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6/10

I will try to explain the reasons why low score even when I got all achievements. I still recommend this game but with BIG caveats. I play Tales of Zestiria and Berseria before, while it’s only 2 Tales games I spent a lot of time on other J-RPGs. TLDR at the bottom.

Story and Characters:

The story premise is actually good with colonialism and racism with actual adult characters in tales game, this is the first time they are doing it. I can bear the usual J-RPG dialogue about friendship, I like this genre after all, thankfully this game mentions less about it so it’s a plus. That being said Tales of Arise story best described as a ‘missed opportunity’, it should be 2 games like Tales of xillia and Tales of xillia 2 because the scope is too many and too big for one game. Here Bandai Namco made pacing of the game fast so it can be completed in one J-RPG game but it actually makes story inconsistent even though there’s repeatable story session like defeating one lord to another for 5 times (this is explained pretty early so don’t worry), dahna is a planet but the world feels small because how rushed the story is.
Now onto the last 25% story part. The easiest way to describe is that 25% should be 50% of the story. Bamco really needs to delay this game 1 more year. Make it longer and got more weight each session. I can bear 75% part but the last 25% is…. just happen. All those lore dumping at once in only a short time to reveal something, it’s TOO FAST! . The reveal is just for the sake of being there as an obstacle for the party to overcome and explained suddenly. Tales games always have story skits, you know like comic panels but mostly it’s just party banter like usual tales games, it should explain the lore more and interesting facts about the world for Tales of Arise case. Berseria's story is great because it stays to ONE problem but there are many stories to deliver to go there while Arise's story branched out too much makes the story ‘mediocre at best’.
The plot hole happens few times, new things introduced to the story but never mentioned again and some of them left unanswered. The way new NPCs introduced on main story and suddenly gone gives bad feeling that he/she only there so the plot progress. I am already too far grinding story, items, and side content before realizing this so might as well complete all achievements. Honestly I don't get it how this title got best RPG on the game awards 2021.
For characters, Alphen is decent but nothing special. Shionne is unbearable and not friendly, she got her reason but needs long hours of game time to explain why. Rinwell is the youngest but mature when it’s needed and goes well with Law. Law is kind of funny and stands out from other members. Kisara is the caretaker of the party and acts as a mom. While dohalim struggles to learn how a normal person should act it’s amusing and the way he talks is poetic. There are almost no memorable casts but it’s passable.

Gameplay:

Tales of Arise combat is pretty great not gonna lie, great improvements from the previous Tales game, and the game becomes more stylish with boost attacks and boost strikes. No button mashing and spamming the same artes (skill attacks). There are dodging mechanics that is actually fun. Artes are actually cool and varied. You might stay playing this game for combat more than the story. Sadly the combat hurt itself because lack of enemy type, the normal mobs' enemies maybe can be counted with all your 10 fingers because of how few it is, there is a gigant enemies type as side content that only few are different, the rest are just bigger and harder enemies of normal type, even some main story boss design at least used TWICE. You know those old J-RPG and mobile games that same enemy types but only different colors as progress goes on? Yeah, tales of arise is like that, it’s an embarrassment for a game that boasts about different places of the world to visit and different biomes only got the same enemies with different colors, and Bamco is brave enough to ask for a $60 AAA game price LOL.
All of your 4 members cast the spell and attack while screaming the name of skill, I know this is happen in all Tales games but I can see some people getting irritated about this. Too much happening on the screen in a small combat arena, making it hard to dodge and avoid damage if you use close combat characters like Alphen, Dohalim, and Law which need few hours to get used to. But if you do not use close combat characters and let AI do it, they die too fast. Bosses got too much HP make it HP / damage sponges. The AI is not good enough to play on a higher difficulty than normal on the boss stage, they like to stay in the same place when there’s an enemy projectile and attack targetting them, There is also no compensation for AI like damage reduction. A way to solve this is to change control to them and dodge, but doing it every time is pretty tiring, another one is going to artes menu to uncheck long animation arte and use arte that have short animation or use spell to attack from far away, But it’s still not good enough to justify how bad the AI is. Can change the difficulty when playing.
Gald (money) to buy items is harder to earn and everything are expensive especially orange gel that only adding 30% max of CP (stamina like to casts heal spell) , to buy one the price is 1 side quest on early game. This is my first time on J-RPG struggling getting money, you will found out runs out of gald on higher difficulties. it's bothersome from start to midgame.

Graphics and OSTs:

The graphics are insanely good. The shaders they use to become more like watercolor painting are amazing and should be used for a few next tales games because it creates a new visual identity for J-RPG, really pleasant to look at. Tales finally use a time cycle that changes from morning to night. These are the strongest points of the game but again lack of enemy type really hurt this game a lot, only variants that different colors and were a bit stronger.
Characters model design are great. Alphen, Shionne, Kisara armor are nice. Rinwell and Dohalim looks good too while law outfit suits with his style but it can be better. The voice acting are suitable with how you expect them to sound like, fully lipsync both in japanese and english language. English dub need more expressiveness on some part but not a problem.
I don’t remember memorable OST from this game sadly except for a few like ‘Flame of Hope’ because it uses violin, the OST when fighting the third lord, and the Vocal opening and ending OST.

TLDR:

The game just passed barely for positive review, i think Tales of Arise is good J-RPG to start if you are new to the genre, maybe as your first 5 J-RPG. Clearly better than Zestiria but far worse than Berseria in terms of story. Except graphics anything else feels need 1 more year of effort to be great but the problem might be the lack of budgets that bandai namco gives to tales team and this is almost happened on every tales game. Play Tales of Arise if you are new to the genre or run out of J-RPG titles. There is another series that can be compared to this franchise called Ys, specifically Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana which is better in every way except graphics but the art direction still good to look at. Buy this game only on 60% or more sale.

Beyond the Dawn:

It suck so bad. No new playable characters + no new skill + no new mechanics + literally only final boss the new one + place (dungeon) only 3 that new + main story 7 hours, side quest so barebones to make the game longer to 25 hours + pre-fixed level on level 65 for "lazy content" + recycle map but can't visit most of them because separated title screen than main story. Play it if you want more of the characters which imho they decent nothing special except law and dohalim.