One of the most satisfying parts of an RPG is unlocking and trying new abilities, and Tales of Arise is no exception. Each one of Arise's party members has tricks hidden in their sleeves, and players will want to level them as much as possible.
Combat abilities in the Tales series are known as Artes. These can range from simple healing spells and special attacks to Tales of Arise's tide-shifting Mystic Artes.
As expected from a long-running RPG series, the way the player unlocks Artes changes from installment to installment. Tales of Arise has two systems for unlocking Artes. Players can unlock them with the proficiency system, or they can unlock them with skill points.
Proficiency in Tales of Arise
In Tales of Arise, each character can use three different types of Artes. For example, Alphen's Arte types are Sword Strike, Aerial Strike, and Flame Strike, while Shionne's are Gun Strike, Blast Strike, and Astral Arte. Every one of their artes will fall into one of these categories.
Every time a character uses an Arte, their proficiency in that Arte type will go up. In other words, players don't just level Tales of Arise's characters, they also separately level their Artes. Increasing proficiency not only makes the players' current artes stronger, but it will unlock new Artes as well.
If a player wants to focus on a single category, players should make sure to assign artes in the menu ahead of time. The AI will focus on the assigned artes in battle.
SP and Arise's Skill Tree
Aside from the proficiency system, every character in Tales of Arise also has a skill tree. Every time the player levels up a character or completes a quest, they earn skill points or SP. They can spend these points to unlock nodes on the skill tree, which will give them new artes and skills.
Players will have to do more than grind to complete the skill tree, however. Certain branches of the tree are blocked off and are only unlocked as the player earns the series trademark titles.
The unlock conditions for titles vary. Sometimes the player just needs to cross an important story moment. Other times they need to go out of their way to complete sub-quests or see skits. They might need to perform certain actions in battle or cook certain foods at the campsite. It can even be as simple as equipping one of Tales of Arise's DLC items.
Unless they are going for 100% completion, players shouldn't worry about going out of their way for artes. These two systems in tandem mean the player is bound to unlock them pretty frequently.
Tales of Arise is out now for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
