Tales of Arise Beyond the Dawn Edition Review (Switch 2)

Gameplay

Graphics

Audio

Narrative

Summary: A satisfying yet streamlined JRPG that is more character study than grand adventure.

4

Character Study

Tales of Arise has been on my to-play list since it came out in 2021. Since I only ever seem to have time to play games I’m reviewing these days, when I was offered the shiny new complete Switch 2 port: Tales of Arise – Beyond the Dawn Edition, which includes the main game and its epilogue, I jumped at the chance. Now I just wish I’d found time to play it sooner.

Tales of Arise follows the adventures of a mysterious young man in an iron mask living on planet Dahna, which has been conquered and enslaved by the inhabitants of its technologically advanced neighbour, Rena.

An amnesiac who is unable to feel pain, our hero is soon drawn into a fight for the liberation of Dahna after a chance encounter with an equally mysterious woman called Shionne, who is on the run from both the Renan authorities and the Dahanan rebels.

After putting their differences aside, and pulling a flaming sword out of Shionne to kill a whole load of Renan soldiers, our happy‑go‑lucky amnesiac slave, the Renan noble that electrocutes anyone who touches her, and a merry band of Dahnan rebels go on a quest to free the Dahnan from Renan control by quashing the Renan lords who rule over the once peaceful planet with an iron fist.

The narrative is placed front and centre in Tales of Arise, and as a result, it’s a fairly linear experience.

There aren’t many sidequests, though taking them on does make the main campaign progress a little more smoothly since you won’t have to do much if any grinding for the inevitable boss fights, and I would recommend doing so because it’s not hard to do everything in an area and it always helps to have the latest gear from each area and have a few more upgrades under your belt before you move on to tackle the next area and the lord reigning over it.

Rather than the grand open worlds you’ll find in your average Final Fantasy or Dragon Quest, the world is split into a series of small areas. However, it can be hard to navigate through because it doesn’t show you where each part of the map is relative to the rest of the world. This isn’t so bad when you’re in more open areas that only have a couple of exits, but some of the more winding and complicated sections, like towns and cities, can be a little confusing at times.

Combat in Tales of Arise feels like a more simplistic version of the combo-based fights from Tales of Berseria. Fighting as Iron Mask, you’ll tap the attack button to form basic combos and then use different arts as well as alternating between the ground and air to build larger strings and dominate the enemy.

This is augmented by abilities from members in your party who can do things like interrupt enemies’ magic attacks or break enemy shields. The fun lies in looking for openings in the enemy’s defences and successfully exploiting them to then kick them from one side of the arena to the other.

Although the Switch 2 can’t hope to reach the same level of fidelity as something like the Series X or PS5 can (on a PS5 Pro, you’ll get a native 4k 60 presentation), the Switch 2 version is still a mostly serviceable port from a technical standpoint.

Outputting at 1080p, Arise’s painterly art style still looks lovely at a lower resolution, even with some cutbacks to foliage and other minor details compared to the other current-gen versions; its storybook visuals continue to shine in both handheld and docked modes. Where it does slip up sometimes, though, is in maintaining a stable frame rate. Unfortunately, there isn’t a performance mode on Switch 2, and it is stuck with an uncapped 30fps presentation that it doesn’t consistently hit.

Final Thoughts

Tales of Arise is a brisk JRPG that is more of a character piece than your usual sprawling epic. The stakes may still be sky‑high, but it’s the evolving relationship between its two leads that makes Arise easy to get invested in, and makes me eager to keep playing even if the overarching narrative is the standard teenagers‑destroy‑the‑evil‑empire plot.

Though it’s not the best version from a technical standpoint, it’s still a solid port that provides a decent way to play this superb story-driven mini-epic at home or on the go.

About the Author

Gareth Newnham

Tales of Arise Beyond the Dawn Edition Review (Switch 2)