"A strong addition to the Tales Of series."

The Tales of series has been around for 10 years now. Tales of the Abyss marks the 10th anniversary of this long standing series in Japan, which started out with Tales of Phantasia for the Super Nintendo. However, the Tales of series really wasn't in the spotlight in the US for awhile. Tales of Symphonia, like many others, was my first Tales of game, and it just blew me away. A few years after Symphonia, the "black sheep" of the series, Tales of Legendia, was released, and there was a lot of negative feedback towards it from players. Then a year later, Tales of the Abyss was released. Abyss was done by the same team that did Tales of Symphonia, so you could expect some similiarities here and there. The product overall, though, is a worthy title that can catch any RPG fans attention. Even the non-Tales fans.

Tales of the Abyss follows the story of a young aristocrat, Luke fon Fabre. Luke has been sheltered in his manor ever since his abduction 7 years ago. Because of this sheltered life, Luke has no clue about any current events going on around the world, including anything to do with the kingdom, Kimlasca, in which he lives in. However, one day, a woman named Tear comes into the manor, and Luke is all of a sudden thwarted to the outside world, in which he knows nothing about. From there, Luke slowly discovers what the world has really been going through, and what will happen if he doesn't have any kind of involvement in it.

The story seems like a watered down cliche storyline, with the whole "Good vs. Evil" thing. While that may be the case, Tales of the Abyss does offer some political views into the game, which are pretty obvious as you venture deeper into the game, learning more about what's going on in the real world. I thought it was a good idea, but the storyline seems to be extremely sluggish and doesn't really pick up until past halfway through the game.

Tales of the Abyss has some pretty good graphics. The characters are designed nicely, looking like real characters. Their facial expressions are there almost all of the time when needed, and they're just great all around. The environments are gorgeous at times, but they can sometimes feel recycled.

The music in Tales of the Abyss is pretty strong. There are a lot of great tracks to be found on the OST, including my personal favorite from the game. The music seems to fit in with the right moods, which is always a plus. Voice acting for Tales of the Abyss is really good. While at first Luke may irritate the hell out of you, the overall job done (especially by Jade's VA, Kirk Thornton) is top notch, and you probably won't notice the few times the VAing is off key.

Like with the other Tales of games, Tales of the Abyss sports a real time battle system, in which you can move your character around manually and attack enemies on the screen. While this may sound like the other Tales of games, there is a new addition here. You're now able to freely run around the battle field in any direction you please. This is a first for the Tales of series, and it works out well in the end since you can use this to dodge enemy attacks, get yourself some space to cast magic (or Fonic Artes), or anything like that. While the game is completable with the Free Run aspect, it still helps a lot.

Another thing that's good about Tales of the Abyss is the AD Skills system. Basically you have a list of skills that you can learn by equipped Capacity Cores on your characters. A certain combination of stats will often help you unlock certain skills, which requires you to switch around Capacity Cores from time to time if you're looking to learn all the possible skills a character can learn. This was a great way of learning skills, and there are plenty of skills to learn.

Tales of the Abyss is a large, large game. Even if you're not doing any sidequests, and it's your first time through the game, you're looking at at least a 45-50 hour playthrough. But if you do plan on doing the sidequests, you're possibly looking at over 100 hours for a single playthrough. And that's not an exaggeration either as Tales of the Abyss has plenty of sidequests to do, ranging from certain fetch tasks to optional dungeons. Some of these sidequests are pretty rewarding, such as new recipes or new skills/spells for a character. They're certainly worth the time to do.

However, if I were to gripe about one thing, it would be the loading times. Pretty much everywhere you go, you'll always have to deal with the loading times. While it may not seem like a bad thing, the loading times can sometimes last for a bit, especially while getting into fights on the world map. While the loading times are horrible, they do tend to slow down your progress, but it's something that you can deal with, as once you get used to the times, you probably won't notice them as much.

All in all, Tales of the Abyss is a strong entry into the Tales of series, and it should be a real treat to anyone that's a fan of the Tales of series that liked Tales of Symphonia. Even non-Tales fans should be able to enjoy this game due to its real time and fast battles. This is certainly worth anyones attention.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 04/23/07