Tales of Symphonia PC / GameCube comparison

[Crache]

Reposting this from my Tales of Zestiria details thread:
http://steamcommunity.com/app/351970/discussions/0/490121928341649052/

Tales of Symphonia was originally released in 2003 and then re-released in HD in 2014 on PS3. Anyone who pre-ordered Tales of Zestiria directly from Steam before the game's release got a copy of this in their library immediately, but it wasn't playable until it's released in on 2016-02-01.

While PS3 Tales of Symphonia Chronicles included both this game and its sequel Dawn of the New World, the Steam release is just Tales of Symphonia, with the sequel possibly coming to Steam in the future.

Improvements

• Tales of Symphonia on PS3/Steam has these improvements over the original Gamecube version:
  
  
  • Cameo costumes for characters from Tales of the Abyss, Tales of Vesperia, Tales of Graces f, Tales of Xillia and Tales of Xillia 2.
    
    
  • Niflheim dungeon extended and 6 new boss fights added to it.
    
    
  • Improved character textures and improved some environments.
    
    
  • Dual-audio support: Japanese and English voiceovers, which neither the PS2 or GameCube versions had.
    
    
  • Cutscenes support voice acting in both languages, but skits only have voice acting in Japanese. If you select English, you will just see the subtitles during skits. This is not a porting issue, as this is just how the GameCube version was.
    
    
  • Fixed framerate drops caused by mystic artes.
    
    
  • Multiple theme songs for the intro might be included.
    
    
  • While the original GameCube version ran at 60fps, the Japanese PS2 port which the PS3 Chronicles HD version is based off of ran at 30fps. The Steam version can run at 40FPS, though it seems likely we will see a 60FPS mod at some point in the future.
  
  
• Since the HD re-release is based on the Japanese PS2 version, by extension these are other improvements it has which were not featured in the original GameCube release:
  
  
  • The casino now has playable games. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDVskljWJ0I
    
  • Skit art now shakes and moves to emphasize the dialogue like newer Tales games.
    
    
  • 40 brand new artes were added across playable characters and enemies, which some think improved the game quite a bit.
    
    
  • More post-battle animations.
    
    
  • Characters gained an extra costume to unlock.
    
    
  • The end credits now feature a montage.
    
    
  • Includes new side quests, new camera angles on some cutscenes, new animated cutscenes not featured in the GameCube version.
    
    
  • And a large number of bug fixes and adjustments...
    
    
  • http://bandainamcoent.co.jp/cs/list/talesofsymphonia_ps2/event/
  
  
  
  
• Tales of Symphonia PS3/GameCube visual comparison:
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=1&v=-UBtEYlXXxI
  
  
• Tales of Symphonia PC Preview (skip to 1:15:50 in the video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLVcF7llfx8&feature=youtu.be&t=4548
  
  
• Tales of Symphonia PC Modded Screenshots: https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B6qSRWcJ4yUMVnNjWGF1cUpBQ0U

Mods

With the addition of mods, Tales of Symphonia on Steam is now the best version on any platform despite the controversy. 4K resolution support, 40FPS work-around, black character outlines like the original GC version, intro replacements, music mods, etc.

• Kaldaien's Tales of Symphonia Fix - Numerous bug fixes and improvements.
  
  
• Tales of Symphonia HD+40FPS+StutterFix Mod - Deprecated, as it's recommended to use TSFix instead.
  
  
• Durante's blog[blog.metaclassofnil.com] - Deprecated, as TSFix now has these fixes included.
  
  
• Modding Steam Guides

[Lametta]

nice article and very informative but arent people who are running the game with 40 fps have issues with game speed?

[Crache]

Lametta の投稿を引用：

nice article and very informative but arent people who are running the game with 40 fps have issues with game speed?

It does run slightly faster, but not enough that it is unplayable. Try it yourself and see. So far, nobody has run into any bugs due to it that I know of.

[Lametta]

Crache の投稿を引用：

Lametta の投稿を引用：

nice article and very informative but arent people who are running the game with 40 fps have issues with game speed?

It does run slightly faster, but not enough that it is unplayable. Try it yourself and see. So far, nobody has run into any bugs due to it that I know of.

I see. Keep up the good work.

[Goilveig]

Just one nitpick on terminology - you should probably use the term "refresh rate" or Hz instead of "FPS" because while the Gamecube did have twice the refresh rate (60 Hz vs 30 Hz) of the PC port, they actually have identical frame rates (30 fps for both) since the Gamecube produced an interlaced video signal versus the progressive scan of the PC version.

Interlaced videos require two fields to make up one frame, so you have to cut the refresh rate in half to get the true frame rate. Essentially, the GameCube drew half of a frame every 1/60th of a second, versus the PC drawing a full frame every 1/30th of a second.

Only the Japanese release of ToS could produce true 60 fps (480p instead of 480i) - and to do that you needed a first-generation GameCube (before they removed the digital video output) and a special digital video cable.

[Crache]

Goilveig の投稿を引用：

Just one nitpick on terminology - you should probably use the term "refresh rate" or Hz instead of "FPS" because while the Gamecube did have twice the refresh rate (60 Hz vs 30 Hz) of the PC port, they actually have identical frame rates (30 fps for both) since the Gamecube produced an interlaced video signal versus the progressive scan of the PC version.

Interlaced videos require two fields to make up one frame, so you have to cut the refresh rate in half to get the true frame rate. Essentially, the GameCube drew half of a frame every 1/60th of a second, versus the PC drawing a full frame every 1/30th of a second.

I never played the gamecube version (I pretty much never played any gamecube games), so I just assumed when people said it ran at 60FPS they meant it.

That said, there is a distinction to make between the update rate and render rate. Did the GameCube version update at 60 too? This would mean the rendered fields could be as new as the latest update, which is not the same thing as "30FPS" and for today's interpretation would be mostly functionally equivalent to 60FPS.

[Wiedzmin]

with the sequel possibly coming to Steam in the future.

please give me a source

[Crache]

Wiedzmin の投稿を引用：

with the sequel possibly coming to Steam in the future.

please give me a source

I don't think there is a source, hence the "possibly". Considering both Tales of Symphonia and the sequel were released on PS3, it's not unlikely the sequel will also make it to Steam. It may depend on how profitable Symphonia is for them relative to the porting cost.

[Lametta]

Wiedzmin の投稿を引用：

with the sequel possibly coming to Steam in the future.

please give me a source

http://blog.talesofgame.com/en/tales-of-berseria-is-coming-to-ps4-and-pc/
http://gematsu.com/2015/12/tales-berseria-coming-west-ps4-pc

on both sites at the end of the trailer you can see the steamn symbol net to the ps4 one

[Krae]

You forgot to list that they completely destroyed rune bottle/herb farming, removed the gold dragon from the earth temple, and heavily nerfed any of the combos that were relatively strong.

[Great Duck]

Veran Black の投稿を引用：

You forgot to list that they completely destroyed rune bottle/herb farming, removed the gold dragon from the earth temple, and heavily nerfed any of the combos that were relatively strong.

And spell canceling's now requiring 999 uses for... at least one of the attacks involved, probably the melee.

[Airship Canon]

Veran Black の投稿を引用：

You forgot to list that they completely destroyed rune bottle/herb farming, removed the gold dragon from the earth temple, and heavily nerfed any of the combos that were relatively strong.

Rune/Herb still works, and no combos were batted, save for ones involving glitches- to which, outside of a few that required illegit moves [E.G. Para Ball->Hammer Rain] only applies to:
Charged Indignation Judgment. [IJ -> IJ-- Genis's strongest combo]
Infinite Combo

Neither of which is anything but a glitch.

ETD was the only real change you listed.
But Gold Dragon still exists.

[Luk]

As usual, PC modders doing the good work. Thanks.