In what promises to be a deep dive into the golden age of the auteur JRPG, I recently began revisiting Bandai Namco’s Tales of saga, giving myself the chance to rediscover each of its many installments. Of course, as many will know, not all of the games in this series were officially localized by the Japanese publisher, and at the time of writing, Bandai Namco is busy with a brand relaunch to celebrate the franchise’s 30th anniversary. Even so, the only two titles currently remastered for today’s audiences are Tales of Graces F—already available on modern platforms—and Tales of Xillia, scheduled to release later this year across all contemporary consoles.
Some fans have expressed disappointment at Bandai Namco’s decision to revive such recent entries, especially when entire generations of older installments are still missing from the libraries of English-speaking players. Thankfully, thanks to the tireless work of the fan community, it’s now possible to experience nearly the entire series in English through translation patches, which localize most of the saga’s “mothership” titles—that is, the mainline Tales of releases. Naturally, my attention turned immediately to Tales of Phantasia, the very first entry in the series, and one of the most technologically ambitious games ever released for the Super Nintendo.
