This Old Neon Forum

Welcome to the #BGE2020 Elimination Round of 512!

Each game is seeded based on its performance in the two opening rounds of pools. Every game in the Upper Bracket has defeated multiple other games in 1-on-1 polls to get to this point. These are still the best of the best.

Polls are updated weekly, typically on Sunday or Monday. Check back throughout the week to make sure you don't miss a vote!

HOW TO VOTE

This is easy. You only get one vote per poll. The game with the most votes wins. In the event of a tie, the higher seed advances, so don't get complacent!

Wow - this surprises me. Xenoblade Chronicles is one of the best RPGs I've ever played - maybe it's the excellent British voice cast, or the way the story just goes straight for the gut right at the start, the unique premise, varied environments and really fun combat dynamics, cool equipment and skill upgrade system or the really cool and interesting characters, but this is a great game. Add in the fact that it effectively led the charge for the reevaluation of traditional JRPG tropes and gameplay style, pulling gameplay from MMO influences and merging them with the JRPG foundation, and it was a real breath of fresh air at the time.

I just can't see it above C:BL.

liu yuante wrote: ↑11 Mar 2023 20:40 Wow - this surprises me. Xenoblade Chronicles is one of the best RPGs I've ever played - maybe it's the excellent British voice cast, or the way the story just goes straight for the gut right at the start, the unique premise, varied environments and really fun combat dynamics, cool equipment and skill upgrade system or the really cool and interesting characters, but this is a great game. Add in the fact that it effectively led the charge for the reevaluation of traditional JRPG tropes and gameplay style, pulling gameplay from MMO influences and merging them with the JRPG foundation, and it was a real breath of fresh air at the time.

The reason it didn't get my vote is on that last point—I don't see it as effectively leading the charge, but rather being a rote/cynical copy of what Final Fantasy XII had already done on that front... or an unsuccessful attempt at a copy (since IMO it didn't do it as well). "Big" immersive environments felt unimpressive after seeing a PS2 game do them better. The things it tried to use as its unique selling proposition were effectively hampered by coming out on a last-gen system.

Anyway, this is a retro forum so coming out on a last-gen system isn't a bad thing. I'd probably re-evaluate the game better on those clunky retro charm merits nowadays. I guess this is a game where it's positioning/marketing hurt it more than the game itself did (c.f. No Man's Sky).

Kong Wen wrote: ↑12 Mar 2023 06:26 The reason it didn't get my vote is on that last point—I don't see it as effectively leading the charge, but rather being a rote/cynical copy of what Final Fantasy XII had already done on that front... or an unsuccessful attempt at a copy (since IMO it didn't do it as well). "Big" immersive environments felt unimpressive after seeing a PS2 game do them better. The things it tried to use as its unique selling proposition were effectively hampered by coming out on a last-gen system.

Not a bad point, FF XII was there first I suppose - but I found that game to be very slow going in the beginning and the environment to be a pretty standard Square-type world, imo. Xenoblade's setting was, to me, much more unique and the science-fiction elements were much more immediate, which for me helped to separate it from the usual fantasy RPG setting.

Spoiler

Add the fact that a very likeable character is brutally killed for basically no reason at all near the start of the game - though this would get retconned much later in the story - and that the main bad guy you're fighting in the first half of the game is not some mustache-twirling madman or misunderstood outsider, but is basically just a giant dick, and I found it to be a breath of fresh air based on more than just mechanics.

Anyway, it doesn't matter now - the Definitive Edition advanced so I'm good