The story of Tales of Graces begins with childhood friends Asbel and Hubert living in Ephinea, a world full of political conflict and monsters. Whilst the plot may start a little slowly at first, this phase is necessary to set the background for later events. Asbel and Hubert meet a girl with no memory, whom they call Sophie. She is integrated into their group of friends and plays a central role as the story progresses. As with many memorable RPGs, Tales of Graces works hard to establish the importance of its characters and world. You experience the conflicts, which often begin locally and personally. But then events take a turn, the stakes get higher, and both a major betrayal and the deeper nature of Ephinea and the universe make for exciting escalations.

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Tales of Graces f Remastered was announced as part of the 30th anniversary of the Tales series. The original game was released in 2009 for the Wii and in 2010 as Graces f for the PS3, but was stuck on outdated hardware that isn't exactly user-friendly today. Fortunately, Graces f Remastered seems to have left the mixed reception of Symphonia Remastered behind. So the question is, is the remaster still worth your time? Spoiler: YES!


A strong cast of characters contributes greatly to the drama of Tales of Graces. Players grow and develop together with them through quests, battle dialogues and numerous cutscenes. The ability to switch between Japanese and English voice acting offers the right experience for every taste. The battle system is one of the elements that reminds me of Symphonia and is once again convincing here. Enemies are encountered on the field and battles take place in a marked circle in which you can move freely. Characters can dodge in four directions, block and strike at enemies. Attacks are divided into two categories: Artes for physical and magical abilities. Instead of a time-based system, Graces uses the so-called Chain Capacity (CC), which indicates how many actions can be performed. So the goal is to fight, earn SP and EXP, level up titles/characters to get more titles and abilities.

Some combos or special moves consume more CC and you have to wait a short time for it to replenish. The only disadvantage is that you use up CC within seconds and keep catching yourself blocking and waiting over and over again. An interesting addition to the combat system are the titles, which function like jobs. They are levelled up to unlock new abilities or buffs and you gain title experience by doing battles in order to earn SP. With around 100 titles and numerous artes, combat in Tales of Graces can be extremely fun - especially for strategists who know when to focus on opponents or split up the party. The humour is also wonderful and made me laugh a few times.

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One of the most exciting new features in Graces f Remastered is the early access to the Grade Shop, which was only available after completing the game in the original. This allows you to unlock bonuses such as more experience, increased health points or tougher challenges. If you want to get through the battles quickly, you can activate all kinds of advantages and defeat your opponents with ease. In this version, you can also repeat a fight directly after a defeat without having to reload a savegame. Almost all DLCs from the original are included, including the Lineage and Legacies DLC, which takes place after the main story and offers the characters additional closure.

The graphical overhaul brings the game's charming aesthetic to modern consoles without losing the essence of the original. The game offers enough improvements to appeal to a new audience while staying true to its roots. Tales of Graces f Remastered is a loving adaptation of a classic JRPG for modern platforms. Instead of making elaborate, unnecessary changes, Tose and Bandai Namco have paid their respects to the series by preserving the game as it was, with meaningful quality improvements. Technically solid and with a good dose of nostalgia, Tales of Graces f is a highlight for veterans and newcomers alike. It impressively demonstrates that not every game has to be a remake on the level of Final Fantasy VII Remake to shine especially after Tales of Arise was such a big disappointment for me.

The big problem, however: Unnecessary combobreakers from bosses that have super armour, can cast the Artes without any problems or beat your arse are very annoying. There are bosses that do environmental damage every second or break all forms of combos. Flying enemies are also annoying because you can't jump in battle. Tales of Graces F does a wonderful job with the combat system, but unfortunately some bosses/enemies are more than tiring and leave a bad aftertaste. Something that Tales of Symphonia does insanely well.


Tales of Graces f Remastered is a role-playing game remaster as it should be. It maintains the quality of the original, but improves it visually and adds a few new features that improve the gaming experience for newcomers and fans alike. The remasters in the series can go on like this and I'm looking forward on what their next remaster will be. Even if not everything about the game is perfect and things like super armour and annoying bosses make small cracks in the pink nostalgia bubble, it's still worth buying, even at full price.

Tales of Graces f Remastered is an action JRPG that leans heavily on action part of the JRPG. If you've played previous Tales of games (Tales of Vesperia, Zestiria, Berseria, etc.) you'll like know what you're getting into as it's more of the same skits, action and heavy combat spreeing once again. (Before I get to writing I want to mention this is the first time I'm playing Tales of Graces so bear with me for a first timer!)

Straight off the bat, I want to mention that Tales of games are all self contained unless stated otherwise! I want to start off by talking about the combat because for me personally it's one of the best that the Tales of Series has to offer. The amount of chaining/fluid combos that you can do in this game makes it enjoyable from start to finish. The game tends to slowly introduce more things to a solid base which built up the battle systems very well as a result. My criticism is more towards the fact that flying enemies have a lot of advantages if you're playing as more grounded fighter (Asbel, Sophie, etc.) so you're kinda forced to switch to a mage type if you want to combat those and it does pose a bit of an inconvenience but it's something you kind of have to deal with. Enemies cancelling your attack mid attack can also come as a bit of an annoyance later in the game but it can be managed if you just avoid smartly at times and be mindful of which attacks are coming. The title system (equip a title to unlock stat boosts or new moves) was a highly interesting system that I would like to see Bandai Namco go back to in the future if they would do so because it was fun to experiment with certain builds and it provided more depth I found too.

The story for the game is a mixed bag for me. Whilst, I loved the characters and the stories they had self contained the overarching story was very cliched and was one of the weaker points of the game. The world is very interesting of Ephinea in Tales of Graces and the mysteries of the world are all very awesome to when they're revealed but the base story is very much about the friendship of all the characters. While I did not like the main story I feel like Lineages and Legacies (epilogue chapter) really did redeem itself by making a solid attempt to wrap everything up in the end even though certain things remained a slight annoyance regarding a few characters (I can't believe Asbel is so oblivious haha). Having being critical of the story, the characters more than make up for it and I think that's what carried me through the game because they had solid chemistry throughout. It really made the experience a lot better than what was presented initially with the story.

Some other thoughts, the skits are still great if you liked them in previous entries of the Tales of series and there's a ton of side stuff to do like card collection (can be annoying as the field items only have a chance of them appearing sometimes), side shot puzzle mini game, battle arena, etc. You're looking at a solid 60-70 hours+ of gameplay if you plan to actually tackle everything.

My overall thoughts on the game? I stated several times that I think this is the best Tales of in terms of combat gameplay and I think I'll stick that as my final assessment but if you're wanting something a bit more story focused I think other tales of games have a better story but this one overall for the combat really elevates to a fun time for me.

8/10

Not the most perfect of story as the main character can feel a little immature at times. But the overall story is still good and cohesive. The whole premise is pretty heartwarming especially starting the friendship from the Childhood arc. General direction of the story can be pretty predictable but the simplicity of the story highlights the beauty of the game as well.

The character interactions, skits in this game are really fun and I had a lot of fun doing the sidequests while reading about the characters' quirks.

The combat is very smooth and I enjoyed every small little encounters even with the trivial enemies. The fights can be pretty challenging especially at some boss fights as they really test if you have been respecting the combat system and punish brainless button mashing habits. Performance-wise, I didn't experience any issue while playing on the maximum setting all the way. I have experienced 1 crash so far after about 200 hours into the game. Thank goodness I saved frequently at the widely available save points.

Definitely recommended to all Tales fans.
For non-tales fans that are unsure, definitely get it if this is on sale.
For people that only played Tales of Arise, this is a decent stepping stone to explore other Tales games.