Game:

Tales of Arise (2021)

Duration: 3:15:46

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It's been a long time since the last Tales game. I'd say the future of the franchise has potential and I'm looking forward to more Tales in hopefully the near future.

Let me lay out some points:

Gameplay: 7.8/10
The combat is, in my opinion, the best is has been, at least for the 3D combat titles. Taking notes from things like Bayonetta's Witch Time and Ys's Flash Guard gives this game some nice fluidity in combat. My main concerns come with how unbalanced the damage is for certain artes and that, aside from bosses, there is a noticeable lack of enemy variety. It would be less glaring if combat wasn't set up in a arena format. Maybe as time goes on they'll make the gameplay more like the Earth Temple segment, but refined.

Story: 6.5/10
It feel like a story from a Tales game. It's good, but nothing spectacular with the usual twists and turns that make it enjoyable. I want to give a shout out to the devs for adding the feature that shows which NPCs you have read the dialogue for.

Sound: 7/10
The sheer amount of voiced dialogue is something to appreciate, but my problems lie mostly with the audio levels failing to stay balanced, especially mid-battle. There are times outside of battle where the voices are too quiet, so you bump up their volume, but then you enter a battle and you can't even hear the music. Speaking of music, it started of on a high note with its orchestral scores. You can definitely hear some original Tales style music in there as well. However, these don't mix very well and I think they need to decide to either go full orchestral or keep to the old style. Even so, there are no bad tracks in this game.

Graphics: 9/10
The game looks fantastic overall. Characters range from good to ok in terms of design. The environments are nice and diverse. However, the real MVP is ufotable handling the special effects. Lots of nice small particle effects and eye melting spectacles fill this game with style.

Other Stuff:
Chaos (and through free DLC Unknown) difficulties are this game's content for replayability.

Overall: 7.5/10
This game is a solid entry into the Tales series. My scoring system is pretty harsh, but remember that my 5+ means that I enjoyed the game. There are just a lot of flaws or simply ok elements that don't merit my high score. I'm leaving this as a not to a commenter saying that Tales of Arise is an 8/10 at least. Maybe in a generic reviewer's scoring system, but not mine.
All in all, good game. Best 3D combat in the series, but it still has plenty of room to grow.


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Streamed on: October 16, 2021

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