Xenoblade Chronicles X video explores, battles, and gets a sweet mech paint job

Nintendo welcomed viewers to the uncharted expanses of planet Mira in a lengthy Xenoblade Chronicles X livestream on Friday. Viewers got to see plenty of combat, exploration, and even how to customize your very own giant fighting Skell robot in over an hour of play. Don't worry if you missed out - you can catch it all below.

The Arts combat system will be quite familiar for players of Xenoblade Chronicles 3D, as well as the original Wii version. Since the main character is fully customizable this time around, you're also not stuck wielding the Monado Blade the whole time. Each class seems to favor a unique weapon pairing: one swaps between knives and machine guns, while another fights with spears and sniper rifles.

If futuristic pointy sticks and firearms aren't doing it for you, you can always jump into your very own Skell, customized with slots upon slots of special equipment and color settings. And if you're more in the mood for exploring than fighting, you can turn your giant robot into a giant robot motorcycle and tool around looking for new places to drop probes. The GamePad will track your regional location while you watch the action (and try not to get stepped on by giant monsters) on the main screen.

Xenoblade Chronicles X will hit Wii U in Japan on Wednesday, and its release is still set for later this year in Europe and North America.

Connor Sheridan

I got a BA in journalism from Central Michigan University - though the best education I received there was from CM Life, its student-run newspaper. Long before that, I started pursuing my degree in video games by bugging my older brother to let me play Zelda on the Super Nintendo. I've previously been a news intern for GameSpot, a news writer for CVG, and now I'm a staff writer here at GamesRadar.