Ideas for the future of Xenoblade Chronicles
By all (or at least most) accounts, the Xenoblade series sort of peaked with the release of Xenoblade Chronicles 3 and its DLC, Future Redeemed. The base game told a completely new story that could technically be understood without playing the prior games (but was enhanced by doing so) while also tying together the futures of the worlds from Xenoblade Chronicles and its sequel. Without going into too much detail right off the bat, Xenoblade 3’s ending is said to have wrapped up the series – or at least the Klaus trilogy. That being said, there are a few loose ends introduced in Xenoblade Chronicles 3 that weren’t fully tied up – and today, we’re going over which of these plot points we can expect to see in future games, if any at all. Do keep in mind that there are spoilers ahead.
Xenoblade’s unsolved mysteries
On its own, Xenoblade Chronicles 3 and its DLC left quite a few major plot points open or unanswered. Surprisingly enough, the art book for the game that released earlier this year actually has the answers to several of these questions. If you’d like to read more about that before we continue with what wasn’t answered, you can check out our dissection of the art book lore details here. Perhaps the largest unanswered plot point has to do with N’s Sword of the End or Sword of Origin. According to the interviews present in the art book, Noah’s version of Lucky Seven is what Fiora decided to take form as in Aionios. It’s also confirmed that N’s Sword of the End is specifically Malos, which should technically be impossible given that he was killed at the end of Xenoblade Chronicles 2. In the interview, the series director stated that he cannot say how Malos is present in the Sword of the End. Whether this means we’ll be hearing about it more in the future or not remains unclear. One potentially neat idea is that Xenoblade Chronicles 2 could receive a remaster for the next console with updated graphics, and especially an updated resolution and frame rate, plus an epilogue story that explains what happens to Alrest between the end of Xenoblade 2 and the start of Xenoblade 3. Of course, that’s not confirmed – and rather unlikely – but we think it’s interesting that tidbit about Malos has been left purposefully unanswered.
Another perhaps more popular unanswered tidbit is the identity and whereabouts of Mythra’s child. At the end of Xenoblade Chronicles 3, Nia looks at a picture of everybody from Xenoblade 2, including Pyra, Mythra, and herself all with one child each. Mio is clearly Nia’s daughter, while Glimmer is almost certainly Pyra’s daughter. We don’t know, however, who or where Mythra’s child could be. There were plenty of semi-joking fan theories that Blackblaze Dirk, also known as Moebius D, was him. It’s extremely unlikely, though, because the art book does cover Dirk but doesn’t connect him to Mythra in any way. This is despite the art book revealing tons of new lore, so if Dirk somehow were Mythra’s child, we think that would have been included. And seeing how another major unsolved mystery is Malos being alive, maybe we could somehow see a Xenoblade 4 with Mythra’s child as the protagonist and an explanation of how Malos was alive to be present in the Sword of the End.
Will there be a Xenoblade Chronicles 4, or something new?
Having a Xenoblade Chronicles 4 with Mythra’s child as the protagonist (or a Xenoblade 4 at all) is probably wishful thinking, though. Seeing as the entire message of Xenoblade 3 is to look forward to the future, and the somewhat open-ended nature of its ending, it’s very possible that Monolith Soft’s next big RPG has little to do with Xenoblade at all. We know for sure it’s in development, though. The ending of Future Redeemed does confirm that Bionis and Alrest successfully merged together thanks to Origin, but we don’t know if any of the characters who met in Aionios ever meet in the new combined world. It’s unlikely we’ll ever find out, either – some video game endings are left open-ended on purpose, and as much as we’d like to see what happens in the new world, we don’t think that’s very likely.
Perhaps for the next Xenoblade Chronicles game, it will be set in the new world, but very far in the future. It’s been confirmed that people in Aionios born in the City will eventually be born in the new world, which means characters like Matthew, Ghondor, and Monica would all exist generations after Noah and Mio, who are children both prior to and after Aionios. That said, we think it’s unlikely that Monolith Soft puts any of those characters in the spotlight, given that they all get plenty of screen time in Xenoblade 3 as it stands. If they are to continue Xenoblade Chronicles at all, it’s a bit more likely that they go with a new game set in the far future that reveals the identity of Mythra’s child. Or maybe they’ll just keep it a mystery forever.
If you ask us, we think Monolith Soft may opt to make a new branch of the Xeno series. It’s already been confirmed that Xenoblade Chronicles 3 and Future Redeemed were the end of the “Klaus” saga, so it would be a good time to perhaps start a new trilogy or Xeno sub-series to reflect that. Pair that with the entire theme of Xenoblade 3 being to not let the past or present weigh you down and look toward the future, and… it’s possible that this mindset extends to the developers themselves, too. All things must come to an end at some point, even if they haven’t overstayed their welcome yet.
What do you think, though? Will we see a Xenoblade Chronicles 4? Or maybe a remake of Xenoblade Chronicles 2 with an extra side story? Or do you think Monolith Soft will go for a brand-new “Xeno” series instead, marking the definitive end of the world of Xenoblade Chronicles? Only time will tell. Xenoblade 3 is over two years old already, and it’s almost certain that we’ll hear about what Monolith Soft is working on within the next two years. Feel free to let us know what you think the future of the Xenoblade series is in the comments below.
In the meantime, Xenoblade Chronicles 3 and its DLC are available now. Check out the official site here.
