Round 3, Match 25: Xenoblade Chronicles - Winner (4) vs Dark Souls (1)

Wheels

7thCircle wrote: »

Yeah, 3 rounds in, anyone paying attention could see where this one was headed. I did expect Mac to vote for Dark Souls, though, since he was so positive about the game after his second playthough and not as keen on Xenoblade overall.

One thing both these games had in common for me was a point near the middle where I realized I wasn't having fun and considered quitting them. In Xenoblade, I switched from Shulk to Riki and never went back to controlling Shulk again. It saved the game and the battle system for me. Here too is a game that was too big and too long in my opinion, and something as simple as changing which character I controlled brought a new hook and fresh gameplay to something that had become stale. This is an excellent example of what I mean when I say long RPGs need some sort of progression or hook to keep my attention through the mid and endgame. I also think the interface was poorly designed for controlling Shulk and the Monado. Combat worked much better when I controlled anyone else. Riki was my fav though.

On the other hand, Dark Souls never did become fun to me again after the midway point. After Anor Londo there was too much backtracking, grinding, and wasted time trying out new weapons and builds and running back to the far reaches of the world to see if I was geared and leveled enough to handle them. As I said in the Dark Souls v Devil Survivor match, that was when the flaws in combat and particularly the slowness of it started to grate on my nerves. I loved the atmosphere, but the level design in the last half of the game was atrocious in ways that exposed combat flaws. The only new hooks and progression in the mid and endgame were related to grinding and a major slowdown in progress. I think I kept playing more out of a stubborn mindset than anything else, not because the combat was saving it, and I hated the use of trigger buttons for action commands (which it bears repeating that NO OTHER ACTION GAME DOES RARGH!!!) to the end.

Dark Souls wasn't a game where combat was good enough to make up for other issues, and made some of them worse. In Xenoblade, combat saved the game for me in a world whose size was too large for its content. To the surprise of no one:

Vote: Xenoblade Chronicles

My response: [video]

7thCircle

Side note -- Wheels, why haven't you played Xenoblade?

Phillip Willis

Youza! LOL. I love it!!

7thCircle wrote:

Side note -- Wheels, why haven't you played Xenoblade?

Oh, I know...I know!! Because its combat system isn't as good as Dark Souls??

Mike Moehnke

Well, let's have the poll results.
Xenoblade Chronicles 196 75.38%
Dark Souls 64 24.62%
Total Votes 260

Wheels

7thCircle wrote: »

Side note -- Wheels, why haven't you played Xenoblade?

didn't find it all that interesting.

Pretty much me with any Xeno game.

DarkRPGMaster

Wheels wrote: »

didn't find it all that interesting.

Pretty much me with any Xeno game.

You tasteless heathen! /joke

Rya_Reisender

I can agree that Xenoblade isn't all that good (but most because of things unrelated to the battle system). It was just overhyped and then all the US people were happy to get it actually released in US and only because of that it received so much attention. The Last Story is much better than Xenoblade, but I always feel everyone thinks Xenoblade is the best there is for Wii.

I only have negative memories on Xenoblade like doing all the quests and turning them in just to find out that now there are 10 more quests to-do and I was like: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.

And then when they introduced the "build your own town" thingy I was just like "Okay, I can't take it anymore. I quit". And then I never touched the game again.

But combat is definitely the best thing in that game.

DarkRPGMaster

Rya.Reisender wrote: »

And then when they introduced the "build your own town" thingy I was just like "Okay, I can't take it anymore. I quit". And then I never touched the game again.

You don't actually build the town yourself, you end up getting people to come live there and repair it, and you donate the funds. So basically it's the same as every "repair the town" quest from every RPG you've ever played.

Rya_Reisender

That's the same thing to me and not every RPG has that.
I quit DQVII out of the same reason too.
I just don't like the idea of revisiting previous places and having to yet again talk to all the NPCs.

Anna Marie Privitere

Couple extra days to wrap up any thoughts~

TwinBahamut

Rya.Reisender wrote: »

I can agree that Xenoblade isn't all that good (but most because of things unrelated to the battle system). It was just overhyped and then all the US people were happy to get it actually released in US and only because of that it received so much attention. The Last Story is much better than Xenoblade, but I always feel everyone thinks Xenoblade is the best there is for Wii.

I only have negative memories on Xenoblade like doing all the quests and turning them in just to find out that now there are 10 more quests to-do and I was like: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.

And then when they introduced the "build your own town" thingy I was just like "Okay, I can't take it anymore. I quit". And then I never touched the game again.

But combat is definitely the best thing in that game.

I find this statement pretty insulting, honestly. I looked forward to and played both Xenoblade and Last Story, you know. Last Story is a pretty good game, but Xenoblade is much better. Saying I feel that way simply because Xenoblade was "overhyped" is nothing more than you bending the truth and being rude for the sake of trying to discredit me and others who feel like me. I don't like it at all.

Me feelings that Xenoblade is better and fully deserving of its praises are completely genuine and are not at all rooted in ignorance or "hype". Please don't insinuate otherwise.

Anna Marie Privitere

This one's well cooked, off to the next round~