(12-18-2017, 02:44 PM)MayImilae Wrote:Xenoblade 2 Spoilers: (Show Spoiler)So, I'm 55 hours in, and the story is REALLY ramping up. Layers upon layers of deception, and genuine characters. I'm really enjoying it now! The playing gacha to collect obsurdly distorted women with giant boobs is still not great, but for the most part I've just been ignoring it, and it's going ok.
Thaaat said, I have a new complaint. Difficulty spikes.
I just finished the Aeshma core fight, and I was five levels over the core. It should have been cake, but as soon as the power cables reached 50% health, it uses an unavoidable AOE attack that just destroyed me, over and over and over! I tried at least ten times! I completed all remaining quests I could, I swapped out drivers and blades, and I main Nia and Dromach so I was timing and optimizing healing even! But in the end, I did everything I could, and it wasn't enough. I had to google it, and what I found was that this fight was basically all about using multiple combos to get orbs fixed to it then timing a chain attack and popping the orbs to get massive damage in a single turn so it wouldn't get the chance to obliterate you. So, a "this is a tricky way to maximize damage if you want to but it isn't really necessary" mechanic became "you must pull off this complex sequence of events and timing or you will guaranteed fail" mechanic. And of course, there was nothing in the game that told me I needed to do this, I had to find it out online. And it was relying on the chain mechanic and bursting orbs which the game taught 40 hours ago, I hadn't needed it so I had mostly forgotten about it at this point, and even when it explained it it didn't explain bursting orbs very well, I thought you had to attack the orbs with the same type, not the opposite (opposites being something it also has not explained well either). Come on game!
This isn't the first time I've hit a difficulty spike, mind you. It happened with the Akhos and Malos fight too, and I wasn't the only one to notice. But that was just solved by a bit of grinding. It's an action RPG, but it's still Japanese, I'm fairly used to that. But no grinding would have solved the Aethmas fight; I had already completed all the sidequests I was able to, and I was five levels over the Aethmas core, yet I was getting utterly destroyed. That attack just does too much damage and it happens too often.
Now, to be fair, Xenoblade Chronicles 1 had this issue as well. After the death of Fiora and first leaving town, there was a terrible difficulty spike. That was responsible for bouncing me the first time I tried Xenoblade! But that was just solved with avoiding enemies and grinding with ones I could take down. Definitely a problem and poor design, but doable. The Aeshma battle takes it to a new level though. Holy fudge!
I am absolutely convinced at this point that this game was rushed and needed way more time in the oven. Certainly more playtesting at the very least!
Xenoblade 2 is absolutely an extremely flawed game. It has too many systems and they often conflict with eachother (that's a rant for another time), terrible explanation of those systems, poor difficulty balancing, some egregious inhuman choices in character design, uses gacha and lootbox mechanics for no reason (thankfully not monetized), and literally has you gambling to collect highly sexualized women who have no character whatsoever! Buuuuut, I primarily play games to experience their world, characters, and story. And so far it's really delivering on that point! The characters respond as people would and are very charming, the world is very different from our own but follows its own rules, and there is a lot of history and unknowns in the world. I can predict most media before it comes, and I can't see where this is going! So, I definitely have a lot of mixed feelings about the game, but now that the story is really kicking in, I'm really glad I got it flaws and all.
I am just before the ending in Xenoblade 2 and the story is pretty good, i just stopped before the final fight doing all the sidequests, blade quests and developing the towns since i don't want for it to end. And there is plenty of content there. There is much more otaku vibe to this game but i see it being used mainly for humor so it isn't as annoying as some were saying, for me at least.