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Tales of Zestiria |OT| - Sorey, Modders did what Bamcouldn't!

Yeah, I felt like the game did a really bad job at explaining the whole thing. So are you saying that I shouldn't be looking at a piece of equipment's base stats? Because I've been upgrading to new weapons and such every time I get the chance in a new town.



Talk to the other human party member that walks around the world map with you. Their discussion options usually include the sidequests. There doesn't seem to be a quest journal in this game, which is irritating.

Thanks for the reply! Having no journal for the side-quests makes no sense and makes things difficult to manage.
 

R0ckman

Member
Thanks for the reply! Having no journal for the side-quests makes no sense and makes things difficult to manage.

The journal is the character that follows Sorey talk to them and they will tell you what to do next from a list of events.

I actually like it though, in some cases the party member will inform you if the side quest in temporarily locked behind main story triggers.
 

kayos90

Tragic victim of fan death
Just got all four Seraphim. I'll have a detailed impression later. No exaggerations. Except in the tldr version.
 
I plan to buy the CE of this game soon (hopefully soon), When is it recommended to to watch the the blue ray? is it a prequel of sorts or mid game events?
 

Fauve

Member
I plan to buy the CE of this game soon (hopefully soon), When is it recommended to to watch the the blue ray? is it a prequel of sorts or mid game events?

It's a retelling of the prologue I believe. So you can watch it before, or after you even play the game.
 

Durante

Member
The equipment skill system is really throwing me off. Even 20 hours in, I only get the basic gist of it.
I really feel like the equipment system in Zestiria is by far the most interesting out of any Tales game I've played.

It's not really that complicated, but sufficiently so that equipment selection and management comes down to more than just "hey I'm in a new town, let's buy incremental upgrades for everything!".
 

Drkirby

Corporate Apologist
My only gripe about the Skill system is that you can only fuse items with the same name.

Or does that go away at some point?
 

Bladenic

Member
Has anyone activated Charge Cast? I can't do it. I use Edna's Rock Lance but no matter how I try she won't use Air Pressure directly afterward like the battle action descriptions claims she should.
 

Sinatar

Official GAF Bottom Feeder
I'm 10 hours into this and still have no idea what I'm doing. I just alternate between mashing B and A in combat and win.

Is there like... mechanics... or depth... or really anything to the combat or is this really it?
 

sora87

Member
I'm 10 hours into this and still have no idea what I'm doing. I just alternate between mashing B and A in combat and win.

Is there like... mechanics... or depth... or really anything to the combat or is this really it?

The amount of stuff happening is totally overwhelming, I'm doing the same as you lol
 

Fuu

Formerly Alaluef (not Aladuf)
Is there a picture of the skill sheet/grid along with appropriate labels? I was thinking of making one because I'm not sure if you can access the skill sheet when trying to Fuse equipment. Right now I'm going into the Fuse menu then going back out into the regular menu to check what I gain or lose when fusing equipment that's already equipped to my character.
This is the only thing about the skill system that feels like an oversight to me. If you don't have the skill positions memorized it's a bit of a hassle having to jump back and forth between the fuse and equipment menus to check where they go on the grid.

I really feel like the equipment system in Zestiria is by far the most interesting out of any Tales game I've played.

It's not really that complicated, but sufficiently so that equipment selection and management comes down to more than just "hey I'm in a new town, let's buy incremental upgrades for everything!".
I'm having a good time with it too. After it clicked for me I started paying more attention to what I should fuse/buy/equip and so far I haven't felt hampered by it yet.
 

Durante

Member
I'm 10 hours into this and still have no idea what I'm doing. I just alternate between mashing B and A in combat and win.

Is there like... mechanics... or depth... or really anything to the combat or is this really it?
What difficulty level are you playing on? This is a JRPG, which is like an "AAA" WRPG in that the first 3 or 4 can be safely disregarded :p

My only gripe about the Skill system is that you can only fuse items with the same name.

Or does that go away at some point?
Funnily enough the fusion mechanic is a lot like the system in Two Worlds 1.
 

Ryne

Member
How does the grid work anyway? I'm putting it together like a bingo board and haven't really noticed that many effects so far.
 

Durante

Member
This is the only thing about the skill system that feels like an oversight to me. If you don't have the skill positions memorized it's a bit of a hassle having to jump back and forth between the fuse and equipment menus to check where they go on the grid.
Yeah, this is true.

It's also not very nice if you fuse items resulting in you getting a previously unknown skill on the board which changes your awesome 4-in-a-row bonus to a shitty 5-in-a-row bonus.
Yeah, that happened to me.
 
What difficulty level are you playing on? This is a JRPG, which is like an "AAA" WRPG in that the first 3 or 4 can be safely disregarded :p

I've been playing on hard and intense, and I haven't really felt like it changes the gameplay all that significantly beyond giving the enemies way too much health. At least for random encounters, bosses are more interesting on higher difficulties.
 

Kasumin

Member
People who are saying that Zestiria is the worst in the series most likely never played the game.

I feel like US complaints were so overblown only because they heard it from some vocal people during JP release, thinking it's the majority opinion.
That one dumb tumblr post and the whole Amazon thing (which happens to everything) did damage to people outside of Japan.

The tumblr post was silly.

As for Amazon, the 1-star review thing isn't what's an indicator of the Japanese fans' reception of the game. The price of Zestiria dropped precipitously on Amazon, which means people were returning the game in droves. Leaving a 1-star review is easy. Returning a game means the person was willing to lose money. There's more to the story than just 1-star reviews and some idiotic rant on Tumblr.
 

R0ckman

Member
How does the grid work anyway? I'm putting it together like a bingo board and haven't really noticed that many effects so far.

You get a stack bonus (bonus for piling on equipment that has the same exact skill), you get a row bonus and you get a column bonus.
 
I've been playing on hard and intense, and I haven't really felt like it changes the gameplay all that significantly beyond giving the enemies way too much health. At least for random encounters, bosses are more interesting on higher difficulties.

What I've noticed is that the game plays like Graces or the Xillias: in theory, the random battles aren't challenging in and of themselves, the challenge is conserving enough resources so you can beat the boss. (In practice, ehh, not so much, although I'm optimistic about the future given that the Spiritcrest had some pretty rough random battles.)
 

V3rt1go

Member
I'm gonna start this today, any advices?

Played all Tales of in the previous generation but I always feel like something is missing. Hope Zestiria's good.
 

Aeana

Member
I really feel like the equipment system in Zestiria is by far the most interesting out of any Tales game I've played.

It's not really that complicated, but sufficiently so that equipment selection and management comes down to more than just "hey I'm in a new town, let's buy incremental upgrades for everything!".

Other Tales games have systems like that without feeling so completely transient. For instance, Tales of Vesperia follows FF9's lead by having equipment that has skills on it, but allows you to learn the skills permanently. And you're granted the skill without having to use SP to equip it by wearing that piece of equipment, which gives you a reason to keep old stuff around. In Zestiria, there is no permanence at all, which I think removes the feeling of progression as well as a sense of control. In Zestiria, I feel like I'm basically held captive by the skills on my equipment a lot of the time.
 

Dude Guy

Member
Graces was a hot mess of a game with meh combat, a terrible story, and uninteresting characters. Easily my least favourite Tales of the last generation, but that's just me. That's pending playing more of Zestiria, of course, but I'm really enjoying the game so far despite how simple many of it's elements are.

But then, I never seem to like the "popular" Tales games, Abyss and Vesperia aside.

I felt the combat was the only redeeming quality about the game
 

Durante

Member
Other Tales games have systems like that without feeling so completely transient. For instance, Tales of Vesperia follows FF9's lead by having equipment that has skills on it, but allows you to learn the skills permanently.
I haven't played Vesperia, but I actually thought the FF9 system was really bad. It transforms equipment from something which actively provides effects and which you chose for that reason to basically a skill book you need to drag around with you for a limited time before you can finally get rid of it. And you spend a lot of time shifting items around between characters to have everyone learn optimally.

What can I say, I really didn't like that system. (I actually re-played FF9 quite recently, so that's as direct a comparison as it gets)
 

kayos90

Tragic victim of fan death
So like I said I'm up to the point in the game where pretty much a good chunk of the battle mechanics are available to me. I'm enjoying the game much more than I have in my JP previous run.

I'll start off with the characters. I like Sorey as a main character and I like the rest of the cast for the most part. However, I do feel like the characters that hang out with Sorey are pretty boring for the most part because they are flat characters rather than dynamic ones. Not only that but they all have stupid one liners during dialogue which can be pretty hit or miss. They're not offensive but they're not spectacular either. Having said that, the story falls on its face pretty considerably. I take no offense as to why Alisha leaves like I posted in the JP thread. However, I always had a problem of how Rose joined the party considering they made it a pretty big deal of how Alisha was causing issues but Rose does not. I just found it abrupt and pretty terrible.

The voice acting is rock solid and so is the script. I would say this is the best localized script for a Tales game bar none. It's fantastic.

The combat system. Oh boy. I loved Graces' combat system after a second playthrough. Perhaps it's similar for Zestiria in the same vein. After coming back to it with a fresh mind, I'm enjoying the combat system much better than before. I still think the Blast Gauge system is flawed to a large degree due to Armatization being the great priority use but there are some nuances revolving around the system that didn't necessarily exist before in the series. For instance, using Armatization to redistribute health and BG resources, or using the Blast Chain to create longer Power hit combos, or using the Blast gauge for revival. Things like this wasn't really possible and I'm glad it exists in the game. The Seraphim in the same light are more resources than they are characters. They exist to heal you, give you power ups, change you positioning in a fight, etc. They're great but they'r'e extremely limited in hindsight because of the elemental weakness system.

The weakness system in Zestiria I find to be a stepback in numerous ways. Graces had a great idea, Xillia sort of ruined it, then Xillia 2 improved it a great deal. In Zestiria, they took a step back with it as enemies pretty much required you to use weaknesses in order to defeat them otherwise you're SOL. This means that it gives players less freedom in starting the initial combo and continuing it. Perhaps this is a personal gripe but I find it sort of annoying.

The skill system was another auxiliary system I found an issue with originally as well. Rather than giving players the full control of how they're characters are progressing utilizing levels and learned skills, we're tied by the equipment we choose for our characters. Fusing equipments can power up your character and give more skills for characters but we have no direct control over what we can get and sometimes it feels like it's a slot game. We're further limited because you can only fuse items of the same name. Needless to say, the fusing in the game is pretty bad.

Overall, I'm enjoying the game because of the battle system but the game is still flawed to a great degree. This is by far the worst PS3 Tales game of the generation. Having said that, I do think this is better than Hearts R now.... for the time being...
 

e_i

Member
Got the point where
Edna, the loli with a mouth
joins my party. Damn, Lailah is a fucking dtiz, a riot, and possible
fujoshi.
 

Arkeus

Member
I'm a little confused with part of the story.

Excuse if I may have missed an NPC or some scene that clears this up a bit more, maybe its not as awful as I think.

I don't think the Pope was even victimized at all. The thing, though, is that
He ran away because he felt he had no reason to be pope anymore, and then ran a scam with Fake Elexir. This is bad... but is it a reason to condemn the entire village which depends on that scam?
So basically, it felt less like a "Grey Area" and more like "This is about politics and the Pope isn't going to come back regardless".

I have to say, though, this cast of character is really fantastic.

Edna, Laihla, Rose, Mikleo and Sorrey really do play off each off each others really well. So far Devel is a bit of a third wheel to Rose though. Also the whole Alisha arc is really cool.
 
So Durante's article on PC Gamer mentions being able to force 60hz with the driver control panel if the game detects your monitor as being 59hz. I was wondering how you would do that with the nvidia control panel? Zestiria correctly detects my monitor as 60hz, but I've had that issue for a ton of other games and had no idea there was a solution for it.
 

zakujanai

Member
I'm getting so so tired of bland, brown, overly spacious ruins. They look like randomly generated dungeons from a bad PS2 dungeon crawler. Outside area are much nicer but that's no excuse.
 

Nose Master

Member
I've been playing on hard and intense, and I haven't really felt like it changes the gameplay all that significantly beyond giving the enemies way too much health. At least for random encounters, bosses are more interesting on higher difficulties.

So far (like every Tales game I've played), hitstun, backstep, and free run makes almost every random encounter completely trivial regardless of the difficulty. Optimizing is just for style points and to make the fights go faster.

Agreed about Symphonia, btw. It was just the first 3D style Tales I played, so it got in there first.
 
I love the DLC so much, hes so hot.
CSHQMveUwAA6f6b.jpg:large

Been using the official guide, it has lots of typos :( but the maps and such are good. Still only at the first village.
 
I think I'm at the early-to-mid game stage.

And woooooooooow Alisha
was ditched so unceremoniously it's not even funny. You could be forgiven to think that she would return soon later. But knowing what I know this makes it feel even more insulting. No wonder people were pissed.
 
It's a retelling of the prologue I believe. So you can watch it before, or after you even play the game.

Ah good, thanks!

Last question, do players feel obligated on using Sorey and the other girl to fuse? Or can you enjoy the game without using that feature, asking for multiplayer purposes.

Xillia kind of destroyed the co-op feature for obvious reasons.
 

kewlmyc

Member
Think I'm finally getting the hang of the equipment system. I just need to make sure I have the first row filled out since it gives +20 to all stats. The mascot characters (forget what they're called) really help out with that since they just add skills to your equipment.
 

zakujanai

Member
The theme from the Earth Shrine is godly. Wind Shrine theme is great as well.

I find all of the music really overbearing, particularly in the shrines. Normally love Takes music but this is really giving me a headache.

If I'm up to
the last of the fout trials
does anybody know how much longer I'm likely to have left? I really want to be done with this game but I hate leaving an RPG unfinished, even a bad one.
 
Is it just me or do bosses mercilessly attack seraphim? I'm not having much trouble defeating them or moderate, but I always end up with a few seraphim K.O.s (and a hefty grade penalty) since the bosses don't even seem interested in going after me. It's also annoying since it takes just a few hits from a boss to knock out someone.
 
Is it just me or do bosses mercilessly attack seraphim? I'm not having much trouble defeating them or moderate, but I always end up with a few seraphim K.O.s (and a hefty grade penalty) since the bosses don't even seem interested in going after me. It's also annoying since it takes just a few hits from a boss to knock out someone.
Yup. Seems like most bosses just take turns hitting each seraphim a couple times in rotation.
 

Arkeus

Member
Is it just me or do bosses mercilessly attack seraphim? I'm not having much trouble defeating them or moderate, but I always end up with a few seraphim K.O.s (and a hefty grade penalty) since the bosses don't even seem interested in going after me. It's also annoying since it takes just a few hits from a boss to knock out someone.
I'm getting the impression that Bosses attack a Seraphim in priority when the Boss resist that Seraphim's element, as it seems to mostly happens to those particular fights.

Also, people are actually finding mobs super easy just after switching to Intense? I have switched a while ago but still dread the fuck out of groups of spellcasters. Having half of your skills made useless is really hard if there is more than one spellcaster at once, especially on harder difficulties where they cast super quick.
 

PKrockin

Member
I do seem to be targeted less than my other party members, though that might just be confirmation bias. Maybe it was a mistake to turn on the guard appeal battle action in conjunction with the Focus on Counterattacks and Watch Health strategies.
 
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