Mixed Feelings on Tales of Arise

It’s Christmas Eve (which, remember, means it isn’t Christmas), but we aren’t talking about a Christmas game today.

No, we’re going to talk about Tales of Arise.

Tales of Arise was one of my most-anticipated games of the year, and during the first few weeks after it came out, I played it nonstop and felt it had the potential to become one of my favorites in the series.

But now that I’m done, I find myself with mixed feelings.

Parts of the game were great, but later parts ended up feeling… just okay, to me. So let’s step back and take this one piece at a time.

Gameplay in Arise feels significantly different from past Tales games. Dodging is much more important in combat, and the combat overall is much tougher. Constantly being on the brink of using all my healing items was the norm for much of the game, especially since gald is hard to come by. Yet it walked a fine line where I always was able to get just enough to make it through.

Now, this is tarnished somewhat by the DLC practices. Arise’s DLC is slightly intrusive, with the camp menu reminding you that there’s DLC to buy. Some of the DLC providing exp boosts, gald boosts, additional abilities, etc. also makes it tempting to buy it when things get tough.

You do not need DLC to beat Tales of Arise. However, it sometimes feels like the difficulty was set to make you think you should.

Outside of combat, gameplay also involves things like gathering ingredients, fishing, and other little details that made it fun to explore. You can cook for buffs when you set up camp, and you eventually get a ranch as well (although I felt it was underutilized; it just gives you a supply of meat).

This game is also beautiful! The breathtaking environments are what stood out to me the most. Every area made me pause and look around to take in the sights.

Moving on to the story, this is another Tales game that involves two worlds, Dahna and Rena. Dahna has been invaded by people from Rena, who subsequently enslaved the Dahnans. You play as Alphen, an amnesiac slave who can’t feel pain, who ends up joining forces with a Renan woman named Shionne trying to overthrow the Renan lords for her own purposes.

Although I made a lot of joking Tales of Symphonia comparisons in the early hours (okay, for like half the game), I did enjoy the story for a while. The characters are likeable and have a good dynamic, and the story is pretty interesting. Aside from one point that made me pause the game in anger to RANT, the story was off to a great start.

But in the final arc, things just… I don’t want to say they fell apart, because they didn’t. This isn’t a Tales of Zestiria situation. Instead, it feels like the final arc is rushed.

So much story is crammed into such a short period of time that it loses its impact. Some parts of the plot just needed time to develop more gradually and immerse the player as much as earlier events did.

Sometimes the dialogue and subtitles just didn’t match up, too, but that’s a minor complaint.

So in the end, I’m not sure how I feel about Tales of Arise. A significant portion of it is an excellent Tales game, and it’s definitely worth playing, but my final feelings toward it ended up being much more lackluster than I expected.