I have been a dabbler in the long-running Tales series for quite a while now and Tales of Berseria is one of the best. I will go one better than that and say that this is one of the best JRPGs I have played in quite some time. While it is a prequel to Tales of Zestiria, you can play this without any prior knowledge of the series at all.
How to Download Tales of Berseria
You can download the game from Steam or from the PlayStation Store. Start by clicking on the Download button at the end of this review. Check out also another RPG from the Tale series that we have reviewed – Tales of Vesperia.
The Game Review
The Tales series is known for its fantastic storytelling and characters and the story that Tales of Berseria tells is one of the best ever! This is not a happy, happy, joy, joy, let’s all work together and be best friends’ kind of story that many RPGs (including the Tales series) are known for.
Instead at its core, this is a tale that is all about revenge. Our main character is called Velvet (the first female protagonist for the series) and she is out for revenge and she does not care if the world burns as a result of it. It is such an interesting premise where our “hero” is so headstrong on her revenge no matter the cost. I do not want to go into too much detail as it has some great twists.
Along the way, as you would expect, others join her cause. What is great about the “party” in Tales of Berseria is that these other members are just as morally dubious as Velvet is for the most part. The character interactions and the way they develop and build relationships is amazing stuff indeed.
The gameplay on offer here is that of an action RPG. You will be heading into towns to talk to people, get missions, buy items, and so on. The mission system is actually handed really well as the game makes sure you know what is a main mission and what is a side mission so you can choose what to focus on.
The game also throws these mini-game-style events of you as well as the ability to send out a ship on an adventure for stuff as well. The combat is where the game really shines. To start with the way, it lets you map various attacks to the four face buttons is a great idea and allows you to tailor your attacks just the way you want.
There is a Soul Gauge which is a major factor in the battle system. When you attack, the Soul Gauge is depleted, you can still attack, but the attacks are not as damaging. You can pick up Souls to replenish it during a battle and it also fills up over time too. It makes it so you cannot just spam the same attacks and it forces you to think and develop a strategy. As you would expect, each character also has their own special abilities that they can use in battles too.
Tales of Berseria is a fantastic-looking game, it certainly has that “Tales” look about it and I mean that in a complimentary way. It has a kind of cell-shaded look to it all and I love it. My only complaint about the visuals is that I wish there was more variety to the monsters in the game. It is also voice acted with some great performances, which along with the awesome soundtrack fit the visuals very well.
