Honestly your main problem si you havent gottent too far in to Tales of the Abyss. The first few hours are pretty crap but later the story starts to really picks up and eventually becomes(what I believe to be) the best Tales game released so far.

Before you go on trying Vesperia I'd really reccomend that you go back and keep playing Abyss. the game itself gets way better after the first few hours especially after the events at Azukerith. Trust me give Abyss another chance once you get farther into the game i'm sure you'll love it.

thats not about remades soriku but milking the series.

how many tales have you seen this year soriku?

world, symphonia 2, hearts, mother etc.

same system and similar character design, like cookie cutter RPG.

i think after phantasia quality decreased, except symphonia of course.

Tales of Symphonia and Abyss are great games. The load times for ToA are there because of the PS2. The story in both games are great. I fail to see why people are complaining here. Tales of Vesperia is a must have for any Tales fan.

And imo Final Fantasy decreased, increased, and decreased again. Hopefully it increases again with FFXIII. Anyway who would be milking a franchise more. A company that makes a few spinoffs that stay in the same genre as the main one, and are pretty ok in quality ,or a company that makes Chocobo Minigames and a remake or two a year. How many games this year have been released with Final Fantasy in the name, let me see Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Ring of Fate, Final Fantasy VII Crysis Core, FInal Fantasy Chocobo's Dungeon, Final Fantasy IV, Final Fantasy Tactics A2, and probably a couple more. I'm not saying thsee games are bad they are far from it, but its still more games than you mentioned for the tales series just now, and whose to say those games you mentioned are bad. Both are great series, though I would say the tales series is more consistent in quality, while the Final Fantasy series seems to have some games that top all of the tales games I've played.

@Jo21 why does Tales of Hearts matter to you. (or anyone else upset that Namco is making too many Tales games) I don't see it ever coming out of Japan, check this wiki list http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tales_RPG_series you'll see that Namco after Tales of Destiny 2 releases a new mothership title every year Symphonia 2 is Namco's 2009 mothership title.

I've said this a lot before Tales of the World is milking the game but it's a game made for fans that know all the tales characters and like to see them together. Being upset at these titles is like saying both Marvel and DC comics are horrible because they decided to make a small Marvel vs DC series, and now they're milking their fans that have always wanted to see this kind of collaboration. No Marvel has a story arc they follow, DC has a story arc they follow as well, if you see a comic bringing Captain America back from the dead chances are you're reading the wrong comic (or a really really old one).

If you want to see the TRUE TALES story arcs than only play mothership titles, that's the way it works. Every other game is not part of the true story arc, I don't think Namco makes it hard to determine what game is mothership since they specifically announce whether the game is a mothership game despite which developer is working on it.

Played all Tales. Vesperia is best. I will admit I had more fun with Abyss then Symphonia though.

@OP What did you not like about Abyss? It seems you like the combat of Abyss more so I'm guessing you dislike the characters?

That's understandable I myself hated the Luke for a long time but that's also the point, you're not supposed to like him. To me Abyss has much more complex plots and extreme changes in character development (you could start from hating the main character to actually understanding him). At the same time Abyss to me has a very good overall form. This is probably because I play classical music, but Abyss should've been called Symphonia because I can see a classic Sonata form in it. Exposition introducing what's happening, in the middle of Abyss you will see the Development a huge change from the character when Luke is with Tear and realizes how much he's fucked it up. Than you hit the Recapitulation all things unresolved are now resolved the jig is up, everyone knows what everyone else is here fighting for this occurs when Luke goes home and a month occurs.

As for Tales of Vesperia I would recommend a rental, to me the combat has evolved and gotten much better. In previous Tales games the strategy is to spam sword rain alpha, or whatever gave you a lot of combos. ToV makes overlimits much more useful, before I rarely ever used them the game combat feels a lot more balanced. I haven't finished it so I can't say how the story is compared to other Tales and I don't know when I will finish it because I tend to finish my favorite games last so I can take the time to enjoy them.

I read a faq to see how much more I had to play to finish Abyss. According to it... about 5 hours.

Its been 3 months since then and I haven't played those 5 hours.

Recent Tales I remember:

PSP: World 2

Wii: Symphonia 2 and an unnamed one (Soriku posted it a while ago)

Xbox360 - Vesperia

DS - Innocence and Hearts

In one year....

At this rate, in a pair of years, we will have so many Tales games that even adding the Chocobo games, we will still have less FF's.

With the exception of Abyss... I like the series... but I wished they would slow down with the main franchise.

Chocobo games? Who buys those anyway...

That's actually 3 years of Tales games.

Innocence is from last year.

Vesperia, Hearts, and Symphonia gaiden are this year.

Radiant Mythology 2 and the Wii mothership title are next year.

Ryougazell why don't you read my post about the Tales series...and look at the wiki article i posted before making inaccurate statements.