. Plans for the game began shortly before the launch of Xenoblade Chronicles X in 2014. Key developers from previous games returned, including franchise creator Tetsuya Takahashi and directors Koh Kojima and Genki Yokota. The team wanted to develop a story-driven game in the style of the original Xenoblade Chronicles.

The game was announced in 2017 and was released worldwide the same year. As with Xenoblade Chronicles, the game was localized by Nintendo of Europe. The game is set in the fictional land of Alrest, a sea topped with clouds called the Cloud Sea, which is inhabited by massive creatures called Titans on which humanity lives. Legends claim that humanity once lived atop the World Tree, a massive tree at Alrest’s center, in a paradise called Elysium with their creator, the Architect. However, they were exiled for unknown reasons and given the Titans to live on. Blades are powerful beings summoned from Core Crystals who channel power into their weapons through a force called Ether.

Their masters are called Drivers; when a Driver dies, their Blade reverts to a Core Crystal and loses their memory. After some time, another Driver can awaken them if the crystal is intact. Due to the close spiritual bond between Driver and Blade, the personality of the former influences that of the latter. Two nations, Mor Ardain and Uraya are on the brink of war throughout the story. Rex, an orphaned salvager who collects treasure from below the Cloud Sea for money, is hired by Argentum Trade Guild Chairman Bana to aid the Drivers Jin, Malos, and Nia, part of a group named Torna, in the salvage of an ancient ship. In the ship, they find Pyra, a legendary Blade known as the Aegis.

When Rex reaches out to touch Pyra’s sword, Jin fatally stabs him. Rex awakens on a field with Pyra, who reveals they are in a memory of her old home Elysium. She asks him to bring her to Elysium and in exchange gives him half of her Core Crystal to revive him. With help from his Titan companion Azurda and Nia, who has defected from Torna, Rex escapes to the Titan Gormott, but Azurda is wounded and reverts to his larval stage. Soon after, they arrive in Gormott’s capital Torigoth and are joined by the Nopon Driver Tora and his artificial Blade Poppi. The group try to get to Elysium, but are stopped by the artifice Ophion and swallowed by the Titan Uraya.

Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is an action role-playing game, and similar to previous games, the player controls a main character out of a party of three. The game is open world and has a day-and-night time cycle that affects in-game events, including quests, enemy strength, and item availability. Unlike the two previous titles, which consisted of a cohesive open world, the game takes place on several different Titans which the player travels between using fast travel. Unlike previous entries, characters in the party also control additional beings known as Blades and can have three Blades active at a time, which determines their class. 

The game’s Blades and skills are based on eight elements: Fire, Water, Wind, Ice, Electric, Earth, Light and Dark. There are a total of 40 unique Rare Blades to collect throughout the base game, with 11 being obtainable through downloadable content and New Game Plus. Most of the game’s Blades are optional and not obtainable through the main story; among them are KOS-MOS and T-ELOS from the Xeno sub-series Xenosaga. The game’s Challenge Mode, added through downloadable content, features Shulk and Fiora from Xenoblade Chronicles and Elma from Xenoblade Chronicles X as obtainable Blades.