For a lot of people, their weekends consist of sleeping in, watching TV, hanging out with friends, running errands, and generally just taking a break. While I too enjoy such things, the highlight of my weekend was the 20-ish minutes I spent playing Tales of Vesperia.
For those of you who have been hiding out in a cave for the past 6 months, Tales of Vesperia is the next "main series" Tales of RPG from Namco Bandai (the previous being Tales of Innocence for the Nintendo DS), and it marks the long-running Tales of franchise's first foray into HD gaming, debuting the end of this summer on Xbox 360 in both Japan and North America.
Before I get into my impressions and the nitty-gritty details of the demo I played, I think it's important for you to realize that I am something of a Tales of fanatic. Though I knew of the series from its inception, Tales of Phantasia on the Super Famicon, I never actually got around to playing it until Tales of Eternia (unfortunately renamed to Tales of Destiny II in North America) on my PlayStation 1. After that, I was completely hooked on the series and have kept up with it as much as possible since that time. In fact, I mostly bought my GameCube last generation just to play Tales of Symphonia. I hope that you will look upon my following impressions with this in mind.
First off, the demo starts with a brief, fully-voiced cutscene, which though mildly interesting, is not overly exciting or revealing of the plot in any coherent way. I suspect this was intentional so as not to give away any of the story, however, it makes the cutscene feel a little foreign, and probably won't do anything to draw anyone's interest in the plot.
One thing that everyone will notice right away, though, is just how crisp the graphics are. Though the game appears to be running on the same (or a similar) graphics engine that gave Eternal Sonata life on the 360 last fall, the graphics are greatly improved for ToV. In fact, the game looks like an HD anime, even during gameplay. Each character is truly a sight to behold, and puts the PS2's Tales of the Abyss' graphics to utter shame.
The voice acting (done completely in English for anyone playing the demo on a North American 360) is about what you would expect from an anime-esque game. While this may turn some off, I will throw in an interjection here that all of the Tales of games have had such voice acting, and it often ends up working well. Though I always prefer to play/watch media in its original language (especially Japanese, since I speak it fluently), from the little I saw, the English actors do quite a good job. Certainly anyone familiar with English-dubbed games/anime will feel right at home, if not impressed with the performance.
After the cutscene, players are given control of a party of 4 characters: Yuri, Estelle, Repede, and Rita. (Karol is present in the demo, but is not available for combat). Navigating the level map is just what one would expect from a Tales of game, with a generally linear path filled with monsters, treasures, and interactive points of interest. There are several branching paths that allow players to hunt for treasure or fight additional battles, as well as some giant flowers that will stun the player if touched.
Which brings me to the level presented in the demo. Like the cutscene, the area is unfortunately a non-descript grassy forest type area, typical in many RPGs, especially early on in the story. Being that as it may, the graphics are still quite lovely, and most JRPG fans (especially Tales of fans) will have no issue with it. Certainly we can be sure that there will be much more interesting locales to visit in the full game.
Battles are handled in a style very similar to Tales of Symphonia or Tales of the Abyss (which really should come as no surprise considering it was the same team that has worked on all three games). Your four party members are set off against a group of enemies in a 3D battle "zone." The character you are in control of can be guided around this field, dodging enemy attacks, attacking, using special moves and items, and generally just fighting it out. The "free run" ability (which was also present in ToS and ToA) feels much more fluid than previous installments, and makes the 3D battles feel much smoother. The only issue I had with the battles was the reversed controls. Traditionally, Tales of games in North America used the bottom face button to attack, and the right face button to use a special move (X and O respectively on the Dual Shock, A and B on the 360 controller). These are opposite on the demo, and definitely take some getting used to. Due to the demo actually being a Japanese-only demo, it is likely these are the Japanese controls and will be switched for the North American release, but it was still a little weird.
The demo allows you to control any of the four characters I mentioned above, but easily my favorite was Yuri. Sword combos mixed with 'artes' makes for a very familiar battle experience that many are sure to enjoy. Estelle and Rita, on the other hand, are relatively clunky in battle, and will definitely require more patience to master playing as. Repede is quick and fairly powerful, but I just had a hard time enjoying playing as a dog.
At the end of the demo is another short cutscene followed by a surprisingly difficult boss battle. The boss hits hard and is surrounded by smaller, faster subordinates that will consistantly hassle your spell casters and get in the way of your special moves. Without any specific plan of attack, my party fell quickly to the merciless onslaught doled out by the underlings. In fact, it generally seemed that the monsters could kill my party members faster than I could revive them. Interesting to note, however, was the presence of the stun-inducing flowers from the area placed in various locations around the edges of the battlefield. Striking these flowers produced a shower of pollen that would stun any enemy within its vicinity. Though initially frustrating, this battle showed not only that the game will require both strategic thinking and battle competence, but will also employ environmental elements within the battles that can give players an edge in more difficult encounters. Hopefully there will be more of these in other boss battles throughout the game.
Overall, despite the bland location chosen for the demo, Tales of Vesperia was an immensely enjoyable experience. Newcomers to the series will be instantly swept up in the gorgeous visuals and fast-paced gameplay, while long time fans will definitely be delighted by the enhanced gameplay mixed with plenty of tried-and-true Tales of gaming.
For those of you who prefer to watch rather than read, I've embedded Gamersyde's video of the first part of the demo. Enjoy.
Tales of Vesperia is set for release on Xbox 360 this August 7th in Japan, and tentatively for August 19th in North America. I, for one, will be picking this up launch day (and taking a day off to play it).
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