Watching this anime is exactly like having a great game but not getting to play because your bastard friend keeps on hogging the controller. Unfortunately, unlike in real life, you cannot beat your friend on the back of the head and knock him out with your baseball bat so you would just have to content your self with watching an anime of a great game and not being allowed to play.

The Intro and ED are both great and really in sync with the flow of the anime, the voice acting is in character and completely believable unlike the English dubs and are in fact all the voice actors for the game including as Tear the seiyu Yukana Nogami who also did C.C. recently in Code Geass R2. The designs of the characters are keeping in touch with the game and unlike previous Tales animes or other animes of games it kept almost completely to the game which while does not ruin the show and cause people to give horrid reviews also points out that what results is remarkably stale and at best advertising for an already great game with its own cult followings.

The characters are kept remarkably to the game like Luke, the main character, being a complete douche bag and hated/disliked by nearly the entire cast for his arrogance and mannerisms until finishes redeeming himself. The character relationships are also kept remarkably to the game and again this is both a blessing and also boring to watch. Of course there is no reason NOT to watch the show because it is a nice refresher for those that have finished the game on the events and plots that occurred but I would recommend to those who have not played the game not to touch this show as it would spoil many events that occurred and ruin the plot. Overall, as the game allows more options and is played from the player’s point of view, it is still better than the anime no matter how accurate it is because the game will definitely provide for more content than 12-13 hours of animation which only covers the major events and not the small script interactions and secrets.

Filed under: Japanese Anime, Abyss, Game, Japanese Anime, Tales