For those who don’t know, the Vita has a few “Tales of” games, one released and another on the way. However, they haven’t come stateside as of yet, and nothing indicated that they ever will.  However, I remain optimistic that the one of the vita titles will make it over. The two tales games that have received the Vita treatment are Tales of Innocence R and recently announced, Tales of Hearts R. Both games are ports from the DS. However, neither have been released outside of Japan.

Despite being ports, the games have received some rather large graphical updates; however Hearts seems to be getting the royal overhaul treatment. According to Famitsu, through way of Siliconera, “Hearts R is 50% of the way through development and that the game’s battles are now in full 3D.” Here are comparison shots of R on the DS and Vita:

Battle

DS Version – Battle

PS Vita – Battle

Story

DS – Story

PS Vita – Story

So, am I optimistic that this game is going to make it overseas? I peg its chances at slim to none. The DS version never made it over seas and I see no reason for Namco Bandai to localize this version. I hope they do! I would love to dive into a new Tales game, but it will probably be Tales of Xilia and not this. Which is a shame, because this reinvention of Tales of Hearts is looking pretty rad. Fingers crossed! But I wouldn’t get my hopes up.

Source: Siliconera

Jaime (aka. Paco) wants a great RPG to sink his teeth into for the PS Vita, and think the Tales games could definitely do the trick. However, his optimism for localization has been waning due to recent trends regarding localization. Talk about RPG with him on his twitter feed over @RTBL1990