I'm a bit baffled as to why this isn't that well-liked in the context of the Tales series. It's definitely more fun than Phantasia, due to the larger number of characters and more exciting battles. I believe this is the first appearance in the series of the combo counter, which is a wonderful mechanic that adds another layer to the otherwise painfully-simple combat. By rewarding long combo strings with extra exp, it incentivizes good timing, aggressive play, and liberal use of special skills.

Two things I can see working against it are the presence of some less-than-likeable characters and a relatively weak score by Sakuraba's standards.