Was 10 years worth the wait?
On the Vesperator
Tales of Vesperia stars Yuri Lowell, an ex-knight who gets a little too involved in a local problem in his part of the city, and eventually gets to, surprise surprise, save the world. Although the storyline may cling more towards the original, the characters are still unique and keep you guessing every now and then. The story felt a little slow in the first hour but certainly picks up afterwards.
Eternal Sowhat-what?
The graphics are easily the selling point, even outdoing the developer's previous project, Eternal Sonata. All the characters, Environments, and weaponry have a crisp, vibrant, and colorful look to them, making ToV the best-looking cel-shading to date. The only gripe one could have in terms of graphics is a lack of attention to the battlefield environments, and the world map doesn't look that impressive.
Artes and Crafts
Using an adaptation of the original ToV, Tales of Vesperia implements a free-roaming action system that starts off very light, but allows for some clever customization in both strategy and abilities themselves. The artes method(Similar to the tech moves in Chrono Trigger*) allows easy access to a few variety of beautifully animated moves by a change inside the menu. Looks aside, your preferred style of hack and slash is dependent on your choices of moves. Yuri's dragon Swarm and Ghost Wolf aren't too far off from many moves from Ninja Gaiden.
It's like Chess... but with swords!
Just like in the original as well, you other 3 partners are accessible in mid-combat for using items and healing artes in casse the crap hits the fan. If you get tired of playing Yuri all the time, feel free to change leaders to one of the other characters as a nice change of pace: That's right ladies, no need to play console RPGs as the generic male hero. Changing your leader to a healer can be a bright idea for boss battles if your AI friends have a hard time keeping up.
Omniwho?
To add a little zing to this gameplay, some "uber attacks" have been added in the game, The over limit gauge grows after hitting an enemy or getting hit. Once activated, you can attack in one long combo for a short time. You can also use burst artes during this, a powerful attack that come free of TP cost. Finally fatal strike, with the right timing, can instantly kill off an enemy, and do excessive damage to bosses. All of this adds up to an old-school, entertaining method of mercilessly killing... while cel-shaded.
Sum up 35 hours in a Paragraph
In the end, tales of vesperia reminds us what keeps action RPGs great, with enough tweaks to keep you interested. With a massive graphical overhaul and a clever enough storyline, it manages to upt even Eternal Sonata to shame. ToV is a safe bet in a world of iffy JRPGS, and is a reccomended title for those looking for a little old with a little new, and very pretty graphics.