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Clockwise from top: Vicious, Aegis Alver, Yuna Azetta, Kanata Hjuger, Orwin Granberg, Misella.
In the world of Crestoria, every human is born with a Vision Orb which allows the user to record someone's transgressions and broadcast said person's crime throughout the region. If public opinion deems the suspect guilty, their vision orb merges into their body and becomes a "Stain of Guilt", marking them for punishment by a mysterious group called the "Enforcers."

Kanata Hjuger, a young man working at an orphanage run by his father Cody, discovers the dark side of the system when he gets branded with a Stain of Guilt after he ends up discovering that his father runs a human trafficking ring—and ends up killing him when he finds out that Misella, a childhood friend and one of the orphans, is to be sold off to an arranged marriage. Kanata and Misella are forced to flee from the Enforcers but are soon saved by Vicious, a mysterious man known as the "Great Transgressor" for his reputation as a ruthless criminal, who turns his—and eventually Misella's—Stains into weapons known as a "Blood Sin". The three eventually form an unlikely band of fellow outcasts, including Aegis Alva, a knight initially tasked with hunting down Kanata but soon finds himself in trouble over an unrequited love; Yuna Azetta, an information trader with a penchant for lying and a mission to find someone; and Orwin Granberg, a world-weary family man.

Tales of Crestoria is the fourth mobile spin-off title in the Tales Series. Taking inspiration from other popular mobile games, Crestoria is a turn based RPG rather than an Action RPG like the series it hails from. Characters have two moves they can perform besides attacking, and the highest rarity characters can use Mystic Artes. The game uses Memoria Stones as a secondary summonable item that acts as equipment for characters as well.

On December 7th, 2021, it was announced that all of the servers would be shut down on February 7th, 2022. Unlike past spin off titles, the setting and characters are considered as important as mainline titles, and are expected to reappear in later works.

On December 15th, 2021, a manga adaption of the game was announced, which will conclude its story. Jun Kumagai will draw the scenario, while the artist Tsubaki Ayasugu will illustrate the characters. The manga is estimated to be released in early 2023.

The short animation, TALES OF CRESTORIAーTHE WAKE OF SINー that covers the first chapter of the story was released on October 18th, 2020 on YouTube.

    open/close all folders 
    Recruitable Characters 
  • Original: Kanata Hjuger, Misella, Vicious, Aegis Alver, Yuna Azetta, Orwin Granberg, Makina, Forte, Assid
  • Phantasia: Cress Albane, Mint Adnade, Arche Klein, Dhaos
    • Narikiri Dungeon X: Rondoline E. Effenberg
  • Destiny: Stahn Aileron, Rutee Katrea, Leon Magnus, Philia Felice, Bruiser Khang
  • Eternia: Reid Herschel, Farah Oersted
  • Destiny 2: Kyle Dunamis, Judas, Barbatos Goetia
  • Symphonia: Lloyd Irving, Colette Brunel, Genis Sage, Presea Combatir, Zelos Wilder
  • Rebirth: Veigue Lundberg
  • Legendia: Senel Coolidge, Norma Beatty
  • Abyss: Luke fon Fabre, Jade Curtiss, Anise Tatlin, Mieu
  • Tempest: Caius Qualls
  • Innocence: Ruca Milda, QQ Selezneva, Kongwai Tao
  • Vesperia: Yuri Lowell, Estellise "Estelle" Sidos Heurassein, Repede, Rita Mordio, Raven
  • Hearts: Kor Meteor, Kohaku Hearts
  • The World: Kanonno Earhart
  • Graces: Asbel Lhant, Sophie, Cheria Barnes, Malik Caesar, Mecha-Asbel
  • Xillia: Jude Mathis, Milla Maxwell, Leia Rolando, Elize Lutus & Teepo
  • Xillia 2: Ludger Will Kresnik, Gaius, Chronos
  • Zestiria: Sorey, Mikleo, Lailah, Edna, Dezel, Zaveid, Rose, Alisha Diphda
  • Berseria: Velvet Crowe, Rokurou, Magilou, Eleanor Hume, Eizen
    Memoria Stone Characters 
  • Phantasia: Chester Burklight, Claus F. Lester, Suzu Fujibayashi
  • Destiny: Garr Kelvin, Mary Argent, Chelsea Tone, Karyl Sheeden, Lilith Aileron
  • Eternia: Keele Zeibel, Meredy & Quickie
  • Destiny 2: Reala, Loni Dunamis, Harold Berselius
  • Symphonia: Raine Sage, Kratos Aurion, Sheena Fujibayashi, Regal Bryant
  • Rebirth: Mao, Eugene Gallardo, Annie Bars, Tytree Crowe, Hilda Rhambling, Saleh, Tohma, Militsa, Walto
  • Legendia: Shirley Fennes, Will Raynard, Chloe Valens, Moses Sandor, Jay, Grune, Vaclav Bould
  • Abyss: Tear Grants, Guy Cecil, Natalia Luzu Kimlasca-Lanvaldear, Asch the Bloody, Largo the Black Lion, Legretta the Quick, Dist the Reaper, Arietta the Wild, Sync the Tempest
  • Tempest: Rubia Natwick
  • Innocence: Illia Animi, Spada Belforma, Ricardo Soldato, Ange Serena, Hasta Ekstermi
  • Vesperia: Flynn Scifo, Karol Capel, Raven, Judith, Patty Fleur, Tison, Nan, Clint
  • Hearts: Hisui Hearts, Beryl Benito, Ines Lorenzen, Kunzite, Galando Grinus, Clinoseraph, Chlorseraph
  • Graces: Hubert Oswell, Richard, Pascal, Kurt Bessel
  • Xillia: Alvin, Rowen J. Ilbert, Agria, Wingul, Jiao, Nachitagal I. Fan, Presa
  • Xillia 2: Julius Will Kresnik, Muzet
  • Zestiria: Alisha Diphda, Symonne, Lunarre
  • Berseria: Eizen, Oscar Dragonia, Teresa Linares, Shigure Rangetsu, Melchior Mayvin

Identify the tropes. Even if it's a sin.

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    Tropes associated with the game 
  • Absurdly High Level Cap:
    • The maximum level for Super-Super-Rare characters is 100, which is the highest cap of any class. Even then, the cap for each character starts at level 50. To ascend to level 80 and beyond, you need progressively more gald and increasingly rare items to raise the cap up to 100, which can only be found on exclusive Raid Bosses or the Very Hard missions. And even after you raise the level cap, you still have to actually get them to the cap with Elixirs and Level Grinding. It's going to take dozens of hours just to unlock the possibility of reaching the level cap for any one character, and it only applies to that SSR character; doing it with multiple characters is going to take even longer. In spite of all this, ascending SSR characters to level 70 is usually enough to clear story missions without much trouble, and doing that is fairly easy, since the items needed to ascend to level 60 and 70 naturally drop from Normal and Hard missions (respectively) quite frequently.
      • A January 2021 update raised the cap even further to level 120, which is only obtainable by getting Chalices of the respective element for an SSR character. Even then, a character has to already be level 100 for these Chalices to work, it takes multiple Chalices to get the cap that high, and you have to complete the "Might Unhidden" quest to get the Chalices in the first place. And the only way to complete a "Might Unhidden" quest is to complete a level 100 SSR character's Ascension Board, which is going to take a while to do.
    • The maximum level for Super-Super-Rare characters' Memoria Stones is also 100. The highest these can go naturally is level 50. Increasing the level cap on Memoria Stones requires enhancing that Memoria Stone with either a copy of the same Memoria Stone, or using an SSR Ascension Stone that works on anything. Doing this is also going to take a while, owing to the random pulls from Loot Boxes or needing to convert other SSR Memoria Stones into Rainbow Shards to get an SSR Ascension Stone.
  • Accidental Murder: When Misella sets fire to the shelter to save Kanata, Nash's little sister Nisha runs back in to retrieve a charm Nash made for her, and dies after getting caught inside. Nash blames Kanata for his sister's death.
  • A-Cup Angst: If Misella and Velvet are in the active party, Misella may comment on the size of Velvet's chest, wishing she had "bazongas" like that. Velvet will quickly tell Misella to stop looking at her breasts and focus on fighting.
  • Adaptational Personality Change:
  • All Crimes Are Equal: Any and all crimes, from simple libel to outright murder, gets you labeled as a Trangressor and put at the mercy of the Enforcers if the general public declares you guilty. Those in power, such as King Gadel, justify this by pointing that that even a seemingly minor crime is capable of creating an Incarnation of Sin, which in turn creates monsters.
  • All Part of the Show: During the Centerport arc, the gang need money to get passage on a ship and decide to enter the theater contest of putting on a play. When pirates attack Centerport due to Vicious, Kanata gets the idea to use the pirate attack as part of their play. Aegis tells everyone to move back to watch the show, and the people get out of the way of the pirates and enjoy the whole show. Aegis couldn't believe that it worked so well.
  • Aloof Ally: Vicious is a nominal ally of Kanata and Misella, but he's also a complete asshole. He refuses to participate in any sort of friendly antics, frequently will do terrible things for the sake of saving his own skin, and encourages the two of them to commit crimes since no one's going to listen to them anyway.
  • Alternate Universe: The returning Tales characters take elements of their backstories from their home titles, but fit it into the world of Crestoria.
  • And Then What?: Played for Laughs in one of Assid's character episodes. After striking out with a girl that prefers more intellectual men, he propses that Forte hit on her instead, and then they'll switch places once he's won her over. Forte then questions if Assid means to impersonate him for the rest of his life with this girl, at which point Assid stresses over the matter for a few seconds and then abandons the idea in favor of finding girls who are more interested in "fun" than intelligence.
  • And Your Reward Is Clothes: Crestoria carries on the recent Tales tradition of letting you add cosmetic accessories to your characters. All these cosmetics have to be found through random drops or bought through an exchange mechanism, of course.
  • Anti-Frustration Features: Shares a page with the rest of the franchise here.
  • Anti Poop-Socking: AP is needed to attempt most challenges. It regenerates over time, though there are green Grape Gels that restore it instantly.
  • Anti-Rage Quitting: If you force quit the game at any time during an Arena match, it counts as a loss and you lose the Arena Ticket expended to try the match; you only recover an Arena Ticket every two hours. In addition, staying until the end of the match (even if you lose) has the match count towards Battle Pass rewards; forfeiting or quitting mid-match earns nothing at all. Finally, in order to maintain your battle rank from week to week, you have to fight in the Arena at least forty times and have a win rate of at least seventy percent. Doing both keeps your rank in tact, doing only one of the two causes you to drop one rank at the end of the week, and doing neither drops you by two ranks. Since quitting mid-match counts as a loss, rage-quitting too frequently means that your win rate, and therefore your battle rank, will suffer.
  • Arc Villain: Due to the more episodic structure of the game's story, each chapter has its own unique villain to fight.
  • Armor-Piercing Question: "Do you want to own your sin, or do you want to let it own you?" Also doubles as Arc Words, from Vicious. When someone is hitting a Heroic BSoD after being labeled as a transgressor, Vicious asks this of them in order to snap them out of it and ask them if they're going to lie down and die or accept that they're a sinner and move on in spite of that. It's also right after this that Vicious helps the new transgressor unlock their Blood Sin.
  • Artificial Stupidity: The game's Auto-Battle system makes the characters focus on the enemy furthest to the left unless you manually direct it to do otherwise, meaning a character with an elemental advantage will most often not get to exploit Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors in your favor. Characters will also inconsistently use their Artes, sometimes not using them despite having one up, or using an Arte when a simple attack would finish the enemy off. They also throw out Mystic Artes as soon as they get them even if the enemy is so weak a regular attack would be enough, prioritizing all-out offense with no strategy. The enemy AI, by contrast, doesn't pick and choose quite so blindly and is more like to target elemental strengths.
  • Bad "Bad Acting": Kanata, Misella, and Aegis try acting as a theater troupe in order to get enough money for a boat ride. At their practice, their dialogue is wooden, their acting is awful, and the characters comment on how bad they are, which eventually turns into a big argument. When a real actress comes along, she becomes their acting coach partly because she considers the group's acting to be so bad, it's an affront to the art of theater. Later on, when trying to convince everyone to flee Yednark before it's destroyed, Yuna doesn't let anyone else talk because their acting is so bad that it would instantly give away that the whole thing is a ruse.
  • Big "NO!": Occurs in Velvet's side story after Velvet kills Presea's sister Alicia, who was only alive as an Incarnation of Sin. Once Presea finds out that Alicia is dead, she says "But... I... NOOOOOOOOOO!"
  • BFS: Kanata wields one as his blood sin, Patricidal Edge. The blade is longer than he is tall, and Kanata has to use all of his body weight to swing it in a few of his attacks.
  • Black-and-White Morality: Enforced by the vision orbs, or rather by the population's trust in them. As Vicious notes, nobody is really interested in hearing why a criminal committed a crime; they want things to be morally easy, and rely on the vision orbs as infallible proof that someone's a transgressor.
  • Boring, but Practical:
    • SR characters lack the same power that the SSR characters have, and are unable to use Mystic Artes. However, they are able to be Awakened comparatively easier since their Memoria Stones are more likely to be obtained from summons, meaning they can reach higher stats quicker and be made to be as strong as SSR. Naturally if the player manages to get a fully Awakened SSR, it will be more powerful, but the chances to do so are much harder without throwing loads of money. For example; if you were to Awaken a SR character twice, their raw stats would be almost on par with a SR that is almost ten levels higher.
    • Similarly, Rare Memoria Stones lack the same raw stats that the SR and SSR Memoria Stones have, but are both more plentiful, and have abilities that are more useful than some higher rarity abilities. For example, the Flynn (Heartfelt Knight) Memoria Stone provides all fire element allies with a small boost to defense, which can be ascended to a total of 14%. By comparison of similar skills, Misella's SR and SSR Memoria Stones provide one person a hefty defense with higher amounts (15% and 24% respectively) and better stats, but Flynn's provides the entire party said buff, which makes it useful for the entire team. Furthermore, getting the higher rarity ones fully Ascended is harder to when you also need them to Awaken units of that rarity, so they end up being as helpful as the higher rarity ones even with the lower stats.
    • The SR versions of the original characters serve as a Crutch Character, but their Awakened passives either affect all units, or have two effects that affect everyone, and their element. Both Kanata and Misella's SR buffs provide flat party wide attack and defense respectively, meaning if you stick them on the sub-member spot, you can have their buffs apply to the entire team without them needing to be leveled.
  • Break Meter:
    • The dominant strategic element of boss fights, as boss enemies will build up a Charge Attack during their moves. If you can Break them before they fire it off, the attack fizzles out and the boss loses its turn.
    • There's also a Combo Meter available at all times; every 10 hits within the same turn will add a damage multiplier bonus.
  • Broken Pedestal:
  • Burn the Witch!: The villagers subject Misella to this in Chapter 1, Stage 15, after she has been condemned for burning down the shelter. Fortunately, Vicious intervenes in time, and Misella turns the flames into her blood sin.
  • But for Me, It Was Tuesday: Vicious, the "Great Transgressor," levels this accusation at the population. His name is Famed In-Story, but a lot of people still don't recognize him because he received the Stain of Guilt, and the rest of it is the result of Bystander Syndrome. He specifically calls them out on the disposable nature of justice.
  • Bystander Syndrome: People aren't interested in changing the vision orb system of convicting transgressors to a Fate Worse than Death, because it doesn't usually affect them personally. Some of the villains exploit this in order to get away with crimes or pin the blame on someone else by showing half-truths on the vision orbs.
  • Came Back Wrong: After Muzét granted Luke and Alisia's wish the entire Southvein's population back to life (temporarily). The Southvein's citizens aren't fully revived, but they are physical manifestations of the dead based on Luke and Alisia's memories, created with flowers and spring water as a catalyst. They become mindless beings with no will of their own. The only thing they have in common is a desire to get revenge on Northvein for killing them. The only way for them to disappear is for Luke to apologize to them for being responsible for their deaths.
  • Cannot Spit It Out:
    • Kanata issues a Declaration of Protection on Misella, which she returns after Chapter 1 is over, even calling him "[her] light" and swearing to stay by him. Vicious teases them over this fact, but any implication of romantic feelings isn't actually presented or commented on further in the story. On top of that it's very clear that Misella's affection are less towards Kanata and more towards her idealized version of him and Kanata is more concerned with his goal.
    • A subverted one-sided case between Queen Rebecca and Aegis, the Queen's most loyal guardian. The audience is lead to believe that's the case, but it turns out it's not as he was more concerned with upholding his own half-baked ideals. Even when confronted with her feelings, he doesn't and couldn't respond to them before she's murdered.
  • Cliffhanger: Chapter 10 Part 2 ends with an appearance of an transgressor resembling Yuri Lowell, which was around the time the game announced its shutdown on February 4th, 2022. What prevents this from being No Ending is because of the manga continuing the story from where it ended (although considering that the crossover aspect will be removed, this particular cliffhanger probably won't get a follow up).
  • The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: The RNG for arena battles is noticeably skewed in favor of AI teams; enemy units will evade far more often than the known 9% evasion rate (which is the highest any unit can achieve on their ascension board, and requires a Memoria Stone dedicated to adding evasion to go any higher), and will also score critical hits much more often than the player does. One could view this as a method of balance, since the player has the advantage in being able to take the first turn and isn't handicapped by Artificial Stupidity, but it's a small comfort to a player that just lost their big winning streak to an AI team that evaded all their attacks for several rounds while scoring critical hits for most of their attacks.
  • Contractual Boss Immunity: Downplayed with Raid Bosses. They're not immune to everything, but they are immune to some of the strongest status effects. For instance, Raid Bosses can't be afflicted by Curse, which deals a large percent-based amount of damage after two turns. If they could be afflicted by this, it would make raids far too easy.
  • Convicted by Public Opinion: The subject of the traditional Tales Series deconstruction. Crestoria's justice system is built around vision orb broadcasts — before the first chapter is out, someone who was falsely accused of a crime uses vision orb testimony to clear their name. The true culprit is Unpersoned and brought to justice in short order. However, the dark side of the system is revealed when Kanata forgets this fact when discovering something heinous. As such, his actions don't have their correct "Pay Evil unto Evil" context, and the vision orb recordings — all taken by bystanders and showing him in the aftermath of a crime of passion — depict him as a deranged maniac. Additionally, the citizens of Crestoria trust vision orb testimony to be infallible, ignoring all context or rationalization. Therefore, a transgressor's protestations and justifications are written off as self-serving excuses. It's so bad that even the creator of the system itself knows that something has to be done about it, but feels the only way to do so is to use the system to make something that unifies the world against it, just so that after the Vision Orbs can be removed.
  • Courtly Love: Perceived to be between Queen Rebecca and Aegis, her loyal knight. The king even picks up on it. This isn't the case; Rebecca loves Aegis, but it's not returned. Not that the truth mattered to the king anyway.
  • Crutch Character: The SR versions of the games Original Generation serve as this. They have the same skills as their SSR versions, with their stats being lower to match their rarity, and having the same Memoria Stone effects, just weaker. This makes them good early on since they provide utility and fill holes your account lacks, but will be overshadowed by any SSR units obtained, especially their own SSR versions thanks to better stats and having a Mystic Arte. You can boost their power by using the Exchange Shop to purchase extra copies of their Memoria Stones, allowing you fully Awaken them, but this requires converting SR Memoria Stones to do so, meaning unless you have spare SR Memoria Stones, it can be difficult to have them fully Awakened.
  • Darker and Edgier: When the first chapter opens with child trafficking, with the added talk of organ harvesting and statutory rape, it somehow makes Kanata's plot-triggering Accidental Murder look like a misdemeanor. Then, Misella burns down the orphanage, accidentally killing Nash's little sister Nisha in the process, with the people of the second town calling to burn her at the stake for her crimes. All the while, Nash cries out in rage for someone to kill the main character out of pure hatred for them. And as proof that this game is going to get pretty dark, all of that happens just in the first chapter.
    • It even shows in the "characteristic genre title," a short tagline that supposedly sums up the game's themes. The previous mobile Tales game was an RPG about pursuing the power of truth. Crestoria? An RPG Written in Blood and Betrayal.
  • Death Seeker: Luke fon Fabre becomes one in his side story. After what happened in Southvein, Luke wants to die in order to atone for his guilt. He eventually meets Alisha, the Sole Survivor of the attack, who refuses to kill Luke in spite of this.
  • Defector from Decadence: Another Tales staple. Someone who works for law enforcement for the bad guys ends up turning their coat. Amusingly enough, cutscenes show that one of the characters in the same court as the turncoat is Eleanor Hume, who filled this role in her game. In this case, it's Aegis who turns after being framed for the Queen's murder, when he had nothing at all to do with her death.
  • Developer's Foresight: Party members have conversations both during and after battles, depending party line-up. However, some of this dialogue only comes up in very specific situations, such as characters fighting a certain enemy type, as a Call-Back to the games. For instance, Velvet and Laphicet from Berseria have unique battle dialogue, but only if the party is fighting Katz enemies, which references Velvet's allergic reactions to cats.
  • Disappointed by the Motive: When confronting Esvanilla in Chapter 8 for the second time, Kanata remarks that Esvanilla must want to remove the vision orb system, since it would mean that people can't be condemned for sins so easily. Esvanilla counters that he's perfectly fine with the vision orb system; he's just a Misanthrope Supreme who believes all humans need to die because they're all irredeemable monsters. Kanata and the rest of his group promptly remark how little Esvanilla's argument holds water, with Kanata in particular disappointed that Esvanilla is, at the end of the day, just a crazy serial killer who wants people to die for nothing.
  • Dissimile: While eating raw soybeans, Misella says that soybeans are the meat of the plains, so it's just like meat. As long as you don't count the flavor. Or the texture. Or the smell. Then it's just like meat.
  • Does This Remind You of Anything?: Vision Orbs and their role in influencing public opinion, for better or worse, can be likened to social media. Moreso with the rampant rise of cancel culture.
  • Doomed Hometown: As an RPG staple. However, it's given a twist in that the ones responsible for dooming it are Kanata and Misella, the two main characters. Kanata kills his father when it's revealed that he's involved with human trafficking, and Misella was to be a victim of said trafficking before setting the whole place on fire.
  • Driven to Suicide: In one of Makina's episodes, "Bad People", Winn is in despair after Makina kills his lover Monica for being a transgressor. He asks Makina to kill him so he can join Monica in the afterlife, but she refuse since he's not a transgressor. As a result, Winn jumps off the cliff.
  • Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors: Fire is strong against Earth, Earth against Wind, Wind against Water, and Water against Fire. Light and Dark are mutually strong against each other. This is critical in party-building because every character has an innate element. If a Fire character (say, Luke fon Fabre) fights an Earth enemy, Luke will do bonus damage with all attacks. However, if the elements are done in the reverse, the damage is reduced. So if an Earth character (say, Lloyd Irving) attacks a Fire enemy, Lloyd's attacks won't do as much damage as normal. Therefore, knowing what you're facing and tailoring your lineup to match is a simple and effective way to stack the deck in your favor.
  • Empty Shell: The Royal Guard have been rendered this via some vile technique.
  • The Fake Cutie: Makina, a powerful and blood-hungry Enforcer, who takes the appearance of a little girl.
  • Felony Misdemeanor: Another major flaw of the Vision Orbs is that, provided the recording and context are manipulated properly, even minor offences can lead to a condemnation and accompanying death sentence. Examples include Farah inadvertently getting a childhood bully killed by tattling on him with her Orb, Penelope's father Genitz being condemned because of his provocative theater productions pissing off critics, and Yuna being condemned for speaking her mind in response to people glorifying Penelope's impending death.
  • Frame-Up:
    • King Gadel of Medagal murders his wife Queen Rebecca, and then uses misleading Orb testimony to blame the act on Aegis, causing him to become a transgressor.
    • Downplayed with Count Senegal of Northmine. He paints a false picture of what happened to Southvein, but presents Luke as a boy who was forced to kill someone in self-defense when they attacked him, preventing Luke from becoming a transgressor. Even so, Senegal is only saying all of that to hide that he manipulated Luke into wiping Southvein off the map and that Senegal personally led a charge to kill all of the survivors.
  • Gameplay and Story Segregation: By virtue of being a gacha game, characters from previous Tales games can participate in battle without interacting with the story. Additionally, it's possible to go into battle with none of the plot-relevant characters on the front lines.
  • Gameplay Automation: Taking the lead from Heroes Charge, the game is equipped with an "AUTO" button that allows the AI to brute-force your team through a level.
  • Hard Truth Aesop: The game's story teaches the lesson that you can feel as guilty as you want about mistakes that you've made in the past, but that doesn't magically absolve you of sin, nor does it change what you've done. You can't just suffer and hate yourself for your sins, then pretend like that suffering somehow makes everything okay. Exemplified by the Catchphrase of Vicious: "Are you gonna own your sin, or are you gonna let it own you?"
  • The Heartless: Incarnations of Sin, a type of monster born of a person's guilt that will absorb the host and then continue to kill relentlessly until it is slain. Apparently the Vision Orb-system was enstated specifically to prevent the birth of Incarnations.
  • Heroic BSoD: Luke undergoes one after killing a beast that regulated mana flow for Southvein, causing an avalanche that destroyed the town. Even though he was manipulated into doing it, Luke constantly ignored the party's warnings that something was suspicious.
  • Human Shield: Played for laughs. When Rita thinks Kanata and the others are bandits, Misella uses Vicious as a human shield to protect Kanata from Rita's fire blast in chapter 6 part 2.
  • Human Trafficking:
    • The Inciting Incident revolves around this. Kanata's father Cody runs an orphanage, at which Misella lives. Can you guess where this is going?
    • In Cress' sidestory, you learn that some of the perpetrator's buyers used the people they bought in human experiments. The victims of these experiments include Cress' former swordsmaster Mibaru, as well as Emil and Presea, both of which have undergone human experimentation in this version.
  • Humans Are Bastards: Flip flopped between invoked and played with depending on the context. It becomes obvious how flawed the Vision Orb system is in two ways:
    • Someone broadcasting can manipulate what events to show as a part of the broadcast, leaving out small details that could change the entire context of the situation. Anyone savvy enough to know how to work the Vision Orb can get away with whatever they want as long as they are able to broadcast their side of the story uncontested.
    • On the other hand, the masses seeing the vision might not care about the context in the first place. Even with reasonable doubt if they still want to see people get punished even if prove themselves innocent, they can still invoke the Vision Orb to punish them. Natalia learned this the hard way as she tried to defend a man who made an honest mistake that caused a spirit to be angry and flood her lands which caused the deaths of several in the village. Instead of turning the blame to the villager removing the context of the mistake, many still wanted to punish the man and now wanted to punish Natalia for simply defending him, even though such a display would be noble. If it wasn't for Vicious stepping in to pull away everyone's attention, the two of them would have been marked.
  • I'll Kill You!: Velvet is on both ends of this, both as the one giving the threat and the one receiving the threat.
    • On the receiving side, after Presea finds out that Velvet killed the Incarnation of Sin that was Presea's sister Alicia, Presea declares that she'll kill Velvet and attacks in rage. In the ensuing boss fight, when Presea's health is almost depleted, she uses her newfound hatred for Velvet to recover to full health. Even after losing, just before Presea passes out, she declares that she'll kill Velvet one day.
    • On the giving side, Milla saved Velvet's life, but it came at the cost of accidentally getting Velvet's brother Laphicet killed. As such, Velvet has decided that Milla needs to die, but Milla promises to let Velvet kill her only if the incarnations of sin are all eradicated. This is why Velvet is helping Milla on her mission — if she does, Velvet can get her vengeance on Milla without a fight.
  • I'm Not Hungry: Misella insists she isn't hungry after getting her blood sin. It's because she still feels guilty about what happened with Nash and Nisha.
  • Light Is Not Good: Antagonists Dhaos and Makina use light element.
  • Limit Break: Mystic Artes, as usual. In this game, they're built up as a meter for each character, and can be used at any time during the player's turn, even if that character has already taken an action. However, only Super-Super-Rare characters can use them.
  • Loophole Abuse: The Fatal Flaw of the Vision Orb system. If someone is wise enough on how it works, they can easily manipulate what appears during them without actually tampering with them, or get away crimes without being charged at all. This means that through things like Exact Words, and not detailing or fully showing the full context, someone can frame another person and get away with what they do, or someone can be branded a transgressor for doing the right thing. As an example, Count Senegal tricks Luke into causing a rock-slide that destroys the city of Southvein, but since he didn't physically commit the act, nor tell them of his plans, this meant that the Vision Orbs couldn't be used to expose him.
  • Loot Boxes: The title is a "gacha game" (named after the "gachapon" Written Sound Effect for pulling on a slot machine) where you spend a currency called "Gleamstone" to summon random characters. To give them a boost, the player is allowed to pull one Super-Super-Rare character of their choosing for free upon starting the game.
  • Manipulative Bastard: In Chapter 4, Count Senegal of Northmine manipulates Luke fon Fabre into causing a rocky avalanche over the city of Southvein in an attempt to kill its inhabitants, all under the guise of an act of peace. Luke, understandably, is pissed at this.
  • Me's a Crowd:
    • Thanks to the support character feature, it's possible for more than one of the same character to be in an active party. This can also extend to a character fighting themselves in an arena battle.
    • While players automatically unlock Super-Rare versions of the main characters as they move through the campaign, there are SSR versions of said characters who are capable of Mystic Artes. The two are differentiated by different subtitles ("Aegis, Heart Full of Chivalry" for the SR version, "Aegis, Lance that Lights the Way" for the SSR one). Both rarities of the character can co-exist in the same party.
    • And finally, the game had not been out for a week before the developers started releasing alternate versions of pre-existing characters. When the game shipped, the Water-aligned "Kanonno Earhart, Greatsword Wielder" was available as a SSR; during the "Lure of the Forest Fruit" limited quest, a Wind-aligned SSR "Kanonno, Summer Holiday" was released with completely different skills. Since Brave Exvius has found monetary success at releasing different "instances" of the same character this way (its Player Character Rain has seven variants and three more as Secret Identities; Final Fantasy VI Player Character Terra has four), it can be assumed Crestoria will follow suit.
  • Miscarriage of Justice: People rely on vision orb footage as infallible proof of a crime, even though such footage ignores all context or justification, leading to a lot of people becoming transgressors through no fault of their own.
    • In Medagal, Aegis is framed for the act of killing Queen Rebecca by the king. Even though he had nothing at all to do with Rebecca's murder, Aegis becomes a transgressor when the public condemns him for it.
    • Played with in the first town with the Inciting Incident. Kanata and Misella really did commit the crimes they were accused of: Kanata killed his father, and Misella burned down the orphanage. However, it was to stop a ring of human trafficking that was causing utterly horrific fates for orphaned children.
    • In chapter 7, Kasque, despite being the one who created the vision orbs, admits that Kanata is right in this regard when he tries to talk to her regarding the injustice and harm it has bought to people.
  • Mix-and-Match Weapon: Party member Vicious uses pistols with knives welded beneath the barrel, switching seamlessly between slashes and ranged attacks and taking Gun Fu to new levels.
  • Mythology Gag: Shares a page with the rest of the franchise here.
  • Named Weapons: The Blood Sins are named after the crimes of their user.
    • Kanata's sword is "Patricidal Edge", alluding to killing his own father Cody in protecting Misella from being sold off.
    • Vicious' dual pistols are called "Endless Torment" for unknown reasons though it's likely due to the fact that he was born with the stain of guilt already, thus having to endure a lifetime of hate.
    • Misella's flower is "Annihilation Flame", referring to her burning down the orphanage to help cover Kanata's tracks, in the process accidentally killing Nisha.
    • Aegis' spear is "Wavering Heart", owing to his reluctance to defend himself after being falsely accused of seducing, then murdering, Queen Rebecca.
    • Yuna's knives are called "Embroiling Deceit", due to her being a liar after giving an honest review of Penelope's final performance and swearing to the crowd that she will perform again, just as a messenger arrives and informs the crowd that Penelope's health declined.
    • Orwin's knuckles are called "House Asunder" for killing his own wife who is dying after her Heroic Sacrifice. It's much more tragic as it his own daughter who condemned him on the vision orb.
  • Not-So-Well-Intentioned Extremist: A recurring theme is people in power who selfishly take advantage of the less fortunate under the guise of justice.
    • In the beginning of the game, Kanata suffers a Broken Pedestal. Cody claims that he's providing the children in his orphanage with a better life by selling them to others, when in actuality, he's just a delusional sadist who sells the children in his care to abusive slavers for money, oftentimes killing children to sell their organs.
    • Medagal has someone even more extreme. King Gadel is after the transgressors because of the crimes they've committed, and is after the Nation of Sin in order to wipe out all transgressors living there. Thing is, he's an abusive husband who intentionally makes Aegis, the otherwise loyal head of his armies, a transgressor by killing his own wife and blaming him for it, just because the two were having a thing together. Plus, despite the Nation of Sin being inhabited by peaceful transgressors, he still sends out Enforcers to kill everybody inhabiting it.
    • Late in the game, an antagonist goes even further. Count Senegal has the entire population of the rival Southvein city wiped out completely while painting its citizens as hateful jerks who deserved to be slain to maintain peace to the people of Northmine.
  • The Paragon:
    • Kanata is moral, upstanding and constantly concerned with helping the downtrodden. Too bad he's considered a transgressor after the Inciting Incident.
    • Aegis, the Token Good Teammate, has a similar personality. He believes in upholding justice and serving the Knights.
  • Once Done, Never Forgotten: Enforced. The Stain of Guilt applied to a transgressor makes it so that they can never truly escape their crime, seeing as how they're literally branded with a mark of their sin for the rest of their life. This gets brought up by Naph in the Nation of Sin, as Naph notes that while many of them have done bad things, they can still be decent people if they choose to be.
  • Original Position Fallacy: Many people support the vision orb system without caring about the exact circumstances of the crime, including Kanata who initially believes the system is just. Kanata learns the hard way that no one cares about the circumstances of his or Misella's crimes, causing the vision orbs to make him a fugitive.
  • Patricide: Kanata kills his own father after the orphanage is revealed to be a child trafficking ring. This ends up getting him the Stain of Guilt.
  • Play Every Day: Another staple of modern mobile games, this title offers you rewards for logging in consecutively.
  • Playing with Fire: Misella's Blood Sin, Annihilation Flame, allows her to use fire magic. She also burns down the orphanage in her Doomed Hometown with brightblaze flowers.
  • Power Equals Rarity: Only characters who are Super-Super-Rare can use Mystic Artes. This leaves the Super-Rare and Rare characters (which are the most common characters) without them.
  • The Power of Hate: It's shown that when enough people condemn a person for a crime, that person becomes a transgressor, and if they again desire hard enough they can summon a specially made enforcer for the job, like when the villagers want Misella to burn alive and suffer the same fate as Nash's sister who she indirectly killed.
  • Psycho Prototype: Emil Castagnier's backstory is changed to make him this. Unlike his original game, where he is a split personality born when the Summon Spirit Ratatosk came to mistakenly believe himself human, in this setting he is a human with a split personality called "Ratatosk" that was created as a result of human experiments involving his body being infused with the essence of a myriad of monsters. Befitting the trope, his Superpowered Evil Side lays waste to the facility where he suffered shortly after first awakening.
  • Power Tattoo: When a character accepts their crime, Vicious is able to do something that transforms their Stain of Guilt into a unique shape that represents their Blood Sin.
  • Rags to Royalty: Queen Rebecca of Medagal mentions this as being her Back Story: she was originally just a peasant working the fields.
  • Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: Similar to Berseria's player party, the group in Crestoria is primarily composed of outcasts, exiles and other misunderstood folk.
  • Red Baron: Vicious is the "Great Transgessor", said to have killed thousands of people and wiped whole towns off the map.
  • Set Bonus: You can get these from Memoria Stones, which are in-game items that represent a Tales character and provide some sort of bonus. In addition to attaching one to each character, there's also a 3x3 grid for them, where they can combine to provide augmented bonuses.
  • Shout-Out:
    • Vicious has two guns, wears a Badass Longcoat (with nothing under it), summons his weapons, and is seemingly immortal (managing to survive being stabbed through the heart). Complete with that trollish, wise-cracking attitude, he's essentially the Tales version of Dante.
    • Aegis is a fan of "Silver Mechaknight Avalanche," which is about a group of justice-seeking heroes that pilot a giant automaton. That's right, Aegis is a fanboy of the Tales equivalent of Power Rangers/Super Sentai. The small episode introducing this is even titled. "Go, Go, Avalanche, Go!"
  • Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Sonia is shown that Kanata is ultimately a good man, from saving her life multiple times in spite of her bloodlust towards him to being told of his idealistic goals. Sonia also learns about just how bad her father Cody was as a child trafficker. So does this mean that Sonia forgives Kanata, or comes to see him as the good man he is? Of course not. Sonia still hates Kanata, and she will never forgive him for killing her father. The only caveat she gives is that she wants him to live so she can decide what should happen to him, but she still hates his guts, and nothing Kanata can do will change that.
  • Trademark Favorite Food: Misella loves meat of any kind. She lovingly describes the flavor and texture of a steak, and when she meets a supposedly tasty creature in the Nation of Sin, she openly fantasizes about eating it, to its face.
  • Then Let Me Be Evil: Discussed. Vicious notes that once someone's become a transgressor, people have no interest in hearing what they have to say. As such, Vicious shows that there's no line he won't cross to survive, including taking people hostage and forcing them to make a Sadistic Choice. In addition, kind characters like Kanata and Misella are forced into more and more extreme decisions simply because the vision orb system doesn't give them the option to explain themselves or protest their conviction.
  • Undying Loyalty: Misella is very loyal to Kanata, so much that she has absolutely no qualms in burning down the shelter, just to save Kanata. After Chapter 1, she vows to go with him to try and clear his name, because she wants him to be her paragon again.
  • Vitriolic Best Buds:
    • Misella and Vicious argue during almost every conversation they have, but when in agreement, they're completely in sync.
    • Milla and Velvet undergo some Teeth-Clenched Teamwork owing to Velvet having No Social Skills, being especially curt with everyone she meets. However, Velvet and Milla work pretty well together for the sake of their mutual mission. It's eventually revealed that Velvet is being so abrasive towards Milla because she's accidentally responsible for Velvet's brother Laphicet dying to an incarnation of sin.
  • Wham Line: In the Chapter 6, Part 1 finale. Kanata wakes up from a nightmare, then sees Sonia in front of Vision Central. What he overhears while eavesdropping reveals that Sonia is Kanata's estranged sister, since Cody is also her father. Or rather, was - since Kanata murdered Cody, Sonia wants him dead.
    Sonia: Vision Orb, enforcers, I'm begging you! Please! Let justice be done! Please, deliver your punishment to the vile transgressor who killed my father! Punish the transgressor Kanata for killing my father, Cody!
  • Wham Shot:
    • In the Chapter 9 Part 1 finale, when Kanata and the others follow Kaya in the middle of the night only to witness her glowing in blue light and turning into a monster.
    • At the end of Chapter 10 Part 2 finale, the one who cut down the Great Pasca Tree wasn’t Kasque nor the twins (Forte and Assid), but a transgressor who looks like Yuri Lowell.
  • Wounded Gazelle Gambit: Played with. Forte and Assid spell out their plan in Yednark: manipulate vision orb footage to make Kanata out to be history's greatest monster, all so the condemnations of the people will create enough mana to summon the goddess Kasque. To this end, they also manipulate Sonia into blind hatred for Kanata, feeding off of her desire for revenge against him in order to cause her hate to fuel an Enforcer to the point it blows up Yednark. Which Forte and Assid will also blame Kanata for.
  • Wretched Hive: The Nation of Sin, a secret hideout where escaped transgressors go to live, protected by Some Kind of Force Field that keeps Enforcers out. Vicious wants to find it. Subverted: It's more of an Arcadia where the transgressors, relieved to be able to live in peace, are doing so quite happily. Vicious is audibly frustrated when he finds this out, since he was hoping to unleash an army of monsters on the world.

    Tropes associated with ーTHE WAKE OF SINー 
  • Adaptation Deviation: In the game, Cody doesn't get a chance to take off Misella's brightblaze ornament that Kanata gave her. However, in the anime short, he forcibly removes Misella's brightblaze ornament from her head since he believes it's filthy.
  • Adapted Out: Cress, Velvet, Milla, and Leon do not appear in ーTHE WAKE OF SINー.
  • The Cameo: Aegis, Yuna and Owin appears at the end of the anime short.
  • Compressed Adaptation: In the game, the first chapter contains 16 parts, but most of the scenes are cut and compressed into 15 minutes of anime short.
  • Foreshadowing: At the beginning of the short, the orphaned children in Cody's wagon are unhappy and miserable. This foreshadows Cody's true nature of selling children as slaves or worse.
  • Holding Hands: After Kanata and Misella reunite at Brightblaze Field, they can be seen holding hands at the end of the anime short.
  • Narrator: Misella becomes this for the short to tell the story about the important events about transgressors, vision orbs, and the Enforcers.
  • Stop, or I Shoot Myself!: Misella threatens to kill herself with a dagger if Cody doesn't leave Kanata alone, since he needs her alive to sell to buyers.

    Tropes associated with the manga adaptation 
  • Adapted Out: NONE of the crossover characters will be around.


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