Review: Tales of Symphonia Remastered - A GameCube Classic That Shows Its Age On Switch

Dwarven Vow #108: Let sleeping dogs lie.

Though it’s never quite had the popularity of the Final Fantasy or Dragon Quest franchises, the Tales series has set a good reputation as the ‘other’ classic JRPG series that’s consistently maintained a decent quality for quite some time now. Back in 2004, Namco (no Bandai yet) was only on the fifth iteration of the Tales series, which made the bold transition to full 3D with the release of Tales of Symphonia on the GameCube. Sporting an attractive cel-shaded visual style and packing enough content to last for hundreds of hours, there was a lot to love about this release back when the pickings were much slimmer for great RPGs on Nintendo consoles. Now, Tales of Symphonia Remastered--which is based on the 2013 PS3 rerelease, which in turn uses the PS2 Japan-exclusive version as a base--has brought the classic experience to modern hardware and while it still remains a charming adventure, it’s definitely showing its age.

The story is set in the land of Sylvarant, which is experiencing a bit of an ecological crisis. A critical shortage of mana caused by the lingering effects of a war from thousands of years back means that the world is itself dying, and time is running out fast for the inhabitants. The only hope is for the Regeneration to take place, in which a person dubbed “The Chosen” opens various seals across the land to awaken the goddess and return life to all things. You take the role of Lloyd, good friend of the current Chosen, Colette. Lloyd is the headstrong son of a dwarven smith, and after he inadvertently causes a terrible tragedy in his village, Lloyd sets out with his best friend Genis to accompany and protect their friend Colette on her journey to fulfill her Chosen duties and save the world from destruction.

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