Tales or symphonia: or the unexpected virtue of are you the final boss yet for fucks sake
The title of this post makes my opinion of this game sound way lower then it is overall. I could write a complex through and through of the whole thing, but im way too lazy for that, so here is a simple rundown of things I liked and disliked instead.
-Characters go somewhat beyond just anime stereotypes and by the end I actually liked most of them.
-Combat is simple enough to be casually fun, but does require a degree of strategy adjustment in bosses and such. I also ended up using items a lot more then I do in most JRPG’s.
-The title system is neat and I like how it actually changes npc dialogue. Unfortunately I only realized that it does so at the end of the game.
-Just looking around for stuff on the map was fun. Especially for the dialogue hotspots since it rewards you with some neat dialogue.
-Everything is nice and colourful. With how drap a lot of games are these days, this was very refreshing.
-The whole thing was just overall nicely optimistic, without being straight up childish.
-Lloyd is just kinda bland. He suffers from the jrpg protagonist problem of having a personality that leaves him open for any of the relationship choices you go with, so he does not come off very focused.
-The world is too small! It fucks up my immersion when you are trying to save a world that’s about the size of a town in northern Lapland. I can get over it with the world map, but even the towns are just tiny as shit and there are really not enough of them to make the world feel like an unified civilisation.
-The difficulty curve was not that tight. The challenge was pretty on point most of the game, but by the end I was just having Raine heal and three guys attack on frontlines and most things just sorta feel apart, including bosses.
-I would not say it was exactly too long, but the pacing kinda dragged by the end. There were like 3 bosses in the endgame that I thought would be the final boss, but then they just were not. This was definately my biggest gripe with the game.
-The whole relationship system is not theat well balanced. I was aiming for Sheena though out the whole thing (I was roleplaying, ok? I thought Lloyd was 15 till I checked the wiki), but instead I got the totally heterosexual journey with Regal ending.
-The villain was stupid as shit.
-The plot was overly confusing for no real reason. By the end I was just sort of going along with it.
-Sheena and Raine are real fine and all, but the graphical style really makes all of the fanservice very ineffective.
-Suprisingly I did not dislike Colette by the end and I even kinda liked Presea. Never liked Zelos though.
-The “racisim is bad” message was nice and all, but I feel it comes off as a bit phony when the entire cast does not have even one coloured person. reality subtext and all. C+ for effort.
Very enjoyable, if a bit overambitious and overlong. Will try some of the other games in the series.
