When I first played Xenoblade 1 back on the wii, I find the story and music pretty engaging. However, I find the muted color palette and wooden character faces less so. More importantly, it is bogged down by the combat system that I find wholly unfun, with a weird blend between real-time and turn-based combat.
At the time, applying my expectations of real time combat based on my previous experiences was a bad idea. I compared it to the environment interactive combat of the last story and the fast paced kingdom heart/tales of games, and I just find Xenoblade 1's combat... lacking.
I even compared it to the flashy and complex turn-based combat jrpgs at the time, including Arc Rise, and I also find Xenoblade's tactical options lacking.
It didn't help that I was just sick of the grindy MMO's combat at the time and find it odd that Xenoblade 1 would mimic an MMO's lackluster combat system that I've completely written off. I got all the way until final acts of the game, and then just... lost interest.
Then came Xenoblade 2. I was apprehensive at first, the beginning of Xenoblade 2's combat wasn't much different, until I was introduced to the blade combo, driver combo and the rest was history. Xenoblade 2 became one of my favorite jrpgs of all time, and even propelled me to replay and complete the original Xenoblade 1.
