Tales of Vesperia is the latest entry into the fairly successful Tales series. There are more than ten games in the series spanning multiple consoles, Starting with Tales of Phantasia back on the Super Famicom. While the series has changed much from its beginnings, it still remains the same in some aspects. At its core, it is still a Japanese RPG series. The Tales battle system has always been what separates it from other RPGs as it Plays more like a fighting game than a traditional turn based RPG. Battles are fast, furious, and fun. Sometimes they get a bit button mashy, but they are never really dull.

Tales of Vesperia is no different. The battle system is pretty much the same as 2007’s Tales of the Abyss. Not a lot has changed, and not a lot needed to be. Combat flows smoothly, and is enjoyable and easy to learn. B for normal attacks, A and a direction on the thumbpad for skills, or “Artes” as they are called. String them together and its a combo. I found myself grinding for experience even when I didn’t need to just because battles were really fun. Although if you really wanted to, you could download character levels from Xbox live. Seems kind of a waste, but if you need to its there.

At the heart of any RPG is its story and characters. While Vesperia doesn’t really break any new ground with its story, it’s still interesting, especially the way it’s broken up. It almost feels like three stories in one, each with its own antagonist, which felt like a nice twist. Despite some of the cliches and “been there done that” parts of the plot, it was still a rather good story. The story is also fairly well written and translated for the most part, with just a few awkward lines here and there. The English voice actors did a good job portraying their characters.

While the characters filled in quite a few RPG character stereotypes, I really didn’t find any that were unlikable or annoying. Yuri, the main protagonist especially, comes off being more of an anti-hero at first, very cynical, and kind of a jackass. Deep down he’s actually not a bad person, and is a very likable main character. He does have a bit of a dark side, though. The female lead, Estelle is basically a “sheltered little princess” That doesn’t know anything about the outside world, and is incredibly naïve. This makes for some interesting exchanges between the two.

While this game has a few shortcomings and doesn’t really break a lot of new ground, it’s still one of the best RPGs on the 360, and one of the better games in the Tales series. It looks beautiful, it tells a fairly interesting story, and the characters are likable. The good definitely outweigh the bad. Not only that, it’s very lengthy as well. You will get your money’s worth. Took me 40 hours to beat, and I pretty much just powered through the main story. No side quests or anything. I would say this game is a definite buy if you enjoy RPGs.

	System:	Xbox 360
	Genre:	RPG
	Experience:	Played through the main storyline in 40 hours.

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