Nintendo has a lot of games on its plate this year, including Xenoblade Chronicles 3, the next installation in Monolith Soft's young but highly successful RPG franchise. Luckily for Xenoblade Chronicles fans, Nintendo and Monolith Soft just released a new trailer that shows off more of the game's combat and story, including a huge party size and a mechanic allowing playable characters to fuse with one another. Altogether, Xenoblade Chronicles 3 looks like an exciting continuation of the franchise. This isn't all that Monolith Soft revealed in the trailer, though; it also announced that Xenoblade Chronicles 3 would release well ahead of schedule.
When the game was announced in February 2022, Xenoblade Chronicles fans were told that the third game would release in September, giving Monolith Soft a healthy window in which to finish the game. Now, however, Xenoblade 3 will release at the end of July, meaning it'll be well over a month ahead of schedule. The early Xenoblade release is shocking, considering how frequently games get delayed in the current state of the industry. It's a great surprise for Xenoblade fans, though. One hopes that the release date change is a sign that the game industry is getting back on its feet after several difficult years.
Xenoblade's Release Among Constant Delays
In the last few years, video game releases have constantly been delayed. Whether it's Square Enix's Forspoken or Traveller's Tales' LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga games of all shapes and sizes have needed more time. Even Nintendo's own sequel to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild got delayed recently. The COVID-19 pandemic hasn't been kind to the game industry, causing many of these delays as developers are forced to adapt to long-distance working conditions. Even as pandemic conditions change, the game industry continues to see regular game delays.
Because of the ongoing pattern, nobody could've guessed that Xenoblade Chronicles 3 would release so far ahead of schedule. If anything, there was ample opportunity for a delay, since there was more than half a year to go between the announcement and the game's release. Nevertheless, it looks like Monolith Soft has cleared its development goals with ease, meaning Xenoblade fans will have a new game to enjoy in the middle of summer 2022. In a time when delays are so probable, Xenoblade Chronicles 3 inspires hope that other games will start to meet their projected releases again, even if not every game has good odds of exceeding planned release dates.
Xenoblade Chronicles 3 Could Be an Omen
Naturally Monolith Soft's development pace isn't indicative of every other game developer, but it's still encouraging to see that an early game release is possible again. The Xenoblade Chronicles games are big games in terms of sheer content volume, so finishing it early is a serious accomplishment. If Monolith can manage an early release, then maybe other studios will start managing some early releases in the future too, or at the very least, they won't have to regularly delay their projects. Game development may be approaching its usual pace in spite of changing working conditions
The quality of Xenoblade Chronicles 3 matters as much as its release timing, of course. It'll be some time before fans find out if Monolith's next game is another winner, but in the meantime, fans will at least be able to assess the Xenoblade gameplay that Monolith shows off, searching for innovation and improvement. Aside from that, it'll be interesting to see if the early Xenoblade 3 release is an anomaly or a sign of what's to come. The prior is entirely possible, but the latter would be ideal. Even if delays make games better in the long run, fans would appreciate seeing more franchises follow Xenoblade's lead whenever possible.
Xenoblade Chronicles 3 releases July 29, 2022 for Nintendo Switch.
