Has Tales combat always been this janky?

[BillHicks]

I don't remember Symphonia being this annoying. It seems like your strikes wiff alot, and that any attack will stagger you.

[Simon]

Ya, I agree Vesperia's combat being having a rougher start compared to Symphonia and Abyss.

[Silent Guy]

I only started playing ToV a few weeks ago, and early combat is kinda stiff, but mid game it becomes more fluid, I find the combat system kinda similar to old fighting games, where input order to perform combos is the way to achieve better results, instead of smashing all the buttons at the same time, is a bit hard get used to the first time and there are some advanced techniques to perform long combos, it's mostly muscle memory but I like it

[MorbusGon]

If you unlock more skills (from weapons and side weapons) e.g. Backstep, Critical Guard, Roll, Step Away, Combo Plus, Recover etc. the combat system starts to feel more like that from Abyss or Symphonia. You just need a little stamina and patience. After some hours the story starts to become more interesting and that kept me playing the game until the combat system was fine enougth and after some hours more it became really fun.

[Squerol]

Get ng+ ready save file with all skills unlocked (I can upload it If You want), start ex new game, buy ''Skill SP 1'' in grade shop so not only You will have access to all skills (no need to waste Your time on grinding for them is another good thing) but also every of them will cost 1 SP, play solo on hard because it is most fun in my opinion. Voilà - You can quickly change Your combat to be fluid and fun as hell because skills in this game are game changers. Also learn to manual cancel as soon as possible. Also boost Your agility as soon as possible too with skills and persian boots (You can synth them with free dlc craft pack).

[Starcake]

I left a negative review the first time I played it. It's still up, but I will change it. I'm giving the game a second go, playing on Hard mode and for some reason this time, I'm enjoying the system. To me the only problem so far is Gattuso. I had to downgrade to Normal difficulty to beat it after many hours trying. On Hard it has almost triple HP (from 23k to something like 66k), and hits far, far too hard and is waaaaay too fast. I have no idea why they had made diffculty spike in an early boss that is not even relevant for the story. It's legit the kind of thing that would be better off on a side, optional boss. It doesn't make sense. But overall I'm really enjoying the combat this time.

I agree, the combat in this game is more like old fighter games. Before engaging just have a pre-ready input on your mind and then defend after it's done. It becomes much more doable and enjoyable once you get yourself into this mindset instead of just mashing buttons like crazy. It can be especially difficulty if you are coming from Berseria/Zestiria like me because those two games are 2 button mashing. And being completely honest, I find Vesperia's combat much more well thought when you put the jankiness aside.

Something I miss in Tales of game, and that would bennefit GREATLY is a combat training dummy somewhere very early in the game, something you could go back to and beat it senseless so you can learn each character's move. I honestly have no idea why the developers from this IP don't add them. Here is hoping taht Arise doesn't commit this same mistake (imho it's a mistake, you're free to disagree).

[MorbusGon]

Originally posted by Starcake:

<Snip.>

If you like the combat system of ToV you should take a look on Tales of the Abyss (one of the best Tales of stories imo) and Tales of Symphonia (also here at steam purchasable) because they use a similar combat system but using a different (and imo better) system for the skills. I'm not a big fan of the ToV skill system where you have to use all the different weapons to unlock them.

[Starcake]

Originally posted by MorbusGon:

Originally posted by Starcake:

<Snip.>

If you like the combat system of ToV you should take a look on Tales of the Abyss (one of the best Tales of stories imo) and Tales of Symphonia (also here at steam purchasable) because they use a similar combat system but using a different (and imo better) system for the skills. I'm not a big fan of the ToV skill system where you have to use all the different weapons to unlock them.

Thanks for the recommendation. I'll keep that in mind for when I finish this. So far I've been enjoying yeah. I'm not the best player out there but I am enjoying the challenge it provides.

[Squerol]

Sure combat can be fine but rest of this game aspects... dear god... After 20 hours I have enough. I've only finished Eternia (psp) and Symphonia (gc) so far (played some Abyss too but got dissapointed after hearing so much hype about it and dropped it) and Vesperia is just bad. Even soundtrack is meh, feels like Sakuraba became reaaaaaly tired with composing Tales music after all those years lmao

[DesiDunklen]

You're not wrong. Combat is clunky AF in this game.

[Squerol]

Originally posted by DesiDunklen:

You're not wrong. Combat is clunky AF in this game.

Tales of Destiny DC which got english translated lately is nice cure for dissapointment which this overhyped Tales game is.