Tales of Arise

Tales of Arise marked a major reset of look and tone for the long-running Tales series. The story unfolds on two connected planets, where one civilization has oppressed the other for three hundred years, stripping it of its resources. The hero is a man without memory who feels no pain and wears an iron mask; his counterpart is a girl from the oppressors' realm whom no one can touch without being harmed themselves. From this seemingly simple premise, the game gradually builds a story about retribution, guilt, and how hard it is to find reconciliation between peoples.

Combat continues the series' tradition: it plays out in real time, with the player controlling one character and unleashing chains of attacks and special abilities while the rest of the party acts according to set behavior. New this time are combined attacks with individual companions, which reward good timing, and a much clearer system for managing resources used for spells. Outside combat, there's cooking, fishing, gathering materials, and above all short scenes between characters, which have always been among the series' best moments and here too deepen the bonds within the party. Enemies have resistances based on elements, and the right party member can cut a long fight down to a few seconds.

On PlayStation 5, the game runs at high resolution and smoothly, and its art style, combining anime characters with painterly backgrounds, really shines on a big screen. Motoi Sakuraba's music alternates orchestral themes with rock inserts during battles. Critics received the game as the best entry in the series in a long time, praising especially its presentation and more serious storytelling, with objections aimed at a weaker second half and repetitive environments. The interface and pacing also shed much of the sluggishness earlier installments in the series suffered from, and loading on PS5 is virtually instant. For a player who wants a classically structured JRPG on PS5 without dozens of hours of side content, it's a very good choice.