I need the help of the greater gaming community knowledge.

I'm currently playing Tales of the Abyss for the 3DS. After five hours of playing, I just noticed that I've missed the collectors book. And I really hate missing such very basic stuff. I am usually a very observant player, so it came to a surprise for me that I missed that.

Therefore I would really like to have a "walkthrough" that gives me a heads up about anything that I could miss, without spoiling the game for me. Ideally would be a list of "cut off points" and a checklist to see if I have anything till that point.

I've checked a few of those on gamefaqs.com and the two I checked weren't really what I was looking for. I also don't want to read too much into those, because I don't want to have anything spoiled. So, is there anything I'm missing? Is there maybe a fansite some of you may know of?

Sorry, I can only offer you a reply that has absolutely nothing to do with helping you out. Just wanted to say, the anime version of TotA sucked smelly balls and I vomited 200 times watching it. :(

I think most people used Kouli's guide when it came out (or maybe I'm thinking of Vesperia), though the thing is I don't think he's a native english speaker, it's based off of the import version, it's still kind of badly organized, and I've heard he recently pulled all his guides and started charging money for them.

But by this point, people have probably sifted through all that information or discovered it themselves, and sorted it in a more legible and easier to read fashion that matches the english localization.

that doesn't really help... Though, I don't really think it matters since IIRC you can't go to the bonus dungeon or see some of the stuff like special mystic arts/attack extensions on your first playthrough.

There's an awful lot of things that it's *possible* to miss in this game - granted, none so easy nor important as the Collector's Book - that it might not be plausible to compile a walkthrough for all of these things without some spoilers (and by 'some' I mean 'really quite a lot of'). Titles, costumes, skits.... I guess it depends on how much of a perfectionist you are :)

My personal reccomendation? Play the game twice - it's easily enough fun to merit a second playthrough, and the second time you can take a walkthrough and grab everything you've missed without the key plot points being spoiled for you.

Of course, I'm sure that's occurred to you, and you probably have a massive game queue and don't want to add another 60-hour playthrough to that, but... that may be your best option :)

It really is worth it, though - Tales of the Abyss is possibly my favourite Tales game (fighting alongside Vesperia for that particular honour) and almost all the characters are worthwhile and well-realised. The story is great and Luke is...... well, to avoid spoilers, I personally enjoyed Luke's character a great deal and truly empathised with him as the story progressed.

As an aside, the anime isn't that bad at all, although personally I don't go for any of the Tales animes much.

This fellow is claiming to have tried to write his guide spoiler free:

"Even if I want to spoil it to you, I'll bite my fingers so you can get the most
spoiler-free walkthrough here."

http://www.gamefaqs.com/ps2/929343-tales-of-the-abyss/faqs/51814

You said you looked on Gamefaqs, so my apologies if you've already discarded this one as an option.

Vinheim's guide is quite comprehensive, but it's also very hand-holding. It doesn't spoil the specifics of what happens in cut-scenes, but it can often spoil the outcome of those cutscenes. Also, all hidden and extra stuff is contained within the main walkthrough which means you have to open yourself up to whatever spoilers there are. It's a good walkthrough, but he might find it too spoiler-ific for what he wants :)

What I've seen so far I really liked. It is very "Japanese" in many regards, but even of what I've seen so far, it had some great character development.

The collectors book really was a cringing moment for me, because I wouldn't have minded the occasional title or weapon, but a whole "feature". ARGH!

Btw, is there also a "Monters Book?" or is that covered by the collectors book?

As far as I remember, the Collector's Book covers it all. I only picked up a 3DSXL last week, so Tales of the Abyss 3D has only made a brief appearance on it (I'm going to finish Lego Batman 2 first). As such, I'm remembering back when I played the PS2 version :)