If you own a copy of the game, and have a Wii U, you can in good conscience, play it via emulation on PC.

Which is by far the best way to play the game.

You wont believe how big a graphical differnce there is, and theres even texture patches for it

It runs smoother and looks much better on pc.

Xenoblade Chronicles doesn’t really pick up. In fact, it’s a lot slower at certain portions in the later half of the game. There are some great moments ahead, but you have a giant snow field maze, and an even more giant robotic-like area ahead. Granted there are some great moments ahead, but also some incredibly dry ones that are very time consuming.

The game has a fairly interesting last bit, but it’ll feel a little unoriginal. If you’re familiar with Xenogears, you’ve already seen basically the same plot done with much more inspiration, much more detail, and in a shorter timeframe. Also, it’s not done in a way that is really a homage to Xenogears either, it’s more like they used the plot structure as a template.

In short, the part of Xenoblade that really excels is its explorative gameplay, and the beautiful Bionis section and Fallen Hand. The exploration of those portions. I played it a few times, because despite my post above sounding like harsh criticism, I actually really like the game. But my favourite portions are in the earlier portions. If you haven’t done so, I recommend trying to play through until you reach a part of the game called Frontier Village, if you like that, then you know how charming this game can be. I am not going to lie, there are a bunch of really desolate and long portions ahead after this, but what you can do is go to more pleasant regions of the game and level up + do quests to get by them more quickly.

I have tried twice..first on wii..then on my wii u..lost interest later in the game at the exact same point cuz things became to dragged out and grindy

^ This. X is excellent. It's not story driven as mentioned as well, but if the topic creator is interested in world building and deep, deep customization it literally gets no better than X. Not that it's story doesn't have great merit as well, but digging up a good picture of that story takes time and effort. X is a game you play if you love gameplay and getting lost in a new world.

You should if for nothing else because you can beat the game in 40 hrs if you wind up hating it. But if the game does resonate, it offers SO much more than even the original. Also, if you can't get into a game that starts you out on the last stand at sword valley (original), or waking up marooned on an alien planet and asking you to fight your way to he only civilization on the planet while you cross paths with foes that can 1 hit kill you, I'm not sure you're going to be pulled in with Xenoblade 2's going around a guild vessel opening, talking to a ton of folks about things you'll likely rapidly tap buttons to skip.

I could be wrong but 4-6 hours I had assumed the opening probably had a pretty significant impact of overall impressions of pacing. There's a lot of talking at the beginning of 2.

I think that if this is your fourth attempt, maybe the Xenoblade games aren't for you buddy, just saying

They are way worse in XC2. "THINK YOU CAN TAKE ME!!!"

Why are people always complaining of a xenoblade game starting slow? You can't have non-stop action from beginning to end. You need to give your characters some time to breath and grow or it ends of becoming a dull Micheal Bay experience.

Don't forget that NPCs show up only during a certain time of the day. Some show up only during the day and others during the night, so you'll have to explore every city twice.

The inventory sucks butt because there's a limit on the amount of items of each class you can carry. Several times I dropped some trash (because my inventory was full) that hours later I needed for a quest.

The game is easy, so don't fret. Level (or level difference between your characters and the enemy) is the most important stat in the game, because it has a huge impact in damage dealt, received, accuracy, evasion and block. Any enemy, including the final boss, is a joke if you are six levels above it. If an enemy gives you trouble, come back later when you've gained a few levels.

Speaking of important stats, the second most important one is Agility. The game doesn't explain what it does, but it plays a role in both acuracy and evasion. Critical hit rate is also important because critical hits fill the party gauge.

Since I said that Agility is so important, you can guess that all the agility-boosting and weight-reduction (weight reduces agility) skills are important to learn. All the AP boosting skills too.

In my game, all my characters except the last two to join (or the last three, I don't remember well) were able to learn all their skills, so don't worry about it. The same can't be said about the Arts, though (that's why I recomended to learn and link to everybody the AP-boosting skills).

Characters can learn up to two extra skill trees. The way to unlock them is to complete certain quests.

If you want to have an easy time crafting gems at the end of the game, don't raise the affinity of one of your characters (decreasing affinity is a pain in the butt). The last character to join is the best one for this purpose.

As for which arts to level up, it depends a lot on the way you want to use the characters. You're really early in the game, but I'll say that I still used Shulk's Back Slash a lot at level 99 (and Shulk isn't too versatile).

This game has missables. There are entire areas that can't be accesed after a certain point, which means that you won't be able to fight the unique monsters in them. Defeating those monsters is the only way outside of leveling up to obtain affinity coins, which are used to link skills from one character to another. Until certain events in an area called Mechonis Fields happen you can't miss any of them.