The latest entry in the long-running Tales series, which sees the move into HD. Vesperia is a wonderfully crafted JRPG
The story begins with the main character, Yuri Lowell. A somewhat fly-by-his-own-pants type a guy, who doesn't care what people say, and looks outs for others. His quest begins by investigating the lost Aque Blastia Core from the Lower Quarter of the Imperial City. Wait. What? Blastia? Tales of Vesperia names magic, as Aer, and the tools in which man kind harness that magic, as Blastia. For the sake of this review, I'm not going to go into depth about it all.
In any case, Yuri set's out to find out who stole the Blastia Core, and hopefully return it. What he doesn't expect is that he'll eventually get dragged into a quest to save the entire world from a powerful and ancient force.
He first meets Estelle, an apparent noble who lives within the Imperial castle, and upon meeting Yuri (and Yuri's totally awesome pipe smoking dog, Repeade), asks him to escort her out. The two meet eventually meet a large number of people over the course of the game, including brash young Karol, hot-tempted Rita, smooth talking Raven, and the calm minded Judith. All of whom will make up the bulk of your party over the course of the game.
Tales of Vesperia, unlike other JRPG's, has a very realistic nature about it. Story wise, it starts of small, and slowly becomes bigger and bigger until every choice your characters make effects the entire planet. The interaction's between the characters is charming, and feels personable. You see clear character development in each of them, and watch them as they grow closer together over the course of the game. These types of things, I feel, enriches the gaming experience.
Visually Vesperia is stunning. The game is presented in HD, with 3D cell-shading like graphics. Even though the animation of the characters is limited, and the background looks like it's pre-rendered, the world and everything in it, is stunning.
The battle segments, like any previous Tales game, is real-time. You move along a set path, left to right, with the option to roam freely by holding the left trigger. Battles are more or less, easy. You can hack and slash with the X button, guard with the B, and perform special arte attack's with A. Early in the game you'll find yourself hacking away with the X button, relying little on Artes. However as you progress, you will rely more and more on Artes, combining normal attacks and special for maximum damage.
The soundtrack is simple, but effective. The main song of the game, "Ring a Bell" is one of the best J-Pop tracks I've heard in a long time. The battle music is effective, and overall, every piece of music sets the atmosphere perfectly.
One of the highlights of the Tales series is its use of Anime cuscenes. Sadly, Vesperia lacks enough of them, but delivers with the few it has. Anime in a game I feel is great, because, it allows you to see the characters fully animated.
Overall, I enjoyed every aspect of this game. I said at the begin that there wasn't anything negative I could say, but, the game does drag story wise sometimes when the characters sort of dwell on the same story elements and themes over and over. Apart from that, Tales of Vesperia delivers. It's an action packed, time consuming, enriching gaming experience that will please any JRPG 360 owners.
Story: 10
Visuals: 8
Sound: 9
Gameplay: 9