How Long Is Tales Of Vesperia (And Why)?

How Long Is Tales Of Vesperia (And Why)?

Exact Answer: 50-60 Hours

In an era of HD collections and remakes, Tales of Vesperia Definitive Edition fits right into the current gaming landscape. And like its gorgeous art style and genre-rare combat system, it still manages to stand out and do its own thing. 

One of the most beloved RPG series this side of Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest, the original Tales of Vesperia has released a decade ago as an Xbox 360 exclusive, then it got a Japan-only re-release with expanded additions. 

At the time of its original release, Vesperia was groundbreaking simply because it took all the good from the Tales series and expanded on it, ripped out the bad, and easily became the best entry in the series to date—which is saying something given the global popularity of Tales of Symphonia to this day. 

How Long Is Tales Of Vesperia

How Long Is Tales Of Vesperia?

Tales of Vesperia is a JRPG that takes roughly 50-60 hours to complete.  As is always the case with a JRPG, the gameplay loop has to be fun, rewarding, and fresh to succeed, no matter how great the tale told around it is. The Tales series has always differentiated itself, opting away from turn-based gameplay for a real-time affair, minus menu interactions. 

Part of the brilliance that hasn’t aged after a decade here is the ability for anyone to have pick-up-and-play fun while those dedicated to improvement can receive droves of rewards for their time investment via appreciable skill gains in combos and team strategies. In more ways than one, it is quite like a well-tuned fighting game. 

Other lesser gameplay elements, such as item crafting and cooking, are here as well, though a player throwing those on the back burner won’t miss them too much they are a fun diversion, but the game moves quickly and is varied enough as it is without diving into extra systems that don’t offer a ton of rewards.

This applies more to the latter than the former, as crafting might be a fun end game and completionist activity for some. In a nice touch, character interactions players can summon up with a button press during gameplay offer depth and context to the story. Even short exchanges during the battle victory screen ooze immersion as far as character development goes. 

GamesTime
Tales of Vesperia40-60 hours
Tales of Berseria45-60 hours

Why Is Tales Of Vesperia So Long?

The game’s dialogue, while sounding up to par and voice-acted relatively well, is a bit childish. It makes sense for a game released in 2008 and surely written far before then, but it is still a notable drawback.

The graphics may age well thanks to an uptick here, but the game wasn’t rewritten, after all. It seems some voiceovers were reshot as well, which can sometimes create a jarring effect for those paying close enough attention. 

While on the topic of audio, the soundtrack doesn’t get annoying, which is always a plus for a game in this genre that could ask the player to grind for hours. Players can also choose the original Japanese or English dub, even if the latter struggles at times. 

With this being the re-release, global players who didn’t play the version released in Japan also get a few new characters to experience, loads of costumes, and other goodies, not to mention expanded interactions and, in general, story. Vesperia was a massive undertaking even on the 360, so the extras added to the mix only make the overall package more appealing. 

As touched on before, the combat system in Vesperia has a high skill ceiling, especially for those who take the time to master character, class, and weapon combinations in certain fights. Memorizing puzzles and executing them adds to the intrigue of a potential speedrun. 

Conclusion

The current world record for the PS3 speed run checks in at just under four-and-a-half hours. The how of a particular speedrun in terms of details to give runners an advantage won’t blow anyone away, though. 

It starts with cutting down a game of this size by blowing through the absolutely massive script. In the settings, users can toggle an option to have all the text from dialog appear at once as opposed to scrolling at certain speeds. That’s going to be a necessity, as is mashing through said dialogue. 

References

  1. https://gupea.ub.gu.se/handle/2077/38297
  2. https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=RdioAwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PA11&dq=tales+of+vesperia&ots=ELHUskq_C1&sig=bUvSKKI8Gb15LUibmq_Kes4Wt7g
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