I absolutely HATE the Tales games. I’ve played Tales of Destiny and Eternia in their entirety, and I’ve played a good amount of Tales of Phantasia, as well as a little bit of Tales of Symphonia and Tales of the Abyss. I have not come remotely close to liking a single one.
Pretty much the main reason is because they take themselves waaaaaaay too seriously, and their stories are not even that good when you take that into consideration (plus, on top of all that, they’re pretty LONG for having such bad plots). Games with such cliche stories usually focus more on character development/interaction, which tends to not happen in Tales games.
That being said, I’ve heard some things about Tales of Legendia that sound COMPLETELY the opposite - I’ve heard that the game is pretty short for a tales game (30-ish hours), focuses a lot on character interaction, and can be ridiculous and funny as hell.
So:
Is that true?
Would you reccomend Tales of Legendia to someone who has not liked ANY of the Tales games released in the United States thus far?
Short answer: No, SG! Don’t play Tales of Legendia! IT’S A TRAP!
Long answer: I LOVE Tales of Phantasia and Tales of the Abyss, but I did not like Tales of Legendia. IMO, it’s story is even worse than the stories in of TOP and TOTA, and I liked their stories.
Also, TOL is not fun. Not fun at all. It’s not very short; the ‘main quest’ takes about 40 hours, but if you continue playing after the ‘main quest’, it’ll actually last you a total of about 70 hours, 70 hours of mediocrity. The music is lifeless, the voiceovers are dull, the graphics are so-so, and the ending sucks. And the game also has the worst playable female RPG character ever. (Norma Beatty must die!!!)
And this is coming from a guy who adores TOP and TOTA. Well, chances are if you despise the Tales of series, you will hate Legendia with fury like that of which you’ve never felt. TOL is possibly the worst PS2-only RPG I’ve played. It is a blemish on the legacy of the Tales of franchise, or just another reason to hate the Tales of franchise.
Well, considering you don’t like the other Tales games, you might want to give Legendia a try, as it’s very different from the other games. For that reason, I didn’t like it as much, but that might cause you to like it Oh, and I felt the battle system wasn’t quite as smooth as ToE’s or the 3D games, but maybe that’s just me.
TOL’s story is pretty good, different from most Tales games. The battle system is pretty fun except for the fact you have to grind for stones to get the spells for your mages. Overall it is a good game, but the characters are too cliche to be cliche.
If you like good stories and character interaction, give ToA a longer run. It starts off slow, but the characterization is excellent - some of the best I’ve ever seen - and the story is far from cliche. (Of course, the definition of cliche will vary based on who’s saying it, but I certainly haven’t seen too many stories that do what it does.)
It took over ten hours of Tales of the Abyss to start going anywhere. I will still play it - probably to completion - but taking so long to start up something like that is purely unforgivable. Mystery doesn’t work unless there’s at least a few things that AREN’T mysterious. Otherwise, how can you get excited? You don’t know what you’re getting excited about! This is the flaw in how Tales of the Abyss starts. You know…just…NOTHING. And, for that reason, there was no hook for me. If I were playing this game by myself, I likely would have never reached this point where it’s beginning to turn around.
In any case, I’m more curious about Tales of Legendia at this point. I’ve never liked the Tales team, so knowing that the combat system of the Tales game is being taken and handled by someone else is kind of intriguing to me.
That’s hilarious that you said that, because that’s precisely the reason I hated Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter. 8p At least in ToA you have a set of characters who interact constantly and with quite a lot of chuckles. I enjoyed the camaraderie until the main story actually started getting more in-depth.
I actually consider the way the Tales game handle the story to be the perfect formula. You get a good amount of wander-around time in which the world and your characters are introduced and developed until the real plot development kicks in. I HATE when I’m thrown in right into the fray, mostly because the “oh shit, we gotta save the world” pace turns old very fast and most of the time the characters’ development suffer or gets rushed as the events gain priority over who’s carrying out said events.
Then again, the plot has to be very, and I mean VERY good for me to accept having less-developed characters, otherwise what’s going on looses a lot of charm if I don’t give a crap about who those things are happening to (I’m looking at you FFXII). Basically, the characters are my absolute priority 99% of the time, so I’m considerably biased in that sense.
I wouldn’t recommend it. The main plot is still serious and the gameplay isn’t that great. If you do end up getting it, I wouldn’t do the aftergame because it’s just doing the games dungeons over in a different order and with new enemies.
Dragon Quarter got off to a really quick start, and the character interaction was excellent - to me, it’s one of the best examples I’ve ever seen of using direction and non-verbal communication in a video game. Granted, if you play through the game on the first playthrough, you’re missing a lot of information in the final stretch; that’s about the one thing I think is just dumb about Dragon Quarter - why would you leave out parts of the story to try and create replay value? But, ESPECIALLY when you play through it the second time, everything makes great sense. In any case, there was never a trouble with a hook in the beginning - you’re thrust into action immediately and with a purpose.
Besides that, in ToA, the character interaction might be hefty, but it’s so far been a lot of
Luke acts like a pansy and rides Van’s nuts
Tear gets mad and defends her stance on whatever cryptic plan that Mohs has
Jade alludes to knowing absolutely everything, but doesn’t say anything
Guy just acts scared of women
With random other stuff from Mieu, Ion, and Natalia. I know that’s all changing NOW, but the character interaction up to this point has been downright frustrating.
-Well, that’s the point, he’s an ignorant ass.
-Tear knows barely anything at all.
-Jade knows practically nothing of real relevance at this point.
-Guy… well, you’ll see.
Just how long HAVE you been playing anyway? If that’s all you know, you couldn’t have gotten back to Baticul yet, which is pretty darned early into the game to expect any serious exposition.
Granted, if you play through the game on the first playthrough, you’re missing a lot of information in the final stretch
In other words, the game gives you no information EVEN BY THE TIME YOU FINISH IT. It requires you to actually finish the game (or die trying) before you get any background. And you somehow see this as more of a hook than ToA? Even if you’re thrust into battle, you do so with a grand total of three characters, one of whom is generic and one of whom says literally nothing. How is that any sort of attempt at keeping your interest?
Luke acts like a pansy and rides Van’s nuts
Tear gets mad and defends her stance on whatever cryptic plan that Mohs has
Jade alludes to knowing absolutely everything, but doesn’t say anything
Guy just acts scared of women
In other words, the characters act consistently with their design rather than instantly changing around depending on the situation. That says good character design to me, not bad. And the characters certainly do grow in time - realistic time. Also, content isn’t as important necessarily as the interaction itself, which I think was the real highlight of the band you had together.
I’m just about to go to Baticul, I just found out something about Natalia that is seemingly spoileriffic.
Either way, I’ve got near 25 hours clocked in. I think it’s been vastly more interesting lately, but you’re saying that it’s STILL not all that interesting yet? Just how amazingly epic IS this game that it takes this long to unfold? Gimme a break
Whoa, whoa.
I think you’re taking this argument a little towards the heated and personal side, and
That’s not what I said, though rereading it, that’s what it looked like. What I meant was, you’re missing information that makes things in the late game make sense (i.e who the hell are the Regents, who is Elyon, etc.). You get a LITTLE extra stuff for Nina, but the main things you’re missing out on are things that flesh out the villains more than anything.
I found the characters to be very interesting - if anything, Dragon Quarter proved to me that, in a video game, you don’t need to use words to say a lot. This might be obvious enough in real life, or in movies; but, Dragon Quarter was about the first game I ever played that went “Hey, yeah, you can bring a lot of real emotion across without dialogue.” The minor details that Dragon Quarter paints makes it a lot more real to me than most games I play.
Now, imagine if someone would do that with a story that set out to be something amazing! Dragon Quarter clearly didn’t; however, it accomplished its goal with flying colors - that’s much more than I can say for most games I play these days.
Perhaps not bad character design, but it’s terrible dialogue and interaction. It’s good that the characters are written well; but, it’s tragic that the actual content is awful.
I do see and acknowledge that the characters are steadily changing - particularly, Luke; however, it’s very hard to sit tight for so long when you don’t know anything, and your main character is SO, SO dislikeable for so very long.
And lastly, content is absolutely more important than the interaction! In virtually all walks of life, how much you commit to something matters less than the quality. I’ve had friends and dates that were chatty as all hell, and they could be just fine; but, some of my best friends and dates? We say very little to each other all the time, but what we have to say to each other is always amazing.
I’m not bashing Tales of the Abyss, which is why I think you’re taking this whole thing so personally - if you look back, you’ll see that I agree with what you’re saying! I just have a different reaction to it. It’s definitely gotten a lot better, and even kinda fun, now; but, there’s really NO reason that anyone should have been made to wait as long as they did.
In the genre of RPGs, there are obviously plenty of people who have that kind of patience - otherwise, why would RPGs be so long? I, however, don’t. In fact, most of my favorite RPGs in terms of story are never longer than 30 hours (Dragon Quarter, Shadow Hearts, Okage, and Growlanser 3, to name a few recent ones), simply because I think that these are the kinds of games that recognize that a longer game isn’t necesarily a better game. If you’re gonna make a game long, it should be interesting in the first AND the last hour - more fun at some times than others? Sure? But, to have a long chunk of the game that is just agonizing to sit through? Yeah. I would have NEVER gotten to this part of the game by myself. If your game isn’t interesting the entire way through, make it shorter.
And you JUST got to Baticul? Man, no wonder you think it takes you forever, just how the HELL did it take you that long to get there?! You’re not even done with the first quarter of the main story, not to mention the bazillion plot-related sidequests later on…
Uhhh not for the first time, dude. Here, I tried not putting spoiler stuff about TALES OF THE ABYSS in my TALES OF LEGENDIA - SHOULD I PLAY IT thread, but here you go:
We just came back from the Abyss, and Kilmasca and Malkuth are fighting. We heard that Engeve is in danger of falling into the Abyss, so the party split up and coincidentally wound up both heading for Chesedonia. There, Ion sort of surrenders himself to Mohs, we find out that Natalia is very likely to be a fake princess, and we’re supposedly going to Baticul to try and get support from the king to stop the war.
Now, according to walkthroughs and reviews, I’m roughly halfway through the game. If this is where you thought I was, and you STILL think that I’m not far enough to have experienced anything good about this story…well, that’s bad - from not just the perspective of hours spent, but from the perspective of “wow, I’m halfway through the game”, as well. But, I don’t think that’s what you meant - as I’ve said many times, the game HAS picked up since the first time I posted about it in this thread. So chill out.
I think you’re taking this argument a little towards the heated and personal side, and
Because I used capitals? I wasn’t upset, so I’m sorry you got that impression, and I haven’t taken anything you said personally.
I found the characters to be very interesting
Obviously a matter of taste. I found the hero to be cliched and generic, and Nina was just depressing. I simply didn’t feel that they had any depth to them.
Perhaps not bad character design, but it’s terrible dialogue and interaction.
Again, we’ll have to agree to disagree. I thought the characters had wonderful chemistry.
however, it’s very hard to sit tight for so long when you don’t know anything, and your main character is SO, SO dislikeable for so very long.
I actually loved Luke even during the first part of the game. It was so refreshing to be around someone that naive, who speaks his mind all the time. No, I wouldn’t like to be buddies with him, but he was very fun to watch.
And lastly, content is absolutely more important than the interaction!
What I meant by content vs. interaction was the difference between the characters simply talking, and doing plot-important things. How many of the skits did you view, by the way? I took in every single one, which is why I was so impressed by the chemistry.
It’s definitely gotten a lot better, and even kinda fun, now; but, there’s really NO reason that anyone should have been made to wait as long as they did.
But it’s not like you had nothing in your hand while you waited. You got to spend time with the characters and their personalities bouncing off each other; in my mind, that sort of thing is infinitely more interesting than which bad guy has uncovered which evil plan at the moment, and who has what tragic past.
I’m one of the few people that enjoyed ToL. I thought the character interaction was great and it was funny. The story is decent. The battlesystem can get old after awhile and during the character quest (second part of game) you do repeat dungeons. I completed the game in about 62 hours. It’s not really short…about 30 hours for each part. The characters really did it for me.
If you want, I can send you a copy of the game SG. I haven’t touched mine in ages. If you don’t like it, I would like it back though. I’ll finish it someday >_>
Tales of Legendia was extremely boring to me. There were two characters that I ever gave a damn about (Moses and Jay,) and to cap it off, they gave everything stupid names that rhymed for no paticular reason. Merines, Teriques, Werines, Ferines. God. I was getting sick of hearing that crap by the end.
However, the Moses character quest had such an excellent ending, it almost made the game worth buying by itself. Sadly, playing the game felt more like a chore than anything.
Oh, and I felt the battle system wasn’t quite as smooth as ToE’s or the 3D games, but maybe that’s just me.