Tales of the Abyss

Aion

Aion

Time-Traveller
I thought I'd make a thread for it since MrIcy made a few the other day. It's by far the best out of the three new series I've tried so far. Not a lot of the other new series seem even semi-interesting, so unless Casshern turns out to be amazing once an actual plot is revealed, TotA may very well be the only series I follow weekly until the end.

It's been very faithful to the game in the first 4 episodes. There's been a few MINOR cuts, such as boss fights that would've been pointless and slowed down the story, but nothing of any importance has been removed. Sunrise are clearly aiming to please fans of the game by not messing with anything, which is a good thing for me when my main reason for watching is to see the end of the game story without going through the game again.

What I'm most happy with on the faithful to the sauce side is how Sunrise haven't tried to remove any of the main casts quirks. For example, Tear still blushes and mentions how cute animals are, which adds a little extra to her usually overly serious personality. The same can be said of the rest of the cast, the most noteworthy mention being Guy's fear of women, a bizarre phobia that's explained in detail later on in the story.

The OP is wonderful. It apparently clocks in at a full 2 minutes, some 30 seconds longer than the average, but that hasn't bothered me at all as of yet - I've watched the OP from start to finish on all 4 episodes. Sunrise wisely chose to use the AWESOME song that accompanies the game animated OP and the actual animation is basically the game OP reanimated, with 30 seconds cut. It's right up there with the best I've seen.

Talking of looks, the series is sexy as hell. The colours are vibrant, the animation is excellent and Tear has seemingly had a boob job. It's hard to knock TotA when Sunrise aren't being cheap and are trying to create the best anime adaptation possible.

So, who else is watching it?

Edit: Extra links.

Full OP song (streamed): http://www.imeem.com/tyobo/music/V4I-GV ... the_abyss/

Game animated OP: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=3gaMKbv-xHU
 
Aion said:
What, am I only the one following the best anime currently airing? :| I'm disappointed in all of you.
Click to expand...

Well... I hardly watch any upcoming anime that streaming in Japan. The only one I seemed interested in (and actually like) is Chaos Head. But Tales of the Abyss does look interesting.

So judging by the description you told, its a anime retelling of the game, just with pointless stuff cut out?
 
Yup. The dungeon crawling and needless boss fights that are in the game for gameplay reasons are all cut (as you'd expect), which makes the story move at a fast pace in comparison to the progression of the game story.

Aside from minor filler additions at the start, it's followed the game as closely as possible. Even a trip to a forest where Luke (the main character) finds himself stuck with an annoying furball after he helped save the furball race from being eaten was kept. It doesn't look like Sunrise are going to butcher the source in order to transform the story.

Out of the three new series I've watched, it's far and away the best. Chaos Head is far too weird and dull for me, and the first 3 episodes of popular Casshern Sins allowed so few story details revealed that I'm still none the wiser about why the Casshern world is how it is.


Random anime OP link: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=15-L6z35IwY
 
im currently watching this series too, ive just began as a fan of the tales series with tales of symphonia and eternia, and radiant mythology as the games ive played, i was really disappointed to hear tht the abyss never made it to uk shores and began the anime to see the games story.

im fairly impressed with the anime so far. luke and tear seem to be a strong lead female and male character with room for growth in both their personalities and with. cant wait to see more of the series. the battles in the anime retain alot of the rpg feel with tear standing back to do magic and the main character who hasnt fought monsters before having difficulty plucking up the courage to fight (makes it seem a bit lvl 1 characters)
 
The problem with the growth of Luke is that he's an ******** for the first half of the story, then a big event occurs and he suddenly becomes a nice guy for the last half. I remember viewing his development as a little on the unnatural side.

Haseo, the main character of .hack//G.U., had a similar personality change occur after an event. Both he and Luke share the same English voice actor and both have very similar anti-hero character types.


By the way, turning to you comment about how you can see where the RPG gameplay came in, that's most peoples problem with the anime - they feel it's too much like a game in terms of story-telling. Of course, it's also a plus point for fans of the game and fans of the RPG genre.

Here's a little bit of game information you'll probably like: When Jade gets his abilities sealed, in the game he also had his level reduced from high (30 something?) to under 10. The lightning skill you see him use in the second episode is a high level skill he doesn't reacquire until much later.
 
I'd been anticipating this series for most of the year and I've got to say it really was worth the wait. I've been a huge fan of the series since I got hold of ToS about 3 or 4 years ago and I've got my hands on every game released since (except for Tales of Vesperia - damn namco and their region locking).

Tales of the Abyss is by far one of my favourite games of all time, so I think you can understand my trepidation when this series was announced and especially after finding that Production I.G. weren't involved, it was their cut scene's from ToS and TotA that got me looking into anime in the first place. However I really cannot find fault with the work Sunrise has done, everything is there, they've stayed true to the game to a degree that I was never expecting and it even looks like they're going to do Jade's character (and hopefully all his hilarious scenes - please use the material from some of the skits please) justice. So yeah if you've not guessed I'm really enjoying the series so far, though I'm only on episode 3 at the moment as I'm following Abyssal Chronicle's sub (a great site for any Tales fan if you've not checked it out I've been going there for years) as they're really going the extra mile with their project.

I wouldn't really call Luke's development unnatural, he'd gone through some pretty serious and traumatic stuff when he was already pretty messed up to begin with, people in reality have had even more dramatic changes in personality. Its surprising what a shock to the system can do to a person perspective.
 
I've never really been a fan of the Tales series. ToS was only ever an 8/10 in my mind when I played it years ago on the GC, and I've always ended up dropping it whenever I've attempted to replay it. Then, when I finally got around to playing TotA, I ended up disappointed by the gameplay, with the world map having some serious issues and the battle system not clicking with me. I still haven't even got around to trying my copy of Legendia (sp?), even though I've owned it for years.

Thinking about the TotA game pisses me off. Why? Because my copy arrived with the cover stuck to the plastic of the case, preventing me from removing it without ripping it, and the case also had a little damage on arrival. I later made the case issue worse by hitting it with a spin kick in an attempt to stop it from falling from my bed, which resulted in the top case lock thing smashing off. I was pissed off for a long time after that - I can't stand imperfections, those caused by idiocy frustrating me even further.

Still, I *might* replay the game in an attempt to complete it if the anime pleases me enough. I've dropped TotA (50 hours), FFXII (100 hours) and Persona 3 (80 hours), so I really need to actually finish a RPG for the first time in ages.
 
thanks aion for the info on jade i had wondered if that was an ingame effect as well as he seemed to start off pretty strong in the anime then when his magic was sealed i wondered if it was kinda a mistake by the anime ( used a high level spell to show off the magic effects for the anime then realised he should be low level and had his magic sealed). so im pleased to hear it was also in the anime.

From what i hear they seem to have stuck really well with the games plot which im pleased with seeing as though i probably wont experience it myself (im kinda an rpg nutcase prtty much the only type of game i like)

im surprised with luke's major personality change though, so he get nice really quickly have u ever played lost odyessy (sp?) the main character in that has a major personality change in the space of a few moments which i felt was unnatural and it annoyed me a bit as i felt it should have been developed over time , maybe the abyss anime will make it a bit more natural.

1 quick question is tear pretty strong in the game i get the feeling although they have shown a few spells of hers in the anime, she will end up as a kind of damsel in distress, but in the game from some vids ive watched she seems quite strong and confident.
 
While I don't doubt that you're a bit of a RPG nut, your taste leaves something to be desired if FFX is your favourite. :)

EP5 skipped a few things, namely a trip to a town that had no real importance to the overall plot. Guy having a fon slot seal placed on him by Sync was skipped as a result, although it can happen later without issue. I didn't remember this myself - I only know because others mentioned it.

No, I haven't played LO - No 360, or even a HD TV. I kinda want to since the same team that made Shadow Hearts are behind it, but playing it isn't a priority for me when I don't really play games these days. As soon as I started getting bored with RPGs, my gaming soul died.

As for Tear, I'm 99% sure she was a healer in TotA. She had some support skills and few offensive skills but she was mainly there to heal. It was kinda odd seeing a support character slaughtering low-level beasts with a staff. I think Natalia has some healing skills, too. Jade is the offensive 'mage' of the game.

Episode 5: EP5 is probably the weakest episode so far.

It was almost funny at the start when the dramatic (voiceless) OP music started playing, with Jade only putting the fon disc into a computer. The dramatic start works when the previous episode ended on a cliffhanger, like the other episodes have, but it makes the start a bit silly when the pre-OP bit has nothing dramatic.

The episode moved at a rather slow pace because it was a set-up episode. The start seemed to make the future story developments a bit too easy to predict, Jade's comment that Luke would hate him and then the discussion about isofons following making it a bit too obvious. I can't be too critical since I can't remember if the pre-OP Jade scene is also in the game. Aside from the conversations Luke and Van had, the rest of the episode wasn't really memorable, the boss fight being fairly boring due to it lacking drama.

I'm looking forward to the future episodes because my memories of the game story are unclear. I do, for example, remember enough to know that the next episode will move at a fairly fast pace going on the preview, which shows that the episode will cover 2 dungeons (with a town visit in the middle), but I'm struggling to recall more important plot details. It's kinda like I'm both re-watching and watching the anime for the first time right now. :)
 
although my username involves ffx its not my fav rpg its just a random name i used and it kinda stuck (was joinin a forum but couldnt think of a good username) my favourite though is ff8. My taste in rpgs is quite wide though i like shadow hearts, suikoden, tale of, grandia, blue dragon,eternal sonata etc so my taste is actually quite wide :) if your a fan of shadow hearts lost odyessy is quite influenced but the main character holds nothing to yuri.

on topic i agree about ep 5 i found it a bit lacking it seemed a bit fillerish and was a bit boring but ep6 looks quite good i like the fact tht it seems to be covering quite alot of ground. so tear is mainly a healer? thats quite a leap in the anime to have her slaughtering monsters as there usually weak with weapins, have any other characters had quite a few changes?
 
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