The Tales of... Series Volume 1 - Oldschool Cool

The Tales of... Series is a truly underrated franchise. The first of the series, Tales of Phantasia, was developed/released in 1995 on the Super Famicom in the land of the rising sun. It was a 2-d side-scrolling rpg hybrid, with the depth and brevity to uphold the lordly caliber of such game styles.



You were Cress, a young man hell-bent on revenge after a strange attack leaves him family-less. You travel through many places in a quest for honor, revenge, and understanding. It has the basic elements of most any rpg; cooking, leveling up, collecting coins. Upgrading your weapons, armor, you rpg fans know what I'm talking about, it's that grind shit we all love so so much. So what sets this game (and its' series) apart? The battle system!!!

In these first 3 games I am reviewing (and the Fandom vol.), the battle system is a 2-d plain with an assorted amount of enemies to battle. They call this a linear battle system. They are random battles, which is not always the case for the series as a whole. You can mash buttons, to be sure, and most times you will be fine. But with the 2 dimensional battle field, sometimes a wiry enemy can trap you in a corner and obliterate you. Makes for some interesting strategy. Did I mention these battles are in REAL TIME!??! This also makes a huge difference in gameplay and opens up for deeper battle strategy.

The sprites in Tales of Phantasia look fantastic. It was the first Super Famicom game to use 48mb of space, a technical achievement for the day. It also features a first in streamed audio voice, with the work done by mastermind sound programmer Hiroya Hatsushiba. You can tell Namco (the publisher of the series) really wanted this game to gain a following. It just breathes creativity and charm.



Tales of Destiny sees a departure from Nintendo consoles until 2003! A 1 disc wonder on the PS1, ToD shared in its predessor's linear battle system, with a few added tweaks. They call this the Enhanced Linear Battle System, which is quite silly because it is mostly a graphical update. In any case, the story revolves around Stahn, a stow-away on a dragonship who meets a mystical talking sword! They explore vast areas to save the world from destruction (crazy, right?). Not much aside from story is different for this game, but I want to stress that that is precisely why people become fans of the series. The story and characters are endearing, and the protagonist has a very personable attitude toward his experiences.



The last of the oldschool console contenders, Tales of Destiny II/Eternia again arrives via PS1. A bit of a backstep in the imagery department, the characters began to be a little more teenage in appearance, and more emphasis instead is put to the backgrounds and npc's. Not too bad, really, but an odd choice to say the least. This also marks the decision by Namco to follow in Square's footsteps and begin mis-naming the American version of the games. In the US, this game is Tales of Destiny II. HOWEVER in Japan an actual sequel to Tales of Destiny, entitled Tales of Destiny 2, came out some years later. We in the States and Euro, of course, are left out of the loop. The story is a little shaky this time around imo, none of the characters are as likable as in previous installments.

After each "generation," so to speak, Namco releases a Fandom of the Tales Series. They are just fun mini-games featuring the main characters of each respective title. It provides a little more insight on the characters in general, as I said this is a staple of the series. It really is fun to meet them outside of battle! Of course, they are Japan-only releases, so unless your PS1 is modded or from Japan, you can forgo these little nuggets.

This is an excellent series, and it deserves the dedicated (albeit a bit obsessive) fanbase it has attained. I will continue on with Vol. 2 sometime in the future...