Xenoblade Chronicles 2 beaten:

My initial instinct to really like Nia but be ambivalent about Homura was correct.  Nia transformed into a beautiful Blade who told me "daisuki" with an open face, then went on to be my most powerful asset for the rest of the game, while Homura kept secrets and kept to herself from start to finish.  Even at the end she pretends that she's dying to save us but only minutes later is revived perfectly fine.  What was the point of all that drama then?  She should have just said she'd be back soon and get to the escape shuttle already.  Sheesh.

I defeated the last boss with ease, but I didn't manage to complete every last thing in the game.  There were three blades I never got, despite cycling through endless rare and legendary cores.  (Not a single legendary core ever got me a Blade!)  Other blades required too much trust for me to advance their individual quests -- Theory wouldn't even begin to care until I'd maxed out Praxis and I couldn't even do that.  I don't like how much time this game requires you waste.  The only possible way to get these small dollops of plot and characterization is to wade through endless eons of trust-grinding, mercenary mission grinding, and core grinding.  I just don't have that much time or patience and I feel like I gave it quite a lot already.  The effort to reward ratio in this game was totally skewed.

But the core of the game, if you actually focus on the plot and the quests you can do, is very good.  I think the character designs are magnificent and the voice acting is an all-pro lineup.  Hitomi Ohwada especially shone -- you guessed it, Nia's seiyuu.  (She's now in my voice actors hall of fame she was so good.)  The music is incredible.  The world is engaging and deep, it feels like a fully fleshed out alternate reality you could totally enjoy living in.  So much effort was put into the different moods for each of the titan settings, the music is part of it of course, but so were the visuals.  Even though it requires you go buy a Nintendo Switch in addition to a Playstation this is still a must-play JRPG.  There's nothing else like it, it's a grand and beautiful experience.

Now I can finally move on to Octopath Traveler and Bravely Default II.  I guess Octopath Traveler is my next priority.  I've heard plenty of good things about it so I hope it doesn't let me down.