Tales Series

I only watch Let's Plays if I know the LPer and enjoy their humor or if it's a 100% completion run. Anything else and I'll just end up getting super annoyed.

I'm beginning to see why Longplays are getting more traction. No commentary and whoever plays the game is either very skilled or at least thorough enough to cover all ground and 100% the game.

I like me some game commentary because I also comment to no one and talk when playing videogames, but something like that would have made me very frustrated to see, especially from someone who's played videogames before.

God help you if its Dark Syde Phil or Arin Hanson, too.

I don't expect every Let's Player to be amazing at all the games they play, but I do expect them to be competent. They don't have to know everything from the start, and it's not a crime to make mistakes - especially if they're going in blind - but there should be progress over time. That's how learning works.

If they're going for humor, it's best if they keep that in their commentary and reactions. Watching someone play terribly is usually more frustrating than funny, regardless of whether or not it's intentional. I remember some big-name LPer (I want to say it was PewDiePie) playing the first Kingdom Hearts game and spending like ten minutes in the tutorial area not knowing how to choose which weapon to keep and give up. Ten minutes of hyperactive rambling and jumping everywhere except the platforms they were on. I couldn't tell if he was actually that clueless or if he thought it was funny to screw around like that, but either way, it was painful to watch.

It's fine to be new to a game, series, or genre, and I'm much more likely to be forgiving if someone's honest about that. An attitude of "OK, this isn't going well, I'm still learning and I'll keep trying" is more likely to lead to genuine improvement over time. It's also much more tolerable than being willfully ignorant and pretending to be better than you are when anyone who knows the game can tell you're not.

Edited by SapphireBlue on Sep 27th 2018 at 11:46:03 AM

Vinesauce streamers like vinny and Joel tend to be pretty aggravating when they keep getting distracted by this that and the other and either spend ages holding up the game or fucking up

Well, except when Vinny got the Rune Sword, talked to chat about this that and the other and jumped into a Nova Skeleton's death beam, that was amazing

Mmm, I meant examples related to the Tales Series... I guess everyone who plays Tales has more or less a good grasp of their gameplay before posting videos, or are outright infinite-combo maestros.

Well, I watched up until the second boss and Lloyd being vanished from Iselia. I admit, they improved a lot. They brought gels to battle, they stopped fighting as if this was Hyrule Warriors (game they have LP'ed) and mained the much player friendly Lloyd (not like they have options now.) That's learning from your fails. But the (good willed?) comments on the videos are still there.

'Level grind off camera'. 'Stock on items'. 'Actually equip the stuff you find'. 'Lrn 2 Block & dodge'. Geez man, those are like, the most basic of the RPG Basics. It's one thing to go in blind, and another is to not have read the fricking manual. The Tales Series is not one that holds your hand much, if at all.

Okay. They have a 70+ videos-long playlist, and they finished the game, so I hope their future videos will be easier on the eyes. Hah, now I kinda want them to play Symphonia 2! It's the perfect game to play with your special someone. This is an actual skit:

• Marta: You rush forward without thinking of the consequences!
• Emil: You keep trying to fight instead of sticking to support!
• Tenebrae: ENOUGH! You are bickering like a married couple!

(Yes, I do this because I am bored at Namco for not releasing what-looks-like mainline games on actual consoles instead of friggin' mobile.)

Edited by FlightMaster on Sep 27th 2018 at 11:30:28 AM

I disagree with that assessment because of the lack of fun playable characters to main in that game. I mean, you'll both get to main someone but someone's not gonna have a good time because they're stuck with the healer.

Not to mention that the two main characters are the only playable characters who can level up. You also rarely have access to characters outside of them.

I like the idea of Shin Megami Tensei meets Tales but it was messily executed and slapped onto an existing story that had multiple endings.

Yeah, Symphonia 2 was a hot goddamn mess. On one hand I WANT to like it because the batte system is streamlined and added free running and Marta is a cutie and a half but goddammit this game

Isn't Symphonia 2 also the first game we got with voiced skits?

Also

ALSO

Tenebrae was good. And the new songs for the game weren't too bad, like With Courage and the final boss theme.

Dawn of the New World is a mess but I'll still defend that mess cause I enjoyed the heck out of it back then.

There's a reason I didn't get it...well, I didn't care for the monster catching, but the other stuff doesn't really inspire me.

The fact that I then had to wait how many centuries YEARS for another Tales game on a Nintendo system (since they skipped Graces by not even porting the PS 3 version over or just fixing the Wii version) made it a painful decision.

Symphonia 2 was my first full Tales Series game and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I need to replay it soon and see how it holds up.

I'm not the best to talk about 2 because I started it right after 1 and couldn't make it through half an hour. Marta was too irritating.

I liked the idea of Pokemon Tales but they really should have been playable.

I enjoyed Symphonia 2 well enough but felt it really would have done better as it's own game given more time. There were some fun things with the prior cast but they felt just sorta "there" in the gameplay when monsters outscaled them and the main characters did that and had better gameplay overall. I liked the original cast and the whole Tales of Pokemon thing was interesting for how it related to the world, but the world was a preexisting one, and so it kinda felt like the stuff was being tacked on.

I liked it well enough, but that's probably because I played it right after the first one, and because I liked the new characters. I can see why people who played the first one before the sequel existed would've been disappointed. And yeah, it really needed a decent budget. It was pretty bare-bones compared to most of the series.

The whole "Lloyd is evil" thing didn't need to go on as long as it did, though. They weren't fooling anyone.

Not to mention even AFTER the plot point is done with, Lloyd STILL acts like a secretive dick for no goddamn reason. Coupled with the game's central premise, and I really get the impression that Namco HATES Lloyd somehow.

One thing I kinda liked about the "Lloyd is evil" plotline is that, if memory serves, the entire original cast didn't believe it for a second. It also had the perfect solution for handling the fact that who Lloyd ended up with was dependent on player choice in the original game.

None of them believed it outright, but I think Zelos is the only one who completely dismissed it, at least to Emil's face. Most of them were more like "this is really weird and not like him at all, so let's track him down and see if he can explain things." Which, considering that something clearly happened and one of the victims is right in front of you, is probably the most appropriate way to go about it.

Edited by SapphireBlue on Sep 30th 2018 at 12:27:04 PM

I hate it! Hate it! Reeeeeeee!

Ahem. Now that I got that out of my system. Tenebrae was the best character and they bothced it by not having him and the other Element creatures be playable or give the rest forms. Only Aqua.

It also doesn't help that It ends up with me feeling Ratatosk was right to kill all the humans because its in a preexisting setting.

Also I guess the voice acting was fine for the new cast.

Just fine? At the very least, JYB killed it as Emile and Ratatosk, as he always does.

I liked To S 2 for what it was. It wasn't great, but I enjoyed Marta and Emile well enough. Hilariously, I really like FFXIII-2, despite almost being the exact same game. Better monster designs I guess?

Alright, to sum it up, I am in the 'Symphonia 2 was flawed, but I enjoyed it inmensely' boat. We know Vesperia sucked all of Namco's budget, but this game could be 'fixed' with some simple steps...

• Make the old cast leveleable and equippable. Also make at least one of them be available per chapter. Xillia 2 did it, it's not hard.
• Make the monsters playable. Okay, party = dead if all humans are out, but make them PLAYABLE.
• Take out Katz Quests and have their dungeons be optional but always available. Of course, for that we need...
• Proper world map. (To add to that, after Emil grabs a Centurion core he can teleport to their dungeon entrance anytime. Say what you want, but chapter 4 is a backtracking nightmare and would be awful with a classic world map.)
• Finished Centurion designs? After you get their core they become playable? (Playable Tenebie after Temple of Darkness = Tenebie's popularity increases dramatically!)

I hope someone remembers their good DOTNW times and play it again... to post commentary here. I have been playing some oldies in a certain emulator box myself .

Edited by FlightMaster on Oct 2nd 2018 at 1:34:46 PM

I might give it a replay after I finish up Phantasia.

I've beaten the Wii version easily, but I've barely started the PS 3 version