Bandai Namco is teasing a "new RPG reveal" for later this week, and I'm going to let the FromSoftware fans down right now: this is almost certainly not Elden Ring 2, or any other follow-up to the open-world RPG, no matter how much you might want that to be the case. There are a few other possibilities for the game's identity, but none more likely than the long-awaited next entry in the Tales series. If you just see the text showing the dates and times, with an ornate golden font on a black background, you'd be forgiven for thinking this is something related to Elden Ring or another FromSoftware game, and you'll see more than a few hopefuls in various comment sections jumping to that conclusion. After all, while FromSoftware now fully owns the Elden Ring trademark, it maintains a close relationship with Bandai Namco, to the extent that company published Elden Ring Nightreign last year. Lords of the Fallen boss says the viral Game Awards teaser isn't pointing to the Soulslike RPG's sequel, but "devs are praying" it's something from FromSoftware Elden Ring and The Duskbloods were missing from today's third-party Nintendo Direct, and fans aren't taking it well Even Divinity devs got carried away by your Game Awards sculpture theories, saying "'Oh I hope it is!'" Bloodborne 2 But if you take a look at the brief teaser video, any thought that this could be a FromSoftware title will quickly evaporate from your mind. Rather than dark fantasy misery, we see a brilliantly green landscape and a brief glimpse of an anime-style character wearing a bold, heroic sword and shield on their back. Bandai Namco has a roster of about a billion different anime-style IPs it could be developing a new RPG for, but none more likely than the Tales series. The aesthetic matches, and so does the timeline – it's been five years since the launch of Tales of Arise, exactly the same gap that existed between that game and its own predecessor. It's also possible that this could be a new IP, or an entry in some other franchise – Sword Art Online fans are keen to point out how familiar that big pillar in the background of the teaser looks. But a new Sword Art Online game, as many fans as the anime has, doesn't feel like the kind of announcement that'd be big enough to warrant this kind of build-up. Tales, though? That's the kind of game – not quite Elden Ring-sized, but with a big fanbase – you can count on making headlines for a special debut on a random Thursday. There's also a larger Tales 30th anniversary broadcast coming on April 3, and I could easily see a new entry debuting here ahead of a more detailed presentation at that event. We'll know for sure what Bandai Namco has in store later this week. These are the best JRPGs you can play today.