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troperville

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tools

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toys

• Accidental Innuendo: In the English version. Luke learns Sonic Thrust from Guy. At night.
  • "Professor Nebilim. . . I'm coming!"
  • "Day in and day out, SCORE! SCORE! SCORE!"^note Largo is talking about the rock, but 'score' has been used as a euphemism for getting laid
• Alternative Character Interpretation: Everyone.
  • Luke in the first part: Wangsty loser or child betrayed by both sets of parental figures and treated as a scapegoat by his friends?
  • Luke in the late game: Sympathetic individual who is trying to atone for what he's done and come to terms with being a replica even if he doesn't know how, or wangsty, guilt-driven and suicidal?
  • Tear: Decent person or Straw Hypocrite?
  • Mohs: A good man who put too much faith in a benevolent but powerless god or is he only out for his own power?
  • Anise: Jerkass Woobie or Jerkass Karma Houdini?
  • Asch. He's either a tragic victim, or an emotionaly simple villain who murdered scores of people and who can't deal with complex situations.
  • Van: Manipulator that rivals the minds of Mengele and Hitler or extremist that will avoid the extinction of humanity at any cost?
• Anti-Climax Boss: The final boss isn't particularly challenging in any of his forms, and in his final form you have infinite HP and TP.
  • Note: the infinite HP and TP phase only occurs when you have Luke and Tear in the party, and besides...what could be more satisfying than wailing on Van with impunity?
• Awesome Music: One of the strongest contenders for the Best Soundtrack in the Tales Series title. And that's saying something.
  • Meaning of Birth and Finish the Promise, hands down.
  • Karma. Even the stripped-of-vocals English version kicks enough ass to compel you to watch the entire opening every time you boot up the game.
  • Happiness in My Hand plays right before you head off to Eldrant. And it's beautiful.
  • Crimson Pride. Sets perfectly the tone for the Grand Finale.
• Breather Boss: Fyr Bronc, the dragon in Mount Zaleho, especially considering that the previous boss was the first fight with the Big Bad and That One Boss.
• Contested Sequel: Very much so; this is possibly the most polarizing game in the franchise. Depending on how you feel about the story, it's either wildly melodramatic and overblown, or it's the high point of the entire Tales franchise. Not many people take a middle ground. It's worth noting that in Japan, it was voted the most popular game in the Tales series in a Famitsu poll.
• Cue the Flying Pigs: Namdai is localizing a port (in the US) of a Tales game they already brought stateside, please let that sink in a little...
• Dude, Not Funny!: When you learn how Guy became scared of women the jokes about it might become a little harder to laugh at. The female members of the party realize that it was wrong to make fun of him for it and apologize.
• 8.8: Nintendo Power's review of the 3DS port gave the game a 7.0.
• Ensemble Darkhorse: Asch in the anime, which leaves out his Kick the Dog moments in the game, including his participation in the Tartarus slaughter^note He arrived afterwards. and his attacking Tear, making him much more sympathetic.
• Evil Is Cool: Sync is Ion's Evil Twin, and is an antagonist. Guess which one is blessed with... martial arts skills, a slick hairstyle and a snazzy mask.
• Evil Is Sexy: Nebilim.
• Fan Nickname: Even if it's their first time hearing it, fans know you're talking about Van Grants when you mention "Master Badtouch".
• "Funny Aneurysm" Moment:
  • See Dude, Not Funny! for how Guy's gynophobia becomes much less funny when you realize that it was because he was buried under the corpses of many women of his house who died to protect him.
  • Similarly, the part when you realize that Anise's attempts to get a rich husband are not out of greed, but to free her family from their debt, as well as how far she's willing to go for their sake.
• Game Breaker:
  • The Glory AD Skill. A character equipped with this bad boy is completely immune to stagger, meaning you can continue spamming melee attacks and channeling spells, save being hit by Overlimit or an enemy Mystic Arte.
  • Long story short, it's entirely possible for Guy to solo Nebilim without ever needing to heal himself because of abusing the temporary invulnerability during a Field of Fonon Arte. See this video for a demonstration.
  • Anise can also get a accessory that restores her HP and TP periodicly. Nearing the end of the game, your HP and TP will be so high that you'll never need to use a gel on Anise...assuming you play on Easy Mode. On Unkown Mode on the other hand....
  • Likewise, Jade. Impressive, especially, since he has no healing abilities. He's strong, and his fonic assaults are powerful. He really reaches gamebreaker status when you re-play the game and have Tutti on him for his Capacity Core the whole time, since it's +4 for everything, and is thus the best in the game, and his stats shoot through the roof.
• Genius Bonus: Jade's sister's name is Nephry. The minerals Jadeite and Nephrite are collectively called Jade. Also counts as Family Theme Naming.
• Good Bad Bugs: One of the cutscenes regarding Nebilim involves the entire party talking to Peony. It can be triggered when you regain control after the Disc One Final Dungeon & the supposed end of the game, when Luke's your only party member. Apparently, he was carrying the entire party around in his pocket just in case he needed them for a cutscene. Talk about Crazy-Prepared.
• Ho Yay:
  • Guy's gynophobia plus his close friendship with Luke.
  • Jade plus Dist or Peony, both of whom earn innuendo-laden comments from Guy.
  • Luke's worshipful relationship with his "Master" Van^note Although lessened if you consider that he calls Van "sensei" in the Japanese version.
• Jerkass Woobie
  • Anise. Her family was the victim of a con and wound up in debt. Mohs paid off the debt, but had her parents become indentured servants, leading Anise to want to earn the money to free them. Unfortunately, she does some morally dubious things to reach this goal, including wanting to marry into wealth, performing occasional scams and serving as a spy for Mohs, leading to Ion's death. How much you sympathize with her depends on how willing you are to forgive her for the latter, spoilered act.
  • Sync is not only allied with the villains but does some exceptionally cruel things for no good reason, such as making fun of Akzeriuth's destruction and mimicking Ion's voice to guilt-trip Anise. However, it's difficult not to feel at least some pity for him when you realize that he was cast away along with the other unused Ion replicas and only kept around as a tool by Van.
• Magnificent Bastard: Heroic subversion: His name starts with a 'J' and ends with an 'ade Curtiss'.
• Moral Event Horizon: Mohs kidnapping Anise's parents, forcing her to act as The Mole, and then personally murdering Ion and making Anise watch.
  • Van loses any right to call himself a Well-Intentioned Extremist when he causes half of the world to fall into poison mist, killing millions.
  • The massacre at Sheridan for Van and his minions. Especially for Major Legretta.
• Most Annoying Sound: Mieu's sounds for the Sorcerer's Ring, especially when you make multiple attempts to hit something.
  Mieu: Fire! Mieuuuu! Fire!
• Narm: The scene just before the final showdown between Luke and Asch. It's fine for the most part, and then it gets to the very end...
  Asch (with a deadpan expression on his face): Well said. I will make those words your last, REPLICAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!
• Nightmare Fuel: The horrifically brutal death of the boy John after the fall of Akzurieth, as he sinks while buried under his father's corpse may very well be the single most terrifying event in the entire Tales franchise.
• The Scrappy:
  • Luke, whether for his arrogance in the early game or his Wangst in the late game.
  • Mohs, who is just repulsive and for being the direct cause of Ion's death.
  • Anise to some. One reason being the fact that she is Easily Forgiven for her role in Ion's death.
  • For some people, Ion is some sort of male Damsel Scrappy.
  • In-universe, Mieu. He's a Ridiculously Cute Critter with a high-pitched voice who helps the party solve puzzles and not much else. Even after Luke's Character Development, he still calls Mieu "annoying" to Mieu's face.
  • That and you kill a bunch of wolves because he burnt down some of the forest making the wolves desperate to survive
• Player Punch:
  • Mohs killing Ion (he dies).
  • Tear finding out she's dying (she doesn't, thanks to one of Ion's final acts).
  • Luke finding out he's dying (whether he does is debatable)... take your pick.
  • Seeing that little boy drown in miasma.
  • Later on, meeting a woman whose husband and son were in Akzeriuth, the latter having come to visit the former.
  • Asch's death. Not only an antagonist, but one we just had a final duel with five minutes ago... But it still hurts.
  • The death of General Frings...especially if you did his adorable romance sidequest...for nothing...
• Tastes Like Diabetes: Mieu. It's astounding how one character can be so cringeworthy.
• That One Boss:
  • Sync and Van usually give most players trouble.
  • Legretta. They don't call her "the Quick" for nothing. Her normal attacks are not only ranged and incredibly fast but they also deal A LOT of damage thus leaving you very little room to attack her. But it gets worse, since her artes are not only incredibly powerful but your teammates will never try to avoid it even if they aren't casting fonic artes so unless you have both Natalia and Tear on the field the rest of your team will start dropping like flies.
• Unintentionally Unsympathetic: Mohs devolves into a mindless One-Winged Angel, and after the party finally fights and kills him, they "feel kind of bad", noting that he was obsessed with the score to the very end. Considering what kind of person he was, holding Anise's parents hostage and forcing her to be The Mole and then killing Fon Master Ion (who was mentally two) it's virtually impossible to feel that he didn't deserve it.
• Unwinnable by Insanity: if you start the Mushroom Road sidequest before entering The Very Definitely Final Dungeon, Luke leaves the party to give place to Asch. You can then go all the way to the other end of Mushroom Road to get out to the world map (in a cliff where the Greater Flightstone is) and then use the world map glitch to get out of there without getting Luke back. This lets you play as Asch for as long as you want*
  You can go back to Mushroom Road to get Luke back whenever you want, though
  , and Asch replaces Luke in every scene (except for one needed to get Tear's Infinity+1 Sword, which will not trigger). If you finish the game while using Asch, you will start the next cycle without Luke. Once you get to the tutorial battle, the game freezes because you don't have any character in your party. If you saved your clear data over your only file, you are now stuck inside Duke Fabre's Manor forever.
  • The world map glitch by itself can be this. To use this glitch, you need to take the disc off the PS2 while being on the world map, which will make the scenario disappear, and allows you to walk over the water, mountains, etc. You can then put the disc back and wait for a while for the scenario to come back. However, if you are over a unwalkable path (over the water, for example) when you do this, you get stuck and cannot even use the world map glitch to leave, as you will be unable to move. It is possible to save the game whenever you want while being in the world map. If you save in this condition, you are stuck forever.
• Values Dissonance: Luke (Well, Asch... It Makes Sense in Context) and Natalia's betrothal, as first cousins. Due to their status as nobles, no one even so much as bats an eye. This is because Auldrant seems to use a world-wide medieval-like setting. In Medieval times as well as other periods, nobles were anything but unknown for marrying within the close family.
• Viewer Gender Confusion:
  • Ion. He looks incredibly effeminate and has female voice actors.
  • Jade deserves an honorable mention: Gender Blender Name, feminine pose, long hair. . . and if you can believe it, some of his concept art made him feel even more like a woman, even with short hair!
• Wangst: Luke goes through quite a bit of this in the last third of the game. Also, if you defeat Asch in Yulia City, the resulting cutscene shows Asch doing a bit of wangsting of his own after being defeated by a mere replica.
• The Woobie:
  • Once you revisit Baticul after Akzeriuth and travel through the Inista Marsh, you might end up wishing you could give Natalia a hug.
  • If Luke's character development in the third chapter doesn't repulse you, then you'll feel terrible for Luke when the God-Generals begin mass replication; it creates a whole myriad of social and ethical issues. Replicas are treated like monsters and subject to violence. Replicas have no place to call home because the originals despise them. The crowning moment of woobie for Luke comes when the world leaders ask Luke to die at the Tower of Rem to save everyone from the miasma. It doesn't get better after, because Luke is dying.
• Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: With the exception of Asch (who fits The Woobie part but not the Destroyer Of Worlds part) and Legretta (who fits the Destroyer Of Worlds part but not The Woobie part), all of the God-Generals.