Developer: Namco Bandai

Publisher: Namco Bandai

Genre: JRPG

Rating: 12+

Platform: PlayStation 3

Release date: Out now

Tales of Graces f really is an interesting game. Its story while weak at the start does grow and become more interest as the game progresses, combat is fast paced with encounters ending is pretty much the blink of an eye.

The story of Tales of Graces f is rather interesting with the games main theme being friendship, which does initially sound pretty weak, but the theme works really well even to the point of where you may not even notice it at times. The games story revolves around Asbel future Lord of the area known as Lhant whose future is changed seven years ago when he and his brother (Hubert) found a mysterious girl with no memory on a cliff. Shortly after he and the girl known as Sophie befriend Richard, Prince of a neighbouring nation. As you might imagine tragedy struck when Sophie, Asbel, Hubert and friend Cheria attempted to sneak into Richard’s castle to meet him, during the attempt to sneak in they are attacked by a mysterious creature which injures all of them and kills Sophie.

Her death troubled Asbel and leads him to becoming a knight and forever changed the friendship of the group. The story starts up again in the present day and while visiting Lhant, Asbel finds Sophie alive and well but with no memory of previously meeting him. After this we learn Richard has become evil after you save him from being assassinated and you, Sophie, Cheria and later Hubert, Asbel’s captain known as Malik and the hyperactive Pascal embark on a journey to save Richard and to stop him from stealing large amounts of Cryas which people need to survive and without it the planet will die.

The story while at the beginning sounds less than excited does grown and become a rather interesting story, with you learning the political climate of the three major nations and how Richard’s actions have lead all three nations to the cusp of war with each other. As I said the overall them is friendship and the games story doesn’t let you forget about it as Asbel keeps going on how he will save his friend Richard and how he can’t believe he is evil (I really disliked the fact it took a good few hours of gameplay for Asbel to realize Richard was pretty much evil).

I found the games six main characters Asbel, Hubert, Richard, Sophie, Pascal and Captain Malik all to be pretty much unforgettable, as each character brought a unique personality and a type of secret. For example at the start Pascal is introduced as a bit of an airheaded archaeologist, but later in the game we learn she is more of a carefree genius when it comes to Cryas and ancient technology.

Combat in Tales of Graces f is a bit mixed in my opinion. On one hand it easy to pick up and use, but on the other hand I found myself just mashing buttons to fight. The games combat is called “Style Shift – Linear Motion Battle System” and it allows for a free form active combat system which requires you to actively dodge and attack in real time. Combat supports up to four players with you and three companions controlled by computer (friends can join battles at anytime and take control of one of the computer controlled allies.

As I said combat involves a lot of button mashing for me as you have two forms of attacking physical attacks triggered by the X button and magic styled attacks triggered by the O button and when you combine a direction from the left analog stick you can perform different attacks. Now as the game goes on and enemies become more powerful I found myself just wildly moving the analog stick while pressing X or O buttons and hoping to win.

The enemy and ally AI for combat where both rather good, with allies offering a lot of help when it comes to healing or using powerful attacks at the right time etc. on the other hand the enemy AI was a bit mixed, at times I found the standard monsters you ran into around the world to be at time to be a greater challenge then some of the bosses I faced, in terms of how much I had to actively dodge etc.

I found the story, characters and combat to be some to be the major parts of the game, but there is also other parts of the game that were interesting which include puzzles. The puzzles in the game where interesting as some were deceptively easy, I remember getting confused with some puzzles only to discover I just had to move one block in another direct to complete it. The puzzles are a nice addition and as you get further into the game they become more difficult.

The voice acting in the game was very well done in my opinion and did a good job of conveying the emotion of each character which honestly if they hadn’t done this right it could have messed up the theme of the game a bit. Also graphically the game was nicely done with an anime style cell-shaded style.

Like any game there were multiple cutscenes which where nearly all voiced over. The cutscenes where delivered as original anime cutscene and as in-game cutscenes, unfortunately there weren’t that many anime cutscene in the game. For the most part the cutscenes where good apart from one which was rather cringe worth with the dialogue and interaction.

The game does offer a lot of content, it took me about 27 hours game time to complete but that could vary from player to player. Interestingly enough when you complete the game it isn’t over as there is an extra story called “Lineage and Legacies” which is an additional 10 hours of gameplay and it takes place one year after the end of the main story.

If I was to be negative about the game I would have to say there is a lot of back tracking to complete objectives. For example you might have to walk half way around the world to go to a certain place you had being to earlier and as such fight lower level monster, but that issue does begin to go away after you receive a quick travel ability but unfortunately that is not gaining until much later in the game.

Overall the game has great unique characters and an interesting if yet button mashing combat with a story that starts of poorly but quickly become memorable adventure.

SCORE: 80%