We knew that Tales of Arise had a Teen rating a while back, but what we didn't know was why it had the rating it did. Thanks to an update over at the ESRB website, however, we now know how Tales of Arise managed to get that rating in the first place.
According to the ESRB page for the game, Tales of Arise will be following the footsteps of previous Tales games by including suggestive themes of sexual content, violence, alcoholic references, as well as blood and extreme language. The previous Tales of game, Tales of Berseria also included all of these features, too.
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The suggestive themes include "female characters wearing outfits that reveal large amounts of cleavage; some characters' breasts also jiggle. A hot-springs sequence contains some innuendo and suggestive dialogue." The dialogue suggests touching 'silky smooth' skin and dialogue about 'becoming a man.' If we know Tales games, it's most likely a mix of innuendo and suggestion than actual sexual content.
As for the violence in-game, the ESRB mentions cutscenes that "depict additional acts of violence and blood: a woman bleeding on the ground after being impaled; a man stabbed in the back; characters impaled in the chest; a woman burned at the stake." Combat will also include blood splatters across the screen, which is a first for Tales of games that usually keeps the blood to cutscenes or anime movie scenes featured in the game. Rarely, if ever, did previous games actually depict blood in any other way.
The use of alcohol, however, implies that there will be a quest involving "an alcoholic substance called cillagin" that will have a character ward off a younger companion, Rinwell, from drinking until they are of age.
Tales of Arise is set to release on PC, Xbox One, Xbox S, Xbox S, PS4, and PS5 on September 10th, 2021.
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