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Tales of the Abyss [3DS] |OT| "The wait better be worth it!" - PALland

demonkaze

Member
I swear, whenever people mention ToTA they always complain about asshole Luke. For me, I loved asshole Luke, even to the point that he's my favorite Tales protagonist after Yuri. He's just different to most of the other main characters in rpgs (excluding Yuri, hence my fave).
 
This is still not being released until february in the US right? They have it as part of the buy 2 get 1 free on bestbuy right now with a status of "backordered" but I'm assuming it's just a mistake by bestbuy?
 

beje

Banned
They really dun goofed with this release in PAL land. We already knew that the game was going to be released only in English (which is considered bad enough for a big publisher) but I just saw it yesterday in GAME and they didn't even bother in translating the back cover nor the instruction booklet (just the quickstart) AND it was full retail price.

Then they wonder why the fuck they don't sell a single piece of their shit (or blame piracy, completely unexistant in the 3DS). I am fluent in English. Heck, I HAVE to speak it everyday at work. But not even bothering in translating those two things is considered such a big lack of respect to the consumer, they deserve zero sales. I mean, not even the shittiest and cheapest publishers releasing the most strange stuff from Japan dare to even try that shit.
 
I've just been wrecked twice in one of the early game boss battles... (first 5 hours)
Arietta and her monster cronies, it's like everyone who isn't Luke is doing shockingly low damage to the beasts and quite literally 1 damage per hit on Arietta herself, did I miss an entire section of game because i'm either under-leveled, under-equipped or both! This makes me look back with fondness at the Wolf boss from Vesperia, at least I was damaging that guy
 
I've just been wrecked twice in one of the early game boss battles... (first 5 hours)
Arietta and her monster cronies, it's like everyone who isn't Luke is doing shockingly low damage to the beasts and quite literally 1 damage per hit on Arietta herself, did I miss an entire section of game because i'm either under-leveled, under-equipped or both! This makes me look back with fondness at the Wolf boss from Vesperia, at least I was damaging that guy

Are you talking about the fight on top of the castle ?
IF so :
Kill arietta first ..you hsould be alright if you haven't rushed the game . Meaning Stay some time in the castle to level up a little . Arrieta should be the first to fall .. Check up your skill to see if there aren't some negative bonuses applied ..( there shouldn't be )
 
Are you talking about the fight on top of the castle ?
IF so :
Kill arietta first ..you hsould be alright if you haven't rushed the game . Meaning Stay some time in the castle to level up a little . Arrieta should be the first to fall .. Check up your skill to see if there aren't some negative bonuses applied ..( there shouldn't be )

Well I guess it's grind time then, will check the skills since I kind of forgot they were actually there.
 

Sadist

Member
15 hours in and I'm liking it. There was just one boss fight troubeling me, but other than that it's smooth sailing. I did notice that the framerate takes a nosedive when walking on the worldmap in forest area's. Very ugly. Was this a problem with the PS2 version?

Loading times are a-okay. Three-four seconds tops.
 

Zafir

Member
Well I guess it's grind time then, will check the skills since I kind of forgot they were actually there.
What level are/were you?

I was level 14-16 when I fought
Arietta this time. Arietta is a cake walk comparing to the sword dancer you can fight straight afterwards(Admittedly you can fight it a a bit later, but I always like to do sword dancers as soon as they become available to fight so I don't forget). Boy did I have a blast trying to beat that with how pathetic the AI is.
Speaking of which, make sure in the strategy section you've set everyone to attack the same target, otherwise they may go attacking one of the other targets instead of your target.
15 hours in and I'm liking it. There was just one boss fight troubeling me, but other than that it's smooth sailing. I did notice that the framerate takes a nosedive when walking on the worldmap in forest area's. Very ugly. Was this a problem with the PS2 version?

Loading times are a-okay. Three-four seconds tops.
The PS2 version was pretty bad on the world map. It would often drop to about 15FPS, even when you arent near forest areas.

Loading times were worse in the ps2 version too.
 

marc^o^

Nintendo's Pro Bono PR Firm
What level are/were you?

I was level 14-16 when I fought
Arietta this time. Arietta is a cake walk comparing to the sword dancer you can fight straight afterwards(Admittedly you can fight it a a bit later, but I always like to do sword dancers as soon as they become available to fight so I don't forget). Boy did I have a blast trying to beat that with how pathetic the AI is.
Speaking of which, make sure in the strategy section you've set everyone to attack the same target, otherwise they may go attacking one of the other targets instead of your target.

The PS2 version was pretty bad on the world map. It would often drop to about 15FPS, even when you arent near forest areas.

Loading times were worse in the ps2 version too.
My formation is to have the healer and the Necromancer as far as possible on the battle field, it helps a lot.

The music in this game is beautiful <3
 

Zafir

Member
My formation is to have the healer and the Necromancer as far as possible on the battle field, it helps a lot.

The music in this game is beautiful <3
Yeah, I have them set to that too in the strategy for bosses. However Jade still stupidly runs up to the enemy and melees it sometimes, despite the fact he has plenty of TP to use magic, and all his strike arts are switched off. I've also seen Tear heal herself, or me instead of healing the person who is at 300hp, and no, the person isn't out of range. In some cases I end up just controlling Jade, the melee AI isn't quite as bad. Though they'll still stupidly stand in the spot where an AoE is about to hit. I'm not really holding it against Abyss though, most AI's have issues like that.
 

Zafir

Member
For jade AI :

-Use only artes
-consume all TP

should do the trick
That is what I have got it set to.

Which is why it was annoying me all the more, him running up and meleeing. Because it was going against what I set him to on the strategy menu.
 
My formation is to have the healer and the Necromancer as far as possible on the battle field, it helps a lot.

The music in this game is beautiful <3

Ehh. As far as Tales OSTs go, it's fairly mediocre. This is when Sakuraba really started to phone in most of his music.

TOS had a far better soundtrack.
 

Sagitario

Member
Ehh. As far as Tales OSTs go, it's fairly mediocre. This is when Sakuraba really started to phone in most of his music.

TOS had a far better soundtrack.

Well, I loved most of Sakuraba boss themes in TotA (particularly against the colosseum cameo and Van). Also, Motoo Fujiwara themes, SO GOOD!
 

Peff

Member
lol no. Edge of Decision and Never Surrender are much better than Symphonia's standard battle themes. Meaning of Birth sucks btw. None of the Sakuraba OSTs come close to Legendia's though, Go Shiina needs to come back.
 
What level are/were you?

I was level 14-16 when I fought
Arietta this time. Arietta is a cake walk comparing to the sword dancer you can fight straight afterwards(Admittedly you can fight it a a bit later, but I always like to do sword dancers as soon as they become available to fight so I don't forget). Boy did I have a blast trying to beat that with how pathetic the AI is.
Speaking of which, make sure in the strategy section you've set everyone to attack the same target, otherwise they may go attacking one of the other targets instead of your target.
I was lvl 11 but I grinded up to 13 and did it, those two levels made more difference than i'd expect, that and altering the attack strategy so thanks for the assistance.

And since we are on about the soundtrack i'm thinking that Nuclear Muffin may be right so far, no tracks have stood out to me at this point.
 

Volodja

Member
I was lvl 11 but I grinded up to 13 and did it, those two levels made more difference than i'd expect, that and altering the attack strategy so thanks for the assistance.

And since we are on about the soundtrack i'm thinking that Nuclear Muffin may be right so far, no tracks have stood out to me at this point.
I am this spot right now with everyone at level 13 (except Anise at level 11)
and the idiocy of the AI is gonna make me burst into flames while fighting the Sword Dancer. I'm going with controlling Luke to lure the Sword Dancer around while Jade, Tear and Anise blast him from as afar away as possible, disabling all their Strike Artes and still, after a while they decide to melee him even if they have TPs and I've set everyone to 100% consumption. I understand that if the Sword Dancer was easily beaten just by literally running in circles around him it would be kinda bad but it is still annoying when the AI completely ignores my orders.
 

weeaboo

Member
Whoa, shit just got real HARD. The pace was killing me and suddenly BAM
Van is WAHHH, Luke YOU IDIOT, Mysterywhat? wtf is going on, a city in qlipsomethin?, Luke is Asch WAHT, and i'm controlling Asch now? wtf Tear's grandfather!?!?.

My poor body, it hurts
 

Zafir

Member
I am this spot right now with everyone at level 13 (except Anise at level 11)
and the idiocy of the AI is gonna make me burst into flames while fighting the Sword Dancer. I'm going with controlling Luke to lure the Sword Dancer around while Jade, Tear and Anise blast him from as afar away as possible, disabling all their Strike Artes and still, after a while they decide to melee him even if they have TPs and I've set everyone to 100% consumption. I understand that if the Sword Dancer was easily beaten just by literally running in circles around him it would be kinda bad but it is still annoying when the AI completely ignores my orders.
Yeah, that's pretty much what I was saying earlier.
The AI is pretty apalling. What I ended up doing was controlling jade, and leave Luke in guard mode stood still to tank him. Tear managed to keep him alive while I battered him with magic. Though, the worst thing about you mentioning that it would be bad if you beat him by running around in circles? For the final 7k I did just that with Jade. Running away, using spell, and then running away, again.
 

Volodja

Member
Yeah, that's pretty much what I was saying earlier.
The AI is pretty apalling. What I ended up doing was controlling jade, and leave Luke in guard mode stood still to tank him. Tear managed to keep him alive while I battered him with magic. Though, the worst thing about you mentioning that it would be bad if you beat him by running around in circles? For the final 7k I did just that with Jade. Running away, using spell, and then running away, again.
I don't really like to change my controlled character, furthermore everyone that gets in range of the Dancer dies in a couple seconds. The cause of this could be that I skipped the last equipment upgrading at the port before the dungeon because I don't intend to grind to have money to refit everyone at every city when you usually can get by keeping the same stuff for more than one section.
My running in circles strategy with Luke was what I did for the first few thousands of health I took out of the Sword Dancer. I never stopped to take a single hit, just pure circling. Too bad that soon enough my other comrades considered that such conduct didn't hold up to their knightly ideals and decided to go tickle the huge guy.
I think I'll try upgrading my equipment while maybe getting a couple levels more on Anise, after all I manage to bring him down quite a bit, but everything goes to hell when the harbingers of stupid visit my casters.
 
I swear, whenever people mention ToTA they always complain about asshole Luke. For me, I loved asshole Luke, even to the point that he's my favorite Tales protagonist after Yuri. He's just different to most of the other main characters in rpgs (excluding Yuri, hence my fave).

Yup,
long-haired
Luke was baller. Most of the party acts much worse
after that terrible Akzeriuth part, especially that actual, honest to goodness traitor who actually did something worthy of "losing their trust", otherwise known as Queen Douchebag of the Universe, Anise Tatlin. Fuck that bitch.

Well, I loved most of Sakuraba boss themes in TotA (particularly against the colosseum cameo and Van). Also, Motoo Fujiwara themes, SO GOOD!

Fujiwara themes own pretty much every other song in Tales for me. Bump of Chicken = awesome group.
 
I am this spot right now with everyone at level 13 (except Anise at level 11)
and the idiocy of the AI is gonna make me burst into flames while fighting the Sword Dancer. I'm going with controlling Luke to lure the Sword Dancer around while Jade, Tear and Anise blast him from as afar away as possible, disabling all their Strike Artes and still, after a while they decide to melee him even if they have TPs and I've set everyone to 100% consumption. I understand that if the Sword Dancer was easily beaten just by literally running in circles around him it would be kinda bad but it is still annoying when the AI completely ignores my orders.
I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to beat him at this level . You'll come back in this region , so it might be best to not tackle that beast right now ...

I remember suffering a huge defeat the first time i've played this game and came back at LV 20 ..it doesn't drop anything of value anyway (You should still beat him to unlocked that quest if my memory is correct )
 

Zafir

Member
I beat it at level 16 straight after
Arietta
, but I would also recommend coming back later. Though, don't wait too long, as it despawns. Basically, just fight it when you're near where the castle is again as part of the story, it isn't that long to go.
 

Volodja

Member
I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to beat him at this level . You'll come back in this region , so it might be best to not tackle that beast right now ...

I remember suffering a huge defeat the first time i've played this game and came back at LV 20 ..it doesn't drop anything of value anyway (You should still beat him to unlocked that quest if my memory is correct )
I can see that I'm not supposed to beat him at this level, having to play around the settings so much was enough proof of that, but it seemed completely doable if it wasn't for the rampant idiocy of my comrades so I got kinda stubborn.
 

Seda

Member
Yeah the Sword Dancers in most Tales games are quite tough to beat at the very first moment you can encounter them.
 

Zafir

Member
I can see that I'm not supposed to beat him at this level, having to play around the settings so much was enough proof of that, but it seemed completely doable if it wasn't for the rampant idiocy of my comrades so I got kinda stubborn.
Yeah, I really do completely agree with you.

It's an issue common in Tales of games actually. I remember having the exact same issue with an extra boss on Vesperia. I was really underlevelled for it, the boss level was 88 if I recall, my party was around 65-70. I'm pretty positive, I could have beaten it on normal with competant AI. In the end I just turned down the difficulty to easy and beat him. It was either that or grinding, and I'm not a fan of grinding.
 
low stocks in uk? Iam hard to get something for xmas so put this on a list of things, guy at GAME say it not out yet and he not have it before January lol.

looked it up and looks like its out of stock every where
 

Zafir

Member
low stocks in uk? Iam hard to get something for xmas so put this on a list of things, guy at GAME say it not out yet and he not have it before January lol.

looked it up and looks like its out of stock every where
Namco Bandai didn't ship enough copies it seems. Most places were sold on the day of release.
 
Yup,
long-haired
Luke was baller. Most of the party acts much worse
after that terrible Akzeriuth part, especially that actual, honest to goodness traitor who actually did something worthy of "losing their trust", otherwise known as Queen Douchebag of the Universe, Anise Tatlin. Fuck that bitch.

...It's days like these I'm honored to call this man my brother.

Anise needed to die. In fact, she needed to somehow receive the Quickening, survive said lightning strike and become an immortal so that she can repeatedly die in multiple fires of various degrees, all of which appear at random. The game would have seriously been better if Arietta had killed her in their "duel" and you got her instead, because then at least you'd get a summoner type character which was oddly missing from the game.

At least Guy told Natalia, Anise and Jade to fuck off and therefore redeemed his man points after stupid Akzeriuth.
 
I can see that I'm not supposed to beat him at this level, having to play around the settings so much was enough proof of that, but it seemed completely doable if it wasn't for the rampant idiocy of my comrades so I got kinda stubborn.

AI isn't perfect but it does it job ..that sword dancer do a lot of damage for your poor character with so low Def...All the sword dancers or fell beasts ( it's one or the other ) appear far before you can take them down normally ..that's how they are ... if you're not willing to take up the challenge of defeating them early , then just come back later . they are totally doable.it's certainly not the AI fault as this guy spoutting ridiculous damage ( at this point of the game )

...It's days like these I'm honored to call this man my brother.

Anise needed to die. In fact, she needed to somehow receive the Quickening, survive said lightning strike and become an immortal so that she can repeatedly die in multiple fires of various degrees, all of which appear at random. The game would have seriously been better if Arietta had killed her in their "duel" and you got her instead, because then at least you'd get a summoner type character which was oddly missing from the game.

At least Guy told Natalia, Anise and Jade to fuck off and therefore redeemed his man points after stupid Akzeriuth.

Anise
-Has herself to blame for the death of ION
-Was blackmailed with her parents situation
-did gave a tip to the party ( volcano part )
-has her normal ( greedy) motives obvious since the start for everyone except asshole LUKE

She has plenty of reasons to suffer , but there is no need to push everything on her , since she is assuming her role and her faults.

It's the total opposite of luke , after the "event" that was saying ... it's not my fault , ect ect ..at this point , luke was just a puppet , didn't have a mind of his own and was useless really .. he had everything to prove ( considering his past attitude ) and they stop doubting him near the end of part 2 .. ( even before that for some )
For me anise Hate is totaly unjustified., but understandable .. it would have been cool however ,
if Arrietta would have been playable ( like ash ).
 

Zafir

Member
AI isn't perfect but it does it job ..that sword dancer do a lot of damage for your poor character with so low Def...All the sword dancers or fell beasts ( it's one or the other ) appear far before you can take them down normally ..that's how they are ... if you're not willing to take up the challenge of defeating them early , then just come back later . they are totally doable.it's certainly not the AI fault as this guy spoutting ridiculous damage ( at this point of the game )

You're missing the point though. While yes, the sword dancer does do a lot of damage that isn't what we're complaining about, it wouldn't be a problem if the AI didn't ignore your strategy setup and go running in to melee to get sliced and diced. I'm not sure if it's a glitch with the artes only strategy setting, because actually, Tear doesn't seem to run in and melee when I set her to Heal. I mean okay, she heals the wrong people sometimes but I can forgive that. Thinking about it, I don't even remember it happening in the PS2 version, but that could just be my memory failing me.
 

Dark Schala

Eloquent Princess
Really? Grand Chokmah's song is still one of the best town music of all time.
You have great taste.

Yup,
long-haired
Luke was baller. Most of the party acts much worse
after that terrible Akzeriuth part, especially that actual, honest to goodness traitor who actually did something worthy of "losing their trust", otherwise known as Queen Douchebag of the Universe, Anise Tatlin. Fuck that bitch.
Agreed. (Likely endgame spoilers)
IMO, the overarching themes for Abyss is fine, but the character writing is pretty bad. The only one who doesn't suffer as a result is probably Jade (but that's because Jade is awesome). How the characters interact with Luke, especially after the Akzeriuth bit of the game is simply cringeworthy. In fact, even prior to that, how everyone interacts with him sometimes drives me up the wall. This is made even worse when Anise betrays the group and everyone's ... fine with it? The hell is this nonsense?

When Luke gets over feeling sorry for himself towards the end, though, he isn't really a bad character.

Also, if only Jade had decided to slap Natalia earlier... haha.

But hey. At least most of us can agree that Tales of Rebirth's story is probably the worst one in the series. It's probably one of the worst stories I've come across in an RPG. :lol
 

polg

Member
I only had time to play the first hour but my first impressions are very good so far. Can't wait for the xmas break to play it more!
 

Volodja

Member
AI isn't perfect but it does it job ..that sword dancer do a lot of damage for your poor character with so low Def...All the sword dancers or fell beasts ( it's one or the other ) appear far before you can take them down normally ..that's how they are ... if you're not willing to take up the challenge of defeating them early , then just come back later . they are totally doable.it's certainly not the AI fault as this guy spoutting ridiculous damage ( at this point of the game )
It is the AI's fault if the reason why it is hard to beat is that the AI itself goes off script for no reason because otherwise the Sword Dancer wouldn't get a single hit on me, which probably would be a problem as well, I guess but that's another issue even if related to this one.
Now let's be clear, this is not an incredible problem and I don't want to make it appear like I'm giving it too much weight, just something I consider sub-optimal, I'll simply go back to it when I can beat it cleanly.
 
You're missing the point though. While yes, the sword dancer does do a lot of damage that isn't what we're complaining about, it wouldn't be a problem if the AI didn't ignore your strategy setup and go running in to melee to get sliced and diced. I'm not sure if it's a glitch with the artes only strategy setting, because actually, Tear doesn't seem to run in and melee when I set her to Heal. I mean okay, she heals the wrong people sometimes but I can forgive that. Thinking about it, I don't even remember it happening in the PS2 version, but that could just be my memory failing me.

It is the AI's fault if the reason why it is hard to beat is that the AI itself goes off script for no reason because otherwise the Sword Dancer wouldn't get a single hit on me, which probably would be a problem as well, I guess but that's another issue even if related to this one.
Now let's be clear, this is not an incredible problem and I don't want to make it appear like I'm giving it too much weight, just something I consider sub-optimal, I'll simply go back to it when I can beat it cleanly.

Wait so you're telling me you told the character to stay away , use only their artes without thinking of their MP and still having Mp they go short range ?
If the grind positions are correct, this is a bug.

there is alos this weird behaviour when you are supposed to be long range but with an ennemy too close they automaticly switch close range . I only had this problem in the japanese ( PS2 ) version .. when i played it undub afterwards i never encountered it.
 

Zafir

Member
Wait so you're telling me you told the character to stay away , use only their artes without thinking of their MP and still having Mp they go short range ?
If the grind positions are correct, this is a bug.

there is alos this weird behaviour when you are supposed to be long range but with an ennemy too close they automaticly switch close range . I only had this problem in the japanese ( PS2 ) version .. when i played it undub afterwards i never encountered it.
That's the jist of it, yes.

Jade isn't even in close range when he does it. He's usually the other side of the screen, and he just decides to run in, despite the strategy being set up to prevent that from happening.
 

Volodja

Member
Wait so you're telling me you told the character to stay away , use only their artes without thinking of their MP and still having Mp they go short range ?
If the grind positions are correct, this is a bug.

there is alos this weird behaviour when you are supposed to be long range but with an ennemy too close they automaticly switch close range . I only had this problem in the japanese ( PS2 ) version .. when i played it undub afterwards i never encountered it.
Like Zafir said, that's pretty much it and this behaviour doesn't show up just when the Dancer is near the casters, because I pay attention so that the situation doesn't occur. They even go as far as crossing the entire battlefield to poke him while their MP bar is nearly full.
And obviously the Strategy is set so that they don't do that.
 

Labadal

Member
Finally had some time for this. Played for 1h 30m. I dislike Luke, but all is well, since it is obvious that is what they want. I like how Tear treats him, some of his own medicine. Voice acting is passable, Tear has the best performance so far. Music is standard Tales fare, slightly below Vesperia so far, but I can't comment enough on that yet. Combat is fun and the framerate is solid. Despite not having awesome voice acting, I would still have liked voiced skits. Silent skits just aren't as fun without voices. A positive first impression, and I hope that it keeps on delivering. Glad we finally got a version of this game here in Europe. Shame about the release. NB dun goofed. Not enough copies shipped. Expecting the game to be worth much $$$ in the future.
 

speedpop

Has problems recognising girls
With my partner grabbing her own 3DS via PAL land I figured it was a good time to play an RPG over the Christmas/New Year holiday period. Realistically I should have waited until the NTSC release because I've got more shit to play with than a sewerage worker, but what can you do.

I've only thrown in 40mins or so before I had to be a glutton at the dinner table. I'm usually one to be quite picky with voice acting and at first this one seemed a bit lame but I'm not grating my teeth over it; I would love skits to be voiced as well though yet I can understand why it did not happen in this release if the original release is any indication. It just seems a little silly to go from grandiose music and such to become almost muted and text to roll on by whenever you select a skit to start. I also may be in the minority but I think Luke is stupid and awesome at the same time. It's a little refreshing to play a lead character in a Japanese RPG who acts like a spoiled shithead straight off the bat.

Outside of that it's a shame that Namco did not invest a bit more time in to this production, though I guess if you want to make a quick buck then you just have to do it. The 3D effect is passable but the up close shots make me want to cry, and some of the textures seem a little too pixelated at times. This is my 3rd Tales game and the only ones I have touched prior are Phantasia and Symphonia so I am expecting at least a decent romp since I have never played Abyss before.
 

Labadal

Member
Where is the "i want to kidney punch Mieu" line? i'd like to give him a punch or two. I also wouldn't mind punching Luke and Anise. Jade and Tear are good so far. Guy is also cool.

Still annoyed by no voiced skits, since I was used to them in Vesperia. Oh well, it isn't the end of the world.

The battle system is really fun so far and I enjoy it more than any other Tales game I have played (not that many).

Just a question about weapons and armour: Can I sell all non-elemental equipment that is weaker than my current gear or should I save them? I have sold everything I don't use.
 

PKrockin

Member
A Cutlass and 5 Maces are needed for a sidequest, you can go buy them again later though. Feel free to sell old stuff but there's one time when the buy/sell value of weapons and armor skyrockets so you may want to wait for that.
 
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