leene_chan | I Finished Tales of Phantasia! ^o^

And how long did it take me to beat it? Almost two months, I think! I finished the game in about 67 hours. I gave up on Pluto, eh heh heh...

It's been a long time since I've finished a game, hasn't it? 6_6 I'm so motivationally challenged nowadays, mwah ha ha!

I finished the game with Cless at level 88. I was waaaay overleveled because when I fought Dhaos he didn't have a chance to use one special attack. For all three forms I only healed my party once, and that was just to be on the safe side. ^^; Yet at the same time I couldn't beat Pluto in the Morlia Gallery! I didn't even go that much out of the way to level up. I just tried my best to finish the side quests. It's weird that in the FAQ I consulted with they tell you to beat Pluto before finishing the game but then mention how hard Dhaos is to beat. Did they even win against Pluto? 6_6

The ending was good. I appreciate that they didn't do the lame thing and "fix" time so that Cless, Chester and Mint's loved ones didn't die. I enjoyed this game very much. It actually managed to unseat TOD2 as my favorite of the series for its general lack of stupidity. Too bad this was the only Tales of... game with tri-Ace's Gotanda in the credits!

So...here's my rundown.

Gameplay: Fairly simplistic but good. Shadow's Cave was the only place that featured really bizarre puzzles. The dungeons were about the right length, short enough not to bog you down but long enough to keep you from asking "That was all?" Towards the end of the game I turned off all Klarth's spells but Asuka and left Arche with Big Bang and Meteo Swarm. I usually tire of controlling melee fighters but even presented with the option to switch to someone else I kept using Cless. If you power him up the battles are reduced to button-mashing. Because I suck at video games this is ideal for me. I know this game has basically the same battle engine as TOD but I actually enjoyed it this time. I like real time battle systems. I'll give TOP a 9 for gameplay. It would have been nice if so many spells didn't become obselete at the end of the game but other than that I can't think of many complaints. Hey, I love that you don't have to find a place to park your flying transportation!

Characters: I hadn't expected much in this department but I was pleasantly surprised. Sometimes I think it would've been nice to tie up Arche, stick her in a sack and throw her into a river, but when she was annoying the other characters usually became appropriately ticked-off. Her interactions with Chester were funny. I'm glad they didn't do the typical thing and make Chester into the brooding, silent best friend. Cless was quiet most of the time and Chester was pleasantly obnoxious. Mint would've been an easy target for dislike but she was unassuming and didn't demand a lot of attention from the other characters or even the player. Poor Mint-chan ^_^;...I thought Klarth was awesome. He had a great voice actor and turned out to be nothing like I expected. For one of the older Tales of... characters he was surprisingly immature! I think he had more charm than a lot of characters in the series because even though he was the authority figure he had next to no control over his life or friends. ^_^;... Suzu seemed completely superfluous but the way she always talked in a monotone was pretty funny. For characters, I'll give TOP a 10. Since it's an old game I didn't expect much but the characters were surprisingly well-developed. Hooray!

Music: Pretty good. "Fighting of the Spirit" is great. I heard they did a number of the music from the PSX version but I've never heard the SF versions, so....I'll give the music an 8. I can't wax poetic about it but FOTS is a fantastic boss theme. Huzzah!

Graphics: All right they were abysmal. TOD had bad graphics. TOP for the PSX also had bad, bad graphics. I wish Klarth had more face chat portraits because when he was laughing or saying something weird his facial expression didn't change. Why no smiling portrait for Klarth? He had one in Narikiri Dungeon! Well, the forest on Lake Ymir looked nice. Nothing else did, not really. Ho hum. 7 for graphics. At least the character sprites were cute.

Story: I don't know if the story in itself was great (because Dhaos himself was hardly effective, though his indirect influence was) but the pacing was good and the game did a good job of keeping the tension level up. Not a lot of cheesy melodrama makes me a happy girl! I salute the lack of wangst! I'll give the game an 8 for the story.

Fun Factor: I played this game several times a day. That's never been done! Because I am a young lady in my mid 20s I grew up playing SNES RPGs and playing TOP (even though it was the PSX version) made me feel nostalgic for the good old days when everything was fresh and new, before RPGs started sucking. Maybe it had bad graphics, maybe the gameplay wasn't complex, but I loved this game. I give it an 11 out of 10 for fun factor. I'll allow it this time.

My Overall Score: 8.8.

That seems kind of low considering how much I loved the game but I think I was being fair. ^^;..Maaann...now I'm tired. That's it for me. Tales of Eternia is next. Bye-bye!