Exploration was always one of the most important parts of the Xenoblade series, especially in XCX. Can we expect an even larger world on Switch ?

Exploration will be even more important in Xenoblade 2. About the amount of places you will be able to discover and explore, I think we will go far beyond what Xenoblade X proposed. As you have been able to see in the trailer, you can expect to traverse a lot of varied environnements, some natural, some artificial, created by humans.

Does that mean the game will allow us to go wherever we want, or will the exploration be more guided, like in the first game ?

In the trailer, you've been able to see gigantic entities : the Titans. The player will traverse entire regions, towns and dungeons on the back of those gigantic monsters. The exploration on those creatures will be seamless. We could have made it so that going from one titan to another was seamless too, but going through the sea of clouds probably wouldn't have been fun, so we chose to make cuts for those transitions. In the game, as you've been able to see in the Treehouse Live, it's also possible to associate with Blades, beings that also are living weapons, and traverse those vast lands on their backs, even if they're not mounts in the traditionnal sense.