System and Games...

[Kasumi89]

Not much of my taste. My friend Jason told me to give it a try. I thought it was ok. But I liked the Graphics. That was(to me) the best part of it.

[CrimsonNataku]

First system: PS2
First Game Played on PS2: ...DDR, I think, can't remember.
I Have: PS2, GC, and PS3
Favorite Game on PS2: Tales of the Abyss
Favorite Game on GC: Tales of Symphonia (notice a trend here? ^_^ )
Favorite Game on PS3: So far, I like Genji: Days of the Blade the most.

[Maester]

Originally Posted by CrimsonNataku

First system: PS2
First Game Played on PS2: ...DDR, I think, can't remember.
I Have: PS2, GC, and PS3
Favorite Game on PS2: Tales of the Abyss
Favorite Game on GC: Tales of Symphonia (notice a trend here? ^_^ )
Favorite Game on PS3: So far, I like Genji: Days of the Blade the most.

DDR is so wicked, it's awesome when you're really good at it

[CrimsonNataku]

Originally Posted by Maester

DDR is so wicked, it's awesome when you're really good at it

Isn't it? It's so much fun to play. My little sister and I play together all the time and we always play Heavy. Basically, we keep playing until one of us passes out (not really, but it sure feels that way). ^_^

[Kanji_The_Wanderer]

Originally Posted by CrimsonNataku

First system: PS2
First Game Played on PS2: ...DDR, I think, can't remember.
I Have: PS2, GC, and PS3
Favorite Game on PS2: Tales of the Abyss
Favorite Game on GC: Tales of Symphonia (notice a trend here? ^_^ )
Favorite Game on PS3: So far, I like Genji: Days of the Blade the most.

oh! Tales of The Abyss, I really want to play that. Is it better then Legendia? Legendia was good, but not as good as Symphonia.

[Vesperd]

wow, another tales game.. tales of the abyss? i would play it.. but i think its a new release.. and would be a long while for it to Hit Uk stores

[Kanji_The_Wanderer]

Originally Posted by Vesperd

wow, another tales game.. tales of the abyss? i would play it.. but i think its a new release.. and would be a long while for it to Hit Uk stores

its nice to see you online again Vesperd-san! It has been awhile. Yeah, Tales of the Abyss came out not too long ago I think. It comes after Tales of Legendia, which sucked in some ways. But it was still a good game.

[CrimsonNataku]

Originally Posted by Kanji_The_Wanderer

oh! Tales of The Abyss, I really want to play that. Is it better then Legendia? Legendia was good, but not as good as Symphonia.

Tales of the Abyss is way better than Legendia... I actually think it's better than Symphonia ^_^

[Kanji_The_Wanderer]

wow, better then Symphona?! care to give me a synopsis without too many spoilers??

[CrimsonNataku]

Originally Posted by Kanji_The_Wanderer

wow, better then Symphona?! care to give me a synopsis without too many spoilers??

At first, the story doesn't seem like much, but it really develops over time. Basically, the game takes place in a world where everything has supposedly been predicted beforehand. Everyone and everything's future has been written in what is known as the Score. At the time of the story, a war is about to begin between two kingdoms, Kimlasca and Malkuth.

The main character is this 17-year-old boy named Luke, the son of Duke Fabre and nephew to the king of Kimlasca. He has been kept in his house for the past 7 years because 7 years ago, he was kidnapped and when his family found him again, he had lost all of his memories. Unlike Lloyd, Luke is spoiled, rude, arrogant, and inconsiderate. He can get on your nerves at times. Then a sudden chain of events throw Luke into the real world, and that's when his story really begins. But what starts off as a simple journey home turns into something far bigger.

Like I said, the story grows on you. It can be a tad predictable at the beginning, but then again when you've played enough video games, anything can feel predictable. The plot twists are pretty similar to Symphonia's. It's pretty easy to tell who the real bad guy is, but something tells me that was intentional...

Like in Symphonia, all the characters grow on you in the end. But unlike Symphonia, instead of having 8 playable characters, you have 6 (this does not include any spoiler-related additional characters you may acquire). This, in my opinion, is a good change. You get to know each character even better, and you can really work with each character and improve his or her abilities. The characters are great, you will love all of them. Even the ones that seem annoying or really wierd at first. What's more, there's a strong female protagonist that you will really use, and more than just one cool character to play.

I can't remember how the Legendia battle system was set up, but I'm pretty sure they went back to the Symphonia battle system in this game. They have similar features, like something akin to Exspheres, for instance (though they're called capacity cores and fon slot chambers).

They still have plenty of side quests, costume changes and titles, but they got rid of the Wonder Chef and all his similar entities (Dark Wonder Chef, Baker... What was her name again?). Abyss does have recipes, but for some reason I don't feel like they're as useful as in Symphonia. Even without the Wonder Chef, there is plenty of humor throughout the game, along with many serious themes.

Another big plus, if this kind of stuff matters to you, is that in Abyss, there are more anime cut scenes. And I don't mean just short little 5 second clips, I mean good solid, nearly minute long pieces that are well-drawn and have characters in them that talk.

It will be definitely difficult to get everything in the first run, nor will you really want to. Replay quality is definitely strong in this game.

Some downsides are probably that the loading times are kind of slow. Also, they went back to the voiceless skits like in Symphonia. Apparently, in the Japanese version they did have voices, but for some reason for the U.S. (or Non-Japanese) release, they decided to cut them out. Lastly, some people complain that the in-game graphics in Abyss aren't as smooth as the ones in Legendia and Symphonia. However, I personally haven't really noticed (nor do I really care, to be honest).

Overall, if you liked Symphonia, and you have a PS2, I highly recommend that you get this game. My sister and I are still playing it, and we're loving every bit of it.

Hope this helps.