Redpill me on the Tales of series. Never played any of them

Awful combat. Decent stories.

based ritafag

Tales has been kinda dead console wise since 2017. Persona, Xenoblade and Trails are where it's at now. Pictured: someone better than every Tales Of protagonist combined.

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They're the very definition of mediocre rpg's, not that that's a bad thing especially if you like simple jrpg's. The main gimmick is these game focus more on the party's character development than the actual story. I don't think any Tales of game's story ever wow'ed me but then again I haven't played many of them. Its the one thing I like about the series is your party members interact with each other instead of either sucking the MC's dick or never interacting with each other at all. Something that seems to be rare in modern jrpgs.

As for the gameplay it kind of ranges depending on the game. Most of them are stand alone like the Final Fantasy game so you can jump into them with no problems. You can try Phantasia for the classic experience or you can start with Symphonia since its highly regarded as the best one(pretty overrated to me to be honest).

Haha... that's our Rean!

Just don't bother with the one you used as the OP image.
Fanbase is utter garbage and the combat is clunky as shit for over half the game.

Graces F was peak combat for the series along with Mystic Artes but the story was godawful even for Tales Standards and that says a lot.

Cringe the series

It's a 7/10 series for the most part.
It's okay if you can tolerate Saturday morning cartoon story lines and dialogue. The combat is its strongest point. If you're interested, I suggest playing Symphonia first. It's got good story pacing and likeable main protag. It's also beloved by fans as many people's first tales game. Way harder to go back to if you start with a newer game in the series.

For a long ass time I thought Tails and Trails were the same series

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I meant tales not tails. Fuck me I need to go to bed.

it's understandable to think that on the name alone in english.

how do I make the most of manual cancel?

Great rpg series as there's a reason it spawned so many games

Do it during the recovery of literally any move. Yuri can get infinite combos from it after tons of artes.

Its a dead franchise

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Low effort shounen games that they pump out yearly for minimal cost. Some of the most bland and offensively bad writing you will find in the entire genre.

Classic JRPG series with focus on action combat.
They're usually fun to play.
Heavy emphasis on anime aesthetics. Features high profile japanese voice actors.
Music is weak imo for most of the franchise.

Still waiting for Arise.

These are my thoughts exactly.
I think Vesperia is the best game of the series because it is a clear culmination of perfecting the combat system they've been using since the SNES, and I now KNOW that Baba wasn't kidding when he said no other game in the series would ever have that much efforted invested into it; it's 12 years old and it's the best looking game in the series. The people that say that the combat takes too long to open up are fucking stupid, the progression is gradual, and doing things like manual canceling when you're still just dealing with base arts helps you get better along the way.
Symphonia is better emulated, and to many it's the best because babby's first Tales - I'd recommend playing that game first if you want to play more than just one game of the series; it's good, but it is hard to go back to if you play something like Vesperia first.
I think Destiny DC is the best one in terms of gameplay, but sadly the Christfag translating the game gave up and didn't distribute his work so that someone else picked up where he left off.
My recommendations of the series would be: Symphonia, Eternia, Vesperia and Xillia 2.
I'd avoid: Graces, Zestiria and Berseria.

Vesperia has nice graphics and presentation, but I was kind of shocked at how mediocre the gameplay and story are ten hours in

Xillia has the best combat but only an okay story.
Berseria is worse than Xillia at everything
Zestria is an abomination
Vesperia is fun
Graces has a good story but blandish combat compared to the good combat in other games
Symphonia is dated but does everything quite well for it's gen

Why avoid Graces? Destiny DC, Rebirth and Graces f are peak Tales when it comes to gameplay.

There's only 3 of them worth playing, and those are the ones created by the Team Symphonia devs. (Symphonia, Abyss, Vesperia)

Berseria is alright but really button mashy in it's combat and doesn't reach the same highs as the Team Symphonia games. Graces F should only be played for the combat system. Ignore Zestiria, Xillia 1 & 2, and most of the other games excepts maybe Phantasia and Destiny.

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Why did they never bring Rebirth? Is it because "muh 2d grafix" even though it makes the game hold up much better than symphonia?

Eternia is a good game.
Fucking zoomers just ignore the classics and just start from symphonia onwards.

Yes. Unironically. 2D grafix on a PS2 when you weren't Capcom was pretty much a death sentence.

if i was going to play just ONE, which one would you recommend
i want to be sold on the series so i seek out the other games

I agree that those are all great for the gameplay, except Graces. Graces has shit everything, except level design, of which Berseria and Zestiria suffer from greatly.
It bastardized the CC system which was developed for aerial play, your mobility options are super fucking limited unlike in Vesperia, Destiny DC, Xillia 2 or even the fucking Vita Remakes, I hate the cancerous combo tree that limits player freedom, the emphasis on defending and dodging to restore CC isn't cool, it's just monotonous, the B-Arte spam gets boring really fucking fast. It's all flash, no substance, and this is coming from someone that beat the game in Evil Mode.
>Graces
>good story
What? It has the worst story and cast in the entire fucking series. What are you smoking?

Berseria and Zestiria are just the Graces combat except they forgot why that combat was so good.

Story? Symphonia
Combat Xillia - don't listen to Graces fags Xillia is peak action jrpg

If you only could play one, then probably Symphonia (Gamecube version emulated, not the PC version). It was many people's first entry into the series as a whole and is constantly memed and referenced.

appreciated, thanks

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Eternia is a better game than either Symphonia and Abyss are.
If you're into anime shit and don't mind a somewhat clunky combat system that evolves into an one way endless combo game, Vesperia.
If you want enemies that actually fight back you're shit out of luck if you don't have a PS3 or happen to know moonrunes. Unless you give something like Eternia a try.

I've only really played Symphonia and Vesperia, and both were pretty great. The Definitive Edition feels a little too bloated with skits and dialogue because they wrote two of the main characters with the intent of cutting them out for the original 360 release, but it's still a fun game.

Definitive version of Vesperia*

>except Graces
I mean, I can understand not liking it. Graces is the Bayonetta 2 of the series, but in its stupidity I still find it oddly satisfying. I hope they finally get it right with Arise.

It goes beyond not liking it. I remember how lauded the game was and how in many ways it sparked interest in the series again, and the combo tree is the worst addition to modern Tales titles - it literally ruined the one thing these games did right: the gameplay.

absolutely based
eternia is the best tales game by far but zoomers will just assume the series started with symphonia