Tales of Festival 2021 has come to an end! For those who want the low own on what happened during Day One, check below!
Tales of Festival 2021 was held at Tokyo Garden Theater, as compared to the usual Yokohama Arena. The venue boasted a new layered theater that allowed effects to be added to the stage. Since we do have an ongoing pandemic, people were required to wear masks, be seated one seat apart, and were not allowed to shout or holler. They were, instead, encouraged to clap to their hearts content!
AC Staff Momo and DimensionSlip were there as part of the press courtesy of Bandai Namco Entertainment America. Many thanks to them once again for this opportunity!
Merchandise Selling Area
For those who didn't pre-order earlier via Asobi Store, on-site selling was also available. The event made use of a numbered ticketing system, where buyers had to get a ticket first. The numbers were given at random, and whatever number you got would indicate your position in the actual buying queue.
Tales of Festival Day One Events
Prior to the start of the day, the venue usually plays all the Tales opening movies before the event proper. This year, they showed the openings from Tales of Phantasia up to Tales of Luminaria, which was shown with the screen split into three to showcase the Federation, Empire and Adventurer openings. Attendees usually chime into the song and light their light sticks depending on the game playing, or in this case, just wave their light sticks since hollering was forbidden. Unfortunately, this part wasn't included in the online viewing.
Opening
After an opening intro showing the past games as well as the cast for the day, the audience was greeted by the Day One MCs, Onosaka Masaya (Zelos Wilder from Tales of Symphonia) and Katsuyuki Konishi (Lloyd Irving from Tales of Symphonia). They comment that despite the venue being at 50% capacity, there are still a lot of people who attended. Now, events like these are usually places where people are full of spirit and are screaming their feelings out, but that also makes people cough a lot. As part of their safety precautions, for example when the audience's favorite voice actors come up, people are discouraged from screaming and instead can wave their light sticks or clap in response. Laughing is allowed, though.
They also said hello to those watching the online viewing, and commented that if they're at home, they can yell as much as they want. They can also use Twitter with hashtag #テイフェス2021DAY1 or the comment system to voice out their reactions. Live comments were momentarily shown on stage. They could also view what digital light sticks the online viewers are using.
There was the issue, however, of how to do Luke fon Fabre's signature line, "Ore wa warukunee!" (literally "It's not my fault!) since yelling isn't allowed. They settled for doing a clapping pattern that fits the line's syllables, instead. Since the stage is also a 4D stage, the audience can also feel even the temperature changes front of the stage . They also reminded about fans being able to buy gels for 200 Yen for their favorite characters, where they can also leave a message.
Day One Special Skit
To start the next part of the day, snow starts falling on stage. The Special Skit then begins, entitled "Tales Adventure Story: Fierce Battle! A Mystery Wrapped in Flame and Ice!" The skit this time around showed waist-up portraits of the characters, instead of the usual square skit faces.
The skit starts with Nobuyuki Hiyama (Veigue Lungberg from Tales of Rebirth) and Takuya Satou (Alphen from Tales of Arise) on stage having a fight inside what seems to be a coliseum. The two appear to be evenly matched. as they throw out ice and fire artes at each other.
From the sidelines, Toriumi Kosuke (Yuri Lowell from Tales of Vesperia), Chihiro Suzuki (Luke fon Fabre from Tales of the Abyss, Lloyd and Zelos are watching and commenting on how good and evenly matched the two are. They are also sadly victims of the effects of the two's artes, because of how cold and how hot it suddenly becomes. Said temperature changes are also reflected to the audience thanks to the theater's event.
On the other side of the arena are Sayuri Hara (Rinwell from Tales of Arise) and Shino Shimoji (Shionne from Tales of Arise), cheering on Alphen. Rinwell is openly cheering but Shionne appears shy to do so.
From the other side, Zelos eyes the two beautiful girls and calls out to them ("Hunnies!"), but is then caught up in what seems to be a deliberate attack from both Alphen and Veigue.
Around the same time, Ryohei Kimura (Sorey from Tales of Zestiria) and Rina Satou (Velvet Crowe from Tales of Berseria) are out exploring a bunch of ruins found beneath the coliseum. Velvet worries that the area may collapse because of the sheer forces from the coliseum fights, but Sorey says the ruins have withstood all this time, so that's unlikely. Sorey spots some ancient text on the wall and becomes excited. Sorey is happy that Velvet also appears enthusiastic about the ruins, but Velvet says it's more of she wants some stories to take to Laphicet back home . Sorey also happily comments that he has a lot to tell Mikleo, as well.
The two spot a red jewel with a stone tablet with ancient text, that seems to say something along the lines that the fusion of fire and ice powers will awaken something. From above, they suddenly hear yelling about monsters, so the two make an attempt to rush back up to the coliseum.
Back to the surface, monster are all over the coliseum, and the cast has been split up. Zelos is together with Rinwell and Shionne, fighting the monsters. Zelos is mostly trying to act cool in front of the girls.
On the other side of the coliseum, Alphen, Luke and Lloyd are fighting against monsters as well. Despite killing a lot of them, there are a lot more coming out. Later, Yuri and Veigue come up to help. Alphen also performs his Scarlet Outburst, but this sheer force causes the coliseum floor to collapse.
While Sorey and Velvet are trying to go up back to the coliseum from the ruins, the way out is suddenly blocked by debris as the ceiling above collapses, where Lloyd, Alphen and Luke also drop down. Sorey recognizes all of them except for Alphen, so the cast introduces Alphen to Sorey and Velvet.
Sorey and Velvet mention that they were on their way out, but thanks to them falling, the path out has been blocked. Luke yells that its not his fault, chiming the audience to do the clap that was discussed before the show. Luke says it's also the same for Lloyd and Alphen. Alphen misunderstands and thinks Luke is blaming him, but Lloyd clarifies that it's NOT his fault (they're trying to make him say the Luke line, technically). Luke makes everyone throw a barrage of "Ore wa warukunee" claps, and ends with an enthusiastic "I love you!" to the audience.
The group sets off to find another path, but it's suddenly freezing, and they find an ice wall blocking the path. Behind it are Veigue, Yuri, and, as Lloyd puts it, the people "Zelos was trying to pick up" (Rinwell and Shionne). Alphen yells, "Rinwell... and SHIONNNEE!" dramatically. Shionne what's been happening has been a bother, and Alphen goes "IS IT BECAUSE SOMEONE TRIED TO PICK YOU UP??!" Shionne is like no, she could handle that. Alphen then thinks it's because of the ice wall, so he plans to destroy it. Rinwell stops him, saying that Veigue actually made the ice wall to support the ruins' ceiling, which is at the verge of collapse.
Lloyd then inquires where Zelos is, and he seemed to got separated from them and flew off (with his wings) upon collapse of the coliseum. Zelos is also briefly shown facing against a mysterious ice bird at the coliseum entrance.
Sorey sees another stone tablet with ancient text but can't quite completely decipher its meaning, with Lloyd commenting that he wishes Raine was here to help. Sorey then says that there is supposed to be two paths around the area, and they should all be able to meet up there.
Alphen's group heads for the red door path, while Veigue heads for the blue door. Apparently, they are supposed to apply fire and ice artes to the respective doors to unlock some sort of mystery in the coliseum, and they do so. The two teams are able to meet up and go back up to the coliseum, where they join Zelos.
Up there, Eiji Takemoto (as Schwann from Tales of Vesperia) reveals himself as the mastermind of this commotion, as well as the day's secret guest! Schwann is apparently here to revive the phoenix sleeping dormant in the coliseum, and to reunite the flame and ice bird, as they should be.
As a battle commences, the event makes full use of the venue's layered theater, showing fire and smoke effects as well. Whenever there's fire, the stage also gives off warm smoke, and vice versa. In the heat of the battle, a bird sealed from the red jewel/stone that Sorey and Velvet saw earlier breaks free, and fuses with the bird that is at the coliseum entrance and becomes a phoenix. Upon its revival, the area around the coliseum comes to life, reviving it. Schwann had disappeared, then out comes... Raven? The cast comments Raven looks similar to Schwann, and Veigue goes "Maybe a relative?"
With the mystery solved, Veigue and Alphen now continue their battle. "There are somethings that can only be said through crossing swords, a friend once told me," comments Veigue. This ends the skit.
Cast Special Talk
After the skit, the cast introduces themselves one by one, with Takemoto-san as the secret guest for Day One. Special spotlight is also given to the new Tales of Arise cast. They thanked everyone in the audience for the huge success of Tales of Arise. Satou-san comments he was actually initially scared because he heard so many weird things from Tsubasa Yonaga (Jude Mathis) about Tales of Festival, but his fears are unfounded. Most of the cast have played Arise, and Shimoji-san in particular has played it on the PS5. They also mention that hopefully, one of the girls from Arise might be co-MC's with Onosaka-san.
Official Tales Character Popularity Poll Results
They then started the reveal of the full list of the Overall Favorite Character in this year's Official Tales Character Popularity Poll. The initial partial results that were released online prior to Tales of Festival 2021 were first flashed as a review. The cast who made the ranking and were physically present durign Day One were asked to pick either a long stemmed red or blue rose, and to give their messages. The first to give his message was Hiyama-san, who is at top 30. Kimura-san also comments that he also has played Rebirth and loves it.
Announcements of the succeeding results, they had Toriumi-san, whose character is in the Hall of Fame, to read out the winners (after some begging from Onosaka-san haha) while sitting on this very fancy chair.
Among the next in the list, Rinwell enthusiastically thanked everyone, and said thank you on behalf of Yoshitsugu Matsuoka (Law placed 16th) who could not make it to Tales of Festival. She also comments that a lot of her messages from the fan gels mostly started with "Do your best even if Law isn't there!" or "It's sad Law isn't around, but you can do it!"
Before showing the top 10, who received bouquets this time around, they first showed the top 10 from 2017's ranking. Satou-san, whose character ranked 3rd, also accepted his bouquet and was initially speechless, but eventually gave a message. Mikleo, who ranked 2nd, was not physically present (Ryota Osaka), but they brought out a lifesize cutout of Mikleo and Kimura-san carried one of the bouquets and took selfies to send to him. He also gave a short thank you.
Onosaka-san wonders then that if it's no longer Mikleo at the top, then who can it be? It seems the people in the comments know!
Toriumi-san got up from his fancy chair and took the podium, and after dramatically opening an envelope, announces that the winner is Dohalim from Tales of Arise (Yasuyuki Kase).
Unfortunately, Kase-san wouldn't be at the event until tomorrow, so they instead got him to deliver a pre-recorded video message to thank everyone. In addition, he didn't get a bouquet - he got a mini Christmas tree! The Christmas tree would be given to him the next day.
That concluded the overall character ranking. The rest of the subcategories for the character polls were to be revealed the next day.
Tales of Entertainment News Corner
The news corner is where any upcoming news, products or events are announced.
The biggest would arguably be the Tales of Arise stage play, which featured a short performance by an Alphen actor - who will only be performing for the Tales of Festival. Alphen's actual actor was not revealed and has not been finalized yet.
For the full list of things announced in the Day One Entertainment News Corner, please see our separate post here.
Live Performance - Kankaku Piero
Next up was the live performance by Kankaku Piero, who sang the opening of Tales of Arise. This was initially started with Satou-san and -san voicing their lines from the beginning of the game, where Alphen remembers his name. This may have been a problem with the venue, but Kankaku Piero's sounds were a bit... too loud. Specifically the bass sounded all over the place. Aside from HIBANA, they also played a couple of their other popular songs, as well as a medley of Tales openings. Their full set list included:
- HIBANA
- Haruka Mirai (Black Clover anime opening)
- Sing along tonight
- Tales of Tribute medley
- White Light (Tales of Zestiria)
- flying (Tales of Eternia)
- Karma (Tales of the Abyss)
After Kankaku Piero's live performance, they also had a short talk with the Tales of Arise cast on stage. Note that Kankaku Piero is also known to having played/have been playing the game, so they were happy to know who the voice actors were behind the characters.
Video Performance - Ayaka
Next, a video recorded performance of Ayaka was shown, where she sang her cover of Hello Again ~Mukashi Kara Aru Basho~ and Blue Moon from Tales of Arise. The video is exclusive for showing at Tales of Festival, and it seems like she's in a church-like area.
Closing
The cast once again take the stage and say a heartful goodbye, and to look forward to tomorrow. A few other announcements were also added here, such as the Tales of Festival 2021 Blu-ray and the new Tales of Dream Project songs.
After the cast, we also have a short talk between Alphen and Shionne, where they just remind everyone of goods and surveys to fill up.
That's all for Tales of Festival 2021 Day One! We'll have the Day Two events up sometime this week!
Tales of Arise is the latest mothership title (new classification: original title) of the Tales of Series which was first announced during Microsoft’s Press Conference in E3 2019. The game was released for the PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X, Xbox One and PC Digital via Steam on September 9, 2021 for Asia and Japan and September 10, 2021 for the rest of the world. The game features use of the Unreal Engine 4 and works on the theme of tradition versus evolution of the series.
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