In the wake of the first releases of the year, February is shaping up to be an exciting month for many gamers. While there are plenty of new titles to play onservices such as PlayStation Nowand Xbox Game Pass, with new titles being added regularly, other services are ending. The mobile game,Tales of Crestoria, has become one of them, as it has shuttered to its many players on February 6. While the game might not have been the most popular, several fans that did have the game could agree on one thing in particular — it deserved to be more than just a mobile gacha game.
Tales of Crestoriawas announced to be receiving a global launch in December 2018, with the title releasing simultaneously on Japanese and English-speaking mobile storefronts after a few delays in July 2020.Crestoriaserved itself as a turn-based RPG with characters obtained through gacha pulls. The characters were a mix between original characters made for the game, as well as legacy characters from other games such asTales of VesperiaandTales of Zestiria. There were plenty of details aboutCrestoriathat made it stand out as a rather strongTales ofmobile title that have made fans wonder since the start why it was relegated to just mobile and not made into a full-fledged RPG adventure on consoles.
RELATED:Tales of Arise’s Impressive Animated Trailer is a Strong Argument for an Anime Adaptation
Tales of Crestoria’s Characters
Tales of Crestoriamay have fancied itself a gacha title, but it still held a rather interesting original story within it, despite that design. The game touted a cast of original characters ranging from the kind yet naive Kanata Hjuger, to the despondent and uncaring goddess Kasque. Overall,Crestoriaheld a strong ensemble cast featuring a varying degree of companionship between them, but the one thing they all had in common is they were all considered wanted criminals in some fashion. UsingfamiliarTales ofdynamics such as Artesto battle three waves of enemies, players would slowly uncover their story through updates.
The game may have had somewhat of a slow start, as each character would be introduced and then framed as a criminal in different situations, with Orwin serving as the late-game party addition, but it made an effort to make how their condemnation happened compelling and dynamic each time. As yet another character joins Kanata on his journey, fans are always given a good reason as to why they’ve joined the party on their quest that is almost against the world itself. If players weren’t invested intheTalesmobile game’s side quests, there was a chance they’d be drawn in by the characters.
RELATED:Tales of Arise’s Darker Story is Perfect for Its JRPG Formula
The Original Story in Tales of Crestoria
Where manyTales ofgames featurethe protagonist becoming disillusioned with the world they’re in, Kanata has his innocence taken from him fairly early as he ends up killing his own father to save his childhood friend Misella. Instead of wanting to hear his side of the story, the entire town accuses him of murdering his own father and Kanata is quickly marked as a criminal and forced out of the village. With no one else to turn to, Kanata ends up traveling with the most feared criminal of their world, the Great Transgressor Vicious. As many others are condemned and turned into the same lowly criminals Kanata was made into, the party is formed, and the group decides to change the broken system that forced them to live on the run.
To their surprise, it turns out the person in charge of the system is an eternally bored god named Kasque, who doesn’t want to deal with proper judgments. The nature of the plot presents itself as highly dynamic and intriguing, as it somewhat makes commentary on how real-life people think about other people around them. It focuses on the weight of each character’s sins and how it shapes them, also leading into dialogues about mental health and how people find their self-worth.
Even despiteCrestoria’s gacha-based parties, the story would lock players with the main ensemble for specific story missions when it fit the most. For aTalesgame, many fans enjoy the RPG series' focus on character relationships over everything else. Seeing Kanata and Misella get their time to shine as a hero and heroine, much likeAlphen and Shionne ofTales of Arisein their own game, was something manyCrestoriaplayers desired to see.
Bandai Namco’s Power
Sadly, while theTales ofmobiletitle had many beloved features, there were sadly numerous difficulties the app faced. Between delays with its worldwide launch and numerous bugs plaguing the game, it almost seemed that, for as many options players had to experience the game, there was also the same amount of problems. For the first few months of the game, crashes were seen as an inevitability when playing. While the development team worked these out over the game’s year and a half-long run, eventually Bandai Namco’s investors in the title told them to either iron out the bugs or the game would need to end its service.
When the time came, investors chose the latter option, according to one of the final posts on the officialTales of Crestoriawebsite. The post was rather transparent about the glitches and questionable stability of the game playing a key role in what led the title to end its service so suddenly. However, even with a month of advance notice, fans kept playing. Many of them held ontoCrestoria’slast few moments, and played the game until the very end to see it off properly. Formany loyalTales ofplayers, there was only one question on their minds, and that was if the story would ever continue somehow.
After all, where the story had left off involved Kanata, Vicious, and Misella all learning new forms and powers regarding their special weapons, and Orwin had only joined the party for a chapter before the game was shelved. Even then, many players who adopted the game late most likely couldn’t work throughthe length theTales oftitleasked fans to complete to experience everything the game had available. Thankfully, upon announcing the game’s closure, aTales of Crestoriamanga was announced as a way to re-tell the story from the beginning and see it to completion. While many fans were happy to hear that the story wouldn’t end on the dramatic point it finished on, many felt that a manga doesn’t suit the scope ofCrestoriaitself.
The world ofCrestoriawas vast, and featured many towns, cities, and concepts that may need to be cut or left open-ended for the manga to finish everything important as best as it can. The crossover characters had their own arcs, such asVelvet fromTales of Berseriaand Milla fromXillia, that may be left unanswered. Original plot points that prominently relied on otherTales ofcharacters such as Sophie may also be cut, and while there’s a chance any other medium featuring the story would run the risk of needing to remove the other games' cast as well, another game may be more able to keep what fans liked fromCrestoriaoverall.
Ever sinceCrestoriabegan, fans had been questioning why a game with such interesting themes and potential was never given a chance to bea biggerTales oftitle. From the start with the issues they faced, and Bandai Namco’s known history of cancelingTales ofmobile games, the worries many fans had over this situation were around since the start. For the last year and a half, as players grew more attached to Kanata and his friends, the desire for a proper game starring the cast has been circling with fans since the game began. If Bandai Namco were to ever re-visitTales of Crestoriaas a proper game, those fans that have been asking for it are already waiting for the chance to experience the story of the RPG all over again.
MORE:Tales of Arise: Should Berseria and Other Tales Games be Played First?
