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Help me pick an adventure game: Xenoblade 2 or Skyrim


Andromeda Stardust

Xenoblade or Skyrim  

11 members have voted

  1. 1. Which adventure game is more BOTW like?

    • Xenoblade 2
      3
    • Skyrim
      3
    • Neither; keep playing Zelda BOTW
      5

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So being enthralled by the Zelda verse, I've all but fought Ganon and started the Master Quest DLC. I've a bad habit of saving final bosses for later and not getting back to it. Silly me for not finishing it yet but life and other interests have kept me occupied.

 

Moving on to the topic title, two epic adventure games are coming to Switch this holiday, neither of which series I've ever played. Xenoblade 2 and Skyrim.

 

Which is most BOTW like? With so much to do stuff on my gaming bucketlist, I doubt I'll ever have time for both. But I'd like for some new adventure in my Christmas stocking. Kinda leaning toward Xenoblade 2 but I thought I'd ask the forum first.

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Skyrim. We currently do not know at the moment because it's not out yet, but I believe Xenoblade 2 will probably be more like the first game than the X spinoff on the Wii U. The game will probably be more focused in its progression and less open than what you would get with something like BOTW, Skyrim, or Xenoblade Chronicles X.

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Neither, because you should experience Mario Odyssey first (assuming you haven't already). I voted "stick with BotW" and it comes down to this great opinion piece about the shortcomings of "checklist"-based open world games: Open-world games are broken, and Nintendo spent 2017 trying to fix them.

 

In short, Nintendo stripped the open-world map game down to its very defining elements: a rich world to explore and a map to explore it with. Rather than leveling up, you got information about the world; rather than an endless flood of activities, you got stamps to place on the map yourself. Its main quest provided a structure for exploring the verdant world of Hyrule and a handful of set pieces, but little more. This clarity of vision alone would’ve marked the game as a turning point in the history of open-world games, but then Nintendo released Super Mario Odyssey—as daring in its own way as Zelda was, but for entirely different reasons.

 

 

 

Skyrim is big, but compared to Breath of Wild, it's lacking in soul and style. I'm going to try to get into it again on Switch, because it might grab me in a different way if I can curl up with handheld mode once in a while. The game is 8 years old and the design goes back to Daggerfall, it's great on paper but is totally a computer game. That's OK if you don't mind the lack of immersion. I mostly play iPhone games so that's not a deal-breaker for me. Touch Arcade: The Skyrim Switch Port Is So Good It Makes Me Mad

Xenoblade (the first one) plays like a single player MMO. I like the world and art style, and it's playable (if chunky) on New 3DS. It's my airplane game. Too bad I haven't been taking any trips. The new one should be more of the same but I'd wait for reviews. They'll be gushy so watch for the critical ones.

I do enjoy a "map game" (read the AvClub piece), as I'm far more Explorer than warrior or socializer or achiever or killer and honestly any of these games should scratch that itch. I do want you to read that article though -- it would be great if Nintendo's choices in these two big games move the industry towards more "fun."

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Being entirely objective here as an outsider on this because I've got no experience but some related basics with either. Xeno the 3DS release for a time but not the WiiU game this is sequel drawn off of, and Skyrim just related experience with online D&D style/dialbo/BotW style stuff.

 

They're not the same, so pick which style fits your needs more to start. Second to that, if you want more bang for the buck both in time allotted to finish things, world to explore, and things to do Skyrim blows Xeno out of the water. Skyrim seems to be truly open and you can do or not do the story so much but just go out and explore if you care to (like Zelda or even those D&D types too) and build yourself out as a character as desired. The other maybe huge in time and subquest/quests to do but at the end of the day it's still just another JRPG which has a linear set story to it you must follow so again down to tastes and wants as it's not similar.

 

Also like flojo said watch reviews, but considering one is a Nintendo property you'll get the Zelda/GTA/FF effect where fanboy reviewers who fail to even attempt to be objective will gloss over or ignore issues just to slap down 9 and 10 after another. Skyrim may get that due to the impact of what it is and what the format it sits on despite the age of the legendary edition that it is. Look for someone being critical, even if the review still sits at a 8.5+ on both, by what is said within. If you find no to minimal grievances it's a fluff piece made to pacify sheeple with what they care to see, not what they need to.

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First, you really should finish Zelda. Ganon isn't that hard of a boss, especially if you have good equipment. I would skip both of these and finish Zelda and then perhaps pick one of them up later when they are on sale.

 

I've played Skyrim before, but have never played a Xenoblades game. My impression of Xenoblades from what I read is that it is more of a traditional action JRPG. Zelda BOTW is closer to a western style RPG, and Skyrim is a textbook example of western style RPG. Skyrim should be a much closer experience to Zelda than Xenoblades.

 

However, I think you will be in for a big let down playing Skyrim right after Zelda. It's not that Skyrim is a bad, but Zelda is such an amazing game. They are both open world, but you can't climb everything like Zelda and the wonderful soaring mechanic isn't there. Skyrim feels bleak where Zelda feels hopeful. I walked away from Skyrim after 20 hours feeling a bit bored with the game. Zelda added so much freedom in movement to the western style RPG and Skyrim, while a good game for its time, feels like a relic compared to it. Zelda is just plain more fun, and I personally felt the world of Zelda much more inviting and interesting to explore than the world of Skyrim.

 

If you really feel the itch to play something new, I'd go with a game that is in a different style than Zelda. I'm currently playing Super Mario Odyssey and it is a lot of fun. I have Xenoblades on preorder as I am a fan of JRPGs.

 

One other note on Skyrim, if you have a decent computer you can get the game for dirt cheap on Steam. Try it out on Steam for cheap and then if you are hooked in, get it on the switch so you have a portable version. Full retail price for an old game feels a bit of a ripoff. I'm sure it was a lot of work to get it to run on Switch, but I still wouldn't pay full price for it.

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Definitely Xenoblade 2. Skyrim you can find on 100 other platforms, give or take ;) Personally, I'm ready to heavily invest in Xeno 2 because I started the first on Wii U, but stopped after about 20 hours (?). The Wii U struggled with such a giant game (started getting bad pop-in, etc), but I really loved what I saw.

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Neither, because you should experience Mario Odyssey first (assuming you haven't already). I voted "stick with BotW" and it comes down to this great opinion piece about the shortcomings of "checklist"-based open world games: Open-world games are broken, and Nintendo spent 2017 trying to fix them.

 

Skyrim is big, but compared to Breath of Wild, it's lacking in soul and style. I'm going to try to get into it again on Switch, because it might grab me in a different way if I can curl up with handheld mode once in a while. The game is 8 years old and the design goes back to Daggerfall, it's great on paper but is totally a computer game. That's OK if you don't mind the lack of immersion. I mostly play iPhone games so that's not a deal-breaker for me. Touch Arcade: The Skyrim Switch Port Is So Good It Makes Me Mad

I defeated Bowser last weekend and have damn close to 400 Moons now. :grin:

 

Thanks to the others who posted. I may just wait a while and finish Zelda in my downtime. I've got four divine beasts tamed, the Guardian armor (all three pieces upgraded to lvl 3), Epona (though there's debate over which horse I get when I do the second part of Ganon fight - prolly best to take Epona out of the stable before fighting), and I've got over 80 Shrines now. I'll use the gargoyle fairy statue to reduce my stamina from three wheels down to two in exchange for five extra hearts. Cook a bunch of hearty ingredients individually (Once you've got 15+ hearts, cooking a single "hearty" ingredient alone refills your meter to max + whatever, much more economical compared to stacking regular ingredients for health) and prepare a bunch of "mighty" ingredients to increase attack power. Five bananas gets me +3 attack boost for a long time, and now the Yiga den is empty I can stock up on boatloads. I probably have enough Guardian loot to get some wicked armor from the ancient tech lab (I'm eye-balling the chainsaw), plus the "ancient prificiency" stat boost from the guardian armor. I also stockpiled some ancient axes on display in my house (never used) from the "test of strength" shrines. Someone told me final Ganon will be a pushover with all that gear. Then there's the entire master sword quest to do which I haven't touched yet.

 

And good point about BOTW likely being superior to Skyrim if nothing else but the fact it's been ten years past. I may still check out Xenoblade 2 as First and Second Party games tend not to deflate in value much. Does Xenoblade require lots of "grinding" to help level up characters? One of my least favorite aspects of traditional RPGs, which Zelda BOTW has relatively little (you'll bulk up in no time randomly exploring and doing side-quests). Truth be told I never much liked the FF series or had the patience for it, instead sticking to safer series like Mario RPG / Party / M&L, or Earthbound / Mother. And I don't mind linear gameplay if the story is exciting. I just don't want to spend dozens of hours slaying random enemy encounters until I'm strong enough to finish the next area. Ditto for "gold farming." I work full time now and don't have the patience for that stuff.

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I am not anywhere close to endgame for Xenoblade 1, but so far, I haven't felt the need to grind out anything. It's somewhat linear despite being open world. Someone with more hours in could say better than me though.

 

Where do you guys get the time to play through these massive games??? (Goes to dabble in Lineage II)

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I've only played Skyrim. I liked it but I sorta think that you could play any of the XBox 360 era Bethesda games and find out if you liked them. Get any of them on Steam and see what you think. When you get to the "you can go anywhere now" moment, you will know. It takes less than an hour on pretty much all of them.

 

If I had to go on record, i'd say Oblivion and Fallout 3 were my preferences from the Last 10 years or so.

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Xenoblade (the first one) plays like a single player MMO.

 

I'd personally apply that label more to X than the original Xenoblade. The "carrot on a stick" optional side quests and urges to explore off-path areas in the distance are clearly there in the original game. However, when it comes to how the story progresses and how the areas are designed to flow from one to the next, it's very "JRPG" in nature. Maybe that's what you meant by "single player" and we're actually on the same page.

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Sheesh, probably should have read through the rest of the thread before making my previous reply.

 

Definitely Xenoblade 2. Skyrim you can find on 100 other platforms, give or take ;) Personally, I'm ready to heavily invest in Xeno 2 because I started the first on Wii U, but stopped after about 20 hours (?). The Wii U struggled with such a giant game (started getting bad pop-in, etc), but I really loved what I saw.

 

You are talking about Xenoblade Chronicles X, correct? The Wii U one. Not the Wii one. The original Xenoblade Chronicles is unrelated to X and is a vastly different game, and this is what Xenoblade Chronicles 2 appears to be a follow-up to, not the much more open X. The reason I say this is Skyrim is probably more comparable to X than X is to the original game. If you are expecting Xenoblade 2 to be more like X, you might end up disappointed. I just hate to see people disappointed when something doesn't live up to their expectations, that's all. :)

 

Does Xenoblade require lots of "grinding" to help level up characters? One of my least favorite aspects of traditional RPGs, which Zelda BOTW has relatively little (you'll bulk up in no time randomly exploring and doing side-quests). Truth be told I never much liked the FF series or had the patience for it, instead sticking to safer series like Mario RPG / Party / M&L, or Earthbound / Mother. And I don't mind linear gameplay if the story is exciting. I just don't want to spend dozens of hours slaying random enemy encounters until I'm strong enough to finish the next area. Ditto for "gold farming." I work full time now and don't have the patience for that stuff.

 

I am not anywhere close to endgame for Xenoblade 1, but so far, I haven't felt the need to grind out anything. It's somewhat linear despite being open world. Someone with more hours in could say better than me though.

 

In the original Xenoblade Chronicles it really depends. The game has an interesting system where something like any enemy five levels higher than you will destroy you in a hit or two. Level up once or twice to bridge the gap between levels and the fight balances out considerably. If you are on the same level or even above an enemy's level, chances are they will be little to no threat to you. If you are five levels higher than the enemies in an area, most will no longer attack you (unless they are special types). So clearly there are benefits to grinding, but it's not always necessary. I find how the system is set up to be a great way to balance out the grind and the typical "forced combat" of JRPGs.

 

That said, I found myself wanting to fight all the time and grinded like crazy anyway because the combat was so damn fun. It was super satisfying to me and it was the combination of how fast the battles moved, what kind of flexibility I had in the battles, and the sounds used in the fights that reinforced a "feel good" kind of vibe from the experience. I just naturally wanted to do it more unlike most JRPGs I have played where the combat felt like a chore.

 

Honestly, the quality of Part 2 is yet to be seen. I feel like if you want to get the right experience, pick up a copy of the original game on the Wii and play it on your Wii U. If you like that, then try the one on the Switch after seeing reviews. The original is definitely worth experiencing.

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Shoot, if you're not even finished with BotW, get busy! By the time you finish it, the next DLC is supposed to be out by next month, and hopefully it will have enough content to justify the $20 price tag.

 

Ganon is a pushover, keep striving for that 100%, you don't even need all the Korok seeds to get it.

 

 

I've personally never been able to get into the Elder Scrolls games. There's just too little immersion, too little interaction, too many cookie cutters, inane dialogue, and really ugly graphics (though TBH Skyrim doesn't look completely awful). I know they have a really small development team, so they have to cut so many corners, but...it just doesn't work for me.

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Shoot, if you're not even finished with BotW, get busy! By the time you finish it, the next DLC is supposed to be out by next month, and hopefully it will have enough content to justify the $20 price tag.

 

Ganon is a pushover, keep striving for that 100%, you don't even need all the Korok seeds to get it.

 

Yes I have the DLC pack. I'll probably kick Ganon's ass this weekend as I get Thursday and Friday off and have a four-day weekend ahead.

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Xenoblade Wii/3DS is not the game on WiiU in any way that's Xenoblade X. This one on the Switch appears to be a JRPG (not MMO style) and therefore is like the older WIi/3DS game.

 

Because of this they aren't comparable at all to put Skyrim and Xenoblade 2 here as a really which one choice as they're not similar at all. I'd say you need to decide if you want an open world game, or just a very long subquest loaded but still linear JRPG type turned based game.

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  • 1 month later...

if you haven't decided yet, and have any other system, I'd go with XBC2 on Switch and Skyrim on your other system (particularly if it's currrent gen or jazzed up version like PS4pro or XboneX) I already had it on PS4, and didn't feel like buying it twice so got XBC2.

Well my other 8th gen system is a Wii-U. So that makes Switch is the first 9th gen system, since XB1X and PS4 PRO are still considered gen 8? :P

 

Anyhow I've decided to continue playing Zelda BOTW as there's still plenty to do between the DLC packs and with a full time job plus retro games, I don't have time to devote to starting a new epic 100+ hour quest at this time. Thanks for your feedback...

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Well my other 8th gen system is a Wii-U. So that makes Switch is the first 9th gen system, since XB1X and PS4 PRO are still considered gen 8? :P

 

Anyhow I've decided to continue playing Zelda BOTW as there's still plenty to do between the DLC packs and with a full time job plus retro games, I don't have time to devote to starting a new epic 100+ hour quest at this time. Thanks for your feedback...

The whole gen thing is just OR on wikipedia, so by "current gen" I just mean something currently available new in stores and still supported.

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The whole gen thing is just OR on wikipedia, so by "current gen" I just mean something currently available new in stores and still supported.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draft:Ninth_generation_of_video_game_consoles

 

Damn straigh 9th gen is real. Xbox 1x and ps4 pro are also 9th gen despite what the wiki wanna-be mod-gods dictate. Did people really expect 8th gen to last 10+ years?

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The first DLC pack is just some "quality of life" junk. The real meat and potatoes should hopefully be in the pack that's supposed to be coming next month.

I stand corrected...much less "meat and potatoes" and more "well, if you're still hungry there's two carrot sticks left."

 

The Master Sword Trials are kind of fun.

 

I find it a little strange that after you beat the game, and then beat EX2, you unlock faster recharge on your Champion powers and a motorcycle...which you won't ever use because you just beat the game and have no more sidequests to complete???

 

Maybe I'll use them to attempt to get the other two monster medallions?

Edited by Asaki
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I stand corrected...much less "meat and potatoes" and more "well, if you're still hungry there's two carrot sticks left."The Master Sword Trials are kind of fun.I find it a little strange that after you beat the game, and then beat EX2, you unlock faster recharge on your Champion powers and a motorcycle...which you won't ever use because you just beat the game and have no more sidequests to complete???Maybe I'll use them to attempt to get the other two monster medallions?

Some of which may or may not come in handy fighting Ganon. I'm doing it backwards. First Ex2, get the cycle and faster recharges, which will likely help me on the Master sword quest, and no telling how much loads of power the Master Sword will have once it's fully recharged. People have already told me that the final Ganon fight will be a pushover with lvl 3 guardian armor, 20 hearts, and a maxxed stamina wheel. I guess I procrastinate a bit much when there's so many side quests left to do. Adhd kicks in. On my way from point A to point B, I've slain enemies, talked to npcs, initiated two new side quests while totally forgetting why I came to point B in the first place. Why I love non-linear gaming, which Zelda botw has in spades! :grin:
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Some of which may or may not come in handy fighting Ganon.

You have to defeat Ganon before the Champions' Ballad quests are unlocked, don't you?

 

First Ex2, get the cycle and faster recharges, which will likely help me on the Master sword quest...

I'm pretty sure they take those away for the Master Sword Trials. They take away everything except for the Runes (a huge oversight IMO), which means you'll be abusing a lot of bombs for a while =)

 

...no telling how much loads of power the Master Sword will have once it's fully recharged.

I haven't heard anything about it having increased power, it just doesn't "break" anymore. Or maybe it stays "powered up"? I've been trying to avoid spoilers, so I'm not sure.

 

Typically it has 30 damage, and changes to 60 when Guardians are nearby, or when you're in the Castle.

 

I'm just doing the challenge because it's kind of fun (but I know it will get frustrating real quickly). It's like that Island sidequest, but nowhere near as easy, so it's nice to have a similar challenge that will last a lot longer.

 

People have already told me that the final Ganon fight will be a pushover with lvl 3 guardian armor, 20 hearts, and a maxxed stamina wheel.

Yeah, Ganon is pretty easy, as usual. Only 20 hearts? I think the max is 28.

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Maxed nothing. I had under 20 hearts, the standard blue champions armor, hyrulean shield and the master sword and did fine. I just ended up spamming the special talents of the dead basically to get through it as the timing at one point sucked for me so that barrier going up worked wonders.

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