Started with Destiny PS1, I liked it because it was real-time but I didn't really like Tales until Eternia, which is still a top 5 favourite Tales game for me. Since then I've basically played every main entry except Legendia and Innocence. I still wish Eternia had a Destiny Director's Cut calibre remake, even though I know it's basically never going to happen...
Phantasia: Only played the GBA version, and a bit of the X version included in Narikiri Dungeon X. The WHAT THE HECK IS THAT? speech is still quoted repeatedly in our group.
Destiny PS1: I finished it as a kid but that was only before I experienced Eternia, after which I could never play it again.
Eternia: I still replay this game about once a year, and it's always installed on my Vita. I always liked how Reid tried to do the "sensible" thing at first and leave the adventuring to people more qualified, like the royal knights. It didn't work out, but at least he tried! The battle system is simple but snappy, I really wish there was a remake so characters that aren't Reid or maybe Farah get to be more fun to play.
Narikiri Dungeon 2/3: I liked these for the novelty of seeing Tales characters interact, and since the GBA was region free, these games got me started on learning Japanese. I probably wouldn't play them again though.
Destiny 2: A blazing fast, pretty fun battle system, but with some obnoxious baggage like accuracy being mandatory to actually do anything as melee and grade being notoriously hard to get. The PSP version at least fixes the grade issue, as well as making titles better overall IIRC.
Symphonia: I spent a lot of time on this game, like 120+ hours or something, but in retrospect I don't think it was really worth it. I think the novelty of playing a Tales game on the Gamecube skewed my playtime a lot, since I don't really look back fondly on it nowadays.
Rebirth: Oh man, this game is great. I probably spent like 300 hours on this including the PSP version and various multiplayer runs. I will never forgive Tempest for killing off(?) the 3 line battle system. I think the biggest complaint we had was that Annie didn't seem all that great(?), aside from Rise Elixir which is probably the most useful ability in the game.
Abyss: I've only played this game through about twice. It's ok, though it drags on pretty long.
Destiny Remake Director's Cut: This game is probably the game that other Tales games will forever be judged by. The battle system is flexible, casting is actually fun, it has Philia in it, and multiplayer runs are great. The main problems with this game are that infinites are way too easy(Johnny alone can infinite with one move!) and the weakness system is too punishing, sometimes making characters completely useless in certain fights. It still has a bunch of great boss fights that our group replays from time to time though, like Ilene. Including multiplayer runs, probably another 300+ hour game for me. If there was a balance patch that somehow made infinites more balanced and made it so hitting an enemy resistance in a friend's combo didn't mess up the combo we'd probably never stop playing it. Oh, and maybe reducing the amount of super meter you get on Chaos for blocking, and making bursting easier to use.
Tales of Vesperia: I liked Estellise and Repede. Otherwise, the game didn't really stand out to me, it felt like a slower, less broken Abyss. Grinding the altered artes or w/e was pretty annoying. I've only played the PS3 version.
Tales of Hearts DS: I liked the game overall, but for some reason I always get distracted before finishing it. Assists are pretty neat.
Tales of Graces F: At first, I really liked this game but soon enough the comparisons to Destiny set in. CC regeneration speed in this game is ridiculously slow compared to Destiny! Also, combos were forever a mystery for us, since sometimes they would work and sometimes the enemy would inexplicably armor through an attack and counter, which on Chaos would usually instant kill you. The Accel skills were fun though, time stop in particular saved a lot of runs.
Narikiri Dungeon X: I never finished it, but it didn't seem all that bad and it also included a version of Tales of Phantasia without spell freeze, which sounds pretty great to me.
Xillia: When I first played this game, I flipped a coin to see which route I would play first and got Milla. A big mistake since I missed a bunch of important scenes...Anyway, this game was pretty disappointing, luckily Xillia 2 came out.
Xillia 2: IMO, an improvement to Xillia in almost every way, but still has some things that prevent me from playing it as much as Destiny DC and Rebirth. Character locked parties for story chapters along with no narikiris is the major one, we tend to plan our multiplayer runs around playing certain characters and it's always a bummer when you don't get to play your favourite anymore. It also has a similar issue with Destiny where elemental coverage determines how "good" a character is, but at least with might charge 3 they get to actually do stuff so it's not a huge loss. Ludger install is also ridiculously good so we soft-ban it, lol.
Zestiria: I liked the vibe, the music, the characters were ok, but the systems made it a one and done game for me.
Berseria: At first we really liked the game, until we realized that to get higher max cubes, you needed to grind gear and then things went downhill. Losing cubes for getting hit by an ailment or crit is also really punishing and gaining cubes isn't particularly common without successful parries, so sometimes people will just get knocked down to one cube and won't recover for awhile which stinks.
Every time a new Tales game is announced I wonder if this'll be the one to surpass Destiny DC, and every time I play it I'm disappointed. I have a huge preference for 2D Tales and every new announcement is just reaffirmation that 2D Tales is forever dead
