Board 8 > Tales of Vesperia beaten *spoilers*

(+) Yeah! (+)

This was my first Tales of game and overall I enjoyed it a fair amount, especially with me knowing next to nothing about the series going in. The plot had some genuinely interesting subversive beats, and the characters pretty much all had something cool going on. At the same time however the game was very typically 'anime' in a bunch of ways that I found to be to its detriment.

The game was at its peak in the middle act. They had really hit their stride and all the plot cylinders were firing- Yuri murdering corrupt politicians and the fallout from that, Yuri and Flynn's relationship getting more and more strained, Estelle realising her power is a poison via Belius and that she may have to die to save the world, Judith wrestling with her own code and abandoning the crew, the reveal that Raven is Schwann, it was all great.

Unfortunately the third act was... pointless. The intriguing plot beats had all concluded, most character arcs had finished, there was no more internal conflict, there wasn't even a villain anymore really, but the game just kept going anyway lol. Weird.

The combat system grew on me as the game went on and I wound up enjoying it quite a lot, though I still don't think the 3D movement really worked like it should have. There's a few early annoying bosses but the game stabilises at a certain point and the difficulty is fine after that.

Yuri is an all round great protagonist, I love that they didn't pull their punches with him or have him learn that violence was wrong or whatever. Pretty bold choice making him the lead over someone like Flynn or Estelle, and it really paid off.

Repede is a dog.

Estelle became interesting with the whole 'poison of the world' arc, I really liked everything with that and how she reacted to it until she just became a standard kidnapped princess later on. I'm not saying she should've died at the end of Act 2, but they definitely chickened out of having some kind of consequences there, I don't like that everything was just suddenly fine again after her quandary was such a driving force of the plot for so long.

Karol is the type of character that I expect the fanbase hates, but personally I quite liked him. He had some annoying childish moments but they usually felt intentional, and I surprisingly found myself enjoying his character arc a lot. He's kinda the heart of the gang, and I love his terrible nicknames.

Rita is a mixed bag for me. There's some good stuff there with her relationship with Estelle and her blastia research, and in theory her eventually abandoning her life's work should be really captivating. But she's one of the characters they trope-ify way too much, just a child genius when they need someone to get the gang out of trouble, and that typical 'angry but secretly likes being around the gang' personality the rest of the time. Her arc is fine but it's hard for me to see past the constant 'Rita hits Karol again lmao' stuff etc. She also says 'dragon freak' way too much in the first half of the game.

Old Man Raven is the worst character in the game, unfortunately. Did you know he's an old man? Old man old man old man old man. Also he's pervy. 80% of the dialogue around him revolves around one of these two things. It's a shame because him being a war vet and secretly working for the Empire is a great layup, but he's the biggest victim of Anime Tropes in the whole game and he doesn't get treated seriously enough by the narrative to make it compelling. They also waste the Schwann reveal and death fake-out by having him just back on side 5 minutes later.

Judith is one of my favs for sure. Yeah her obligatory trope is 'sexy lady', but it doesn't really interfere with her character like Raven's or Rita's tropes do, and beyond that I find her really interesting. She can be a bit of an exposition machine sometimes I guess, but I think they nailed her character and arc in pretty much every respect. I love her voice too

I played this game last year and I thought it was a painful slog for pretty much the entire game. I didn't really like any of the characters or the combat and the plot felt very meandering until like 80% of the way through when they throw the obligatory world ending scenario at you.

You spend the first third of the game running from the empire because of Estelle and then they show up and they're like "yeah she can travel with you it's okay we didn't really care". Usually the stakes get higher as the story goes but they stay low in this game (and get lower randomly) until basically the very end. But by that point it feels way too forced to have any impact.

I didn't like Berseria either and most people seem to really love Vesperia or Berseria so maybe this series just isn't for me. The only one I was actually excited to keep playing was Zestiria and most people seem to hate that one. I'm planning on playing Arise but if I don't like it I think I'm going to shelve this series.

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If you're interested about more vesperia stuff, there's a prequel movie called The First Strike.

People dislike pretty much what you laid out: the 3rd act is just tacked on at the end.

What makes yuri great imo is that he's different from the standard 15-year old thrust into an adventure and learning a lot about the world. He's an adult who already has developed his worldview and remains mostly static throughout the game. Even during the part at mantaic where both flynn and estelle confront yuri over being a vigilante, he doesn't really back down from his stance, only laying off such activities because Flynn is now in charge and he trusts flynn to reform the system. Somehow, it all works great, with the game mostly leaving it to the player to decide whether or not what yuri did was right or wrong. The only thing I think you could argue is that he gets a bit of protagonist leniency: flynn is ready to arrest him at mantaic but all is forgiven by the end because they're buds.

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You pretty much hit on a lot of the common talking points for the game. Most everyone agrees that Yuri's a great protagonist, that the combat ramps up as the game goes along, and that the third act is an abject disaster. The three parts of Vesperia were written by three different people and, well... Let's just say that most big Tales fans have a pretty good idea of whose fingerprints are on the last one.

Vesperia used to be pretty universally regarded as a top-tier series entry, but I and a lot of other folks feel that it hasn't aged particularly well. I do still think it's a very good game, and I believe it's a great barometer for the rest of the franchise - I haven't seen a lot of people who like Vesperia but don't care for the rest of the series or vice versa. So I'd definitely recommend another title or two seeing as you liked this one. Tales of Arise is right around the corner, even.

Yuri > Raven > Rita > Repede > Estelle > Judith > Flynn > Karol > Patty was my ranking a couple years ago when I played through Definitive Edition and did my exhaustive, overwrought Tales character ranking, and I think that still looks about right.

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If we can rec next entries, Skullbone nailed it that berseria is pretty well regarded. I'll also give a shoutout to graces because, while the story is pretty vanilla, the combat and character interaction imo are some of the best tales has to offer.

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I basically agree with all your points. Yuri's an excellent protagonist and the third act is pretty pointless. I will say that the final boss being mixed with the classic Tales Devil Arms sidequest to become an ultimate optional final boss is really cool.

I like Raven more than you did, but I tend to focus more on his "lazy guy who is a lot more clever than he looks" than "pervy old man" shtick. I'm personally fond of the former shtick. He's a really clear example of the tropes getting out of hand. He's like 30. I generally agree with your point on the rest of the cast. It's a surprisingly good cast, even though based on individual characters, it really doesn't feel like it.

I always really liked the graphics. That cel-shaded anime look was really nice for its time. Not sure how it looks now. The gameplay was also pretty good and I love how stupid and fun it gets at the endgame. The gameplay and Yuri are definitely the two main highlights of Vesperia, looking back. Oh, and being jealous of the crazy amount of extras that the PS3 Japanese-only version got.

Oh yeah and accessories are really nice. I'm not always a fan of the costume because I generally like the characters' default attire, but the accessories get around that. Yuri in particular has a lot of excellent accessories.

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I loved Vesperia way back when I played it. I gotta get the enhanced port at some point. Great cast with Yuri and Rita as my favorites. Yuri is still my favorite JRPG protagonist

At the time it came out Vesperia was a good step forward for the series. Since then it has been eclipsed in all areas. It could still be a top tier tales game if not for that third act.

If you're interested on where to go from here, I highly recommend Tales of Berseria and Tales of Graces f.

Graces f is polarizing in that it has a great cast and excellent battle system, but the plot is extremely basic/cliche/cheesy. It's still the most fun I've had with Tales.

Berseria is the most recent entry and is considered by many to be the best in the series.

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Realized I still need to beat Vesperia.

Yeah, that the third act is just... a chore.

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Also, another complaint about the game most people have (I don't personally but I get it) is that the music is pretty subpar compared to other tales games. But lots of tales games have sort of same-y soundtracks, courtesy of Sakuraba, so maybe it's just par for the course. Fury Sparks is tremendous though

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Tales of Vesperia was the last JRPG to have actual meat in the dish that doesn't requires buying another upgraded version (the 360 version was perfectly fine) or a bunch of DLC. The Xillia games, Zesteria and Beseria felt flat compared to the large world and lore of Vesperia. It may not have the best story, it may not have the best gameplay, it may not have the best music/graphics, but the whole of its sums is greater than any RPG I've played in decades.

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Tales games have the most generic music of any major jrpg series I can think of.

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Vesperia is a game that I sour more on with every replay. The plot is boring and generic, the character chemistry disappears for the entire second act, and the battle system, though fantastic at the time, hasn't aged well. I also agree that the third act just existed to pad out the game's length, but there's also the problem with the end of the second act, when Alexei went "I am bad guy! I am doing bad guy things! MWAHAHAHAHA!" and... we never knew what those "bad guy things" were. What the hell did he think Zaude was supposed to do? We never found that out. The game just leaves too many questions on the board.

Abyss is better in pretty much every way.
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Fromw hat I remember, his motivation was he was tired of corruption in the world and thought zaude was a weapon that he could use to spread chaos and remake the world.

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I'm replaying the definitive edition right now. (Currently nearing the end of act 2).

While the third act does completely suck, my current replay has me not liking the main story, plot, or anything revolving around that aspect. Character arcs and stories are great, and Yuri is still one of the best Tales characters, but man the story rarely has any high moments, and when the do happen it's done with.

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Oh yeah Alexei was awful lol. And so obviously the villain because he has an Evil Voice.

Emeraldegg posted...

Even during the part at mantaic where both flynn and estelle confront yuri over being a vigilante, he doesn't really back down from his stance,

Ah I meant to mention here, Estelle choosing to be on Yuri's side in Mantaic was a major moment for her and the moment when it became clear to me that the game wasn't telling me to judge Yuri. Good scene.

NBIceman posted...

The three parts of Vesperia were written by three different people

This explains a lot! I like whoever did the second part the best.

SSBM_Guy posted...

I like Raven more than you did, but I tend to focus more on his "lazy guy who is a lot more clever than he looks" than "pervy old man" shtick. I'm personally fond of the former shtick. He's a really clear example of the tropes getting out of hand. He's like 30.

Lol I am used to 30 year olds being decrepit geezers in anime by now, but even by those standards they refer to Raven as Old Man just so often. I have to assume it's some direct translation thing that doesn't work as well in English, they never even try to mix it up. Same with Dragon Freak.

I like the graphical style but I will say the green grass on the world map was a little too bright for me. Also there were weird audio mixing issues where sometimes the skits would be barely heard over the background SFX.

Emeraldegg posted...

Also, another complaint about the game most people have (I don't personally but I get it) is that the music is pretty subpar compared to other tales games. But lots of tales games have sort of same-y soundtracks, courtesy of Sakuraba, so maybe it's just par for the course. Fury Sparks is tremendous though

The music didn't bother me but it didn't stand out as good or bad (except a couple of themes like Dahngrest's).

I agree that overall this game probably works better than the sum of its parts. As for next entries, I may try Berseria? I know Abyss is divisive and I thought Symphonia was the beloved one but nobody's mentioning it so maybe it has aged poorly? Or I may just wait for Arise seeing as it's close.

I played the Definitive Edition btw, not sure how much stuff it added (except a few free costumes I figure).

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I'd go with Symphonia or Abyss next, imo. If solely for gameplay/battle reasons. All Tales games have their anime charm and cringe so that's not going to change, but Abyss, and especially Symphonia will have a more simplified and archaic battle system.

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Symphonia's fine but it does kinda feel like "baby's first Tales game." It's not a bad thing, but I think it feels particularly bad when you play later games in the series. No free run hurts significantly.

I heard a lot of good things about Berseria, but it's definitely not a Tales game. The battle system doesn't feel like Tales at all.

I'm a massive Abyss fan and I'm playing through it right now. I think it holds up, personally.

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Pretty much agree with most of your complaints.

You're also right that the fanbase hates Karol. I don't really mind him myself, he's actually useful to the party given his knowledge of the guilds.

Alexei annoys me because he's so nothing despite his VA being one of my favorites in the biz.

I played the Definitive Edition btw, not sure how much stuff it added (except a few free costumes I figure).

Among other things, the biggest change is that Flynn and Patty were originally not party members; the latter wasn't part of the game at all.

I actually think it's kind of a shame it didn't stay that way. Flynn became a much less interesting character to me when he hung around more often and got involved in skits and such, and Patty just messes with the entire party dynamic by not really having anything to do with anything outside of her own personal story.

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Whether one likes abyss or not feels entirely predicated on what they think about the main character.

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NBIceman posted...

I actually think it's kind of a shame it didn't stay that way. Flynn became a much less interesting character to me when he hung around more often and got involved in skits and such, and Patty just messes with the entire party dynamic by not really having anything to do with anything outside of her own personal story.

The Patty scenes also stick out like a sore thumb because Yuri's voice completely changes

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Agree with most of your points and that third act is dreadful. Most people "assume" the last act was written by Baba, who then went on to lead the rest of the Tales games until he got the boot after Zesteria for..."reasons" , and it shows in how the plot of all those games in between all go down. Thankfully he wasn't there for Berseria and BOY is it all the better for it, that's the current champ of the series. Best cast by far.

As far as actual plot/story goes though, the best (though NOT SAFEST) bet may be to actually move back one step from Vesperia and hit Tales of the Abyss. A VERY polarizing game that always leads to multiple pages of arguments whenever discussion of its story is brought up, but I think it stands league's above the rest.

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UshiromiyaEva posted...

A VERY polarizing game that always leads to multiple pages of arguments whenever discussion of its story is brought up, but I think it stands league's above the rest.

The fact that it's still that way after 15 years (?!) is a testament to how great Abyss is tbh

Emeraldegg posted...

Fromw hat I remember, his motivation was he was tired of corruption in the world and thought zaude was a weapon that he could use to spread chaos and remake the world.

I mean... what exactly would "spread chaos and remake the world" mean to him? That's still very vague. And we never got WHY he felt that way considering how the only other person who held as prominent a position as he did was Don Whitehorse, seeing as Alexei was Commandant as well as Emperor Regent until the idiots on the council, whoever they were (did we ever meet any of them other than Ragou?), decided upon an Emperor. That entire diatribe pretty much sums out that Vesperia had zero attention to detail, and felt incomplete in comparison to Abyss. Vesperia was a game that construed of a lot of "telling" instead of showing, and that led me to just not care about its world.
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NBIceman posted...

Among other things, the biggest change is that Flynn and Patty were originally not party members; the latter wasn't part of the game at all.

I didn't even notice that Patty was new (though it makes sense looking back) so I guess they didn't integrate it that badly for me, though maybe I just wasn't paying enough attention as I didn't notice Yuri's voice change either >_>

As for Alexei, his motives were underbaked and weird but even ignoring that he just wasn't a good character, there was nothing compelling to him. The other villains all filled their roles better even though they were just 'yeah we're selfish and evil what are you gonna do'.

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Berseria is definitely the one I would recommend next if you want an actual good plot and characters.

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It helps that Berseria is the edgiest edgelord Tales game to ever edge. As in, when everyone is fifty flavors of dicks, it makes even Tales' mid-tier presentation a favorable, crude, grungy feel. BECAUSE EDGE!


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I don't really want to get involved in making strong recommendations because opinions on the Tales series vary so much that I think it's hard to give accurate ones after just one entry played, but since Berseria is coming up so much I do want to comment that if you think you have some interest in Symphonia and Abyss, I'd go for those sooner rather than later, because it can definitely be a little difficult to go back to their comparatively barebones combat systems after playing some of the newer titles. The Abyss battle system is still one of my favorites in the series but I do think I'm the minority there.

I also contend that "edgy" and its derivatives have become the most overused adjectives on the internet and, in Berseria's case, are especially misattributed to one character in particular that not only has a very good reason for their dark attitude but also very obviously does not fit the definition by the time you get, like, five hours into the game.

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I mean...how the fuck else do you describe Velvet? When Eleanor and Laphicet are the most well adjusted characters in your party (since everyone else has no qualms about doing...ANYTHING), your game cast is several shades of fucked up. But to me, that's what Tales kinda needed. That hook of, "Have we ever been nice?" is amazing.

Note: I don't want every game to be that way. Berseria was fun because it was the one that did.

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Strife2 posted...

I mean...how the fuck else do you describe Velvet? When Eleanor and Laphicet are the most well adjusted characters in your party (since everyone else has no qualms about doing...ANYTHING), your game cast is several shades of fucked up. But to me, that's what Tales kinda needed. That hook of, "Have we ever been nice?" is amazing.

I would describe her as someone who, even at her absolute lowest point, is motivated exclusively by love for her little brother. That love drives her to hate, sure, but that's only ever directed at one single individual, when in contrast, even as a daemon, she's able to form legitimate bonds with plenty of people. You could make a compelling argument that she's never a legitimately violent person deep down. She'll use and hurt and kill people if she has to in service of her goal, but she does it all with her own brand of dispassion, and as the game goes on it becomes increasingly evident that she has to convince herself all over again when she wakes up every day that it's necessary.

And the key word is "has to." She could kill Dyle right at the beginning of the game, but she doesn't. She could leave all the people in Meirchio to die as a result of the party's conflict with the Legates, but she doesn't. I don't know how you can say she has no qualms about doing anything when you've got examples like that, along with all the other evidence that it does actually bother her to be seen as a blight on the world.

"Edginess," to me, describes something that's dark and gritty purely for the sake of being dark and gritty, and I don't actually think anyone in Berseria comes near that.

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Funny story about me and vesperia, the first time I played it I missed the sword that gives you backstep in the hold early on and had to look up when I would be getting it because I was progressing and was like "man, I am really missing backstep where tf is it?" Lo and behold I just didn't walk down far enough to see the shop there, big whoops

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Play Abyss and Symphonia before you play anything after Vesperia. You 100% need to play Abyss because you're either going to love it or hate it. Me? It's my favorite game of all time some days (it's Persona 4 Golden on others). I too enjoy the battle system a lot.

Graces has the best battle system in the series probably, and its cast is a bunch of weirdos constantly messing with each other. The sad part is that there's even less plot than Vesperia and the character backstory is seriously lacking; it's a fine example of a cast that is far greater than the sum of its parts. It's enjoyable while you play it but ultimately less memorable.

The Xillias are good but mostly standard Tales fare, and are must-plays only if you like the series. Zestiria is a heaping hunk of cow shit, and should be avoided at all costs.

I need to play Berseria personally (I have it on Steam) and should probably fix that before I obtain Arise.
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Abyss is also my favorite game of all time if I exclude VNs, fighting with Berseria for #1.

In regards to Graces combat, it's still #1 for the franchise easy even now (though Arise is shaping up to potentially take that spot from the looks of things), but I just replayed it about half a year ago and...the mediocrity of the plot MIGHT actually override the gameplay's pros? Which was even more dissapointing going in because the front 1/2 of the game is actually WAY better than I remember on the front, shockingly even the opening 5 hour section which in my memory was just dirt. The game basically stops being interesting once the party actually settles in and it starts focusing on the main narrative. A lot of the conflict and character strife early on was pretty compelling.

As for Xillia, I actually think that game deserves a WORSE rap than it gets. It's generally considered the most middle of the road game in the franchise with a gold star, but the last chapter of that game is just....HORRENDOUS, like there's some Zesteria levels of disaster in there and I'm not sure how it tends to get glossed over. Obviously it's for a much shorter length of time and just at the end, but it's still, like...ugh. Also has the wierd negative of being the Tales game that seems custom built for great co-op but then completely removed the ability to use any of it's 2 character systems in actual multiplayer.

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Emeraldegg posted...

Also, another complaint about the game most people have (I don't personally but I get it) is that the music is pretty subpar compared to other tales games. But lots of tales games have sort of same-y soundtracks, courtesy of Sakuraba, so maybe it's just par for the course. Fury Sparks is tremendous though

That one town, though. D... the one Karol and the guilds are from. Daggerford? That music was awesome.

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BlueCrystalTear posted...

I need to play Berseria personally (I have it on Steam) and should probably fix that before I obtain Arise.

It bums me out that a lot of people - even huge fans of the series - have yet to play Berseria. Zestiria really poisoned that well.

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Mega Mana posted...

That one town, though. D... the one Karol and the guilds are from. Daggerford? That music was awesome.

Dahngrest

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KamikazePotato posted...

It bums me out that a lot of people - even huge fans of the series - have yet to play Berseria. Zestiria really poisoned that well.

Worth noting that I do own Zestiria (PS3) but didn't play it either after all the negative press covfefe and watching a single video explaining said negativity.

It spooked me from even playing that game and anything thereafter. But I should correct the Berseria thing, I know this.
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The worst thing about Zesteria is that it's a totally mediocre Tales game that even has a couple of good moments up until a point, but then it just COLLPASES. Like it's a sudden, immediate thing. It's not even a case of "oh this plot point was so stupid it doesn't recover from it", it's that a specific event happens and that's a hard cutoff point that makes you go "uhh that was a little awkward". Then the rest of the game staight up has worse production values and directing from that point forward and feels like it's on a third of a budget, like it was made in order front to back and then they realized "oh fuck, we're out of money".

There are two moments in the entire back third of the game that are even remotely decent, and one of those is just a really cool song and the other is one cool scene in the final boss.

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Labyrinth of Memories beaten. Just Necropolis of Nostalgia and the Coliseum to go! I may not bother with them if it gets too rough.

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Berseria is surface level edge that ends up subverting edge-pectations as the narrative goes on. I think it plays with edgelord tropes but in a tongue in cheek way where you're in on the joke the whole time.

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Yes, and that's why I love it so much.

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