Nintendo UK has shared their hope that Xenoblade Chronicles X can attract a “more hardcore RPG audience,” recognising an unsatisfied appetite for the genre in the home console market.
Monolith Soft’s open-world RPG is the company’s remaining release for the Wii U before the close of the year, rounding out new arrivals over the past 12 months that have included Yoshi’s Woolly World, Super Mario Maker and Splatoon.
“Xenoblade Chronicles X will speak to anyone who loves epic RPGs, as it has everything you could want from a big sweeping sci-fi adventure, with rich diverse landscapes, deep customisation options, a unique battling system, and a host of memorable characters,” Nintendo UK product manager Gemma Hall explained to MCV.
“We are therefore not only targeting it towards fans of the original Xenoblade Chronicles, but to broader JRPG fans looking for their next epic RPG adventure. The game is visually sumptuous and will demand the attention of genre fans.”
That will therefore see their marketing campaign actively target those that have played Monolith Soft’s previous open-world adventure, which will primarily use video formats to showcase the Wii U exclusive’s scope.
“We will be focusing activity initially around Xenoblade Chronicles fans, and then broadening out to wider RPG fans with a tightly targeted digital campaign,” Hall shared. “Due to the highly visual nature of this game, we are concentrating on video formats that show off the many stunning facets of the title, including the huge open world, giant alien monsters, and the awesome Skell transformations.
“We have a wealth of Wii U games that will be part of our Christmas campaign, including Splatoon and Super Mario Maker. However, Xenoblade Chronicles X is a more serious RPG offering, with stunning graphics and sweeping sci-fi story, and so we expect this to open up the Wii U to the more hardcore RPG audience who won’t want to miss out on this future genre classic. We can see there is a big appetite for proper JRPGs within the home console market, and not much currently fulfilling it. On the 3DS, titles such as Bravely Default and Fire Emblem Awakening have proved hugely popular, and so we know that within our Nintendo audience this genre is particularly well received. It will be great to be able to offer this type of game to the Wii U audience as well.”
With attention circling around Bethesda’s Fallout 4, Nintendo UK see Xenoblade Chronicles X as “a very different breed of RPG” and therefore set to attract genre fans on its own merits.
Hall continued, “This game is very unique within the release schedule. The only other vaguely comparable title – Fallout 4 – is a very different breed of RPG so there is nothing similar within this window that offers dedicated RPG fans the scope and depth of gameplay that Xenoblade Chronicles X does. As one fan said: ‘It’s giant robots, flying around a massive field, fighting things. There’s nothing not to love about that.'”
Xenoblade Chronicles X will release exclusively for Wii U in Europe and North America on December 4th.
