Tales of Graces f Remastered Review – The Cycle of Violence

Tales of Graces f Remastered Review

Tales of Graces f Remastered is the twelfth mainline installment in the Tales Series, an action-JRPG franchise that gleefully toys with fantasy genre expectations. This game tackles the cycle of violence with the series’ trademark cel-shaded graphics, playful humor, and unsubtle writing. While being straightforward and idealistic suits some games, I found that this one suffered a bit for it.

Asbel Lhant and his little brother Hubert find a mysterious amnesiac girl while out playing. They bring the newly-named Sophie back to town only to learn that nobody knows her. Asbel swears to his emotionally distant father that he’ll care for Sophie and soon befriends young Prince Richard as well. Along with the butler’s daughter, Cheria, the five form a strong bond.

The game starts quite slow, focusing on kids playing around and fighting with their families. But after a sudden tragedy, Asbel’s childhood comes to an abrupt end. When he returns to the town of Lhant as an adult, he wants only to protect those he left behind. But his old friends aren’t as eager to pick up as he hoped, and something is terribly wrong with the prince he swore to swerve.

And then Sophie abruptly reappears, having not aged a day, still determined to protect Asbel. As the crushing weight of responsibility settles on his shoulders, he must learn what it truly means to protect everyone.

Classic Combat

Tales of Graces f Remastered is an action-JRPG with a real-time combat system. You guide your party around a small battle arena, chaining combos and guarding. The more Artes you use in quick succession, the more powerful they become. There’s also a fairly nuanced dodge mechanic. And you can instruct your AI party members to follow specific strategies in battle.

You use two separate types of Artes to unleash different kinds of combos. Chain Capacity governs how many attacks you can unleash before you must disengage or guard. And Eleth Bursts can max CC out and give you a chance to really whale on the enemy. You can do a ton of stuff, and it’s all fun, making battles a delight.

You unlock new skills by equipping titles, which is neat. It’s also a fun way to encourage level grinding, as each title has rewards. The crafting system is also pretty nice. And you can push a button for a reminder of what you’re meant to do next.

There are no random encounters. You run around the map, avoiding or engaging with monsters to trigger battles. Unfortunately, the camera is fixed, which can make it difficult to navigate and access some of the game’s collectibles. These include fully-voiced skits that flesh out the world and amuse the player. Sometimes they’re sentimental, sometimes they’re funny, and sometimes they’re informative.

Tales of Graces f Remastered is Entertaining but Flawed

Tales of Graces f Remastered’s narrative is the main appeal, and that narrative is hit or miss. A lot of conflicts are driven by characters making poor decisions or behaving badly. And some of the relationships are questionable, which is a bad thing in a narrative-driven game. The Tales Series lives and dies by how invested you are in its characters. And this title has a really divisive cast.

The opening chapter, Childhood, is really long, especially if you’re collecting all the skits and levelling titles. Five hours following a bunch of kids getting into shenanigans started to drag on me. The chapter ends on a very strong note, but it also paves the way for what comes later.

Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised that a game about cycles of conflict and violence has a lot of focus on flawed parenting. But its blunt portrayal of Ashton Lance’s physical and emotional abuse of his sons clashes with the attempts at making him a nuanced character later on. At the same time, the game refuses to commit to the grim tone his actions create.

This is a game that wants to be about intergenerational trauma and how hard it is to end the cycle of violence. The pieces of a truly resonant theme are all there. What a pity it doesn’t quite stick the landing.

Looks Like a PS3 Game

Tales of Graces f Remastered is an old game and you can tell. Even remastered, this title looks like a PS3 game. The character designs are colorful and interesting, though I question adult Asbel walking around in a fantasy disco suit. Unfortunately, many of the environments and monster designs are fairly generic.

The game offers English and Japanese voice acting as well as subtitles. The English voices are pretty decent, even the children. Though it takes a definite jump in quality after the first timeskip. The soundtrack has a tendency to fade into the background. It’s not bad, but it rarely grabs my attention. The opening is good, though.

There’s a lot of customization and replayability on offer here. This title features four difficulty levels and a lot of fine control over elements of the experience. You can turn off vibration and map encounters, for instance. The Grade Shop allows you to customize a single playthrough even further. You can raise or lower EXP gain, add extra health, and make your character faster, among other things.

Tales of Graces f Remastered has a lot to say about what causes cycles of violence and abuse, and it’s not all executed well. The conclusion pulls some punches given how brutal the opening is. And if you dislike inter-party drama and daddy issues, this may not be the game for you. That said, if you’re a JRPG fan and especially a Tales fan, I still recommend it. Just maybe wait for a sale first.

***Steam code provided by the publisher***