***Spoiler Alert: This text accommodates spoiler for Xenoblade Chronicles III.***
Per crucem advert lucem: by way of the Cross, to the sunshine.
This Latin proverb—that the trail to hope and resurrection should first cross by way of struggling and sacrifice—resonates with a very haunting magnificence within the sprawling, recently-released JRPG Xenoblade Chronicles 3.
Set in Aionios, a world the place the troopers of Keves and Agnus stay for ten-year spans to battle one another in a ceaseless cycle of struggle, the sport follows the journey of off-seers Noah and Mio, two troopers from opposing colonies whose job it’s to ship off their struggle useless. It’s not till Noah and Mio, together with their companions, encounter the mysterious Guernica Vandham that they start to know the merciless nature of their restricted, war-torn world—or acquire the ability to rework it.
However such transformation can’t happen with out sacrifice.
In fact, heroic sacrifice has lengthy been a standard trope in JRPGs, and the theme has explicit resonance within the Xenoblade Chronicles sequence. In Xenoblade Chronicles I, Fiora loses her life in a futile battle in opposition to the mechon Steel Face, which units the sport’s main plot in movement. In Xenoblade Chronicles II, Jin finally sacrifices what stays of his life to defeat Indol’s Praetor Amalthus, and the whole Torna: The Golden Nation DLC serves to present context to his motion and his goals.
XBC3, nevertheless, ups the ante by inviting each protagonists and gamers into an emotional crucible after which refusing each the cathartic climax that may provide typical style closure. As a substitute, the sport asks those that interact with it to follow sacrifice as a path to redemption—to, as Richard Rohr memorably tweeted, to “stay [their] manner into a brand new form of pondering” reasonably than suppose themselves into a brand new way of life.
From the outset, the world of Aionios in XB3 is outlined by “the countless now,” a deliberate stasis sustained by the antagonistic consuls and their grasp, Z. The struggle that the Consuls foster is perpetual however serves no goal for many who battle. Troopers are aged up in cradles, emerge to battle for ten years, after which die, solely to relive the cycle once more. The tide of battle shifts from Agnus to Keves and again once more, however there isn’t any clear understanding among the many troopers of why the struggle is being fought, the way it began, or what victory may imply.
To flee this cycle and to achieve the fabled Metropolis referenced by Vandham, Noah and Mio—together with their companions Eunie, Taion, Lanz, and Sena—should regularly take dangers and make sacrifices for the sake of a future they actually can’t envision. Raised as troopers themselves and with no understanding of ideas like previous age, marriage, parenthood, or household, they acknowledge that “the countless now” doesn’t serve them—however they can’t at all times articulate to themselves or to others why such sacrifices could be mandatory.
This theme of sacrifice performs out in methods each giant and small. On the very starting of the sport, Noah and Mio—from Keves and Agnus, respectively—should sacrifice all they know of good friend and foe to belief one another and battle in opposition to the mysterious Moebius D though they can’t comprehend Vandham’s phrases and have by no means seen the Metropolis he mentions to them. And as they journey by way of the world and free colonies from the tyranny of struggle, they need to train their allies learn how to sacrifice previous methods of residing and pondering for newer ones.
One notably amusing subplot traces this battle by way of Commander Zeon and his beleaguered Colony 9, who within the absence of everlasting struggle flip to subsistence farming for survival. The colony’s frustration with the ups and downs of rising potatoes erupts at a number of factors into outright battle and nasty anger. Within the face of a urgent materials want like starvation, colonists query the purpose of sacrificing and struggling for a greater future they’ll’t envision.
However XBC3’s most devastating depiction of sacrifice—of strolling by way of demise to mild—happens on the Li Garte jail in a sequence of scenes so devastating that followers confer with them on social media with the straightforward shorthand “Chapter 5.”
On the finish of that chapter, Noah and Mio’s journey stumbles to a halt when they’re defeated and captured by the mysterious Consul N. Imprisoned by the Consul, Noah—the sport’s most compassionate and introspective character—is pressured, alongside together with his buddies, to look at helplessly from a cell together with his buddies as Mio’s remaining lifespan drains away. Agonized, he bruises his arms attempting to achieve her by way of the jail partitions, however finally fails.
. . . the accomplishment of the sport’s foremost aim—the final word overthrow of Z, the consuls, and “the countless now”—calls for that the participant relinquish all of it.
Grieving her loss, Noah quickly discovers that he has lived by way of this agony earlier than. Consul N is Noah: a earlier iteration from an earlier lifespan, pushed to despair over always shedding Mio in his mission to finish the perpetual cycle of struggle. Selecting in opposition to the opportunity of a greater world to protect Mio’s life, Consul N successfully sacrifices the promise of a greater future for the safety of the “countless now.”
In mild of this data, Noah should make his personal depressing selection: to maintain striving for the opportunity of a greater world even when it means shedding the girl he has come to like, or, like his predecessor, to protect the grim “countless now” through which Mio by no means dies.
However the sport doesn’t actual a value solely from its protagonist. The participant, too, should follow sacrifice.
On the finish of XBC3, a sport that clocks in at nicely over ninety hours of playtime, the participant has encountered the total richness of Aionios’s huge world, has freed colonies from their enslavement to the Consuls, and has supported buddies and allies as they construct lives and desires past struggle and demise. The soul of the sport lives in these moments, within the numerous subquests and tales that drive the participant to care deeply for the world of Aionios and its denizens. But the accomplishment of the sport’s foremost aim—the final word overthrow of Z, the consuls, and “the countless now”—calls for that the participant relinquish all of it.
This marks a definite flip for the sequence. XBC1 and XBC2 each struck a hopeful tone at their conclusion, with the protagonists reuniting after loss and battle to show their faces to a brighter future. However XBC3 strikes a harsher chord. The sport closes not on reunion, however its reverse. After their trials and all they’ve discovered, Noah, Mio, and their buddies should half. The whole lot they’ve helped to resume and are available to like will disappear as part of the better transformation that can set the world to proper.
The visible of the parting is stark. Having mentioned their goodbyes and turned their faces to the longer term, Noah and Mio, Taion and Eunie, and Sena and Lanz break on the final attainable second. Operating towards one another because the transition to a brand new world commences, they attain out however can’t contact—and the world they as soon as knew transforms on their shouted promise to fulfill once more in the future.
Whether or not this promise will come to fruition stays unsure, and the sport’s shut solely presents a number of ambiguous clues on this regard. However the fervent fandom hope that the sport’s promised story DLC will resolve this ambiguity and supply a more true ‘completely satisfied finish’ underscores the resonance of the sport’s key theme: it’s so very arduous to let go of what is for what could be.
However it’s also mandatory.
As Noah signifies at sport’s finish, to need an everlasting and unchanging current—to protect “the countless now” over hope for the longer term—would solely serve to begin the depressing cycle of life on Aionios over once more. Unthinkable, in fact. However XBC3 needs gamers to really feel the burden of that selection, and the price of it. In its ending, the sport calls for that gamers expertise in an uncomfortable, even dissatisfying manner, what it means to sacrifice present satisfaction for a extra nebulous future good.
In Liturgy of the Ordinary, Tish Harrison Warren writes that on a regular basis practices and mundane moments form believers “into individuals who spend their days and due to this fact their lives marked by the love of God.” She notes that the work of repentance and religion is as a craft marked by software and the follow of small, seemingly insignificant acts: checking e-mail, sitting in site visitors, calling a good friend.
Enjoying a online game, in fact, isn’t by itself a non secular follow or a method of non secular formation. However in telling a narrative about give up and struggling within the service of hope, XBC3 invitations its gamers into the follow of sacrifice. For believers, the act of surrendering every thing valuable they inbuilt Aionios is a haunting reminder of what religion requires them in each day life: the discomfort of ready, the sacrifice of instant certainty, the problem of what Henri Nouwen describes as trusting to God’s fact and acknowledging that “our feelings will catch up.”
The sport itself underscores the issue of this selection, tempting gamers with colourful characters, facet tales, and so many sidequests that it’s attainable to postpone the ultimate reckoning with Z for fairly a while in favor of having fun with Aionios as it’s. Nonetheless, the intense participant ultimately understands the significance of transferring ahead, whatever the price. And so does the believer, in spite of everything: per crucem advert lucem. Christianity has at all times acknowledged that there isn’t any resurrection with out demise. However by way of the fictional nations of Agnus and Keves, XBC3 drives this reminder house in a singular and startling manner, asking gamers to sacrifice “the countless now”—for nothing lower than a way forward for infinite risk.
