Project X Zone 3: The Azure Eclipse

Project X Zone III: The Azure Eclipse (プロジェクト クロスゾーンIII：紺碧の日食 Purojekuto Kurosu Zōn San: Konpeki no Nisshoku) is a strategy role-playing game developed by Monolith Soft and published by Bandai Namco Games for the Nintendo 3DS. A remastered edition was released on the Nintendo Switch later on with  its predecessors as part of the Project X Zone Trilogy. This is third game in the Project X Zone video game series, as well as being the first game in the franchise to get a home console release. Even though the series is a dream crossover between Capcom, Bandai Namco Games and Sega, this game once again features guest characters from Nintendo, as well as introducing characters from Activision and Square Enix.

Main Plot
Every thirty years, a mysterious object blocks the sun. Usually lasting about a week, this causes a blue glow to illuminate the entire world. Scientists have stated that the moon is nowhere near the sun during these strange eclipses, but they could never identify the object blocking the sun itself.

This phenomenon is infamously known as the Azure Eclipse.

While the Azure Eclipse gained publicity over the years, tons of incidents occur in its more recent appearances. People receive unexplained injuries, strange disasters occur, and even reports of berserk creatures come up. That’s how the Azure Eclipse got Shinra’s attention.

Shinra, an organization dedicated to keeping reality safe from all kinds of dark multidimensional forces. They have been lurking in the shadows for hundreds of generations, fighting a silent war with no conclusion. Many of their battles don’t last long, but that doesn’t mean the long ones are nonexistent.

During the last Azure Eclipse, a young man named Leos Risket led Shinra’s forces through a brutal conflict. His intel discovered that the beasts present clues of advanced intelligence. This brought up some questions during the eclipse’s aftermath.

What kind of civilization do these monsters live in? Why did they come here? Are they following the orders of some leader? Does the Azure Eclipse act as some gateway to another world?

20XX, Present Day.

After thirty years, the Azure Eclipse has returned to shake a whole new generation… and quite literally. During those past years, Leos married his long-time sweet heart and started a started a family with her. Time has passed and their twin daughters are now rookie Shinra agents.

The two sisters are now on their way to their first field mission. Little do they know that this little operation will lead them on a journey that will test all their limits, but also reveal the meaning behind the Azure Eclipse.

Basics
Project X Zone 3 keeps the core gameplay mechanics like its predecessors. The player moves multiple playable units across a map to engage in combat with enemy units. Multiple attacks can be linked together with other close pair units and a selected solo unit to build extensive combos.

Skills & Auto-Skills
Skills are a way for players to temporarily enhance abilities for playable units. Normal skills can be activated by individual units with the cost of their SP. Returning from the second game, auto-skills are equipable  enhancements that trigger when certain conditions are met.

Intermissions
Intermissions happen in between chapters, giving players a break from battle scenarios. During intermissions, players can save their progress, modify a unit’s skills and abilities, buy and sell equipment from the shop, and practice combos in training mode.

New Features
Unlike the previous instalments, this game introduces some new mechanics to the series.

The most notable addition is the moveset customization feature. From here, players will have the ability to select and arrange the input to a unit’s moveset. With all possible moves unlocked, players can select five out of seven normal attacks for each pair unit (plus one out of two support attacks), and one out of two for solo units.

With the ATK (Attack), DEF (Defense), TEC (Effect Chance Increase), and DEX (Effect  Chance  Immunity) stats, the SPD (Speed) stat returns from the first game. Instead of determining the order of the units, SPD is a player-exclusive stat that gives playable units a chance to dodge attacks from enemy units, functioning in the similar way to the Super Robot Wars series. A higher SPD stat increases a unit’s chance to dodge enemy attacks.

Original Characters
Information to be added...

Playable Characters
Characters marked with a (*) symbol are temporarily fought as an enemy unit.

Characters and game titles highlighted in Italic are new to the series.

Pair Units
A pair unit consists of two characters; a leader who is the one represented on the map and during boss unit attacks, and a partner who assists the leader during the player’s attacks. Pair units are navigated across a map to collect items and trigger battles with enemy units. With 100 XP, either a Special Attack can be activated during combat, or the player can attack multiple enemies at once from the map. Pair units can also activate skills that can effect units in the player’s party. These type of units can gain experience points, level up, and eventually gain new skills. 

Solo Units
A solo unit is a character that can be linked to any pair unit in the player’s party. These characters are meant to be summoned by the player during combat phases to further extend combo attacks. Solo units cannot be levelled up, but they do provide some unique skills to their linked pair unit. 



Boss Units
These are the enemies that will be fought throughout the entire game. Bosses are obviously much stronger than the regular grunts, even having access to both special & multi-attacks with 100 EP.

Characters marked with a (*) symbol have multiple forms.

Characters and game titles highlighted in  Italic  are new to the series.

Alternative Boss Forms
As the main story progresses, certain boss units can go through an enhanced transformation or two. Their attacks will mostly be different, but sometimes they might even receive new auto-skills with their evolution.

Sub-Boss Units
This is another type of boss unit that will be encountered throughout the game. Even though they cannot use special or multi attacks, these enemies can be quite a handful with their auto-skills.

Characters and game titles highlighted in  Italic  are new to the series.

Event Characters
In the game, these characters don’t appear as enemies, but they’re not playable, either. Most of these characters appear exclusively in cut-scenes while some act as shopkeepers.

Characters marked with a (*) symbol are shopkeepers.

Characters and game titles highlighted in  Italic  are new to the series.

Enemy Units
These are the basic grunts that players will face off against. Usually most of them can be defeated in one combat phase, but enemies with high stats and  certain  auto-skills won't be a pushover.

Cameos & References
While many franchises from the three companies are featured in this game, a select few can only be spotted through a cameo appearance. This can range from a character being present in a unit’s attack, having an entire map be based on a certain game, or by just making a reference to something though dialogue.

Soundtrack
One month after the international release of Project X Zone 3, the game's official soundtrack made its worldwide debut. All songs and jingles from the game are present on the soundtrack which came out on digital download stores, CD, and even a three-part vinyl record set.