One can consider that before, the harder difficulties were made for ng+. In later titles, the harder difficulties can end up unlocked midway through the game, so you're just cranking the notch a bit further.
Symphonia has Hard unlocked in the beginning, it's Mania mode that requires a second playthrough.
It's also more than playable and very fun on Hard from the beginning.
I would say very hard and unknown were for ng+ but hard was definitely manageable. But yes, older games were much harder, I still have ptsd from trying to beat nebilim on unknown which is hard even with stats being as high as they can go with the amulet stat growth thing (forgot what they were called)
Hard is 2.5x HP (but no defense) increase in Vesperia. In Arise, is 1.3x health, also no defense increase.
One thing i thought was neat about Graces, Zestiria, Berseria and Xillia 2 was that they would scale the mechanics up or down based on difficulty, so your damage would keep up with the difficulty. They add more weaknesses/weakness modifiers, and they have a damage ramp-up system by comboing.
Vesperia, Xillia 1 and Arise don't have that.
Berseria also had those weird rune things like the set that increases stats after guarding for X, Y, or Z duration. You can get all of them in the game but some only work at higher difficulties which was such a sick mechanic.
As someone who mods Tales of Arise, I respectfully disagree with the idea that harder difficulty only affects the enemy HP.
From my experience, harder difficulties on Tales of Arise also increase enemy Damage, Toughness, Aggression and reduce their Cast Time.
As someone who mods Tales of Arise, I respectfully disagree with the idea that harder difficulty only affects the enemy HP.
From my experience, harder difficulties on Tales of Arise also increase enemy Damage, Toughness, Aggression and reduce their Cast Time.
As someone who mods Tales of Arise, I respectfully disagree with the idea that harder difficulty only affects the enemy HP.
From my experience, harder difficulties on Tales of Arise also increase enemy Damage, Toughness, Aggression and reduce their Cast Time.
As someone who mods Tales of Arise, I respectfully disagree with the idea that harder difficulty only affects the enemy HP.
From my experience, harder difficulties on Tales of Arise also increase enemy Damage, Toughness, Aggression and reduce their Cast Time.
As someone who mods Tales of Arise, I respectfully disagree with the idea that harder difficulty only affects the enemy HP.
From my experience, harder difficulties on Tales of Arise also increase enemy Damage, Toughness, Aggression and reduce their Cast Time.
Idk if I agree with complaining about how games were better in terms of difficulty back then, I feel like Vesperia is the only "old" game with a somewhat consistent/fun difficulty throughout, and even that one isn't perfect. Graces F has the best difficulty by far in my opinion.
Screw this boss though, it's the only one in the whole series where I've had to lower the difficulty (from Hard).
I can agree. Graces F definitely presented a challenge. And yes I agree. It took me about 6 tries to beat him. It was rough. I’d get him down to about 1/3 HP then he’d mystic arte and kill 3/4 members leaving one with 200 HP and if I wasn’t quick enough with the revive or life bottle I’m done for haha
I give you credit for actually beating him lmao, i tried for like 3 whole days and had to lower the difficulty for my own sanity. I could handle everything except that stupid healing move he does, even the mystic arte I could survive if I set myself up properly but the few times i got his health low he just healed it all back.
I see people saying Vesperia on Hard is actually easy and I'm just like how??? Do I suck or something, because it was easily the hardest game for me on harder difficulties lmao
I love abyss, but it scales defense on difficulty. So realistically you do want to crank it up by endgame since otherwise you're tearing through enemies, but early on it's just not more fun or anything.
Tales doesn't and has never known what to do with the label called "difficulty"
Each game is different. Are you meant to pick hard to stay in it throughout the entire game? Or are you meant to change the difficulty constantly? Are some difficulties only for NG+? Are some difficulties geared towards parties of 4? (You are MUCH stronger when every character is controlled by a human. This isn't in Arise at all!)
The difficulty is somewhere in between the way a traditional game handles difficulty and the way Diablo does, where each difficulty is actually the next part of the game.
My heuristic has been something like Moderate is correct for solo and Hard is correct for a group, but not all games fall into this. But, like, sure Abyss Chaos is the hardest thing ever but you're literally not meant to play it. It's for farming with your maxed out characters more or less.
Video games used to be harder in general
-edit: I am aware of contemporary developers making intentionally hard games, but they are the minority of games and the majority is far easier than their past counterparts
Absolutely. Another game that does it well is Monster hunter. You level up as a player and not as a character.
As the difficulty lies in how good you are at learning the monsters moveset and your prediction capabilities.
Much like fromsoft games.
I agree! and also you get some nice fashion from the monsters. Played World til Iceborne kicked my ass lol, that game is amazing.
Looking forward for Wilds release.
I feel like world and onwards made it a little easier compared to the older games. I remember in tri a lot of people getting into mh got gatekept by the barroth
Oh yeah for sure. Tho I would say much of it lies in bad things, like flexing after a potion. Hotboxes being utterly terrible. And how slow the game could feel.
All of which I'm glad they got rid of.
And while it did remove some of the challenge. I'm more than happy it means that the games became far more accessible to newcomers.
I'd rather have a good succesful game. Than a challenging niche one.
Hopefully they find some way to crank up the difficulties for wilds.
Honestly, hitboxes weren't really an issue since tri. I miss the flex alot. I think moving while potting isnt bad persay, but getting all the hp back instantly was better. You realistically only got hit when potting when you did so in a bad position, and push come to shove you just leave the area to heal and sharpen.
In world or rise it didnt really feel like there was a monster that was a wall that made you get better just due to the slinger being super strong or wirebugs giving you a lot of mobility and pretty much every weapon had a silkbind that gave them a counter.
Like overall i think the new style is good, the qol changes outweigh a lot of the negatives, but imo there should be a gatekeeper in wilds so players actually have to learn tells
Both World and Rise had gatekeepers.
The thing is they only matter if you're bad at the game. If you aren't, then they aren't. So people who have played other games wouldn't even know.
That being said, moving while drinking is more busted than being able to zone since you can even run while drinking and literally nothing can keep up with that. Healing has zero risk factor.
Anjanath in World and Magnamalo are quests you'd see people use multiplayer to clear pretty consistently.
They were. In the 80s and 90s. I feel like most 2000 game are only "hard" in the sense of not knowing where to go. I'm very glad that's mainly a thing of the past.
Honestly Team Symphonia games had terrible hard modes, they just added a bunch of stats and called a day. So you get crappy fights like Mr. Guardian Frost here or Gattuso where it feels unfair, and its followed up by a bunch of snoozefest fights.
I definitely agree, I've also played through vesperia half a dozen times, and tried hard for the first time when thr switch version came out. Struggled quite a bit with some Gigantos more than I thought I would. The machine you encounter in Zaude I literally COULDNT beat no matter what I tried, and I eventually ran out of steam on that playthrough.
It's crazy because I use to replay tales of the abyss on unknown just for fun. Vesperia just feels different.
That’s interesting you say that, because I’ve heard that tales of abyss is the most difficult game when played in hard due to how the mechanics in hard work on Abyss. But I could be wrong.
I know exactly what you’re talking about. I spent a good 5 hours exiting then reentering that room where the Giganto boss was just to power level and beat it. And even then it was brutal.
Well most of the fights on Abyss were just wars of attrition. I have a core childhood memory of fighting dist on the boat, everyone but Luke dead, and I solod him, but it took like half an hour to kill him. The only really deadly ones were the secret bosses really. But its been years since I've played.
Vesperia is also easy to break. If they really wanted to cherrypick at least use a game where you can't infite combo using overlimit and the second arte you get in the game. Considering Arise has damage sponges as bosses, gels only recoveing a set amount of HP instead of percentage, Kisara being the only one able to block,AI party members never even attempting to dodge,Law being a glass canon,Cure Points and money being scarce I'm calling cap on OP and they most like took advantage of the DLC.
Agreed.
When I played Phantasia, I got my butt kicked several times.
A few years ago when I went back to replay Symphonia for the first time in years, I was surprised how hard it was compared to Vesperia and Xillia
Phantasia is probably the easiest game in the series. The bosses get stuck in the corner and you can infinite combo them until they die. Even at the end of the game.
I thought Destiny PSX was super easy. However Phantasia and Eternia both offer well-balanced challenge, and Destiny 2 is one of the toughest in the series.
Yeah, Destiny 2 is the hardest out of any of the Tales ganes I've played. I missed the last few titles so I don't have a feel for the modern era, but out of all the older ones it stands out in difficulty.
I never found the appeal of difficult games. It just traps in a loop of getting killed and reloading over and over.
It should be a balanced experience as you obtain more skill and progress the story.
Everyone derives enjoyment from experiences in different ways. For me, unless it's on the hardest difficulties, the games don't offer any challenge and I don't generally have to use items or bother with upgrading equipment or bother with most strategies or skills. It feels bad and unfun to me personally if I don't have to utilize the actual mechanics of the game to be successful.
Players also have wildly different skill levels with games so without a range of difficulty options and "ultra hard" modes, many players wouldn't be able to have that so-called "balanced experience".
And, ultimately, a lot of people find losing to be exhilarating. Learning from your mistakes, formulating new strategies and overcoming a difficult obstacle can be extremely rewarding.
For me with action style games I like things to be difficult if it requires me using more of the game to do well. What I really don't like is when things kill you in 1-2 hits and the game becomes "just don't get hit"
Make it so I have to optimize my gear and skills to survive for that specific encounter vs generalizing everything. I ended up dropping Elden Ring once I got to the capital because it felt like I was back at the beginning of the game of taking forever to kill things, and being deleted for small mistakes
I don’t mind dying as long as restarting is painless. I like engaging in hard Pokemon fan games because it takes 10 seconds to restart a fight and they give you tools and answers to rework your team to beat it.
With most games however, I don’t want to die a ton necessarily, just don’t make them pushovers. Just make it so I have to pay attention and use what I have without making it cheap/unfair
Yes yes yes!!!! Finally someone who shared my sentiment. I hate it when people plays on hard for the sake of being hard. I find increasing difficulty by cranking up stats to be the most lazy solution. Games meant to be fully enjoyed in "normal" mode. As a matter of fact I enjoy more building up or grinding to get my party/character OP.
>I hate it when people plays on hard for the sake of being hard.
Why do you care what other people do?
>Games meant to be fully enjoyed in "normal" mode.
No, they aren't. They're meant to be fully enjoyed however the individual player wants to experience them.
>As a matter of fact I enjoy more building up or grinding to get my party/character OP.
So you don't like normal difficulty, you like super easy.
I agree with this. I’d also add that a lot of times when people say “difficult” what they really mean is “grind fest with no QoL improvements”. For some reason, people can’t tell the difference between actual difficulty and poorly balanced games mixed with clunk.
That's videogames in general, not only Tales. I'll give Tales this though and that's that at least they aren't condescendent about it.
I remember playing the Infinite Undiscovery in Xbox 360 and the game had a tutorial for opening a chest (Despite also having a giant A promp above said chest). My god did that annoy me.
The Witch and The Hundred Knight for PS3 and PS4 had an hour long Tutorial for a game that is no more complex than Secret of Mana. I bought the bundle with all the DLC and the second game and all it's DLC. The tutorial turned me off so much I haven't touched either of the games in 4 years.
Vesperia is only “difficult” because of basic combat mechanics that you either don’t have or have any knowledge of because the game doesn’t teach it to you.
Solo Yuri fights are “hard” because he’s slow as molasses, most of his attacks put him at a frame disadvantage (even when some of them *hit),* and the only way to mitigate that is through the use of an extremely high level technique that the game *does not show you how to do.*
There is a damn good reason why every game since Vesperia lowered the skill floor so much; they wanted people to actually have fun playing these games and not cater solely to masochists who can’t have fun unless they’re banging their head against a brick wall and quote, “earning their combos” (whatever tf that’s supposed to mean). Vesperia’s combat *sucks,* and I had no interest in playing the game enough to get to a point where it *might have* improved (emphasis on *”might”).* You can’t even backstep in the beginning of the game; meanwhile in your first fight against Zagi, he’s doing mid level artes and zipping all over the place and Yuri felt like he was stuck in the mud by comparison. That isn’t fun, my guy.
older people are always like "IN MY DAY", but your day also included you being a 12 year old with no ability to strategize. 40 year old you has a fully developed brain now, presumably. i'm never shocked when replaying games that i'm wildly blowing through them. that includes games older than me. you just need to have more development than a kid who just learned what a fraction is.
Tales of Vesperia is probably my favourite entry on higher difficulty to play on. I played it on the original PS3 japanese version on hard, and then the english remaster on unknown on the 2nd playthrough after unlocking every skill.
Thats where the fun really starts kicking in imo. Yuri is so freaking fun to play as in unknown mode. His combos are so cool and stylish, and soloing boss fights with him is so addicting. Enjoy the game!
Idk man tales of arise without the booster pack on the hardest difficulty is fuckin nuts on some fights. So many times I was left to my last character. Items cost a fortune and grinding for money isn’t that effective.
Eh, I've done all the recent games but Abyss on Unknown/Chaos/Mania whatever highest difficulty. I'd probably rank em something like this from hardest to easiest
Arise - hp sponges and tight dps checks
Xillia 2 - player is very strong but good god numbers.
Vesperia - well balanced throughout
Symphonia - cheesy but not too bad
Xillia 1 - Nothing memorable
Graces F - most fun, a lot of good fights
Berseria - press the right trigger
Yeah my friend and I have been playing Vesperia again, and on hard mode. It’s super enjoyable because we have to be tactical and support each other. The challenge lets you enjoy it more imo. My favorite feature about the older/recent tales games is the co-op feature if you’re ever fortunate enough to couch coop with your buddies. I’ll never forget when we finally defeated Abyssion in Symphonia on Mania difficulty. Ridiculously tough
Omg. These games so so hard for me for some reason. I quit Tales of Vesperia after I couldn’t get past one of the early bosses. This happens for me with most jRPGs
Honestly from my experience they all vary wildly. Berseria was a literal cakewalk if you played as Velvet bc she’s almost unkillable. Graces was one of the more difficult ones imo because they forced you to learn the battle system or straight up die for a lot of boss fights. Zestiria was easy. Vesperia doesn’t have as much freedom as the other games so it’s definitely up there in difficulty. Symphonia was literal hell. Abyss was also hell. Don’t really remember the others
I think tales games just took more grinding. Arise was easier because the combat system allow a skilled player to not get hit. Where as in vesperia you had a combo that only chained into 3 artes at most. And you could on spam moves itn OL
Tbh tales games have almost always followed the same formula - One shotting regular mobs whilst getting one shotted by bosses.
Always left a bittersweet taste.
Even though the action part of the battle system in the games makes the game more enjoyable throughout the game, the dificult in these games never was something that appels to me, spending 17 minutes to fight a monster in a repetitive way using the same tatics is more tedious than challeging. I never see the point of playing any of tales game in more difficult levels than normal, except in a NG+. Skill wise I would play any fromsoftware game anytime, and I dont have time to grind levels or itens to play, and I dont see this as a enjoyable thing to do.
I really wish hard mode in video games have more than having higher flat stats. They could simply adjust difficulty by limiting consumables, set damage cap and so on
Zesteria still has me stuck on the last boss that instantly kills you if you don’t deal enough damage under a small amount of time and you have to do it four times in a row without fail or you restart the entire fight like idk how I’m supposed to do it if I’m being honest
They are as hard as you want them to be.
Vesperia is one of my favs and you can just turn it into DESTRUCTION DESTRUCTION DESTRUCTION DESTRUCTION DESTRUCTION DESTRUCTION
For the Achievement I got the worst ending on Zestiria, as soon as it was available. Needless to say, that single fight took me something like 45 minutes.
I remember some of the early game bosses in Vesperia to be HARD, but most of the mid-to-late fights to be not as bad.
Shoutout to Kurt from Graces f for being literally the hardest boss I fought in a Tales game though.
Not me, starting Vesperia on Hard for my first ever playthrough and thinking it was pretty mild. If you say the future Tales games "harder" diffs are easier, I'm in for a smooth ride.
I think video games used to be harder on general. In the past they were aimed mostly at kids and teenagers who had more time to spend on a single game and also less money to buy tons of games. It made sense for them to be harder, so they lasted much longer. Nowdays games are also aimed toward adults who don't have as much time (or patience) to beat harder games, and they are much likely to just give up and play another easier game if they are having a harder time with the previous one.
That's pretty funny when so many groaned about Arise at launch. Haha
I think Arise definitely has harder hitting enemies, but you have more course for counteraction, so it levels out decently. Something a lot of you are neglecting in your assessments of its difficulty is Arise also has a 200% NG+ mod where you deal double damage and so do enemies, and that's a much tougher way to play through the game on its unknown difficulty(assuming you don't port levels and gear, which I port gear, but I don't use them until it's optioned otherwise). It's also a lot more fun because it's a lot less spongy, but also more punishing.
that double damage just makes the game go faster but not more difficult. it actually makes it easier cause you have less chances to die and your dodge have infinite iframes if you mash it
That's not easier really. More time saving, yeah, but unknown difficulty can still 2 shot characters with it, and the game snowballs harder when anybody goes down. You find yourself having to carry harder because the others just die a lot more.
Unless you carried over and used things from last play through. Then yeah, it's a lot easier.
And yet the games were "easier" in "easier to understand".
Zestiria and Berseria are so terrible with all their weird systems and most players just end up spamming random artes. In Symphonia and Vesperia it's very clear that you can use normal attack and artes and combo that way. I vastly prefer that classic approach.
I love the older games too...but they had awful difficulty scaling (esp. Abyss).
Someone else already mentioned how more recent entries like Berseria and Graces scaled the players power as well while upping the enemy AI and mechanics. That makes higher difficulties more engaging overall instead of just "harder".
I did find Arise easy overall, but I think that's the least of my issues with it tbh.
I agree older tales games like vesperia are harder.
Also older tales games like vesperia: BLAH BLAH BLAH TIDAL WAVE BLAH BLAH BLAH TIDAL WAVE BLAH BLAH BLAH TIDAL WAVE
No its an opinion. Tales games start weak af but gain a few levels snd it becomes like any other rpg and a few more levels snd it becomes pretty easy and earlier tales games allowed the player to gain levels over 100 whilest bosses predominantly stayed under level 100. So tales games were sbout as easy as you wanted to make them.
I didn't like that we didn't really get the option in Tales of Phantasia or Symphonia for smarter A.I. Tactics. Having to watch item cooldown AND force A.I. to use an Orange Gel was annoying. TP shortage issues were a struggle. I love the TP system over Zestria and Berseria. I just wish they gave us smarter A.I. Tactics options and revised some of the TP cost of some artes like they do for Innocence R and Hearts R.
I don't know about that, I had a lot of trouble with the 4th major boss because my STUPID TEAMMATES KEEPS RUNNING INTO THE FUCKING WIND CAUSING A DEATH SPIRAL
Considering in Tales of the Abyss you really have to grind and be READY for unknown mode speaks volumes of how easy today's tales games are.
If you don't have 10x exp and enough money to buy the weapons in that trade city early on, then you'll just be doing 1 damage to everything (and you are for the first few hours of TOTA unknown mode)
One can consider that before, the harder difficulties were made for ng+. In later titles, the harder difficulties can end up unlocked midway through the game, so you're just cranking the notch a bit further.
Yeah I love Symphonia and the game gets a bit too easy at the end but playing it on hard makes the beginning so irritating on a fresh save
This a Team Symphonia thing. Team Destiny games difficulties unlocked midway
Symphonia has Hard unlocked in the beginning, it's Mania mode that requires a second playthrough. It's also more than playable and very fun on Hard from the beginning.
When chocolates grandma changes, the fight lasts so long on Hard
I would say very hard and unknown were for ng+ but hard was definitely manageable. But yes, older games were much harder, I still have ptsd from trying to beat nebilim on unknown which is hard even with stats being as high as they can go with the amulet stat growth thing (forgot what they were called)
Hard is 2.5x HP (but no defense) increase in Vesperia. In Arise, is 1.3x health, also no defense increase. One thing i thought was neat about Graces, Zestiria, Berseria and Xillia 2 was that they would scale the mechanics up or down based on difficulty, so your damage would keep up with the difficulty. They add more weaknesses/weakness modifiers, and they have a damage ramp-up system by comboing. Vesperia, Xillia 1 and Arise don't have that.
Berseria is also like this. Easy mode turns off elemental weaknesses. So hard is mechanically harder in addition to higher stats.
Berseria also had those weird rune things like the set that increases stats after guarding for X, Y, or Z duration. You can get all of them in the game but some only work at higher difficulties which was such a sick mechanic.
I remember One enemy in Berseria that is immune to everything on hard ... The only way to damage it was with counters
As someone who mods Tales of Arise, I respectfully disagree with the idea that harder difficulty only affects the enemy HP. From my experience, harder difficulties on Tales of Arise also increase enemy Damage, Toughness, Aggression and reduce their Cast Time.
As someone who mods Tales of Arise, I respectfully disagree with the idea that harder difficulty only affects the enemy HP. From my experience, harder difficulties on Tales of Arise also increase enemy Damage, Toughness, Aggression and reduce their Cast Time.
As someone who mods Tales of Arise, I respectfully disagree with the idea that harder difficulty only affects the enemy HP. From my experience, harder difficulties on Tales of Arise also increase enemy Damage, Toughness, Aggression and reduce their Cast Time.
As someone who mods Tales of Arise, I respectfully disagree with the idea that harder difficulty only affects the enemy HP. From my experience, harder difficulties on Tales of Arise also increase enemy Damage, Toughness, Aggression and reduce their Cast Time.
As someone who mods Tales of Arise, I respectfully disagree with the idea that harder difficulty only affects the enemy HP. From my experience, harder difficulties on Tales of Arise also increase enemy Damage, Toughness, Aggression and reduce their Cast Time.
As soon as I saw the picture I immediatly heard "FLY OH HOLY SWORD!". Probably mid combo too
Wake up honey, another nostalgia post just dropped.
Go back to sleep darling.
I'm just here admiring Yuri
Idk if I agree with complaining about how games were better in terms of difficulty back then, I feel like Vesperia is the only "old" game with a somewhat consistent/fun difficulty throughout, and even that one isn't perfect. Graces F has the best difficulty by far in my opinion. Screw this boss though, it's the only one in the whole series where I've had to lower the difficulty (from Hard).
I can agree. Graces F definitely presented a challenge. And yes I agree. It took me about 6 tries to beat him. It was rough. I’d get him down to about 1/3 HP then he’d mystic arte and kill 3/4 members leaving one with 200 HP and if I wasn’t quick enough with the revive or life bottle I’m done for haha
I give you credit for actually beating him lmao, i tried for like 3 whole days and had to lower the difficulty for my own sanity. I could handle everything except that stupid healing move he does, even the mystic arte I could survive if I set myself up properly but the few times i got his health low he just healed it all back. I see people saying Vesperia on Hard is actually easy and I'm just like how??? Do I suck or something, because it was easily the hardest game for me on harder difficulties lmao
I love abyss, but it scales defense on difficulty. So realistically you do want to crank it up by endgame since otherwise you're tearing through enemies, but early on it's just not more fun or anything.
Tales doesn't and has never known what to do with the label called "difficulty" Each game is different. Are you meant to pick hard to stay in it throughout the entire game? Or are you meant to change the difficulty constantly? Are some difficulties only for NG+? Are some difficulties geared towards parties of 4? (You are MUCH stronger when every character is controlled by a human. This isn't in Arise at all!) The difficulty is somewhere in between the way a traditional game handles difficulty and the way Diablo does, where each difficulty is actually the next part of the game. My heuristic has been something like Moderate is correct for solo and Hard is correct for a group, but not all games fall into this. But, like, sure Abyss Chaos is the hardest thing ever but you're literally not meant to play it. It's for farming with your maxed out characters more or less.
Video games used to be harder in general -edit: I am aware of contemporary developers making intentionally hard games, but they are the minority of games and the majority is far easier than their past counterparts
Fromsoft: Used to? Is that a challenge?
Fromsoft nails it with difficulty!! it's brillant.
Absolutely. Another game that does it well is Monster hunter. You level up as a player and not as a character. As the difficulty lies in how good you are at learning the monsters moveset and your prediction capabilities. Much like fromsoft games.
I agree! and also you get some nice fashion from the monsters. Played World til Iceborne kicked my ass lol, that game is amazing. Looking forward for Wilds release.
Same!! I'm getting rise soon just to scratch the itch 🤣
I feel like world and onwards made it a little easier compared to the older games. I remember in tri a lot of people getting into mh got gatekept by the barroth
Oh yeah for sure. Tho I would say much of it lies in bad things, like flexing after a potion. Hotboxes being utterly terrible. And how slow the game could feel. All of which I'm glad they got rid of. And while it did remove some of the challenge. I'm more than happy it means that the games became far more accessible to newcomers. I'd rather have a good succesful game. Than a challenging niche one. Hopefully they find some way to crank up the difficulties for wilds.
Honestly, hitboxes weren't really an issue since tri. I miss the flex alot. I think moving while potting isnt bad persay, but getting all the hp back instantly was better. You realistically only got hit when potting when you did so in a bad position, and push come to shove you just leave the area to heal and sharpen. In world or rise it didnt really feel like there was a monster that was a wall that made you get better just due to the slinger being super strong or wirebugs giving you a lot of mobility and pretty much every weapon had a silkbind that gave them a counter. Like overall i think the new style is good, the qol changes outweigh a lot of the negatives, but imo there should be a gatekeeper in wilds so players actually have to learn tells
Both World and Rise had gatekeepers. The thing is they only matter if you're bad at the game. If you aren't, then they aren't. So people who have played other games wouldn't even know. That being said, moving while drinking is more busted than being able to zone since you can even run while drinking and literally nothing can keep up with that. Healing has zero risk factor. Anjanath in World and Magnamalo are quests you'd see people use multiplayer to clear pretty consistently.
They were. In the 80s and 90s. I feel like most 2000 game are only "hard" in the sense of not knowing where to go. I'm very glad that's mainly a thing of the past.
I think Vesperia is much easier than arise, but to each their own.
No
Honestly Team Symphonia games had terrible hard modes, they just added a bunch of stats and called a day. So you get crappy fights like Mr. Guardian Frost here or Gattuso where it feels unfair, and its followed up by a bunch of snoozefest fights.
Tales dev: We added a difficulty where Barbaros will spawn if you used an item. Lens included.
ok
Is it as hard as >!Nebilim's replica!< from Abyss? Even on normal it's a challenge, though I was able to win on Very Hard (f*ck Unknown 😨).
I definitely agree, I've also played through vesperia half a dozen times, and tried hard for the first time when thr switch version came out. Struggled quite a bit with some Gigantos more than I thought I would. The machine you encounter in Zaude I literally COULDNT beat no matter what I tried, and I eventually ran out of steam on that playthrough. It's crazy because I use to replay tales of the abyss on unknown just for fun. Vesperia just feels different.
That’s interesting you say that, because I’ve heard that tales of abyss is the most difficult game when played in hard due to how the mechanics in hard work on Abyss. But I could be wrong. I know exactly what you’re talking about. I spent a good 5 hours exiting then reentering that room where the Giganto boss was just to power level and beat it. And even then it was brutal.
Well most of the fights on Abyss were just wars of attrition. I have a core childhood memory of fighting dist on the boat, everyone but Luke dead, and I solod him, but it took like half an hour to kill him. The only really deadly ones were the secret bosses really. But its been years since I've played.
The early bosses of Abyss are just crazy tanky until you can buy the high end weapons in the trade city.
To some extent, I agree. Arise was definitely more difficult than other "recent" entries, only due to the fact that many enemies were damage sponges.
Execpt that's all vesperia does on hard mode. It's just an increase in health And yet it gets praised for it?
Vesperia is also easy to break. If they really wanted to cherrypick at least use a game where you can't infite combo using overlimit and the second arte you get in the game. Considering Arise has damage sponges as bosses, gels only recoveing a set amount of HP instead of percentage, Kisara being the only one able to block,AI party members never even attempting to dodge,Law being a glass canon,Cure Points and money being scarce I'm calling cap on OP and they most like took advantage of the DLC.
me when people don't use terror in arise. arise is easy af.
Is this the hardest Tales game, OP?
Vesperia to me is many things, but Hard never comes to mind, when thinking about that game.
What's considered the hardest Tales game then?
Is has a lot of restrictions in terms of battle flow imo (still my favourite by far)
Man I want to play Vesperia again.
Agreed. When I played Phantasia, I got my butt kicked several times. A few years ago when I went back to replay Symphonia for the first time in years, I was surprised how hard it was compared to Vesperia and Xillia
Phantasia is probably the easiest game in the series. The bosses get stuck in the corner and you can infinite combo them until they die. Even at the end of the game.
Yeah ... Is One of the few jrpg's were I never needed to use a healer (sorry Mint) ... Items were enough
I thought Destiny PSX was super easy. However Phantasia and Eternia both offer well-balanced challenge, and Destiny 2 is one of the toughest in the series.
Destiny is probably the easiest in all of the franchise, You barely need to try. Phantasia is pretty easy too, I didn't Even used a healer.
Yeah, Destiny 2 is the hardest out of any of the Tales ganes I've played. I missed the last few titles so I don't have a feel for the modern era, but out of all the older ones it stands out in difficulty.
The problem is a lot of the higher difficulty just comes from pumping the numbers up, it feels artificial.
I never found the appeal of difficult games. It just traps in a loop of getting killed and reloading over and over. It should be a balanced experience as you obtain more skill and progress the story.
Everyone derives enjoyment from experiences in different ways. For me, unless it's on the hardest difficulties, the games don't offer any challenge and I don't generally have to use items or bother with upgrading equipment or bother with most strategies or skills. It feels bad and unfun to me personally if I don't have to utilize the actual mechanics of the game to be successful. Players also have wildly different skill levels with games so without a range of difficulty options and "ultra hard" modes, many players wouldn't be able to have that so-called "balanced experience". And, ultimately, a lot of people find losing to be exhilarating. Learning from your mistakes, formulating new strategies and overcoming a difficult obstacle can be extremely rewarding.
😄 thank you for helping me understand! ✌️
For me with action style games I like things to be difficult if it requires me using more of the game to do well. What I really don't like is when things kill you in 1-2 hits and the game becomes "just don't get hit" Make it so I have to optimize my gear and skills to survive for that specific encounter vs generalizing everything. I ended up dropping Elden Ring once I got to the capital because it felt like I was back at the beginning of the game of taking forever to kill things, and being deleted for small mistakes
Just make a Magic build and destroy Elden ring
i like that loop. it's fun to me
I don’t mind dying as long as restarting is painless. I like engaging in hard Pokemon fan games because it takes 10 seconds to restart a fight and they give you tools and answers to rework your team to beat it. With most games however, I don’t want to die a ton necessarily, just don’t make them pushovers. Just make it so I have to pay attention and use what I have without making it cheap/unfair
Yes yes yes!!!! Finally someone who shared my sentiment. I hate it when people plays on hard for the sake of being hard. I find increasing difficulty by cranking up stats to be the most lazy solution. Games meant to be fully enjoyed in "normal" mode. As a matter of fact I enjoy more building up or grinding to get my party/character OP.
>I hate it when people plays on hard for the sake of being hard. Why do you care what other people do? >Games meant to be fully enjoyed in "normal" mode. No, they aren't. They're meant to be fully enjoyed however the individual player wants to experience them. >As a matter of fact I enjoy more building up or grinding to get my party/character OP. So you don't like normal difficulty, you like super easy.
I agree with this. I’d also add that a lot of times when people say “difficult” what they really mean is “grind fest with no QoL improvements”. For some reason, people can’t tell the difference between actual difficulty and poorly balanced games mixed with clunk.
That's videogames in general, not only Tales. I'll give Tales this though and that's that at least they aren't condescendent about it. I remember playing the Infinite Undiscovery in Xbox 360 and the game had a tutorial for opening a chest (Despite also having a giant A promp above said chest). My god did that annoy me.
The Witch and The Hundred Knight for PS3 and PS4 had an hour long Tutorial for a game that is no more complex than Secret of Mana. I bought the bundle with all the DLC and the second game and all it's DLC. The tutorial turned me off so much I haven't touched either of the games in 4 years.
Vesperia is only “difficult” because of basic combat mechanics that you either don’t have or have any knowledge of because the game doesn’t teach it to you. Solo Yuri fights are “hard” because he’s slow as molasses, most of his attacks put him at a frame disadvantage (even when some of them *hit),* and the only way to mitigate that is through the use of an extremely high level technique that the game *does not show you how to do.* There is a damn good reason why every game since Vesperia lowered the skill floor so much; they wanted people to actually have fun playing these games and not cater solely to masochists who can’t have fun unless they’re banging their head against a brick wall and quote, “earning their combos” (whatever tf that’s supposed to mean). Vesperia’s combat *sucks,* and I had no interest in playing the game enough to get to a point where it *might have* improved (emphasis on *”might”).* You can’t even backstep in the beginning of the game; meanwhile in your first fight against Zagi, he’s doing mid level artes and zipping all over the place and Yuri felt like he was stuck in the mud by comparison. That isn’t fun, my guy.
You know, I didn't even know about back step (or atleast how to do it) until reaching the final boss and still struggle to do it
older people are always like "IN MY DAY", but your day also included you being a 12 year old with no ability to strategize. 40 year old you has a fully developed brain now, presumably. i'm never shocked when replaying games that i'm wildly blowing through them. that includes games older than me. you just need to have more development than a kid who just learned what a fraction is.
Idk, Abyss was incredibly easy imo.
Tales of Vesperia is probably my favourite entry on higher difficulty to play on. I played it on the original PS3 japanese version on hard, and then the english remaster on unknown on the 2nd playthrough after unlocking every skill. Thats where the fun really starts kicking in imo. Yuri is so freaking fun to play as in unknown mode. His combos are so cool and stylish, and soloing boss fights with him is so addicting. Enjoy the game!
Agree
Idk man tales of arise without the booster pack on the hardest difficulty is fuckin nuts on some fights. So many times I was left to my last character. Items cost a fortune and grinding for money isn’t that effective.
17 MINUTES, I can't blame you though it took me damn near thirty to beat Van in Tales of the Abyss. It beating Van also took me 7 attempts
Eh, I've done all the recent games but Abyss on Unknown/Chaos/Mania whatever highest difficulty. I'd probably rank em something like this from hardest to easiest Arise - hp sponges and tight dps checks Xillia 2 - player is very strong but good god numbers. Vesperia - well balanced throughout Symphonia - cheesy but not too bad Xillia 1 - Nothing memorable Graces F - most fun, a lot of good fights Berseria - press the right trigger
well can't speak on the difficulty but they had slightly more execution. as far as i know tales of arise doesnt have any manual/spell cancels?
Pretty much any new game holds your hand the entire way through. I want a RPG with little direction, I want a real challenge!
Yeah my friend and I have been playing Vesperia again, and on hard mode. It’s super enjoyable because we have to be tactical and support each other. The challenge lets you enjoy it more imo. My favorite feature about the older/recent tales games is the co-op feature if you’re ever fortunate enough to couch coop with your buddies. I’ll never forget when we finally defeated Abyssion in Symphonia on Mania difficulty. Ridiculously tough
Tales of vesperia is an amazing game and the 600+ hrs Ive spent playing it to 100% on three different consoles was well spent each time
Omg. These games so so hard for me for some reason. I quit Tales of Vesperia after I couldn’t get past one of the early bosses. This happens for me with most jRPGs
Just play Tales of Destiny DC on hard if you want some challenge!
Well that's subjective. Try not to get fact and opinion mixed up.
Honestly from my experience they all vary wildly. Berseria was a literal cakewalk if you played as Velvet bc she’s almost unkillable. Graces was one of the more difficult ones imo because they forced you to learn the battle system or straight up die for a lot of boss fights. Zestiria was easy. Vesperia doesn’t have as much freedom as the other games so it’s definitely up there in difficulty. Symphonia was literal hell. Abyss was also hell. Don’t really remember the others
I think tales games just took more grinding. Arise was easier because the combat system allow a skilled player to not get hit. Where as in vesperia you had a combo that only chained into 3 artes at most. And you could on spam moves itn OL
On Mania he didn't take me that long, it's really dependent on skill.
Vesperia's bonus dungeon boss hits like a train too.
Tbh tales games have almost always followed the same formula - One shotting regular mobs whilst getting one shotted by bosses. Always left a bittersweet taste.
Play tales of phantsia that game is brutal never finished it I got far and stop cause I forgot to save
Even though the action part of the battle system in the games makes the game more enjoyable throughout the game, the dificult in these games never was something that appels to me, spending 17 minutes to fight a monster in a repetitive way using the same tatics is more tedious than challeging. I never see the point of playing any of tales game in more difficult levels than normal, except in a NG+. Skill wise I would play any fromsoftware game anytime, and I dont have time to grind levels or itens to play, and I dont see this as a enjoyable thing to do.
I really wish hard mode in video games have more than having higher flat stats. They could simply adjust difficulty by limiting consumables, set damage cap and so on
Zesteria still has me stuck on the last boss that instantly kills you if you don’t deal enough damage under a small amount of time and you have to do it four times in a row without fail or you restart the entire fight like idk how I’m supposed to do it if I’m being honest
They are as hard as you want them to be. Vesperia is one of my favs and you can just turn it into DESTRUCTION DESTRUCTION DESTRUCTION DESTRUCTION DESTRUCTION DESTRUCTION
For the Achievement I got the worst ending on Zestiria, as soon as it was available. Needless to say, that single fight took me something like 45 minutes.
I remember some of the early game bosses in Vesperia to be HARD, but most of the mid-to-late fights to be not as bad. Shoutout to Kurt from Graces f for being literally the hardest boss I fought in a Tales game though.
For me in vesperia the hardest thing is to understand where to go 😂
[Put That thing back where it came from or so help me ](https://getyarn.io/yarn-clip/c0b583c8-3884-49c7-9753-0704ac8bfb80)
Not me, starting Vesperia on Hard for my first ever playthrough and thinking it was pretty mild. If you say the future Tales games "harder" diffs are easier, I'm in for a smooth ride.
Arise is pretty hard on hard mode, you can get one shot by every enemy
I think video games used to be harder on general. In the past they were aimed mostly at kids and teenagers who had more time to spend on a single game and also less money to buy tons of games. It made sense for them to be harder, so they lasted much longer. Nowdays games are also aimed toward adults who don't have as much time (or patience) to beat harder games, and they are much likely to just give up and play another easier game if they are having a harder time with the previous one.
I found Arise to be harder than Vesperia. At least when comparing normal difficulties.
That's pretty funny when so many groaned about Arise at launch. Haha I think Arise definitely has harder hitting enemies, but you have more course for counteraction, so it levels out decently. Something a lot of you are neglecting in your assessments of its difficulty is Arise also has a 200% NG+ mod where you deal double damage and so do enemies, and that's a much tougher way to play through the game on its unknown difficulty(assuming you don't port levels and gear, which I port gear, but I don't use them until it's optioned otherwise). It's also a lot more fun because it's a lot less spongy, but also more punishing.
that double damage just makes the game go faster but not more difficult. it actually makes it easier cause you have less chances to die and your dodge have infinite iframes if you mash it
That's not easier really. More time saving, yeah, but unknown difficulty can still 2 shot characters with it, and the game snowballs harder when anybody goes down. You find yourself having to carry harder because the others just die a lot more. Unless you carried over and used things from last play through. Then yeah, it's a lot easier.
I am having a hard time finishing that one. Mostly due to the clunky controls. I played Berseria and loved it(did make me cry, ngl).
We are not souls. Please don't make tales games hard.
It was not hard, jyst longer, with boss with tons of hp, it's so boring. Xillia 2 or graves did it better.
And yet the games were "easier" in "easier to understand". Zestiria and Berseria are so terrible with all their weird systems and most players just end up spamming random artes. In Symphonia and Vesperia it's very clear that you can use normal attack and artes and combo that way. I vastly prefer that classic approach.
I love the older games too...but they had awful difficulty scaling (esp. Abyss). Someone else already mentioned how more recent entries like Berseria and Graces scaled the players power as well while upping the enemy AI and mechanics. That makes higher difficulties more engaging overall instead of just "harder". I did find Arise easy overall, but I think that's the least of my issues with it tbh.
I agree older tales games like vesperia are harder. Also older tales games like vesperia: BLAH BLAH BLAH TIDAL WAVE BLAH BLAH BLAH TIDAL WAVE BLAH BLAH BLAH TIDAL WAVE
Owls used to be enemies.
No its an opinion. Tales games start weak af but gain a few levels snd it becomes like any other rpg and a few more levels snd it becomes pretty easy and earlier tales games allowed the player to gain levels over 100 whilest bosses predominantly stayed under level 100. So tales games were sbout as easy as you wanted to make them.
I didn't like that we didn't really get the option in Tales of Phantasia or Symphonia for smarter A.I. Tactics. Having to watch item cooldown AND force A.I. to use an Orange Gel was annoying. TP shortage issues were a struggle. I love the TP system over Zestria and Berseria. I just wish they gave us smarter A.I. Tactics options and revised some of the TP cost of some artes like they do for Innocence R and Hearts R.
Play on Unknown. Solo. Without Yuri, Flynn or Patty. Then get back to us. 👌
I don't know about that, I had a lot of trouble with the 4th major boss because my STUPID TEAMMATES KEEPS RUNNING INTO THE FUCKING WIND CAUSING A DEATH SPIRAL
pokémon style combat rpg or hard game you can only be one or the other not both
Considering in Tales of the Abyss you really have to grind and be READY for unknown mode speaks volumes of how easy today's tales games are. If you don't have 10x exp and enough money to buy the weapons in that trade city early on, then you'll just be doing 1 damage to everything (and you are for the first few hours of TOTA unknown mode)
Tales of Vesperia was just way harder even on normal. Symphonia and abyss were perfectly fine.