Tales of the Abyss = THE BEST TALES GAME

            In the long history of Tales games, an extremely popular Japanese role-playing game franchise, their have been many stellar additions. None stand out to me more than Tales of the Abyss, the eight mother ship title in the Tales franchise and an excellent Playstation 2 game in its own right.

            According to Gamefaqs.com, Tales of the Abyss follows the story of an arrogant amnesiac named Luke fon Fabre. Turns out that Luke was kidnapped seven years ago, and the shock of that event made him lose his memory. Since his return he has been confined to his family's estate, forbidden to leave until he reaches maturity. As a result, Luke is a spoiled, naïve brat with very limited social skills. He spends his days training in martial arts and talking to the servants around the mansion. That all dramatically changes one day when a woman named Tear shows up and attempts to assassinate Luke's master. She fails, but in the commotion somehow Tear and Luke both get magically transported to another part of the world, and they must figure out how to return home, and of course prevent a war and save the world along the way. Fortunately Luke doesn't have to go it alone. There's a small cast of helpful supporting characters that you'll meet along the way, including a snooty princess, an accomplished swordsman who's terrified of women, a furry little arsonist creature who has been exiled from his tribe, and more. The unique relationships between the characters are developed over time to give your party a special dynamic that you'll appreciate throughout the game. The characters in Tales of the Abyss form their own little unique cutout lending much to the enjoyment of the voice acting and the lengthy cut scenes. The dialogue, again is fully-voiced, and provides the perfect amount of quirkiness, humor, and seriousness that helps to make Tales of the Abyss story and enjoyable ride that you will want to see through to the end.

            The gameplay doesn't veer too far from the well-worn path of previous role-playing games. You move from town to town and dungeon to dungeon completing quests and vanquishing enemies to move the story along. When you're exploring a dungeon or traversing the overworld, you'll encounter monsters, which initiates a battle. You can take up to four characters into battle, and three of those characters will be controlled by artificial intelligence. The artificial intelligence is customizable, so you can set a variety of parameters to influence each character's behavior. It works well, and the characters usually do a good job following orders. The battlefields are large and 3D, so you're free to run around as much as you want, which comes in handy when you need to evade enemy attacks. The mechanics of battle seem simple at first, and indeed it's quite easy to hack and slash your way through most of the early battles in the game. However, as the game progresses, slight but significant layers of depth are added to the combat. In battle you have several different attacks that can be strung together to form combos. There's a standard attack that can be modified by pressing the left analog stick in a specific direction. Each character can also use "artes," which are special moves that inflict more damage and often have elemental properties. Most of the time in battle you'll be stringing together combinations of standard attacks and artes. Battle’s are very fast paced, with attacks and artes flying every which way, and you must constantly be on your toes to succeed.

            Tales of the Abyss is overall an standout of example of what a Japanese role playing game can accomplish. According to vgchartz.com, Tales of the Abyss has sold over 570,000  copies which is amazing for a JRPG. Hopefully with these numbers, we can see more Tales titles in the future. 

 Link to image:

http://bzzz.3dsbuzz.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/tales-of-the-abyss-thumb.jpg

Other links:

http://www.gamefaqs.com/ps2/929343-tales-of-the-abyss

http://www.vgchartz.com/game/2325/tales-of-the-abyss/