By For Bandai Namco, producing remasters of Tales of presents an analogous challenge that Square Enix encountered with the recently launched Final Fantasy Tactics: The Ivalice Chronicles: absent source code.
Kazutoyo Maehiro, the director of The Ivalice Chronicles, acknowledged over the summer that the primary obstacle hindering the remaster was the reality that “the master data and source code from the original game were no longer available,” and now Bandai Namco is confronting essentially the same dilemma while remastering the iconic Tales of JRPG series, which dates back to 1995.
“We need to begin by determining where the source code resides and who is overseeing it,” stated series producer Yusuke Tomizawa during a Tokyo Game Show panel (translation via Automaton). “It’s somewhat awkward, but given that various development studios contributed to the series throughout the years, the priority is to locate the original data first. And when we eventually find it, it may contain numerous gaps, which requires extensive time for analysis to resolve.”
Bandai announced the ‘Tales Remaster Project’ as part of its 30th anniversary celebrations late last year, commencing with Tales of Graces f Remastered in January. Next in line is Tales of Xillia Remastered, set to launch on October 31. Bandai isn’t necessarily remastering the older Tales titles in a sequential manner, and this is done for the sake of efficiency. They are simply prioritizing the titles that will be simpler to remaster first.
“Truthfully, I understand that some fans may be wondering ‘What’s the reasoning behind the release order?,'” Tomizawa commented, indicating that the non-sequential production is focused purely on the pace and volume of releases.
In the meantime, here are the top JRPGs available to play at this moment.