Alright! Let's do tales of Xillia. Now if you've read my last post, I think you'd already know the general distaste I have for Xillia. I started playing it immediately after Tales of Graces f (which I completely adore!) and had high hopes for it because of the reviews and the aesthetics. Of course everything stated in this post is my own opinion and I'm well aware that a huge chunk of Tales fans love this game. So without further ado, let's rip into this one.
(Disclaimer: I only played Milla's version of the game as after my 1st play through, I had such a bad taste in my mouth I couldn't play through the game again with Jude)
Plot (spoiler free): The game starts with the player (you!) getting to pick between Jude, or the first ever female main character of the Tales series, Milla. The game starts with Milla (a God) trying to break into a high tech facility with the staple summons of the Tales series, Efreet, Undine, Sylph and Gnome.
She comes across the worst character ever created, Jude and for no reason other than 'Plot?' he joins her. They try to destroy a weapon created by an evil king to capture spirits to use their energy as pawns of war (yawn) only to have her 4 spirits stolen from her. Without said spirits, she becomes a normal human being and goes on a quest with Jude (why?) to save them and the world. Also they meet a buncha dull paper thin characters I guess.Opinion: Okay so the plot is very typical Tales. As usual there was a checklist and they ticked every box for this one. I couldn't shake the feeling of, oh it's just another Tales game with this one. I won't go too deep but like the others, there are twist and turns I just wished I was more invested in the characters to care. While not the worst aspect of the game, it did leave a lot to be desired. 3/5 Soul.
Setting: Alright, I have to admit the setting for Tales of Xillia is good. It's a fantasy setting as usual with Tales but it's mixed in with massive urban cities and areas with technological prowesses. Which makes sense because there's a constant war going on and like in the real world, a lot of money goes into building better machines and weapons. Some areas like the 'dungeons' and the fields end up looking the same though. It felt like a chore having to walk through the same 3 areas (I don't know why but they got rid of the constant puzzle filled dungeons that is a staple to Tales for an obligatory 3 fields/maps and done areas) to get to the next town and I feel it bogged the game down. 2/5 Soul.
 |
| From the left, Alvin, Rowen, Jude, Milla, Elize and Leia.
Character(s): Seeing as how this game has been out for a while and I want to bitch and moan. I will be talking about all the characters. They are all Tales/ manga anime archetypes and go no further outside of their designated stereotype (warning: possible spoilers)
Alvin: Probably the only character I liked but was bogged down by shotty/lazy writing that ruined any likability he had as a character.He was cool and he fights with a sword and gun but he betrays the cast like 3 times? by the third I was over him and everything about him. Next.
Rowen: The voice of reason for the cast ( cos hes old I guess) an ex-militant, he sees the error of his ways and the war and changes to become a paper thin old wise sensei character. He used throwing knifes as a weapon and was the primary mage of the team.
Elize: Omg Elize...okay so she's the designated Loli and dear god was she boring. Normally the youngest character in a Tales game is the one you build the most attachment to (e.g Sophie from Graces and Karol from Vesperia) but not here. Her voice actor was not good and neither was the writing for her character. She was the secondary healer. Also she had a talking doll or whatever and it was super annoying and participated in skits.
Leia: Leia was a sad case of missed opportunity, she had the most character development only for it to amount to nothing in the end. Her stereotype was the god awful childhood friend and boy, do I hate that stereotype! Of course she would be madly in love with her childhood friend, Jude. And outside of a scene where they TELL us they had fun that one time during a birhday party a whole decade ago, Jude treats her very badly which makes me wonder why are they still friends. She was the primary healer of the group which also angered me. Jude is a doctor to be, while she was an inn keeper's daughter who worked at a clinic and mentions many times about her martial art prowess!
Milla: The first ever female main character of a Tales series, she gives off a 'Lightning from Final Fantasy 13' vibe. She had no personality outside of one or two predetermined traits, one of which was being hungry all the time (yawn). Her stereotype was the childlike innocence of never experiencing the outside world and it's as boring as it sounds. She was a God who had to live as a human, where did this go wrong? She fought with a sword but instead of inheriting the swordman's skills from the previous games, she wound up with Pascal from Graces' short range magic....why...
Jude: And we made it to the shit of the shits, Jude. My god where do I start with him. He joins the adventure without a single motivation outside of his love at first sight with Milla and has 0 character development throughout. He's a total wuss and needs to be slapped in his Milla obsessed face. His stereotype is the puppy you can't get rid of. His character is the most shallow of the cast and this is including Elize, it has no depth outside of 'Must Love Milla!!' I might've been able to enjoy this game more had this character not existed. Why was he created? You can have a solo female main character Bandai Namco!
1/5 Soul
 |
Gameplay: In the previous post I had a battle section instead of gameplay, but I'll be using gameplay going forwardto describe and rate the general way the game plays.
Okay so the battle system while not the worst, is a far cry from Tales of Graces f which I considered the funnest system until Zestiria. Xillia is clunky and filled with frame rate issues. You wanna do a cool finishing move? here's a buncha lag. Also back to the clunky comment, in Graces I was hitting 100+ hit combos towards the end of the game while in Xillia I'd maybe do 20 if I'm lucky before it breaks. Maybe I sucked at the combat but that just proves the point I'm trying to make, it's not fun.
This game is not the first to not feature an open world, instead it's list based and that's fine. I liked Graces despite not having an open world but where it fails is they've mostly gotten rid of the multi level dungeons in favor of just having you walk from one place to another in maps filled with monsters. And they ALWAYS come in 3s, everytime you want to get to point A to point B, you always know to expect the same map reused 3 times and it destroys the immersion. Also wheres my cute flying ship??!!
 |
| Ba'Ul From Tales of Vesperia |
Overall: I was very disappointed in Tales of Xillia and if not for my disdain for the game, I would've forgotten every single part of it. The plot was nothing new, the characters were horrible (and forgettable or in Jude's case, unforgettably bad) and the gameplay was not fun. Overall I give it 1/5 Soul. The only redeemable thing about it is the graphics which the ps3 couldn't handle anyway.
Stay in touch as we delve into my 1st nostalgic review with Vanguard Bandits! (1998)
No comments:
Post a Comment