Grade A
When Bandai Namco announced Tales of Graces f Remastered as the first title as part of the Tales Remastered Project I was excited to revisit the original PS3 release in all new HD glory. As we have had Tales of Symphonia remastered prior to this, the project only stands to bring more Tales goodness in the future but for now Tales of Graces f Remastered is the latest game to be remastered.
Tales of Graces f originally a Wii title by the name Tales of Graces and then bought out a few years later to PS3 with additional bonus content and extras follows the story of Asbel and Hubert, both brothers who live in village and meet a girl Sophie in a forest nearby, both part of a noble family they try to find her origins as she suffers with Amnesia but all does not go to plan as they are attacked and Sophie disappears.
After a somewhat lengthy prologue the boy are now grown up and set off on an adventure. The prologue itself being a few hours is only the beginning and if you’re not already invested then the rest of Tales of Graces f may turn you off by this point. The new chapter feels like the game starting over and takes a few hours once more for the story to really get going. Tales of Graces f has a great story overall but the character tropes and writing in places are very typical by JRPG standards. It wouldn’t be a Tales game without Skits and these are present once again, small segments where characters converse amongst themselves adding to character development and relationship building between characters. The game also will give you a marker that shows up should a dialogue moment be present in any given area, while these are optional they can’t be viewed once you’ve progressed after the warning so the fact the game tells you before is a welcome addition.
Whilst the games introduction is lengthy it is important for knowing what has happened since there is a seven year break in-between the first chapter and when the game starts, it is also important in a gameplay aspect as it introduces mechanics of combat which is also a big part of any Tales game.
The games combat for its time was really great and still holds up well today, there are no changes at all here and the combat remains largely as it originally was although it feels much more flashy thanks to it’s updated visuals. Battles allow for free movement by allowing you to sidestep and dodge enemy attacks and lock and switch between enemies. As TP the resource for using magic artes is absent here the game focuses on timing and chaining attacks together by using CC which is known as Chain Capacity. By dodging enemy attacks you will be invincible and gain more CC, CC being the resource where every action including attacks artes draw this power from. While at the beginning this resource feels limited and depletes quickly, later on it feels much more rewarding, understandably it can feel restrictive for anyone not used to it and if you’re someone who just likes to spam moves and restore TP with restorative Items then this will feel quite different. The game feels much more strategic to other Tales games in the series because of this but dodging and making use of CC strategy ultimately makes fights much more challenging and more fun.
Character building is done through selecting a characters title and levelling up the traits as part of that title, new Artes a learned through this system and there is no specific way of doing it as you can unlock everything eventually, it is just a matter of preference and which ones you find beneficial to begin with. Another system that becomes available as early as the first chapter and introduces Dualizing. This is essentially crafting where you can combine items into a better item, to begin with you will make Apple Gels by combining apples with another item which on it’s own is toxic item but then creates a restorative item. Apple Gels are a relatively cheap item anyway but the Apple Tree is accessible in the first chapter and always bears fruit when you re-enter the area and there are other landmarks found later in the game which bear their own items. You can also use Dualize to create food dishes which will boost your stats and then add stats to weapons and armour also. You can Combine, Cook, Convert and Merge Items with this system and with many different recipe’s this is a great system that will really boost the potential of your characters.
Music and Sound in Tales of Graces f is as perfect as it can be but that is as expected, the Tales series has that signature sound and if I was not already well versed in the music I could just tell if a music piece was from the game by listening to it by itself. Motoi Sakuraba is a genius when it comes to action based JRPG’s and if you aren’t aware of him he has also worked on the Star Ocean series.
While Tales of Graces f is not an overly difficult game it does have some difficulty spikes in parts but this can be easily mitigated should you wish to. From the get go the game allows you to toggle features in the Grade shop before your playthrough, this is a feature known in the Tales series and is usually an addition added after New Game Plus, you’re able to select from increased EXP gains and Double damage. Whilst ive never been against this feature at all I feel adding it in Tales of Graces f from the get go diminishes it somewhat, I get that it is optional but I still feel like it should be worked towards as to give the most Vanilla experience possible. Fighting the Wolves in the forest in the opening are actually quite difficult and it makes sense, you’re kids fighting with sticks and they should really be avoided but now you can increase your health greatly, do double damage and have massively increased EXP gains and never have to worry about battles going forward. Money also doesn’t become an issue as you can Double Item drops and even exchange EXP for Gald, as the game also comes with all previous DLC you can just open these in your inventory and get access to hundreds of thousands of Gald and never have to worry about it again.
Tales of Graces f is a fantastic game but I feel like having all the access to DLC items and Grade shop from the beginning really kills the feeling of adventure, an RPG should be focused on the grind. Having all these powerful features on the first playthrough mitigates any difficulty but also mitigates the need for character building, an important aspect of any RPG.
A PlayStation 5 Review Code was provided by Bandai Namco
