* [[GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff Americans Love Xenoblade]]: It apparently sold more in America than both Europe & Japan (and was only carried by a single retailer on top of that).
* AnimationAgeGhetto: Most of the people who refuse to play it refuse to because it's on the Wii (and thus has terrible graphics and is for kids) and [[RatedMForManly not rated M]] and [[RealIsBrown isn't realistic]]. A large number of reasons why it's cemented in this state by non-fans are reasons that are also shared with ''VideoGame/{{Xenosaga}}''.
* AwesomeArt: For a Wii game, the game's appearance holds up well even with games released on the HD duo and PC, thanks to the highly detailed art direction.
* AwesomeMusic: We could easily say the entire soundtrack. [[AwesomeMusic/{{Xenoblade}} See the page for details.]]
* BadExportForYou: Some American players complain of this, since the US localisation of the game is just the UK version; British spellings and all. Even the copyright date on the title screen remains unchanged: something one would expect the lawyers to insist upon if anything of significance had been done at all. What they don't realise is that the UK has been putting up with the exact same problem for ''decades'' (very few titles will ever take the time to change the spellings from American English to British English when being brought overseas).
* BaseBreaker: Riki. For many, he is TheScrappy, given his habit of ruining dramatic scenes with his grating voice and childish concerns and speech patterns. For example, while the rest of the team [[spoiler: mourns the loss of the High Entia's Emperor]], Riki is more concerned with being hungry. What makes it worse is that you can never tell when he's being serious or not. [[spoiler: As he notices Melia is tired but hiding it on the Fallen Arm and so pretends to be fatigued so that they'll relax and she can get some rest but we never get anything that suggests he was pretending to be hungry after the Emperor's death.]] On the other hand, there are just as many who find him absolutely hilarious and enjoy the fact that he is both comic relief and also a character in his own right (his TeamDad moments, caring for Melia, having seven children, etc.) And then there are those who love him for his surprising usefulness in battle.
** Riki's dickishness is actually intentional and they were going for a jarring effect. In an interview, the dev team said they wanted to see how people would react to a stereotypically cute-looking "mascot" character saying rude things and being an insensitive JerkAss.
* BigLippedAlligatorMoment - Debateable but [[spoiler:Tyrea's sudden flight]] at the end of her sidequest comes off as a bit jarring, since it hasn't been mentioned, demonstrated or hinted at that [[spoiler:High Entia's headwings]] serve as anything but decoration, they've got plenty of technology to [[spoiler:render their ability to fly on their own mostly meaningless]] and the plot implies that they've been actively trying to mix their bloodline with the Homs for unrelated reasons which would also serve to breed this trait out as a side effect.
** Actually one of the nameless [=NPCs=] in Alcamoth mentions that it's possible for a High Entia to fly using their headwings, but it requires a great amount of training and compares it to being able to wiggle their ears.
** [[MagicByAnyOtherName Ether]]. *snort snort*
* CompleteMonster:
** [[spoiler: Mumkar/]]Metal Face. Many face Mechon [[spoiler:don't have the memories they had when they were Homs]], but he does, and he doesn't care about attacking [[spoiler:the place that used to be his home]] and clearly enjoys killing. It's made pretty clear that he was always an asshole. And in general he's an absolute {{Troll}} that love to rub in his enemies faces the wrongs he's done to them.
** [[spoiler: '''Zanza''']]. Who takes the concept of [[spoiler:a JerkassGod]] to horrifying extremes.
* {{DemonicSpiders}}/{{BonusBoss}}es: Unique Monsters. They're always much stronger than the other nearby monsters. How much stronger depends on the monster.
* DisappointingLastLevel: While the game is considered to be excellent, the plot takes a noticeable dive in quality starting from [[spoiler:the Mechonis Core.]]
** The plot rises again after the WhamEpisode [[spoiler:when Zanza reveals himself]] but the quality of the level design doesn't, since there are very few new areas and those aren't nearly as exciting as earlier parts of the game (some of which have to be re-explored, on top of that).
* EarWorm: If you spent any time at all solving the Bionis' Leg quests, [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xweRl4LZlmo Gaur Plain]] will. not. leave. your. head. for. weeks.
* EightPointEight: The game got glowing reviews in all of the continents it was released in... with the exception of [[ElectronicGamingMonthly EGM's]] [[http://www.egmnow.com/articles/reviews/egm-review-xenoblade-chronicles/ review.]]
* EvilIsSexy: [[spoiler:Lorithea]]
* ExecutiveMeddling - Not by Creator/{{Nintendo}}, rather, Nintendo of America.
** And a positive example out of GameStop, who apparently convinced Nintendo to sell ''Xenoblade'' from their stores.
* FanNickname: "Seven" is the usual non-spoilery way for fans to refer to [[spoiler:Fiora after she rejoins you at Fallen Arm, since she is]] the seventh party member.
* FauxSymbolism: Mostly averted given the thick symbolism of the "series" history, but they just couldn't leave it alone completely: A character does get crucified once for no real reason.
* GameBreaker: Topple locks. With enough skill levels, the cooldowns for Topple arts will finish before the effects even wear off, allowing the party to keep up an infinite chain of spamming Topple on enemies so that they never even get a chance to get up.
** Interestingly, ''all'' of the party members can be game breakers in their own unique way if built right.
*** '''Shulk:''' His regular arts are easy to score criticals with if he's under player control. This builds up the Party Gauge rapidly, allowing you to use Chain Attacks very consistently. He even packs a little healing to go with it. And that's not even ''counting'' the Monado on top of all that, which on the a NewGamePlus with the InfinityPlusOneSword version, has a 75 percent critical hit rate and by far the highest damage of any weapon. His talent arts with it can allow him to deal heavy damage, seal enemy auras, and defend against their arts.
*** '''Reyn:''' Has the fastest Topple->Daze combo in the game, has not one but ''two'' arts that contribute to his Talent Gauge during combat, and can rack up incredible one-hit damage with Magnum Charge->Sword Drive (which is the most damaging single hit art in the game besides Shulk's Monado Buster).
*** '''Sharla:''' Even despite her TierInducedScrappy status, you'd be surprised how effective Head Shot can be, especially when used in a Chain Attack, which mitigates Head Shot's sluggish cooldown.
*** '''Dunban:''' Is just behind Shulk for the strongest regular attack in the game, and his agility lets him tank just as well as Reyn without needing quite as much healing.
*** '''Riki:''' Is a fantastic boss killer with his damage-over-time arts (which against enemies the player has difficulty hitting are more reliable than straight up damage), has almost as much defense and even more HP as Reyn (though Reyn will eventually catch up to him), has decent healing, and can boost the Party Gauge with Happy Happy.
*** '''Melia:''' Discharging her spells counts as a neutral art during Chain Attacks, letting her serve as an "adapter" between two characters with otherwise-incompatible arts, making it very easy to get the maximum 5x damage multiplier. Even though her AI doesn't utilize her to her full potential (and tends to have her get WAY too close enemies despite her being the least durable character in the game), in the hands of a player, her spell discharges can result in a barrage of lethal damage-over-time ether attacks.
*** '''[[FanNickname Seven]]/[[spoiler:Fiora]]:''' Once you've fully unlocked her fourth skill branch, all of her counter-attacks and double-attacks become critical hits. By borrowing Dunban's Critical Drain ability, she can heal herself with practically every hit. In addition, her Sword Drones [[LimitBreak Talent Art]] can rack up '''huge'' amounts of damage with a full chain multiplier. (To the point where it's capable of killing the strongest BonusBoss in one Chain Attack)
* HateDumb - Because of the situation listed just below, a lot of people seem to suddenly believe Europeans are lucky bastards that get all the good games and America is [[DoomyDoomsOfDoom DOOMED]]. Of course, that nicely forgets how Europe suffers from NoExportForYou much worse than America has ever did, even to this date, and ''Xenoblade'', ''[[VideoGame/PandorasTowerUntilIReturnToYourSide Pandora's Tower]]'' and ''VideoGame/TheLastStory'' are the exception, not the rule. In fact, as far the ''Xeno'' series goes, America still beats Europe 4 to 2!
** With the announcement that ''Xenoblade'' is coming to America, they started quieting down about that game... then they started focusing on the latter two games.
** With ''TheLastStory'' heading to US soil, that leaves PandorasTower left... then people found out its [[SoOkayItsAverage quite average]] compared to the other games.
** There are quite a number of people who refuse to play ''Xenoblade'' because it doesn't have HD graphics and is on the Wii (and this also leads to the further assumption that it is "for little kids"). As Operation Rainfall says, [[http://operationrainfall.com/dont-judge-a-game-by-its-console/ Don't Judge A Game By Its Console]]. It's also not [[RatedMForManly rated M]], which is stupid, seeing as ''almost no JRPGs are ever rated M'' to begin with.
* HypeAversion: To be expected, since the game is already being called the "Best JRPG of this generation," even being ranked among the likes of VideoGame/ChronoTrigger and FinalFantasyVII.
* InternetBackdraft - The moment Nintendo of America said they may [[NoExportForYou not bring the game to North America]], specially after Nintendo of Europe confirmed they were going to bring it to the good Old Continent. The fact that reviews praised it as the best JRPG in an entire console generation didn't help either. Fortunately, the key word was "may", and eventually the game arrived to American shores.
* IronWoobie - Good lord do Melia and [[spoiler: Fiora]] take horrible torment with grace.
* MemeticMutation - Reyn's English battle quotes surely clicked with the internet.
** "Now it's '''Reyn Time'''!"
** "Man! What a bunch of jokers!"
** Want to know if someone else is a ''Xenoblade'' fan? Start with the first line of Dunban's "Blossom Dance" poem, and sure enough they'll be rushing to finish it for you.
*** And if they screw it up, you can call them "amateurish."
* MostAnnoyingSound - Some of the battle quotes are repeated WAAAAAAAY too often.
** Fiora's jumping sounds also sound a little like constipation.
* MoralEventHorizon: [[spoiler: Lorithia turning Kallian and all his men into Telethia, then her and Dickson gloating about it certainly counts as one for the both of them.]]
** Pretty much ''everything'' [[spoiler: Zanza]] does.
* MostWonderfulSound - Several.
** The shattering-glass sound when you change the party's fate during a battle.
** ''Now it's time for a Chain Attack!''
** The [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wryI07kDr6k fanfare]] that plays when first encountering a secret area.
* {{Narm}}: Characters still wear their armor in cutscenes. Or... lack of armor. It's possible to go through the game's most serious and dramatic moments with everyone in {{Stripperiffic}} outfits. Case in point: it's possible for Fiora to go through all her scenes at the beginning [[spoiler: up to and including her HeroicSacrifice]] in a bikini. And since the game ''remembers'' what you gave your characters at those moments, ''all flashbacks later in the game will still show her in a bikini.'' It can be kind of a mood killer sometimes.
** Also notable is that [[spoiler:Fiora's new form]] has a very plot-significant piece in the center of her chest. Because it's plot important, whenever that plot point comes up, the camera meaningfully zooms in on her chest, which is a little awkward when she's wearing armor that's heavy on AbsoluteCleavage.
** Xord's voice is either this or a case of NarmCharm. You probably wouldn't expect a gigantic mechanical abomination to sound like a Warhammer 40000 Ork, and the fact that he's the first Mechon you hear speak makes it even more jarring. Admittedly he does make for a fairly entertaining CardCarryingVillain, and the next Face Mechon you meet does manage to sound genuinely menacing.
** Dialogue example: During the WhamEpisode on Prison Island, when [[spoiler: the Emperor, Melia's father, is stabbed and dying]], Shulk gives an anguished [[spoiler: "Emperor... I failed you."]] It's normally tragic and dramatic, but the fact that it's worded ''very'' similarly to a [[MemeticMutation memetically]] SoBadItsGood line from [[DawnOfWar Dawn of War: Soulstorm]] (and StarFox64) might ruin it for some players.
** After the events at [[spoiler: The Mechonis Core]], you're back in Colony 6 once you resume control. However, if you've been making an effort to reconstruct the place, it's possible [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJHp1Ek_V-o this]] theme might start playing immidiately. Which is '''MASSIVE''' MoodWhiplash considering [[WhamEpisode what just happened.]]
* NightmareFuel - Some areas are not fun to run through for those with arachnophobia.
** Specific example: there's an early sequence of sidequests involves you having to find the "Giant's Mirror." It's located in a ruined shrine on the edge of a cliff, which seems simple enough... But the moment you pick it up, you'll see a leg emerge from the abyss, and suddenly a ''huge'' spider pulls itself up right in front of you. And at the point you can first do this quest, it'll probably kill you horribly in one hit. And then when you go to the place you have to offer the mirror [[spoiler: the same thing happens, but there are ''three'' giant spiders this time!]]
*** Oh, and that first spider will show up if you explore the ruins no matter what, even if you haven't gotten the sidequest yet. You could run into it on on your very first trek up the Bionis' Leg, well under half the level needed to actually beat the thing. It also attacks-on-sight and takes a while to get over the edge of the cliff, so you could walk to the edge, turn around, and [[JumpScare not know you're under attack until the mini-boss theme kicks in]].
*** One of Shulk's first [[CombatClairvoyance visions]] shows the Arachno Queen ''impaling and killing Reyn in one blow.'' If it weren't for Monado Shield [[DieOrFly kicking in just in time]], [[spoiler: Shulk would have lost ''both'' of his best friends within days of one another.]]
** The Mechon entirely. Especially the Faces [[spoiler: once you find out [[ReforgedIntoAMinion what]] [[BrainwashedAndCrazy they]] [[WasOnceAMan are.]]]]
** [[spoiler: The High Entia getting turned into Telethia, they go through a PainfulTransformation and which they are powerless against and lose all their free will.]]
* ScrappyMechanic - Debatable, but Spike damage tends to edge towards this: basically, anything that has Spike aura automatically does a set amount of damage to anyone who attacks them and, naturally due to the enemies' vastly higher HP, the fact they end up getting hit a lot more often than your characters, your limited sources of healing and thus the need to rely more on evasion to keep your party alive, this tends to work far too much to their advantage. There are ways to counter it, but they're either temporary or require you to sacrifice far too many gem slots to defend against it, and you have no clue on what enemy has such defenses before you see the purple numbers popping out of your characters. Furthermore, the spike damage defense gems don't work on Spikes that cause status effects, which you naturally have no access to.
** The above is mitigated somewhat with high-level gems that make you almost immune to spike damage and ones that protect you from all status effects, but until you get sufficiently high-leveled variations of them, you're still going to be crippled severely by it. Not to mention the fact that the few skills that you can use to nullify spike damage rely on not only being able to hit the enemy, but to be able to build enough party gauge for a chain attack as well to make the effect stick.
** Another example would be the Ether Cylinders you get from gem crafting. In theory, they're a nice way to re-use gem components if you fail to get them over 100% during crafting, and could even be used to distill a single effect so that you can focus on it with Strong flames instead of Medium on the next run. Unfortunately, trying to exploit this feature often leads to your high-affinity party members [[StopHelpingMe "helping"]] the two characters push a desired quality over 100%, [[FailAtFailing turning what would've been an awesome cylinder into an underpowered gem.]] This is especially annoying when you're trying to Mega-Heat gems (which requires you to push the quality to 300%, something that's only really possible with starting cylinder values of 150% or more) which gives them the maximum possible stat boost and creates another copy of the gem in addition to pushing the resulting gem up a rank that accomplishing normal Heat does, the end result being that the most consistent way to create 90+% cylinders is to purposefully leave a pair of characters at low affinity to minimize the % increase and chance of other characters butting in until you finish creating every possible gem you need for the rest of the game.
* ShipToShipCombat: Shulk/Fiora vs Shulk/Melia.
* ShockingSwerve: [[spoiler:Dickson shooting Shulk after he refused to kill Egil, revealing that he was evil all along. Then later revealing that he solely rescued Shulk and kept him alive to be a vessel for Zanza.]] Ho-leee Shit. Playing on a NewGamePlus makes it a bit more obvious, however, as you're capable of picking up the little bits of {{Foreshadowing}} better.
* SidetrackedByTheGoldSaucer: Dear '''lord!''' This may as well be called SidetrackedByTheGoldSaucer: The Game. To put things in perspective: a player can reasonably spend 5 hours doing sidequests ''before even leaving the first town!'' The in-game tutorial even outright ''encourages'' it at one point, telling you to "come back to Colony 6 during breaks in the story." And lets not get into exploring all the areas, which the game encourages by rewarding the player with more experience.
* SoCoolItsAwesome: Widely considered the best EasternRPG of generation 7, the game that the genre needed to claim back its relevance in Western markets, and one of the best games of the generation in general. Plus, arguably the best graphic engine on the Wii and [[AwesomeMusic one of the best soundtracks of all time]].
* [[ThatOneLevel That One Area]]:
** Satorl Marsh. It's filled with [[GoddamnBats bird enemies]] that are very aggressive and tend to dog you as you try to evade them, and unlike the wide open beauty of the Gaur Plain before it, is rather confined and dull-looking, at least during the daytime([[SceneryPorn during the nighttime...]]). It also contains an aggravating fetch quest where you have to collect stones, and they are placed in the strangest places, including one across a poisonous lake. Have fun!
** Alcamoth. Huge and with very few landmarks to teleport from, navigating the place is a massive pain. Not to mention [[spoiler: you have a limited amount of time to do most of them if you want OneHundredPercentCompletion]]. Hope you have a rubber band ready when doing quests there.
** Colony 6's Ether Mine. It's a rather dull-looking underground area (that comes up in the story just after ''another'', less annoying underground area), filled with Mechon that only Shulk can damage without Monado Enchant or a Topple effect. It's not actually that big, but falling damage will force you to go around the rim of the central pit several times before you can reach the bottom safely.
** The Bionis interior. Thankfully it's short, because the place is full narrow pathways where you get attacked by [[DemonicSpider Drakos Telethia]] that can knock you off, causing you to fall into the ether and die, and they fly so you can't knock them off.
* ThatOneBoss: Disciple [[spoiler:Lorithia]]. Not only is she a FlunkyBoss but her flunkies will self-destruct and you're fighting on a tiny platform with ether surrounding it, which deals constant damage if you fall/walk into it. Seeing how she's huge, she'll try to push you into it, and the AI characters aren't smart enough to walk out of it on their own, causing them to die constantly. She also has an unavoidable attack that will hit all party members for over 2000 damage. She has a ton of HP and Shulk is useless for this fight. Melia is ideal but her low HP means she's destroyed a few seconds into the battle. Oh and, at this point in the game, there's also really no place you can go to to get better armor, either. Hope you're ready for ten hours of grinding!
** The 2nd fight with Jade Face/[[spoiler: Gadolt]]. He would be pretty manageable if not for the fact that he keeps his using his arts CONSTANTLY. You survive getting hit with one, just for him to start pulling it off again FIVE SECONDS LATER. God help you if you haven't been leveling up Monado Shield.
* ThatOneSidequest:
** Challenge 2 in Frontier Village, which asks you to kill Breezy Zolos, is surprisingly difficult if you do it as soon as you're able. Zolos will probably be on an equal level to yours, and is probably the first sidequest mark you'll fight who has a Spike aura, meaning you take damage every time you hit it. Not only that, but the area it appears in also happens to be prowled by a ''Level 98'' gigantic T-Rex enemy [[OhCrap who's all too willing to join the fight if he gets too close.]] Luring is key here, as is strategic fighting.
** Reconstructing Colony 6's "Special" to Level 4. It requires 2 Rainbow Slugs, possibly ''the'' single rarest collectable in the game. They only spawn at certain times in certain areas on the Fallen Arm, and even if you know the right time/location there's still only about a 10% chance the collectable will be a Rainbow Slug. And fans all over the internet ''still'' aren't 100% sure what the right times are, the only definite is they have to be at night. And you need two of them ''plus'' an extra one for your Colloctapaedia if you're looking for OneHundredPercentCompletion in that area too. Hope you like running around and around the same area for hours! This wouldn't be so bad were it not for the fact that one potential resident ''requires'' this upgrade to move there!
** Getting Colony 6's special to level one isn't as bad, but still annoying. You need to a Light Rain Element that is only dropped by the Aqua Nebulas the Bionis Leg. Not too bad. Oh, the drop only occurs during a thunderstorm, which is a royal pain in the ass because you have NO CONTROL OVER WEATHER EFFECTS, and if you change time on the clock, it doesn't bother telling you what the weather is so you have to go on it from guess work. Even then, it's VERY rare for the Aqua Nebula to drop the item, and you kill them all, you have to wait for them to respawn and then get another thunderstorm going.
* TierInducedScrappy:
** Sharla, due to the fact that the game's mechanics make healing less valuable than in many other [[EasternRPG JRPGs]]. The fact that she is very lacking in combat arts, combined with the inability to use her Cooldown Talent Art (itself a ScrappyMechanic) in Chain Attacks, makes it difficult to perform lengthy Chain Links with her. Unlike many other examples of this trope, though, it's not so much that she is actually a detriment to the party and more that everyone else is just that good, and needing her to win non-boss/uniques much higher than you is a sign that your party is underleveled or underoptimized.
** Shulk, by virtue of being too good. The Monado gives him access to many useful abilities, including some that none of the other characters have (e.g. he's the only reliable defense against area attacks with Monado Shield and Monado Armor). That several fights are basically tutorials to show off the Monado's power only highlights its usefulness and doesn't help anyone who would like to use someone besides Shulk in your small 3 man party.
* VisualEffectsOfAwesome: While the character models take a noticeable hit from this, the vast, thriving world you explore is well conceived design-wise and lavishly detailed, with its own ecosystem, weather effects and day/night cycle, with surprisingly good draw distance to boot. And this was all pulled off on an aging system that's only slightly more powerful than the original XBox.
** Notable examples include the Gaur Plain, a grassy field with huge cliffs and rock formations, and the Makna Forest, with a huge group of waterfalls that you can actually explore for yourself and filled with realistic flora and fauna.
* WhatAnIdiot - Shulk's refusal to let [[spoiler: Dunban kill Mumkhar at Sword Valley]] left a bad taste in many players' mouths. Although his reluctance to [[spoiler: kill other Homs is reasonable given Fiora's state at the time, his insistence on sparing even a CompleteMonster like Mumkhar who has crossed the MoralEventHorizon multiple times and continues to be a threat to the party even as he defends him]], pushes Shulk into StupidGood territory for many. Had [[spoiler: Mumkhar not been HoistByHisOwnPetard at the very last moment]], Shulk's adamant HonorBeforeReason could have gotten [[spoiler: Dunban killed and likely himself as well.]]
** Arguably, though, no one can quite understand the scene from Shulk's perspective. In this world, the only real conflict is between Homs and the mindless Mechon. The concept of hurting something with a conscious mind, and a fellow Homs at that, is pretty alien.
* WTHCostumingDepartment - A lot of people dislike most of the armors of the game so much that they refuse to put the characters anything but the standard outfits and maybe a one or two better-thought armors. Even if that means having worse stats. The worst offenders are the heavy armors, which are ridiculously bulky and over-ornamented. Not to mention {{Stripperfic}} with Sharla and [[spoiler: Mecha Fiora]], even to the point of FetishRetardant.
* TheWoobie: Even with all of what the rest of the main cast has to endure, Melia gets hit hardest and most often. It begins even before Shulk's team meets her: [[spoiler:her best/closest/only friends and bodyguards are killed while on a mission to destroy a Telethia, her stepmother tries to have her assassinated, her father is killed before her eyes, one of her advisers turns traitor, and a good number of her people- including her brother and stepmother- are turned into Telethia.]]
** So to summarize, by the end of the game, [[spoiler: her whole family is dead, only a tiny fraction of her people are still alive, and she knows that she's lost out to Fiora when it comes to winning Shulk's affections. She definitely got the rawest deal out of all the party members. [[IronWoobie And despite all this, she keeps her chin up and resolves to continue shouldering on.]]]]
* WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds: It's hard not to feel sympathetic for [[spoiler:Egil, considering Zanza took over his friend's body and committed mass genocide on the Machina just so he could continue his vicious cycle of causing apocalypse to keep himself alive. Too bad that Egil's plan to kill Zanza would have resulted in the destruction of the Bionis, where Homs and other races live in.]]
* {{Woolseyism}}: Although in British style. It was so good that the [[Magazine/{{Edge}} Edge Magazine]] gave Nintendo of Europe a special award for the best localisation of 2011. The other four translations were also really great.
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