Tales of Berseria (PC) Review

By Renan Fontes 30.01.2017

Review for Tales of Berseria on PC

Tales of Zestiria, while not necessarily bad, was nothing short of a disappointment. Meant to mark the 20th anniversary of the series, Zestiria brought the series back to its root to pay tribute to the foundation Phantasia set. The intent is certainly admirable, but the execution was lacking, leading to a lacklustre anniversary title that should and could have been better. Just a little over one year later, Tales of Berseria (PS4 review here) acts as an almost antithesis to Zestiria. By far the darkest and most violent Tales instalment yet, Berseria leads the series down a new path for better or worse.

It's not unusual for an RPG to use the death of a character, or characters, as a driving force for the protagonist's motivation. Some of the lightest titles in the RPG genre open with death and go from there, but very few portray death as brutal and vicious as Tales of Berseria.

Opening with two children running against a blood red background makes for an incredibly memorable introduction, and suits the story rather well thematically. The Holy Midgand Empire is far from safe and that is excellently portrayed through the aesthetics. Death surrounds the brief opening, so it can be a bit jarring when it ends and Velvet is properly introduced in a traditional Tales setting. The quirky main character lives in their simple village, but, unbeknownst to them, their life is about to change forever.

Screenshot for Tales of Berseria on PC

While the familiarity is intentional and meant to be broken down during the first hour, it suffers from poor telegraphing and pacing. Velvet interacts with her quaint village, but nobody feels like a real character save her brother, Laphicet, and brother-in-law, Arthur. On top of that, the village doesn't have much to offer in terms of attachment. Velvet cannot interact with every villager and the few she can are underwritten and don't have much to say outside of exposition.

It's a shame the first real section is lacking in meaningful interactivity because the rest of Tales of Berseria features an incredibly consistent narrative whose story only improves as its cast and world grows and develops.

Velvet and her five companions all feel very developed, which isn't unusual for Tales of, but what is unusual is how each character feels equally as important to the plot. Everyone has a purpose and a goal in joining Velvet. It certainly helps that each of Velvet's party members are social pariahs in a sense, disregarded by the rest of the world. They take on their roles as outcasts and use that to fuel their motivations, which lets Tales of Berseria have perhaps the most thematically sound party. As good as the story and characters are, though, nothing manages to outshine the stellar combat.

Screenshot for Tales of Berseria on PC

Aside from a few uninspired enemy designs, there is little to dislike in regards to Berseria's action. The introduction of the soul gauge may feel like a limitation at first, but it allows for the cleanest and smartest combat the series has seen.

In battle, Velvet and her party will each have soul gauges that determine how many attacks they can use before needing to recharge. This adds a level of strategy, and spamming artes and spells is no longer viable, as it would leave the party unable to attack too frequently. Instead, attacks have to be carefully chained in and out of each other with actual thought required.

Best of all, combos are entirely customisable, as each party member's moveset can be edited. Combos are divided into four phases and each phase can hold any arte or spell that character has access to, leading to hundreds of different combinations. Not every combo is going to be a winner, but half the fun of Berseria's combat is the experimentation.

Screenshot for Tales of Berseria on PC

The Break Soul mechanic adds further depth to the combat, as characters can choose to expend their soul gauge in favour of an almost "super mode," which increases the speed and strength of said character in exchange for draining their health. Killing an enemy via a Break Soul will replenish health, but overly relying on it, especially during boss fights, creates a much-appreciated risk-reward scenario with legitimate pros and cons.

Tales of Berseria's biggest problems come from the smaller moments, which is a shame since those smaller moments start to pile up. There's a fair amount of backtracking later that hurts the pacing, and the English dub is one of the worst the series has seen. Despite these problems, however, the story is strong enough to salvage the backtracking, and dual audio offers the Japanese dub as a nice alternative.

Berseria may not feel tonally consistent with the rest of the series at times, but, in this case, it is certain proof that a little bit of change is necessary for any healthy franchise.

Screenshot for Tales of Berseria on PC

Cubed3 Rating

8/10
Rated 8 out of 10

Great - Silver Award

Rated 8 out of 10

Tales of Berseria has some rough patches and could have used a bit more polish before release, but it is an otherwise strong entry in the Tales of series. Opting for a darker tone was a dangerous move on Bandai Namco's part, but it's handled with enough tact and respect to the franchise that the more cynical storyline doesn't feel alienating. It certainly helps that the combat has only been improved, with combo chaining feeling smoother than ever. Whether or not the next entry in the series decides to keep Berseria's gloomy atmosphere, it's clear enough that straying away from the series' story norms was the breath of fresh air the Tales of series was desperately in need of.

Developer

Bandai Namco

Publisher

Bandai Namco

Genre

Real Time RPG

Players

1

C3 Score

Rated $score out of 10  8/10

Reader Score

Rated $score out of 10  8/10 (1 Votes)

European release date Out now   North America release date Out now   Japan release date Out now   Australian release date Out now   

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