76 hours of gameplay later, I completed Tales of Arise last Winter and I enjoyed playing the game for what it’s worth. For a series that has always caught my attention since Tales of Symphonia, Tales of Arise had a lot to live up to. I already knew most of the series from amazing titles such as Xillia, Berseria, Zestiria and Symphonia, of course.
The game has a lot of potential and was a great introduction into playing the series. While the good and bad have already been said, I want to share a few thoughts of what it was like playing Tales of Arise.
GAMEPLAY
Compared to RPGs like Dark Cloud, Pokémon, Final Fantasy, Dragon Age and Persona, Tales of Arise’s gameplay is strikingly familiar yet requires more strategy as enemies are always a few levels higher, can be faster at hitting you and your teammates may distract you constantly by shouting about what more they are going to do next.
Levelling up is rigged. Upon the mission, Farewell, Mage, I saved Torin from level 66 flying Zeugles at level 36 and I didn’t go up any levels on normal difficulty and any food I ate beforehand didn’t boost me enough EXP to level up faster…
