Among the new titles announced in the latest Nintendo Direct presentation is a third Xenoblade Chronicles, slated to launch this September on Nintendo Switch. Continuing Nintendo’s acclaimed RPG franchise, the upcoming game is described by developer Monolith Soft’s executive director Tetsuya Takahashi as an installment that bridges the worlds introduced in 2010’s Xenoblade Chronicles and its 2017 sequel. With a story that spans centuries, Xenoblade Chronicles 3 has plenty of narrative room to explore to make good on its teased premise while expanding the fan-favorite fantasy mythos behind the Xeno series.
The original Xenoblade Chronicles was released for the Wii and took place on the frozen body of two Titans, Bionis and Mechonis. True to their namesakes, the inhabitants of Bionis are humanoid while Mechonis are machine-based and caught up in a conflict between each other, with the mythical Monado blade heralded as the weapon that could turn the tide of the war in favor for Bionis. Xenoblade‘s protagonist Shulk discovered he could wield the Monado and set out to defeat Mechonis to avenge his colony after it was attacked, with Shulk learning more about the Titans and the origins of the epic conflict.
Xenoblade Chronicles 2, released for the Switch, features an entirely new cast and takes place on the world of Alrest, a sea of clouds where the characters live on top of and inside Titans. The protagonist Rex wields the Aegis which leads him to encounter a living weapon with two different personalities, Pyra and Mythra. Rex is targeted by other blade wielders for his mastery over the Aegis, stumbling across a plot to wipe out humanity while searching for a fabled hidden paradise known as Elysium. Over the course of his adventure, Rex learns more about a war between humanity and the Titans nearly five hundred years prior to the events of the main story which was explored in a DLC expansion.
Xenoblade Chronicles 3 is said to take place in the future of Xenoblade Chronicles and Xenoblade Chronicles 2, despite its predecessors occurring on totally separate worlds, with few overt links to the two games beyond the franchise hallmarks of magical swords and fallen Titans. While the full nature of how Xenoblade Chronicles 3 connects the worlds of its predecessors is being kept under wraps, a teaser image from the upcoming game reveals the broken sword of Mechonis from the first game and the body of the Urayan Titan, which figured prominently in the story and world of Xenoblade Chronicles 2. This hints that Xenoblade Chronicles 3 may explore an unseen conflict connecting Mechonis to Alrest while staying fresh and accessible as its own standalone adventure.
Xenoblade Chronicles delivers open-world, RPG action, and while the first two games in the series appeared to take place in completely different continuities at first glance, the teaser image for Xenoblade Chronicles 3 hints that the two stories are not as separated as initially believed. Featuring new protagonists Noah and Mio from opposing kingdoms in the new world of Aionios, these characters hold the key(blade) for the future of the Xenoblade franchise. It’s been five years since players received a new Xenoblade game, and Xenoblade Chronicles 3 is shaping up to unveil the biggest twists and turns for the RPG series yet.
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