Today's system updates on the Tales of VS. site include demos of items, skits, and GP. In the item demo, characters demonstrate the use of various skills and weaponry not in their standards repertoires. These bonus artes and other sundry materials are granted to them through item use. For instance, Nanaly tosses a couple of pow hammers, Yuri uses Nan's ring blade, and Kyle uses Raven's arte Serpent. The other video includes a bit of map wandering followed by some skit samples. There's also a brief showcase of GP and the level up system, which allows you to increase whatever character attributes you like. In other words, you level up each stat independently according to your wishes. Spend on HP and DEF if you want to be a tank, or throw lots of points into TP and INT for mages. Anyway, check out the videos for yourself to get the full effect!

The official Tales of VS. site was updated today with Arche Klein from Tales of Phantasia and Judith from Tales of Vesperia. Judith uses some signature artes, including Moonbeam, and finishes with Radiant Moonlight. Arche casts a number of spells while flying high above other players, including Lightning and Meteor Storm. Her former standard spell Big Bang has been upgraded to mystic arte status for this title. Cut-ins are included below. The system update, which came earlier this week, demonstrates weapon selection and arte assignment. Nothing too interesting, but it should certainly be important to in-game micromanagement once the title is released.

Though the Tales Festival trailer for Tales of Graces was leaked over the weekend, it was only available in a pretty blurry off-screen camera recording from YouTube. Now, the Tales of Graces official site has been updated with a downsized logo, character art for Asbel and Sophie, and a stream of the trailer. It's divided into three parts, the first third showing a montage of town, dungeon, and overworld roaming; the second third demonstrating the style shift linear motion battle system in action; and the final third previewing a few major cutscenes from the game. If the stream is running slowly for you, ndsfans2009 has uploaded the trailer to YouTube. Feel free to watch it below!

Asch from Tales of the Abyss and Ruca Milda from Tales of Innocence, two previously announced characters, were added to the Tales of VS. official site's roster today. Strangely, the video they chose for Ruca included a clip that seemed to have no other purpose than to allow Senel to abuse him with a couple of fists to the face, plus he gets downed by an earth spell moments later. Not the most flattering of videos. Still, as always, mystic artes were included for both, and the cut-ins are below.

A commercial for Tales of VS. is now airing. It includes a small portion of the game's theme song, some pieces of the opening animation, and a little bit of battle footage. The bonus DVD that apparently comes with the game is also fairly unique considering the characters it features include Magnius from Tales of Symphonia, Saleh from Tales of Rebirth, Legretta from Tales of the Abyss, Alice from Dawn of the New World, and Raven from Tales of Vesperia. Check the commercial out below!

For anyone following news on Tales of Symphonia: THE ANIMATION, it seems the official website has updated with a picture of Colette, the Tower of Salvation in the background, and the words "Coming 2010 spring...!!"



No other information regarding specific release dates for the next episodes, however.

The Sylvarant Arc can still be accessed by clicking the logo at the bottom of the page.

The Tales of VS. official site received an update today that includes two new system videos. The first shows a number of characters fighting one another (including red shirt Lloyd against blue shirt Lloyd). Rita also showed off a few spells, including some like Ivy Rush that are unique to her arsenal. The second video explores training mode with Lloyd and Colette. Various techniques that range from basic combos to magic guard to taunting are explored. Check out a couple of screens from the videos below.

This year's Tales Festival has brought us tons of new info on Namco Bandai's upcoming Tales releases.

Up first is Tales of VS., which showed off three new characters, including Harold Berselius from Tales of Destiny 2, Presea Combatir from Tales of Symphonia, and Eugene Gallardo from Tales of Rebirth. A screenshot of the character selection screen was also leaked here, so speculation on the remaining characters has become much more focused since the characters are lined up in "standard" order for each of their respective games. As a result, Mint Adenade from Tales of Phantasia seems like a shoe-in, and, unfortunately, it seems as though Eternia, Legendia, and Tempest will only be getting one character each. Either Innocence or Dawn of the New World will suffer the same fate as well, though it's impossible to determine which at this point. Have fun trying to figure out the remaining characters by filling in the blanks yourself! The new preview video posted on YouTube by Nore139 is now available as well.



For Tales of Graces, a new preview video was released, though it hasn't yet been posted anywhere for persons not at the Festival. We'll post it as soon as it becomes available. Aside from that, complete art for Sophie was shown, and rumors of weapon types have begun to circulate, including one which states that Sophie fights with both a gun and a chakram while the redhead in the last PV uses both a spear and a rapier. Sophie supposedly also wields saiseijutsu, or rebirth spells.

Tales of Vesperia PS3 debuted some new costumes that include an Asch costume for Yuri, a Tear costume for Estelle, and a Luke costume for Flynn. They're apparently available via a password exchange with Tales of VS. There's also new Fujishima group art for the game's cover that includes Patty, and the release date for The First Strike was set at October 3rd. The First Strike's trailer is also now available on YouTube from TalesWorld0. Check it out below.



Keep watching for more Tales Festival info! I'll be updating as it pours in.

Today, Cless Alvein from Tales of Phantasia and Leon Magnus from Tales of Destiny were added to the Tales of VS. official site's character list. You'll see pretty much everything we've come to expect from the character videos with a lot of fighting, a bit of spell casting, and a preview of each character's mystic arte. Cless performs Dark Blade while Leon uses Majin Rengokusatsu. Check out the cut-ins below.

Yet another group of Tales of VS. entrants cropped up today, including Kyle Dunamis from Tales of Destiny 2, Lloyd Irving and Colette Brunel from Tales of Symphonia, Senel Coolidge from Tales of Legendia, Tear Grants from Tales of the Abyss, and Rita Mordio from Tales of Vesperia. Lloyd and Colette had already been shown in a previous article, and Tear was surmised to be in the game by most when her name appeared briefly in the original trailer, but Kyle, Senel, and Rita are entirely new developments for the cast of VS. Check out the scan below for selection screen art, Kyle's cut-in, and some other random screens of the newest additions in action.

The latest issue of Weekly Shonen Jump featured side-by-side articles on Tales of Graces and Tales of Vesperia's PS3 port. For Graces, a new character was finally fully unveiled, name and all. Sophie, a purple-haired girl seen briefly in the most recent trailer, seems to fight with her fists. She'll be voiced by Kana Hanazawa in the Japanese version of the game. A scan of her character artwork, an event screenshot, and a battle screenshot are available below. Tales of Vesperia's article revealed that Patty will be superimposed into the game's existing anime FMVs. A screenshot of her face in the intro and in the FMV at the end of the Sword Stair were included in the article (also below). Finally, a new leafy Giganto monster that seems to reside in Keiv Moc was shown off for the first time. Enjoy the scans!

Tales of VS.'s official site was updated with a new system video today that includes a bunch of samples of 4-player team battles, including a particular point battle that revealed Chester Barklight of Tales of Phantasia to be a playable character (see pre-battle screen below). You can also see a number of previously revealed characters in action, so be sure to check out the newest video!

Today's update on the Tales of VS. official site showcases Kratos of Tales of Symphonia and Anise of Tales of the Abyss, two previously announced characters. There's some brief battle footage followed by each using a mystic arte. As usual, Kratos performs Shining Bind while Anise pulls off Final Fury followed by Dying Moon. Cut-ins are reproduced below, and unless I'm just getting slower at hitting print screen, it seems like the cut-ins keep getting faster and faster. It wasn't so fun capturing these two. ~_^

Two new system videos were recently posted on the Tales of VS. official site. The first is a pretty long montage of different characters fighting, including a quick duel between Luke and Asch at the beginning that gives us a better sense of how spell cast time will be handled when Asch drops a Thunder Blade. There are also glimpses of Nanaly and other more unique characters going at it, and the characters make use of various traditional skills, including magic guard and recover. The second video shows fragments of several mystic artes, though no new cut-ins were shown. Enjoy!

Tales of VS. is now available for preordering on Play-Asia for $49.90. However, the release date has now changed from August 6 to August 16.

For those who preorder, the game is also coming with a Special DVD, which is shown below (though the actual picture is apparently temporary).



(Special DVD images from Dengeki Online.)