We begin 2023 with a fight for freedom. Overthrow your oppressors in Tales of Arise! Here are the details:
I'm excited to take a stab at the Tales franchise. Back in the day, I played and finished Tales of Symphonia on my trusty Gamecube. I've started Tales of Zestiria a few times, but never have stuck with it. My wife and I also played Tales of Vesperia for a while, but the big love for that game in the Tales community didn't quite click with me. It felt fairly disjointed. (Also, Karol is just the most annoying character). But this game looks beautiful and I remember how much people raved about it last year.
Happy gaming, everyone!
I had a rude discovery yesterday. Was very excited to play through with my wife, but I just assumed Tales of Arise is multiplayer -- after all, from what I understand, every other game in the series allows multiplayer play. Not this one, though! 
Hello, new thread. I started this the other day. I am only about an hour in so far. I am finding the mix of animation/presentation styles interesting. Is this normal for a tales series? You have the in-world 3D stuff, the comic panel style presentation and then occasionally what feels like more hand drawn cutscene sort of thing.
What a coincidence, I also started playing this a couple of days ago. I'm liking what I see so far, though I'm only 2-3 hours in. I'm still trying to get comfortable with combat. I tend to alternate between mashing the Artes buttons until it beeps at me, then mashing attack for a while until the Artes chimes that it's refilled; I don't think that's optimal. I've been trying to get used to watching enemy attack wind-ups, and guard/parry/riposte - that's satisfying when that lands. The story is interesting so far, and looks like it has the potential to really go some places.
***EDIT: Correction, I was reading the time I last saved when I ended playing last night, not the elapsed time! Impressions updated accordingly. D'oh!***
I got a bit of a head start on this one unintentionally with a few hours here and there last month, then since this won the club's vote I put it at the front of my pile since it's as good an excuse as any to actually focus on a primary game. 
I'm nearing the end of the second region in the game (leaving off any spoilers, early in the story you learn that there are essentially five major regions and in a more traditional JRPG fashion they're pretty clearly delineated) and closing in on 10 hours played, though my available time to play will be curtailed now with the holidays nearly over between work and my kid's activities resuming in January.
I'm overall favorably disposed towards the game so far, but have a number of nagging annoyances too.
Good stuff:
The worldbuilding is interesting, though the whole Dhanan/Renyn conflict is a little too simplistic and binary for my tastes. That's not a spoiler, it's laid out right in the opening of the story, and sadly at 20 hours in there's been no meaningful development of that aspect of the story. The closest to "interesting" we get is
the cultivation of "collaborators" amongst the Dhanans in the second region
but even that is shallow and undercooked.
But again, this is listed in the good stuff because while I wish there was more meat and creativity to this part of the story, it serves as a solid foundation that has been used to build the party's characters and major NPC's with some occasional nuance to their personalities, as well as also serve as a strong impetus to push the story forward with a purpose that's more interesting than just "save the world from the Big Bad Evil Guy" -- instead the goal is "resolve a multi-generational ethno-political conflict". I can dig that.
The art direction is excellent, the game's performance is solid (and I've been playing on both my PC and my Steam Deck -- and while I have it basically maxxed out on my modest PC, I cut the settings down drastically on the Deck and I'm running at 40hz refresh rate instead of 60, but the game still looks great and plays quite smooth), the music ranges from solidly serviceable to good with no bad tracks yet (I'm sure I'm going to regret saying that), and the voice acting has been solid all around. Whoever voiced the hootles clearly graduated Juillard. 
So-So Stuff:
I've come to accept that I will never really love combat in any Tales game. It's not because it's an action-combat system, as I've played plenty of other party-based JRPG's with action combat that I grew comfortable and happy with (Final Fantasy XV, Xenoblade Chronicles 1, X, and 3, Ni No Kuni 2, Rogue Galaxy) but something about the Tales series' combat just doesn't work for me.
Arise is the closest to working for me so far, though it's still just semi-controlled chaos that I can barely follow or influence. The dodge/counter element feels very satisfying, the quick responsiveness of your party members' "boost" abilities is good (so they effectively behave as player abilities rather than party abilities), and the party members seem to know what they're doing more than me so far so that's good too.
I think it also helped that for so long there was only two members in the party (with an occasional third) so I could spend more time acclimating while the chaos was easier to visually follow and respond to. When the third full party member was added, the chaos ramped up a bit but it was accompanied by a crucial new boost ability that party member uses. Then I had time to settle into that before finally getting a fourth party member (and another new boost ability) and, while now we're firmly in "just roll with it and assume the party will cut its way through things for me" territory, I really appreciate that I had time to get used to using party members' boost abilities so that I feel like I have a better handle this time than on prior Tales titles I've played.
While I praised the worldbuilding element of the story earlier and how the foundational elements give opportunities for character-building, the characters themselves fall firmly into so-so territory so far. The two main characters established themselves pretty clearly early on, and neither of them has had any meaningful development past that. Minor spoilers follow:
I know people will argue that both Alphen and Shionne have had character development throughout the first two regions, but the problem is that it's so little development and it has been beaten into my face repeatedly. Oh look, we're going to find it remarkable again that Shionne is healing someone when she doesn't have to and she insists it's only a matter of convenience. Oh look, Shionne's doing her "don't get close to me!" schtick again. Oh look, Shionne is reminding Alphen that she's only here to kill the Lords and she's not his friend.
FFS writers, we get it, Shionne's thorns and some to-be-eventually-revealed childhood trauma have caused her to distance herself from everyone because she's afraid both to hurt others and be hurt by them. And with the way they're telegraphing it, I'm willing to bet it's in part due to her thorns manifesting in a way that made her parents unable to give her the affection and child should have and/or she hurt or killed one or both of them with that manifestation at some point. So now she's angry at the Renyn source of power that cursed her with this ability, and she's killing her way through the Lords until she can destroy whatever that source of power is. Hell, it's probably something she has to sacrifice her life to do (or at least she thinks it is) but she's had enough trauma that she can't imagine a life worth living or blames herself for the death of one or both parents and believes her death is a deserved punishment.
There's foreshadowing, and there's clubbing people in the face repeatedly with tropey crap. This game is doing the latter with Shionne and it's really f*cking annoying, because if the writing were handling this better, it wouldn't be so glaringly obvious what's coming down the pipe with her characters.
Alphen isn't much better. Oh look, he can't feel pain again and is going to inadvertently get himself killed. And oh look, yet another conversation where he's acting like a walking, talking tutorial/exposition device by discussing combat with one or more party members in the most grating "as you know" approaches I've seen in a game.
Don't misunderstand me, I actually like the four party members I've acquired so far including the two main characters. It's why the writing is frustrating me so much -- it's holding the story and characters back from being as enjoyable as they should be to experience. I'm not expecting high-brow entertainment here, but I've also seen Saturday morning cartoons handle exposition and character-building more effectively than we're getting here.
The Bad:
I had hoped with the glimpses of semi-open-world exploration given early in the game that by this point there would be a bit more exploration and enemy encounter variety. I have been quite disappointed to find this is not the case. Every area is entirely static. The same items populate in the same spots each time you enter an area, and the same enemies populate in the same spots (down to the exact same quantity and encounter composition). And the variety of enemies is woefully low. In the first main story region, there were maybe 5 different wildlife enemies you could encounter. That's it. And the second main story region has yielded about another 5. It's so bad that I actually searched and found that there are 110 total normal enemies in the full list, and that includes the nearly 20 reskins/recolorations of normal human soldiers you'll face throughout the game.
Maybe if there were more random variations to the enemies that do appear (like, wolves in the initial area could spawn with mildly randomized abilities or attributes, for example) it wouldn't be so disappointing, but as it is it just feels dull and disappointing to finally encounter new enemies and then realize I'm going to be fighting the same 4-5 of them for the next ~3-4 hours with the same static encounters if I replay any areas to gather additional resources.
Speaking of resources, I hope the weapon forging stuff gets more interesting later, because so far it's just a pointlessly gussied-up replacement for simply buying the occasional new weapon at a new shop location. At least the accessory crafting shows some room for player agency and creativity, I'm looking forward to that opening up later in the game.
The 10-Hour Impressions Conclusion:
Don't let my gripes fool you -- this is a good game so far and overall I'm enjoying it. I wouldn't be so frustrated with elements of it otherwise -- it's easier to just not care when a game is overall bad. I actually think that this is the most I've enjoyed a Tales game so far (I've only ever been able to actually finish one previously, the first Xillia; any others I've tried I've dropped by the halfway mark out of losing interest or getting frustrated). Maybe that means this must be one of the least-liked by long-time series fans, though.
I'm genuinely mostly enjoying myself with the game and am happy to continue onward, though my progress will be slowing down soon!
I’m in. I’m restarting and going in hot.
I'm about 90 minutes in, and have made it to the first town. I have to say, the pacing of this is much better than Tales of Zestiria, which seemed to be a slower burn at the beginning, but then, once battle was introduced, felt like it constantly threw battle systems at me. I'm finding the world and characters compelling so far, and want to learn more about it. And, what a beautiful game, visually and musically.
I'm still on vacation for the next few days, and though I have a ton of time to play this, I'm going to try to take it slow, spend maybe an hour a day, savor it, and reflect on my early experiences here.
Farscry, love your overall impressions, and I'm excited to see how mine compare when I'm at 20 hours in!
Hello, new thread. I started this the other day. I am only about an hour in so far. I am finding the mix of animation/presentation styles interesting. Is this normal for a tales series? You have the in-world 3D stuff, the comic panel style presentation and then occasionally what feels like more hand drawn cutscene sort of thing.
I think that is normal, yeah. I've seen the comic panel style side conversations in the other Tales games that I've played, though they were more in the nature of talking heads than the more fully animated panels of this game.
When I got to my first campfire, earlier today, I got 3 side conversations that hit all at once. Felt like they were triggered out of order, too, because the 1st one definitely felt like a conversation that would have happened after the 2nd and 3rd.
What a coincidence, I also started playing this a couple of days ago. I'm liking what I see so far, though I'm only 2-3 hours in. I'm still trying to get comfortable with combat. I tend to alternate between mashing the Artes buttons until it beeps at me, then mashing attack for a while until the Artes chimes that it's refilled; I don't think that's optimal. I've been trying to get used to watching enemy attack wind-ups, and guard/parry/riposte - that's satisfying when that lands. The story is interesting so far, and looks like it has the potential to really go some places.
Based on a tutorial message I got earlier today, it seems like Artes are weakened if you do the same one within 4 moves of a prior one. I'm guessing the game wants you to build regular attacks and Artes into combos? Here's what I've been trying so far: 3 regular attacks followed by that attack that launches the me & the enemy, then 3 regular attacks (in the air) & the aerial Arte that knocks the enemy back down. Sometimes I mix in 3 regular attacks + the horizontal cut before the 3 + launch.
Just following for impressions for now. This has been on my wishlist for a while, but never really liked the combat of other Tales games I have played (aka. Tales of Berseria).
I will be jumping in shortly, hopefully either later tonight or tomorrow. I am trying to wrap up Blue Reflection before starting another JRPG so it doesn't get lost on the back burner again. I played a bit of Zestria back when it came out but dropped off because of other games that came out at the time and the only other one I played is Destiny 2 (which is actually something else) back on PS1. Excited to see what all the love is about.
I bought the game a few days ago and booted it for the first time tonight. I played maybe an hour. I can't say yet whether I like it or not, but it's pretty.
The first thing that popped into my mind when I saw the mask: How does he eat with that thing?
He does bring up the fact that it's difficult pretty early on, but doesn't go into detail.
Disappointing,
So two things:
1) I'm a silly goose who read the timestamp and not the hours played -- I stopped playing around 8pm last night (which my system/game was displaying as 20:00), which apparently I read as the hours played. D'OH. I actually had around 10 hours played as of the end of last night's session, so that makes me feel a bit better actually (I was wondering why it didn't feel like I'd actually played 20 hours).
2) I put in another couple hours tonight, and ended up running into the second big story boss like a freakin' brick wall. That was... quite a giant leap in challenge compared to basically anything in the game so far. So I dropped back to do a little xp/item farming (which I haven't actually done at all yet, so props to the game for handling pacing pretty organically so far) so I can craft up some nice upgraded accessories.
So in an update to one of my comments earlier, while the weapon forging is really just an extra step to buying weapons at a merchant so far, the accessory crafting is actually a nice bit of light RNG plus gathering up "fuel" to rank up those crafted accessories to unlock additional benefits. Should provide a solid boost to my party's capabilities along with a couple levels and some skill point investments.
Played a bit more today, and just finished the game's first real dungeon, the abandoned "castle."
I kind of love the idea that Iron Mask is confused by why Shionne cares so much about the clothes that she wears, all while marveling at the technology in the storage unit. It's clear that Shionne is invested in fashion, but also, he doesn't really seem to grasp that she wants something durable and high-tech. And hey, free rifle upgrade!
I love that, as I was coming out of the dungeon, the game gave me fast travel! The menu for it is great, too, it shows you exactly which locations have quest and subquest markers, and whether you can pick up new subquests.
Gotta finish God of War, but this will be the next in line until Jedi Survivor!
I love when games make a clever little nod to, and joke out of, JRPG tropes. The second sidequest I got, about taking down a big monster eventually, definitely made me chuckle. I googled it and eventually is, apparently, a long time from now.
I love when games make a clever little nod to, and joke out of, JRPG tropes. The second sidequest I got, about taking down a big monster eventually, definitely made me chuckle. I googled it and eventually is, apparently, a long time from now.
I left off a couple days ago right where you are now. I was actually planning to attempt that fight during my next gaming session, but I suppose I don't need to try it now. 
Yeah, I jumped into that fight out of curiosity and... that's gonna be a late-late-late-game fight. Geebus.
Also, do not sleep on crafting accessories. The game clearly expects you to make use of accessory crafting to deal with certain enemy encounters (that or you're gonna be grinding a lot of level-ups).
Edit: that's not a complaint, by the way. I actually am pleasantly surprised to see that the accessory system isn't just some vestigial limb of JRPG game design in this game!
Yeah, I jumped into that fight out of curiosity and... that's gonna be a late-late-late-game fight. Geebus.
I did the same thing. Is there a way to see the gigant levels without just jumping into the fight to see just how outmatched I am?
Also, do not sleep on crafting accessories. The game clearly expects you to make use of accessory crafting to deal with certain enemy encounters (that or you're gonna be grinding a lot of level-ups).
Edit: that's not a complaint, by the way. I actually am pleasantly surprised to see that the accessory system isn't just some vestigial limb of JRPG game design in this game!
And weapons, too! I just finished with Balseph (more on that later), but when I got a couple of key crafting items late in his castle, I was very happy to zip back to town and build the weapons that, before I left, I wasn't able to craft.
More impressions, through Calaglia / Balseph:
- For as much as this game features a lot of dialogue, I really like how propulsive the story was through the first major area. I was surprised to hear Farscry say that he was almost to the second boss in 10 hours, but then I finished with Balseph in about 5. The game introduces a lot of stuff in those 5 hours, but it never felt padded to me,
- I really like the "slaves overthrowing their oppressors" storyline. There are a lot of standard JPRG character types and tropes in this game, but the overall conceit seems like it's well done and gives the story a new, interesting angle vs. the standard Hero's Journey.
- I didn't realize how ready I was for a new JRPG until I started playing this. I'm here for the big bold characters, here for the melodrama, here for the battle system and the sidequests. Everything about this is just hitting what I want from a game, right now.
- Definitely enjoying the battle system a lot. It feels like the technique of building up combos, and combining strikes and special moves, is clicking for me in a way that it hasn't with any prior Tales game. And, I really like the integration of Boost Attacks and Boost Strikes, it feels like there's always something going on in battle. This feels both familiar and fresh in a way that reminds me of FFVII Remake.
Has anyone spent much time playing as Shionne, yet? I've only focused on Alphen (name change!) and haven't ever controlled her. But as the skill panel opens up, and I can see more options, she looks very interesting to control. I also like that the game AI seems pretty good, all things considered.
And Farscry -- I hear you on the character development. I like it, and it's working for me, but I'm not going to argue with your take, which I think is totally valid. It can be very heavy-handed at times, especially the way that Alphen's memory loss is conveniently used to prompt exposition. It reminds me a lot of the way FFX used Tidus, but I think his I'm-an-outsider story felt much more organic within the context of the game.
I've tried a little of Shionne but find her pretty dull to play. I haven't gained the artes or figured out how to use existing artes for comboing, so I just stand on the edge of the combat arena and pew pew away. I am finding Alphen much more interesting to work with.
I made it up through defeating Lord Ballsack late last night, and I agree with all of your points, LS. I’m enjoying the world so far, and the oppressive nature of that society is doing a good job of making me want to progress forward to remediate it. I’ve gotten a bit more hang of combat, though I still feel like Shionne is doing all of the heavy lifting. Also, I must have missed the tutorial for it somewhere: how do you change target lock?
I'll probably just stick with controlling Alphen through the entire game if I'm able, because I've grown relatively comfortable with playing as him and the Tales combat isn't really my thing most of the time. I think the mixture of Boost Strikes, limit breaks (I forget what they're actually called in this game), and dodge/counter opportunities is enough to keep me engaged.
I wrapped up the second story region last night and did a little backtracking to Calaglia for some component collecting that I had missed (mainly those golem things -- didn't kill enough of those to get all the weapon components needed and I'm obsessive about crafting all the weapons in case they are used for further upgrades later). Should be heading to the third region today.
I quite like the current four-person party right now overall. My complaints have been limited to the ham-fisted way some of it's been handled (and repetitiveness, though that toned back a bit in the latter half of the second region), but the characters themselves are interesting and likeable. All four of them have room to grow, giving impetus to keep following their individual stories along with the overarching narrative.
I'm still waiting for the other shoe to drop and turn this from the interesting ethno-political conflict into a more traditional "save the world from the BBEG" who I suspect we've caught a glimpse of. I just hope it doesn't completely overshadow what's made the story interesting and more grounded so far.
I made it up through defeating Lord Ballsack late last night, and I agree with all of your points, LS. I’m enjoying the world so far, and the oppressive nature of that society is doing a good job of making me want to progress forward to remediate it. I’ve gotten a bit more hang of combat, though I still feel like Shionne is doing all of the heavy lifting. Also, I must have missed the tutorial for it somewhere: how do you change target lock?
On the Playstation controller, you hold L1 and move the left joystick horizontally. Holding L1 + moving the left joystick vertically changes which character you control.
I'll probably just stick with controlling Alphen through the entire game if I'm able, because I've grown relatively comfortable with playing as him and the Tales combat isn't really my thing most of the time. I think the mixture of Boost Strikes, limit breaks (I forget what they're actually called in this game), and dodge/counter opportunities is enough to keep me engaged.
... I quite like the current four-person party right now overall. My complaints have been limited to the ham-fisted way some of it's been handled (and repetitiveness, though that toned back a bit in the latter half of the second region), but the characters themselves are interesting and likeable. All four of them have room to grow, giving impetus to keep following their individual stories along with the overarching narrative. ...
I'll be keeping my eye out for this, for sure. It's such a hard balance in storytelling, because people don't move past their trauma quickly, and so people might lash out or keep others at arms length even after growing closer to one another (like Shionne does). But at some point it needs to give way to progression.
In terms of developing characters, it worked, for me, to me, that just as Shionne was softening toward Alphen, that Rinwell came along, was obviously distrustful of Shionne, and sent Shionne right back to square one.
Spoiler:In terms of developing characters, it worked, for me, to me, that just as Shionne was softening toward Alphen, that Rinwell came along, was obviously distrustful of Shionne, and sent Shionne right back to square one.
Oh absolutely, that made perfect sense as well as serving to allow for demonstrating growth on other characters in relation to that story element. I thought it was handled quite well.
This morning I beat a discovered a useful thing for building combos, and I beat a giant zeugle!
The useful thing: if you use another party member's Boost Attack, it recharges your Artes Gauge! As far as I know, this was never said to the player, directly; rather, I found this little tidbit buried in one of the help menus as I was looking for something else. This looks like it'll be a useful way to extend combos.
Second, I beat the big fungal zeugle on the way to Cyslodia. I didn't take it on right away, but left the cave where you find it and progressed through the first new area, up to the camp site--where I got a very useful new game mechanic. Spoiler-tagging for information about the mechanic and the monster, in case you want to experience it fresh:
The new mechanic was accessory crafting, and I immediately made a few. I like the ability to combine items of different rarities to build different boosts into the accessories. "Null poison" was immediately useful vs. the fungal Zeugles as I backtracked to face the boss ...
But the boss, itself, made me wish that I had crafted one of those accessories that minimizes reduces earth damage. I also learned, after the fact, that it was weak to Wind. Makes me wish I had a wind-elemental attack for Alphen, but I haven't learned any of those yet. (Similarly, ahead of the Balseph fight, I didn't learn Shionne's ice attack ... oops.) I also think maybe the fight is intended to be for after you get a permanent 3rd party member, maybe Rinwell, as Shionne comments that she thought we weren't strong enough for it yet. Still, it felt like a fun challenge!
Anybody found a good way to make money? Apple Gels are expensive and I keep burning through them. 
I am just now heading out to the third main story region from the second main story region. I went back to the first region once I was finally allowed to backtrack as it turns out some of the materials I needed for weapon forging I was missing only drop from those rock golem enemies at the start of the game (not the armadillos), so I had to go hit the two areas they show up in a few times to get enough drops.
And without spoiling why, take my advice: forge every weapon. Don't skip any. Spoiler shows why:
I unlocked a new title (group of skills) in the Skill Upgrades for Alphen after crafting all the weapons, so I would not be surprised if there are other gameplay benefits down the road from crafting all the weapons you can.
I also spent the time to do every quest I could in the first two regions before moving on, which did involve two big bad zeugles (hence my depleted apple gel and life bottle stocks). Once I was sure I did everything I could (short of checking a FAQ -- I may do that in the endgame but I like to avoid that for a first normal playthrough of any game) I headed out. Finished my last session saved at the departure towards region #3 and I am very curious what lies in store there!
Played a good chunk today and got through the first major boss (Balseph). I was starting to feel comfortable with the combat and fights with normal enemies were going pretty well, other than a couple times getting knocked over and then getting chain attacked to death before my character even stood back up. But I went into the Balseph fight and burned through almost all my CP in the first phase since his attack timings were weird on some attacks, and some had no telegraph at all. I ended up dying in the second phase, and when the game let me retry, it started me in phase two and gave me the option to use items. Popped an Apple and Orange gel and went back to it and finished the fight. I definitely felt a little underpowered for the fight, and maybe I missed some mechanics, but it felt more like a slogfest than an interesting fight. They introduce that special attack to knock Balseph out of the air when he jumps, but I never saw the prompt for it again even though he jumped many times.
On the story side, I am slowly warming up to what they are putting down. I typically am not very fond of characters that are Very Angry (even if justified), as I have trouble relating to them. Alphen's character makes sense for his situation, just not immediately relatable or likeable to me, but I am intrigued and he is growing on me. Shionne seems like a typical tsundere, and I am just waiting for her facade to crack. The story premise is a little bit of whiplash for me since I came right off finishing Blue Reflection, which has a very different tone to it, but it is keeping my attention. I do like how quickly the story is moving, getting a major boss in 5-6 hours seems like a breath of fresh air for the genre.
I've dabbled with Shionne in combat a bit, but am mainly sticking to Alphen since I have a solid combo going with him and she seems really limited currently. Plus, if I am playing as her and want more than 1-2 arts, I have to remove her healing abilities, which feels really weird. Maybe I missed something and there's a way to use healing artes and items from a menu while in combat? It feels like I have to just let the AI handle healing.
I actually kinda liked the Balseph fight once I got a feel for the rhythm, though I mostly just blunt-forced my way through it.
The second Lord fight is just total bullsh*t though and I hated it. Spoiler advice to get past it:
I crafted four accessories that reduced Light damage and added whatever other perks I could graft onto them via the accessory crafting/enhancing, as without Light resistance the fight was absolutely unwinnable for me. Even with those accessories, I burned through most of my gels and life bottles getting through that fight. Everything that was frustrating about the Balseph fight was amped up on the second Lord's fight.
If the third Lord fight is worse, that'll be where I drop the game.
I am amazed when looking at a walkthrough as to how far I got a year or so ago. I am in Del Fharis Castle so when you folks get there I might pick it up and try to keep going.
I'm in as well. Got just past Balseph on my last play session. I turned the difficulty to easy after one wipe, I was level 7 and his big hit's were one shot kills.
I'm quite liking it so far, premise is pretty good. Seems to go at a nice clip, as Malkroth said, it's so nice to get to the first boss in the first few hours.
Howlongtobeat pegs this at 40 hours, which is just about perfect for me - I might have a chance of actually finishing this!
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