Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World review

Equal parts enticing and infuriating

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We don’t want to come down on it so much, but here the mediocrity, which might have flown anywhere else, mucks up the works even more than usual, thanks to the parts of the game that work quite well. Collecting monsters, visiting old Symphonia locations, listening to the dialogue scenes and watching the motion-captured characters act out the drama suck you in like few other Wii games can, only to have the hackneyed plot devices and persistently obnoxious sidetracking annoy the living crap out of you.

If you can look past the last-last-gen flaws that absolutely should be gone by now, there’s a totally playable bit of gaming here that’ll scratch your RPG itch for the time being. But if you’re unsure as to which new Tales game you should play, Vesperia or Dawn of the New World, go Vesperia.

Nov 13, 2008

More info

GenreRole Playing
DescriptionThis sequel is equal in its fun and infuriation, making it ultimately sort of above average.
Franchise nameTales of...
UK franchise nameTales of...
Platform"Wii"
US censor rating"Teen"
UK censor rating""
Release date1 January 1970 (US), 1 January 1970 (UK)
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Brett Elston

A fomer Executive Editor at GamesRadar, Brett also contributed content to many other Future gaming publications including Nintendo Power, PC Gamer and Official Xbox Magazine. Brett has worked at Capcom in several senior roles, is an experienced podcaster, and now works as a Senior Manager of Content Communications at PlayStation SIE.