Breakdown
- Bandai Namco have delisted several Tales of games from the PS3 and PS Vita stores
- Tales of Graces F, Tales of Xillia 2, and Tales of Hearts R are now gone
- Physical copies are available, but expect price hikes
Bandai Namco has delisted several Tales of games from the PS3 and PS Vita stores, further showing that their days are numbered. While there are still ways to play some of these games, this goes to show how fragile digital media can be when it comes to video game preservation.
Reddit user InnocentStrategy has pointed out that Tales of Xillia 2, Tales of Graces F, and Tales of Symphonia Chronicles are no longer available on the US PSN store. Tales of Hearts R has also been removed from the PS Vita store, which is a huge loss since that’s the only readily available version of the game.
Noisy Pixel confirmed that Tales of Symphonia and ToS: Dawn of the New World can be purchased separately, but they can’t be bought in the Chronicles bundle. The site also said that Tales of Graces F can still be purchased as a bundle with Tales of Xillia 1, but neither can be bought separately.
Fans can buy physical versions of these PS3 games so there is some hope there, but that might mean an increase in their prices as well. The retro game market is pretty notorious for marking up prices of delisted titles, so we’re sure something similar will happen here.
At the time of writing, Tales of Symphonia is the only other game here that’s readily available in modern systems. Bandai Namco released Tales of Symphonia Remastered for Switch, PS4, and Xbox One last August, so fans can get that whenever they want. Still, the fact that it’s the only game available in this era of PS3 and PS Vita games is very disappointing.
Video game remasters are a core part of Bandai Namco’s release strategy these days, so there’s hope that they will start releasing some of these games. Fans love the Tales of Xillia duology, while Graces F and Hearts R are pretty solid RPGs in their own right.
The most recent game in the series is Tales of Arise. Fans can pick that game up on PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series, and PC.