Tales of Phantasia
Jul. 28th, 2011 10:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chuckroA dozen years ago, a group of warriors sealed the evil king Dhaos using a pendent. Young Cress just received a pendent from his father, a well-regarded swordsman. In classic jrpg tradition, this doesn't lead to anything good. The first game in the Tales series of action-rpgs, Tales of Phantasia was first officially localized when it was remade for the GBA.
We quickly learn that Dhaos apparently came from the far past, where a group of warriors had nearly defeated him. He escaped to the future and was sealed by Cress, Chester and Mint's parents. To escape his wrath when he’s freed, Cress and Mint are sent to the past. In the past, you discover that there's a power called "magic", but it's disappearing. The spirits are sustained by magic, so this is an issue for them. I think I've heard this before...in every Mana game and plenty of others. But it's trope-ier than that: Mana is produced by a great tree, which is dying. Oh, and it's fading from the world because stupid humans are draining it for "magitech". Poorly-used plot-hole-filled time-travel and heavy-handed environmentalist themes abound, and pretty much all of it has been seen before and done better elsewhere. (And in the end, we discover that better communication could have averted the entire plot. Communication, bah!)
The map screen and town graphics reminded me of the SNES Lufia games. They also use a number of the same tropes as those games, like the multi-generational heroes and the hidden elf village. Despite the story being relatively generic, but they put a lot of time into inter-party character interaction, and the characters do get actual personalities.
The battle system is unusual and takes some getting used to, especially since it feels very slow and clunky. There's a general lack of tutorial, which makes it hard to guess what you're supposed to press to achieve what effect. Essentially, every battle is a 2D fighter game, a la Street Fighter, only you have a relatively limited moveset (there are only two buttons and the cross-key; the shoulder buttons are used to direct your allies) and the battle is constantly pausing to display your allies' spell effects. Also, the same button is used for "attack" and "slide away from the enemy", which means that it's actually very difficult to just beat something to death--the game will insist that some of your attacks are actually attempts to dodge.
I think part of my problem is that the game's style and length means it's not enough to tolerate the battle system, you need to love it. There's too much grinding necessary and too high an encounter rate (especially in old areas where the enemies die in one hit anyway) if you don't really love the battles. Apparently the team that made this later left and went on to work on the Star Ocean series. That makes a lot of sense from an action/rpg perspective; and that's also a series where I found the system tiring after a while.
The fact that the game forces additional random encounters at points (there's a couple of places where you specifically need to collect random drops, and a sequence where monsters are visible and seek you out) doesn't help this issue. The thing is, they had plenty of plot and events without the fillers like a high encounter rate and some of the fetch-questing. The game is really long for something from the SNES era, especially a game with action elements. When you consider grinding time, sidequests and bonus dungeons, you could spend 50-60 hours on this. (Note: I didn't. I only made it through the game, in 20 hours, using cheat codes and dogged determination and skipping many of the late-game sidequests.)
The puzzles are pretty weak--it's trying to be Lufia 2 and failing, as most of the puzzles are switches (either wall switches, step-switches or "drag the statue" pressure plates), and the ones that require tools (a ring that shoots sparkles, a pickaxe) are very obtuse. Clues are either non-existent (necessitating either a lot of wandering or a walkthrough) or translated badly. Also, the high random encounter rate in dungeons makes running back and forth to test things frustrating. (The mazes are of the "man, I wish I had a strategy guide" variety. Eventually, running into dead ends and my growing frustration with the battle system led to breaking out the Action Replay and a "no encounters" code.) The worst was probably the Tower of Flames, a late-game dungeon where most of the rooms will give you a game over in 5 seconds unless you're wearing an Ice Charm, which you need to use a Rune Bottle (used to identify mystery items) on a Flare Charm (randomly drops from enemies in this dungeon) to make. Nothing ever indicates that you can or should do this! How the hell did FAQ-writers even figure out what was killing them, much less that it could be prevented?
Contrast this with the Golden Sun games, which are very puzzle-heavy, but generally turn off or reduce random encounters in areas where the puzzles are, so the player can concentrate on one thing at a time.
I noticed that the menu screens get kinda crowded, as they layer boxes to fit everything in at the type size they used. This led me to pull up the fan-translated SNES version of the game (the original) and do a quest side-by-side. The SNES version is much prettier, with graphics that rival FF6 or Chrono Trigger. Music and voice quality are better, too. The fan translation is by DeJap and apparently takes "liberties" with the original Japanese (adding some M-rated content that wasn't there), though I didn’t play enough to see much difference. The controls are better, too, with less slowdown in battle and a generally smoother feel. I suspect, if not for the fact I'd paid money for a real copy of the GBA version, I would have been better off playing through the SNES version. (It's kind of a crap port, similar to the Dragon Quest 3 Remix GBC port when compared to the SNES version that wasn't officially localized.)
On that topic, the translation is generally good, but in one of the most impressive gaffs I've ever seen, the ancient war long before the events of the game was called...Kangaroo.
What.
Finally, on the topic of time travel in video games: In general, there are two options. Either the past can be changed and the future will follow (time is fluid, see Chrono Trigger or Zelda: Oracle of Ages) or the past can't be changed because what you do is predestined (and you can see evidence of things you’ll do in the past before you go there, as in Final Fantasy Legend 3 or Dragon Quest 5). This game takes the “time is fluid” model as a bit more of a timey-wimey ball. That model really works when you can freely travel between eras, so you can change things in the past and see what happens in the future. It’s more for sandbox games. The predestination model works fine for linear, plot-heavy games, because the player won't have a choice but to do the things fate says he will. (Which I'm sure has been the death of many a tabletop rpg, when the players decided they didn't want to follow the rails.) This game makes it clear that history is changing as you visit the various eras, but never really makes it clear how much it changes, or why the characters specifically travel to the times they do. (The rules aren’t clear, they use at least three different methods to time travel, but every trip is one-way.) Despite elves having a lifespan long enough to survive the entire length of the game, there’s only one sidequest that makes use of “the slow path.” Time travel in this game seems mostly like them wanting to be able to reuse the maps between the first and second halves of the game. There was a lot of potential, but I think they wasted it.
Overall: Gotta be honest, I didn’t really like it. Even if the combat system had grown on me more, the puzzles were obtuse and often kinda stupid, and the plot wasn’t different or special enough to justify the problems. If you want to play it, unless you have a strong aversion to emulators, find the fan-translated SNES version and play that instead. The graphics, sound, and play control are better; the additions to the GBA version were a couple of sidequests, a late-game bonus character; a fairly-useless cooking ability; and an extended bonus dungeon. And those are only really worth the trouble if you really love the game.
We quickly learn that Dhaos apparently came from the far past, where a group of warriors had nearly defeated him. He escaped to the future and was sealed by Cress, Chester and Mint's parents. To escape his wrath when he’s freed, Cress and Mint are sent to the past. In the past, you discover that there's a power called "magic", but it's disappearing. The spirits are sustained by magic, so this is an issue for them. I think I've heard this before...in every Mana game and plenty of others. But it's trope-ier than that: Mana is produced by a great tree, which is dying. Oh, and it's fading from the world because stupid humans are draining it for "magitech". Poorly-used plot-hole-filled time-travel and heavy-handed environmentalist themes abound, and pretty much all of it has been seen before and done better elsewhere. (And in the end, we discover that better communication could have averted the entire plot. Communication, bah!)
The map screen and town graphics reminded me of the SNES Lufia games. They also use a number of the same tropes as those games, like the multi-generational heroes and the hidden elf village. Despite the story being relatively generic, but they put a lot of time into inter-party character interaction, and the characters do get actual personalities.
The battle system is unusual and takes some getting used to, especially since it feels very slow and clunky. There's a general lack of tutorial, which makes it hard to guess what you're supposed to press to achieve what effect. Essentially, every battle is a 2D fighter game, a la Street Fighter, only you have a relatively limited moveset (there are only two buttons and the cross-key; the shoulder buttons are used to direct your allies) and the battle is constantly pausing to display your allies' spell effects. Also, the same button is used for "attack" and "slide away from the enemy", which means that it's actually very difficult to just beat something to death--the game will insist that some of your attacks are actually attempts to dodge.
I think part of my problem is that the game's style and length means it's not enough to tolerate the battle system, you need to love it. There's too much grinding necessary and too high an encounter rate (especially in old areas where the enemies die in one hit anyway) if you don't really love the battles. Apparently the team that made this later left and went on to work on the Star Ocean series. That makes a lot of sense from an action/rpg perspective; and that's also a series where I found the system tiring after a while.
The fact that the game forces additional random encounters at points (there's a couple of places where you specifically need to collect random drops, and a sequence where monsters are visible and seek you out) doesn't help this issue. The thing is, they had plenty of plot and events without the fillers like a high encounter rate and some of the fetch-questing. The game is really long for something from the SNES era, especially a game with action elements. When you consider grinding time, sidequests and bonus dungeons, you could spend 50-60 hours on this. (Note: I didn't. I only made it through the game, in 20 hours, using cheat codes and dogged determination and skipping many of the late-game sidequests.)
The puzzles are pretty weak--it's trying to be Lufia 2 and failing, as most of the puzzles are switches (either wall switches, step-switches or "drag the statue" pressure plates), and the ones that require tools (a ring that shoots sparkles, a pickaxe) are very obtuse. Clues are either non-existent (necessitating either a lot of wandering or a walkthrough) or translated badly. Also, the high random encounter rate in dungeons makes running back and forth to test things frustrating. (The mazes are of the "man, I wish I had a strategy guide" variety. Eventually, running into dead ends and my growing frustration with the battle system led to breaking out the Action Replay and a "no encounters" code.) The worst was probably the Tower of Flames, a late-game dungeon where most of the rooms will give you a game over in 5 seconds unless you're wearing an Ice Charm, which you need to use a Rune Bottle (used to identify mystery items) on a Flare Charm (randomly drops from enemies in this dungeon) to make. Nothing ever indicates that you can or should do this! How the hell did FAQ-writers even figure out what was killing them, much less that it could be prevented?
Contrast this with the Golden Sun games, which are very puzzle-heavy, but generally turn off or reduce random encounters in areas where the puzzles are, so the player can concentrate on one thing at a time.
I noticed that the menu screens get kinda crowded, as they layer boxes to fit everything in at the type size they used. This led me to pull up the fan-translated SNES version of the game (the original) and do a quest side-by-side. The SNES version is much prettier, with graphics that rival FF6 or Chrono Trigger. Music and voice quality are better, too. The fan translation is by DeJap and apparently takes "liberties" with the original Japanese (adding some M-rated content that wasn't there), though I didn’t play enough to see much difference. The controls are better, too, with less slowdown in battle and a generally smoother feel. I suspect, if not for the fact I'd paid money for a real copy of the GBA version, I would have been better off playing through the SNES version. (It's kind of a crap port, similar to the Dragon Quest 3 Remix GBC port when compared to the SNES version that wasn't officially localized.)
On that topic, the translation is generally good, but in one of the most impressive gaffs I've ever seen, the ancient war long before the events of the game was called...Kangaroo.
What.
Finally, on the topic of time travel in video games: In general, there are two options. Either the past can be changed and the future will follow (time is fluid, see Chrono Trigger or Zelda: Oracle of Ages) or the past can't be changed because what you do is predestined (and you can see evidence of things you’ll do in the past before you go there, as in Final Fantasy Legend 3 or Dragon Quest 5). This game takes the “time is fluid” model as a bit more of a timey-wimey ball. That model really works when you can freely travel between eras, so you can change things in the past and see what happens in the future. It’s more for sandbox games. The predestination model works fine for linear, plot-heavy games, because the player won't have a choice but to do the things fate says he will. (Which I'm sure has been the death of many a tabletop rpg, when the players decided they didn't want to follow the rails.) This game makes it clear that history is changing as you visit the various eras, but never really makes it clear how much it changes, or why the characters specifically travel to the times they do. (The rules aren’t clear, they use at least three different methods to time travel, but every trip is one-way.) Despite elves having a lifespan long enough to survive the entire length of the game, there’s only one sidequest that makes use of “the slow path.” Time travel in this game seems mostly like them wanting to be able to reuse the maps between the first and second halves of the game. There was a lot of potential, but I think they wasted it.
Overall: Gotta be honest, I didn’t really like it. Even if the combat system had grown on me more, the puzzles were obtuse and often kinda stupid, and the plot wasn’t different or special enough to justify the problems. If you want to play it, unless you have a strong aversion to emulators, find the fan-translated SNES version and play that instead. The graphics, sound, and play control are better; the additions to the GBA version were a couple of sidequests, a late-game bonus character; a fairly-useless cooking ability; and an extended bonus dungeon. And those are only really worth the trouble if you really love the game.
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Date: 2011-07-31 02:13 am (UTC)Are you a fan of the Tales series in general? I've never played any of the others.