When it comes to memorable JRPG franchises, the Tales of series certainly fits that bill. And to celebrate the series’ anniversary, Bandai Namco has decided to expand the series reach by releasing remakes of old Tales games over the past few years.
We’ve had Tales of Zestiria, Vesperia, and even the Symphonia game remastered, but now, Tales of Graces f Remastered has joined the crew. Our staff member Gary Green has previously reviewed the PS3 release of the game, and seeing as this is a remaster of that particular version, the question is: is it worth getting the remaster?
A Daring Protagonist
In Tales of Graces, we follow the protagonist Asbel Lhant, a very “spunky” child, for the lack of a better word, and the son of the Aston Lhant, who rules over the rural town of, well, Lhant, as its lord. Accompanied by his timid younger brother Hubert, the two of them make an excursion to Lhant Hill, where a number of flowers are said to bloom there, regardless of season.
In that field of flowers however, they find a mysterious girl, who doesn’t remember who she is or where she is from. Concerned, Asbel and Hubert return to the village, and attempt to ask around to see who this mysterious girl could be. Eventually, Asbel names her Sophie, and so, goes on a journey to help regain her memories.
The story starts off extremely slow at first, with Asbel’s childhood being entirely summarized with a “how many times can I ignore my dad’s warnings?”. It definitely picks up from Chapter 2 and beyond, where Asbel is now 18, and much more mature, after throwing a hissy fit from what happened with Sophie in Chapter 1.
The “Slow Start” JRPG Curse
If I had to pinpoint it, I’d say that Tales of Graces F also suffers from the dreaded JRPG curse of the PS3 era, where the story is incredibly boring at the beginning, but starts to pick up after a while. And in this case, I’d say the point it starts to pick up lies a little past Chapter 2 and into Chapter 3.
And then, when you get to the post-game, that’s when things really start to spice up, I’d say. Though, unfortunately, it seems that the developers even did a little oopsie when it comes to spoiling the game for players. For one, the Activity feature will sometimes contain a cutscene of something that only happens way later in the chapter.
Furthermore, since this remaster features almost all of the DLC of the PS3 release, including the special skits, there is no warning, or even a recommendation, that these skits might feature characters in a later part of the game.
I accidentally redeemed one of those skits, and because of what characters were featured in it, I got instantly spoiled on it. Yes, I know Graces is practically a decade-old plus game at this point, but there could’ve at least a “Warning: It is recommended to only view this skit after you’ve beaten the main game. Are you sure?” message box or something.
Reality Sinks In
Personally, I didn’t think of Asbel as a bad protagonist per se. But the narrative certainly doesn’t do him any favors. There’s definitely a wonky pacing here, and it’s so weird on just how it took me a couple of hours before the narrative could even immerse me at all. I know the Tales series has a tendency to push towards the more clichéd type of storytelling, but Graces feels like it leans a lot.
The timeskip was also not handled correctly in my opinion. The narrative takes on this huge tonal shift, that I don’t know what the writers were thinking. The once innocent children is now at each other’s throats, and the justification for that is “it’s been 7 years. People change”? Honestly, this whole thing is just…not that well written.
A Weird New Game+ Feature
Upon starting your save file, Tales of Graces f Remastered immediately takes you to the Grade Shop, where you can purchase several upgrades such as Double EXP, and the ability to even convert your EXP into gald, if you’re daring enough to try a Low-Level playthrough of the game.
After doing some research, I discovered that in the original PS3 release, the Grade Shop was previously a New Game+ feature, where by acquiring titles, completing sidequests, and completing technical bonus requirements during certain battles, you could obtain this currency that would assist you in a future playthrough. However, for this remake, they have elected to just give you the option to obtain every single upgrade available here.
As someone who has never played Tales of Graces once, it feels very weird to have this feature foisted onto me on my playthrough. I think I spent 10 minutes wondering what I should get, because there are so many options to choose. While it might be useful for those who wish to fine tune their playthrough to be easier or harder, I also think this feature should’ve been kept to New Game+.
A Confusing Battle System
Honestly, the tutorials for Tales of Graces’s battle system are some of the worst I’ve ever seen. Some of the basic attacks, such as the buttons to attack and defend are explained, but from there, each enemy battle will give you a new text wall of something you can do, but doesn’t show it in a practical manner.
In fact, the option to manually input your skills is locked to a non-descript chest on a random cabin. This is just absurd, in my opinion, and while Auto Mode is a nice feature, this truly isn’t as refined as Tales of Arise was. It’s hard to explain why, but even after playing for a few hours, I still can’t quite grasp it, and most battles feel like I’m just mashing X or 〇 at random, and eventually, the battle is won.
An Empty Open World
Perhaps one of the most disappointing aspects of Tales of Graces has to be its overworld. It feels extremely empty, with not much to do. There are some elements here and there which you can jot down in the Discovery Book, but you can’t even turn the camera with the right stick, and in reality, all you can do is go to your next destination.
Though the open world may feel empty, I will at least give credit where credit’s due and say that I enjoy the fact that enemy encounters aren’t random. I’ve never been a huge fan of random encounters, so I liked not having to face the enemies unless I really wanted to. Still, it would’ve been nice if there was more to do.
The Tales’ series iconic skits are thankfully present here, and while I vastly prefer the squares in Tales of Symphonia, I also like how expressive the characters are during those cutscenes. Certain skits in the original version’s DLC that were only available in Japanese have newly added English voice overs as well.
Graphical Enhacements? Eh, Not Quite
Despite being a remaster, you can definitely tell that Tales of Graces f doesn’t do much in the graphical department. Models still retain their rather stiff animation from the PS3, with the only difference being that they’re now upscaled to 4K, and perhaps nothing more. There were many times during my playthrough where I couldn’t help but sigh and say “yep, that’s…a PS3 game all right”.
This also extends to the voice acting of the game. At first, I put the voices in Japanese, and I couldn’t help but notice that Cheria’s voice felt very compressed, especially when compared to other characters. After this, I switched back to English, and well, the issue extended to different characters.
Bandai Namco did mention that they have added English voiceover to the DLC skits that were previously Japanese only. For these scenes, Cheria’s English VA changed from Laura Bailey to Alexis Tipton, but the rest of the cast has all returned to voice all of those characters.
I want to believe that because those voice recordings were made for the remake, you can tell that the quality of the audio is much better. It’s sad that Bandai didn’t at least bother to uncompress the audio, but frankly, I think they just didn’t really care about it, and just wanted Tales of Graces on a more modern platform, which is a shame if so.
A Game for the Fans, Not So Much for Newbies
Tales of Graces f Remastered is definitely what it says on the tin: It’s definitely a Tales of remaster. If you’re already a fan of the series, and have played either the Wii original or the PS3 port, and want to revisit Asbel’s tale modern hardware, then you’ll definitely enjoy it. However, for newbies to the series…buyer beware if you’re the type to enjoy an RPG’s story, as Tales of Graces’s story has to be one of the weakest points in the link, or at least, until you get to a certain point.
I still think there could’ve been more to Tales of Graces that could’ve appealed to me, but it’s certainly not a game I would go out of my way to play for long periods of time. However, if you don’t want to dust off your PS3, then the $40 required to get the game might be worth it for the right person.
Joys
- Very funny skits
- Very interesting post-game
- The remake features some quality of life improvements
Cons
- Confusing battle system
- An empty world to explore
- Hardly any graphical improvements
