The Xenoblade Series and Breaking Cycles of Institutional Violence

Note: This article features copious spoilers for all the Xenoblade games, but more specifically the numbered entries in the series. If you don’t care, then read on. If you do, I recommend playing through this fantastic series before reading further.

Over the six months, starting with the release of Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition, though I didn’t know it would unfold this way at the time, I began a grand journey to replay the entire Xenoblade series (barring Xenoblade 1, a game I’ve purchased no less than three times across three platforms, and have finished just as many times).

I began with Xenoblade X, and then moved to finally finish Xenoblade 3, a game I truly loved, but had restarted twice, and stopped at the same place (the end of Chapter 4). I don’t want to get into why I put the game down twice, but this time, I was determined to finish it. I loved everything about my adventure. The story was compelling and heartfelt, the combat was a natural evolution of Xenoblade’s series-long romance with simulating MMORPG tab target combat, and the world was just as expansive as the series has always been.

When I finished Xenoblade 3, I was beside myself with emotion. I cursed myself for not finishing the game when it came out. Such an incredible game had sat on my shelf for several years, yearning to share its story of love, loss, and destroying a system that traps its citizens in unending war. I felt as if I had righted a great wrong, finally able to participate in the discourse in one of Nintendo’s finest titles on the Switch.

Throughout my playthrough of both 3 and X, I posted daily on BlueSky about my experience with both games, vacillating between nostalgic posts about story beats remembered and clear-eyed new understanding, both narrative and mechanical, about these incredible adventures I was revisiting. After I finished both games, posters began replying, asking me to revisit Xenoblade 2, a game that had always been a low point in the series for me. Alas, I was still hungry for more, so I relented, and began replaying Xenoblade 2.

Noah, Mio and the gang fighting Kevesi forces

My replay of Xenoblade 2 was more eye opening than my playthroughs of both X and 3. Where the latter two games were both beloved titles that I was rediscovering, my impressions of Xenoblade 2 were mired in preconceived notions and memories of unenjoyable mechanics. By time I hit the 94 hour mark and the credits rolled, my feelings about 2 were largely unchanged, but I found a new appreciation for the game at a macro level, couched in the context of its surrounding brethren. Xenoblade 2 on its own has its fair share of problems, far more than others in the series, but in the larger narrative, was no question an essential piece of the puzzle. The gacha mechanics and clunky skill check system were just as annoying on my second go-around as they were when I played the game in 2017, but the game’s place in the series made its themes and story shine brighter.

I don’t just mean its obvious late-game story beats that tie it into the larger narrative of the series. Its overarching themes of brewing war fueled by dwindling resources and malevolent god-like forces were all in line with Xenoblade’s ethos as a series, and Monolith Soft’s stories as a whole.

Going all the way back to Tetsuya Takahashi and Soraya Saga’s ambitious script for Xenogears while at Squaresoft, the same themes have popped up in the Xeno series over and over again. God-like artifacts and powers that may be more dangerous than helpful. Man-made avatars of unfathomable power with the tools to save the world, but could just as easily destroy it. Shadowy organizations with untold political reach who use the citizenry as pawns to maintain their position of power and reach their ultimate goal: immortality. Damaged protagonists who find power and courage in difficult truths others are unable to face. Each of these themes have been woven through every title in the Xeno mega-series, with some being more important than others in specific titles, depending on the very specific story the creators are trying to tell in that moment.

Xenoblade as a series specifically, has always orbited a central theme that has remained a relatable and constant reminder of our modern world: the existence, and perpetuation of institutional violence.

Xenoblade as a series has always stood on a very specific hill, and called it true: that those in power promote violence amongst the people it controls to maintain and grow that power.

In Xenoblade 1, our hero Shulk is a likable protagonist who spends all his time salvaging old machines, and burying his head in building things. He lives in the sleepy and idyllic town of Colony 9, atop the back of the biological titan, Bionis. He idolizes Dunban, a hero of the war with the villainous and robotic race called the Mechon, and wielder of the legendary sword, the monado. When circumstances thrust Shulk into the role of protecting his home, the monado is placed in his hands, and he becomes an unlikely hero tangled in an unending war with the Mechon, mirroring the stalemate between the two titans each race live on.

Shulk holding the monado

What Shulk soon learns is that the war with the Mechons is not what it seems, and in fact, the very cycle of death and life that all life on the titans accept as reality, is nothing more than a sick meat grinder designed to keep its God, Zanza, alive. Once at war with Zanza and his liuetenants, Shulk and his cohorts must not only fight for the people of the Bionis titan, but also for those that live upon Mechonis. The true evil is not his neighbor, but his master. When faced with this truth, Shulk and his party realign their allegiances. No longer are the lines drawn between Bionis and Mechonis, but between those that accept and promote the status quo, and those unwilling to give in to the senseless violence.

JRPGs are no stranger or God killing, and stories of plucky heroes defeating God often talk about breaking the status quo, and leading the world in a new direction. Xenoblade, however, leans heavily into the idea that the status quo isn’t just bad, it’s actively making things worse, is ultimately untenable, and is killing its people for a purpose that only serves a small ruling class.

In the world of Xenoblade 2, humanity lives on massive titans that trudge through an ocean of fog known as the Cloud Sea, forever orbiting the World Tree at the world’s center. Accompanying humanity are Blades, warriors that, when resonating with the right person, spring from one of many cube-shaped core crystals that litter the world. Those that awaken Blades are dubbed Drivers. Blades are treated differently by different nations. Some nations ask that Drivers treat their Blades as companions and equals, while others look at them as mere tools of war. Orphaned boy and cracker jack salvager Rex is thrust into a war with an organization called Torna, who seek to destroy humanity.

While Rex and his cohorts stay firmly focused on stopping Malos and the rest of Torna from erasing humanity, Torna’s mission is a reaction to the hegemony built by the world’s entrenched religious institution the Indoline Praetorium, who also control the distribution of core crystals. Historically, even before restricting the proliferation of core crystals worldwide, the Praetorium goes to war with other nations in the name of the Architect, the moniker given to the creator of this world, shown in the events of Torna: The Golden Country.

Rex, for better or worse

While Xenoblade 1 reveals a secret process of enriching its gods through a manufactured cycle of life and death, Xenoblade 2 mirrors our own historical past, where powerful religious leaders send their disciples on holy wars against sovereign nations in the interest of attaining and maintaining power, all the while invoking God to absolve themselves of guilt. This is where Xenoblade 2 differs from the other numbered entries. Xenoblade 2’s world is one involving a cycle of life, evolution, death and rebirth, fashioned by its God, not to enslave the people, but to repair the very world God decimated with his own hands a millennia before. Without a God interested in shackling its people, the role is instead filled by people. Specifically, Praetor Amalthus.

Scarred by a bloody past, Amalthus interprets the Architect’s creation of Blades as an edict to use thinking, feeling people as weapons of war in an effort to bring the world to heel under his gaze. In the process of establishing bloody hegemony, Amalthus even unknowingly corrupts Malos, one of the two Aegises, powerful progenitor Blades created specially by the Architect. Corrupted to his core, Malos cuts a bloody swathe through the Cloud Sea, recruiting disenfranchised Blades, and swearing to eliminate all of humanity. Amalthus ends up being the creator of his own personal salvation and his torment, creating a dying world that normalizes subjugation and constantly on the brink of war, all to keep hold of power.

In all of this, the plight of Blades is in clear focus for the entire runtime of the game. While Blades cannot die from injury or old age, they are irrevocably tied to the Drivers that awaken them. When Drives die, the Blade returns to their core crystal where they await reawakening at the hands of a new Driver. When reawoken, they lose all memory of their previous lives, making them a blank state. This loss of memory over multiple lives is juxtaposed with their immortality when compared to humans. Rex argues that he’s envious of that longevity, while one Blade explains to Rex that their loss in memory is a fate worse than death. Humans can live on through their children or chosen family, passing information on to others, thereby fueling the incremental advancement of humanity. Blades, however, do not control when they are sent back to their crystals.

Brighid, Morag’s Blade, has a written account of her past lives, but she’s only able to keep any level of continuity because her core crystal never leaves the royal lineage. Other Blades are not so lucky, some even returning to their crystal after their Driver is killed, only to be reawakened by their previous Driver’s assailant. While Blades have undeniable power and longevity, their very existence and use is restricted. Individual Drivers have shown to bond with and cherish their Blades, but the societal systems at large see them only as things to be used. They are immortal, near impervious beings, deemed slaves by the systems set forth by civilization. It’s interesting to note that Torna, the one nation that treated Blades as equals (and the namesake of Malos’ organization), was eliminated by the Praetorium 500 years before the start of Xenoblade 2’s story.

Amalthus, the master of gaslighting

In contrast to Xenoblade 1, the corruption that upholds institutionalized violence in Xenoblade 2 isn’t an untouchable, invisible God, but a very visible, very public figure who wields violence as a means to maintain the structures of current society, no matter how rotten or corrupt its foundations obviously are. And just like any other despot, Amalthus plays two roles: on one side using rousing speeches and convenient lies to get otherwise well-meaning people to his side, while at the same time quietly eliminating those he considers a direct threat. Rex and his cohorts even side with Amalthus at first, believing him to be an advocate for their goals. However, when Rex‘s group become an inconvenient thorn in his side, Amalthus ignites a three way war between Torna, Rex’s party, and the Praetorium, convinced that only he has the ear of the Architect, and that all blood is worth spilling if power is to be maintained.

It’s really in Xenoblade 3, though, where the theme of institutionalized violence become the bedrock of its entire story. Set after Xenoblade 1 and 2 (which both take place at the same time), Xenoblade 3 tells the story of the world of Aionios, a blasted land engulfed in endless war between two factions: Keves and Agnus. Each faction is broken up into individual battalions called colonies, and manned by children, created at the equivalent age of 10 by their respective queens and forced into military service for a total of 10 years. If they survive that 10 year life span, then they are invited to participate in a “homecoming”, an event where their bodies are converted to motes of light, and they return to the bosom of their queen. This is considered a great honor. To the soldiers on the ground, they are engaged in a righteous war with their enemies, with 10 short years to achieve glory.

To maintain aggression between the factions and disincentivize ceasefires or peace talks, each colony is outfitted with a flame clock: a piece of technology connected to every member of a colony. In order to fill a flame clock, a member of that colony must kill a member of an enemy colony. When killed, the victim’s life essence is sucked into the flame clock, prolonging the life of the winning side. Flame clocks drain over time, so soldiers are forced to continue fighting to prolong what little time they have on the planet. If the flame clock empties, every member of the colony dies.

Similar to Blades losing their memories upon returning to their crystals, both the flame clocks and the soldiers’ limited life spans work in tandem to deny them the opportunity to make any incremental, generational progress.

Main characters Noah and Mio, one from Keves, one from Agnus, are thrust into an ostensibly unwinnable situation as they and four of their friends are labeled as traitors to both factions after coming into contact with an ancient power called Ouroboros. On the run from their homes and imbued with an ancient power capable of tipping the scales, the six young heroes slowly learn to trust each other, and through that, learn that the war is not at all what it seems.

In truth, the war is completely manufactured (huh, that sounds familiar). Each colony is watched over by a Consul, a powerful representative of the queens themselves. Consuls are preternaturally powerful, capable of fighting Noah, Mio and the rest of their team, even with their newfound powers. Through their conflict with the consuls, they realize the truth: that the queens are fabrications, and the consuls on both sides of the war all answer to a single power: Z. Z and the consuls (collectively called Moebius) control the entire world, and promote the continuation of its unending war for one reason: when humans die, Z and his consuls consume their life essence as sustenance like vampires, and that life essence is especially delectable when a human dies in the throes of extreme emotion.

A Consul in their Moebius form

Z and the consuls perpetuate a system in which two warring sides that actually answer to the same master, kill and die for the benefit of a ruling elite. The consuls regularly also refer to humanity as vermin. They consider them lesser; useless lumps of meat fit only for fodder. They cartoonishly revel in brutality and fear mongering, relishing in the slaughter of regular people like a cat playing with a dead mouse. Xenoblade 3’s entire plot is based around this: the futility of war, and the benefit that brutal institutions gain from perpetuating war, while our kith and kin die needlessly.

Additionally, the consuls themselves were once colony members embroiled in Z’s unceasing cycle of war and carnage. As each consul is unmasked throughout the story, its strikingly obvious that only a couple are true believers. Many are regular people, convinced to turn on their people and help perpetuate the violence in exchange for immortality and power beyond our ken. Much like the sycophantic groveling we see from journalistic institutions, universities, comedians, and tech bros in our society today, consuls choose to bend the knee to Z, in the hopes that they benefit from the system rather than become its victim.

Xenoblade isn’t a series that simply revels in nihilism and the hopelessness of the cycles we find ourselves in, however. Quite the opposite. Xenoblade is a series about breaking the norm, and finding truth in new structures. One of the prevailing systems in Xenoblade across all three numbered titles is the reputation system. Each town or colony in each game has a reputation that the player builds over time, represented by a five star system. In each game, reputation is built in one simple way: by solving small problems. Each of the Xenoblade games is littered with side quests, many of which are given to the player by NPCs living in the colonies and towns they visit. Some of them are trivial, while others are life or death situations, but they all have something in common. They are grassroots, hearts and minds efforts.

In just the same way that many people will encourage those dealing with fascist regimes to get involved in their community, so do the playable characters in Xenoblade. Each new quest can range from finding someone’s lost cat to securing a permanent route for importing food to an isolated colony. As the characters complete quests and raise their reputation, bigger and more important quests become available, and the townspeople begin to change their song about you. Some will sing your praises, while others will introduce you to others that need help, trusting that you are the solution to the problems that plague their homeland.

Freeing colonies from the flame clocks is only the beginning

Because of the unique topology of Xenoblade’s various worlds, townships and colonies tend to be few and far between, encircled by vast stretches of uninhabited land. In the narrative, these towns are often forced to fend for themselves, and while they survive, even in the face of war and extinction, your intervention makes those places better. You as the hero are not just fighting the big bad and bringing down a tyrannical system, you are also an empathetic person helping citizens at ground level. No task is too small. And it shouldn’t be. Toppling a dictator doesn’t put food on the table overnight. Restructuring a failed institution doesn’t bring about order immediately. Xenoblade’s writers know that being a hero doesn’t just mean that problems are solved by killing Gods and bringing down regimes. It’s also solved by teaching people to till soil and grow plants, and bringing people together to fix a windmill that powers the only bread shop in town.

This is especially true in Xenoblade 3, as Noah and Mio learn the ability to smash flame clocks, severing a colony’s connection to the war, and ridding them of their need to fight. Each time they do so, there’s a small celebration, but reality soon sets in. Without the flame clocks, the colonies no longer receive regular shipments of medicine and food from HQ. While a major victory has been won, there’s still the tough work ahead of helping the colonists become self sufficient, either via trading with other liberated colonies, or by helping to create new systems, like farming infrastructure. Without doing this work, the newly emancipated colonies will simply either wither and die, or return to their old ways, resorting to attacking other colonies for their supplies.

Xenoblade 2’s Torna expansion and Xenoblade 3’s Future Redeemed expansion, take the reputation system to the next level. As you finish quests issued to you by individuals, they join your community, represented by a collage of faces, a reminder that every NPC is an individual, a living breathing person, and while the world is ending, they matter.

A community screen filled with the smiling faces of all the people you’ve helped along the way

Xenoblade tells the story of the hard truths of fighting authoritarian regimes: that solving it doesn’t happen in a day, and we must all get involved if we wish to be free of the yoke of senseless death. By the end of each game, when it comes time to face the true evil at the rotten core of each respective world, the player’s party doesn’t just walk into the belly of the beast alone. Whether in person or in spirit, the many denizens whose lives they’ve touched are right beside them, disabused of the notion that nothing can changed, and unconvinced that the current system need be.

Xenoblade 3: Future Redeemed further hammers in this point, and even refuses the idea that these crises can be solved by quickly wiping the slate clean. Matthew remarks as much to the expansion’s villain, Alpha, in the conclusion of the expansion. Alpha believes the solution to Aionios is to eliminate everything and start anew with a select group of people. He wishes to create an untouched world, one Alpha believes would be free of the toxicity that destroyed the current one. Matthew calls him on his bullshit, telling him that any world created on a bedrock of genocide is doomed to decay. You do not fight fascism with genocide. You fight it with concerted, constant effort, and with unyielding empathy. By dealing in those thoughts, you set yourself on a path to becoming just as brutal and tyrannical as the forces you seek to destroy, and in the process, needlessly perpetuating the ongoing cycle of violence.

It sends a very specific message: The world as it is does not have to be this way. We can change it. There are heroes, but they cannot solve our problems for us. It is in our hands to support them, band together, and make the world a safer, kinder place for everyone in it.

The greatest weapon institutions have to continue their violence is their ability to convince the masses that “this is how it is, this is how it’s always been, and it’s okay that it’s this way.”

Xenoblade’s heroes tell us that it doesn’t need to be this way, the fact that it’s been this way for so long is not an admission of its validity, but a failure by all of us that it has persisted for so long, and no, it’s not okay, and we have the power to change it.