Tales of Graces F

I haven't followed anything Xillia except a few gameplay vids; unlike Graces which I pretty much knew the entire story before playing it. So glad they didn't force us to wait 2+ years to finally get a localized version. That said, while I do like the dodge feature in Graces, the team attack feature in Xillia looks so F'in epic and is going to enable 100+ hit combos easily unlike Graces where it was near impossible without some luck or serious planning.

Now if they'd just send us Twin Brave I'd be all set..... need to expand my Vita library.

It's interesting, but I wonder how it's going to change anything? You can change your in battle character at any time and even bench your main character if you want. They even allow you to change your party leader on screen and NPC reactions have changed in the past based on which on screen character you have.

Unless there's a major party split during the game, it would all stay the same after the first boss. That's the one thing I do know; that Jude and Milla meet at the first boss fight in the game. If all things after remain the same, I would just as soon watch the opening sequence for the other character and be able to go right into a 2nd playthrough with the original character using the bonuses from the grade shop. Milla is boss though, and it will be nice to finally have a legit fist fighter in a 3D battle ground; not the 2D plain Senel of Legendia or the style-shift limited Sophie of Graces.

Other than this, I heard the director said that he was seriously peeved that they had to drop a lot of the content prior to release in order to get it out on time. Would be epic if we actually got that content for the NA release and finally have one up on the Japan Namco market. Still wish we got PS2 or PSP Destiny and Destiny 2, PSP Rebirth, DS Hearts and Innocence and Vita Innocence R and Twin Brave. Japan gets all the good shit.

What the hell? Omg I had no idea this was already released! I wonder if it's anything like the 2D tales. Mainly like Tales of Destiny DC. It would be awesome if it's easy to combo asdfa I mainly just play for the battle system. I MUST BUY

This is actually the hardest game in the series to do solo character combos. Because of the gameplay style, you are severely limited in the combos you can do unless you have seriously planned it out. The battle system is loosely based on the Destiny remake for PS2; using CC in order to attack. The issue is that you do not immediately begin battle with a high number of CC even after leveling up a lot and boosting your max. You have to increase the amount available during battle from your minimum number to your maximum by attacking or dodging. It also does not recharge as fast as Destiny did allowing you to juggle enemies and then continue attacking.

What it does bring, is the dodging ability; which is the primary focus of the battle system rather than massive combos like Destiny or Vesperia.

Overall, the story is a bit cliched, but the battle system is fun and it's a good game overall. If you enjoy Tales games, I'd give it a shot.

EDIT: Just FYI, for ease of comboing, at end game when you've boosted CC and have access to pretty much all your abilities, I can rip off 50-60 hit combos relatively easily without Eleth Burst. That's to say, just a standard combo unassisted by the "overlimit" function. If you have the right skills learned, you can potentially tack on a Mystic Arte to the combo and add an extra 15 hits. In certain cases, I've gotten the 100 hit combos without Eleth Burst but it seriously takes a lot of skill.

Feel free to ask anything you want about the game and I'll let you know without spoiling it.

nooo! gawd it was so easy to do a 999 hit combo in destiny asdf. well at least they brought the cc gauge to Gaces F, even though it isn't as fast. One thing, is the battle system super stiff like that god awful thing they call Radiant Mythology? Oh, and are hi-ougis (mystic artes I think they're called) easy to pull off?

Either way, I think this is the only 3D tales of game that looks really promising to me. Besides Abyss anyways asdfas

I wouldn't write off Vesperia for 3D Tales games. Despite me not taking to the story the first time I played it, I do think it was a better story than Graces with better characters. The battle system is also very fluid and a lot of fun. If you've got a 360, or can actually read Japanese (for the PS3 version), then I would give Vesperia a shot.

As for Graces, the battle system is quite smooth; not clunky like RM. The issue is that Graces focuses more on the dodging ability than on building massive combos. You can still execute combos easily and fluidly, but you just can't expect to get 100+ hits every time unless it's a group effort. It forces you to think a bit before acting rather than just charging into a combo and beating on enemies. You should watch some videos on youtube to get an idea of how the system functions.

As for hi-ougis, they are very simple to do. Just one button press and it activates once you learn the skill. Each character can learn 4 total; one of which requires a special, in-battle skill to be activated in order to use, which is also one button press. There are two ways to activate them; during Eleth Burst (the overlimit function for Graces) is the primary one. A guage is shared by your party in battle and once it's filled, you enter Eleth Burst; which allows unlimited CC for its duration, prevents staggering and allows you to use hi-ougis. The problem is that it only lasts a limited amount of time so you can't combo infinitely. Once you enter EB, start a combo and hit the button to use a hi-ougi. The one you use depends on what you've learned and the level of the hi-ougi guage (also shared by your entire party).

You also have the chance to learn a specific skill for each character for each of his 3 normal hi-ougis. That skill allows you to use that hi-ougi during a standard combo once per battle. The catch is that the combo has to be a certain number of hits; 25 hits for Level 1 hi-ougi, 50 hits for Level 2 hi-ougi, 75 hits for Level 3 hi-ougi. The 4th hi-ougi can be used at any time as long as you activate the in-battle skill I mentioned and perform a combo.

Summary: If that's too long-winded, the simple answers to your questions are No and Yes.

Yes, I'm double posting.... sue me, I can't edit!

John - Started my playthrough on Chaos last night. Didn't do much; only played through the first chapter (childhood arc). I have to say, with the additions from the grade shop (boosted HP, boosted minimum CC +3, double critical, double damage), it doesn't even feel like playing on Chaos. At least I didn't go with 5x damage or else it wouldn't be worth it. Hopefully the bosses actually pose some threat; though Bryce was a 6 second fight..... literally.