Tales of Legendia

"A worthwhile RPG that puts characters before gameplay"

Tales of Legendia is yet another game in Namco's Tales series, a series whose popularity is mainly in Japan. While it is generally considered a step back from Tales of Symphonia, the only Tales title to sell well in the United States, it is a game worthwhile for fans of the action RPG who don't expect it to be another Tales of Symphonia.

The main game starts of with the protagonist, Senel, and his sister, Shirley, on a ship at sea. A dense fog and strong waves bring them to the Legacy, an enormous ship that they initially believe is an island. This ship, large enough to accommodate a town, rivers, mountains, and other landmarks, serves as the location for the rest of the game. Upon arrival on the Legacy, Shirley is kidnapped, and Senel is determined to save her. What starts as a search for Shirley grows into much, much more. Along the journey, the player learns about a past conflict that is at the heart of growing tensions on the Legacy, and Senel meets friends who will aid him in ending these tensions and saving Shirley. Sounds all good, right? Well, not quite; there are a few problems. The story suffers from being cliche, and a few glaring plot holes weaken its impact. It's interesting, but it has some problems.

From there, the game doesn't just end. There are more chapters whose total duration is approximately equal to that of the main quest. These chapters focus on the characters that weren't at the center of the main quest. Each character quest is a chapter of the game that focuses on a particular character. At the start of the character quests, a dark mist mysteriously appears and makes some of the monsters stronger. While the each of the quests focuses on one character in specific, they all share the idea of the mist, hence adding another story to Tales of Legendia. The result is nearly double the time of gameplay, very well-developed characters, and a more enjoyable experience.

With regards to the actual characters, let me begin by saying that the characters of a game have an influence that is separate from that of the plot. For example, a game with a good plot can have characters that are lacking, and that can cause players to enjoy the game less. Because of this, the characters are a separate, yet very important part of a game, especially when it comes to RPGs. After all, who would want to help a protagonist about whom he could care less?

With that said, the characters are where Tales of Legendia really shines. From the beginning, the character development in this game is excellent. At first, the game follows how Senel feels and acts through his adventure. He grows through interactions with other characters and matures through the main quest. The player gains an understanding of not only Senel, but also the other characters in the main quest through the numerous interactions.

However, the main quest marks only the beginning in this game's characters. In the character quests, each character gains plenty of depth in his quest by resolving a major issue pertaining to him. Each character deals with something that the main quest mentions but never really emphasizes. This "something" haunts his past; the stories include the need for revenge, fulfilling the dream of a role model, fixing strained family relations, and many other tales that add depth to the characters. Because of the development in the character quests, Tales of Legendia has some of the most well developed characters of any game I have played to this day.

What is the most important part of any video game? Gameplay. In this case, it's battle system in particular that is most important. Tales of Legendia, like the other games in the series, uses a real-time battle system. It's back to the two-dimensional field for battles, and the side-scrolling feel is a complaint of many. The field is easily crowded, and the fact that it is limited to a single line makes things even more hectic, especially when there are some bosses that take up a large portion of the screen. The battles mainly consist of the player controlling one character out of a party of four and running toward the enemy to attack. From there, it degenerates into a button masher. Mashing buttons is the easiest way to win some battles, and while it may be fun, it is the reason that only a few battles during the entire course of the game require any strategy.

In this game's case, the characters do gain certain skills that can be set to certain button combinations. The player can perform these skills with his controlled character in battle or order the AI-controlled characters to perform certain skills. Combining certain attacks adds a dimension of excitement to the battle system. However, while there are some effective combinations, the button-mashing tactic of using normal attacks consistently is just as, if not more, effective for the most part. Also, the AI-controlled characters, unless constantly watched, will do some stupid things. Melee AI characters tend to die fairly quickly, and mage AI characters seem to pay no attention to an enemy's resistance to certain elements.

During the main quest, battles are usually short and uneventful, consisting of the player mashing buttons until the enemy falls. During the character quests, it gets worse. Normal enemies gain an obscene amount of HP, and even non-boss fights become time-consuming. This is further aggravated by the fact that Tales of Legendia uses a system of random encounters. The encounter rate is slightly on the high side. To make matters worse, there are certain zones that hold treasure chests. These zones have a significantly higher encounter rate, and if the player wants the treasure, he will almost surely have to fight a monster. This coupled with the already existing rate can make treasure hunting a chore. At least there are items that can temporarily lower the encounter rate…

When it comes to difficulty, Tales of Legendia has three settings: easy, normal, and hard. On the surface, this is great. However, the differences in the difficulties are not too noticeable, consisting primarily of less-than-significant HP boosts. The biggest difference between hard mode and normal modes, for example, is the length of the battles. Also, the game is inherently on the easy side on any difficulty setting. Very few fights require planning, and button mashing is just as good a strategy as any for the most part.

The dungeons are nice overall, and the length of most of them is fine. Some can be annoying to navigate, but the design of the dungeons makes running through them enjoyable. Backtracking is not too much of a problem in the main quest because the player is automatically taken out of a dungeon after he completes it more often than not. However, in the character quests, backtracking becomes quite a nuisance, and the player will be required to manually leave most dungeons. Also, another problem is that in the character quests is that just about all of the dungeons are revisited, and very few, if any, new dungeons are introduced. Trekking through all these dungeons twice more just to earn a bit of depth for the characters can be tedious at times.

Next, the dungeons themselves do not have puzzles; instead, they have a duct to a separate room with a puzzle that involves hitting switches and moving blocks. These puzzles are easy at first, but they get gradually harder. That part is fine. However, the only problem is that with one of them in almost every dungeon, they get pretty repetitive, and this is just about the only type of puzzle in this game.

Another problem with Tales of Legendia's gameplay lies on the world map. The design of the map itself is nice, but every time the player appears on the world map, whether from a town, a dungeon, or even after a fight, there is an annoying two-second interval in which the camera has to reset and the player cannot move the character. This may not sound like much, but it can be enough to disrupt the flow of travel. Also, the large world map with which one can view the entire area lacks a lot of detail; therefore, while traveling, one must rely almost exclusively on the minimap, which is, well, mini. However, there is one positive aspect of world map travel: the ducts. These can immediately transport the player between many locations he has already visited, and they particularly help in the character quests, which include a lot of revisiting.

The game leaves much to be desired in the way of replay value. While there is a grade shop at the end in which the player can purchase "adjustments" for when he starts a new game, none of these make replaying the game worthwhile. While there is a display of total items collected by the player that can remain for a new game, there isn't any incentive to complete it. There are no rewards or extras. The fact that nothing is offered for replaying the game hurts its overall replay value.

Tales of Legendia features music that is different from that of most Tales games. While the actual number of tracks may not be the most impressive thing, the quality is fairly high. There are many memorable tracks, and most of the songs fit the mood and the atmosphere of the part of the game at which they play. In addition, almost all the tracks in this game sounded great, and I cannot recall one that was particularly annoying. Some of the tracks do get a little repetitive at times, but the quality doesn't slack.

The voice acting is very good as well. The voices of the characters fit with their personalities and add to the characters. In fact, I would have been willing to say that voice acting was one of the strongest parts of this game if it wasn't for one thing: the fact that it disappears halfway through the game. That's right; other than the few exceptions, there is no voice acting for the character quests. Some situations that could have been greatly enhanced by voices remain silent.

Graphically, the game is different than what most expect from a RPG game in the Playstation 2 generation. I ended up liking the designs of the characters and the dungeons, but it could easily turn some people off. The character design wasn't the best thing in the game, but it wasn't exactly horrible. The dungeons are very nice, and the world map (once the player gets past its other annoyances) can be pleasant to observe.

With all that considered, I would give this game a solid 7/10. If I had to summarize, I would say that it has excellent character development, an above average story that is enough to keep the player interested, and gameplay that is enjoyable but flawed. It is a worthwhile game in the end, but there are a few flaws that bring down its score. In areas like story and gameplay, I see wasted potential. As for renting or buying, I would recommend buying this game to those who enjoy real-time combat in games but will not be repelled by the two-dimensional nature of this game's battles. For those unsure, renting the game before buying it would be a good idea.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 03/01/06, Updated 08/23/06