Xenoblade Chronicles 3D Wiki – Everything you need to know about the game

X enoblade Chronicles 3D is an upcoming Nintendo 3DS port of an already released, yet exceptionally popular, Nintendo Wii game. Originally developed by Monolith Soft, who are partly responsibly for The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, the handheld port of this popular Open World Action Role Playing Game is being developed by Monster Games  who worked on Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D and Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze on Wii U.

The game is still going to be published by Nintendo and is one of the very first games to be an exclusive title for their newly updated handheld platform, the New Nintendo 3DS.

At this time, the game is currently slated to drop in Japan and PAL regions on April 2nd, whereas North America must wait until April 10th.

• 1. Development
• 2. Story
• 3. Gameplay
• 4. Characters

Development

Xenoblade Chronicles was originally a game that was developed for the Nintendo Wii, where a staggered localization schedule saw the game arrive in different territories at drastically different times. Arriving in Japan on June 10th of 2010, Europe on August 19th 2011, Australia on September 1st of 2011 and finally in North America on April 6th 2012.

The localisation process for getting the game to North America was very drawn out and resulted in fans of the series taking action by way of creating petitions, mass pre-ordering products related to the game to see it climb to the top of sales charts and writing to Nintendo of America asking for it. This project was titled “Operation Rainfall”, similar to the “Operation Moonfall” name used to demand a Majora’s Mask 3DS remake (which happened February 13th of 2015).

Though despite the action and dedication of the fans involved with Operation Rainfall, the localisation process was not spurred along by their longing for the game, Reggie Fils-Aime of Nintendo of America has said that, “I have to tell you – it doesn’t affect what we do. We certainly look at it, and we’re certainly aware of it, but it doesn’t necessarily affect what we do.”

He went on to say “I wanted to bring Xenoblade here. The deal was, how much of a localisation effort is it? How many units are we going to sell, are we going to make money? We were literally having this debate while Operation Rainfall was happening, and we were aware that there was interest for the game, but we had to make sure that it was a strong financial proposition.”

Following the game’s initial launch in North America, and the other territories, it was praised for being a brilliant and lengthy adventure packed with content. This perhaps inspired the port of the game, following the resurgence of JRPGs on handheld platforms.

It was on August 29th of 2014 that Nintendo announced that they were working on a port of Xenoblade Chronicles that would be coming exclusively to their newest upcoming handheld, the New Nintendo 3DS. A more powerful version of the regular 3DS with some extra buttons and a C-stick.

This announcement came by way of a Japan only Nintendo Direct Presentation that caused fans to express their concerns over the issue of localisation once again. But it was later announced that the game would indeed be coming to PAL regions, North America and Australia. This was confirmed when the game was given a world wide release date of April 2015. Specifically, the game is set to arrive in Japan and PAL regions on April 2nd, whereas North America must wait until April 10th.

One of the new features in the game is the inclusion of the Street Pass functionality. Following in the wake of the Amiibo craze, the New Nintendo 3DS port will also feature Amiibo functionality that will make use of the Shulk Amiibo.

Story

Xenoblade Chronicles is set in a world that was nothing but ocean, from pole to pole. This is until two colossal titans, named Bionis and Mechonis, came into being. The two monstrous beings then engaged in a battle that lasted beyond our ability to conceive the passage of time. Their battle raged until, after an unmeasurable amount of time, a final blow was delivered, leaving both of the massive lifeless corpses forever entwined in combat.

After countless eons pass, new and strange forms of life start to take form and grow on the now dead titans. On Bionis, as the “Bio” portion of the name would imply, organic life began to flourish, this includes the humanoid beings, the Homs.

Conversely, on the corpse of the Mechonis titan, once again as the name would imply, Mechanical life somehow took form and began to thrive. This included the species known as Machina.

Like the mighty Titans that came before them, the two organic and mechanical species’ started to fight each other, thus re-enacting the endless battle of the titans upon which they live.

This is where the player takes control of the young 18 year old named Shulk. Shulk lives on the body of Bionis and has his home in Colony 9. Colony 9 comes under attack from the Mechon. In this attack, Shulk comes to own the Monado, a blade of legend that’s capable of doing damage to the mechanical Mechon. Not only does the sword grant the wielder the ability to fight the Mechon, it also lets them see the future.

Gameplay

Xenoblade Chronicles is, at its core, an action adventure role playing game that is set in an open world environment. As you would expect from the genre, the player adventures forward and takes on quests from NPCs throughout the game world, completing these tasks will progress the story and level up the player and their party of team mates.

The gameplay is from a third person perspective and makes use of the popular, real time action based battle systems that are perhaps most recognisably implemented in the Final Fantasy video games, specifically Final Fantasy XII, and a number of MMORPGs.

Players can manually input attack commands that are called Arts, but these are only available after a limited cooldown period which begins after each use. These arts can be offensive, defensive and can even be used to heal party members. Healing is, of course, crucial to your success as both party members and enemies have a set amount of health that, once depleted, will result in a game over or a victory condition.

Characters

The following is a list of seven playable characters in Xenoblade Chronicles.

• Shulk – Shulk is the main protagonist and wields the Monado.
• Dunban – Dunban is considered to be the “voice of reason”.
• Fiora – Fiora is a friend of Shulk and Reyn, she’s also Dunban’s younger sister.
• Melia – Melia is a powerful mage from the Royal City.
• Sharla – Sharla is a medic serving with the Colony 6 defence force.
• Reyn – Reyn is another of Shulks childhood friends and also serves in the Colony 6 defence force.
• Riki – Riki is a member of the Nopon race, a race of merchant-like people.

Note: This wiki will be updated once we have more information about the game.