That said, the game does offer a few indulging elements. While the exclusion does quicken the pace of New World, it also truncates the title’s playtime to the thirty-hour mark. What’s more, Symphonia’s world map- which facilitated a gratifying sense of exploration, has been excised. Obviously, the Tales team wanted to give Emil Castagnier a protracted character arc, but the game ends up replacing a cowardly, contemptible youth with a brash, disagreeable hothead. The game’s idea of bringing back Lloyd Irving, but recasting the protagonist as a possible villain seems sound- but the concept in undermined by the inclusion of an irritating new lead. The other half of the package, Dawn of the New World, doesn’t fare as well as Symphonia. Players give general directions to their CPU-controlled cohorts, with these characters demonstrating a pleasing sense of intelligence and autonomy.
Most notable is Symphonia’s adept artificial intelligence. Before long, nuance is introduced through components like EX Gems- which endow each character with up to four special skills or Unison Attacks, which unleashes a collective assault from every member of your adventuring party. Initially, the title’s clashes require scant strategy from gamers, with character able to issue beast-besting strikes with a simultaneous tug of the analog stick and a button press. On the upside, the font used during dialog sequences in much easier on the eyes.Įngaging battles have always been a staple of the Tales series, and Symphonia is no different. That means the sixty frame-per-second fluidity of the GameCube version is halved, seemingly removing a bit of the responsiveness during the title’s real-time combat. Notably, the game’s blurriness has been reduced, but in a move destined to draw the ire of graphical faultfinders, Symphonia’s seems be ported from the Japanese PlayStation 2 version. Character models and t environments receive redrawn textures which exhibit a higher fidelity, but there are still the sporadic assets such as the world map which look almost identical to the GameCube original. Naturally, Tales of Symphonia receives a visual upgrade- but unfortunately, the improvements aren’t uniform. Later, gamers will discover a number of smaller additions- from new character attacks, Mystik Artes, and even a few new skits- Tales’ optional dialog sequences which help to flesh out the story or point perplexed players in the proper direction. Having a save file from Tales of Xillia bestows a bevy of character costumes, while the preference for the original Japanese voice acting is available from the game’s menu. Although the dialog too often favors exposition over conversation, the story veers and extends in unexpected directions, ultimately providing a contenting adventure that’s capable of involving gamers for at least sixty hours.įor returning players, Improvements to Symphonia will be immediately perceptible.
Echoing the storyline of recent release Bravely Default, the narrative centers on the actions of Lloyd Irving and Colette Brunel, a duo tasked with regenerating the realm’s supply of mana by unsealing a set of five temples.
While a decade old, the title is a gratifying reminder of role-playing’s past- filled with likable protagonists and a consistently comprehensible plotline. Although the package isn’t seamless, it’s undoubtedly a collection that RPG devotees will want to own, unless their elder consoles are still tethered to their HDTVs.įor many, the inclusion of Tales of Symphonia will be the major motivation for purchase. Not to be left out of the role-playing renovation race, Bandai-Namco has released Tales of Symphonia Chronicles, a compilation comprised of the revered 2004’s GameCube title, as well as the less-lauded Wii follow-up, Dawn of the New World. Naturally, publishers have been expanding these efforts to other genres- with Square-Enix delivering both Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 ReMIX as well as the upcoming Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster. As the ever-growing convoy of action anthologies such as the Killzone, Ratchet & Clack, Sly Cooper, and Zone of the Enders collections have demonstrated, high-definition remasters appear to be profitable.