A Bandai Namco representative in a recent shareholders meeting, when asked by a X (formerly Twitter) user whether a new Tales game is in development considering the 30th year anniversary coming up in 2025; replied “There are things that I can’t reveal at the moment, but please look forward to upcoming announcements”.
The words used by the representative has raised hopes that the eagerly anticipated next entry in this massively popular franchise could have a definite release window being announced soon – as typically most official answers to such queries are on the lines of we will announce when we are ready or something like that.
The most recent entry, Tales of Arise was a success critically and commercially. The game sits with a Metacritic score of 87. Not only that, it crossed the 3 million sales milestone in February earlier this year and is the fastest selling game in the Tales franchise. So it does make a lot of commercial sense for Bandai Namco to have this game on their radar when it comes to planned releases for the year ahead.
Update: We do have a new Tales game – a remaster, though – not strictly a new entry in the series. Tales of Eternia – Remastered will be launched on Oct 16 for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox Series S/X, Switch 1 and 2.
The original was launched way back in 2000, and is actually the third entry in the overall Tales series. This then had an anime, based on the game, that came out and ran in 2001. The game did enjoy a good bit of success during the launch, with close to a million units sold, and a safe entry into the top 100 games of all time, back in 2006.
The game follows the classic JRPG archetype of a young protagonist, teaming up with friends and companions, in a fantasy-based setting, with combat a mix between the traditional turn-based to real-time. The Remastered version promises quality of life changes to bring the gameplay mechanics in line with modern times, and will have a Deluxe Edition version available as well – with artbook and soundtrack included. You can watch the trailer announcement for Tales of Eternia Remastered here:
