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[Bladenic]

Last night I made a lot more progress (I'm playing so slowly) and (late game spoilers)

Spoiler

Tiamat was so unfun on Hard. First boss I got 0 grade on too, I got KOd 9 times. Well, the AI did anyway. At least the animated cutscene looked awesome, although Tiamat was way bigger in the cutscene than in the fight haha. Maltran wasn't bad but they could've at least given us a new dungeon to go through so we can actually make use of Alicia, she literally rejoins for just the boss (and lolz they still find time to make her look like shit by having Sorey say his vision is a bit blurry).

Instead of Alisha/Rose, people should've been more mad with the fact that

Spoiler

this game promised us dragons and... well, I certainly didn't feel like I got dragons. Hell Graces had a sidequest with fighting dragons, this game couldn't let us fight the 8 dragons mentioned by Edna early on? Terrible. I'd say that was more of a false advertising claim than Alisha haha.

 

[Datschge]

Estelle is a playable damsel in distress, Alisha is empowered. Outside of the shortcoming of the story execution I prefer the latter.

Edit:

Spoiler

Yeah, the whole dragons thing irked me way more as well. Dragons were central to the first couple trailers and the logo as well.

 

[Taruranto]

Estelle? Alisha?

True gentlemen know who the best Tales of Princess is.

Yes, Natalia fans. Yes, we exist.

Tales of Destiny is underappreciated. The PS2 remake is legit the best Tales game. That aerial battle system. The gorgeous 2D. The fun cast and added skits. Elemental talking swords. Ahhhhh! I need to play the special edition some day.

And that amazing first battle theme

I would have enjoyed ToD more if the first half of the story wasn't "chase this McGuffin all over the planet". The cast is probably one of my least favorite as well. I know Japan has a giant boner for Leon, but I just can't understand why.

 

[tiebreaker]

Quick question, can I access maps from other areas aside from the local area where the speherd currently located? For example, when Sorey and co are in a town, but I want to check the surrounding area without getting out of the town

 

[Fuu]

These posts just add more weight to my statement above that people prefer Mary Sues/Gary Stus to actual realistic characters that make mistakes and aren't right all the time.

And what's with this "She's a princess!" excuse for Alisha? Estelle was one, too. She had plenty of time to travel around with Yuri.

Alisha was written to be a bad character. Rose is written as a happy go lucky sociopath that can do no wrong. I'm fine with the characters as the base personalities are fine. What I take issue with is the terrible writing that produced this situation with the plot.

I don't prefer Mary Sues at all, it just isn't something that bothered me when it came to Rose. I recognized she's written like that, I just didn't care.

Alisha is objectively a better written character, she has an arc and faults while Rose doesn't. She's more of a real person and I'd be completely fine with Alisha staying in the group through the whole game, I liked her. I don't feel strongly about this matter either way though.

 

[Bladenic]

Estelle? Alisha?

True gentlemen know who the best Tales of Princess is.

Yes, Natalia fans. Yes, we exist.



I would have enjoyed ToD more if the first half of the story wasn't "chase this McGuffin all over the planet". The cast is probably one of my least favorite as well. I know Japan has a giant boner for Leon, but I just can't understand why.

Nope, sorry, she's the worst. I actually really liked Natalia until 2/3 through the game when literally everything that comes out of her mouth is "Asch" this and that and "Fuck me, Asch." Ruined her character. She's still fun to play though.

 

[Zafir]

Estelle? Alisha?

True gentlemen know who the best Tales of Princess is.

Yes, Natalia fans. Yes, we exist.

Oh lord. I didn't even know they existed.

I think I'd probably put Alisha on top. Natalia is okay for most of Abyss, and then she falls off a cliff nearing the end and becomes really whiny over Asch enough to make me dislike her. Estelle I've never really liked honestly, for the same reasons I dislike Colette(although I don't dislike her anywhere near as much as I dislike Colette, very few characters get that joy).

 

[Cornbread78]

These posts just add more weight to my statement above that people prefer Mary Sues/Gary Stus to actual realistic characters that make mistakes and aren't right all the time.

And what's with this "She's a princess!" excuse for Alisha? Estelle was one, too. She had plenty of time to travel around with Yuri.

Alisha was written to be a bad character. Rose is written as a happy go lucky sociopath that can do no wrong. I'm fine with the characters as the base personalities are fine. What I take issue with is the terrible writing that produced this situation with the plot.

Each character is different for me. I'm also a Kirito fan, so obviously the overpowering characters are not a problem for me. However, when presented with it, you always love a good underdog story and watching a character struggle and word hard to succeed. All I ask is that they are given a decent personality to go along with it.

 

[psynergylover]

just finished the Water Temple and man was it a doosey, who else got to the last part of the trial just to be teleported to the fucking beginning

and damn:

Spoiler

didn't expect Maltran to be in bed with the Lord of Calamity, and Alisha is so attached to her that it a damn cruch to her character; Rose couldn't get a damn word in because Alisha was fucking balling over how much Maltran has been there for her, I was hoping we'd get the option to tell her or not

 

[kewlmyc]

Estelle? Alisha?

True gentlemen know who the best Tales of Princess is.

Yes, Natalia fans. Yes, we exist.

Abyss is my 2nd favorite Tales game and she's my second most hated character.

Spoiler

"Guy, if you didn't save her, I would have lost all respect for you."

Why would you say that? There was zero reason to say that. Only Anise is worse.

 

[StarSketch]

Each character is different for me. I'm also a Kirito fan, so obviously the overpowering characters are not a problem for me. However, when presented with it, you always love a good underdog story and watching a character struggle and word hard to succeed. All I ask is that they are given a decent personality to go along with it.

Is it weird that I was disappointed that Sorey didn't break down from stress at some point? Cause I felt that there were signs pointing to it happening everywhere.

Spoiler

Admittedly, he sort of did during the final boss fight. Losing family that way sucks.

There was definitely a struggle going on though.

Anyway, my definition Of Mary Sue hinges on whether or not the character in question is overpowered enough that it ruins any sort of feeling of tension when it matters (Kirito is a perfect example of this.) Rose...I'm not gonna lie, Rose manages this a few times, but on a smaller scale than what Kirito does. She mainly kills tension via not letting Sorey have to deal with having to mercy kill things, but

Spoiler

he eventually does end up having the resolve to do it himself, so...

Also she's not the protagonist, so a lot of what she does doesn't have the same weight, nor can she do things that are reserved for the protagonist to do. Also, character wise

Spoiler

I can't see her making the same sacrifice Sorey makes at the end of the game at all.

Of course this is just my definition, and I don't like throwing the term around much anyway because of how varied people's definitions are (I was watching a stream of the game the other day and a bunch of people were calling Sorey a Marty Stu which...I'm not all that sure about.)

Also really late edit but:

Alisha was written to be a bad character. Rose is written as a happy go lucky sociopath that can do no wrong. I'm fine with the characters as the base personalities are fine. What I take issue with is the terrible writing that produced this situation with the plot.

so·ci·o·path
noun: sociopath; plural noun: sociopaths
a person with a personality disorder manifesting itself in extreme antisocial attitudes and behavior and a lack of conscience.

I dunno, would someone who lacked a conscience

Spoiler

look into the people who she's assigned to kill to make sure that she's not killing an innocent person? I mean, The Scattered Bones were assigned to kill Alisha, and that never happened. (Lunarre clearly didn't give a shit.) She also leaves the guy that gave the assignment in the first place alive. Rose's philosophy seems to be stopping people who are so far gone that staying alive would cause nothing but harm to the person themself and everyone around them, hence "May these Weary Bones Find Peaceful Rest" and all that.

Which of course, falls in line with how she handles heavily corrupted Hellions.

 

[Chocolate Thunder]

Not very far in, just got to the city that floats but I am having fun. Combat will take a minute to get use to as I think I am buttonmashing more than I should.

I have to say the theme song is hype though, was not expecting that at all.

 

[Cornbread78]

Ok, wtf is up with this lizard

Spoiler

knight when in the ruin with Rose

? How do you not die in this battle? So frustrating. wtf.


Nvmd, what kinda bullshit difficulty spike was that? Uugghh.

 

[MechaX]

I dunno, would someone who lacked a conscience

Spoiler

look into the people who she's assigned to kill to make sure that she's not killing an innocent person? I mean, The Scattered Bones were assigned to kill Alisha, and that never happened. (Lunarre clearly didn't give a shit.) She also leaves the guy that gave the assignment in the first place alive. Rose's philosophy seems to be stopping people who are so far gone that staying alive would cause nothing but harm to the person themself and everyone around them, hence "May these Weary Bones Find Peaceful Rest" and all that.

Which of course, falls in line with how she handles heavily corrupted Hellions.

When considering that people who display sociopathic behaviors can still rationalize, the answer to your overall question is yes, someone who lacked a conscience still would do those things.

Spoiler

The game expects the player to just handwave that issue away with stuff like "Oh, Rose checks into the people she kills to make sure they are not bad" without ever even attempting to adequately answer what criteria Rose even goes by in these determinations. Moreover, bad or not, the simple fact is that Rose is in fact killing people who likely have loved ones or who have family. Does she have doubts or think about those factors more than not at all? Well, the game answers that at least due to the fact that she cannot generate malevolence.

This is much different from someone like Yuri, who in term fully understands the weight of killing another human being, understands the legal and social ramifications of such, and understands what he did is likely going to be very punishment-worthy. Yuri does rationalize it through things like "cutting off an infected part of the whole," but we have Flynn as a direct anti-thesis of that philosophy and Yuri does in fact display doubt.

On the opposite end, the game couldn't even bother to attempt to get Rose anywhere close to that point in any sense of the word, and she comes across as a scapegoat to absolve Sorey of committing bad acts.

 

[Nose Master]

Valuables are automatically in effect, right? You don't have to turn them in anywhere or activate them?

EDIT: Completely forgot you could edit fashion accessories. I'm sorry.

 

[SolVanderlyn]

Valuables are automatically in effect, right? You don't have to turn them in anywhere or activate them?

EDIT: Completely forgot you could edit fashion accessories. I'm sorry.

Now give him the sideburns too

 

[RPGCrazied]

I see the idol master costumes, but where is the anime ones?

I see them, LOL @ $10. Wtf? I just want Sorey's. I don't want the ones for the girls.

 

[TangerineCloud]

I see the idol master costumes, but where is the anime ones?

I see them, LOL @ $10. Wtf? I just want Sorey's. I don't want the ones for the girls.

Damn, ten dollars for five costumes. I mean, I'm still gonna buy, but damn.

 

[RPGCrazied]

Damn, ten dollars for five costumes. I mean, I'm still gonna buy, but damn.

Yeah, I don't like how they are bunching them up this time. I'd rather just buy them for one character when I see fit.

 

[SolVanderlyn]

Costumes came far too late. Game is done now.

Really wish the legacy costumes were regular DLC. Would go back and buy those for battle themes.

P.S. Zaveid's school professor outfit

A) Makes

Spoiler

his hat look acceptable

B) Is awesome

 

[wheeplash]

Valuables are automatically in effect, right? You don't have to turn them in anywhere or activate them?

EDIT: Completely forgot you could edit fashion accessories. I'm sorry.

NOW!

 

[Nose Master]

Is it worth retreading old dungeons, besides if you've gotten a new key? Like, will Normins pop up in them?

 

[Bladenic]

Ok, wtf is up with this lizard

Spoiler

knight when in the ruin with Rose

? How do you not die in this battle? So frustrating. wtf.


Nvmd, what kinda bullshit difficulty spike was that? Uugghh.

Yeah Dragon Newt is a pretty tough boss. Doesn't help that the wind armatization is kinda meh.

 

[Droplet]

Okay fuck this, someone help me with the final boss.

Spoiler

Second form: I get that you have to attack him as he's charging up his laser thing and then armatize, but I'm keeping the attacks going and he's still managing to fire it off? I can usually get the first time, just not the second and it's really annoying me. I just want to finish this fucking game not get fucked over by these stupid gimmicks.

 

[ULTROS!]

Okay fuck this, someone help me with the final boss.

Spoiler

Second form: I get that you have to attack him as he's charging up his laser thing and then armatize, but I'm keeping the attacks going and he's still managing to fire it off? I can usually get the first time, just not the second and it's really annoying me. I just want to finish this fucking game not get fucked over by these stupid gimmicks.

Spoiler

I had a hard time at first but it seems like you need to reach 10k damage overall for him to get knocked out.

 

[GoldCrusader]

Okay fuck this, someone help me with the final boss.

Spoiler

Second form: I get that you have to attack him as he's charging up his laser thing and then armatize, but I'm keeping the attacks going and he's still managing to fire it off? I can usually get the first time, just not the second and it's really annoying me. I just want to finish this fucking game not get fucked over by these stupid gimmicks.

Spoiler

I don't know if it will help but I used banish blast a lot to reduce his hp faster since it's scales of missing HP.

 

[Faenix1]

Is it me or does enemies hardly ever target you? (I do have appeal guard on, or whatever it's called)

Took me 18 hours to finally realize how bad the AI is. Twice now I've failed in two big battles purely cause the enemy targeted my AI allies and they don't know how to defend/sidestep. Doesn't help no matter what I do I can't get the enemies attention instead.
This results in them dying 7+ times which usually means I end the battle with less than 2 grade. ><


Another question: Can you not interrupt item casting? Used a life bottle like an idiot but couldn't interrupt it to side step. So naturally I died against the boss that I spent a good while on already. (Was barely hitting him)

 

[Droplet]

Spoiler

I had a hard time at first but it seems like you need to reach 10k damage overall for him to get knocked out.

Spoiler

I don't know if it will help but I used banish blast a lot to reduce his hp faster since it's scales of missing HP.

Thanks to the both of you. Took me a couple more tries but I was able to clear it.

Welp, I liked the game I guess. A lot of it was a bigass mess, but I loved the characters enough that I didn't mind as much, although like others I wish they had been a bit more involved

Spoiler

and not get sidelined in favor of Rose, lol. I liked her though, I wish more Tales heroines could have her agency.

Battle system was fun, but sometimes I felt like I was getting cheated by dumb things like the camera angles, stupid AI, weird slowdowns, etc.

That said, I do think I liked this objectively more than other Tales games I've played. It didn't have the same Tales tropes that tend to make every single plot the same, but on the other hand it gave those up for a plot that was about as straightforward as possible. And the characters didn't necessarily seem to be the same angsty fair as usual

Spoiler

except Dezel lol

, so I genuinely enjoyed them (and Mikleo is the best, hands down). Its battle system definitely feels more involved and at times there are things that are actually challenging (aside from just the artificial challenge of camera angles). The...okay, the dungeon and town designs weren't very good. But still, I don't think I'm getting the same enjoyment out of these games as I did in the past, and I felt my patience being slowly tested by a lot of it. Like I said, I did still like the game, and I would recommend it to other Tales fans, but it would certainly be a strained recommendation to anyone else.

 

[Nose Master]

Just got a 0.01 grade in a boss fight. Party members died NINE times. :V

 

[RocketRacoon]

Hope I don't hurt the OT, or this gets lost.

I've never played a Tales, I love the classic JRPGS (not just in age) like FF7-10, Persona 4, Chrono Trigger etc. I'm not saying IS IT AS GOOD!?! but more along the lines of..

Will I like this game? I watch some anime so the style doesn't throw me off. I mean in terms of an overall package, battle system, no tales xp prior, etc.

It seems like its the first great JRPG of the gen, and I don't wanna play catchup later.

Thanks dudes and ladies.

 

[Blackleg-sanji1]

Hope I don't hurt the OT, or this gets lost.

I've never played a Tales, I love the classic JRPGS (not just in age) like FF7-10, Persona 4, Chrono Trigger etc. I'm not saying IS IT AS GOOD!?! but more along the lines of..

Will I like this game? I watch some anime so the style doesn't throw me off. I mean in terms of an overall package, battle system, no tales xp prior, etc.

It seems like its the first great JRPG of the gen, and I don't wanna play catchup later.

Thanks dudes and ladies.

I'll be straight with you.. In my personal opinion this is not the tales game to jump into the series with, I feel like it's going to turn u off from an other wise great rpg series. Story wise I feel it's lacking, the characters aren't really that great, the battle system while is pretty much takes style gets screwed sometimes because of the camera, and the equipment/ skills system is so unnecessarily handled. Again this is all my opinion maybe someone else can chime in.

 

[ULTROS!]

Hope I don't hurt the OT, or this gets lost.

I've never played a Tales, I love the classic JRPGS (not just in age) like FF7-10, Persona 4, Chrono Trigger etc. I'm not saying IS IT AS GOOD!?! but more along the lines of..

Will I like this game? I watch some anime so the style doesn't throw me off. I mean in terms of an overall package, battle system, no tales xp prior, etc.

It seems like its the first great JRPG of the gen, and I don't wanna play catchup later.

Thanks dudes and ladies.

Actually I enjoyed the characters but the story is obviously half-assed and cut towards the end. I'd really recommend Tales of Symphonia first. You can go for Graces afterwards (story is simple but it's at least complete compared to this game).

 

[DR2K]

I imagine a Takes of Zestria 2 might have been a thing at one point with Alicia as the main character, but they decided to cut it and make it the DLC.

 

[Falk]

Hope I don't hurt the OT, or this gets lost.

I've never played a Tales, I love the classic JRPGS (not just in age) like FF7-10, Persona 4, Chrono Trigger etc. I'm not saying IS IT AS GOOD!?! but more along the lines of..

Will I like this game? I watch some anime so the style doesn't throw me off. I mean in terms of an overall package, battle system, no tales xp prior, etc.

It seems like its the first great JRPG of the gen, and I don't wanna play catchup later.

Thanks dudes and ladies.

If you're tolerant of games from that era, Symphonia is probably the best jumping-on point. Great game, but aged horribly in terms of graphics (and graphics mismatch) poorly conveying the aesthetic. (Like FF7)

Or Eternia (nope, not biased here. No siree)

 

[Firestorm]

If you're tolerant of games from that era, Symphonia is probably the best jumping-on point. Great game, but aged horribly in terms of graphics (and graphics mismatch) poorly conveying the aesthetic. (Like FF7)

Or Eternia (nope, not biased here. No siree)

I think Vesperia is probably the best bet here unless you mean it would be too hard to go back to Symphonia after it?

 

[Cornbread78]

Just got a 0.01 grade in a boss fight. Party members died NINE times. :V

Lol, I did that during the stupid Lizard boss. So sad.

 

[demidar]

Just got a 0.01 grade in a boss fight. Party members died NINE times. :V

Pfft, when fighting T

Spoiler

iamat___

, my party members died 29 times.

Suffice it to say, I didn't get any grade for that.

 

[kewlmyc]

Hope I don't hurt the OT, or this gets lost.

I've never played a Tales, I love the classic JRPGS (not just in age) like FF7-10, Persona 4, Chrono Trigger etc. I'm not saying IS IT AS GOOD!?! but more along the lines of..

Will I like this game? I watch some anime so the style doesn't throw me off. I mean in terms of an overall package, battle system, no tales xp prior, etc.

It seems like its the first great JRPG of the gen, and I don't wanna play catchup later.

Thanks dudes and ladies.

What consoles do you own? If you're only talking about PS4, then this game probably isn't the best jumping in point for the Tales series since it's very experimental with mixed results and opinions among the community. I'll wait to see how Beseria (the next one) turns out or try your luck on either Tales of Vesperia (360) or Tales of Symphonia (PS3, upcoming PC).

 

[Datschge]

Hope I don't hurt the OT, or this gets lost.

I've never played a Tales, I love the classic JRPGS (not just in age) like FF7-10, Persona 4, Chrono Trigger etc. I'm not saying IS IT AS GOOD!?! but more along the lines of..

Will I like this game? I watch some anime so the style doesn't throw me off. I mean in terms of an overall package, battle system, no tales xp prior, etc.

It seems like its the first great JRPG of the gen, and I don't wanna play catchup later.

Thanks dudes and ladies.

You only list menu driven RPGs, the Tales series are action RPG games with battle systems akin to fighting games. That aside if you like (and never are annoyed of) anime and their tropes you should like most Tales games as overall packages. Which one you'll like more depends on your preferences regarding battle system, overall game design, characters and story.
E.g. as you love classic JRPGs you may prefer having a classic traversable world map? In that case you'll want to look at Tales game like Vesperia and older.

 

[Bladenic]

I imagine a Takes of Zestria 2 might have been a thing at one point with Alicia as the main character, but they decided to cut it and make it the DLC.

Doubtful, since the DLC came out 2 weeks after the game. They might've had ideas for a sequel if the game was well-received, but...

 

[SephLuis]

Doubtful, since the DLC came out 2 weeks after the game. They might've had ideas for a sequel if the game was well-received, but...

I am going by my memories of the japanese version, but regarding Alisha's epilogue

Spoiler

didn't it ended in a cliffhanger ? I was pretty sure that they left that ending there if they ever wanted to do a Zestiria 2

 

[MegaPanda]

A Lloyd costume would've been so good

 

[DR2K]

I am going by my memories of the japanese version, but regarding Alisha's epilogue

Spoiler

didn't it ended in a cliffhanger ? I was pretty sure that they left that ending there if they ever wanted to do a Zestiria 2

Yes it left on a

Spoiler

cliff hanger.

 

[Pics_nao]

Playing on PC again and I realized that the OP doesn't play. What gives? I did change it to the Japanese one as soon as I found out that I could.

 

[Khilandros]

Playing on PC again and I realized that the OP doesn't play. What gives? I did change it to the Japanese one as soon as I found out that I could.

They added a hash/file check to the game that disables the Jpn version swap trick. Even with that, people found a way to bypass it by using an edited file...I think it is on Nyaa, search for AM_TOZ_OP_001.bk2.

 

[Cornbread78]

I gotta say this game plays rock solid on my Vita with remote play.

 

[flatearthpandas]

Did they skip DLC this week? Thought we were supposed to get the Eva costumes?

 

[Khilandros]

Did they skip DLC this week? Thought we were supposed to get the Eva costumes?

EVA was released this week: http://store.steampowered.com/app/382467/

 

[flatearthpandas]

EVA was released this week: http://store.steampowered.com/app/382467/

They not coming to PSN? Don't see them on the store.

Edit: I see them on the computer store, but not on the PS4 store. Hm.

 

[Khilandros]

They not coming to PSN? Don't see them on the store.

oh wow, they messed up the catalog for it. Look for the PS3 Zestiria, then in the addon section and you should see Eva for both PS3 and PS4 there.