Big FF fan here (up till FFXII), specially the PS1 era.

It's been a looooong time since I don't play a JRPG again and want to try one for PS3. The tales series seems to be a good option since everybody talks about it and it is a long time series, so it must be good.

Need to choose one game for my PS3. WHich one should I get?

Obvous choice would be Tales of Xillia, it's pretty much recent, amazing graphics, voice, etc. But there a re other option too.

Tales of Symphonia: Everybody seems t love it, but it is actually a 2003 game, I'm afraid I might get disappointed by graphics and voices, etc.

Tales of Vesperia:  Critically acclaimed, already a 7th generation game, would be my first choice, but it seems there is no PS3 verion in english right?

Tales of Graces: It is actualy a Wii game, so even if I play the port it will look and sound like a 6th generation game

Tales of Xillia: First option as of now, I was amazed by the video review with graphics, sound, the anime style, everything. But I'm afraid once I play it I wont go back to the older games becasue they will look too dated.

Any help?

Well, Vesperia was the one I started in, but since you have Ps3, unless you speak Japanese, not an option.

I'd say try Symphonia regardless. If you can endure (and love it), you can love all Tales of games after it.

Yep I would recommend Vesperia first also, but since you don't have a 360 then I'd go with either Xillia or Graces F all the Tales of games are pretty good regardless.

For the most part (with exception to the nifty different aspects of the Combat system) they play reasonably similar.

Biggest thing is the story: I like the characters in all the games on the PS3 (Xillia1/2, SymphoniaChronicles, Graces F) but they have similar overall themes but definitely different tones.

I call Graces F's story "The Power of Friendship"

Xillia is more mature (especially the second one fuck if I dont feel like a complete ass a good bit of the time, but I really dig it) The second one also has the best character development of all of them on PS3.  Hell, the main character is my least favorite part of Xillia 2.  I like the option to choose what I say, but really?  He wont say it?  And everything he does say is 1 word (Kind of Annoying with almost everything else voiced). 

Symphonia is more of a feel good story than the other two (first game). Second Game I characterize as the "Power of Love".  The second game is like Xillia 2 in that it also features the cast of the first game in the series, but with different main characters.

You can usual find a good combo price on Xilla 1 / Graces F (and Symphonia Chronicles isnt to expensive). If you can deal with the Older School Graphics on Symphonia, Id start with it. They did not bother me at all and it is definitely an earlier, less advanced battle system than the other 2.

Which one is better in terms of story? Xillia, Graces or Symphonia?

Thanks. I was thinking about starting with symphonia since is the first in the "ps3 sequence". I herar everywhere that it is a really good game, and I'm afraid once I played Xillia I would never want to go back to the older games because of the dated graphics. Also I'm 33year old so maybe the dated/childish graphics style would turn me down on the game.

So, for now, it is a tie between Symphonia and Xillia for me

Better story vs better technology

I didn't like any of the 3D Tales games until I played Graces F and the combat system didn't suck.  The other 3D Tales games are like the 2D games in the sense that you mash a three button combo and then use an art, rinse, repeat, but the 2D games just felt a lot better.  The storyline on the 3D games released west has been pretty garbage as well(haven't played through Vesperia to tell you if its story sucked, but the other ones have.)  The games are like a chore to play, switching off between boring story and meh gameplay.

Not Tales of Graces though, and I'm assuming Xillia which I haven't played.  The combat system has been refined with an intricate and deep system, where you can side step in every direction and you have a four hit combo that each hit is a variation of four moves between each character, but it's not always going to be beneficial to use all four hits because you combo in low cc attacks that do a similar amount of hits increasing damage and then reset back to start and start attacking the enemy before the hit counter stops.  

The only problem with Graces is that all A artes are physical attacks and all B artes are magic, so it's pointless at times to even bother with A artes on some enemies when you can just s pam B artes to do far more damage and get them out of the way quickly.  Seems like Xillia fixed this from videos I've seen.

I'd say play Graces F, Xillia, or Eternia.

They all have the same story - a boy-cook reconciled two countries.

There's really not much a generation upgrade would do to Symphonia's art style. It has my favorite Tales story thus far, with 8 potential different endings based on who in your party you are closest to, which is pretty awesome in my book.

Any of them remotely turn based?

I'm interested in the series, but much prefer turn based RPGs and there aren't many left....