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Saturday, April 7, 2012

Rare game alert! Xenoblade Chronicles finally released, but only to GameStop and Nintendo's online store




Xenoblade Chronicles is the latest title from Monolith Soft and Tetsuya Takahashi who is famous for his scenario work on Xenogears and the Xenosaga series. Not having imported the European version of the game, I can’t say how the game is, but knowing Takahashi’s work, I expect an incredible sci-fi JRPG-esque story. With Yoko Shimomura (Kingdom Hearts series, Mario and Luigi series) and Yasunori Mitsuda (Chrono Trigger, Xenogears) on board for the music, I’m sure the music is going to be pretty fantastic as well.

Thanks to Operation Rainfall, Nintendo finally released Xenoblade Chronicles in the US on April 6th 2012, almost 2 years after its release in Japan. Problem is that there is only 2 ways to get it: GameStop, Nintendo’s online store. With only 1 retail outlet to buy the game, the game would undoubtedly become rare before you know it.

Preorders of the game from GameStop nets you an art book that is very high quality although paperback and thin at only 20 pages. Of course, it is too late for preordering but if you call around your local GameStop stores, you might be able to get one. According to the Xenoblade preorder bonus thread on CheapAssGamer, some stores didn’t even get enough books to fulfill preorders while other stores have more than enough. Personally, I didn’t preorder the game, but was able to pick up both the game and the art book. As of this writing, the books are already up on eBay going for $20+.

For anybody who like to collector JRPGs that are high in demand but rare to find, I'm sure Xenoblade Chronicles would certainly rank high amongst the gems like Suikoden 2. Well, maybe not that high but you never know. If you missed the boat on this one, there’s a chance that Nintendo would reprint this game if they know the demand is high. They did so for Super Mario All Stars for the Wii and are doing so for the circle pad pro which is getting a second run from GameStop in July.


NA cover of the game.
Characters on cover of art book is raised and bumpy.
Setup of all images. Captions on left with image on right.
Makna Forest.


Frontier Village.


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