Review for Xenoblade Chronicles 2. Game for Nintendo Switch, the video game was released on 01/12/2017
Xenoblade Chronicles 2, on its release almost a year ago, managed to satisfy fans and critics, winning excellent ratings and a satisfied fandom despite some small narrative incompleteness. This incompleteness concerns in particular the War of the Aegis on which the game bases its premises; and this is where The Golden Country Returns DLC comes into play. The latest expansion planned in the first (and for now only) pass will take us to play the role of Lora and Jin during the days of the Aegis war.
In addition to them two other characters known and not as Addam, Mythra or Aegaeon will be involved, but the story mainly focuses on the two main protagonists, while providing key information on the hero of the Aegis. Monolith promised an important expansion with a great duration, well-maintained premises, although the duration of Torna The Golden City will be far less than that of the original game.
Xenoblade Chronicles 2: The good DLC
From the title it might seem that we want to imply that Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is a mediocre game. This is not the case at all, considering, among other things, the excellent rating we gave it last year. Despite this, playing Torna The Golden Country really feels like you are in front of Xenoblade 2's “beautiful DLC”. This is because, at first glance, everything works better. The combat system has been deepened and rebalanced for the introduction of new mechanics such as the ability to swap drivers and blades during combat. The new combat system turns out to be the improved version of the original, with a better overall balance and an additional variety of moves.
All while managing to condense effective explanatory tutorials in just a few minutes, avoiding the initial obstacle of the original Xenoblade Chronicles 2 that could certainly fill. The total removal of the random system of obtaining the Blades, in favor of a predefined fixed team, has certainly helped the game design and removed the more controversial mechanics present in the original. But it's not "only" the gameplay that works best in Torna the Golden Country. The new protagonists are much more suited to the narrative, as well as giving a real sense of belonging to the group that will be formed without having to resort to constant jokes, sometimes even bad.
An (almost) perfect prequel
Narratively Torna the Golden Country has some heavy duties. Virtually every single character present in the group of protagonists must be deepened, however keeping in mind the rules already prepared by the Xenoblade 2 narrative. After concluding the expansion we can say that these points have all been taken in full. The characters of Addam and Jin are really deepened, giving a different insight into Mythra's behavior 500 years later. All the other party members behave well, with genuinely funny banthers to each other and great characterization.
But the real star of Torna The Golden City is Lora, the main protagonist who, for what is his role in Jin's story, risked being trivialized to a generic female character full of vitality and joy. Instead it was not like that, on the contrary, we found Lora a much more credible and well characterized character than Rex, so much so that Torna The Golden Country also managed to make us become attached to her and, consequently, to empathize much more with the because of Jin in Xenoblade Chronicles 2. In only 16 hours of gameplay, few compared to the 50/60 of the original game, the expansion has managed to hit every apparent goal and give new points of speculation for fans, in addition to the countless explanations on the war of the Aegis.
Length can be a flaw
As mentioned earlier Monolith Soft had promised an impressive DLC, with several hours of play ... which is what Return The Golden Country actually manages to be. With an average of 16 hours of gameplay it is among the longest DLCs available on the market ... but the way it reaches these 16 hours is not the best. After 8 hours of fantastic narrative and non-narrative pacing, the game decides to slow down and force the player to do myriads of sub-quests. In fact, it will not be possible to continue with the plot before maximizing the with your community, the unique mechanics of Torna The Golden Country, strongly inspired by the affinities of the first Xenoblade Chronicles.
This new mechanic isn't bad either, but the fact that the main quest forces you to use a secondary mechanic for half its total duration slows down the game too much. Also because this will happen towards the final stages of the title, just when you are ready to face the epic finale. It must be said that, in itself, it is worthwhile to finish the Main Quest, thus doing whatever is required. The final boss-fight and in general the character of Malos are so well done in The Golden Country Returns that the original pale in comparison.. But the exaggerated and obligatory interruption of the narrative to devote oneself to secondary activities, sometimes interesting others less, is a huge defect of this expansion; perhaps the only one outside of some technical problems.
Technically the same old Xenoblade
Monolith's JRPG epics have never enjoyed exceptional technical sectors. Excellent environments alternate with various problems, which also recur in this expansion. The frame rate drops are present and noticeable, and almost no effort has been made to solve the graphics performance problem on laptop, which remains too inferior an experience compared to playing with a docked console. On a musical and directorial level The Golden Country is back literally Xenoblade 2.5, with remixes of old tracks and directorial choices already seen and already functional in the original version of Monolith Soft's work.
Xenoblade Chronicle 2 - The Golden City is back is a fantastic DLC that keeps all the narrative promises and offers many better elements than the original adventure. If it were not for the nefarious choice of forcing dozens of almost useless secondaries, and for some technical problems already present in Xenoblade Chronicles 2, we would be talking about a masterpiece. Instead the limits lower the final judgment, which however remains extremely positive. This expansion is Monolith Soft's perfect farewell gift to Xenoblade Chronicles 2.
► Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is an Adventure-JRPG game developed by Monolith Soft and published by Nintendo for Nintendo Switch, the video game was released on 01/12/2017
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