Thoughts About Tokyo Xanadu eX+...

One of the games I finished this year was Tokyo Xanadu for PC. I got the Normal Ending, unlocked the True Ending, and beat the After Story. Below are my thoughts after beating the game.

Tokyo Xanadu combines Action RPG battles with Life-Sim elements making the city the story takes place in and all the characters in it feel alive. By the time I finished the game, I felt a connection with the town of Morimiya and its inhabitants.

In the gameplay side, Tokyo Xanadu takes a lot of inspiration from two Falcom franchises. The battles are action-based like the Ys series, while the level progression and special equipment remind me of the Legend of Heroes Trails' Orbaments system.

The story progression reminds me of the Persona series. The battles take place in a parallel world filled with monsters. While in town there are a lot of things to interact with and discover. The setting and characters are fun to be around.

Each chapter introduces a problem for the cast that introduces the next party member and reveals more of the overall mystery. I like how the final chapter connects all the dots. Some of the plot twists were great. I didn't expect the main conflict of the final chapter, but it feels poetic in the end.

The Normal Ending was a bittersweet "we overcame the calamity but at what cost" type of ending. The path to the True Ending was about fixing what went wrong in the normal path. It feels like a "fan service" kind of ending, but I don't mind.

I've seen some fans talk about Tokyo Xanadu needing a Sequel. I agree.

Throughout the game, there are chapters called Side Stories. I think these were added in the "eX+" version of the game because their climax happens in the After Story that was introduced in the "eX+" version.

The After Story ends in a sequel bait, with the dialogue implying that there's more story to explore... Sadly, no Sequels are confirmed even now, years after the game's release.

Lately, I've been noticing a trope in JRPG games in which all characters take their turn to comment on every development in the story. In Tokyo Xanadu, this becomes exhausting once you assemble the full party.

I began to notice how "empty" some of the dialogue was. Sora, Yuuki, and Shio all become generic and one-dimensional after their character arcs end. Asuka and Kou keep being relevant because of the story, but their dialogue could've been better. This problem is also found in other games including Persona 5, but I noticed it in Tokyo Xanadu more.

What do you think?

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• All images are screenshots of the game taken by me.