Current Events > Why did Tales of Symphonia and Xillia get a sequel?

(+) Yeah! (+)

But not Abyss, Vesperia or Berseria

Symphonia's sequel was a mistake.

Because Symphonia was monumentally popular and Xillia was monumentally popular in Japan.

Wasnt Berseria the sequel?

solosnake posted...

Wasnt Berseria the sequel?

I believe it's the prequel.

MJOLNRVII posted...

I believe it's the prequel.

You are correct.

solosnake posted...

Wasnt Berseria the sequel?

It was a prequel, but it was set like 1000 years before Zesteria or something like that.

Same with Symphonia too. It was set 1000 years before Phantasia

Solar_Crimson posted...

Symphonia's sequel was a mistake.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/9/97804048.jpg

NeonPhoenix posted...

Same with Symphonia too. It was set 1000 years before Phantasia

Oh wtf, I love Symphonia and I never knew this.

Namco was sitting around trying to figure out how to irritate PowerOats and decided this would do the trick.

Looks like they were right.

Shah138 posted...

Oh wtf, I love Symphonia and I never knew this.

yeah, a bunch of things in Phantasia are related to Symphonia, like the tree at the end of Symphonia 1 is the same tree from the beginning of Phantasia. Suzu's ancestor is Sheena. I think there's elf discrimination shit in it just like Symphonia. Probably other stuff I forget

It is 2025 and we still don't have a Xilia port do we?

MJOLNRVII posted...

It is 2025 and we still don't have a Xilia port do we?

I'm praying it's the next remaster following Graces f

MJOLNRVII posted...

It is 2025 and we still don't have a Xilia port do we?

No. I don't know why it isn't on PC by now.

ellis123 posted...

Because Symphonia was monumentally popular and Xillia was monumentally popular in Japan.

Xillia 1 actually sold pretty good in america too I remember reading. It was in the top 3 best selling north american tales of games.

Tales of symphonia was number 1, but I forgot what was the 2nd best selling NA tales of game.

I do know that 360 vesperia did ok (xillia 1 sold better than this in NA), and that NA graces F and NA tales of the abyss sold pretty damn badly.

These days arise took symphonia's place as the best selling NA tales of game.

But yeah the reason why these games got sequels (and the exact same thing goes for tales of destiny) is because these games were really popular in japan thus why we got tales of destiny 2 (actual destiny 2), a remake for tales of destiny on the PS2, symphonia dawn of the new world, and tales of xillia 2.

I imagine xillia 2 was pretty easy for them since xillia 1 was so damn rushed because of a tales of anniversary date bandai-namco was trying to meet. Xillia 2 comes off as a expansion pack to fix xillia 1's biggest tales of faults like a mediocre artes list for all the characters not jude and milla (good lord was leia bad in xillia 1. Her and alvin got the biggest improvements from the xillia 1 to xillia 2 jump), and lack of side content to do. Gaius and muzet were both meant to be playable in xillia 1.

Symphonia sequel was trash and relegated to side story status.
I know I'm in the minority on this one, but, Xillia 2 was trash too.

I'm fine with other games not getting sequels. Destiny 2 is supposed to be good, but aside from that, the track record isn't great.

NoxObscuras posted...

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/9/97804048.jpg

Pssh, way to spoil like 3/4 of the dialog in the game.

To be fair though, I actually did enjoy some of the combat system in the sequal, and tenebre was cool, and there were some funny skits (the one where Emil starts to think he might be in love with Richter is possibly the funniest skit in any Tales game). I think with 3 relatively simple changes they could have made it a significantly better game.

1) Balance the monster party members better
2) Make the returning characters regular characters instead of the weird fixed equipment stuff
3) Remove like 80% of the flashbacks to that one line of dialog.

chris1001_the_sequel posted...

I know I'm in the minority on this one, but, Xillia 2 was trash too.

I'll fight you.

Don't make me do this.
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/0/09575801.jpg

Ludger does freaking suck as a MC. Good lord was making him a silent protagonist (but not really because there is a grade shop option that allows him to voice at least a few lines....) with that half-assed choice system so goddamn dumb.

Still though xillia 2 is my favorite tales of game and I won't stand no slander.

Shame on you guys for not talking about Phantasia and Destiny getting sequels. For shame.

Humble_Novice posted...

Shame on you guys for not talking about Phantasia and Destiny getting sequels. For shame.

? Yes I did, lol.

Not phantasia but I did talk about destiny getting one.

Xillia 2 is a mixed bag for me.

The story is pretty good overall. But the story structure is trash and the mostly silent MC thing was a mistake.

I like the expanded roster of moves and characters. But it went from the most dynamic systems as far as using characters in battle goes in Xillia 1 (being able to freely change characters in combat, including benched members) to the most restrictive (can only change party members in that chapter's hub, and your character selection can be seriously restricted). Which ties into the flawed story structure.

Mad-Dogg posted...

I imagine xillia 2 was pretty easy for them since xillia 1 was so damn rushed because of a tales of anniversary date bandai-namco was trying to meet. Xillia 2 comes off as a expansion pack to fix xillia 1's biggest tales of faults like a mediocre artes list for all the characters not jude and milla (good lord was leia bad in xillia 1. Her and alvin got the biggest improvements from the xillia 1 to xillia 2 jump), and lack of side content to do. Gaius and muzet were both meant to be playable in xillia 1.

I still dont think they did a good job of balancing in Xillia 2. I think it has the best battle system in the series hands down everything considered but only Ludger is able to hit every weakness in a combo. The other characters cant and to even hit the ones they can they need link artes.

PowerOats posted...

But not Abyss, Vesperia or Berseria

Funny thing is Berseria's bonus dungeon feels like a gigantic sequel hook that never went anywhere.

Solar_Crimson posted...

Symphonia's sequel was a mistake.

nah even tho it's flawed as hell and they over used that quote to death i liked the idea of the story seeing how shit got worse once the world was joined again and people started to find a new target for their hate outside of half elf's

Xillia 1 was rushed out in a trimmed down state lacking many forms of optional content traditional to Tales games, and introduced a whole other world in the last 10% of the game in a very limited capacity, so debatably a second game was justified to actually complete the experience as well as flesh the new setting out. Additionally they got to tell a new story while largely just reusing the first game's assets, very affordable.

Symphonia 2 was a lazy cash-grab brought upon by the first game bringing the franchise mainstream popularity.

As for the other games not getting sequels, Berseria is a prequel and thus technically already has a sequel, Vesperia was long as fuck and kinda sputtering out as-is (the game hits a climax then just goes on and on and on like some daytime TV drama) and then got a rerelease with a bunch more content, and Abyss ended with an intentional ambiguity that a sequel would kill flat.

Probably due to sales, popularity and their ability to reuse assets.

Doing so both times was kind of a mistake though. symphonia 2 for numerous reasons. But both xillia games to me were even worse.

The only tales of games I never finished and pretty much killed my interest in the series to this day.

Holy_Cloud105 posted...

I still dont think they did a good job of balancing in Xillia 2. I think it has the best battle system in the series hands down everything considered but only Ludger is able to hit every weakness in a combo. The other characters cant and to even hit the ones they can they need link artes.

Yeah can't deny that ludger is beyond busted compared to everyone else and even compared to milla and jude. Power charge 2 can at least be used for a attempt to make a character's combo power hits that the enemy is weak to, but it still doesn't beat a character like ludger having easy access to every single element and enemies' weakness.

I actually did not mind the story mode thing of making you use certain characters depending on the chapter since it kind of pushed me out of my comfort zone to used all the characters at a decent level. (I thought the one story chapter with a team of ludger, jude, milla and rowen vs victor was fun/challenging as hell since you had to make jude, milla and ludger heals work lol. I remember making this old xillia 2 board post explaining that I had milla's arte usage for undine up to like 400 and so it could then cure status effects or something like that:

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/672891-tales-of-xillia-2/70524668).

I would go as far as to say that ludger is the most busted tales of MC in the entire franchise. 48 artes spread across 3 weapon types (and the player can shortcut every single one of them at once thanks to 16 artes per 4 shortcut pages), a super transformation, and all of the best passive skills to equip via the rest of the party members because of the bond system. Only other MCs who felt that strong compared to others in their game is velvet and her break soul, and yuri with his overlimit shenanigans (but even in his own game he has some competition like with rita also making full use of the overlimit system).

Man I cannot wait for xillia 2 to get the modern port treatment so it can be played with no slowdown and at a better resolution.

Sir_Will posted...

The story is pretty good overall. But the story structure is trash and the mostly silent MC thing was a mistake.

I don't even think the story is good. Like, They had a really interesting potential story built in with the ending of Xillia 1, and instead they go with this alternate timeline thing out of nowhere, which, I mean fine, it COULD have been interesting, but the execution is awful. 90% of the alternate areas have no meaningful visual differences, if any. There's so many interesting things they could have done with the concept, and they just don't. It feels very cheap. And within what we have, the majority of the alternate time stories boil down to:

Go to alternate world
"Oh no we need to save everyone"
"Cool we saved everyone"
"Now let's wipe them from existence"

ToP was very very very popular if I recall. It had a huge loyal following at its time but I think most people moved on and you can barely find anyone of those hardcore fans.

I don't even understand how Xilla got a sequel. The first game was absolutely terrible

firedoom666 posted...

I don't even understand how Xilla got a sequel. The first game was absolutely terrible

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMeHLjBdzjo
also post on your main coward

firedoom666 posted...

I don't even understand how Xilla got a sequel. The first game was absolutely terrible

Milla is hot and Jude is relatable to many Japanese players are the big reasons, I suspect.

People can hate on the games all they want (Dawn of the New World is one of all time tales favorites with the only flaw being static main cast characters and the xillia games were both average) but it's hilarious when they start thinking they were anywhere near the failure level of zesteria.

Xillia is the only Tales game I've actually beaten...

firedoom666 posted...

I don't even understand how Xilla got a sequel. The first game was absolutely terrible

Well the sequel is debatably better. I disliked Xillia but Xillia 2 really saved the duo for me, to the point were my main gripe is that you have to suffer the first game to get to the second game. I at least don't think it hurt anything by existing, unlike Symphonia 2.

Chewisbeast posted...

People can hate on the games all they want (Dawn of the New World is one of all time tales favorites with the only flaw being static main cast characters and the xillia games were both average) but it's hilarious when they start thinking they were anywhere near the failure level of zesteria.

I've been actively avoiding Zestiria because I just feel it's gonna fall way short of the mark for what I want out of Tales lol.

Solar_Crimson posted...

Symphonia's sequel was a mistake.

If you can get over it having the most annoying protagonist in the universe, I seem to recall it being an OK game.

firedoom666 posted...

I don't even understand how Xilla got a sequel. The first game was absolutely terrible

Xillia was my least favourite Tales game by a comfortable margin. It actually kind of kicked me out of the franchise, because I was so disinterested in it that while I bought Berseria, I never played it and didn't bother with any of the games that have come out since.

Usually there's at least one character in the party that I really gel with, but not here. Also, the way they kept letting Alvin back in the party despite the constant betrayals was just infuriating.

chris1001_the_sequel posted...

I don't even think the story is good. Like, They had a really interesting potential story built in with the ending of Xillia 1, and instead they go with this alternate timeline thing out of nowhere, which, I mean fine, it COULD have been interesting, but the execution is awful. 90% of the alternate areas have no meaningful visual differences, if any. There's so many interesting things they could have done with the concept, and they just don't. It feels very cheap. And within what we have, the majority of the alternate time stories boil down to:

Go to alternate world
"Oh no we need to save everyone"
"Cool we saved everyone"
"Now let's wipe them from existence"

That's... kinda fair. I'll say mixed bag. But I admit there's a lot I don't remember.

Mad-Dogg posted...

These days arise took symphonia's place as the best selling NA tales of game.

Is this true? I got to the snow village and dropped it because I was so bored.

Sir_Will posted...

That's... kinda fair. I'll say mixed bag. But I admit there's a lot I don't remember.

Eh, it didn't play out exactly like that, lol. Like the party wasn't just up and all like "lol yeah whateves, fractured dimension has got to go" Deleting these fractured dimensions means absolutely nothing and no one ever feels the slightest bit bad about it. Its whatever though....you can make every single tales of game's plot look stupid as shit if you just summarize plot points like that.

Tales of the abyss: "lol this dude is moping because his master betrayed him and pushed him to accidently explode this town on top of finding out he is a clone. What a loser."

Luke's story would be a lot sadder if he wasn't a piece of shit to begin with.

party_animal07 posted...

Is this true? I got to the snow village and dropped it because I was so bored.

Yep.

Here is the top 10 selling tales of games for each region 4 years ago. NA, JP, and EU.

https://www.reddit.com/r/tales/comments/mdpg3o/tales_of_top_10_best_selling_games_based_on_region/

4 years ago this was NA's top 10 selling tales of games (these lists count all the different versions of the game in one number, so tales of symphonia's for north america was just counting it's gamecube release, it's symphonia chronicles PS3 release, and the PC release of symphonia):

1. Tales of Symphonia ( 940,000 sold copies)
2. Tales of Vesperia ( 810,000 sold copies)
3. Tales of Zestiria ( 600,000 sold copies) *Oh god oh lord what in the fuck, lmao. This causes me physical pain.*
4. Tales of Berseria
5. Tales of Symhonia: Dawn of the New World
6. Tales of Xillia
7. Tales of the Abyss
8. Tales of Graces
9. Tales of Xillia 2
10. Tales of Hearts

I was wrong a bit and xillia 1 was 6th place.

Tales of arise made it past 3 million total sales with all the regions combined back in february 2024, and while I can't find the bandai-namco tweet about it right now they had posted that NA was responsible for like half of that 3 million.

Personally I like to think that what made arise so successful was bandai-namco actually started properly advertising for once on social media and just had good timing. Tales of arise dropped on september 9th 2021......at this point of time you still had a lot of PS4 and xbox one gamers playing rpgs, and the PS5 n' xbox series x/s was now approaching 1 year old with those who actually had a PS5 and xbox series console looking for whatever new games to play. It also had a successful steam release.

*For me I also liked that tales of arise had this slave breaking free and rising up theme to it. Really wished the plot leaned into this part way more compared to the plot we actually got. That first region against that one axe dude man I was into it, lol.*

alvin (and milla?) could also do a full element combo, but yeah i agree the system is kinda bad. you kinda just did the same combo against everything, with the starting arte being the only difference

power charge 2 felt way too centralizing with how many things stopped having weaknesses

Mad-Dogg posted...

Tales of Symphonia ( 940,000 sold copies)
Tales of Vesperia ( 810,000 sold copies)
Tales of Zestiria ( 600,000 sold copies) *Oh god oh lord what in the fuck, lmao. This causes me physical pain.*
Tales of Berseria
Tales of Symhonia: Dawn of the New World
Tales of Xillia
Tales of the Abyss
Tales of Graces
Tales of Xillia 2
Tales of Hearts

I really overestimated how well those games sell. I just assumed they all were in the 1-5 million range.

SecretBase posted...

Luke's story would be a lot sadder if he wasn't a piece of shit to begin with.

He's so annoying. He gets better but... he's still kind of annoying. I know many love Abyss but it's always been near the bottom of my lists. Fewer characters in it that I actually like playing compared to some of them. And I just don't like much of the cast as much as many of the other games.

party_animal07 posted...

I really overestimated how well those games sell. I just assumed they all were in the 1-5 million range.

It also does not help that some of the older releases had some very unfortunate release date timing.

PS2 Tales of the abyss for example the EU region was completely skipped over and they did not get to play abyss until the 3DS port came out. (EU still never got a chance to play tales of legendia).

NA PS2 tales of the abyss also released like, 2 weeks or 3 weeks ahead of NA final fantasy 12, =/ Of course rpg gamers normally won't buy like 2 full length rpgs on the same platform to playthrough in the same month at once and so the average gamer is going to make the choice to save money and just get 1 for now......the obvious choice for many being on the more well-known rpg franchise like final fantasy over some barely out of unknown status outside of japan rpg series like tales. *Unlike with gamecube tales of symphonia which nintendo theirselves did the major lifting for advertising swapping over to the PS2 with abyss+legendia isn't going to guarantee all those NA gamecube symphonia buyers following the series over.*

*Japan was good though since they already had stuff like actual tales of destiny 2 on the PS2 and tales of rebirth beforehand, with a PS2 port of symphonia to top it off. They were buying these games alot.*

Personally I was a FF12 hater (did NOT like the gameplay pitch being "its like a MMO, but offline and you make scripts via the gambit system for the AI to follow". I also thought vaan looked so, so dumb. Still do matter of fact) and opted to go with abyss EZ, but I already knew I was like, 1 out of 100 jrpg enjoyers that would go for abyss instead of FF12, lol.

Yeah, NA tales of the abyss PS2 sold like butt.