Tales - Which to start?

[pawaclutter]

I've been considering binging Namco's tales series. I've had issues with getting into RPG games in the past (yadda yadda too boring turn based stuff) but the action concept of these games interest me. I've seen that there are a lot of tales games, but i have no idea of which to start. Do the games work like Final Fantasy, where there's no universal plot? I see a lot of people saying Tales of Symphonia is the best, but Tales of Abyss seems good. Which one should i play first? Which to avoid?

 

[MasterEn]

the tales games span a few different worlds, similar to final fantasy. some of them are linked together, but you would only know that by reading wikis. symphonia is the prequel to phantasia, despite coming out a decade later.
i've played the two mentioned above, so i would recommend those. avoid the sequel to symphonia, it is a very weird mixed bag. a sequel, new game and a spin-off all combined into one.
also similar to final fantasy, they share some mythos and mechanics, but are usually their own separate, contained stories stories. unless the games share the same title, you can play whichever one that you want to first.

 

[HexGramarye]

So I'm in the same boat as you and am getting into Tales for the first time this year. Well, I did play Zesteria for like an hour in 2015 and didn't like it, but that doesn't really count. So I picked the three that I'm most interested in to start with:

1. Phantasia, which I'm playing now because it's the first game in the series. I want to see where it all started, and I've heard the Super Famicom fan translation is iconic. I like it so far. Lots of attention to detail for its time with the NPCs, and the 2D combat is unique and fun.
2. Symphonia. The one everyone talks about, and it's co-op, which is rare for RPGs, so my girlfriend and I are going to play it together when I finish Phantasia and she finishes Vesperia.
3. Arise. A lot of people claimed that Final Fantasy XVI was just a ripoff of Tales of Arise with a Game of Thrones coat of paint. So I might as well just play Arise instead of XVI since I'm falling out of love with modern Final Fantasy and the story sounds really interesting.

I was also thinking this would give me a good vertical slice of classic Tales, the Golden Age of the series, and then the modern era. From there, I can decide where to go next based on what I enjoyed most. Of course, having no personal experience with the franchise, I'm not 100% sure whether this would be the optimal experience.

 

[Taukyrie]

When in doubt, play Vesperia. It's considered one of the best in the franchise.

From what I know the franchise is like Final Fantasy in the sense that there's no universal plot unless the game specifically says "2" at the end. The only other game with any connection to another is Berseria is set in the same world as Zestria many years in the past, but you don't need to play Zestria first to understand anything. Most is that you'll have a few "OOOHHH I KNOW WHO THAT ISSS" moments. (I have been playing Berseria without playing Zestria first and I'm able to understand everything perfectly fine.)

Personally, I recommend either Vesperia or Berseria.

 

[psvitaforever]

My answer is mostly "sentimental": first one I played has been Innocence (with english patch on ds), I loved it and it's my favourite; years after I played Abyss on the 3ds, I liked that one too but I always feel like Innocence has the 1st place as a good memory. Also tried Tales of Tempest (always eng patched on ds), everyone says it's a horrible Tales but I liked it, though I got stuck on one puzzle so I never finished it.
I think the answer to your question also depends which consoles you own (or maybe can emulate, if they are old games).

 

[Bonkers225]

Start with Destiny 1 and 2 on the PSX

 

[pawaclutter]

When in doubt, play Vesperia. It's considered one of the best in the franchise.

From what I know the franchise is like Final Fantasy in the sense that there's no universal plot unless the game specifically says "2" at the end. The only other game with any connection to another is Berseria is set in the same world as Zestria many years in the past, but you don't need to play Zestria first to understand anything. Most is that you'll have a few "OOOHHH I KNOW WHO THAT ISSS" moments. (I have been playing Berseria without playing Zestria first and I'm able to understand everything perfectly fine.)

Personally, I recommend either Vesperia or Berseria.

Personally, Vesperia has always interested me! The fact it's to what i can see one of the only jrpgs that ever touched the 360 makes me want to try it out. though, i've heard there was a much better ps3 port made. which one do i try out?

Post automatically merged: Feb 11, 2025

the tales games span a few different worlds, similar to final fantasy. some of them are linked together, but you would only know that by reading wikis. symphonia is the prequel to phantasia, despite coming out a decade later.
i've played the two mentioned above, so i would recommend those. avoid the sequel to symphonia, it is a very weird mixed bag. a sequel, new game and a spin-off all combined into one.
also similar to final fantasy, they share some mythos and mechanics, but are usually their own separate, contained stories stories. unless the games share the same title, you can play whichever one that you want to first.

is it now? that's disappointing. people talk a lot about symphonia, so how bad could the sequel to it be? you can only go up from there, right?

Post automatically merged: Feb 11, 2025

So I'm in the same boat as you and am getting into Tales for the first time this year. Well, I did play Zesteria for like an hour in 2015 and didn't like it, but that doesn't really count. So I picked the three that I'm most interested in to start with:

1. Phantasia, which I'm playing now because it's the first game in the series. I want to see where it all started, and I've heard the Super Famicom fan translation is iconic. I like it so far. Lots of attention to detail for its time with the NPCs, and the 2D combat is unique and fun.
2. Symphonia. The one everyone talks about, and it's co-op, which is rare for RPGs, so my girlfriend and I are going to play it together when I finish Phantasia and she finishes Vesperia.
3. Arise. A lot of people claimed that Final Fantasy XVI was just a ripoff of Tales of Arise with a Game of Thrones coat of paint. So I might as well just play Arise instead of XVI since I'm falling out of love with modern Final Fantasy and the story sounds really interesting.

I was also thinking this would give me a good vertical slice of classic Tales, the Golden Age of the series, and then the modern era. From there, I can decide where to go next based on what I enjoyed most. Of course, having no personal experience with the franchise, I'm not 100% sure whether this would be the optimal experience.

I loved XVI! If what you say is true, i suppose i'll try out Arise. though, considering i only have PC, it might be a bit hard..

Post automatically merged: Feb 11, 2025

My answer is mostly "sentimental": first one I played has been Innocence (with english patch on ds), I loved it and it's my favourite; years after I played Abyss on the 3ds, I liked that one too but I always feel like Innocence has the 1st place as a good memory. Also tried Tales of Tempest (always eng patched on ds), everyone says it's a horrible Tales but I liked it, though I got stuck on one puzzle so I never finished it.
I think the answer to your question also depends which consoles you own (or maybe can emulate, if they are old games).

personally. i don't really like emulating ds games. not that it's bad, no...i just want to save playing those games on their proper devices, if you get what i mean. whenever i get my hands on a 3ds, i'll try them!

 

[MasterEn]

Personally, Vesperia has always interested me! The fact it's to what i can see one of the only jrpgs that ever touched the 360 makes me want to try it out. though, i've heard there was a much better ps3 port made. which one do i try out?

Post automatically merged: Feb 11, 2025

is it now? that's disappointing. people talk a lot about symphonia, so how bad could the sequel to it be? you can only go up from there, right?

i'd say go to google and type in the name of the game and version differences. you should get a site or two listing out any and all differences between the ports. that should help out.

 

[pawaclutter]

Start with Destiny 1 and 2 on the PSX

i heard these two got ps2 remakes. are they worth it?

Post automatically merged: Feb 11, 2025

i'd say go to google and type in the name of the game and version differences. you should get a site or two listing out any and all differences between the ports. that should help out.

got it. thank you for the help!

 

[Evaccaneer Doom]

I've been considering binging Namco's tales series. I've had issues with getting into RPG games in the past (yadda yadda too boring turn based stuff) but the action concept of these games interest me. I've seen that there are a lot of tales games, but i have no idea of which to start. Do the games work like Final Fantasy, where there's no universal plot? I see a lot of people saying Tales of Symphonia is the best, but Tales of Abyss seems good. Which one should i play first? Which to avoid?

Symphonia (GameCube runs 60 FPS but PS2 has extra content, so pick your poison), Phantasia (fan translated), Abyss (3DS), Vespiria, Arise, Zestiria, Beseria, Destiny (preferably Director's Cut), and Eternia (which was called Tales of Destiny 2 internationally despite not being Tales of Destiny 2) are all good places to start

 

[TotzOnGaming]

Been playing the series backwards. Started with Arise then I play Phantasia and now I'm currently playing Gtaces F.

 

[Klonoa7]

There’s no specific order. Just grab a game and start playing. My first Tales game was Tales of Legendia and I absolutely loved it. So far Tales of Legendia and Tales of the Abyss are the only games that I’ve completed.

 

[Taukyrie]

Personally, Vesperia has always interested me! The fact it's to what i can see one of the only jrpgs that ever touched the 360 makes me want to try it out. though, i've heard there was a much better ps3 port made. which one do i try out?

Go for the Definitive Edition, that has more content.

 

[Rosenbann]

My first one was Tales of Eternia on PSP and I liked it a lot. The gameplay was good and exploring was fun. It had mechanics that were new to me on JRPGs which was fun. But the characters and plot are mediocre in my opinion.

After that I played Tales of the Abyss on the 3DS which is one of my favorite games of all time. It was originally released on the PS2 and spawned a fantastic Anime adaptation. The overall plot started slow but shortly became a banger. The playable characters had amazing and well written unforeseeable story arcs, especially the main character. He has one of the best character growths I've ever seen, which brought me to tears. Also the villain arcs were somewhat great.

 

[OrpheusT-ELOS]

I highly recommend Graces f which just got a remaster, it has a great combat and characters. The other games i recommend are Abyss (my favorite one and may or may not be remastered soon), Vesperia has issues with the story at the end but still is a great game and its very fun and the graphics are really beautiful and also includes an overworld so it looks like a PS1 game but made for the X360 lol, Destiny DC is also great if you want something 2D and the combat is really flashy and fast af and the last is not my favorite at all but Arise is the most recent and kinda fun, i don't like it very much for not really look like a Tales game and the final half is terrible.

 

[DanVzare]

I've not had a chance to play through the Tales Of series, but usually when I start going through a long RPG series, I'll base my first choice on what my end goal is.

If I'm going to go through every single game regardless, I just start with the first game. (I did that with Dragon Quest, and got through the first six games in a single month. The seventh game also took a month... boy was that a long game. Worth it though.)

If I'm on the fence, then I'll start with what people generally consider the best in the series, then randomly move onto other entries from there. (Which is more or less what I did with Neptunia.)

 

[DarkVahn]

Just jump in. Any of them are great, some better than others, and the newer they are, the better combat tends to be (not always though).
I'd say go for an older one so you can progress and not feel like the older games aren't as good due to differing mechanics, because subsequent entries in the series tend to build on the mechanics, or change a gimmick to the mechanics.

Start with Phantasia, or Symphonia, that'd be my honest suggestion, because then going through newer entries will feel built upon Phantasia/Symphonia, rather than going from, say Arise to Symphonia, only to find the gameplay is so much different.

 

[What's His Face]

If you're just starting out, I recommend beginning with Tales of Vesperia. It looks fantastic, it plays great, it has a great story with genuinely likeable characters, and just when you think the game is over BAM! The MC is the anti-JRPG Hero trope - that alone is worth the price of entry. If you decide to start on a different game, keep the following in mind:

• Tales of Phantasia is the distant sequel (4000 years later) to Tales of Symphonia
• Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World is the immediate sequel (2 years later) to Tales of Symphonia...and it sucks.
• Tales of Destiny 2 is the sequel (16 years, I think) to Tales of Destiny, but Tales of Destiny II (aka Tales of Eternia) is not.
• If you play Tales of Eternia on PSP, make sure the version is higher than 2.0 or you'll encounter a game-breaking bug.
• Tales of Legendia is widely hated, but I personally liked it. YMMV.
• Tales of Xillia and Tales of Xillia II are immediately connected (2 years, I think) titles - Xillia being the Xth anniversary title (see? Get it?) and Xillia II being the the cut content due to running out of time made into a sequel. There will be parts in Xillia where huge story/character development was cut due to time constraints, yet still polished-up rather well all said.
• Tales of Zestiria is the sequel (after 1000 years) to Tales of Berseria (which came out a year or two later), like Phantasia is to Symphonia. It's also likely that Zestiria/Berseria are the distant sequels (another 4000+ years) to Symphonia & Phantasia - there are multiple non-skippable & non-sidequest story beats that connect Berseria especially to Phantasia.
• Tales of the Tempest sucks and was removed by the makers from being an official "flagship" title and delegated to spin-off like Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology, Tales of Phantasia: Narikiri Dungeon, & Tales of VS.
• Tales of Hearts R & Tales of Innocence R aren't great but aren't bad, either.
• Tales of Destiny II/Eternia, Tales of Rebirth, Tales of Legendia, Tales of the Abyss, Tales of Rebirth, Tales of Legendia, Tales of Innocence R, Tales of Vesperia, Tales of Hearts R, Tales of Graces f, & Tales of Arise aren't connected what-so-ever save a few references (as is common throughout the series).

My personal list of worst to best, for what it's worth:

1. Tales Of Symphonia: Dawn Of The New World
2. Tales Of Arise
3. Tales Of Zestiria
4. Tales of Innocence R
5. Tales Of Hearts R
6. Tales Of Legendia
7. Tales of Rebirth
8. Tales Of Xillia 2
9. Tales Of Destiny 2
10. Tales Of Destiny
11. Tales Of Graces f
12. Tales Of Symphonia
13. Tales Of Phantasia
14. Tales Of Xillia
15. Tales Of Berseria
16. Tales Of The Abyss
17. Tales Of Eternia/Tales Of Destiny II
18. Tales Of Vesperia

Yeah, I hated the newest game, Arise.

 

[Yousef's iconYousef]

Tails Adventure

 

[Jotaro]

I've been considering binging Namco's tales series. I've had issues with getting into RPG games in the past (yadda yadda too boring turn based stuff) but the action concept of these games interest me. I've seen that there are a lot of tales games, but i have no idea of which to start. Do the games work like Final Fantasy, where there's no universal plot? I see a lot of people saying Tales of Symphonia is the best, but Tales of Abyss seems good. Which one should i play first? Which to avoid?

i will tell you the tales games that you should play mostly, dont sweat for the ''mid'' tales games

symphonia, xillia, vesperia, arise and abyss, finish firstly these amazing tales games, and later you can check the rest too

 

[Evaccaneer Doom]

Tails Adventure

Tales of Skypatrol is clearly better

 

[Cu-Neo]

Tales of Skypatrol is clearly better

Nu uh ?, Tales of the Shire: a Lord of the rings videogames, is better

Now speaking of the topic I recommend starting with the ones that are on modern platforms, of that list I recommend Vesperia because you are going to laugh a lot and it has the combat that the majority of the series have, then if you want to taste something more modern play Zestiria and Berseria.

 

[Bonkers225]

i heard these two got ps2 remakes. are they worth it?

Post automatically merged: Feb 11, 2025

got it. thank you for the help!

I personally never played the PS2 remakes so I cannot comment on that.