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[Plastic Mario]

"Perfect for 2 types of people. Those who love RPGs, and those who hate them, too." -Some magazine

Tales of Symphonia is an incredible RPG often overlooked by people, because it looks very generic. However, it is anything but that. It has been voted #1 RPG for the Gamecube, and it gets my vote too, except I vote it to be the best game ever made. That was a few years ago. I still believe it today.

As I said, it is different from normal RPGs. That is because the battle system is less of an RPG and more of a fighting game. You control one character out of your team of 4, and battle to your hearts content. However, the RPG element takes over as you set and use skills and spells, use items to restore your HP and MP, and a lot more. In dungeons, there is a puzzle around every corner, often frusturating but sending a wave of satisfaction over you as you hear that "Ding" telling you that you solved it.

The battle system also gets your heart pumping fast. With some fights lasting as long as half an hour without getting tedious, you can expect a few suprises every minute of the game.

Every detail has been nearly perfected, every potential unlocked. There's also one detail I can't leave out. The personality combination of your party makes a good setting for MANY dialogues. A complete retard (Got 25 on a test out of 400), a genius, an overprotective archelogocial freak, a clumsy teenage girl, a VERY irratible female ninja, an arrogant philanderer who never learns, a zombie-type personality, and a convict, something funny just has to happen. And it does.

It sounds like it would be hard to get used to an RPG on a GC controller, but its actually quite simple. You will most likely get (Maybe master) it by the first 2 or 3 fights.




The game is incredibly long, my first run was over 80 hours. At 4 100% finished files, it is still just as fresh as the first time. Also, when you complete the game, you have the option of adding small modifiers to your next game, such as more inventory space, 2x, 3x, even 10x experience, and carrying over things like your battle records. Paired with an incredibly in-depth storyline (The best i've seen out of... anything), incredible graphics, TV-quality anime cutscenes, beautiful audio and a good amount of humor in the many voiceovers, It combines to make a stunning game that you won't soon forget.

I give it a 10/10.

[Yellow Magikoopa]

Yeah, it's long and fun, but I wouldn't call it the "Best game ever made". The hype will eventually calm down, and you'll think otherwise.

[Plastic Mario]

SEZ YOU.

[Francis]

[Plastic Mario]

An RTS battle system. Kind of like LoZ, except you can only move back and forth.

[Flavio]

The fighting system used in the Tales of series is called the Linear Motion Battle System. This battle system is like a combanation of an RPG, Super Smash Bros., and some fighting game. The classic battle system was 2d with one row. You perform conbos using what ever weapon that the charecter you're contrloling. Using the A button you perform normal atacks. Using the B button you perform special techs and spells. B, Down B, Up B, and the sideways Bs each perform a different tech/spell. You assign what tech/spell you use with your different bs from a list. As you level up you gain more techs/spells to use.

The version of the Linear Motion Battle System used in Tales of Symphonia is esesnsly the same, accept there's different rows with enemies in them. Sort of hard to explain what Flavio means by that.

Well, Flavio hopes that this explained it good enough for you Francis. If not Flavio can post some non spoiler videos showing battle examples.