Tales of Zestiria

The Tales of King Arthur

Back in the Gamecube days I bought the Tales of Symphonia game and found it rather enjoyable. I got the sequel to the Wii and actually never finished it. Didn't get a Tales of game until Tales of the Abyss for the 3DS. So as you notice I only got the Nintendo releases even though I got a PS3 and there been like 3-4 games and the first I bought was the HD collection of Tales of Symphonia which I wished was released for the Wii U but no. And then I read that LittleKuriboh was one of the voices for this game so I got it instantly. And then I learn that Kirbopher is one of the major voices... sweet! And what do you know, celebrities draw sales apparently cause after finishing the game I say it's the weakest Tales of game in the story department I've ever played. The premise is that it is the Age of Chaos caused by the Lord of Calamity who causes strife in order to create hellions, creature born out of the Malevolence in the peoples heart. To combat this a Shepard shall emerge from the humans and together with the Seraphim bless the land and purge it of Malevolence.

Meet the Shepard Sorey

Sorey, raised by the Seraphim leaves his home with his best friend, the seraph Mikleo, to warn Alicia, a knight they found in the ruins they were excavating and being hunted by an assassin. On his journey he will take up the mantle of Shepard from the fire seraph Lilah as he is pure and will rid the world of all Malevolence. As standard the interactions between the characters are fun, informative and well acted. Sadly the main character is boring, a goody-two-shoes that more or less is a Loyd, but lacks the great villain to compare him to. Heldalf is no Mithos Yggdrasill for sure. Of course Abyss didn't have a strong villain either, but Lukes journey and depth was something that made that game stand out. Here... nothing. And maybe it isn't the main focus of the game. You have very little environments and it's more focused on dungeons. A dungeon crawler. Action, battles and treasures. And it works. The armatize functions work well enough and unleashing the Mystic Arts are really satisfying. Sadly they even revamped the weapon system for a loot based economy where you gather weapons to synthesise and combine for better effects. Sadly this means you either spend 100 of hours gathering items, synthesising and taking notes of what does what... or you buy a guide... or read a FAQ, but it's busy work and I can't tell if a weapon is better or not due to all the skill bonuses. Just tell me if it's better Attack or Defence and I'm fine alright?

Well, apparently some people don't need clothes

So I'm a bit underwhelmed with the game, the only thing I can't say a bad thing about is the music which is made by Motoi Sakuraba, he who made the music for Golden Sun and you can tell. Certain themes sees eerily familiar and with an easy four element set up I feel right at home. Other things that are fun is they incorporated a discovery system where you find relics, plants, creatures and monuments that reminds me of Skies of Arcadia... doesn't help that Sorey begin with the same color-scheme from clothes to hair, all that's missing is an eye-patch.... oh, here it is in Fashion. Sadly that is all discovering you do since the overworld map is gone and we have a smaller world with a few settings. Sadly that feels like most RPG's are heading and I guess with more technical power you push more detailed environment, which feels big and looking across the whole area is fantastic, but the continent feels small in comparison to the two worlds of Symphonia or the one world of Abyss. Also there is several problems with the story. The malevolence angle, while understandable, gives the sense that you can't do anything without causing hellions. Lie, malevolence. Feeling sad, malevolence. Denying, malevolence. Really, an ascetic monk would probably be the only one not be affected or as they pointed out people really determined that they do the right thing, which somehow causes no malevolence. Right, I just need to believe in what I do apparently and it doesn't care if it is good or evil. No, I might play Tales of Symphonia Chronicles after I finish the DLC in this game.