The Tales Series is Disappearing in the West 

Being a Tales fan is suffering. And rest in peace to Mutsumi Inomata, who passed away last month. She designed a massive chunk of the series' characters. :(

I distinctly remember Harada, director of the Tekken series, making a tweet about being fed up with Bamco having, apparently, a revolving door of executives who's only concerns were maximizing profits and advancing their careers.

It's baffling to think there wasn't a single original title for the Switch, the most popular platform uh Japan, this generation. Remember how many titles they put out in the DS/PSP era? Yes we didn't get most of them but still. What happened to those studios ? Probably moves to those now dead mobile games... Whoppeeee....

Mutsumi Inomata's character designs for the titles she designed for are so iconic and colorful and fun and her art is so gorgeous, it's heartbreaking to see Bamco letting her legacy rot like this.

Graces and Xillia need to be ported to PC and current gen consoles

I'm getting really disheartened with the Tales series and Namco. They practice some lame business decisions. Symphonia's recent release is plain SAD...

Where’s my Abyss re-release Bamco

It hurts my soul to see legacy of tales slowly being erased because Namco hasn’t rereleased anything on steam/ modern consoles outside of a verspira and symphonia or the last few mainline games

I love the Tales series and Symphonia on the Gamecube is THE game that got me in to JRPGs. I am actually playing a fan translation of Tales of Innocence on DS right now. My favorite is either Symphonia or Berseria.

This makes me happy that I have them all physical. I'm still eagerly awaiting the next Tales of... game!

The way Bandai Namco treats fans of this series is like having an Evil Stepmother on steroids.

Dude thank you for the call out to legendia. That soundtrack was pure gold and I loved the hell out of that game! This is a game that needs a full remaster just so it can be playable in the way it deserves to be. It'd probably be a huge money sink and terrible for them profit wise because this game isn't popular enough, but it'd be so nice to have for the OST alone. Plus poor Moses could actually hit something if it got a full overhaul. Also, I love Abyss. It's a game you have to play at least twice to truly see the MC as he is. He is the "hated" MC on your first play through. It's the second one that shows you just how much of his true growth and personality is there all along. Abyss needs more love. ❤

The recent Xenosaga collab for the mobile game makes more sense now. The series is joining Xenosaga as a series destined to not be available for download.

See guys? Jon isn't the only person that makes good videos in this channel. You can complain about other people opinions, but going to hate the person behind it is wrong.

My favourite video game series. There is so much potential in rereleases alone. And then there's Bandai Namco who just does nothing with it.

I recommand a lot to follow "Life Bottle Production". It's a Tales of fan group who are doing more than Bandai Namco for this game series. They have done the recent Tales of Destiny (PS2 English patch translation) and Innocence R English patch translation. They also done HD texture pack for Abyss, Hearts R and Legendia. Now they are working on the Rebirth English patch translation. 😁

Being a fan of any Namco series is crushing, I wish they would respect their games like they deserve. Tales has always been my favourite franchise and it feels like they gave up right when JRPGs started to become successful again. At least The Legend of Heroes has blossomed in its place and eventually filled the hole in my heart that Tales left behind

It's ironic the developers spoke about changing the art style of Arise to be more "threatening" in order to appeal more to male players just as we were entering an era where cute art styles like those in Genshin are absolutely thriving.

I would attend a college course on the Tales series taught by Dan.

Its a shame that Tales of the Rays failed in the west because its still going strong in Japan and in my opinion its the perfect Tales game for mobile. It plays like a Tales game (you can check out combo videos on my channel or just watch gameplay on YT) and it does a fantastic job of bringing in all the characters as it has almost every notable Tales character you can think of with every single playable character from every game, most of the villains like Mithos, Van, Artorius, to even lesser known ones like Creed and Mathias to also having other mobile and spinoff games like Link, Crestoria and World Mythology available. Its super free to play friendly, just about every character is viable, tons of costumes, and just celebrated seven years of service. The biggest reason why Crestoria flopped was all the bugs and glitches plus coming out just before Genshin Impact and the bar for mobile games going up and Luminaria failed because it was a Tales game in name only and a very unprofitable monetization. But the other problem is it just can’t compete with what Rays offers in Japan and how many mobile games are basically becoming triple AAA games on your phone. They’d have to bring something out as high quality as Persona 5X to compete. In any case I suspect Bamco just doesn’t care because the games don’t bring in nearly as much money as their other properties like Elden Ring, Dragonball and Sword Art Online. And while it sucks, emulation is always available. When I got into the series through Abyss 3DS and the Vesperia remaster, I just emulated all the other games that weren’t on Steam or modern consoles besides Symphonia (had a working Wii). Yes its less than ideal but Bamco clearly doesn’t care and all the games work wonderfully on emulation.

Honestly considering how important Tales Of is to Bandai Namco, I cant believe I won the remake lottery with Baten Kaitos Remastered, a game so few people got to experience and now I have it available with me on the go. Genuinely hope theres good news for Tales Of in the future, the fans definitely deserve it.

Another reason why piracy is necessary, the good thing here is that these games and the DLC are pretty much preserved thankfully so you can still play them on modded systems

It's really not an exaggeration at all to say that I wouldn't be the person that I am today without Tales of the Abyss. I was 16 when it released and it really set a lot in motion for both my future view of the world and what I expect out of a story in order for me to enjoy it. The list of things that I wouldn't give to see it reach another generation and show them the things that I saw when I was their age is a very, very short list.

Your voice makes this devastating news easier to deal with😢 Thanks for that🖤

My entire life as a Tales fan since 2003 has been like this. A lot of ups and a LOOOT of downs... Games still not being released on modern platforms or in the west at all? The more things change, the more they stay the same.

I want to see a sequel to tales of zesteria, with sorey and mikleo finding an old temple dedicated to the first lord of calamity and the first shepherd. In doing so, they unleash this lord of calamity back upon the world…only, she’s not really evil. Yes, this is an excuse to bring back velvet, just because the idea of her and sorey is such an interesting dynamic. Bring back the other seraphim too. Because zavead and edna could have very interesting interactions with her. Whats lailahs connection maotelus, who she knows is laphicet. God, there’s so many amazing ideas to be done!

Finally discussing a series I love ❤️ I need Graces F, Xillia Collection and Tales of Vs.

Psst, Versperia and Berseria are also on PS3. 8 games in total.

Loving my physical library right now! So I own all of the Tales games already, Physically!

Emulation and fan translations. 'Nuff said.

I'm really glad I just recently got into the Kiseki series of games and that franchise is thriving with more games to come, I feel really bad with all the Tales of fans and Namco in general getting shafted with everything that is happening. Hope good fortunate comes your way brothers.

I don't even like the tales series but your love for the series is really contagious and as a fan of some other niche games I understand your frustration

I just went into the EU PS Store to notice that the PS3 digital releases of the Tales of games are gone only the DLC for Tales of Zestiria on PS3 are still available. That sucks because I wanted to get all of the costumes for Tales of Graces F. Least I have all of the physical releases of the Tales of games, they will always be preserved and remain with me.

Tales of Symphonia on the GC remains one of my favorite RPGs, right up there with The Last Story and Golden Sun/Lost Age.

Symphonia on Gamecube is still the best version of the game. Considering Namco's President said they need to focus on quality (many years too late), I'd expect them release some quick ports of these games sometime soon.

Man, shoutouts to Legendia. It's incredibly rough in the beginning, but it gets so good! The story feels so personal to the characters.

I like that you're about the only English speaker I've ever heard pronounce "Xillia" as intended. I've been a fan of the series since the very first game for SFC, and I used to buy the games again when they came out in English, just to try and help support the series for my friends who don't know Japanese. I always wanted us to be in the same boat when it came to new releases, but...not by Namco just not seeming to make any for anyone anymore.

I will never understand how Bamco did not capitalize on Tales of Arise's success in 2021, only to release story DLC 3 to 4 years later to a completely different gaming environment and expecting similar success. They even pissed off Tekken fans earlier this month ontop of pissing off Tales fans with this. It really feels like Bamco's passion for games is just straight up gone. If they can't keep a constant cash flow going with something, they'll drop it like a rock.

I really hope they do a whole "Tales" collection because there's ton of games in the series I think need a modern re-release or remaster or remake idc how it happens, there's just a lot of the series I've yet to play and it's because the old ones are locked to consoles I don't have or they get delisted or they're Japan exclusive.

What really hurts about the delisting of Tales of Hearts R is the physical copy is pretty expensive.

I really wish that Bandai Namco could have an archive of every series available. Especially for their rpg legacy series. No matter the platform. Being able to give their fanbase access to every title past and present would be fantastic, and worthwhile

Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World was my favorite RPG on the Wii.

Phantasia GBA isn't the only version we got. We also got the iOS port. I mean, I'm not surprised you forgot the iOS port existed, cause it deserves to be forgotten, but still...

I had no idea the Tales franchise was still so big in Japan, Tales of Festival looks like so much fun!!

Here i'm just hoping for another tales of the world spin-off series. The last one we got was Reve Unitia on 3DS. Don't get me wrong, I collected all physical copy of the main series, but I also want more for the spin-off.

This kind of stuff is why i make sure to keep a backup console of every console for modding, so i can have an "ultimate" console with everything i have had for the console backed up to it.

Loved this video, you shared a lot of the same thoughts that I have. I absolutely agree that Tales of Legendia probably has my favorite Tales OST ever, I didn't loved the came coming off Symphonia but it is SO good. It's on Spotify along with a lot of others if anyone wants to take a listen, it is magical. ☺

One can only hope that Bamco will do something with Tales next year

The Tales of series has always been very influential to me. It makes me want to create my own story and characters. Abyss/Vesperia/Hearts R/Xillia is my favorite type of battle system. Eternia was my very first Tales games, before Symphonia existed.

I recently got Tales of Arise, and I don't know if the delisting is going to affect DLC. I might be wrong, but this is pushing me to find any available copies of the series since I figured this was coming and I need to find a good time to go get these games when I can.

Glad I've already got physical copies of every Tales game that had a western release. I'm still hoping Bamco will rerelease and translate the games that never came over.

I'm not a huge Tales fan and only played through a few of the games, but I absolutely loved Tales of Phantasia. It was one of the first games that I played through back when I was first introduced to emulation over 20 years ago. I would absolutely love a remake of that one.

I'm still waitin' on Tales of Destiny 2 and Rebirth to get some kind of localization... let alone any kind of re-release combo pack of any of the ones that didn't get one.

9:35 If you thought those PSN store decisions were weird, us people in Europe only had access to Symphonia Chronicles and Graces f physically through a triple pack where those 3 games were lumped together for some reason. Like you got Symphonia, it's sequel, and Graces f too for some reason all in the same case. Tales of have being doing weird selling packages for years.

I'm sad they don't release tales title more often, :c I check every week for news about tales.

My guy with the best take, tales of the abyss is peak

The jumpscare my brain experienced not hearing "Hello, Jon here!"

One good thing is that Innocence R at least has a full fan translation on the Vita now, though it's unfortunate that legal means to buy it still aren't possible in English.

Thanks for letting me know that Tales of Festival is a thing that exists. I’mma get you a t-shirt!

The only hope right now is the statements of those behind the series currently saying stuff along the lines of making them more available being something they want to do, pretty much since Arise's release. Sucks that it's not something Namco wanted to prioritize for the literal decades this has been an issue for, but hopefully they follow through. And follow through well, of course.

Cries in Tales of Eternia (Tales of Destiny II)

I got my mom into the tales series back in the gamecube ps2 era, she's been hooked ever since. She beat tales of the abyss about 15 times or more alone.

I could listen to Daniel talk about Tales games for hours...

I just finished the tales of arise dlc. I will always be a fan of this series. It’s one of the few series I always buy day one. I don’t normally buy dlc which is why I waited on this.

"Fun" fact: Tales of the Abyss' PS2 version wasn't even released here in Europe for whatever reason. We only got the 3DS port.

Another sad thing is that the people directly involved with Tales definitely know of the western fans. There was a popularity poll a few years back that asked for the most beloved games and separated between answers from Japan and overseas and when they saw the massive difference between the two when it came to Destiny (which is btw stuck on the PS1 in the West), the hosts remarked how they would love to show people why Destiny is so beloved in Japan. They also had a character popularity poll and Lloyd made it pretty far in it. The hosts even commented on how a big chunk of the votes for him were from the west. But all that doesn't do much when the higher-ups at Bamco just say No.

I am so glad I got the platinum trophy for Tales of Xilla 2 before it got delisted. I got it digitally because at the time I purchased it, it cost more to buy physical copy than digital. That and I was too lazy to switch different disk.

Is that Lucina in the poster above Tales of the abbyss? I love it!! 😍😍😍

Tales of is my favourite series, and it’s rough being an English-Speaking fan. So many entries stay in Japan and fan-translations are few and far between. Tales of the Abyss is my favourite video game of all time; I bawled like a baby at the end of it (not that I've ever finished a Tales game dry-eyed). Seriously I have never played anything that wrenched my heart out repeatedly like that. It’s a shame so few western fans really give the series a chance. I can understand somewhat since they're slow-burn games that usually take around 15 hours to hit the first big plot beat and at least 30 hours before it starts ripping your heart apart. But damn, the buildup is worth it and makes those emotional moments hit so much harder once they come. I hope someday the series gets a renaissance in the world-wide market. People are sleeping on some of the most emotionally powerful games and deep combat systems out there.

Maybe I'm too much of an optimist, but my hope is that these delistings are just a prelude to further remasters/ports. They did state their intention to do more of them, and I think they've learned the hard lesson from Symphonia that putting out low-effort, janky ports just won't cut it. But that being said, I do share your concerns about the series and it's preservation/availability on modern platforms. Who would've ever thought that Star Ocean would end up in a better state than the Tales series? All 6 mainline Star Ocean titles are finally available again on modern PlayStation systems worldwide. It's madness.

I think something that could help is if there are ports of older games for this generation of consoles to come out. I feel like for the foreseeable future backwards compatibility is more or less going to be baked in to the PS and Xbox ecosystems (hopefully nintendo too) because their consoles use similar architecture to their predecessors. If something gets ported to PS4/Xbox One then they might not need to do much to keep releasing them. I do think the series will continue to develop more even if releases are more spread out. The Final Fantasy ports we have took a while to all come out but are all really accessible, so I hope Bandai does the same for Tales

I have yet to play a Tales games (bought multiple) but my current plan is that my first will be the fan translation of Phantasia on the snes

If I want to redownload the game. How do I do that then?

I've never heard of this delisted thing! its baffling because not only are so many Tales games not available on modern consoles, but the limited ones that we do have are sneakily being wiped away from us. I wish we had it like the JP fanbase, I was always so curious about the fan festivals.

Tales of arise is like the star fox adventures of the tales series: a game originally nothing like the ip they transformed into a pre established ip later in development

Back during the great PS3 store scare I jumped on cheap physical copies of Graces F, Symphonia Chronicles, Xillia 1 & 2. I haven't had the opportunity to play them since, but I'm still glad I did.

This was a very interesting watch while I completely forgot about the Franchise, seriously. Tales of is in a very weird spot currently at Bandai Namco. I do not think the situation is any better in Japan besides the Tales of Festival and a few mobile games. The series kinda vanished the moment Tales of Producer Hideo Baba left the company to start his own at Square Enix, and we all know how this turned out (studio was shut down without releasing a single game). It was thanks to Baba that the series tackled the West again. The helm went over to Katsuhiro Harada of Tekken and Xenogears fame, but he made clear that he isn't interested that much in Tales of (but would love to see a new Xenogears) and he actually don't have the time to manage the franchise. After a while the helm went on to the current Tales of Brand-Manager, Yusuke Tomizawa who promised a lot of stuff like Remasters and even Remakes of unreleased games in the West (there are even more unreleased Tales of here in Europe) to fill the gap between the bigger games. None of it happened, in fact, he was the one who said countless times there will be no DLC for Arise. I don't think there currently is anyone at Bandai Namco games capable of handling the once so popular Franchise. But Bandai Namco itself might be the problem here. There focus is making big money with Tekken 8 over the next years and of course releasing cheaply made licensed Anime-Games. There isn't much room anymore at Bandai Namco for quality games like Tales of, Xenogears or even the .Hack Series.

Honestly I've never been a tales fan but i definitely feel sorry for the fans because for a ip thats been around for over 30 years eoth a tons of games it definitely feels like its treated with no care or respect from the devs.

My best mate loves this series so much as for myself I've only played Berseria and I wouldn't mind playing Xillia 1 and 2 next but that option now is harder. So yeah as someone who might become a fan this is rough.

Man... I remember Tales of the World. I played so much of that back in the days on my PSP. It's super sad that those games never really hit it off. I enjoyed all the interactions between the characters. It's actually the first tales of games that I played and made me play Symphonia. I never had a Gamecube but I did have the original Wii which had the ability to play Gamecube games before they revised that console. What an experience it was.

Being a Tales of fan in the West is accepting that you're the unloved child in the family. Namco brought 1 Tales of the World game. I picked it up one Boxing day sale at a Gamebuzz (which have all closed down). I looooved that game. Then found out there were 2 sequels! And then all the Narikiri dungeon games!!!! A whole world of portable Tales games just never came stateside. Then to find out that a lot of early Tales games DID come stateside, but are extremely difficult to get a hold of (Destiny, Eternia), and a toooon of games that have never come over like Rebirth, Destiny 2, Phantasia X. I absolutely LOVE the respect the translation community because they have made so many games playable and enjoyable. I haven't gotten around to beating them, but I have my eyes on Tempest, Innocence, Destiny DC. Thanks for continuing to talk about Tales games with your platform. I'll continue to try and playing all the games, like the PSP games like Tales of Brave, and such.

Tales of the Abyss my beloved. Never owned a PS2, but I spent so much time on my 3DS with it

Thanks for making this video. It's honest and serious, and not sensationalizing the news. I have all of the ps3 Tales games digitally, I hope I'll be able to continue to play them at least that way, but who knows. My absolute favorite and first love is Destiny, which I have both the US and JP releases of and the ps2 remake. I would be overjoyed (like shaking in disbelief) if Tales of Destiny DC received an international re-release. I also hope they remaster Phantasia for the 30th anniversary. This comment is too long now, but your open passion for the series is so refreshing I wanted to share some as well.

Tales of the abyss on the 3ds was the first tales game I ever played and I loved it. 🥰 Great story and characters. So glad I had the opportunity to experience it.

Tales of are the reason i still have my ps3 and my copies of their games there, so weird that the amazing Xillias are still stuck there

I've always wondered if Tales Of would do better if it were simply advertised better. I fell in love with Symphonia on Game Cube, and since then, I've had many times walking around a game store where I noticed a new one on the shelf that I had no idea was even releasing. I feel like Arise was the first one I knew existed pre-launch since Vesperia. I've often missed games just because I'm knee-deep in other games before I realize they exist and I either don't have the time or money to add another game.

Tales of the tempest was also on the DS never forget the jigsaw puzzles

I was really hoping to see a port or Graces and both Xillia games for modern consoles/PC. Personally I think those are some of the best games in the series and it is a shame they are stuck in the ps3. But it would be great if we could get all the other games that are either japan exclusive or the portable games too like Hearts R or even Abyss since the game is too stuck in the ps2 and 3ds.

Felt nice to talk about games like Xillia 2, Legendia and Phantasia in a meaningful capacity. Wonder if I should make a video going in-depth on a specific game in the series…?

They need to revamp and breathe new life into this series. I LOVE this series and have extremely fond memories of so many of the titles even some of the meh ones. They really make some...interesting...and inconsistent decisions with some of them which just leaves gamers scratching their heads sometimes. I honestly loved Arise so much! I would be SO sad if this series died. 😢😢

I will never understand why Bandai Namco didn't re-release the two Tales of Symphonia games together on modern platforms.

Good thing I got all the ones taken of the eu store physically. I dont have Xillia though but that hasnt been delisted here luckily.

Meanwhile Trails series is going strong.. new Arc coming trails fan eating good 😊

Imagine we had a Phantasia or Eternia remake in the style of Star Ocean 2nd Story R man. The potential being wasted with this series is sad. It deserves better

I've already downloaded every single rom and fan translation for the games that aren't available anymore ( and JP Exclusives). It's their loss if they decide to not release the Japanese exclusive titles or re-release the old ones.

For a while there was a phone version of tales of phantasia too. I played it in college some.

I'm pretty sure they were pulled because a re-release is in the horizon. Vesperia, Symphonia, Zestiria, Berseria and Arise are readily available in modern hardware. I would not fret since the PS3 install base is shrinking and re-releasing games is an efficient way of making money from something that is already there.

As a casual enjoyer of the series as opposed to a proper fan, I had no idea so much time had passed since the last release before Arise! I hope the series keeps going strong and healthy around the world. What I have played is indeed recommendable to anyone interested in RGPs or anime.

With how little regard Bamco has for preserving the series, it at least makes me totally glad that I copped a physical copy of Tales of Vesperia Remastered on Switch a while back when I found it for a decent price.

can u please continously cover this? this is prob the fastest view-count / best coverage vid of the tales of series. i feel like the fans have the power to free it from the hands of bamco. the tales of studio belongs with sega or nintendo. hell even square enix