Current Events > Playing Tales of Zestiria for the first time. *progressive spoilers*

(+) Yeah! (+)

Played Berseria couple weeks ago and fuckin loved it.
From what I hear, Zestiria has a worse story, but whatever, I'm on a Tales binge right now, I guess. And I want some more Zaveid.

Still in Sorey's village. Alisha just told me her name. Sorey's fun, but I feel like I'm not going to like him as a protag as much as I liked Velvet. Alisha seems alright -- though she's WAY too trusting (sleeping in some random guy's house for two days when they barely just met? Okay...). And I find it funny how Gramps was like "Get that human out of here!" Sorey was like "Okay," and then let her stay for two whole days regardless.

Gameplay seems a bit simpler than Berseria's, which is fine since Berseria's was lost on me after a point.

(Also started up Nier Automata for the first time as well, but didn't get too far. The gameplay in that is fucking great.)

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Alisha best waifu

You should also check out the Zesteria anime in the meantime.

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I'll check out the anime after I beat the game, most likely.

I wish they made a full Berseria anime -- I know there's a couple episodes of the Zestiria anime that covers the Berseria prologue, but that's not enough lol.

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lailah is a qt

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I stalled out at like 80% of the way through this one. Boss battles were pretty frustrating for me. I'm interested to see someone else's take on the game.

Just made it to the human world.

The controls in battle are very strange. The direction Sorey runs is almost never the way I'm actually holding the directional button, and when I fought the fox-face Hellion, Mikleo wasn't even helping and I couldn't figure out how to switch to him after Sorey was KO'd, so I had to use both my Life Bottles.

Dunno if there's a way to switch the settings to make things easier to control or not.

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slmcknett posted...

Just made it to the human world.

The controls in battle are very strange. The direction Sorey runs is almost never the way I'm actually holding the directional button, and when I fought the fox-face Hellion, Mikleo wasn't even helping and I couldn't figure out how to switch to him after Sorey was KO'd, so I had to use both my Life Bottles.

Dunno if there's a way to switch the settings to make things easier to control or not.

You can switch characters by opening the menu (triangle I think) and clicking options.

Yeah, I saw that, but it didn't actually switch. Maybe because I'm not far enough into the game yet?

Ah well, I'm in Ladylake now. I like the layout of the place.

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For all the dislike Zesty gets, 'White Light' is a top tier Tales OP.

And that's me speaking through my extreme bias for 'Karma' and 'Progress.'

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I did like the OP, though I wish it had lyrics like Berseria's. Not sure which I like more atm, but just based off the OP I feel like I'm going to like the character designs for the main characters in Zest more than Bers.

Not that Bers had bad designs, but after how great Velvet, Rokurou, and Magilou's were, the rest of the cast seemed kinda tame in comparison.

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Didn't play much today since I feel sick.

Pulled the sword from the stone. I like how that's all it takes to become Shepherd these days lol. Forging a pact with a malak was easy peasy back in the day, but now it's so rare you become the world's savior for pulling it off.

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It's a terrible game.

On the bright side, you should enjoy the story tie ins to Berseria.

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My brother also owns the Vesperia remake. How good is that one?

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Character motivations seem to be all over the place. Or at least, Sorey's is. He's def a less compelling character than Velvet. He seems to be doing all this just because he's being told to -- he only came to Ladylake to warn Alisha, and now he's accidentally the savior of the world.

Purification powers are Laphi's silver flames, right? Though they're not silver here.

Just learned Armatization. I like how it's a good thing now lol.

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The music is a 10/10 but the rest is uhhhhh all right :)

Enjoy the game! There's a lot of cool easter eggs that you might find having played Berseria first

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Scintillant posted...

The music is a 10/10

Yeah, I feel like if they had Zest's composer for Bers, it would've been a solid 10/10 game.
I noticed that the only 2 tracks in Bers that stood out for me were Zaveid's theme and another song that was ripped from Zest. lol

In other news, I feel like I've been in Ladylake forever.
Just did the Galahad Ruins, Mikleo got his bow and armatized with me. Now I'm trying to find a seraph to be the town's guardian or whatever. I don't remember things like Squires and Sub Lords being things in Berseria (even under different terms), so I'm guessing that's just something people learned about over the course of the years.

I feel like part of me being taken out of the story is me trying to connect everything to Berseria, even though obviously not everything will. So that's definitely on me. But I still feel like the narrative is kinda all over the place at times.

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slmcknett posted...

Just learned Armatization. I like how it's a good thing now lol.

Probably my favorite part of the battle system.

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The Lord of the Land menu is pretty great, mainly the chance to warp between save points.

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Zesteria is really bad
The highest peak in the game is the kick-ass song that plays during the intro.

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Finally got to the Zaveid/Eizen/Edna stuff. Best characters right here. Edna's great.

What's the difference between choosing to build the bridge right then versus waiting til nightfall? I chose to wait.

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I legitimately cannot even recall that happening in the game. I played it when it came out 5 years ago and I don't think I even did a full NG+.

Edna is basically Toph lol

Eizen is awesome.

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Marlind is a cool village. I like the forest vibe, and having a haunted house is a plus.

Just defeated Atakk, and forgive me if I'm wrong but...I thought that malaks/seraphs/normins only turned into dragons when exposed to malevolence, not daemons/hellions like Atakk did? How did that happen? I don't remember any other instance of that.

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Just got through the Hyland/Rolance war segment and met the Lord of Calamity for the first time.

There were prob more anime cutscenes in that segment alone than all of Berseria lol. I wish Berseria got that level of treatment in the anime department -- so many moments came off as so awkward because they were using the in-game models and such.

Anyway, obviously the assassin lady was the merchant girl. I wish the game would stop taking Alisha away from your party -- losing half your party members is a total drag.

Also, how come sometimes your equipment is greyed out when you evolve it? Like, some abilities are locked or something, so it greys out the entire weapon name.

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Didn't play any Zestiria today since The Last of Us came out, so I'm probably gonna be distracted for a while lol.

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Edna's the greatest Tales of character ever the end.

Also, don't go crazy with the equipment customization system, it's garbage. Upgrade your equips whenever you get higher leveled ones.

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The Nintendo Master posted...

Upgrade your equips whenever you get higher leveled ones.

That's what I'm doing. I don't understand how the ability grid thing is supposed to work anyway (even after those skits where Lailah informed me).

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The skill system in Zestiria is the worst in the series in my opinion (of the games I've played, at least). Equipment grinding is such a bore.


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slmcknett posted...

That's what I'm doing. I don't understand how the ability grid thing is supposed to work anyway (even after those skits where Lailah informed me).

You get bonuses if you complete a column, a row, or have multiples of the same square. Problem is, you could have an amazing set of bonuses, but be stupid weak because you're not using the current level equipment. So you basically have to ignore the system entirely until you get end-game equipment, and then at that point I guess you could work on the bonuses but why bother unless you really love the game and just want to grind away at it post-game or something.

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Zesteria picks up a bit after you leave the first city. It isn't an amazing game by any means, but its not horrible. That said, lots of backtracking. LOTS OF BACKTRACKING. I like the alternate color of Soreys outfit, which you pick up as you progress in the story. The white and blue just doesn't suit him.

Ivany2008 posted...

That said, lots of backtracking. LOTS OF BACKTRACKING

I do appreciate how you can warp to previous save points. It helps save some time there. Though I feel like I'm going to end up under leveled if I warp everywhere instead of fighting.

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My condolences

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