tales

16: Tales of the Tempest
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FMgeYgFDNU
'Genre': RPG THAT AWAKENS THE SOUL

Tempest is... existant? It isn't really offensive, it's just really dull. Combat is very boring, feels sluggish, and the plot feels like the first act of an actual game. The characters are very generic, too, and even the skits aren't that charming!

That said, it's not bad. Everything in the game is reasonably competent. Also, the character designs are still very cute. It has that going for it. I love the lead girl's weird flower design, she looks like a digimon half the time.

15: Tales of Destiny
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3tCPUjpAbE
'Genre': RPG OF DESTINY

Destiny also exists!

Now, to be fair to poor destiny, I haven't played the remakes that add a lot to the game - like, to the tune of 3 party members, an entirely different battle system, and an alt. mode focusing on Leon.

Speaking of Leon, I don't like him. He's very pretty! But he's mostly just some jerk that dies. (Naturally his death gets retconned in the remakes.)

But yeah, Destiny is... sort of charming, in its generic 90s RPG way, but there isn't a whole lot there that grabbed me. The combat system isn't really in place yet, and honestly, neither is the skit system. I might have a different opinion of it if the remakes ever get translated, because I can at least see why Japan has so much nostalgia for it, but the game I played just wasn't that interesting!

14: Tales of Symphonia 2
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfHXFO2-RbI
'Genre': RPG TO BELIEVE IN LOVE

First: A lot of people don't like the main characters, Emil and Marta. I think they're very cute and charming! And their relationship of Marta trying to get Emil to conform to gender norms and be a STRONG MAN and Emil hating the idea of being a strong man because his 'strong man' uncle abused him, and they have this weird tension about it until Marta realizes that she is wrong to try and make Emil be something he's not, and that he is strong being the wimpy, sensitive kid that he is - that is all very cute! And a v. good arc! Good on you, Tales!

Unfortunately, Emil and Marta, even though I like them, just aren't enough to carry the game. They spend the vast majority of the game on their own, with the original Symph party popping in for cameos sometimes. They also have a talking cat demon, but he's barely in skits. So you get this weird thing where Tales is a series about the relationship between the party... only this is a Tales game without a party. It's just Emil and Marta.

I feel like if they'd just made a full party of their own, with maybe one Symphonia character in it, it'd be a much better game. But as it stands you have to deal with awkward monster taming and raising mechanics to fill up your party. And then whenever a Symphonia party member arrives, you're forced to kick out one of the monsters you spent so much time training! It's weird.

Also, 'courage is the magic that turns dreams into reality' is a line that gets repeated frequently. It starts out tacky, then it becomes charming, then it loops back around to tacky.

13: Tales of Phantasia
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OgUhrhnqkGk
'Genre': THE RPG THAT SINGS

The party in Phantasia is super generic, but the plot itself is actually sort of neat for a SNES game. The moral ambiguity, unlike a lot of games in the series, actually kind of works. This is probably because it was based on a novel.

And for how generic they are, the party actually do get a good, fun dynamic going, just because they lean into their genericness and have fun with it. As a first game in the series, it's definitely a good start, and really charming in its way. That said, being the first game, combat is... kind of a massive pain. Impressive for its time! But very, very dull these days. Everyone moves so slowly! And also Arche flies, so you can just fly up to the top of the screen and be invincible.

Also, for how simple they are, the character designs in this game are really good! Very - memorable!

12: Tales of Innocence
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eyct_nDgSXw
Genre: RPG TO TIE THOUGHTS TOGETHER

Tales of Innocence's core concept - that the characters are reincarnations of devils and demons, persecuted and forced to fight for the country they drove to the brink of collapse in their past lives - is really, really, *really* fascinating.

Unfortunately, it's a DS game. It definitely has more to it than Tempest, but it doesn't have the time it needs to dig into the ideas it sets up. It mostly just goes 'poor luca. it's okay he has friends now. :)' and while that is cute - Luca is an adorable little munchkin - it doesn't live up to its potential. The battle system is also... admirable for what it tries to do on the DS, but still a bit of a mess. A full 3d system just isn't workable on the DS. Hearts had the right of it by using sprites.

11: Tales of Symphonia
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yt9JKSHMgeQ
Genre: RPG THAT RESONATES WITH YOU

First, I have tons of Nostalgia for Symph. But objectively it... isn't really that good.

The big problem is the villains. It tries to set them up as deep, conflicted - victims of persecution that rose up against their persecutors - but then it also introduces them calling humans 'inferior beings' and literally herding captives off to places calling 'human ranches' for inhumane experiments to further their war efforts.

It is going for a 'cycle of hate' thing, but it goes so extreme with it that it's impossible to sympathize with.

Also, the party never really develops a dynamic. Individual interactions are fun - Zelos and Lloyd being weird bros, Regal and Raine trying to be the adults of the group - but as a group, they never gel. You never see, say, Regal talk to Sheena. Everyone forms their own little groups of 3-4 characters they talk to and then those characters also only have 3-4 characters they talk to. Which is a big problem, since the party dynamic is, again, half the point of the endeavor!

Combat is also really sluggish, and the dungeon design is awful.

Also also, it's an 80 hour long game that really feels like it could've been 40. The game starts with the elemental dungeons thing, then goes 'actually that was all pointless and in fact furthered our evil goals, muahaha,' which is a fair enough twist, but then 20 hours later, you're, uh. doing the rest of the elemental dungeons. Because, I mean, they just had them laying around.

10: Tales of Legendia
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZ-kiWA1Lfs
Genre: RPG WHERE BONDS SPIN LEGENDS

Legendia is... weird. The writing is all over the place and literally includes a major villain who just goes 'yeah, I'm done with this' and walks off-screen never to be seen again, the combat system features literal grapples and a protagonist that has 90% of the same moves as Jin from Tekken, and the second half of the game is literally just a character study about what happens to JRPG heroes after they've saved the world, including stuff like 'well what do we do with the villains that survived?' and 'I should probably go talk to my parents now that I've been away from home for like 6 months saving the world.'

But that weirdness is why I actually respect Legendia a lot? The one thing you can't call it is generic! Everything about it, from the artstyle to the music to the plot, makes it stand out from its peers. Unfortunately, not everything it tries works - the combat system, while interesting, mostly just amounts to doing chain throws with Senel until one of the AI party members finishes channeling their 50 second long spells, and the plot, while neat, is... an absolute mess at the same time, with tons of information to convey and absolutely no idea how to convey it. Also lots of weird incest-y vibes.

But I mean, go shiina did the music.

9: Tales of Rebirth
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mEuy8CgWxWc
Genre: RPG WHERE YOU WILL BE REBORN

Rebirth is dumb. It's a game where the final boss is literally a racist dragon that has the magical power to make other people racist. It's a game where one of the big moral dilemmas is 'if your girlfriend turned into a nekomimi, would you still want to have sex with her?' It is a dumb, dumb, duuuumb game.

But there's something charming about it. Veigue is a brick wall that spends the entire game shouting his girlfriend's name, and I absolutely adore him. It goes so far and the other characters make fun of him for it so much that it almost feels like it's a parody.

Also, the battle system is one of the best sprite-based systems! Really really fun! And it has team-up techniques, which are always my favorite things in RPGs.

8: Tales of Vesperia
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IW98Ty3JXpA
Genre: RPG TO ENFORCE JUSTICE

You see that genre title? That is Vesperia's problem.

It sets up an interesting conflict: Yuri and Flynn are poor slumkids. They both tried to join the knights - Flynn made it, Yuri flunked out and just stole a sword and left.

They meet up again a bit into the game, after Yuri's exposed a corrupt noble. Flynn tells Yuri that the noble will be taken away and appropriately punished. Yuri doesn't buy it, and he's right to - a little later it's revealed that all he'll have to do is pay a fine.

Flynn tells Yuri that he's trying to stop this sort of thing from happening. Yuri, again, doesn't buy it. So in the dark of the night, Yuri kills the noble.

Bam, that is a great hook.

Unfortunately, Vesperia kind of... doesn't follow through. Yuri kills another corrupt noble, Flynn realizes what's going on, they have a pretty well-written conversation about it, and then, 30 hours in, after setting up all this conflict, Vesperia promptly dumps literally every word of that to have a generic RPG plot where a princess has magic powers and they have to go to elemental dungeons, and there's a villain who wants to destroy the world.

It's not bad! But that weird herk-jerk of the plot makes everything grind together, awkwardly, like nails on a chalkboard. The party has a pretty good dynamic going, and Yuri is a very fun guy to be around - lazy, streetwise, clever - but he doesn't get a chance to develop because his arc is yanked out from underneath him, and the rest of the party - and the whole game - suffers for it. It feels like they just didn't know where to go with it.

Also, the battle system is very, very, veeryyy slow.

Vesperia is still a really enjoyable game, with a lot of great characters and moments, which is why it's so high up - it just doesn't come together into a cohesive whole.

7: Tales of Hearts R
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8JHetM3uDY
Genre: A MEETING OF HEARTS RPG

Hearts is... cute! Charming, is the word. It's a very simple story, with very simple characters, but it just commits to that sense of fun. Lots of weird jokes, a combat system that is light and breezy and mostly built around timing. But it's fun! The characters are all really likable in their dorky, simple ways, and the fact that the villains are super generic honestly only adds to the charm.

For a game called 'Hearts,' though, the main romance doesn't really work for me. Possibly because the game starts with Kor Meteor literally turning Kohaku into an emotionless zombie, because he's kind of a selfish jerk, and then going 'uhh, i can fix this, maybe.'

The side romances are all very cute, though, so that angle is saved!

6: Tales of Eternia
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gV2LtbRgJ64
Genre: RPG OF ETERNITY AND BONDS

Everything I just said about Hearts applies to Eternia, too, only I like its characters and plot a bit more - it's sort of an interesting look at a bunch of people who really don't want to be JRPG heroes. It also has bizarrely effective plot twists and fakeouts, too, for how simple the plot is overall.

Also, it has a terrible PS1 RPG dub, which, like, doubles the charm factor.

5: Tales of Zestiria
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSQV-NkWGOk
Genre: RPG OF PASSION IGNITING THE WORLD

I think I've babbled at you enough about Zest!

4: Tales of the Abyss
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=carnZ6nVsO4
Genre: RPG TO KNOW THE MEANING OF BIRTH

Abyss has pretty much the opposite issues of Vesperia - it's so, so committed to the ideas it sets up that it sometimes strains under the load of them. Luke is an unbearable jerk for the first ten hours or so, but he needs to be for the plot to work. The party dislikes and distrusts each other for about 50% of the game, because they need to for the plot and its themes to work.

On the one hand, this definitely makes their eventual camaraderie and dynamic feel earned, and the game is smart about deploying humor in ways that help exhibit the changing relationships between the characters. On the other hand, well, if you're playing the game for the first time you do need to give it a bit of faith that it'll execute on the arcs it's setting up, especially considering it takes its time on a lot of them.

And it does! Not always perfectly, but I really, really admire Abyss for sticking so clearly to its core ideas and themes. It's one of the few Tales games to manage that, and that makes it even more impressive. The music is also some of Sakuraba's best work, but you dislike him, so that might not be a plus!

The combat system is also the first time Tales really nailed 3d. It's not perfect - it has some weird gimmicks and only about half the cast is actually worth playing as - but it's fun.

3: Tales of Xillia 2
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MB4bvAK__Ks
GENRE: RPG WHERE YOUR CHOICES SPIN THE FUTURE

Xillia 2 is mostly a random collection of character vignettes, loosely stitched together by a weird time travel, brother-killing narrative. And I kind of love it?

It has so many moments that shouldn't work - the game is so focused on character vignettes that it doesn't do much to set up its plot - but it manages to make them affecting and charming. Ludger, despite being a silent protag, is actually a pretty charming, cute guy, and Elle is a really likable 'little girl' character. And I liked Xillia's cast enough that seeing them bounce off each other some more was fun.

I also really adore the modern setting, with characters having magitech cellphones and such. It gives the game a very unique feel in the series.

Combat is fast and generally fun! A little heavy on status effects, but fun! Ludger is a joy to play, which is good since he outclasses every other character except maybe Gaius.

2: Tales of Graces F
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SymLluPY-ig
Genre: RPG To know the strength to protect

Graces's plot... isn't good. It's mostly chasing Richard around and Asbel saying 'protect.'

But I love its characters. The skits are some of the best in the series, the party dynamic is adorable, and the game is constantly, constantly leaning on its humor, and the humor generally works! Due to how, ah, bad the plot is, it actually moves pretty fast, too - you go to a place, you solve something there, you move on. It helps keep the game feeling fast-paced, which helps the game's best asset.

Its combat. The combat is glorious. Incredibly fast, incredibly flowing, with tons of ways to string combos together. Every single combat encounter is an absolute joy to play, from random encounters to the secret bosses. Every character, even the pure-healing character, is incredibly fun to play. It's just - a really good combat system!

Besides its plot, Graces' one flaw is its dungeons. They're bad. Especially Wallbridge, a series of samey rooms and ladders that is only ten rooms big and takes the average player about an hour and a half to figure their way through.

But that combat!

1: Tales of Xillia
Opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dm-IYaf_hag
Genre: RPG of unwavering convictions

Xillia's plot is decent. Xillia's combat is good, if not great. Xillia's dungeons are literally just hallways, which is either a plus or a minus.

It's my favorite game of all time!

The characters are so, so lovable, in all their dumb little ways - and Milla is absolutely the best JRPG protag of all time! I love everything about her, including the dumb lisp her dub VA has. She's just - a very, very lovable character. She does the 'you humans are so __' thing, but instead of it being condescending, its a 'you humans are so __, and that rules! Keep it up!" She loves people, and wants them to be better, and that pushes herself to be better, too. And her and Jude actually have a really cute romance, because Jude admires her so much. It's sweet.

I thought I'd have more words to say, but I don't!