Tales of Berseria Remastered Review – A Decent Touch-Up

It’s always fun to revisit a Tales game — the anime-inspired art style pairs well with stories and gameplay loops that are generally fun and light-hearted in their approach. That’s where Tales of Berseria sets itself apart, taking a grittier, darker approach to a story that might seem out of place among the series’ other entries, but it’s also one of the strongest stories the series has told.

The remaster’s QoL tweaks help the game feel smoother in motion and in combat, and make playing through the game a lot better than it used to be. And yet, I found myself raising an eyebrow at a few elements of the experience that should have been refined, but have largely stayed the same since I first played it years ago. There are autosaves, expanded skip options, and a Retry option after losing normal battles, and a few more that we’re going to dive into in due course.

If, like me, you’ve witnessed Velvet Crowe’s destructive path to vengeance before, you already know that it’s quite the tale. Her icy demeanour stems from a single-minded focus on bringing the man who destroyed her family to justice. But if this is going to be your first time with the game, know that Velvet is an anti-heroine whose choices might leave you wondering if helping her on her mission really is the right thing to do.

Of course, she meets a motley crew of characters along the way, each with clear motivations and enough nuance to feel genuinely compelling. From a demonic swordsman to a someone having trouble understanding the concept of personal liberty, the friends you make along the way are definitely a highlight of the experience.

I found myself more interested in some of their stories than even the main narrative, and I always took every excuse to stop and chat with them through Skits just to see what they had to say and perhaps even laugh at the banter between them as we travelled across the kingdom of Midgand.

It’s safe to say the story is the strongest part of the game, and it might even pull you through its more repetitive stretches, depending on how invested you are after the rather long prologue. I say that because there’s going to be a lot of backtracking through previously visited areas to get to your next objective, with the game often forcing you to traverse multiple maps to get to where you need to be.

"Velvet is an anti-heroine whose choices might leave you wondering if helping her on her mission really is the right thing to do."

It’s a complaint I had with the original version, and it continues to be a sore spot despite the remaster moving the Bottomless Denore/Inoph Bottles earlier, giving you much earlier fast-travel tools than before. However, those items are limited in their utility, and you’re going to be running across maps quite a lot. It does help that your characters’ movement speed is boosted (the remaster increases it by 20%), but it’s still a tedious amount of repetition that quickly overstays its welcome.

With that being said, the addition of a new star destination marker for main-story objectives that also shows you the distance to your destination is a nice touch. Making the Grade Shop accessible right off the bat was another great way to just blaze through the story for me. However, it could trivialize the game even on greater difficulties, and I’d recommend limiting the boons you obtain from it if you’re interested in a bit of a challenge from the game.

As far as visuals and performance go, the remaster certainly does benefit from a fresh coat of paint, but it’s nothing to write home about. The characters’ facial models are still rather stiff, although they are designed quite well. On PS5, the remaster targets 4K at 60 FPS, and it largely feels like it. The experience was smooth with no pop-in or stutters on most of the maps and cutscenes. The environments themselves are rather bland, but that’s an issue that was prevalent in the original game as well.

The audio design and voice acting deserve a special shout-out, with the soundtrack being among my favorites in the franchise, while the Japanese voice acting really sells its material. While the English actors do a decent job, I’d recommend going with subs instead of dubs with this one.

"The AI for both your party members and enemies is quite basic, and you’re going to be doing most of the heavy lifting yourself"

While the story is great and the exploration is mildly interesting for the most part, Berseria’s take on the series’ LMBS-style combat was a bit too hit-or-miss for my liking. Yes, the controls are smooth, and combos flow into each other quite well, but it’s all simplistic.

I’m a fan of combat systems in JRPGs that encourage building synergies with your fellow teammates, and while the potential for it is there, Tales of Berseria’s combat is largely a matter of button-mashing with a few Artes and Break Souls thrown in. Combat revolves around your Soul gauge: actions consume Souls, and you’ll try to gain more while preventing enemies from stripping yours away.

The AI for both your party members and enemies is quite basic, and you’re going to be doing most of the heavy lifting yourself. I did have a battle where the AI managed to bring down a foe after I got Velvet knocked out, but it was a long wait that made me decide to take a more active role myself. All in all, your mileage is going to vary with the game’s combat depending on how much you like what’s on offer in this one and other titles that are similar to it.

Of course, you now have the option to toggle enemy encounters completely off, so touching field enemy symbols won’t trigger battles, event battles excluded. It saves quite a bit of time if you’re just looking to experience the story. That option works very well with Grade Shop upgrades that let you double or triple the XP you earn from battles you do play through, ensuring you’re still levelling up your characters as intended.

A convoluted UI and unintuitive menus are another deterrent to those among you looking to make the most of distinct builds and varied skill sets for Velvet and her party. Although the game’s RPG trappings are quite rudimentary, engaging with them via its menus continues to be a part of the experience that I just began avoiding thanks to how relatively easy its combat can be.

" Your mileage is going to vary with the game’s combat depending on how much you like what’s on offer in this one and other titles that are similar to it."

Does Tales of Berseria Remastered do enough to justify the effort that went into making it? That depends on what you’re expecting from the game going in. If you’re looking to revisit the story or experience it for the first time without focusing too much on its other mechanics and features, the remaster is definitely going to be of value to you.

But if you’re in the market for a title that tests your skills while entertaining you with its story, you might want to wait for a sale before you pick this one up. Its mixed  combat and tedious emphasis on exploration are going to wear you down, considering that they’re a crucial part of the gameplay loop on offer.

If you’re a fan of the original game or the Tales franchise, this one’s a no-brainer. But for the rest of you, you might want to wait things out a little and pick this up when you get a solid deal on it.

This game was reviewed on PlayStation 5.