Tales of Legendia.

So this has been out for some time now and I for one truly enjoy it. It's been getting a lot of flack from gamers for it's "Toy Story" like visuals, but I find the overall visuals amazing.

So has anyone finished/picked this up yet? At the moment, I'm storming through the Character Quests and having a blast.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

I'm playing this as well, and yes it's a great game. I just started the character quests myself, and I'm loving it. Some great characters in the game, and they're all very endearing.

My favorite character is Chloe. She's so cute, and I like how she appears tough but has that softer side to her.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Finished it in Japanese, loved it, started playing it in English but then my PS2 died.

It sucks that the localization got chopped up AGAIN. In the original game, the Character Quests were voiced just as much as the main section, but now it is complete silence. Mimmy had voiced scenes as well.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by Vkamicht

Finished it in Japanese, loved it, started playing it in English but then my PS2 died.

It sucks that the localization got chopped up AGAIN. In the original game, the Character Quests were voiced just as much as the main section, but now it is complete silence. Mimmy had voiced scenes as well.

I haven't played the Japanese version, but I did hear about the voices getting slashed off the American version for the Character Quests, which was most disappointing. I noticed it right off the bat too, after the main quest. Save every random skit from time to time, they don't say a word. Not a huge complaint, but still pretty hurtful.

I really do not believe the kind of hate Legendia has been recieving. Even though EGM (Ziff Davis) aren't really to be taken seriously over their RPG criticism, they gave Legendia a 5.0. A 5! The injustice. Some fabulous websites like Got-Next gave it an 8 though, which is nice. ;D

Originally Posted by Rei no Otaku

My favorite character is Chloe. She's so cute, and I like how she appears tough but has that softer side to her.

Hah, I love Chloe alongside with Norma for her upbeat behaviour. The softer side in Chloe is really cute to watch unfold and everytime she wants to tell Senel something intimate she shies away. It's awesome. I suppose you started Will's Character Quests?

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

me too,i love it,is really great but is too short is only 30 hours to finish game

I was speaking idiomatically.

Originally Posted by RYU

me too,i love it,is really great but is too short is only 30 hours to finish game

That sounds about right for the 'main quest', but that's not the end of the game. The character quests are basically the 2nd half of the game, not doing them is losing half the experience. Because the dungeons are re-used they are almost entirely story/character driven. But still, they have the true ending of the game and tie up almost all lose ends around the plot.

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It's unfortunate that Namco US decided to remove all the voice acting for the character quests... I can't believe they would be so cheap at trying to save every bit of their money to avoid paying the VAs for the works they suppose to finish.

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by yangxu

It's unfortunate that Namco US decided to remove all the voice acting for the character quests... I can't believe they would be so cheap at trying to save every bit of their money to avoid paying the VAs for the works they suppose to finish.

Well they have been producing a Tales game nearly every year now, so maybe it's a good thing for them to be cost efficient. In the last five years we had the real Tales of Destiny II, Rebirth, Symphonia, Symphonia PS2, Legendia, Abyss and the GBA games. And I'm probably forgetting a few more. Sucks though, I feel ya.

How ya doing, buddy?

I was playing this right up until Grandia 3 came out, which I am now a little more in favor of. Legendia's still quite good though and I plan to go back to it once Grandia 3 is done.

I really like the game as a whole though -- the characters are cool, although Shirley does get on my nerves quite a bit. I'm getting tired characters like Shirley in general. I'm really enjoying Jay, Norma, and Grune though.

Jay's cool because he's really smart and a smart-ass, and Norma's personality is great. It's awesome when her and Jay do their victory skit and she asks him to dance while she sings. "Norma's the best, ever, YAY!" XD And Jay's break-dancing. XDD I like Grune just because of what she does to Senel to cheer him up. Grune's also so air-headed it's funny.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Rocca

I haven't played the Japanese version, but I did hear about the voices getting slashed off the American version for the Character Quests, which was most disappointing. I noticed it right off the bat too, after the main quest. Save every random skit from time to time, they don't say a word. Not a huge complaint, but still pretty hurtful.

I really do not believe the kind of hate Legendia has been recieving. Even though EGM (Ziff Davis) aren't really to be taken seriously over their RPG criticism, they gave Legendia a 5.0. A 5! The injustice. Some fabulous websites like Got-Next gave it an 8 though, which is nice. ;D



Hah, I love Chloe alongside with Norma for her upbeat behaviour. The softer side in Chloe is really cute to watch unfold and everytime she wants to tell Senel something intimate she shies away. It's awesome. I suppose you started Will's Character Quests?

Not even. I'm still in the introduction part. I just fought Moses in the arena, which was hilarious btw.

Norma: Yay, go Senel!
Moses: Hey, where's my cheering section?
Jay: Yeah Moses! Go out there and die!

I'm kind of ticked that Senel doesn't go for Chloe. I feel so bad for her. Especially since I don't care for Shirley much at all...

The reviews for this game are a prime example of why I don't listen to reviews at all. This game gets mediocre reviews, when a boring game with an archaic battle system like DQ8 gets high scores.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

I loved it.. just a shame though, they should've localized Tales of the Abyss.. it looks like the ultimate Tales game.

Im still hoping to hear a NA release at E3..

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Well, it's just as yangxu said. That the only downside to the game is that the english voice actors have been cut off from the character quests. The only time you'd hear them is during the anime scenes. Which I think is a total bummer. Because I had high hopes for the game.

If Namco does get Abyss in the U.S which there's no doubt that they probably will due to the picture of the end of the Legendia manual. They'll probably go all out. Since there seems to be more stuff going for Abyss than in Legendia. Like the increased Special Attacks (Normal/High Ougis). And plus that Limit Break-esque attack, Overlimit.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Abyss didn't have as great of a cast of characters as Legendia, and no Tales game can beat Legendia's soundtrack. Gameplay alone Abyss holds its own VS all other Tales games. It seems to take the best parts of all the different Tales games and put them together in one nicely polished package. Fans of Symphonia will love the battle system, fans of a system like SO3 might enjoy the free run option (lets you leave your line), it even borrows some ideas from Tales of Destiny 2 (jp), such as setting extra abilities to your skills which can level up as you use them (extra damage, for example.)

But yeah. I think Abyss has a high chance only because of the sheer numbers of rabid Symphonia fans.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Originally Posted by Rei no Otaku

Norma: Yay, go Senel!
Moses: Hey, where's my cheering section?
Jay: Yeah Moses! Go out there and die!

I'm kind of ticked that Senel doesn't go for Chloe. I feel so bad for her. Especially since I don't care for Shirley much at all...

The reviews for this game are a prime example of why I don't listen to reviews at all. This game gets mediocre reviews, when a boring game with an archaic battle system like DQ8 gets high scores.

Not every place graded it badly. Got-Next.com rated Legendia an 8 and the reviewer was spot on with everything about it. I guess you just can't trust the big corporations when it comes to some reviews. A lot of money goes around. Anyway...

That arena scene is awesome! I laughed when Jay wanted Moses to literally die. And I'm also really disappointed that Senel doesn't go for Chloe. Shirley does nothing for me at all, and I find it adorable whenever Chloe shies away from Senel.

Chloe: Oh...n..nothing.

XD

Originally Posted by Vkamicht

Abyss didn't have as great of a cast of characters as Legendia, and no Tales game can beat Legendia's soundtrack. Gameplay alone Abyss holds its own VS all other Tales games. It seems to take the best parts of all the different Tales games and put them together in one nicely polished package. Fans of Symphonia will love the battle system, fans of a system like SO3 might enjoy the free run option (lets you leave your line), it even borrows some ideas from Tales of Destiny 2 (jp), such as setting extra abilities to your skills which can level up as you use them (extra damage, for example.)

But yeah. I think Abyss has a high chance only because of the sheer numbers of rabid Symphonia fans.

Well said, the AD Skill System was pretty interesting, but you could just leave them all on, so there was no real strategy. Of course, turning some off only made things harder, but there's no point to do that. I agree pretty well with everything you said about Abyss. It's nice, but I didn't care at all for the characters as much as I did in Legendia. The localization was amazing. Not to mention Go Shiina did an excellent job and I couldn't be prouder. It's a great little gem that I hope more people pick up. I'm glad this came to America instead of Abyss.

Originally Posted by Zeta26

If Namco does get Abyss in the U.S which there's no doubt that they probably will due to the picture of the end of the Legendia manual. They'll probably go all out. Since there seems to be more stuff going for Abyss than in Legendia. Like the increased Special Attacks (Normal/High Ougis). And plus that Limit Break-esque attack, Overlimit.

Ha, I thought I was the only one who noticed the back cover for the manual. A nice subliminal suggestion if I do say so myself. Abyss is okay, but I wouldn't automatically label it as the best of the series (to many Rebirth and Legendia are far better). It's already obvious through my sig, but I replayed each one recently just get a 2nd impression from them and Abyss to me is still so-so (even though the production values are insanely high).

But if they do bring this stateside, here's hoping they actually keep the hi-ougis for once. ;D

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

I know a ton of people want Rebirth over here badly, mostly based on the high quality 2D graphics alone. For some reason I couldn't get into that game as much as the others. I played through it once and tried to start again with grade shop bonuses but just got bored.

On the other hand, my Tales of Destiny 2 (jp) play time is like, 250 hours. Some of this is the auto-level trick, I let the game run overnight 2-3 times.

It took me 105 hours to finish Legendia the first time, but I left my PS2 on a couple of times accidentally, unlike ToD2j.

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by Vkamicht

I know a ton of people want Rebirth over here badly, mostly based on the high quality 2D graphics alone. For some reason I couldn't get into that game as much as the others. I played through it once and tried to start again with grade shop bonuses but just got bored.

On the other hand, my Tales of Destiny 2 (jp) play time is like, 250 hours. Some of this is the auto-level trick, I let the game run overnight 2-3 times.

It took me 105 hours to finish Legendia the first time, but I left my PS2 on a couple of times accidentally, unlike ToD2j.

Oh no? I truly enjoyed it. Especially a certain sequence between Veigue and Tytree on the beach. That was pretty rad. Auto-level trick? You see, aside the Nakiriri Dungeon games on the GBA, Destiny 2 remains the only Tales game I've never played. I suppose you really recommend it if you played nearly 300 hours of it.

I'm taking my sweet ass time in Legendia and I'm only at 60 hours. For some reason, I really want to push it to 300+ hours. :P

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

ToD2 is a love or hate game.

Here's why: the battle system has many features never seen in a Tales game, those that like this game have found ways to appreciate them or ignore them, but most people who hate this game hate it because of them.

1. Magic is your main damage source. Your fighters can still dish out enough damage for most of the game, but there are certain boss fights where you spend most of your time guarding your casters while waiting for them to do the major damage. You can still do big combos, and fighters use hi-ougis like crazy. The system is very fast paced.

2. SP bar. This is similar to Star Ocean 3's guts/fury guage. I liked this, but I guess most people like to spam their attacks endlessly. Doesn't recover nearly as fast as it does in SO3, but guarding attacks helps raise it faster.

3. If you go behind an enemy, your max SP and TP are cut in half. That's right, you can't swarm an enemy from both sides without a penalty. To top it off, some enemies can teleport and will teleport over to your side, and anyone left on the enemy's side of the battle field takes a penalty. It's just simply not fair.

On the other hand, we have things like ACTION ENCHANTS, which let you set special abilities onto your attacks (as I mentioned before). Man, I love these things, I wish all Tales games had this system. Some of the passive enchants are a little useless (increase damage doesn't help much) but being able to extend your skills for extra hits, and extend ougis into hi-ougis is very fun.

I don't know much about the story except what I read in someone's translation guide, I mostly play this game for the battle system and bonus dungeon stuff. I recommend it, but someone else will probably tell you not to waste your time.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Tales of Legendia, eh? Honestly, I hate the game. The characters all fail, with the exception of Grune, who can't fail because she's an airhead. It does get bonus points for having a lot of character interaction, though. Story seems dragged out quite a bit, and I'm getting tired of getting close to my destination and the game goes "OMG PWND TRY AGAIN" in the plot. Battle system isn't too bad, but it's kind of boring in my opinion.

The only thing I like about the game is the music, which is simply amazing. Other than that, I can't stand the game.

I will note that I'm only at the end of Chapter 5. So if it gets a lot better after this point, great. But right now, it's looking like a massive pile of fail.

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Rebirth has a really mediocore story, a very simple theme about race difference with a crappy ending that didn't stir up any sympathy in me... what's horrible about Rebirth's battle system is that you can't ask anyone to heal you, each character's skills are executed whenever AI sees fit, so when you're almost screwed over by a boss and see Annie at the back casting Grave, it's like "I'm dying here honey, use your brain a little and heal me..."

On another note, since when did Apple Gel become a rare item in Rebirth... it's supposed to be a cheap healing item that can be bought anywhere in the shop, but they made it a rare item with a poor healing effect... -___-ll

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by yangxu

Rebirth has a really mediocore story, a very simple theme about race difference with a crappy ending that didn't stir up any sympathy in me... what's horrible about Rebirth's battle system is that you can't ask anyone to heal you, each character's skills are executed whenever AI sees fit, so when you're almost screwed over by a boss and see Annie at the back casting Grave, it's like "I'm dying here honey, use your brain a little and heal me..."

I had this problem too, and the only way I stopped myself from dying in random battles was to limit Annie's circles to 2x the healing circle and gave her 2x the resurrect skill.

One thing I like that came with the force cube was the ability to have 8 skills set. Yeah, you can't do ougi without a regular skill, but I still thought it was an interesting idea.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Originally Posted by yangxu

On another note, since when did Apple Gel become a rare item in Rebirth... it's supposed to be a cheap healing item that can be bought anywhere in the shop, but they made it a rare item with a poor healing effect... -___-ll

? There are Apple Gels available everywhere in Tales of Rebirth. Are you sure you're talking about the right item? Maybe you mean Miracle Gels.

edit: My bad, I was thinking of the red gel icon allocated to Gel items.

I was speaking idiomatically.

The red, 30% healing gummi in Rebirth was not available in shops anywhere if I remember right. This is unlike most Tales games. Instead you had that purple, 50% recovery gummi... can't remember what the name of it was.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Currently at Fallen Lands, Chapter 6.

Sure, it's my most focused game at the moment. Started out at a rent, ended in a purchase. I won't say it's topnotch, but it's very good (and no, don't tell me why Symphonia rules over this because it won't matter anyway. No, this is my FIRST tales game and I don't care about that either). Sure, characters are quirky and the system is quite entertaining but the story seems headcrashing to a forgettable account. Romance links are also shoddy as Senel seems to be on a one-minded track while the other party members see each other on a rocky-road relationship. Chloe's a hopeless case while Norma exists as a comedic stand-out (like Mimi, that wonder bimbo of a baker) while Moses seems to be the one who ends up being ostracized very much in intelligent conversations much to the dismay of Jay (I mean hell, this kid don't strike me as mysterious, I think he's just pretentious) and among characters of the war between humans and the water people are just.. well, relatively decent.

But I'm having fun. Small moments of quirkiness always please me but some lines are just flat-out dull. The combat system isn't like The End of Time or Symphonia, a free-for-all slugfest but upgrading base eres to arcane eres is fun for me and always take a lot of my time off. There's also the concept of baking when I'm out of items which is good.

For all that, I deem it a good adventure but now since I'm in Chapter 6, I'll need to focus more since the story is going head-on to disaster.

8/10.

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by Vkamicht

I had this problem too, and the only way I stopped myself from dying in random battles was to limit Annie's circles to 2x the healing circle and gave her 2x the resurrect skill.

One thing I like that came with the force cube was the ability to have 8 skills set. Yeah, you can't do ougi without a regular skill, but I still thought it was an interesting idea.

That works, though in Rebirth, I tend to rely on items a lot more often than spells, which decreases the grade rating at the end of each battle, oh well... =/

The Force Cube is a major change to the traditional Tales battle system, I like the idea, too. The fact that you can pull out a skill with an ougi in consecutive manner is very satifying... the only problem with this is the damage decreases as the quadrants in the Force Cube begin to drain, but thanks to the new trilinear system, you can switch positions freely to restore the lost forces while the AIs help you defend for the time being.

ToD2 and Rebirth seem to have the same way for counting damages you deal to an enemy... the numbers that pop out when you execute combos are the sum of the total damage you delt to that particular enemy... when I first saw a clip of Judas pulling out his final hi-ougi, I was totally amazed by how much damage he was able to pull off (first 5xx times 4, then 2xxx times 7, etc), but when I got my hands on the game and used a miracle lens on the enemy, I realized that it's the total damage he did, not individual damages represented in Phantasia or Eternia, lol.

Originally Posted by Rocca

? There are Apple Gels available everywhere in Tales of Rebirth. Are you sure you're talking about the right item? Maybe you mean Miracle Gels.

edit: My bad, I was thinking of the red gel icon allocated to Gel items.

Yeah, it's rather confusing since they messed around with the healing items in Rebirth... I don't know if Namco wanted to make the game harder or what, but whatever the reason is, changing something like that is somewhat unnecessary... If I need to heal outside the battle, I usually turn to cookings since many recipes have multiple healing effects.

How ya doing, buddy?

I assumed they changed the default healing item to be 50% instead of 30% because of the major change to game mechanics; nobody has a real "heal" spell anymore.

Aren't they somewhat expensive, though?

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