Understatement.
But yeah, I have massive hate for Vesperia due to that, and can't help it when folks say they like it . . . But domestic folks haven't been able to experience better D:
-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
New Tales of Graces f English Screenshots
- Thread starter Dark Schala
- Start date
Understatement.
But yeah, I have massive hate for Vesperia due to that, and can't help it when folks say they like it . . . But domestic folks haven't been able to experience better D:
Me too.
The work on legendia was remarkable and usual tales osts compared to it pale
Damn, you must've hated it really really bad. I didn't think it was that bad. I definitely thought the plot fell off but, mind telling me why you hate it so much in detail. I'm actually really curious
CielTynave
Member
I assume it has something to do with Legendia being done internally by Namco instead of Tales studio, and Shiina being a Namco in-house composer.
Detail huh, lol there's a lot of hate involved . . . I'll leave it at that everything just really falls apart. Everyone's motivations, the villains. It was just a giant slap to the face considering just how well everything was going up until that point.
I thought I heard somewhere they don't pay him enough to compose for Tales lolol, and he has GOD EATER now anyway.
I don't remember much of what happened in the last act other than it suddenly became every character's "do or die!" time, and they used that as the justification for a lot of things. Convenient for me I guess. I saw most of the stuff that happened there as filler for the filler/finish up side quest part of the game.
So now that Tales Studio has been merged, maybe they can let him work on a new mothership title.
PixyJunket
Member
One can dream, eh?
There's still a chance of course, but it's unlikely. Mainly because they would have had to build up a new demo from the ground up. The PS3 demo was set in the Future arc which was added exclusively to the PS3 port, and it was probably designed to show Wii version players what's new, or whatnot. That really wouldn't work with the NA audiences for obvious reasons.
So there's a small chance. However, I'd rather them not release the same JP demo if that were the case. I mean, I played the JP demo already but couldn't understand anything of course. I would not want to play it in English so as not spoil anything.
SatelliteOfLove
Member
I felt bait-and-switched by the more character-driven and mundane forces driving the plot earlier. After that 2/3 mark: BOOM cliche city, and not the good kind.
Wondering the same. I know I seen Dark Schala's posts mentioning the Platinum is far easier to obtain than Vesperia's, so I'm not sure if that's directly related.
If it's one thing the Tales series needs to be rid of, is timed events, especially those that have ridiculously small timeframes and are ridiculously hard to find unless you know exactly where to go.
Yeah, Destiny has some amazing dungeon themes (which is even crazier as a Tales game, which I feel usually have some of the blandest and most forgettable dungeon themes I've ever heard), but I wasn't too fond of the remade tracks in comparison. I think even the remakes are better than what most other Tales games have to offer though.
Costs, time, and maybe the ability to have a consistent "Tales sound".
I'm guessing Shiina can't (or isn't willing to) pull off a soundtrack with those constraints like Sakuraba can.
Oh, you think Vesperia was bad? Abyss was the worst, and Symphonia is a close second for me. At least Vesperia let you run into a couple of excuses to roam the world map at times.
It's like the only way you could ever find this stuff outside of a guide is if you went and visited every single town you had access to after every cutscene or mini-event.
DigitalDevil
Member
This thread makes me want to play destiny again... Was it co-op also? I can't remember
Dark Schala
Eloquent Princess
It's a little unfortunate, because Xillia's soundtrack feels somewhat different and a little more mature from the rest. I'm all for a change-up or refresh in sound, though, even if I don't mind Sakuraba's sound for Tales.
There are some 'timed' skits (ie: certain Groovy Chats accessible at certain points in the narrative) and timed 'quests'/conversations/scenes, so yeah, there are some missables... in that case, I'd advise looking at a FAQ or the Japanese wiki. There is a huge Google Doc out there with a bunch of info like grimoires, cooking, password-locked chests, titles, Skits, etc.
Regarding the plat/trophies, you will be locked out of the sidequest trophy (and this is a trophy that's a pain in the butt to get, imo) if you miss ONE item (and this is related to a timed event quest... but this is between the time, well, it's not really a spoiler, but...
between the time Hubert permanently joins your party and before the you reach the final dungeon's last floor; after that, it's gone
There are also 8 other missable trophies, but those are the "Beat _____ in 1 minute!" trophies. I can't say which bosses these are for because they're usually spoilers, but just try to clear bosses in under 1 minute. You can easily do this in 1 playthrough, but some people use 2. What I usually do is I play on Chaos difficulty (the highest difficulty) for most of the game after I get it, then I lower the difficulty to Second or Normal to get the trophy, and then I reset to go through the boss battle again on Chaos. These trophies, imo, aren't very hard. They aren't dumb like the Secret Mission trophies in Vesperia.
Plat is definitely easier than Vesperia's. I'd been replaying the game a little bit before GotY 2011 came around/I decided to replay Sonic Unleashed HD to compare it to the Wii version, and had to drop it for a bit to get that stuff done, and I'm having fun with trying to get all the trophies again. I'm dreading the sidequest trophy a little because when I had originally gotten it when I played the game a first time, it took me quite a while since I had to farm stuff I didn't get before and then synthesize them to create weapons with different natures. :|
I'll say this, though... I certainly hope the item duplication/gald exploit is still in the English version so I can speed through it.
It has a few more dungeons (demo dungeon is one example), and there are a few revisits.
The way the marketing is going, I doubt that there will be another trailer. Maybe maybe a launch trailer.
Meccanical
Member
Yeah speaking of the marketing, whats up with them?
DO they want the game to sell or what?
chickdigger802
Banned
So what are the bullet point features/ changes besides combat?
Haven't really paid attention to this since wii version launch.
I recall ffx style world traversal. The death of blob shadows. Better skits?
Haven't really paid attention to this since wii version launch.
I recall ffx style world traversal. The death of blob shadows. Better skits?
Dark Schala
Eloquent Princess
It's Namco.
Gillian Seed
Banned
Why is everyone so content about this? People should be mailing thousands of letters to them about there crappy marketing decisions.
Well, there's a huge future chapter after the "main" story that was added in the 'F' version which is supposed to be around 10 hours long. I also think there are more skits. Oh, and more customes to get.
Why is everyone so content about this? People should be mailing thousands of letters to them about there crappy marketing decisions.
They'll just view those thousands of emails as reason not to market. When you have thousands of emails coming in about the game, why advertise?
Also there apparently added more scenes into the main game.
Most of the marketing (whatever little it is) is focused on Gamestop apparently. Seems like they expect a majority of the people that have a worthwhile level of interest in this to pre-order (and presumably pre-order it at Gametop) and get it day one, and intend to base the shipment on covering that number and little else.
Just hope the supply is a bit better than what they seem to have produced for Abyss 3DS.
I personally think of Graces' soundtrack more as an atmospheric soundtrack akin to Eternia's. Imo its strong point in-game are all the pieces used in story sequences which are mostly nicely done fitting piano music. Though me just watching and having to interpret stuff instead being able to understand Japanese likely rosetinted the effect for me...
Besides the two Fandom games (of which Shiina did do the second one) Legendia is the only Tales game actually developed in-house at Namco, Tales Studio on the other hand was a physically and legally separate unit until this year. With the dissolution, absorption and merger of all fully owned NB development units as part of the monolith NB Studio this may change now.
It's generally believed that Tamura does the slower dungeon themes while Sakuraba does the driving ones (usually end game). The latter ones were great in Abyss and Vesperia.
Starting with ToD PS1 all console Tales games except Legendia have co-op battles (though ToS GC and Xillia are pretty broken).
chickdigger802
Banned
well I was looking more to the whole game, not just the additions of F. What makes this different from previous entries besides combat?
It doesn't use the TP/Normal Attack scheme. Instead it uses the CC system. Each move you do is an Arte and takes a certain amount of CC. By you can do crazy amount of moves. CC replenishes when you just guard or meet other requirements. The battle system is a lot faster from previous Tales games.
^ he wrote "besides combat"
- Focus on gameplay over story: progress is usually without filler and padding, story and music can be weak and short as a result
- Perfected overall game design: all systems are consistent and interwoven, everything has an effect, no useless complexity for the sake of misunderstood tradition/completion/featuritis
- Full body skits instead the face skits from 1998
- Lots of little touches: quick save anywhere, skip anything, auto advance for spoken text, target direction with dot on the map...
It's the first "Team Destiny" game in 3D (and the first coming to the West). Typical feature of "Team Destiny" over "Team Symphonia" games:
- Focus on gameplay over story: progress is usually without filler and padding, story and music can be weak and short as a result
- Perfected overall game design: all systems are consistent and interwoven, everything has an effect, no useless complexity for the sake of misunderstood tradition/completion/featuritis
- Full body skits instead the face skits from 1998
- Lots of little touches: quick save anywhere, skip anything, auto advance for spoken text, target direction with dot on the map...
^ he wrote "besides combat"
It's the first "Team Destiny" game in 3D (and the first coming to the West). Typical feature of "Team Destiny" over "Team Symphonia" games:
- Focus on gameplay over story: progress is usually without filler and padding, story and music can be weak and short as a result
- Perfected overall game design: all systems are consistent and interwoven, everything has an effect, no useless complexity for the sake of misunderstood tradition/completion/featuritis
- Full body skits instead the face skits from 1998
- Lots of little touches: quick save anywhere, skip anything, auto advance for spoken text, target direction with dot on the map...
If you're marketing the game then you're doing awesome but too bad some of those is not really true or I disagree with. Overall game design is not perfected. Combat on the other hand might as well be described that way. Also, no quick save I'm pretty sure.
chickdigger802
Banned
Ah this would be my first 'destiny team' game.
Playing abyss 3ds again and don't enjoy having to manage tp early game. A lot of spamming attack.
Isn't the camera also different now, like it's behind main player during battles?
Playing abyss 3ds again and don't enjoy having to manage tp early game. A lot of spamming attack.
Isn't the camera also different now, like it's behind main player during battles?
For a lot of people it'll be their first Destiny game. Also, the camera is behind but that's due to Around Step. It's nice.
Dark Schala
Eloquent Princess
You might like CC since it can be replenished faster than TP via defending or completing certain actions, then. I really dislike TP in general. :/
TP is a bad mechanic in the beginning where it doesn't encourage you to spam moves and creates a boring battle system. CC doesn't really do that. I feel like as a result, it's a sign of bad game design. Oh well.
RPGCrazied
Member
Going to go put a $20 on this today! Got to get those costumes for preordering. Kinda bummed we aren't going to get an Art book(like usual, the PS2 games had those) or something cool like the art cell for preordering Tales of the Abyss. Even Tales of Vesperia had a tin case for preordering.
Oh well, better than nothing I guess.
Oh well, better than nothing I guess.
You're right, there's no quick save in Graces (though checking it again just now save points are very frequent). I guess having played the game nearly two years ago is a little long, not sure what game I was thinking of there. But I'm not sure what are your concrete objections with the other parts, compared to the "Team Symphonia" games and even Xillia which all do mistakes in the basic design already even Destiny 2 is further ahead in terms of game design. Of course the actual execution is always a matter of opinion, but there's a clear difference between things being done by design choice or being broken due to pure neglect.
Better in terms of story? What within the Tales series is so dramatically better than Vesperia's that "domestic folks" haven't been able to experience?
Maybe magic racism is so bad it goes to the other end of the spectum.
RPGCrazied
Member
Does this Tales of have the Devil Arms?
Were it not for the combat, this game would be so outdated... But yeah, opinions I guess.
No, that's a Team Symphonia-esque thing usually. It's been in Symphonia, Abyss, and Vesperia.
DigitalDevil
Member
Oh snap! As soon as my wife and I finish Eternal Sonata we are starting this! I've just converted my wife to jrpg's, and ToD was always my favorite. Excite!
DigitalDevil
Member
Wait, the back of the box indicates 1 player only. Did you mean ToD 2?
darkmark1987
Member
any gaf members have any recommendations on where to preorder this?
i want to to have it imported to the uk, i wouldnt mind if it didnt have the preorder bonus as i guess gamestop wont send it to the uk?
also how long would it take? 1 week?
thanks in advance!
i want to to have it imported to the uk, i wouldnt mind if it didnt have the preorder bonus as i guess gamestop wont send it to the uk?
also how long would it take? 1 week?
thanks in advance!