Endgame was pretty hype. The final dungeon hit all of the right marks when it came to atmosphere. The music was tense, the robot enemies made for imposing encounters--especially the motorcycles and giant ****ing mechs, and the reveal of the World Tree not being entirely organic built tension and concern throughout the trek.
Pneuma is ****ing awesome. She pretty much made late game combat bearable and satisfying. If she was the one who performed a chain attack finish, the enemy was crippled, if it survived to begin with. It was a satisfying mechanic and I loved doing it on the bosses and giant enemies.
Amalthus as a villain was eh. He made himself into a clear threat in Chapter 8, but I feel like they were info-dumping me over a character introduced halfway into the game. Would have been better if he was a presence throughout the very beginning. Maybe show him visiting Gormott or Uraya in Chapters 2 and 3. Establish his presence, influence, and heinous mindset early on so we can acknowledge him as a clear player in the story, like Torna. Oh well, he at least served a purpose with Malos. I legitimately liked the twist that the Aegis was actually a sentient data collector and that Malos was evil because Amalthus was evil. It made sense logically (because they were artificially created) and it made Malos's last minute turn to good not feel forced.
Speaking of Amalthus, the boss battle was pretty cool. You know that one hole he made when entering the room? That's actually a bottomless pit. On my third attempt, my blade combo knocked him into that hole, ending the battle
immediately. That was so hilarious that I took a screenshot just to commemorate it. The tension was cut like a knife.
Damn does this game have good atmosphere. Elysium's reveal would not have been good without this
unsettling piano track.
And the whole, "Hey the world ended and this is your second chance" twist was okay. These last three chapters did a bunch of storytelling without any cutscenes, I feel. When I made it to the Land of Morytha, I knew immediately something was off in this world. Clearly the world ended before the events of the game. Then Rex picked up an ID, hinting that these zombies were actually humans. Then the World Tree dungeon being completely manmade is ****ing cool, because it only added to the recent world building. You really get the feeling that Elysium is not what we think it is.
What sold it for me, though, was that I suddenly remembered that this is a sequel to Xenoblade Chronicles 1, and not in a cheap way. They don't retcon anything and the events of the apocalypse clearly took place centuries after whatever happened in the first game. (I didn't play XC1 so don't spoil or quote me on that.) What they did was use the art style from the first game for the designs of the humans before the Cloud Sea!
Like that is so cool! It really hammered in how this was a different world while also taking advantage of what was before it.
Anyways, the final fight with Malos was pretty hype. I went in with Rex, Tora, and Nia. All of them were at levels 68. Only thing I detest about the boss fight were the reinforcements. I can handle Siren Buster, I can handle Polling Sensor, but I can't handle both at once. That makes me lose the fight immediately. I could have level grinded, but I had **** to do so I just set the game to easy mode as my trump card. Get ****ed, Malos.
And Pyra's "death" was weird. Was it too hard for her to just tell Rex that she'll transfer her essence into him, and then leave a vessel to deal with Elysium? That felt needlessly emotional.
But I was happy that everything was sorted out. Good on Alrest, now don't **** it up again.
