New to Tales Games

I've been thoroughly enjoying Tales of Arise as an action RPG fan, appreciating the engaging storyline. My only exposure to the Tales series before this was Tales of Berseria, which I found enjoyable initially but eventually fell off due to the lackluster environments and a diminished motivation for combat. Given my current positive experience with Tales of Arise, do you recommend revisiting any previous Tales games that might align better with my preferences, or should I simply anticipate upcoming titles in the series?

If what you like about Arise is the quality graphics and environments and the smoother combat then I think most of the older games are going to disappoint you. Older Tales games naturally look worse (though some have different art styles you may prefer if you can put up with older graphics) and I think the combat was much rougher in the past. Depending on your platforms there are a bunch of older games available like Vesperia and Symphonia (both of which are beloved though the Symphonia port is apparently not great, though somewhat fixed)

But like a lot of RPGs I think that what holds up best about those older games are the characters and stories. Unless that can carry a game for you I'd just wait for the next. And there are a lot of good action RPGs out there right now with good action and graphic design if that's what you're into. Have you considered Scarlet Nexus? Not the best game but it plays well and has some excellent visuals.

I got into the Tales series with Vesperia, which is still one of my favorite RPGs. I don't know that the combat is necessarily as smooth, but I think the story is way better and it also uses actual portraits for skits instead of those lousy looking in-engine comics like Arise, so I'll take it as a net plus.

If you can, get the original version, though, not the "enhanced" one or whatever they're calling it. They tried to go back and voice all the lines, but didn't get all the original cast. Most of them do pretty well, but they guy they got to voice the MC is not very good. God bless him, he tries extremely hard. But he is also extremely not Troy Baker.