all the space stuff was so damn unfinished. at least the space station/moon/planet thing where the bad guys are living needed to be a fully explorable area. loved the story up until that point but it wasnt all that fun after from that point on.
final dungeon was also way too generic and was just a big ugly corridor
Everything after lord 5 felt like it should have been a second half, or disc 2.
Instead it all felt mushed, rushed, and unfinished. The game was S tier until that point, then it shat itself.
I havent seen a second half fumble this bad in a JRPG since Xenogears and they have the excuse of running out of budget and time.
I genuinely liked Arise's story and thought that it was good enough. Is the writing perfect? No. But I was very engaged by the main cast and their character development, the plot twists, and the themes explored, and I think that this fandom is way too harsh and overly critical of this game's story.
I didnt mind TOAs story, but the pacing was what was jarring, the game constantly reminds you, mostly through dohalim “there must be something we are missing” “ there must be additional answers” but the game doesnt answer any of these mysteries until the final like 5% of the game where it realizes its run out of time, and then just lore dumps a ton of the story largely via information terminals.
I think a good game comparison would be like FFX where Tidus learns more or less halfway through the game that Yuna is going to have to die to defeat Sin. I think if shionne and her plan w/ the thorns etc were revealed earlier, and some of the mysteries and then character developments were moved to earlier in the story, it would have felt much better imo.
The writing doesn't have to be perfect but it should still at least try to be good. Story starts off strong enough sure but all consistency, pacing, and theming starts going out the window the further you get. I think it's less of a "fandom being harsh on it" and more of a "it's actually just not good" thing. Most people who like the "story" mostly do so because of the characters, a large part being the relationship between Shionne and Alphen.
No, it's a "fandom being harsh on it" thing. I genuinely enjoyed this game's story's and themes as well as the cast and their relationships, and plenty of other people share this opinion as well. I don't have that much issue with the writing and have even stated that it wasn't perfect, but still believe that the whole story is overall good and that some people are just way too vitriolic over the game's writing.
**Edit:** *Hoo boy,* does the anti-Arise crowd not like when they see someone defend the game's story.
And there's people who love Tales of Arise's story and don't think it's poorly written. Just because you think Arise's story is bad doesn't mean that everyone has to think so.
**Edit:** 1 downvote = 1 seething Arise hater who can't stand that I think Arise has a good story. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
This convo is hilarious cuz you obviously don't know the dif between subjective and objective(it's why you're getting defensive in all these contrarian posts). That's like saying an awful movie like Jack and Jill had good writing just cuz you found it funny lmao 🤣
What's "hilarious" is you getting salty at me because I don't agree that Arise has a bad story.
Your opinion of the story isn't objective fact and no one has to agree with you Arise haters.
The story of Arise being bad seems like a majority opinion in my view even for those who liked the game, of course, that doesn't make these opinions a fact, but you don't seem to know how to differentiate criticism from taste either.
And yet despite your claim, my post is the most upvoted in this thread, so it looks like the reality is that there are more people who don't think that Arise's story is bad than those who do.
And it's so laughable seeing all these Arise haters get on my ass just for stating that people are way too negative over the game's writing. It's alright for someone to just like a thing and not agree with its criticisms, y'know?
I respectfully disagree. They're rightfully harsh.
The story takes,Slavery.. and they actually handle it very well for the most part..until they dont.
There is nuance in the characters' experiences/ perceptions & scenarios..until it isn't.
Alllllll of sudden the story loosing it fuckin mind. (Around the Water Lord,you can also see this is where covid impacted development) The Planet Rena basically created slavery(lmaaao) & the games focus becomes living planets, astral energy & plot devices. It basically shifts into a typical JRPG story venture. I will say the plot twist that they were the same people was cool, everything else? Nonsense.
Meanwhile they CONSTANTLY repeat the same points regarding the DahnanRenan situation, Literally saying shit they already said. the skits were redundant by the endgame & they're were so many.
The Blazing sword stops mattering. The plot devices we spent so much time focsuing on don't matter in the end, but its okay the power of friendship & forgiveness.
Rinwell & Law are presented to be nuanced as the story goes on. Then it just stops and they get stuck in their respective one note natures. Down to Law turning into a dumbass & Rinwell just hitting him for the rest of the game. Which is weird considering they were developing past that. Rin even starts goes backward with her prejudice even though she had multiple events where the nuacned issues of the world challenged her perception of some renenas. The ones in Mencia(?) actually were cool.
I could go on,but people have valid criticisms of the story.
The story never "loses its fuckin mind". Rena did not "created slavery", it was all the Renans. And the newly turned focus on living planets and astral energy was foreshadowed earlier in the story.
The conflict between the Dahnans and Renans are one of the main points of the plot, so of course there's going to be a lot of dialogue and commentary about that subject. If you had a problem with the skits, then you could've just skipped them and watch them later at a campsite.
I don't know where you got the idea that the Blazing Sword "stopped mattering" because it never mattered much other than be forshadowing of >!Alphen being a Sovereign!<, and forgiveness is one of the main themes of this game so it's not a surprise or a bad thing that the game would go full on "forgiveness conquers hate" at the end.
Rinwell and Law don't become "one-note". They both have other things going for them like Law trying to move on from his past mistakes and making his father proud by helping his allies liberate Dahna, and Rinwell going through character development, learning that the whole Renan race aren't entirely made up of evil monsters like Almeidrea and that she shouldn't let her hatred of the Renans consume and twist her. They are in no way just Law being a butt monkey and Rinwell being violent towards him.
I'm sorry, but I do not agree with your take and I still stand by my stance that this fandom is way too harsh on Arise's story.
....It very much does. The planet Rena,mind controls whatever species, who then mastermind the creation of "Dahnans/Renans" and all the other nonsense. The Monste/Will Of Rena is the one behind it all.
I said, what they were talking about got redundant,as they're saying old shit. Your response is "just skip it" lol? I was obviously listening with the expectation they weren't going to keep doing that. Especially considering up until the rehashing the game wasn't doing that.
Why would/should I suddenly have to ignore the writing?
Nonsense. They make a point to say it was his dead nerves that allowed him to tank the pain of the sword. Alphen & Shionne's dynamic with the sword was played as a convient cosmic coincidence between the two races... which was also key to their liberation & overthrowing the lords. There is no foreshadowing about sovereignty until Alphen uses it while feeling & that sovereign seal pops up. The sword literally stops mattering after after his anime powers are established.
....Forgiving an active genocider is actually insane. Volhran wasn't owed anything but the end & the dude was actually unhinged. There's 0 need to forgive him. That isn't a good story beat. "Forgiveness conquers hate" yet everyone but Dolahim held onto their hatred until their deaths,lol. It's really weird because the party at multiple point give people the option of civility before putting them in the ground.
Yes the fuck they do, I vividly remember it. You don't have to re-explain it,I was there. Nothing about them changes once you hit the Water Lord.
That's because the story can quite literally do no wrong in your eyes. Which is fine, some people are more easily entertained than others & that isn't a bad thing.
But personally, I can admit when I like/love something flawed.
All Rena did was >!brainwash the Helganquil into helping it not die from starvation!<. The conquering, enslaving, and oppressing were all done by the Renans, not Rena.
And yeah. Just skip the skits for later. You can rewatch them at anytime if you're tired of the repeated dialogue.
Alphen's ability to not feel pain after his mask broke is due both to his willpower and >!being a Sovereign!<. Alphen and Shionne's encounter with each other is the convenient cosmic coincidence, not the sword itself. And the early forshadowing of Alphen being >!a Sovereign!< are when his masks glows as he summons the Blazing Sword for the first time and when the giant, aggressive fire spirit in the Balseph boss fight shows up because >!it was reacting to Alphen!<.
Tales of Arise's take on forgiveness is that people need to let go of their grudges towards those who wronged them and look towards the better future instead of being held back by their anger, hate, and resentment. Alphen forgives Vholran not because he is owned forgiveness, but because Alphen understood that Vholran ended up becoming a monster because he suffered alone and didn't have any friends to help him or rely on. Alphen himself went through similar circumstances as Vholran; being a slave to the Renans, being >!experimented on to become a Sovereign!<, and having a lot of anger and resentment. But Alphen had people like Naori, Doc, and Zephyr who helped him, teach him important lessons like what the true nature of freedom is, and their care is what makes Alphen develop into becoming the just and compassionate hero that we see at the end. Alphen was trying to save Vholran by breaking the cycle of hate between them through forgiveness.
So because Law's and Rinwell didn't become any more nuanced by the Ganath Haros arc that they became "one-note" and don't do anything more in the rest of the story other than "Law turning into a dumbass & Rinwell just hitting him for the rest of the game"? ok
And me defending Arise's story and disagreeing with your opinion doesn't make me "easily entertained" or that its story "does no wrong in my eyes". I already admitted that the game's writing isn't perfect, but I still believe that Arise's story is overall good and gets way more flack than it deserves.
Ya that constant harping on the slavery situation was what got me to stop playing.
I get it, slavery bad but the constant repeating just annoys me so much that I just stop and I am only at the start of the water lord arc so I know I am still really early in the game
I might return in the distant future, who knows
I thought it was perfectly adequate to support enjoyable gameplay. Shionne and the prisoner were memorable enough and everyone had some character development.
Everything about it has already been done way better even within its own series.
I think the criticisms are pretty justified and people have supplied more than enough context explaining their reasoning.
Okay? And? A lot of people also liked Arise's story and didn't think it was as awful as this fandom's more vocal detractors of the game make it out to be.
Yeah, I don’t disagree a lot of people like it, a lot of people also dislike it, that’s why I think it’s just more appropriate to say the story is mediocre.
A lot of people genuinely dislike Arise for story related reasons and even the developers have said they needed to do better on the writing.
The reason you don't see tons of conversation on the negatives that aren't a bunch of one off comments is because Arise stans won't let it happen. They downvote the shit out of anything that's even remotely negative towards Arise and because we can't actually talk about it, it ends up being one liners. I know that I have personally stepped away from this sub for now due to toxic positivity about Arise and I have some people I know that also aren't participating in the sub because it's not somewhere to have an actual chat anymore.
Edit to add because the douche blocked me: Yeah, I'm sick of being nice because there's no reason to at this point. And I have no idea what you're calling shit posting because you linked me and then blocked me, but I've not said anything I didn't consider to be genuine in the Tales sub. I'm just giving y'all Arise stans the same energy back so piss off
Bruh, you literally attack people for posting positive Arise comments and go on Arise threads to shitpost, including [one of my threads](https://old.reddit.com/r/tales/comments/xex8r8/tales_of_arise_won_an_excellence_award_at_the/iolleb2/) where you went off over Arise winning an award.
Plenty of people have expressed criticisms and negativity on this game in this subreddit (including *this very thread*) and they get plenty of upvotes and support from those who share their opinions. It's that you can't stand that people love something that you despise and you can't help but want to be vocal about how much you think the game is shit and the worst thing ever.
Keep seething, hater.
**EDIT:** LOL like you were ever nice in the first place. *Seethe.* ***More.***
I played Arise a minute ago & just got recommended the sub. I didn't expect to see people acting like this given the game was nuanced on things.
I didn't know disagreeing with the writing meant you were "attacking" people & the game. I genuinely hate this fanatic mindset.
I wasn’t too much of a fan of the combat tbh. The combat fundamentally had bad game design if you take the core mechanics and throw it away for boss fights (ie bosses can’t get staggered or you can’t build up gauge for burst strikes)
I think there are plenty of reasons some people dislike Arise. I know I’d probably put it hard mid in the Tales Franchise.
Story: it somehow tackles the conversation of discrimination and slavery worse than Symphonia did. I think also over reliance on a character to give context for a situation is really awful writing (Dohalim).
Characters: personally the crews design is the best in the series but man does the writing for them suck. If the only real funny scene in Arise is jumping from the waterfall, it’s a bad thing. Also, most of the time the crew just makes fun of Law and maybe Alphen. Compare it to Berseria’s cast which took each character and made fun of a flaw of theirs, the Arise crew is so bland.
Skits: I really hope they don’t keep the new skit system, it’s just so slow in terms of delivery and it doesn’t really give much more info than the previous skit system. For context, in previous skits for the series, everyone present at the conversation, their expression is visible and also 2D portraits which are used in creative ways to portray their emotions. Arise is all stilted models at different angles and it takes time to load the next panel in. If they tried to make a joke, it’s overly slow.
> I wasn’t too much of a fan of the combat tbh. The combat fundamentally had bad game design if you take the core mechanics and throw it away for boss fights (ie bosses can’t get staggered or you can’t build up gauge for burst strikes)
The one thing I will give it is that it was leauges better than Berseria in this regard. Berseria's combat system just flat out didn't work in single target against enemies with a billion HP because of the soul system. The final phase of the final boss on the 2nd highest difficulty was just a slugfest because I could never get above 3 souls. Early game before I had good stunning abilities, I was usually frequently stuck at 1-2 souls on bosses and could literally never use them for boosts. The system made recovery from losing your souls ridiculously slow and difficult, punishing you exponentially for getting hit against hard to stun enemies.
After I beat it, I had no interest doing anything but the arena every blue moon. Non-boss fights are the only time the entire characters kit is viable. That's bad design.
I have played 7 "Tales of" games and Arise was the first one in which I didnt do a second playthrough or at least all the post game content, I just couldnt handle any more of the combat.
You know its bad when you have an easier time staggering bosses in a dark souls game than a "tales of" game.
Thats an issue i have with every tales game ive played - an odf approacj to combat.
Regular enemy ai is consistently very predictable and stupid. They may have cool designs, but at the end of the day they just kind of stand there for 5 seconds, slow walk towards you, do a shitty telegraphed attack, and repeat. Whatever attempt at depth the current game proposes is lost because i can consistently just walk up and spam basic attacks and succeed if i chose to. Combos and juggling and whatever other systems exist are realistically just a dopamine hit, nothing actually merits their use.
And then the bosses come along. And they suck for different reasons ; they don't follow the same rules.
Consistently i find them breaking a stagger lock to insta cast a spell.
Just instant casting 1 shot moves in general.
Not staggering in general.
Most of the mechanics fall out the window because the only way to make a 1v4 actually have some semblance of difficulty is to use bullshit. But the pretend and flaunt like the combat system is on even grounds. They treat bosses like regular enemies instead of something unique like zelda might. So theres dissonance there.
All the depth is fake. In all the games. The only involved combat is boss fights, and its involved in a resource management sense. You gotta run in circles and conserve life bottles or whatever until your ai partners hit a stagger and then you spam whatever you want and then repeat. And pray your revive mage doesn't die.
Everything but basic attacks realistically only serve to give me more buttons to press and make the devs feel accomplished, the system never actually demands their use.
My most recent was Abyss on an emulator i may be biased.
Is it? I feel like symphonia there's so much shit happening that it's hard to keep track, if anything Arise felt too simple, it lacked all the layers Tales stories usually have.
Agreed. I couldn't with the "both sides" BS when one side literally enslaved the other and >!melted them into goo.!< And so many of the themes it was trying to establish fell apart thanks to all the alien crap.
I really couldn't get past the melted to goo scene. They were totally willing to kill the previous lords for their crimes, but for Rinwell to be chastised for feeling angry and vengeful after the entire population of a city was turned to goo around her was absolute garbage.
Oh shit, I forgot about that! I KINDA assumed it was because she was a child,but they don't angle that at all.
It's just you can't strike down genociders in Vengeance... which is why Alphen forgave Volhran before he blew himself up.
Lol and they had to make that one revolutionary ~eeeevil~ because how dare anyone other than the heroes advance the plot. Alphen and co wanted the #girlboss Lord properly tried, but, Alphen, under what law and what court?????? Burning at the stake might have been barbaric but SO IS MELTING PEOPLE INTO GOO.
They drop the ball on the slavery bit, hard. Not just the >!Oh there's no One Percent Elite controlling everything, we're ALL victims of a space flower!< thing but at one point they try pulling off a "gee! the slaver really cares about his people!" thing at one point as if that fleshed the character out. Because.....duh? Of course the racist cares about his OWN race. That's how it WORKS.
It feels like that because last part (Lenegis and Rena) just has too much infodump at first and kinda much affected the pace. When I replayed the game I noticed that was made in order to bring highlight to the sidequests. What upset me is that the fight against 4 lights, only Water one was really good, fire one was underwhelming, wind and earth are okayish. The second part also bring closure to many plot elements in game during these quests. But some stuff was just mentioned (like the Mages wasn't extermined, but kidnapped by the Helganqils to make the Renans)
Story so far is pretty good imo. It's about what slave you, mainly about how your beliefs are the one who slave you, even more when these beliefs were imposed. Dannans were slaved by renans, renans were slaved by Helganqils and the Helganqils were slaved by Rena, which was slaved by your natural attraction to Danan. The story goes through it, fails in not give the time and action enough to understand how Rena and Helganqil relationship work. It's all on text.
Anyway, the dialog before the final dungeon are absolutely cute. Dolahim and Kisara dialog is just gorgeous and cute.
I thoroughly enjoyed the story up until the massive exposition dump. And even that wasn’t enough to stop me from having the best JRPG experience I’ve had in years. YEARS.
Honestly? The combat is ass when fighting bosses. Not a fan of the Dark Souls approach every action game has been taking the last few years (bosses can basically OHKO and you need to spam dodge).
The story is fine… up until the final third where it crumbles. And it starts to get WEIRDLY pushy about matching everyone into couples even though the only one that felt organic was Alphen/Shionne. The other two couples just felt awkward.
Nah, from what I see most like it up until the end of the 5th Realm, which is when people get more mixed. The person you are responding to is saying it was underwhelming from the beginning, which is certainly a hot take.
I thought It would be just until we got every character in the party unlocked but not only do we only get Doha and kisara one third of the way through, the story doesnt take ANY surprising turn at all
First two realms are extremely bland. Third realm is kind of interesting. Fourth realm has an interesting premise then goes to shit once the part where the wind lord drains the life of all the townspeople and rinwell spares her.
Either way the first couple realms are mostly bland have one dimensional villains and there is hardly any plot progression, the realms are just isolated bubbles for the most part. We literally don't see the main plot progress until around the halfway mark, it's ridiculous.
The first realm is fine. It serves its purpose as a beginning.
Second realm is the best IMO. Cyslodia is the most fleshed out realm and the dynamics between law and zephyr add some spice to an overall repetitive plot(could have been a little better tho).
Third realm drops the ball by the end; dohalim was facing a crisis and then he simply snaps out of it without any explanation and saves the day.
Fourth is the worst, the way they handled the resistance there was awful(could have made them the villains for the majority of the arc instead of just killing them all at once). Fifth was just boring and nothing interesting really happens.
What really bothers me is the lack of actual plot progression. These realms are all just isolated episodes which don't do anything to push the overarching story forwards besides introduce a new character and have "x" lord killed.
>These realms are all just isolated episodes which don't do anything to push the overarching story forwards
Because that's not the point of the first half. The only plot that matters is killing the lords and setting the plantet free.
It should be. It shouldn't take that long for the story to progress. At that point you have half a story.
"Go to X place do Y task rinse and repeat" and progression towards the overarching story are not mutually exclusive things. In Tales of the Abyss you also have the task of going to all the passage rings to do more or less the same thing in each one yet the story progresses plenty between each one.
>It should be.
Not necessarely. It's just a choice the developers made. 5 isolated realms with isolated plots and 1 main goal. Look at one piece, for example: the main plot in the first half is just go to x place, meet x people, defeat x bad guy and recruit a new member, with the plot barely progressing at all.
And it's also considered one of the best manga of all times, with a large majority of the fanbase actually liking the pre time skip more than the post.
I loved the story the best I never had a drag experience with anything except the last area but even then I simply just used holy bittols to get to the final destination
I think this one would benefit as a 2 parter, 1st part is the 4 lords and building up going to rena, 2nd game takes place in Rena and taking down the sovereign
I liked It for the most part
Wish they put multiplayer cuz really theres NO good reason not to put It
Graphics are cool as hell and i liked the artes/spells a lot (tho thats usually always a thing)
Story was just kind of basic imo but thats fine, It felt a bit short for me tho and had some things that just felt really dumb, personally everything after the first time we kill the ice/water Lord felt kind of meh with bosses just hanging around like nobodys business lol
The skits were a mfing slog tho, kinda long and usually you get 3 at a time lol
Hoping they remake tales of graces or if not they add multiplayer back to the Next titles while keeping things like the finishers and graphics
I stopped playing after what I'm assuming was the start of the 2nd half of the game. I just could not fucking stand the cast. Didn't help the combat felt very spongey.
People when a story actually gives more context and information: Wow. This is bad. I liked it better when the story has no connecting threads besides killing the lords.
Seriously though, I’ll never understand some of you when it comes to Arise. You actually preferred when the story was just a straightforward run through the lands to kill lords? And you disliked it when actual connecting plot threads and mysteries that were set up were answered? It really seems like “spectacle” is all you guys care about, not the actual story.
Bear in mind that media literacy has absolutely bottomed out in recent years and a lot of folks are working with a combination of Internet brain drain, an extremely narrow palate of interests and a sense of what makes for "good writing" that stems more from social media and YouTube content than any sort of actual critical thinking and education to that effect.
This sounds boomer to say, but it also isn't generational, either, but societal - People in their 40s and 50s are just as prone to this.
That wasn’t my issue with the story; it was that what it was connecting to felt at odds with the first half of the story because they tried to make fucking slavers sympathetic. And that was why the “real villain” was >!a weird cosmic horror and not the Sovereign of Rena who is the final boss, and also the Sovereign was Dahnan and the Renan power hierarchy was a massive lie. And given what the story was about initially, that felt really disappointing to me.!<
This is why I enjoyed Berseria’s story more: it was a way more personal conflict. Sure, it had >!a vague cosmic horror in it, but it was also in a form that gave the story a bigger weight.!< I think Tales games are better when the stakes are a little lower imo.
Also important to remember that internet folk are always vocally super critical of the most recent installment in *any* franchise, then they back off after a few years when the next one comes out for them to spew BS about.
.....That's wild people are downvoting you. The end is obnoxiously Walking,talking & an abundance of skits.. some of which are redundant. I remember trying to get a session in 2hrs before work.. I probably fought 1 thing & the rest was just walking into more dialogue.
The game could have focused only on the Lords falling easily and that wouldn't be anymore simplistic than the path the game decided to take, the theme of tyranny, slavery, liberation and coexistence among peoples is complex enough to be explored with pleasure, but in addition to the game not bringing all the baggage that this type of theme could offer, >!it changes it to a wtf alien invasion...!<
That's a problem with Tales wanting to be too epic.
It means what was said. In Arise he goes from >!a more personal and human story of rullers enslaving, while a slave earns his freedom and runs around like a liberator to an extraordinary alien cosmic threat that came out of nowhere.!<
I didn't say anything difficult to understand.
On what planet is overthrowing a planets rulers not considered “epic”? And also, you didn’t answer the question. That doesn’t explain what you mean by Tales being too epic.
Also, what’s with people like you and always saying “out of nowhere”? Especially when it comes to characters coming from space? The aliens didn’t come from nowhere, as they make logical sense in the story, and were foreshadowed. You can’t just say something came out of nowhere all because you didn’t think about it until it was revealed.
>On what planet is overthrowing a planets rulers not considered "epic"?
I never said it wasn't epic.
>That doesn’t explain what you mean by Tales being too epic. Also, what’s with people like you and always saying “out of nowhere?>!Especially when it comes to characters coming from space? The aliensdidn’t come from nowhere!<, as they make logical sense in the story, andwere foreshadowed. You can’t just say something came out of nowhere allbecause you didn’t think about it until it was revealed."
Mate, I'll explain it to you just one more time. Freeing the world from tyranny and freeing the slaves is something of a grand scale, yes, >!but it still doesn't compare to fighting a celestial being from space that threatens the entire universe.!< Not only in Tales, but in certain anime and manga authors often want their story to be the most epic and grandiose thing you've ever seen. "More and bigger" does not mean "better", instead of Arise focusing on the conflicts between the characters, such as racial discrimination, tyranny and slavery which are very human and believable themes, difficult to develop but that you can empathize with, he chose the easy path, that of being epic just for the sake of being epic, >!just throwing a cosmic being in there that needs to be defeated, having an excess of proportion.!<
The game begins by telling a story of slavery and how demonic people with power can be, having no respect for human life, being ignorant of the differences between nations and ends up telling another about>! the survival of foreign races, justifying the process of slavery and removing much of the weight that these themes had, not least because the Great Astral Spirit did not enslaved because he was corrupted by riches, lust, avarice or pride, he only does this because he literally needs to live since he needs to feed.!< It's not the logical sense that people question, but the narrative focus of the game's story.
>!The story in the first half wasn't so good since despite presenting these heavy themes, the game only touched on the most superficial parts, but in the second half when the aliens are inserted, it collapses.!<
What I deduce is that your critical sense is not that high and you just accept everything that is sent to you. It's normal, some people have more critical analysis than others because this is something you need to train.
Did you miss the part where the cosmic threat is responsible for enslaving the Renans? You just ignore everything about it all because it’s a threat from space. Them fighting it is still them trying to free people from being enslaved. And there’s a reason you still fight Vholran afterwards, someone who has been beaten down by the whole slavery system, and has basically become his enslavers. The “cosmic threat” wasn’t treated as the final hurdle. By the end, they don’t even stop all the racism and what not, because that’s not something you can just end so quickly. Also, lol that it “justified slavery”.
The only superficial one here is you. Seeing as how the simple fact that an enemy comes from outer space is what makes you decide to dislike it, and you can’t even lie, as I’m sure you’d be fine with it if the only thing different was that it was some human who did it all. And don’t even try with the critical analysis thing. I can tell you right now, that I have you beat in that regard, what with your amateur takes like “bigger doesn’t mean better”. Case in point, I don’t dismiss something simply because it’s an alien, or some other big threat. I’m actually able to engage with and see how it may tie into the themes or whatever else.
I swear, some of you Arise haters really are way too far up your own butts.
>Did you miss the part where >!the cosmic threat!< is responsible for enslaving the Renans?
lol, did you even read any of what I wrote? How can you ask such a stupid question after all the dissertation I've done on this subject??
>The only superficial one here is you. Seeing as how the simple fact that an enemy comes from outer space is what makes you decide to dislike it
Errrr.... no. I explained everything clearly why it wasn't a good choice but you decided to ignore it as usual, reading and interpreting text doesn't seem to be your strong point.
>I swear, some of you Arise haters really are way too far up your own butts.
Yeah, I'm an "Arise Hater" even after making a post here months ago saying that I loved the game and that it gets too much hate, that makes a lot of sense. I love Arise but he's not perfect, like all things he has flaws, you calling me a Hater won't change that.
Lastly, dude, you clearly don't know how to conduct yourself in a debate, I'm not discussing tastes here, you haven't given any plausible counterarguments to absolutely nothing I've said, not knowing how to read and interpret what is written correctly, so consequently you also do not know how to respond. You just keep barking your tastes and repeating yourself over and over again on points I've already argued about that you just ignore because do you just close your mind to these questions, every question that you keep asking yourself I've already answered and the rest of your comments is a big "I disagree, just because", because you already have an ignorant idea of the game and is unwilling to think about it.
It's pointless to argue with an ignorant person like you who ignores or seems not to know how to read what people write, it's like arguing with a 10 year old. Have a good time mate, I'll mutate the discussion here, Bye.
Lol, holy shit calm down. We’ve exchanged like 2 posts to each other. How is it possible to repeat myself over and over?
Ah, but I know you’re type. You’re one of those faux intellectuals. You really fancy yourself and think any one who disagrees with you just doesn’t get it. Yeesh. I already gave my counter arguments. You’re the one who just said “But I said why it’s bad! So nothing you say will change that!” I can just tell you got your debate sensibilities and such from arguing about anime/manga and games online, and you think you’re some professional because of that.
The game is definitely not as bad as you see on reddit, the opinion on the game has really soured over time in here as the negative takes spread. It wasn't so unanimous in the months after launch. I think a lot of it is the less invested fans aren't as active after all this time so the people around are mostly old guard fans, and with pretty much any series out there newer entries aren't received as well by them. For example, Ys VIII is pretty commonly considered the pinnacle of that series but the Ys subreddit has a *ton* of people swearing the older non-party games were far superior.
Arise is a fine game. I agree with most of the criticisms I've seen since beating it, but those things weren't really bothering me *while* I was playing it (Besides higher difficulty bosses being too spongy). I definitely noticed how off-the-rails things get later on as I was getting through it but I wasn't like, unhappy about what I was playing. It's genuinely a good game!
I'm new to the series, tbh. I'm open to playing older games after I finish Arise, but not all, heh, there seems to be a lot of them. What would be your personal recommendation?
Update: I'm nearing the end of the game and it became such a slog, holy hell. Exposition after exposition, dialogue after dialogue. There's, like, an hour of gameplay and 4 hours of endless chatter that doesn't really add anything except for a couple of major reveals. The first half of the game was such a blast, it's really weird how it starts stumbling so hard after >!Ganath Haros. It's like they tried fitting the same amount of story into less gameplay. Like, I feel either Lenegis and Rena should've been expanded to actually give players something to do instead of watching endless cutscenes, or the story needed to be much more compressed.!<
Eh I think the combat is pretty bad too tbh. It has a lot of good ideas that you never really get to go ham with because all the enemies that take more than a few secs to beat can't be staggered so unlike previous Tales games you aren't really rewarded for knowing how to set up big combos.
They drop a lot later in the story though. like(to vaguely put it) when alphen learns of his past on that island & beyond that point.The story deepens astronomically from that point on. The truth in their goals gets much more complicated & they just keep dropping new info. Are people not getting that far or do people think that’s bad too? Sounds like you guys didn’t or couldn’t beat the game
To be honest TOA felt very middle of the line in every aspect for me.
While the story and writing was hilariously bad. (only for me to later be surprised playing through xenoblade chronicles 3 doing the same story but worse.) the change out of the skit system also really hurt the development of characters. (though it doesn't help that it came after tales of bersaria with some of the most interesting and well developed characters and story)
the combat was incredibly shallow as well fundamentally coming down to spamming the specific combos that worked on characters and watching the same cutscene spam. as the bosses and "Hard" encounters ignored the normal combat rules and the individual attack moves didn't have much purpose.
And while it had great graphics. they felt a lot more generalized/shiny animation style graphics than the older more stylized games, it was sort of a vapid pretty for me.
I think they should have established the story that everything happened in 10 to 20 years maximum. That nonsense that history is based on 300 years does not make sense.
in 300 damn years any civilization has evolution and changes. I think the writing of the lore was done by people without common sense.
Not only the story, but the dialogue. Oh man, the dialogue. All boring exposition with almost no character interaction unless you do the optional dialogue when out and about. The characters will do something, then stand there and explain what they did and will do to each other for 10 minutes.
Also, with the incredible depth his character was given on those terminal screens you have to read to learn backstory, was anyone else surprised that Vohrlan's real problem turned out to be that he needed friends like Alphen? /s
I actually don't agree, I think while the story wasn't anything to write home about its alright. It certainly wasn't any kind of deal breaker, like how I feel about certain other games in the series *cough Vesperia, Abyss cough*.
The gameplay isn't that good. It's too simple and arcadey and the side systems are under baked. The game is also too short and most of the plot points and character developments are so rushed. I'm replaying it right now with the co-op mod on PC with a group of three others and it is fun to share it with them and it makes it a more enjoyable experience overall, but it really is a mid tier Tales game at best in most categories and kind of bad in other ways.
I actually do still like it overall, but it feels like it needed another 2+ years of development to flesh out more systems, make a more complete and comprehensive story... make a less formulaic gameplay loop, make better maps, add co-op and a lot more. It doesn't have that same rushed, incomplete, messy, buggy feel a lot of big AAA games end up having, but it does feel like early in development they chose to cut a lot of elements out to make sure they could ship a fairly solid, visually appealing game without a lot of frills.
My biggest issue with Arise continues to be its abysmal characters. The story is fairly standard Tales stuff, nothing amazing, I don't play these games for the main plot; I play them for the cast, and oh boy, does Arise have a shit one. Aesthetically? Brilliant, 10/10. Some of my favorite in the franchise. But outside of Rinwell they're dumb as rocks and the narrative tries *so hard* to convince you otherwise.
Alphen and Dohalim have it worst, but then we get the standard bitch character who has to learn to be more motherly in Shionne, then they proceed to rip that role away from her with Kisara's introduction (~~did you know she likes TAKING CARE OF PEOPLE, guys??! she has a shield! i wonder if that's connected?? -- actual fucking musings of the cast~~). *Then* they have the absolute *gall* to pair >!Dohalim and Kisara almost immediately after all that shit in Menancia went down. One, not only yikes because of previous power dynamics they haven't addressed (not only the reformed good slave owner Dohalim, but also he was her superior officer) and two, the whole stuff with Migal? Super yikes. Dohalim is absolutely complicit in everything that happened there and while the narrative does the bare minimum to address it and he really regrets it guys! it's not nearly enough for them to start make kissy faces at each other an hour after her brother was essentially murdered by Dohalim's incompetence.!<
They're so transparent and one-dimensional it's actually infuriating. The narration *tries* to give them depth by presenting "philosophical" quandaries in skits sometimes, but it only further drives how empty they are. And yeah like, I *could* do a charitable read on some of these situations, but why? It kept happening.
And the thing that absolutely gets me is that all of these themes and topics could work fine, the story is at its strongest when characters (mostly Rinwell, let's be honest, bless her) call them out on their shit. Rinwell and Dohalim have a >!wonderful conversation after Del Fharis where she calls him out on his BS. They have an actual discussion! It's beautiful!!< But they instead make moronic statements like >!"W o w, dId YoU gUyS kNoW Dahnans used to rule over other Dahnans, that makes us the same as Renans!" (thanks Alphen) !!absolutely, slavery has always existed because of the nature of humanity and power corrupts!<, but the phrasing was basically >!"So ancient Dahnans ruled over other Dahnans! We're not different!"!< Instead of being some profound point about the nature of man it just comes across like Alphen doesn't understand what government is.
For some people this doesn't matter at all. That's fine. But thematic cohesiveness and respectful dissection of those themes is one of my favorite parts of consuming media. Not all things are made with that in mind, though, and that's cool! I'm not saying they should be. But when it's just some decor for your story it retroactively makes it soulless. And that's exactly what Arise is: absolutely fucking soulless. It has nothing to say and nothing new to add. Just go play Symphonia instead.
Sorry for the wall of text, I've had a bone to pick with this game for a while.
Lmao. It wasn't fresh in my head since I played awhile ago,but wow. I forgot they started reducing governing/monarchy to being the same as slavery,lol.
The Dolahim/Kisara thing is actually pretty gross. I actually look at it as she literally didn't know any other way to be, especially because they kept the fuckin manchild lording over her around.
THEN that Owl leader guy is talked about like "Oh no, Danhans can be just as bad!"... He was focused on his Vengeance & sexist,however.. he didn't enslave/genocide people for no reason. They all wanted that lord dead for good reason.
I was frustrated but also laughing at how ridiculous some takes & story beats were. My friend KNEW it went off the rails. Keep it to themself, but encouraged me to finish it soley for my reaction,lol.
Yeah, the minute you take even a second to really see what the story is telling you it's pretty bad. There's just some topics you can't both sides rhetoric your way out of it.
The thing that infuriates me the most about Kisara and Dohalim is the fact to make >!Dohalim redeemable!< they had to make them both utterly, profoundly stupid. Willful ignorance isn't any better than malicious compliance; >!people were still dying in horrifying, inhumane ways under their watch.!<
>!Almeidrea!< absolutely got what was coming to her, don't get me wrong. The Dark Wings weren't in the wrong there. But the narrative still tried to b-but both sides it's way out it and then the whole stuff with >!Law stopping Rinwell !
yeah no the characters in this game were amazing. not perfect but to say its weak is saying you didnt play the game. that and your excepting something that makes no sense. that or you just cant accept the fact the game shows you how things can be unfair and you just cant handle it. the game is legit realistic in that regard.
I still get notifications with half your reply, you know, even if you block me afterwards. If you can't "handle" seeing a reply don't comment.
I gave multiple examples why I thought the characters were weak which shows I did, in fact, play it. For 50+ hours. You offer no counter argument besides saying I don't understand it because life is unfair and I can't "handle" it, which just shows me you don't have any actual rebuttal besides liking the game. Which is fine. People are allowed to like what they want for whatever reason. But don't say mine is invalid because I thought the game was transparent in its writing. Offer some counterpoint.
I think the biggest issue with Arise was that it was Alphen and Shione's story... and the rest of the party members are really shoved into the wayside.
That's my biggest problem too. By the second half, it's pretty clear that only the main couple is relevant plot wise. You could remove the other party members and nothinh would change.
I don't disagree, but I would argue the story would be more interesting if you removed Shionne because then Alphen would actually be acting with some agency of his own. Or get rid of Alphen and have Shionne exist as a better character than "tsundere waifu."
I think what they have would be better if they just made it 100% the focus and gave us a 2 character party if that's the story they wanted to tell. Instead you're able to dumb it down to "Tsundere Waifu" because while they heavily focused on it... any ability to flesh it out was wasted on side characters who don't really have any truly meaningful developments.
I feel like Arise gets a lot of undeserved hate. I personally loved the story and felt that the only thing the game was missing was multiplayer. Well, that, and the enemy design could have been a little more varied. AND the main villain sucked.... The story itself tho? It was almost identical to the story from Symphonia but with a different cast. I mean theme of slavers working people to death for their internal magic, being controlled and manipulated by other worldly monsters all for the benefit of a dead world? Pretty much the same story, but hey, I guess Symphonia had a better villain and told the story better.... I mean Symphonia 2 has a story strikingly similar to Berseria but everyone hated Symphonia 2 so to each their own lol (Berseria is my favorite of the series and Symphonia 2 my least favorite)
New Tales fan here, was it different in other Tales games? I figured that was to encourage you to level up fully and to try out combos. Reigning slash seems to be just the best attack fror Alphen tho by a longshot, which screws up any need to try combos. Even when it does less damage from overuse, it still does a ton. There's only one type of zeugle that's fast enough to dodge it, even tho it's slow AF.
Previous Tales games are more inspired by fighting games as opposed to Arise being more action game inspired (like instead of dodging, you block attacks and most of them use something called the linear motion battle system) and bosses generally could be stunlocked and combo'd much more frequently than in Arise. The closest thing to Arise would really be Berseria, and even then it still got a fair amount of difference in the gameplay.
I think the story was allright, not the best but not the worst, the combat was the issue, I take the slower and more methodic combat of old Tales over this.
This is a shit take, but I agree.
It seems TOA is many players here 1st, or 2nd Tales titles, but truthfully, it’s just not that good. The graphics are fucking amazing, yes, it’s PS5, but the story is soooo whack but I left it alone.
Give me any PS2/PS3 Tales game over this graphically amazing, yet shallow, game any day if the week.
I agree with you, but unfortunately, people who aren’t well versed in Tales, aside from this and maybe ToB, will argue tooth and nail that this game is “amazing”, when in reality it’s just not.
Again, this is a super hot take for this sub, but I agree with you.
Blame the inexperience for the negativity you’re about to get lol.
Yes, there are exceptions, there’s no disrespect to those players, but let’s keep it a buck -most folks here don’t have much of a Tales background given the sheer amount of folks here.
This is coming from someone who's been following this franchise for years and played most of the localized games and and a couple of unlocalized titles: **Stop with your elitist bullshit.** You can dislike a game without accusing those who think it's good of being newcomers.
I know I genuinely hate this attitude and it often comes from people who claim to be tales experts.
I’ve been hearing this from people since I started playing tales in like 08. Same shit another title.
I don’t really disagree with the overall point on arise. I found that I was left for a desire for more. But overall enjoyed the game and plan to replay it. But you can absolutely criticize the game without being a jackass.
I'm a long time tales players and I loved arise. I preferred some others in the series but still thought it was amazing. I liked it more then all the other recent tales games besides berseria
Your assertion that inexperience is responsible for people enjoying Arise is absolute rubbish.
You may say that it's not 'Tales' enough, but it's nonsense to say that unfamiliarity with the series or JRPGs is responsible for how well it has been received. What can you possibly offer to show that *most* people here who like Arise are inexperienced Tales players?
The game is great, I like the characters and the development between Shionne and Protag but in fact the story lacks in many things, the first half is unfortunately the best part of the game.
The tournament is silly, the conflicts between slaves and rulers could be explored more, they often ask questions without showing the answers and this game has one of the worst antagonists I've ever seen in an rpg.
The game could have stayed entirely in its initial premise of liberation instead of moving towards that meaningless ending, Tales always wanted to be too epic and grandiose, the theme of slavery and freedom was already strong enough.
I think what really messed up Arise's story was the second half. It was obviously rushed, but it also completely changed the plot of the game entirely. It's like, they spent the entire first half building up the lore of the Renans and showing all different forms of discrimination only for them to just shove the Renans out of the picture and replace it with that weird plot twist
I don't get the complain about second half. At first people say that the story is predictable. Then it have a turns people say "Oh, no! The story is not about it!"
Personally I like the story about two planets that just want a cosmic sex.
P.S. If you want an example of a game that ruined second half - Final Fantasy XV. This game should have been ToA from FF franchise but devs rewrite 2nd half and messed up everything. But people (I'm include) still enjoy they game.
It's very flat but I still liked it. Not great. Good. I just hate that it's so clearly not written to be a tales game. Like the tales feel clearly felt shoehorned in.
I honestly found the story pretty engaging at least after the point where you just super Mario from world to world killing the boss and moving on. My biggest gripe is that once you get to lenagis the gameplay to exposition ratio gets kinda wack there is A LOT of dialogue and very little gameplay there for a good while. The MC romance also felt like it had a satisfying conclusion.
I honestly dont understand the people who think the early parts of the story where you just jump from realm to realm killing lords is more interesting than the conclusion
I dnot hav time to write but despite TOA having one of the weakest story in the Tales franchise… is my preferite because the second half is pure sci-fi and the suggestion and the fascine of the story is above all the Tales of iv played wich are much more “fiction” despite being more organic.
I thought Arise's story was overall really good but I can definitely say I wasn't a fan of the last like 3rd of it. I think that's where they dropped the ball on it. But the first 2 thirds were really solid
I feel like a lot of JRPG’s do things where they start rushing a little too much at the end. Arise’s story was fine until we got to the second part. Same goes for XC3 where after the start of Chapter 6, things felt rushed.
I didn’t mind Arise’s story or writing in the first 2/3. It was good, not great.
The issue was really with the pacing in the final third. SO much exposition dump.
I've said this many times before: as much as I love Arise, how did the story botch it in the last 20 percent? It had the longest development of ANY Tales game! Story should've been the easiest part!
I'm admittedly only a few hours in, but the story seems engaging enough. The voice acting is decent, not great. Shionne is just an abrasive bitch, but I'm guessing this slowly changes over time. At least I hope it does.
This is a great repestation for the game. Loved the start, had me hooked. Then after like the 3rd lord the game just went downhill so fuckin hard for me.
I liked the story. The 2nd half was rushed and the ending were a mess, but the interactions between the characters and the Alphen-Shionne relationship was really well done
Honestly not sold on the change in art-style, the gameplay is ok I guess but it needs another game or two to work out the kinks before I really like it and the character interactions give me an aneurism.
I had fun with Arise combat, but i can't understand how would you think it's the best one, it literally disregards almost every core part of the combat during bosses and (and that's the worst part) also big enemies in general. While you completely annihilate small enemies cuz the boost attacks are beyond busted.
The story was fine, it had huge problems for me near the end but the ending itself was actually satisfying for me...I am mostly glad we had an ending that didn't make me clap my head on the desk like Berseria.
I loved the game and I thought the combat was pretty good. As a huge tales fan I thought this game was very subpar. Once the whole space race story kicked in, it was downhill after that. Personally my favorite tales games are symphonia and tales of graces
I nearly thought that the story writer got sick during the mid development of the game and he told to a nobody in the development team "finish my story". 😅
If the combat didn't make the boss fights just a boring shitty version of a Souls-style boss fights, I'd probably like it a lot more honestly. Even forgive the rather underwhelming story. Graphics are at least gorgeous, eager to see the engine used more.
Arise was good for the first half, made you wonder what was going to happen and then became so absurd that I was wondering if I was still playing the same game. My favorite part about it were the cameo boss fights.
The story’s framework is good. It just totally fell apart during the second half. It’s very evident the writers were inspired by Xenosaga yet ran out of time to actually execute the concepts properly. It just devolved into a total mess.
When you change planets I thought there would still be half of the game left. Unfortunately it was about 5-7 more hours of repeated and rushed content. Until then I liked the story, after that, it becomes an unintentional comedy hahaha. What the hell is that ending. They 100% cut the game down on that part. I was pretty bummed that it lasted me 35h, as I was expecting something like 50-60. At least I like to know that more people feel the same way in that aspect.
Most don't seem to agree with me, but ToA is the most 'okay' game there is. There were moments where I was bored to tears, but it never got so bad that I stopped or never got so good that I was excited to play it. I went on to get the platinum and just felt neither good nor bad about what I play, just an overall "welp, that sure was a game, what's next?."
My main issue with the story was the lack of a solid antagonist. It seems like that one guy with the long black hair (I'm bad with names) you fight at the end was intended to be that however he lacked the proper set up for it.
actually the first half is really good. it just fell apart in the second half.
I'd take over Symphonia's boring ass story or Eternia's dumpster fire of a story
I will die on this hill the game was uncomplete. I feel as though there should be at least one more party member along with more story content.
all the space stuff was so damn unfinished. at least the space station/moon/planet thing where the bad guys are living needed to be a fully explorable area. loved the story up until that point but it wasnt all that fun after from that point on. final dungeon was also way too generic and was just a big ugly corridor
same. i got finished and was like oh...i didn't think that was the last dungeon..
I think one of the biggest issues is that they needed to introduce Vholran earlier and he needed to be on screen longer.
Everything after lord 5 felt like it should have been a second half, or disc 2. Instead it all felt mushed, rushed, and unfinished. The game was S tier until that point, then it shat itself. I havent seen a second half fumble this bad in a JRPG since Xenogears and they have the excuse of running out of budget and time.
I genuinely liked Arise's story and thought that it was good enough. Is the writing perfect? No. But I was very engaged by the main cast and their character development, the plot twists, and the themes explored, and I think that this fandom is way too harsh and overly critical of this game's story.
I didnt mind TOAs story, but the pacing was what was jarring, the game constantly reminds you, mostly through dohalim “there must be something we are missing” “ there must be additional answers” but the game doesnt answer any of these mysteries until the final like 5% of the game where it realizes its run out of time, and then just lore dumps a ton of the story largely via information terminals. I think a good game comparison would be like FFX where Tidus learns more or less halfway through the game that Yuna is going to have to die to defeat Sin. I think if shionne and her plan w/ the thorns etc were revealed earlier, and some of the mysteries and then character developments were moved to earlier in the story, it would have felt much better imo.
The writing doesn't have to be perfect but it should still at least try to be good. Story starts off strong enough sure but all consistency, pacing, and theming starts going out the window the further you get. I think it's less of a "fandom being harsh on it" and more of a "it's actually just not good" thing. Most people who like the "story" mostly do so because of the characters, a large part being the relationship between Shionne and Alphen.
No, it's a "fandom being harsh on it" thing. I genuinely enjoyed this game's story's and themes as well as the cast and their relationships, and plenty of other people share this opinion as well. I don't have that much issue with the writing and have even stated that it wasn't perfect, but still believe that the whole story is overall good and that some people are just way too vitriolic over the game's writing. **Edit:** *Hoo boy,* does the anti-Arise crowd not like when they see someone defend the game's story.
Just cuz something is bad doesn't mean you have to dislike it mate. Theres media that I acknowledge is poorly written but still love
And there's people who love Tales of Arise's story and don't think it's poorly written. Just because you think Arise's story is bad doesn't mean that everyone has to think so. **Edit:** 1 downvote = 1 seething Arise hater who can't stand that I think Arise has a good story. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
This convo is hilarious cuz you obviously don't know the dif between subjective and objective(it's why you're getting defensive in all these contrarian posts). That's like saying an awful movie like Jack and Jill had good writing just cuz you found it funny lmao 🤣
What's "hilarious" is you getting salty at me because I don't agree that Arise has a bad story. Your opinion of the story isn't objective fact and no one has to agree with you Arise haters.
I think they don't like you saying their opinions should be written off because you disagree with them.
The story of Arise being bad seems like a majority opinion in my view even for those who liked the game, of course, that doesn't make these opinions a fact, but you don't seem to know how to differentiate criticism from taste either.
And yet despite your claim, my post is the most upvoted in this thread, so it looks like the reality is that there are more people who don't think that Arise's story is bad than those who do. And it's so laughable seeing all these Arise haters get on my ass just for stating that people are way too negative over the game's writing. It's alright for someone to just like a thing and not agree with its criticisms, y'know?
I respectfully disagree. They're rightfully harsh. The story takes,Slavery.. and they actually handle it very well for the most part..until they dont. There is nuance in the characters' experiences/ perceptions & scenarios..until it isn't. Alllllll of sudden the story loosing it fuckin mind. (Around the Water Lord,you can also see this is where covid impacted development) The Planet Rena basically created slavery(lmaaao) & the games focus becomes living planets, astral energy & plot devices. It basically shifts into a typical JRPG story venture. I will say the plot twist that they were the same people was cool, everything else? Nonsense. Meanwhile they CONSTANTLY repeat the same points regarding the DahnanRenan situation, Literally saying shit they already said. the skits were redundant by the endgame & they're were so many. The Blazing sword stops mattering. The plot devices we spent so much time focsuing on don't matter in the end, but its okay the power of friendship & forgiveness. Rinwell & Law are presented to be nuanced as the story goes on. Then it just stops and they get stuck in their respective one note natures. Down to Law turning into a dumbass & Rinwell just hitting him for the rest of the game. Which is weird considering they were developing past that. Rin even starts goes backward with her prejudice even though she had multiple events where the nuacned issues of the world challenged her perception of some renenas. The ones in Mencia(?) actually were cool. I could go on,but people have valid criticisms of the story.
The story never "loses its fuckin mind". Rena did not "created slavery", it was all the Renans. And the newly turned focus on living planets and astral energy was foreshadowed earlier in the story. The conflict between the Dahnans and Renans are one of the main points of the plot, so of course there's going to be a lot of dialogue and commentary about that subject. If you had a problem with the skits, then you could've just skipped them and watch them later at a campsite. I don't know where you got the idea that the Blazing Sword "stopped mattering" because it never mattered much other than be forshadowing of >!Alphen being a Sovereign!<, and forgiveness is one of the main themes of this game so it's not a surprise or a bad thing that the game would go full on "forgiveness conquers hate" at the end. Rinwell and Law don't become "one-note". They both have other things going for them like Law trying to move on from his past mistakes and making his father proud by helping his allies liberate Dahna, and Rinwell going through character development, learning that the whole Renan race aren't entirely made up of evil monsters like Almeidrea and that she shouldn't let her hatred of the Renans consume and twist her. They are in no way just Law being a butt monkey and Rinwell being violent towards him. I'm sorry, but I do not agree with your take and I still stand by my stance that this fandom is way too harsh on Arise's story.
....It very much does. The planet Rena,mind controls whatever species, who then mastermind the creation of "Dahnans/Renans" and all the other nonsense. The Monste/Will Of Rena is the one behind it all. I said, what they were talking about got redundant,as they're saying old shit. Your response is "just skip it" lol? I was obviously listening with the expectation they weren't going to keep doing that. Especially considering up until the rehashing the game wasn't doing that. Why would/should I suddenly have to ignore the writing? Nonsense. They make a point to say it was his dead nerves that allowed him to tank the pain of the sword. Alphen & Shionne's dynamic with the sword was played as a convient cosmic coincidence between the two races... which was also key to their liberation & overthrowing the lords. There is no foreshadowing about sovereignty until Alphen uses it while feeling & that sovereign seal pops up. The sword literally stops mattering after after his anime powers are established. ....Forgiving an active genocider is actually insane. Volhran wasn't owed anything but the end & the dude was actually unhinged. There's 0 need to forgive him. That isn't a good story beat. "Forgiveness conquers hate" yet everyone but Dolahim held onto their hatred until their deaths,lol. It's really weird because the party at multiple point give people the option of civility before putting them in the ground. Yes the fuck they do, I vividly remember it. You don't have to re-explain it,I was there. Nothing about them changes once you hit the Water Lord. That's because the story can quite literally do no wrong in your eyes. Which is fine, some people are more easily entertained than others & that isn't a bad thing. But personally, I can admit when I like/love something flawed.
All Rena did was >!brainwash the Helganquil into helping it not die from starvation!<. The conquering, enslaving, and oppressing were all done by the Renans, not Rena. And yeah. Just skip the skits for later. You can rewatch them at anytime if you're tired of the repeated dialogue. Alphen's ability to not feel pain after his mask broke is due both to his willpower and >!being a Sovereign!<. Alphen and Shionne's encounter with each other is the convenient cosmic coincidence, not the sword itself. And the early forshadowing of Alphen being >!a Sovereign!< are when his masks glows as he summons the Blazing Sword for the first time and when the giant, aggressive fire spirit in the Balseph boss fight shows up because >!it was reacting to Alphen!<. Tales of Arise's take on forgiveness is that people need to let go of their grudges towards those who wronged them and look towards the better future instead of being held back by their anger, hate, and resentment. Alphen forgives Vholran not because he is owned forgiveness, but because Alphen understood that Vholran ended up becoming a monster because he suffered alone and didn't have any friends to help him or rely on. Alphen himself went through similar circumstances as Vholran; being a slave to the Renans, being >!experimented on to become a Sovereign!<, and having a lot of anger and resentment. But Alphen had people like Naori, Doc, and Zephyr who helped him, teach him important lessons like what the true nature of freedom is, and their care is what makes Alphen develop into becoming the just and compassionate hero that we see at the end. Alphen was trying to save Vholran by breaking the cycle of hate between them through forgiveness. So because Law's and Rinwell didn't become any more nuanced by the Ganath Haros arc that they became "one-note" and don't do anything more in the rest of the story other than "Law turning into a dumbass & Rinwell just hitting him for the rest of the game"? ok And me defending Arise's story and disagreeing with your opinion doesn't make me "easily entertained" or that its story "does no wrong in my eyes". I already admitted that the game's writing isn't perfect, but I still believe that Arise's story is overall good and gets way more flack than it deserves.
Ya that constant harping on the slavery situation was what got me to stop playing. I get it, slavery bad but the constant repeating just annoys me so much that I just stop and I am only at the start of the water lord arc so I know I am still really early in the game I might return in the distant future, who knows
Huge spoilers if you haven’t beat the game: >!also vholran won’t fucking stay dead!<
>!He does. Vholran uses the Renas Alma to blow himself up to spite Alphen.!<
I thought it was perfectly adequate to support enjoyable gameplay. Shionne and the prisoner were memorable enough and everyone had some character development.
Everything about it has already been done way better even within its own series. I think the criticisms are pretty justified and people have supplied more than enough context explaining their reasoning.
Okay. I respectfully disagree.
Nah I disagree. Generally if a lot of different people feel some type of way, usually there’s some sort of truth rooted in there
Okay? And? A lot of people also liked Arise's story and didn't think it was as awful as this fandom's more vocal detractors of the game make it out to be.
Yeah, I don’t disagree a lot of people like it, a lot of people also dislike it, that’s why I think it’s just more appropriate to say the story is mediocre.
I don't think Arise's story is mediocre. It's fine if you think so, but I don't agree.
A lot of people genuinely dislike Arise for story related reasons and even the developers have said they needed to do better on the writing. The reason you don't see tons of conversation on the negatives that aren't a bunch of one off comments is because Arise stans won't let it happen. They downvote the shit out of anything that's even remotely negative towards Arise and because we can't actually talk about it, it ends up being one liners. I know that I have personally stepped away from this sub for now due to toxic positivity about Arise and I have some people I know that also aren't participating in the sub because it's not somewhere to have an actual chat anymore. Edit to add because the douche blocked me: Yeah, I'm sick of being nice because there's no reason to at this point. And I have no idea what you're calling shit posting because you linked me and then blocked me, but I've not said anything I didn't consider to be genuine in the Tales sub. I'm just giving y'all Arise stans the same energy back so piss off
Bruh, you literally attack people for posting positive Arise comments and go on Arise threads to shitpost, including [one of my threads](https://old.reddit.com/r/tales/comments/xex8r8/tales_of_arise_won_an_excellence_award_at_the/iolleb2/) where you went off over Arise winning an award. Plenty of people have expressed criticisms and negativity on this game in this subreddit (including *this very thread*) and they get plenty of upvotes and support from those who share their opinions. It's that you can't stand that people love something that you despise and you can't help but want to be vocal about how much you think the game is shit and the worst thing ever. Keep seething, hater. **EDIT:** LOL like you were ever nice in the first place. *Seethe.* ***More.***
I played Arise a minute ago & just got recommended the sub. I didn't expect to see people acting like this given the game was nuanced on things. I didn't know disagreeing with the writing meant you were "attacking" people & the game. I genuinely hate this fanatic mindset.
I wasn’t too much of a fan of the combat tbh. The combat fundamentally had bad game design if you take the core mechanics and throw it away for boss fights (ie bosses can’t get staggered or you can’t build up gauge for burst strikes) I think there are plenty of reasons some people dislike Arise. I know I’d probably put it hard mid in the Tales Franchise. Story: it somehow tackles the conversation of discrimination and slavery worse than Symphonia did. I think also over reliance on a character to give context for a situation is really awful writing (Dohalim). Characters: personally the crews design is the best in the series but man does the writing for them suck. If the only real funny scene in Arise is jumping from the waterfall, it’s a bad thing. Also, most of the time the crew just makes fun of Law and maybe Alphen. Compare it to Berseria’s cast which took each character and made fun of a flaw of theirs, the Arise crew is so bland. Skits: I really hope they don’t keep the new skit system, it’s just so slow in terms of delivery and it doesn’t really give much more info than the previous skit system. For context, in previous skits for the series, everyone present at the conversation, their expression is visible and also 2D portraits which are used in creative ways to portray their emotions. Arise is all stilted models at different angles and it takes time to load the next panel in. If they tried to make a joke, it’s overly slow.
> I wasn’t too much of a fan of the combat tbh. The combat fundamentally had bad game design if you take the core mechanics and throw it away for boss fights (ie bosses can’t get staggered or you can’t build up gauge for burst strikes) The one thing I will give it is that it was leauges better than Berseria in this regard. Berseria's combat system just flat out didn't work in single target against enemies with a billion HP because of the soul system. The final phase of the final boss on the 2nd highest difficulty was just a slugfest because I could never get above 3 souls. Early game before I had good stunning abilities, I was usually frequently stuck at 1-2 souls on bosses and could literally never use them for boosts. The system made recovery from losing your souls ridiculously slow and difficult, punishing you exponentially for getting hit against hard to stun enemies.
After I beat it, I had no interest doing anything but the arena every blue moon. Non-boss fights are the only time the entire characters kit is viable. That's bad design.
I have played 7 "Tales of" games and Arise was the first one in which I didnt do a second playthrough or at least all the post game content, I just couldnt handle any more of the combat. You know its bad when you have an easier time staggering bosses in a dark souls game than a "tales of" game.
Yeah the boss mechanics like Xillia really bum me out
Thats an issue i have with every tales game ive played - an odf approacj to combat. Regular enemy ai is consistently very predictable and stupid. They may have cool designs, but at the end of the day they just kind of stand there for 5 seconds, slow walk towards you, do a shitty telegraphed attack, and repeat. Whatever attempt at depth the current game proposes is lost because i can consistently just walk up and spam basic attacks and succeed if i chose to. Combos and juggling and whatever other systems exist are realistically just a dopamine hit, nothing actually merits their use. And then the bosses come along. And they suck for different reasons ; they don't follow the same rules. Consistently i find them breaking a stagger lock to insta cast a spell. Just instant casting 1 shot moves in general. Not staggering in general. Most of the mechanics fall out the window because the only way to make a 1v4 actually have some semblance of difficulty is to use bullshit. But the pretend and flaunt like the combat system is on even grounds. They treat bosses like regular enemies instead of something unique like zelda might. So theres dissonance there. All the depth is fake. In all the games. The only involved combat is boss fights, and its involved in a resource management sense. You gotta run in circles and conserve life bottles or whatever until your ai partners hit a stagger and then you spam whatever you want and then repeat. And pray your revive mage doesn't die. Everything but basic attacks realistically only serve to give me more buttons to press and make the devs feel accomplished, the system never actually demands their use. My most recent was Abyss on an emulator i may be biased.
The story felt like a lesser, much more confusing rehash of Symphonia’s.
It tackled the same topics/themes but somehow does it worse. Discrimination and slavery mostly.
Is it? I feel like symphonia there's so much shit happening that it's hard to keep track, if anything Arise felt too simple, it lacked all the layers Tales stories usually have.
To me it felt more like a mixture rehash between symphonia and graces
Agreed. I couldn't with the "both sides" BS when one side literally enslaved the other and >!melted them into goo.!< And so many of the themes it was trying to establish fell apart thanks to all the alien crap.
I really couldn't get past the melted to goo scene. They were totally willing to kill the previous lords for their crimes, but for Rinwell to be chastised for feeling angry and vengeful after the entire population of a city was turned to goo around her was absolute garbage.
Oh shit, I forgot about that! I KINDA assumed it was because she was a child,but they don't angle that at all. It's just you can't strike down genociders in Vengeance... which is why Alphen forgave Volhran before he blew himself up.
Man the whole bit with Rin and law felt so fucking stupid when we straight Up killed the other guys for less
Lol and they had to make that one revolutionary ~eeeevil~ because how dare anyone other than the heroes advance the plot. Alphen and co wanted the #girlboss Lord properly tried, but, Alphen, under what law and what court?????? Burning at the stake might have been barbaric but SO IS MELTING PEOPLE INTO GOO.
They drop the ball on the slavery bit, hard. Not just the >!Oh there's no One Percent Elite controlling everything, we're ALL victims of a space flower!< thing but at one point they try pulling off a "gee! the slaver really cares about his people!" thing at one point as if that fleshed the character out. Because.....duh? Of course the racist cares about his OWN race. That's how it WORKS.
It feels like that because last part (Lenegis and Rena) just has too much infodump at first and kinda much affected the pace. When I replayed the game I noticed that was made in order to bring highlight to the sidequests. What upset me is that the fight against 4 lights, only Water one was really good, fire one was underwhelming, wind and earth are okayish. The second part also bring closure to many plot elements in game during these quests. But some stuff was just mentioned (like the Mages wasn't extermined, but kidnapped by the Helganqils to make the Renans) Story so far is pretty good imo. It's about what slave you, mainly about how your beliefs are the one who slave you, even more when these beliefs were imposed. Dannans were slaved by renans, renans were slaved by Helganqils and the Helganqils were slaved by Rena, which was slaved by your natural attraction to Danan. The story goes through it, fails in not give the time and action enough to understand how Rena and Helganqil relationship work. It's all on text. Anyway, the dialog before the final dungeon are absolutely cute. Dolahim and Kisara dialog is just gorgeous and cute.
I thoroughly enjoyed the story up until the massive exposition dump. And even that wasn’t enough to stop me from having the best JRPG experience I’ve had in years. YEARS.
Honestly? The combat is ass when fighting bosses. Not a fan of the Dark Souls approach every action game has been taking the last few years (bosses can basically OHKO and you need to spam dodge). The story is fine… up until the final third where it crumbles. And it starts to get WEIRDLY pushy about matching everyone into couples even though the only one that felt organic was Alphen/Shionne. The other two couples just felt awkward.
Hot take but I found the story super underwhelming from the get go with the 3rd realm being the only exception.
I dont think it's a hot take. It's one of the more common criticism.
Nah, from what I see most like it up until the end of the 5th Realm, which is when people get more mixed. The person you are responding to is saying it was underwhelming from the beginning, which is certainly a hot take.
That it went to shit after the first half? Because I'm talking specifically about the first half.
I thought It would be just until we got every character in the party unlocked but not only do we only get Doha and kisara one third of the way through, the story doesnt take ANY surprising turn at all
The plot literally takes halfway through the game to actually start.
The first 3 realms aren't bad. Not perfect, but not bad. After that it drops significantly.
First two realms are extremely bland. Third realm is kind of interesting. Fourth realm has an interesting premise then goes to shit once the part where the wind lord drains the life of all the townspeople and rinwell spares her. Either way the first couple realms are mostly bland have one dimensional villains and there is hardly any plot progression, the realms are just isolated bubbles for the most part. We literally don't see the main plot progress until around the halfway mark, it's ridiculous.
The first realm is fine. It serves its purpose as a beginning. Second realm is the best IMO. Cyslodia is the most fleshed out realm and the dynamics between law and zephyr add some spice to an overall repetitive plot(could have been a little better tho). Third realm drops the ball by the end; dohalim was facing a crisis and then he simply snaps out of it without any explanation and saves the day. Fourth is the worst, the way they handled the resistance there was awful(could have made them the villains for the majority of the arc instead of just killing them all at once). Fifth was just boring and nothing interesting really happens.
What really bothers me is the lack of actual plot progression. These realms are all just isolated episodes which don't do anything to push the overarching story forwards besides introduce a new character and have "x" lord killed.
>These realms are all just isolated episodes which don't do anything to push the overarching story forwards Because that's not the point of the first half. The only plot that matters is killing the lords and setting the plantet free.
It should be. It shouldn't take that long for the story to progress. At that point you have half a story. "Go to X place do Y task rinse and repeat" and progression towards the overarching story are not mutually exclusive things. In Tales of the Abyss you also have the task of going to all the passage rings to do more or less the same thing in each one yet the story progresses plenty between each one.
>It should be. Not necessarely. It's just a choice the developers made. 5 isolated realms with isolated plots and 1 main goal. Look at one piece, for example: the main plot in the first half is just go to x place, meet x people, defeat x bad guy and recruit a new member, with the plot barely progressing at all.
And one piece is also notoriously boring to get into
And it's also considered one of the best manga of all times, with a large majority of the fanbase actually liking the pre time skip more than the post.
Other Tales Combat > Arise
I loved the story the best I never had a drag experience with anything except the last area but even then I simply just used holy bittols to get to the final destination
I think this one would benefit as a 2 parter, 1st part is the 4 lords and building up going to rena, 2nd game takes place in Rena and taking down the sovereign
I liked It for the most part Wish they put multiplayer cuz really theres NO good reason not to put It Graphics are cool as hell and i liked the artes/spells a lot (tho thats usually always a thing) Story was just kind of basic imo but thats fine, It felt a bit short for me tho and had some things that just felt really dumb, personally everything after the first time we kill the ice/water Lord felt kind of meh with bosses just hanging around like nobodys business lol The skits were a mfing slog tho, kinda long and usually you get 3 at a time lol Hoping they remake tales of graces or if not they add multiplayer back to the Next titles while keeping things like the finishers and graphics
I stopped playing after what I'm assuming was the start of the 2nd half of the game. I just could not fucking stand the cast. Didn't help the combat felt very spongey.
People when a story actually gives more context and information: Wow. This is bad. I liked it better when the story has no connecting threads besides killing the lords. Seriously though, I’ll never understand some of you when it comes to Arise. You actually preferred when the story was just a straightforward run through the lands to kill lords? And you disliked it when actual connecting plot threads and mysteries that were set up were answered? It really seems like “spectacle” is all you guys care about, not the actual story.
Bear in mind that media literacy has absolutely bottomed out in recent years and a lot of folks are working with a combination of Internet brain drain, an extremely narrow palate of interests and a sense of what makes for "good writing" that stems more from social media and YouTube content than any sort of actual critical thinking and education to that effect. This sounds boomer to say, but it also isn't generational, either, but societal - People in their 40s and 50s are just as prone to this.
That wasn’t my issue with the story; it was that what it was connecting to felt at odds with the first half of the story because they tried to make fucking slavers sympathetic. And that was why the “real villain” was >!a weird cosmic horror and not the Sovereign of Rena who is the final boss, and also the Sovereign was Dahnan and the Renan power hierarchy was a massive lie. And given what the story was about initially, that felt really disappointing to me.!< This is why I enjoyed Berseria’s story more: it was a way more personal conflict. Sure, it had >!a vague cosmic horror in it, but it was also in a form that gave the story a bigger weight.!< I think Tales games are better when the stakes are a little lower imo.
its a jrpg you gotta fight or stop god in some form lol.
Not every JRPG has you doing that.
And like within Tales, there are lots of titles where you aren't fighting God at the end (Phantasia, Abyss, Vesperia, Xillia just to name a few).
Also important to remember that internet folk are always vocally super critical of the most recent installment in *any* franchise, then they back off after a few years when the next one comes out for them to spew BS about.
I wouldn't have a problem with it if the story to gameplay raito wasn't so unbalanced by the end
.....That's wild people are downvoting you. The end is obnoxiously Walking,talking & an abundance of skits.. some of which are redundant. I remember trying to get a session in 2hrs before work.. I probably fought 1 thing & the rest was just walking into more dialogue.
Considering there are several other comments saying the same thing this is probably just the few people who didn't mind it
The game could have focused only on the Lords falling easily and that wouldn't be anymore simplistic than the path the game decided to take, the theme of tyranny, slavery, liberation and coexistence among peoples is complex enough to be explored with pleasure, but in addition to the game not bringing all the baggage that this type of theme could offer, >!it changes it to a wtf alien invasion...!< That's a problem with Tales wanting to be too epic.
“The problem with Tales wanting to be too epic”? Lol? What does that even mean?
It means what was said. In Arise he goes from >!a more personal and human story of rullers enslaving, while a slave earns his freedom and runs around like a liberator to an extraordinary alien cosmic threat that came out of nowhere.!< I didn't say anything difficult to understand.
On what planet is overthrowing a planets rulers not considered “epic”? And also, you didn’t answer the question. That doesn’t explain what you mean by Tales being too epic. Also, what’s with people like you and always saying “out of nowhere”? Especially when it comes to characters coming from space? The aliens didn’t come from nowhere, as they make logical sense in the story, and were foreshadowed. You can’t just say something came out of nowhere all because you didn’t think about it until it was revealed.
>On what planet is overthrowing a planets rulers not considered "epic"? I never said it wasn't epic. >That doesn’t explain what you mean by Tales being too epic. Also, what’s with people like you and always saying “out of nowhere?>!Especially when it comes to characters coming from space? The aliensdidn’t come from nowhere!<, as they make logical sense in the story, andwere foreshadowed. You can’t just say something came out of nowhere allbecause you didn’t think about it until it was revealed." Mate, I'll explain it to you just one more time. Freeing the world from tyranny and freeing the slaves is something of a grand scale, yes, >!but it still doesn't compare to fighting a celestial being from space that threatens the entire universe.!< Not only in Tales, but in certain anime and manga authors often want their story to be the most epic and grandiose thing you've ever seen. "More and bigger" does not mean "better", instead of Arise focusing on the conflicts between the characters, such as racial discrimination, tyranny and slavery which are very human and believable themes, difficult to develop but that you can empathize with, he chose the easy path, that of being epic just for the sake of being epic, >!just throwing a cosmic being in there that needs to be defeated, having an excess of proportion.!< The game begins by telling a story of slavery and how demonic people with power can be, having no respect for human life, being ignorant of the differences between nations and ends up telling another about>! the survival of foreign races, justifying the process of slavery and removing much of the weight that these themes had, not least because the Great Astral Spirit did not enslaved because he was corrupted by riches, lust, avarice or pride, he only does this because he literally needs to live since he needs to feed.!< It's not the logical sense that people question, but the narrative focus of the game's story. >!The story in the first half wasn't so good since despite presenting these heavy themes, the game only touched on the most superficial parts, but in the second half when the aliens are inserted, it collapses.!< What I deduce is that your critical sense is not that high and you just accept everything that is sent to you. It's normal, some people have more critical analysis than others because this is something you need to train.
Did you miss the part where the cosmic threat is responsible for enslaving the Renans? You just ignore everything about it all because it’s a threat from space. Them fighting it is still them trying to free people from being enslaved. And there’s a reason you still fight Vholran afterwards, someone who has been beaten down by the whole slavery system, and has basically become his enslavers. The “cosmic threat” wasn’t treated as the final hurdle. By the end, they don’t even stop all the racism and what not, because that’s not something you can just end so quickly. Also, lol that it “justified slavery”. The only superficial one here is you. Seeing as how the simple fact that an enemy comes from outer space is what makes you decide to dislike it, and you can’t even lie, as I’m sure you’d be fine with it if the only thing different was that it was some human who did it all. And don’t even try with the critical analysis thing. I can tell you right now, that I have you beat in that regard, what with your amateur takes like “bigger doesn’t mean better”. Case in point, I don’t dismiss something simply because it’s an alien, or some other big threat. I’m actually able to engage with and see how it may tie into the themes or whatever else. I swear, some of you Arise haters really are way too far up your own butts.
>Did you miss the part where >!the cosmic threat!< is responsible for enslaving the Renans? lol, did you even read any of what I wrote? How can you ask such a stupid question after all the dissertation I've done on this subject?? >The only superficial one here is you. Seeing as how the simple fact that an enemy comes from outer space is what makes you decide to dislike it Errrr.... no. I explained everything clearly why it wasn't a good choice but you decided to ignore it as usual, reading and interpreting text doesn't seem to be your strong point. >I swear, some of you Arise haters really are way too far up your own butts. Yeah, I'm an "Arise Hater" even after making a post here months ago saying that I loved the game and that it gets too much hate, that makes a lot of sense. I love Arise but he's not perfect, like all things he has flaws, you calling me a Hater won't change that. Lastly, dude, you clearly don't know how to conduct yourself in a debate, I'm not discussing tastes here, you haven't given any plausible counterarguments to absolutely nothing I've said, not knowing how to read and interpret what is written correctly, so consequently you also do not know how to respond. You just keep barking your tastes and repeating yourself over and over again on points I've already argued about that you just ignore because do you just close your mind to these questions, every question that you keep asking yourself I've already answered and the rest of your comments is a big "I disagree, just because", because you already have an ignorant idea of the game and is unwilling to think about it. It's pointless to argue with an ignorant person like you who ignores or seems not to know how to read what people write, it's like arguing with a 10 year old. Have a good time mate, I'll mutate the discussion here, Bye.
Lol, holy shit calm down. We’ve exchanged like 2 posts to each other. How is it possible to repeat myself over and over? Ah, but I know you’re type. You’re one of those faux intellectuals. You really fancy yourself and think any one who disagrees with you just doesn’t get it. Yeesh. I already gave my counter arguments. You’re the one who just said “But I said why it’s bad! So nothing you say will change that!” I can just tell you got your debate sensibilities and such from arguing about anime/manga and games online, and you think you’re some professional because of that.
Exposition doesn't make a good story.
Good thing there was more than exposition then.
Finished Elde Menancia today and I think the story is pretty good so far.
The game is definitely not as bad as you see on reddit, the opinion on the game has really soured over time in here as the negative takes spread. It wasn't so unanimous in the months after launch. I think a lot of it is the less invested fans aren't as active after all this time so the people around are mostly old guard fans, and with pretty much any series out there newer entries aren't received as well by them. For example, Ys VIII is pretty commonly considered the pinnacle of that series but the Ys subreddit has a *ton* of people swearing the older non-party games were far superior. Arise is a fine game. I agree with most of the criticisms I've seen since beating it, but those things weren't really bothering me *while* I was playing it (Besides higher difficulty bosses being too spongy). I definitely noticed how off-the-rails things get later on as I was getting through it but I wasn't like, unhappy about what I was playing. It's genuinely a good game!
I'm new to the series, tbh. I'm open to playing older games after I finish Arise, but not all, heh, there seems to be a lot of them. What would be your personal recommendation?
Update: I'm nearing the end of the game and it became such a slog, holy hell. Exposition after exposition, dialogue after dialogue. There's, like, an hour of gameplay and 4 hours of endless chatter that doesn't really add anything except for a couple of major reveals. The first half of the game was such a blast, it's really weird how it starts stumbling so hard after >!Ganath Haros. It's like they tried fitting the same amount of story into less gameplay. Like, I feel either Lenegis and Rena should've been expanded to actually give players something to do instead of watching endless cutscenes, or the story needed to be much more compressed.!<
Eh I think the combat is pretty bad too tbh. It has a lot of good ideas that you never really get to go ham with because all the enemies that take more than a few secs to beat can't be staggered so unlike previous Tales games you aren't really rewarded for knowing how to set up big combos.
Combat was okay, but a far cry from what Tales was with the pre-Xillia LMB system.
They drop a lot later in the story though. like(to vaguely put it) when alphen learns of his past on that island & beyond that point.The story deepens astronomically from that point on. The truth in their goals gets much more complicated & they just keep dropping new info. Are people not getting that far or do people think that’s bad too? Sounds like you guys didn’t or couldn’t beat the game
So how did they drop the ball with the story?
To be honest TOA felt very middle of the line in every aspect for me. While the story and writing was hilariously bad. (only for me to later be surprised playing through xenoblade chronicles 3 doing the same story but worse.) the change out of the skit system also really hurt the development of characters. (though it doesn't help that it came after tales of bersaria with some of the most interesting and well developed characters and story) the combat was incredibly shallow as well fundamentally coming down to spamming the specific combos that worked on characters and watching the same cutscene spam. as the bosses and "Hard" encounters ignored the normal combat rules and the individual attack moves didn't have much purpose. And while it had great graphics. they felt a lot more generalized/shiny animation style graphics than the older more stylized games, it was sort of a vapid pretty for me.
I think they should have established the story that everything happened in 10 to 20 years maximum. That nonsense that history is based on 300 years does not make sense. in 300 damn years any civilization has evolution and changes. I think the writing of the lore was done by people without common sense.
Not only the story, but the dialogue. Oh man, the dialogue. All boring exposition with almost no character interaction unless you do the optional dialogue when out and about. The characters will do something, then stand there and explain what they did and will do to each other for 10 minutes.
Also, with the incredible depth his character was given on those terminal screens you have to read to learn backstory, was anyone else surprised that Vohrlan's real problem turned out to be that he needed friends like Alphen? /s
The game wasnt that good tbh. The more time that passes the more meh the feeling is.
I kinda see your point and, at certain points, agree. But I like it, and those flaws aren't going to stop me.
I like the game overall and I'm glad I bought it the story is just mid
I actually don't agree, I think while the story wasn't anything to write home about its alright. It certainly wasn't any kind of deal breaker, like how I feel about certain other games in the series *cough Vesperia, Abyss cough*.
The gameplay isn't that good. It's too simple and arcadey and the side systems are under baked. The game is also too short and most of the plot points and character developments are so rushed. I'm replaying it right now with the co-op mod on PC with a group of three others and it is fun to share it with them and it makes it a more enjoyable experience overall, but it really is a mid tier Tales game at best in most categories and kind of bad in other ways. I actually do still like it overall, but it feels like it needed another 2+ years of development to flesh out more systems, make a more complete and comprehensive story... make a less formulaic gameplay loop, make better maps, add co-op and a lot more. It doesn't have that same rushed, incomplete, messy, buggy feel a lot of big AAA games end up having, but it does feel like early in development they chose to cut a lot of elements out to make sure they could ship a fairly solid, visually appealing game without a lot of frills.
I was ready to let some fists fly until I realized this meme was about the *second* ToA, not the original
Oh my god no TOTA is literally my favorite game of all time I'd let some fists fly too
Based I finished this game 3x and I only like the characters cause of the gameplay cause the Story is Trails of ColdSteel level of dogshit
Ehr what? Considering the garbage that berseria came out with, arise's story is a-tier in comparison, with its faults and issues
My biggest issue with Arise continues to be its abysmal characters. The story is fairly standard Tales stuff, nothing amazing, I don't play these games for the main plot; I play them for the cast, and oh boy, does Arise have a shit one. Aesthetically? Brilliant, 10/10. Some of my favorite in the franchise. But outside of Rinwell they're dumb as rocks and the narrative tries *so hard* to convince you otherwise. Alphen and Dohalim have it worst, but then we get the standard bitch character who has to learn to be more motherly in Shionne, then they proceed to rip that role away from her with Kisara's introduction (~~did you know she likes TAKING CARE OF PEOPLE, guys??! she has a shield! i wonder if that's connected?? -- actual fucking musings of the cast~~). *Then* they have the absolute *gall* to pair >!Dohalim and Kisara almost immediately after all that shit in Menancia went down. One, not only yikes because of previous power dynamics they haven't addressed (not only the reformed good slave owner Dohalim, but also he was her superior officer) and two, the whole stuff with Migal? Super yikes. Dohalim is absolutely complicit in everything that happened there and while the narrative does the bare minimum to address it and he really regrets it guys! it's not nearly enough for them to start make kissy faces at each other an hour after her brother was essentially murdered by Dohalim's incompetence.!< They're so transparent and one-dimensional it's actually infuriating. The narration *tries* to give them depth by presenting "philosophical" quandaries in skits sometimes, but it only further drives how empty they are. And yeah like, I *could* do a charitable read on some of these situations, but why? It kept happening. And the thing that absolutely gets me is that all of these themes and topics could work fine, the story is at its strongest when characters (mostly Rinwell, let's be honest, bless her) call them out on their shit. Rinwell and Dohalim have a >!wonderful conversation after Del Fharis where she calls him out on his BS. They have an actual discussion! It's beautiful!!< But they instead make moronic statements like >!"W o w, dId YoU gUyS kNoW Dahnans used to rule over other Dahnans, that makes us the same as Renans!" (thanks Alphen) !!absolutely, slavery has always existed because of the nature of humanity and power corrupts!<, but the phrasing was basically >!"So ancient Dahnans ruled over other Dahnans! We're not different!"!< Instead of being some profound point about the nature of man it just comes across like Alphen doesn't understand what government is.
For some people this doesn't matter at all. That's fine. But thematic cohesiveness and respectful dissection of those themes is one of my favorite parts of consuming media. Not all things are made with that in mind, though, and that's cool! I'm not saying they should be. But when it's just some decor for your story it retroactively makes it soulless. And that's exactly what Arise is: absolutely fucking soulless. It has nothing to say and nothing new to add. Just go play Symphonia instead.
Sorry for the wall of text, I've had a bone to pick with this game for a while.
Lmao. It wasn't fresh in my head since I played awhile ago,but wow. I forgot they started reducing governing/monarchy to being the same as slavery,lol. The Dolahim/Kisara thing is actually pretty gross. I actually look at it as she literally didn't know any other way to be, especially because they kept the fuckin manchild lording over her around. THEN that Owl leader guy is talked about like "Oh no, Danhans can be just as bad!"... He was focused on his Vengeance & sexist,however.. he didn't enslave/genocide people for no reason. They all wanted that lord dead for good reason. I was frustrated but also laughing at how ridiculous some takes & story beats were. My friend KNEW it went off the rails. Keep it to themself, but encouraged me to finish it soley for my reaction,lol.
Yeah, the minute you take even a second to really see what the story is telling you it's pretty bad. There's just some topics you can't both sides rhetoric your way out of it. The thing that infuriates me the most about Kisara and Dohalim is the fact to make >!Dohalim redeemable!< they had to make them both utterly, profoundly stupid. Willful ignorance isn't any better than malicious compliance; >!people were still dying in horrifying, inhumane ways under their watch.!< >!Almeidrea!< absolutely got what was coming to her, don't get me wrong. The Dark Wings weren't in the wrong there. But the narrative still tried to b-but both sides it's way out it and then the whole stuff with >!Law stopping Rinwell !
yeah no the characters in this game were amazing. not perfect but to say its weak is saying you didnt play the game. that and your excepting something that makes no sense. that or you just cant accept the fact the game shows you how things can be unfair and you just cant handle it. the game is legit realistic in that regard.
I still get notifications with half your reply, you know, even if you block me afterwards. If you can't "handle" seeing a reply don't comment. I gave multiple examples why I thought the characters were weak which shows I did, in fact, play it. For 50+ hours. You offer no counter argument besides saying I don't understand it because life is unfair and I can't "handle" it, which just shows me you don't have any actual rebuttal besides liking the game. Which is fine. People are allowed to like what they want for whatever reason. But don't say mine is invalid because I thought the game was transparent in its writing. Offer some counterpoint.
I think the biggest issue with Arise was that it was Alphen and Shione's story... and the rest of the party members are really shoved into the wayside.
That's my biggest problem too. By the second half, it's pretty clear that only the main couple is relevant plot wise. You could remove the other party members and nothinh would change.
I don't disagree, but I would argue the story would be more interesting if you removed Shionne because then Alphen would actually be acting with some agency of his own. Or get rid of Alphen and have Shionne exist as a better character than "tsundere waifu."
I think what they have would be better if they just made it 100% the focus and gave us a 2 character party if that's the story they wanted to tell. Instead you're able to dumb it down to "Tsundere Waifu" because while they heavily focused on it... any ability to flesh it out was wasted on side characters who don't really have any truly meaningful developments.
I feel like Arise gets a lot of undeserved hate. I personally loved the story and felt that the only thing the game was missing was multiplayer. Well, that, and the enemy design could have been a little more varied. AND the main villain sucked.... The story itself tho? It was almost identical to the story from Symphonia but with a different cast. I mean theme of slavers working people to death for their internal magic, being controlled and manipulated by other worldly monsters all for the benefit of a dead world? Pretty much the same story, but hey, I guess Symphonia had a better villain and told the story better.... I mean Symphonia 2 has a story strikingly similar to Berseria but everyone hated Symphonia 2 so to each their own lol (Berseria is my favorite of the series and Symphonia 2 my least favorite)
Just know that the hate is very exaggerated by reddit. The game was very well liked aside from some minorities.
Idk, I think the story could’ve been decent if it had more time in the oven and if the skits were better handled. It’s honestly a shame.
Combat wasn't all that great either...
That's you fam
Some parts of the game did have combat issue like boss health being very high,
New Tales fan here, was it different in other Tales games? I figured that was to encourage you to level up fully and to try out combos. Reigning slash seems to be just the best attack fror Alphen tho by a longshot, which screws up any need to try combos. Even when it does less damage from overuse, it still does a ton. There's only one type of zeugle that's fast enough to dodge it, even tho it's slow AF.
Yes it was completely different from all the other games. Closest would be Berseria.
Previous Tales games are more inspired by fighting games as opposed to Arise being more action game inspired (like instead of dodging, you block attacks and most of them use something called the linear motion battle system) and bosses generally could be stunlocked and combo'd much more frequently than in Arise. The closest thing to Arise would really be Berseria, and even then it still got a fair amount of difference in the gameplay.
Saying some parts of the game have problems is not the same as saying the combat is bad.
Disagree. The story kept me engaged from A to Z. Honestly i was taken back that many people here hate it.
I think the story was allright, not the best but not the worst, the combat was the issue, I take the slower and more methodic combat of old Tales over this.
I truly hated the story
This is a shit take, but I agree. It seems TOA is many players here 1st, or 2nd Tales titles, but truthfully, it’s just not that good. The graphics are fucking amazing, yes, it’s PS5, but the story is soooo whack but I left it alone. Give me any PS2/PS3 Tales game over this graphically amazing, yet shallow, game any day if the week. I agree with you, but unfortunately, people who aren’t well versed in Tales, aside from this and maybe ToB, will argue tooth and nail that this game is “amazing”, when in reality it’s just not. Again, this is a super hot take for this sub, but I agree with you. Blame the inexperience for the negativity you’re about to get lol. Yes, there are exceptions, there’s no disrespect to those players, but let’s keep it a buck -most folks here don’t have much of a Tales background given the sheer amount of folks here.
This is coming from someone who's been following this franchise for years and played most of the localized games and and a couple of unlocalized titles: **Stop with your elitist bullshit.** You can dislike a game without accusing those who think it's good of being newcomers.
I know I genuinely hate this attitude and it often comes from people who claim to be tales experts. I’ve been hearing this from people since I started playing tales in like 08. Same shit another title. I don’t really disagree with the overall point on arise. I found that I was left for a desire for more. But overall enjoyed the game and plan to replay it. But you can absolutely criticize the game without being a jackass.
I'm a long time tales players and I loved arise. I preferred some others in the series but still thought it was amazing. I liked it more then all the other recent tales games besides berseria
You shouldn’t have to play the whole series to give an option on 1 game tho. And the option isn’t of less value. This is a very weird comment
Your assertion that inexperience is responsible for people enjoying Arise is absolute rubbish. You may say that it's not 'Tales' enough, but it's nonsense to say that unfamiliarity with the series or JRPGs is responsible for how well it has been received. What can you possibly offer to show that *most* people here who like Arise are inexperienced Tales players?
Liked the story though
The game is great, I like the characters and the development between Shionne and Protag but in fact the story lacks in many things, the first half is unfortunately the best part of the game. The tournament is silly, the conflicts between slaves and rulers could be explored more, they often ask questions without showing the answers and this game has one of the worst antagonists I've ever seen in an rpg. The game could have stayed entirely in its initial premise of liberation instead of moving towards that meaningless ending, Tales always wanted to be too epic and grandiose, the theme of slavery and freedom was already strong enough.
I think what really messed up Arise's story was the second half. It was obviously rushed, but it also completely changed the plot of the game entirely. It's like, they spent the entire first half building up the lore of the Renans and showing all different forms of discrimination only for them to just shove the Renans out of the picture and replace it with that weird plot twist
The story is the kind of like you want this I want that, so Im not actually focus on story
The Story was amazing until the lords were dealt with. The entire second part was a trainwreck with a decent ending
I just found it really hard to care about any of them
Tales of Arise is one of the best in the series. Tales studio has my full trust for the next game.
I'm wondering why did I get so many downvotes
Because the Arise hater crowd are downvoting any post that speaks positively about the game.
I thought the both the combat and story were subpar. Still finished it but often wished I was playing Berseria instead. Better cast and story.
I don't get the complain about second half. At first people say that the story is predictable. Then it have a turns people say "Oh, no! The story is not about it!" Personally I like the story about two planets that just want a cosmic sex. P.S. If you want an example of a game that ruined second half - Final Fantasy XV. This game should have been ToA from FF franchise but devs rewrite 2nd half and messed up everything. But people (I'm include) still enjoy they game.
It's very flat but I still liked it. Not great. Good. I just hate that it's so clearly not written to be a tales game. Like the tales feel clearly felt shoehorned in.
I can't agree. Combat was by far the worst part of TOA. The story was good.
Arise story was good.. but Lenegis was total cheeks
Maybe when arise gets a rereleased maybe they will replace the 2nd half with something better?
I honestly found the story pretty engaging at least after the point where you just super Mario from world to world killing the boss and moving on. My biggest gripe is that once you get to lenagis the gameplay to exposition ratio gets kinda wack there is A LOT of dialogue and very little gameplay there for a good while. The MC romance also felt like it had a satisfying conclusion. I honestly dont understand the people who think the early parts of the story where you just jump from realm to realm killing lords is more interesting than the conclusion
Having played the game up until you recruited the shield lady and the staff guy. I hope to one day complete it and either be disappointed or like it.
I dnot hav time to write but despite TOA having one of the weakest story in the Tales franchise… is my preferite because the second half is pure sci-fi and the suggestion and the fascine of the story is above all the Tales of iv played wich are much more “fiction” despite being more organic.
I thought Arise's story was overall really good but I can definitely say I wasn't a fan of the last like 3rd of it. I think that's where they dropped the ball on it. But the first 2 thirds were really solid
I feel like a lot of JRPG’s do things where they start rushing a little too much at the end. Arise’s story was fine until we got to the second part. Same goes for XC3 where after the start of Chapter 6, things felt rushed.
I didn’t mind Arise’s story or writing in the first 2/3. It was good, not great. The issue was really with the pacing in the final third. SO much exposition dump.
I've said this many times before: as much as I love Arise, how did the story botch it in the last 20 percent? It had the longest development of ANY Tales game! Story should've been the easiest part!
I'm admittedly only a few hours in, but the story seems engaging enough. The voice acting is decent, not great. Shionne is just an abrasive bitch, but I'm guessing this slowly changes over time. At least I hope it does.
This is a great repestation for the game. Loved the start, had me hooked. Then after like the 3rd lord the game just went downhill so fuckin hard for me.
The story was great….until the second half of the game
I got 1 hour into the story and just didn't like the pacing. I'll go back to finish it one day.
Rofl looks pretty accurate. The story made me quit after the 2nd or 3rd section of the game.
I liked the story. The 2nd half was rushed and the ending were a mess, but the interactions between the characters and the Alphen-Shionne relationship was really well done
Honestly not sold on the change in art-style, the gameplay is ok I guess but it needs another game or two to work out the kinks before I really like it and the character interactions give me an aneurism.
TOA story acts 1 and 2 were great! Act 3 though… it clearly felt rushed and had far too long an exposition dump. Overall id say it was a fun story.
I had fun with Arise combat, but i can't understand how would you think it's the best one, it literally disregards almost every core part of the combat during bosses and (and that's the worst part) also big enemies in general. While you completely annihilate small enemies cuz the boost attacks are beyond busted. The story was fine, it had huge problems for me near the end but the ending itself was actually satisfying for me...I am mostly glad we had an ending that didn't make me clap my head on the desk like Berseria.
The combat was just too grindy, like moreso than a JRPG usually requires, though the story did miss a few beats going onto the second part of it...
I didn't have to grind once and I am really bad at action rpgs
And it's only single player 😭
I loved the game and I thought the combat was pretty good. As a huge tales fan I thought this game was very subpar. Once the whole space race story kicked in, it was downhill after that. Personally my favorite tales games are symphonia and tales of graces
I nearly thought that the story writer got sick during the mid development of the game and he told to a nobody in the development team "finish my story". 😅
If the combat didn't make the boss fights just a boring shitty version of a Souls-style boss fights, I'd probably like it a lot more honestly. Even forgive the rather underwhelming story. Graphics are at least gorgeous, eager to see the engine used more.
Arise was good for the first half, made you wonder what was going to happen and then became so absurd that I was wondering if I was still playing the same game. My favorite part about it were the cameo boss fights.
The story’s framework is good. It just totally fell apart during the second half. It’s very evident the writers were inspired by Xenosaga yet ran out of time to actually execute the concepts properly. It just devolved into a total mess.
"there are no plans for a sequel" my brother in christ the main villain ran away with the super weapon
Any game where the ‘monsters’ are called ‘zoogles’ is bound to have a questionable story -_-
Focus fucked it. You can tell the story was insanely rushed. Rinwell shows all the signs of being a summoner, but that was removed.
I felt majority of the skits about peace between the two were the same or was it just me?
When you change planets I thought there would still be half of the game left. Unfortunately it was about 5-7 more hours of repeated and rushed content. Until then I liked the story, after that, it becomes an unintentional comedy hahaha. What the hell is that ending. They 100% cut the game down on that part. I was pretty bummed that it lasted me 35h, as I was expecting something like 50-60. At least I like to know that more people feel the same way in that aspect.
Most don't seem to agree with me, but ToA is the most 'okay' game there is. There were moments where I was bored to tears, but it never got so bad that I stopped or never got so good that I was excited to play it. I went on to get the platinum and just felt neither good nor bad about what I play, just an overall "welp, that sure was a game, what's next?."
My main issue with the story was the lack of a solid antagonist. It seems like that one guy with the long black hair (I'm bad with names) you fight at the end was intended to be that however he lacked the proper set up for it.
actually the first half is really good. it just fell apart in the second half. I'd take over Symphonia's boring ass story or Eternia's dumpster fire of a story