Tales of Symphonia : Knight of Ratatosk coming to US

[pedrocasilva]

I don't care about Team Symphonia... their games feel... kinda... empty to me. But I won't start on that; what I really want (and think every Wii owner should be looking forward to) is a non-handheld Team Destiny game, preferably on Wii... and that it gets f***ing LOCALIZED, but that's like asking for a miracle to happen.

They're my favorite Tales team just the same, and the one who make games tailored to the western market, who put Tales on the map outside japan with Tales of Symphonia (I had already played Tales of Phantasia, Tales of Destiny and Eternia, but you get my queue) and not only that they're the ones who always know from the start that their game will come out of Japan, I mean, the Tales of Hearts guys still don't know for instance.

Don't get me wrong, but if Tales Studio/Scamco never puts Team Symphonia on the Wii I'll always feel they're not going all out on it, understimating it, giving us the short end of the stick and being half assed on their approach to it, regarding tales games.

I aknowledge Team Destiny has better battle systems and often better plot, but they're pretty diferent beasts to me, be it artistic direction be it musically (the songs for the openings)... And with that said... I simply like Team Symphonia more.

Now...  I like them as they are, and I certainly don't want Team Destiny being turned into some Team Symphonia substitutes/wanabe's like I feel they are, judging from the new Wii Tales screenshot they released (in full 3D!) and suggested to be a Team Destiny game (HELL NO!) I mean, let them do their thing, I don't want them chasing Team Symphonia, AT ALL. I want them to keep their diferences.

But... To the western masses, getting only Team Destiny is always the lesser deal; and me included I'm afraid. (not to say that I forgive Scamco for not localizing them, and I have imported them, mind you; Tales of Destiny remake collectors edition is my treasure here)

[Craymel]

I really don't see why they couldn't bring them over when they ported them to the psp at least. I wonder if the tod remake was ported to the psp. God those games look good. DAMN IT NAMCO!!!

[pedrocasilva]

I really don't see why they couldn't bring them over when they ported them to the psp at least. I wonder if the tod remake was ported to the psp. God those games look good. DAMN IT NAMCO!!!

It's Namco, you surely aren't expecting them to make sense or be inteligent are you?

they lost so many oportunities already and you still have interviews with them saying:

Where is the Tales series going next in North America? Are you evaluating the DS Tales games or thinking about the mothership Tales title for the Wii?

Right  now, we’re just enjoying the last few months of the series’ 10th anniversary in North America. It was a tall order to prepare two huge RPGs, so everyone is taking a well-deserved deep breath before we decide on our next move.

Source: http://www.siliconera.com/2008/10/31/the-tales-team-tells-us-about-tales-of-symphonia-dawn-of-the-new-world/

WELL DESERVED WHAT!? pricks.

2008 would still have been a good year to release them on PS2 with a budget price, with stuff like Persona 4 and all still coming, 2009? it's too late already; and Sony US doesn't allow for ports without extra content to be released on PSP (even if they're ports of games that weren't in Sony consoles or didn't come out in US) so really, after this only if they release them on the Wii or something. their strategy or lack of it is mindblowing to this day.

[Craymel]

2008 would still have been a good year to release them on PS2 with a budget price, with stuff like Persona 4 and all still coming, 2009? it's too late already; and Sony US doesn't allow for ports without extra content to be released on PSP (even if they're ports of games that weren't in Sony consoles or didn't come out in US) so really, after this only if they release them on the Wii or something. their strategy or lack of it is mindblowing to this day.

What about squares final fantasy 1 and 2 "remakes" They were basically enhanced ports. With nothing but shiny new coat. What ever this really isn't the right topic to make these angry at namco posts (and sony)

[pedrocasilva]

What about squares final fantasy 1 and 2 "remakes" They were basically enhanced ports. With nothing but shiny new coat. What ever this really isn't the right topic to make these angry at namco posts (and sony)

Well, as you said those are enhanced with a meaningless shiny coat to cover up that they're the same game over and over again, but I have no doubt that Square-Enix could get a exception easily.

Namco can't though, as that's the only reason why Tales of Eternia didn't get re-released on PSP in US (but it did in Europe), Atlus can't (they ported the sega saturn's Devil summoner and wanted to release it in US, but sony said NO) and there's more examples.

As for derailing the topic, I'm sorry too, but... I think it's fine as long as we take it back or eventually settle it and go back to the topic. How though... I dunno.

[Joseph]

Anyway, seems like it sold more than Vesperia did on the first week and without needing a collectors edition (first Japan, now US, a low budget spin-off outselling a main installment).

VGchartz figures aren't 100% reliable. In any case, according to them...

Vesperia 1st Week: 57792
New World 1st Week: 61166

Not a huge lead (3374), especially when you consider that New World was supposed to tap into A) a huge built-in audience created from the first Symphonia and B) the Wii's larger user base. On top of that, Vesperia costs $20-$30 more. Right now, both titles are looking about even.

[pedrocasilva]

VGchartz figures aren't 100% reliable. In any case, according to them...

Vesperia 1st Week: 57792
New World 1st Week: 61166

Not a huge lead (3374), especially when you consider that New World was supposed to tap into A) a huge built-in audience created from the first Symphonia and B) the Wii's larger user base. On top of that, Vesperia costs $20-$30 more. Right now, both titles are looking about even.

Symphonia userbase=same as Tales fans, it's a no brainer that a new Tales of installment would sell more than that. As for the extra price, it's 20 more AFAIK, and it had a limited edition who usually acelerates the adoption rate, except it wasn't enough, and the game isn't showing to have legs.

With the first sales week of the Wii already consisting of 60% of the US sales ToV had, and with Japan not even being a contest we have a spin-off trumping a main installment, confirmed.

[Cless]

Nobody knows what DotNW's or ToV's real first week sales are. VGC is full of crap. Vesperia sold 70k in its first five weeks according to NPD data, already beating ToD's LTD. No one knows what it did last month, but it also didn't have a price crash, unlike Infinite Undiscovery.

Anecdotal evidence from amazon.com rankings hasn't exactly been wonderful for DotNW.

[Joseph]

Symphonia userbase=same as Tales fans, it's a no brainer that a new Tales of installment would sell more than that.

I would contest the "Symphonia userbase = # of Tales fans" point, since Abyss couldn't break 300k-500k copies, despite being released on the ubiquitous PS2. As for the second part of that sentence, I'm not sure what you're getting at.

As for the extra price, it's 20 more AFAIK, and it had a limited edition who usually acelerates the adoption rate, except it wasn't enough, and the game isn't showing to have legs.

Not sure what you mean about the extra price thing. Anyways, without any data on both normal and CE sales, we can't really say for sure what effect the Premium had. Same for Vesperia's legs. VGchartz figures on low-key titles like Vesperia are nearly impossible to verify.

With the first sales week of the Wii already consisting of 60% of the US sales ToV had, and with Japan not even being a contest we have a spin-off trumping a main installment, confirmed.

VGchartz figures don't equate to confirmation. If a publisher's PR wouldn't bank on them, then we probably shouldn't either.

EDIT:

Following up on Cless' comments about Amazon's rankings...

New World is currently tracking behind Active Life Outdoor Challenge, Go Diego Go: Safari Rescue, and Hannah Montana: Spotlight World Tour.

[pedrocasilva]

Anecdotal evidence from amazon.com rankings hasn't exactly been wonderful for DotNW.

Well, judging from what I seen of Amazon lately, I'd say it isn't the videogame store it used to be. It's top sellers greatly differ from NPD biggest sellers/trends; from it we'd say pretty much every X360 game is selling kinda meh, and that PS3 doesn't exist.

I know you weren't using it as a fact but... it really feels like a bad source of data for me, granted you might say the same of VGChartz... but, VGChartz at least is a estimative and usually not a groundless one, although with very limited sources (they take sales numbers from some stores and overblow it for taking into account the full population for a estimative, unlike NPD who counts efective sales). But far from me to defend vgchartz (hell no, they're a estimative just that).

This outcome was always pretty likely anyway; we can probably wait for NPD data to say the same, question if is game sales under 100.000 appear on the published data.

I would contest the "Symphonia userbase = # of Tales fans" point, since Abyss couldn't break 300k-500k copies, despite being released on the ubiquitous PS2. As for the second part of that sentence, I'm not sure what you're getting at.

IIRC, Abyss sold total 120k units in US?

I don't know where the number came from, but heard it as a fact many times already.

Well, Abyss was in a diferent platform, but granted, ToS1 also sold what it sold because it was released on a RPG starved platform that didn't have Final Fantasy, sure. But that created some ties with it's userbase in US and Europe, not to ToS specifically, but Tales franchise.

Not sure what you mean about the extra price thing. Anyways, without any data on both normal and CE sales, we can't really say for sure what effect the Premium had. Same for Vesperia's legs. VGchartz figures on low-key titles like Vesperia are nearly impossible to verify.

Fair enough, being "low key" so soon means short legs for me though.

I remember back when Tales of Legendia came out Tales of Symphonia still shifted 4.000 units per week on the GC for instance, those are legs, considering how old the game was by then, for instance. (and this was before VGChartz existed and I'm pretty sure of the number, i also remember ToL selling about 30k first month)

Following up on Cless' comments about Amazon's rankings...

New World is currently tracking behind Active Life Outdoor Challenge, Go Diego Go: Safari Rescue, and Hannah Montana: Spotlight World Tour.

And pretty much every X360/PS3 game is (behind that).

Just goes to show what kind of public still buys stuff in Amazon as their first choice as those games won't even appear in NPD data in the position they're in. They sell bucketloads in the background though, sure they do.

[Joseph]

Amazon rankings are based on sales; VGchartz rankings are based on speculation from guys who have "connections." I'd take the word of the largest online retailer in the world over that of some dudes who run an internet blog.

But that created some ties with it's userbase in US and Europe, not to ToS specifically, but Tales franchise.

But not enough to say that Symphonia's userbase = Tales fanbase.

Fair enough, being "low key" so soon means short legs for me though.

Not exactly.

Vesperia is low-key on a high-key system. By comparison, Symphonia was the opposite: high-key on a low-key platform. Vesperia's fighting for media exposure among the likes of Rock Band 2, Fable II, Fallout 3, Guitar Hero: World Tour, Far Cry 2, etc., etc.. In it's second month of release, Symphonia was probably staving off Mario Cricket or something.

And pretty much every X360/PS3 game is (behind that).

Just goes to show what kind of public still buys stuff in Amazon as their first choice as those games won't even appear in NPD data in the position they're in. They sell bucketloads in the background though, sure they do.

Still more reliable than VGchartz. Real sales trump speculation.

[pedrocasilva]

Amazon rankings are based on sales; VGchartz rankings are based on speculation from guys who have "connections." I'd take the word of the largest online retailer in the world over that of some dudes who run an internet blog.

Fair enough, this said, Amazon isn't exactly showing on top what will be in this months NPD, not by that order anyway.

But not enough to say that Symphonia's userbase = Tales fanbase.

But good enough to call them potential buyers of a Tales game no?

Not exactly.

Depends on scale, of course, but by having legs we're talking about some kind of "short decline in sales" going on, that aparently isn't.

Vesperia is low-key on a high-key system. By comparison, Symphonia was the opposite: high-key on a low-key platform. Vesperia's fighting for media exposure among the likes of Rock Band 2, Fable II, Fallout 3, Guitar Hero: World Tour, Far Cry 2, etc., etc.. In it's second month of release, Symphonia was probably staving off Mario Cricket or something.

Agreed on the low-key versus high-key, but all the more reason for what I've been saying on that matter.

[Joseph]

But good enough to call them potential buyers of a Tales game no?

But now we're the leaving the realm of "fan" and going into "consumer." I would discuss the difference between the two, but I've forgotten why we're arguing about this.

Depends on scale, of course, but by having legs we're talking about some kind of "short decline in sales" going on, that aparently isn't.

Again, there isn't any substantial data out there on Vesperia's weekly performance. Even the NPD numbers for September don't go into much detail beyond the total units pushed that month.

[pedrocasilva]

But now we're the leaving the realm of "fan" and going into "consumer." I would discuss the difference between the two, but I've forgotten why we're arguing about this.

Well, we can discuss the difference though, and why I ultimately agreed, not every consumer buying the product will be a "fan" of it, or a established consumer for it for that matter. But some of them will, or will eventually get attached to it.

For instance, I'm not a Final Fantasy fan (I loved FF6, but I didn't even really like any FF released afterwards, bar FFIX) but I still buy them for completion purposes, so I guess I'm a established consumer who is not a fan or something.

Again, there isn't any substantial data out there on Vesperia's weekly performance. Even the NPD numbers for September don't go into much detail beyond the total units pushed that month.

Sure, that suggests a pretty sharp decline in my book though, question is how many units is that.

[Dimentionalist]

Despite my previous intentions, I've bought the English version.

1. Brian Beacock. Epic Fail. Nothing else needs to be said. Ticked me off enough to send Menville a letter in the mail the other day.
2. Compared to the rest of the spin-offs in this series, the battle system is excellent. The one thing that bugged me with my limited time with Vesperia was that Yuri couldn't aerial combo (it was only Judith, and I didn't particularly like her skill set). Emil makes my inner combo whore very happy. Except that I don't have any Arcane Artes that I can use in mid-air yet...
3. I recall this being discussed awhile ago, but some light cel-shading is applied to some monsters. I appreciate that little bit of detail, though I'd still prefer if the team went with their original plan to cel-shade the entire game, using an enhanced ToS1 style. The jaggies on Emil's character model tick me off to no end. The others are pretty detailed, definitely better than ToA. I also like the more realistic route they took with some of the backgrounds (the overworld-ish area before going to the Iselia Human Ranch stands out to me).
4. The ToS character level cap is irritating. Genis and Raine join a good five levels behind Emil and Marta. I love level grinding, so they pretty much stay out of my party and I let the monsters earn the bonus experience.

[Miraglyth]

Still no EU release >.<

I hadn't noticed that last week, the alleged 28th November release was shelved completely. Play.com (not exactly the most reliable source ever) now claims 6th February and nowhere else is even willing to have a guess.

Starting to worry that this'll be another Abyss.