As for ToS: the womanizing cassanova-type characters always grate on my nerves, but they're pretty standard. I still managed to tolerate Zelos for his utility and as comic relief, though mostly because I did it wrong and didn't get to keep Kratos. Regal was too angsty for me, though, and I was too invested in the other characters by the time he came around that I never got into his story. My favorites were probably Presea, with her android logic and oversized weapons (and watching the whole Genis/Presea dynamic unfold), and Sheena for the whole Badass Tomboy Ninja/Summoner thing. Rayne's bouts of Archeology Geekery were pretty adorkable too, and if you delve into her and Genis' story, it's a pretty heavy one.
Eh, I dislike Zelos to the point of not even enjoying him as comic relief. I just can't laugh, because for me he isn't funny. Hate his voice, hate his stupid pink vest, hate his personality. I purposely use the "incorrect" answer for his skits and never pick him for anything >_> Hell, even if one were stuck with him for the rest of the game, I'd never use him (the one time he was in the party was with Kratos and Regal in Iselia Ranch at the end of D1, just because I could). It'd just be Lloyd, Regal, Presea, and Raine (got fed up with Genis' TP vacuum, though the Faerie Ring I just got should help a lot).
I generally think Regal is kind of fun. Sure, his voice actor is ridiculous, but he's so serious and obsessive about everything that I can't help smiling. Sheena is... eh. I couldn't like her too much. She's a standard-issue JRPG tomboy, down to the last detail. I found the deviations in the other characters endearing (particularly Colette and Presea, as Genis pisses me off), but she's just... too typical. I speak, however, as someone who has watched enough anime to kill a man, and her archetype was one of the more common ones.
*sigh*
Okay, on a rather more important note than Tales of Symphonia. For most of my life, I've been depressed. Quite depressed. Depressed to the point of mood swings, hallucination(s), delusions that people were trying to kill me, and recurrent spells of deep depression that just
won't go away and keep away. I have nasty nightmares and often find myself crying for absolutely no reason, and I can end up just sitting there sobbing for hours while I try to figure out what I'm so damnably depressed over.
Now, right around now is when Rosewood's mother Willow (sure, whatever, it's a tree) suspects that I'm bipolar (she has three severely bipolar siblings), since I also have crazy periods where I work all day, eat five meals and am still hungry, and wake up fully energized after 5 hours feeling ridiculously happy and prepared to work all day. I also have cousins who tend to be either ridiculously absurdly jovial or totally enraged hellcats, taking the piss out of anyone and everyone. It's a coin toss as to which they'll be at a given family gathering.
The problem is that mood-altering drugs are being suggested--and suggested very strongly--and I'm not sure how I feel about it. I don't want to end up being someone who isn't me, and I'm scared that the altered mood will result in a shifted personality. Hell, I don't want to be bipolar, either. I've already been diagnosed with Asperger's (in the "Wow, your disorder is extraordinarily obvious and immediately recognizable" sort of way), and that's more than enough for me.
I'm glad I get a choice, but this isn't a decision I want to have to make. I feel like I've already had more than enough bullshit in my life--long years of suffering and fighting on, and I just want it to be over with. I don't really seem to need therapy. I've fought my demons and won, and gotten a clean break from everything that was haunting me.
I'm just depressed. Over and over again, for absolutely no reason, I'm depressed. I wish I had some idea as to what to do.