It is the story of Luke fon Fabre’s unintentional journey outside of his mansion, which he has been locked inside of for the last several years, ever since he was found in an abandoned castle after an attempted kidnapping, with no recollection of his past. Tales of the Abyss is the story of this journey. Luke fon Fabre has been locked inside of his mansion for the last several years. As soon as Luke discovers a plot to destroy the world as he knows it, he and his ever-expanding team of allies (including a fire-spitting mouse-thing named Mieu) must aid in the unification of two kingdoms and resolve the question of Luke’s own identity before the world comes to an end.
The fighting system in ToA is fundamentally equivalent to that found in its ancestors. The combat is fought on a pseudo-2D fighting field that is designed to look like the natural environment is all around. You have the option of programming your party members to be controlled by AI or manually giving commands to each one by cycling among them while engaged in combat. Fans of RPGs who are accustomed to the method of fighting employed in Final Fantasy may find this approach to be a bit of a challenge, and even seasoned players of the Tales series will have to spend some time getting acclimated to it.
The remainder of the game plays out in a manner that is comparable to that of typical role-playing video games (RPGs): you and your group travel through a variety of cities, investigate a number of dungeons and explore. The World Map screen, which displays an isometric perspective that follows your character around as they go, is used for the exploring portion of the game.
