J'avais testé ce jeu quand j'étais qu'un noob de Tales Of et j'ai dû abandonner le jeu car c'était bien trop différent par rapport à berseria et arise, mais j'ai décidé de tester le jeu maintenant que j'ai un peu plus d'expérience niveau Tales... Eh mince, ce jeu est incroyable wtf !

Le gameplay est tout simplement MAGNIFIQUE, le système des soma et level-up ça me rappelle Xillia, et ça c'est une très bonne chose car c'est hyper addictif de pouvoir choisir quels stats on veut améliorer et quels artes on veut débloquer. Les "assault" honnêtement c'est l'un des trucs les plus fun qu'ils ont ajouté à un jeu Tales wow c'est vraiment trop fun de spam ces trucs et détruire les ennemies, ça aide à créer des combos hyper longs et c'est hyper stylé. Le scénario à vrai dire c'est pas mal du tout, ouais il y a quelques clichés à la fin mais c'est BIEEEEN plus dark que je ne le pensais (il y a plus de morts dans ce jeu que dans tous les jeux de l'arc erebonia dans kiseki 💀)

ET OUAH LES PERSOS, ils sont juste magnifiques. Le truc drôle c'est que je croyais que mon perso pref serait Inès (vu qu'elle est une meuf badass toute stylée et musclée) mais écoutez, elle est géniale mais BERYL EST LE MEILLEUR PERSO DU JEU DE LOIN ELLE EST HILARANTE ET EST TELLEMENT OP ELLE A BOTTÉ LE CUL DU FINAL BOSS AVEC SON SPAM D'INDIGNATION. AH ET SA VOIX EST TROP HILARANTE AUSSI BON SANG

Et ouais, en gros ce jeu est drôlement bon, genre, niveau défauts à part quelques cliches du scénario je pense qu'il y en a pas vraiment

Ultimately, I think my problems with this game simply comes down to seeing a better way they could have done it, and being annoyed they didn't go with that. I'm not in full agreement with the way Tales of Hearts R uses it's main villains or the way it paces it's plot points either. Basically, it just feels to me that they tried to course correct a lot of the original Tales of Hearts story for this remake, but simply couldn't iron out all the problems while doing that. So Tales of Hearts R kinda feels like a longer winded yet under cooked story with strong gameplay mechanics and characters.This isn't to point out that Tales of Hearts R is bad because I'm mostly just frustrated that the rest of the game is quite honestly good.

All the characters feel like they are explored well enough to the degree most Tales games feel. I like the way most interactions with this group are handled, and it honestly felt like a proper group of rag tag friends trying to save the world in the end. While there is some romance in this game, largely it doesn't effect the main cast of characters in a way that's jarring, and each character has enough motivation to be where they are at by the end. Honestly, it feels like one of the tighter cast of characters despite some of them being kinda forgettable. A lot of that has to do with the way that certain tropes play out, bias focus on certain characters story wise, and just how some characters are blatantly taken from you during the adventure. In some ways, the remake seems to try to give more things for each character to work out better dynamics, but it's just not enough to make them remember able compared to characters that already have their arcs in the game.

That's kinda just Hearts R's main problem though, it just feels like a blatant remake of a game with the way it shoehorns things in or paces itself. While I personally haven't played the original, I can tell there is at least 1 of two things that happened within certain scenes. Either it was left in because it was in the original and they didn't know how to make it better, or it feels like it was there to give characters more time. I'm not really broken at this; just more so I rather have a better game that is unfaithful to the original compared to sticking so close to it that it feels off when you add something in. I'm not exactly happy about the game's consistent shift between villains that it does in the beginning either. It's like the game settled on a villain they wanted, and kept changing their mind. It left for a lot of unexplored plot points, and some really big misses that kinda knock the game down a peg in my eyes. Then there's kinda a feeling like they made certain areas or dungeons kinda basic. A lot of the early game dungeons feel far too linear, short, and simple for their own good. Even the ports of the game have next to nothing in terms of how they look samey. In other words, this remake just feels like it needed to cook a little more with the way they seemed to be working with things.

Hearts R is a Tales Of game at it's core, and while a lot of the game can be described as shaky, the gameplay certainly is not. I'll admit that I didn't use a lot of the vita's features for this game, but the basic barebones fighting style of each character was still incredibly fun to use. Nearly every character feels good to use to some degree, and while that is always a highlight in each Tales of game, it's still super impressive. Getting 8 characters to not only play different, but be fun to use really is a tall order, and even more so for this Vita handheld game. That's kind what makes me super wow'd with the way the game feels as it does seem to have the original core philosophy that the PSP was made for, having a console game in your pocket.

If I were to acquaint this to anything, I honestly think Tales of Hearts R feels like a game made for the Dreamcast that some how got on the Vita. Sure, it has it's faults and perhaps could have been a better remake, but I think Tales of Hearts R is a fine representative to what a good game on the Vita looks like.

I jumped into this one almost immediately after Graces F and I'm glad I did. I felt it had alot of the same charm as Graces while managing to have its own unique and fun story line with a wonderful and colorful cast of characters. The combat was noticeably more simple than in Graces F, but still really enjoyable! The only thing bogging it down for me really was, I felt the character bond trophies were a bit forced and the translation isn't always very good, but it's still a wonderful game with alot to offer!

fun battle system, and includes some elements from vesperia I like such as its "stand alone" skill and skills for reducing damage besides just minimum damage, plus my favorite accessory in the whole series, combo command(command button), makes an appearance

some of the music can be a bit grating and there's some odd localization choices but I still love this game

having chalcedony in the party makes me empathize with my vesperia party whenever I play judith, dude is always trying to make a combo video

Uninteresting characters and story. No English voice acting. Some poor localization with oddly worded sentences, likely was going to be dubbed once. In battle dialogue is not subbed. Seem to be less after battle conversations than usual and the subtitles can go away too quickly to read, and I read faster than most people I've met. Boring small dungeons with time wasting puzzles, easily solvable but have you running around while getting into random encounters. Similar looking dungeons due to the plot making you visit nearly identical locations. Poor world map doesn't tell you the names of places. Unimpressive graphics due to being an improvement of DS original. Constantly knocking out enemies instead of killing them or characters thinking they killed people that they didn't for some reason, as is common in bad JRPGS (I miss Yuri in Tales of Vesperia). The battle AI seems to be poor compared to other more recent Tales of games, with the person I set up to heal constantly refusing to do so (haven't seen AI scripts ignore me this much since Dragon Age). Villains are pathetic, there is no in story reason why most of them would have a change against your party (or possibly even one member of your party), they keep coming back after they are beaten and humiliated by your group and are constantly told that they are useless by their leader. Mediocre all around, I think this was one of the lower rated Tales of games to be released outside of Japan. The DS version must have been pretty bad with even worse graphics and lacking one of the better main characters that was added to this version of the game. Positive parts of the game are just common Tales of features like the battle system (which is better in the other newer titles), after battle dialogue, and skits.

Another year, another Tales game just narrowly beaten past last year's end. Of course, this year was far closer than last years (I think I beat Vesperia on January 8th or something, but whatever). I wanted to beat this yesterday, but I guess I thought I was like 10 hours from the end, when I was actually 20, so I ended up beating it earlier tonight. Not my favorite Tales game, but a very good one none the less. For reference, I played through with the combat difficulty on the default setting, and I hunted around for goodies quite a lot (although completely without a guide), so my end clock was at right around 47 hours.

The combat is very Tales with the Linear Motion Battle System LMBS-ing it up like normal, with a few minor twists as the series is want to do. This is a post-Abyss Tales game, so not only are the battles in 3D environments (like Symphonia), but you can also free-run around in them (like in Abyss). One feature (which was added especially for the Vita remake) is the Chase Link system, which is basically the ability to kick off a super combo where the enemy will be unable to block for a few seconds once they've been sufficiently beat upon. Any member of your party can do it, and it makes combat flow much faster.

The main limit on your Artes is the TC limit of each character, which is very similar to the CC gauge that would appear in Graces, where you can only do so many Artes (but not normal attacks, which are free, unlike Graces) before you need to not attack for a moment to let the gauge recharge. It adds another element to combat that keeps it from being crazy spammy like Vesperia or Abyss were, but TP also ends up not being so much of a problem for users of mainly physical Artes (like the main character can be (and as I played him)). Lastly, there are manually activatable overlimits with the easiest to execute Mystic Artes out of any Tales game I've played so far, which was greatly appreciated (they were so confusing to do in Vesperia and Graces that I basically never even tried to do them on my own). The tutorials on how to do every fighting mechanic are also very good, and are also the best out of any Tales game I've played so far, which was very nice.

The leveling up system is also very unique from any other Tales game I've played. Instead of just getting basic level ups, you get a certain number of AP which you can allocate into any of 5 different sections of your character. Just putting points into a certain section will raise certain stats, but once you put in the required number to level up that section, you'll unlock a new Arte, skill, weapon, or stat boost for that character.

It makes it so you can really make any character play how you want them to play, for the most part. Everyone does have their own unique artes, but everyone does have physical, hybrid, and spell Artes, so you can be a spell slinging main character if you want to. Though because everyone has their own spells, only certain characters can fill certain roles (ex: Only 3 out of 8 characters ever learn healing artes, so only they can be healers, and even then they learn different healing artes). Characters also have bonds between them which level up if they participate in enough battles with each other (and can also be boosted through viewing skits or story events), and once their bonds are high enough, then certain character-exclusive skills can be shared among those who have sufficient bond levels. It makes for very customizable characters, and I'd say that this is the most customizable Tales game I have so far played.

The story, however, is where this game really kills it for me. Tales of Hearts R has a very divided opinion on its story, and for good reason: The game's English translation has a very distinct tonal dissonance with what the original Japanese version had. Couple this with the fact that the game has only Japanese voice overs and only English text, and someone with a knowledge of Japanese like myself got annoyed very quickly that the two were so very different. The Japanese puts across a much more serious, darker tone, while the English lines constantly try to be silly and add in tons of jokes in scenes where they feel really inappropriate (like, every other damn line).

This bad translation is most sour for me, because of the really cool things the story tries to do. The story has the biggest effort out of any Tales game I've played on trying to give its (rather wide cast of) villains, if not realistic, motives that the player can empathize with. Incarose especially, has to be one of my new favorite villains from the series.

Add this in with the fact that Hearts R is a remake of Hearts into which they inserted a brand new character to the main cast (Gall), who generally sticks out as feeling inadequately developed and focused upon compared to the other 7, and you have a story that really isn't up to par with what I'd come to expect from the series. Granted, the story is still quite good and interesting, but it isn't up there with games like Graces or Vesperia in terms of ones that are my all time favorites. This is just a more basic level JRPG story (although I will admit I did cry at once scene, though that is not my end-all judge of how good a story is in an RPG).

Verdict: Recommended. It's a Tales game, so it's obviously gonna be good, but it's not the totally incredible level that I'd come to expect from the late 2000's games. Though, for English speakers, this is probably the best portable Tales experience you're going to get mechanically speaking, I'd probably stick with Abyss on 3DS if you want a more fulfilling story experience.

Tales of Hearts R

Pretty fun game, especially the combat! The enemies/bosses had a rage attack that would interrupt combos but if you parry it you hit them back and keep going with your combo. The story was pretty good, not the best but not the worst. The cast overall was fine, this is probably my second favorite combat system in a Tales game. The final boss was fine but definitely one of the weakest I've ever fought in a Tales game.

Beryl is definitely best girl. We love Beryl!

If you have been following this site for a while you will know by now that I don’t have much patience for JRPGs. They are usually extremely long, random battles get tedious to the point of me wanting to quit the game completely, and sometimes the stories and battle systems can be boring or convoluted or both. Tales of Hearts R just so happened to one of the few JRPGs available on Vita so I thought I would give it a try. I was in for a strange surprise.

The story itself is actually pretty decent and actually makes sense despite how involved it is. You play as a young hero named Kor Metor who is traveling the world to help save a girl named Kohaku along with her brother. There are links within people called Spirias. This is kind of like their soul. Somatics has weapons that are formed from this Spiria and Kor discovers he is one after watching his grandfather died at the hands of a woman named Incarose. There is a “Spiria disease” called xeroms that can cause dispir within people meaning part of their Spiria Core is missing or corrupted. Kor and his friends and “link” with people to fight off this corruption. Kor does this to Kohaku and shatters her core sending the shards into eight pieces across the globe. However, what threw me for a loop was that this whole adventure was only the first half of the game. The second half involves another huge plot with an entire ancient planet that can suck out these Spirias. Of course, your new goal is to stop this new evil madman.

Holy crap…I can’t believe I remember all that! With that said the story consists of endless cut scenes…I mean endless. There are probably hundreds of cutscenes in this game but 90% of it is spoken Japanese dialog which is nice. There are a few anime cutscenes that are beautiful but I wish there were more. I know most people like cut scenes but I honestly felt it held up the game too much but that’s just personal preference. Aside from the story, the combat is actually pretty intense and deep. You can control four different party members in real time in an arena. The attack buttons are completely customizable allowing you to assign new skills and “Artes” to Circle and X. While you hacking away at enemies a meter will charge that allows you to go into a “hyper drive” mode to deal more damage and take less. All while this is going on you can also assign other members’ skills to the touch screen by flicking their icon which I thought was a nice touch. I had one party member heal at my beck and call exactly how I wanted him too instead of relying on his AI which would usually wait until everyone’s HP was in the red.

Secondly, you level up in this game very oddly and it took me a while to figure it out. You don’t buy weapons in shops, only armor. Weapons are acquired by leveling up your members through their Somas. There’s some sort of complicated line chart in the form of a star, but thankfully the auto-level button just lets you choose what type of fighting style you want for that character and it will assign the points accordingly. Along with this there’s also cooking items which give you boosts during battles, but I never really got into this much. It did come in handy at times, but thankfully you level up fairly quickly while only hitting a difficulty spike on the last two bosses of the game. This required me to level grind for over a day just to raise my members up about 12 levels to get an edge over the bosses.

Lastly, there’s a lot of side content in this game and a New Game+ which is usually unheard of in JRPGs as they are linear and follow a set pattern and path. There are other difficulty levels that also raise the level cap (200) as well as a few side quests for people interested in some more side story (I usually hate side quests in JRPGs). With all that said it’s optional.

After the credits rolled and I logged 30 hours into this game I felt satisfied. The ending had closure, the final boss was rewarding to fight, and I felt myself feeling relieved that the game was just the right amount of challenge throughout and not requiring constant bouts of level grinding. Graphically the game is average. Not very ugly but also doesn’t push the Vita to its limits. The music is monotonous and typical of a JRPG, but at least the voice acting is great. If you own a Vita this is probably the best JRPG you can plan outside of all those PS1 classics.

At the time writing this, I am currently the only review of this game giving it such a high score and I wanna defend that stance.

This game most definitely has its issues, the animations are dreadful and the game overall has pretty mediocre graphics (mayonaise water), the game remains undubbed, a lot of the anime cutscenes are just taken straight from the DS version or are drawn over, and it has random encounters in the year 2013. I will also say that this game starts off pretty slowly and takes a bit for it to pick up, but it sure does and in the 2nd half I couldn't take my eyes off of the screen.

That being said, I think this game is one of the most underrated games in the series. The cast isn't the best or most memorable but they have some good development, really good chemistry with eachother, and there are some big stars of the cast. Shoutout to Hisui, a character I was really indifferent to at the start but ended up loving come the ending. The story also went from really episodic and whatever to being one of the most interesting in the series for me, with some extremely good scenes and a fast pace in the second half with a memorable set of final hours. So many twists and turns too, a lot of stuff in this game I just didn't expect and it was really fun to see.

The gameplay though? Easily the highlight. This is up as one of my favorite combat systems in the series, if not my favorite. It's fast, fluid, has an emphasis on air combat, an dit just has so many fun mechanics. It's a bit of a middleground between Xillia and Vesperia, instead of having a number of attacks you can do, you have a set number of basic attacks and then a set number of artes you can use. You can use them in any order you like which can make for some creative combos, especially with how almost every character can allow you to go flying. Top that off with perfect timing counter attacks that continue your combo or the ability to enter chase links so you can use link artes and freaking teleport behind your enemies in midair and launch them across the screen and this is some of the most fun I've had in the series. Every character has their appeal too, I couldn't get into all of them but with eight party members I still enjoyed playing as more than half of them, Chalcedony being my favorite.

Overall, this game is an absolute steal. This is one of my longer reviews on this site but I just really wanted to defend this game since I feel most Tales fans just pass it off as an average 7/10 game, but there's so much to appreciate here. The only major issue with this game (aside from stupid random encounters) is that it it's trapped on the Vita.