Post by Friendly Person :) on Dec 17, 2015 4:28:48 GMT -5
So, it has been quiet around here despite the fact that a huge event just happened. Well, I genuinely want to hear your opinions about the trailer. I deleted my own comments in the shoutbox because I thought they were too negative, but I think that there's a difference between silencing myself and intentionally creating a negative environment. Now that I've had a few days to calm down and reflect on it, I'm ready to start a discussion.
I'm not really going to bring up graphics, because honestly I've never been bothered by them in Tales, nor am I going to bring up the music because I don't think there's enough to go on yet. I'll also say from the start that I wouldn't really count 60 FPS as a pro because most every 3D Tales has it, so I feel they shouldn't get bonus points for something that should really be standard. Just my quick feelings on those three things before I get into the meat of it.
Nearly every design I've seen so far turns me off. Be it character designs, weapon designs, or environment designs, nothing about this game piques my interest. I never did like Velvet's design, but small child, Samurai and Lizard-Man all look varying degrees of ridiculous, and Velvet's weapon and demon arm make me roll my eyes. While I'm glad that we already see more variety in the environments than Zestiria, none of them really had anything that made me do a double take. Like, the promotional image for Zestiria which featured Elysia: a hut built into a rock on a grassy mountain top, separated from a towering palace-like structure by a sea of clouds and birds. Granted, the actual area was decidedly less interesting, but the image drew me in, and made me interested to see the environment.
We don't know much about the story, but if the initial description of Velvet made me roll my eyes, the inclusion of a young child as the "light to Velvet's darkness" made me face-plant my desk. Everyone expected the demon arm, but it's a shtick that I feel is as unoriginal as it is dumb, and I worry that we're going to get another failed attempt at making a 'dark' story by writers who don't seem to understand what 'dark' really means. In the past Tales games did a pretty good job of appearing tropey, but then subverting those tropes with solid character development. Then Zestiria came along and played every trope about as straight as they could possibly be played. We'll see if Berseria can do better.
I do not believe the combat will be another Graces or Zestiria. That said, they did borrow the camera position of Zestiria, which is a huge letdown. I always preferred the fighting-game style camera from the Team Symphonia games, but that I can at least chalk up to preference. What I can't is a camera angle that fails to give you a good idea of what's going on around you. Where Graces' camera at least did a decent job of keeping the battle-field in view, I can't count the number of times in Zesteria that an enemy unexpectedly appeared behind me, or a spell I never saw hit me in the butt. In the trailer you can already see (during the fight with the knight's on the bridge) Velvet's forward momentum causing a knight to slip out of the frame.
My initial reaction to "every face button as an arte" was extremely negative, but I've backed down on that one. Really, I'm more curious if Udo is involved (it sounds like something he might come up with though). Experience tells me that if he is, I won't like the combat, which I fully acknowledge as being preference.
What does concern me is this "focus on free-run controls". I've always loved the LMBS system because the 2d controls made for a really tight experience. Movement became, "move toward your enemy or move away from them", with free-run present if you needed to re-position yourself. It kept everything perfectly clear even in the most hectic battles, and it made all your attacks very precise because there wasn't an extra dimension of space for you to swing at. Like the fighting games it was based off of, it allowed you to focus on the most important part: THE FIGHTING. But, since we haven't really had much confirmation on that yet, I'm trying to keep from jumping to conclusions.
But really, I think the thing that disappoints me most about Berseria is just the fact that I'm disappointed in it. With Persona 5 and Star Ocean 5 and Final Fantasy 15 and Dragon Quest 11 setting their fan-bases ablaze, Berseria doesn't seem to be really trying. It's changes are more worrisome/curious/confusing than exciting, and with a 2016 launch, that's 4 Tales games in 5 years. Whether or not you think Xillia, Xillia 2 or Zestiria are good games or not, I don't know if you could really argue that there hasn't been a drop in quality. Plot-wise they are varying levels of incomplete, and in terms of side-content they don't come close to the older games (except for maybe Xillia 2, the bulk of which was side-content). We can hope that Berseria has been in development since Xillia 2, will launch mid-late 2016 and will have had a good, long time to simmer. We can hope.
I WILL play Berseria. I WILL give it a fair chance. I did with Zestiria, and until Alisha left, I really thought they were on to something (and no, I don't think Alisha leaving or Rose joining was what ruined it, but that's a different discussion). After re-watching the trailer several times and thinking on it, I'm really not certain if it's bad, or if I'm having a knee-jerk response to change. All I know is that right now so many other series seem to be revitalized by the hype for new games (even obscure series like Saga are getting new entries!). It's a great time to be a fan of JRPGs: there's a lot of neat stuff coming out, and I only hope that Tales can keep up.
I'm not really going to bring up graphics, because honestly I've never been bothered by them in Tales, nor am I going to bring up the music because I don't think there's enough to go on yet. I'll also say from the start that I wouldn't really count 60 FPS as a pro because most every 3D Tales has it, so I feel they shouldn't get bonus points for something that should really be standard. Just my quick feelings on those three things before I get into the meat of it.
Nearly every design I've seen so far turns me off. Be it character designs, weapon designs, or environment designs, nothing about this game piques my interest. I never did like Velvet's design, but small child, Samurai and Lizard-Man all look varying degrees of ridiculous, and Velvet's weapon and demon arm make me roll my eyes. While I'm glad that we already see more variety in the environments than Zestiria, none of them really had anything that made me do a double take. Like, the promotional image for Zestiria which featured Elysia: a hut built into a rock on a grassy mountain top, separated from a towering palace-like structure by a sea of clouds and birds. Granted, the actual area was decidedly less interesting, but the image drew me in, and made me interested to see the environment.
We don't know much about the story, but if the initial description of Velvet made me roll my eyes, the inclusion of a young child as the "light to Velvet's darkness" made me face-plant my desk. Everyone expected the demon arm, but it's a shtick that I feel is as unoriginal as it is dumb, and I worry that we're going to get another failed attempt at making a 'dark' story by writers who don't seem to understand what 'dark' really means. In the past Tales games did a pretty good job of appearing tropey, but then subverting those tropes with solid character development. Then Zestiria came along and played every trope about as straight as they could possibly be played. We'll see if Berseria can do better.
I do not believe the combat will be another Graces or Zestiria. That said, they did borrow the camera position of Zestiria, which is a huge letdown. I always preferred the fighting-game style camera from the Team Symphonia games, but that I can at least chalk up to preference. What I can't is a camera angle that fails to give you a good idea of what's going on around you. Where Graces' camera at least did a decent job of keeping the battle-field in view, I can't count the number of times in Zesteria that an enemy unexpectedly appeared behind me, or a spell I never saw hit me in the butt. In the trailer you can already see (during the fight with the knight's on the bridge) Velvet's forward momentum causing a knight to slip out of the frame.
My initial reaction to "every face button as an arte" was extremely negative, but I've backed down on that one. Really, I'm more curious if Udo is involved (it sounds like something he might come up with though). Experience tells me that if he is, I won't like the combat, which I fully acknowledge as being preference.
What does concern me is this "focus on free-run controls". I've always loved the LMBS system because the 2d controls made for a really tight experience. Movement became, "move toward your enemy or move away from them", with free-run present if you needed to re-position yourself. It kept everything perfectly clear even in the most hectic battles, and it made all your attacks very precise because there wasn't an extra dimension of space for you to swing at. Like the fighting games it was based off of, it allowed you to focus on the most important part: THE FIGHTING. But, since we haven't really had much confirmation on that yet, I'm trying to keep from jumping to conclusions.
But really, I think the thing that disappoints me most about Berseria is just the fact that I'm disappointed in it. With Persona 5 and Star Ocean 5 and Final Fantasy 15 and Dragon Quest 11 setting their fan-bases ablaze, Berseria doesn't seem to be really trying. It's changes are more worrisome/curious/confusing than exciting, and with a 2016 launch, that's 4 Tales games in 5 years. Whether or not you think Xillia, Xillia 2 or Zestiria are good games or not, I don't know if you could really argue that there hasn't been a drop in quality. Plot-wise they are varying levels of incomplete, and in terms of side-content they don't come close to the older games (except for maybe Xillia 2, the bulk of which was side-content). We can hope that Berseria has been in development since Xillia 2, will launch mid-late 2016 and will have had a good, long time to simmer. We can hope.
I WILL play Berseria. I WILL give it a fair chance. I did with Zestiria, and until Alisha left, I really thought they were on to something (and no, I don't think Alisha leaving or Rose joining was what ruined it, but that's a different discussion). After re-watching the trailer several times and thinking on it, I'm really not certain if it's bad, or if I'm having a knee-jerk response to change. All I know is that right now so many other series seem to be revitalized by the hype for new games (even obscure series like Saga are getting new entries!). It's a great time to be a fan of JRPGs: there's a lot of neat stuff coming out, and I only hope that Tales can keep up.