@igotnopicks
Yeah, but the thing is that I gave these games a try, at least to get the gist of it and why these games are so loved by the fans.
I started playing Xenoblade X in 2019. It was very confusing, with so many options. One day I wanted to do the main missions, but in order to do it I had to conquer a 15% of the territory or something. I’ve spent 3 hours doing it, getting the percentage, started the mission and I had to rescue someone in a forest with toxic water. There was a bunch of enemies that were OP, so, to avoid it, I had to climb the trees and the train with a crappy camera like it was GTA San Andreas. 3 hours later, I realized that I had to run round a mountain. Fortunately I completed the mission.
I wanted to take a break, so I went to a desert and the air killed me at night. I wasn’t sure if that was toxic or freezing, but when I got to that point, I gave up on the game. Glad I’ve spent only 20 dollars on this instead or more money. When I told this to some people, these were like “hey, this percentage didn’t work this way, you suck”. And yeah, I suck, but that person could have helped me in a well-mannered way without telling me that “I suck”.
Then there’s Xenoblade 2. I didn’t like the art design back in 2017, but one friend got it and I wanted to give it a try in 2019. The tutorials weren’t very clear, so most of my time was figuring out how my team worked in front of the main bosses. There were instakills, different stuns, sleeping stats, more instakills… It was a mess. The tutorials didn’t help, so I picked different turorials in the Internet… and they were even less clear than the official tutorial. And the story is very boring, with many predictable twists, a typical villain who wanted to destroy the world (what a surprise), a spa scene (because a hundred animes having a spa scene with fanservice weren’t enough), too much exposition with redundant information that only stretches the game’s length and some twists that didn’t make sense, like Pyra having suddenly a planet killer machine, because why not, I guess, with an ending that doesn’t work in the context of the whole game.
I’ve beat it in 78 hours, but it felt like a limbo. While 2 or 3 people gave me some good advices (because I was dying against some bosses like a hundred times each boss), other ones were like “you don’t get it” instead of helping me.
Xenoblade Chronicles (the Shulk one) cost me 20 dollars in the Wii U store and I played it in 2020 and 2021. The first half was great, it was the first time I had fun in Xenoblade. But after the Fiora reveal, the story was less and less interesting, with some twists that aren’t twists because we got scenes that were preludes to these twists, so, no twists. It was very hard to get it right, especially against the final bosses. It was like controlling a game while your little brother is shaking your head out of spite. And, after beating the game and getting the most Kingdom Hearts possible ending (with a beach and a Celine Dion song), I felt these games were less and less rewarding.
That game took me 92 hours to beat it, and the last 10 hours were basically grinding to get the right level to beat the final boss. And, after saying I’ve beat it, some people were still like “nah, you don’t get it”.
Here’s the thing: I’ve never said Xenoblade was bad. The three games are decent, especially the Wii U one, I just hated the story of the second game. The thing is, if I say these games are decent instead of amazing, the fanboys will pick a fight anytime. It’s the reason why I don’t like the Xenoblade fans, at least the most vocal ones. It’s the logic behind their attitude.
Sorry for the long text, but I needed to explain it.