"Tales of Vesperia" Xbox360 review

Alluplay is not an old site, certainly not old enough to have reviewed oregon trail upon release, but also not old enough to have reviewed any of the previous games from the “Tales” series. As this is the sites first crack at reviewing one, we thought it best to have a totally new and fresh perspective… So they asked me. Hi I’m Wolf, and I’ve never played a “Tales” game until recently.

Tales of Vesperia is a JRPG from Bandai Konami. Much like the more well known Final Fantasy series the tales games are all stand alone titles, occurring in different worlds, with a different cast, and different mechanics. So the good news is you don’t have to read a refresher to understand “the story so far”. Like all JRPGs it’s the story of a crazy group assembled to fight some impending doom. This time round you you fill the boots of Yuri Lowell a citizen of the imperial cities lower quarter, and former knight wannabe. Having quit the knights because he felt they all to often neglected to help the people we find him lounging around watching as the lower quarter is flooded. Before long we’re chasing after a blastia thief, wanted for crimes, and generally having an all out adventure.

Although the setup might be slightly cliche, the story develops into something quite deep and philosophical. In many cases the game refuses to take sides, yes the story is linear, but it raises these issues and often admits there are no golden solutions. This depth had me coming back for more and more, and never seemed in your face, instead choosing to subtlety playout within the context of Yuri’s world.
Yuri is of course joined quickly by a whole list of characters, and although some feel like they are copy paste jobs from any other JRPG (yes I mean Estelle) most seem to have a new enough twist to feel fresh and interesting. There is a fifty fifty split between voice acted segments and purely text based bits, for the most part this was fine but on occasion I did wonder why certain bits hadn’t been voiced. The voice acting is surprisingly good considering some of the JRPG’s we’ve endured, in fact I’d go as far as saying it’s really good.
Perhaps the most striking part of the game are the visuals. Tales is highly stylized, wearing a shell shaded Manga book look. The only let down here, unless you hate this look, is the optional extra story scenes which occur in thumbnails of each character, that feel more hand drawn than the rest of the game and do jarr the experience slightly. All in all though I’m a big fan of the look.

So the story’s good, the game looks and sounds good but how does it play?
The core to any JRPG is… Combat and the combat here is really quite exceptional. The only fault I have, is that I’m not a fan of the standard layout, as I find it favors continual attacking rather than the attacking and blocking which is intended. The core principals are the same as in most games that have a live battle system, you can run around the battlefield attacking, using abilities and magic or blocking. The system here is really deep, allowing for parrying, counter attacking, special finishing moves and customizing the strategies you use. In general the system is both simple enough for casual gamers and offers enough depth that it should entertain hardcore strategists and gamers. Another high for me is they don’t simply dump the combat system on you. Throughout the game they slowly reveal and unlock more and more technics. Every time I got used to the combat system it would evolve with some new technique.

On the character customization front it’s not bad but it’s not as good as I’d hoped. First of all the good news, the weapons you equip will change on the avatars in game. There are even character titles and augments that let you change their appearance more drastically. However the bad news is the titles system, which offers no other benefit, feels limp. Having worked out why it was there, I found out that none of the titles I’d amassed had any effect. Several hours later this was rectified, but it felt a little patronizing to unlock something that in essence was a tittle no one would see.

Like most of it’s ilk, there is an attempt at a minigame (Dice gambling) but this felt flat. With no depth to the game, it was purely a game of chance, and to be honest I avoided it after my first few forays. Along similar lines if you’re worried about your gamer score, than Tales offers only minor rewards once you’ve considered the time you’ve invested in unlocking them.

All in all Tales of Vesperia is a really strong title, that was close to faultless. Most of my points are nit picking, and simply regret that some systems aren’t as well developed as they could be. The game is however a masterpiece, and comes close to toppling Final Fantasy VII as my favorite JRPG. There is the same feeling of wonder that I first experienced with FFVII. However there are just a few too many tweaks that were left out, it’s still one of the best JRPG’s I’ve played in the last ten years though. So if you’re itching for final fantasy XIII, or just generally looking for a JRPG this should be top of your list… At least until Square enix has it’s say.