[[2026 Games]] [[2026 Game Collections#^0f79dc|2026 Game Collections]] ## 2025-12-21 Kudos to [[Bandai Namco]] for the brave decision to make the most annoying main character in a [[JRPG]] I’ve ever played, to be honest. Obviously Luke won’t remain this way, but it’s a sign of good writing how *irritating* he truly is at the start of **Tales of the Abyss**. But that balance is razor-thin. He shows glimpses of kindness and good nature *juuuust* often enough that you don’t write him off completely, before reverting right back to his sheltered, spoiled attitude. Coming back to this game at 31, it's funny how relatable Tear, Jade, and Guy are having to babysit this man-child. Jade in particular is more well-written than I remember — his jabs at Luke are subtle and biting in ways that made me chuckle aloud. **Abyss** was the second game to come out of the split team that had previously made [[Tales of Symphonia]]. I still hate the TP system for an [[Action-RPGs|Action-RPG]] like **Tales**, but at least it all feels a little tighter. The moment-to-moment is smooth, and free running works for repositioning. Unfortunately, the FOF system is kinda cheeks. Setting it up is pretty cumbersome, at least early on, but I don’t recall it getting better than it is a few hours in. Everything is too chaotic to plan around casting artes in circles that usually need to get placed twice. I’d have preferred if the circles were much larger, or just removed all together. Replacing it with some back-and-forth system where you change the element of the battlefield like in [[Romancing SaGa 2 - Revenge of the Seven|Romancing SaGa 2]] could have been cool. So while not as cumbersome as **Symphonia**, the best I can call **Abyss**’ combat is *serviceable*. I’m looking forward to revisiting the Big Event that starts of Luke’s character development. I want to see how well it still holds up. Gotta say though, it’s kinda ass how Bamco couldn’t seem to figure out how to make the overworld of the [[PlayStation 2]] **Tales** games run at 60FPS on the overworld. Was the [[GameCube]] really that much more powerful and I just forgor?