The Silent Protagonist – Tales of the Abyss

Hello and welcome back to The Silent Protagonist, where I look at JRPGs and splurge about how awesome they are. Over the last two months I’ve been telling you about the incredible Tales of series by Namco Bandai. There’s only one more Tales blog lined up after this one and then I’ll change topics. I promise!

Abyss was originally released in 2005 on the PlayStation 2 in Japan then was localised the following year in the NTSC region. If you were in the rest of the world, you had to wait until 2011 to get it. Despite the five year delay, it was well worth the wait.

The story is set in a world known as Auldrant, where the world is comprised up of six elemental “Fonons” corresponding to shadow, earth, wind, water, fire, and light. However, eventually a seventh fonon, the fonon of sound, was discovered. There were some people who, when utilising the seventh fonon, were able to see into the future. One such person is a prophet known as Yulia Jue, who was known for her ability to see thousands of years into the future. The prophecies are known as the score, and the Planetary Score states:

“In Kimlasca shall be born one who inherits the power of Lorelei. He will be a boy of royal blood with hair of red. He shall be called the Light of the Sacred Flame, and he will lead Kimlasca-Lanvaldear to new prosperity.”

However, the Planetary Score is regulated by a religious organisation known as The Order of Lorelei who have divided into two parts: an Open section and a Closed one. The Open Score is read to the people of Auldrant, and foretells prosperity and happiness. The Closed Score, however, describes calamitous events, death and destruction and is kept hidden away save for a select few of the higher officials.

Complicated? I think so. It took me a while to get it, and that’s with it simplified, believe it or not.

The story follows a bloke called Luke fon Fabre, whose name in the ancient language translates to “Light of the Sacred Flame”, so the prophecy told 2000 years ago by Yulia is directly related to Luke. Like many lead protagonists in the Tales series, Luke is adept at using swords to fight, and learns many familiar artes that have appeared through the games, such as Demon Fist, Light Spear Cannon and Lightning Tiger Blade.

Whereas you can learn the former two artes, it is impossible to learn the latter. When an elemental attack is used in battle, it invokes an incomplete Field of Fonons. Should another elemental attack of the same element be used in the same area again, the Field of Fonons fully forms, and should a character use an arte that can be altered, whilst standing inside the complete Field of Fonons, the arte takes on the elemental characteristics of the Field of Fonons and does a hell of lot more damage.

It is probably by far one of the most infuriating battle mechanics of any of the tales games to date, especially when you want to discover all of the Field of Fonon altered artes.

What I really like about Tales of the Abyss, though, is the fact that it was the first game in the series to have dynamic item prices in shops. In other words, a shop in one area may sell an Apple Gel for 30Gald, but in another area, it may sell for 100Gald. This also meant that if you wanted to maximise the profits of selling your gear, you had to travel around the various cities to see what was in short supply before selling. For instance, if an Apple Gel was sold out in one particular area, expect to sell any in your inventory for a much higher price than another shop that is overflowing with them.

After completed the game once you get to do it again with a load of seriously awesome goodies. Increased speed at which the overlimit increases for your characters, bonus experience, extra items, titles, and other sweet bonuses are available to use. Not only that, but when you play through your second time or more, your characters all get the ability to use a second mystic arte, or have the ability to increase the duration and thus power of their original one.

On my final blog on the Tales series, I’ll be taking a look at Tales of Xillia 2. At the time of writing this… it’s only 20 days until Tales of Xillia release. Excited!

Until then…

…To be Continued…