Topic: RE: Namco Announces Tales of Symphonia for the US

[NewsBot]

Cel-shaded RPG goodness coming this summer.

NAMCO TO BRING TALES OF SYMPHONIA™, AN EPIC ROLE PLAYING ADVENTURE TO THE GAMECUBE™

Brand New U.S. Screenshots Reveal The Game’s Stunning 3D Graphics and Beautiful Expansive Environments

San Jose, Ca., (March 9, 2004) – Leading video games developer and publisher Namco Hometek Inc. announced today that Tales of Symphonia™, the latest installment in the enormously popular Tales franchise, will ship exclusively for the Nintendo GameCube™ entertainment system in Summer of 2004.

Using characters designed by renowned Japanese artist Kosuke Fujishima, Tales of Symphonia unfolds with beautiful anime-style cel-shaded graphics that make the expansive 3D worlds feel like a 2D comic book.  The storyline is an emotionally charged, epic adventure that redefines the role-playing genre.

In Tales of Symphonia, players will command real-time battles in a unique 3D battle system that gives them full control over the characters.  Execute and combine hundreds of special attacks and magic spells.  With more than a dozen mini-games and side quests at the player’s disposal, Tales of Symphonia offers over 80 game play hours and brings an exciting new storyline to the Tales series. The Tales series dates back to 1995, when Tales of Destiny was first released on the SNES.  Fans of the series consider Tales of Symphonia one of the most promising RPG’s on current generation consoles.  While it follows a traditional RPG format, the series is set apart by its slick presentation and art, real time interactive battle system, and the clever level designs and puzzles.

We'll have the stunning new screenshots up shortly.

[Ian Sane]

I think the appropriate response to this would be WHOO!

[Bill Aurion]

It's about time! ^_^

Too bad the game won't be released till July... ;_______;

[ruby_onix]

I was under the impression that it was NOA, not Namco, that was bringing the game to America.

Namco passed on an English version of the critically-acclaimed "Tales of Destiny 2" for the PS2, in part because of the growing awareness in America that SCEA hates 2D games, and is willing to kill them randomly upon their completion, but mostly because "Tales of Destiny" and "Tales of Destiny 2 (aka: Tales of Eternia)" for the PSOne only sold about 60-70 thousand copies apiece, despite a "heavy push" from Namco.