Is playing Vesperia PS3 enjoyable with the translation guide?

Short answer: Yes.

Long answer: Yearrrs ago I played through the PS3 version with no guide. It's fun, but not as fun as if you could appreciate the characters dialogue. I highly recommend you pick a lets player you like, or just a walkthrough of the game (360), and play it in the background as you play. I'll be honest, if you've played the game in English before, theres a good chance you'll be able to figure out whats going on just from the tone of voice from the characters and the atmosphere, but don't try to kid yourself: The game is much more enjoyable when you can actually understand whats going on.

I absolutely suggest it. Vesperia ps3 was one of my first imports and with limited knowledge and the right guides I got through it fine and thoroughly enjoyed it. Honestly it feels like a much more complete tales game with the extra content added

If you've played the Xbox version then you should be fine.

I'd rather not recommend. Noticed, there are plenty of people, who think that if they watch anime with subs, they can handle Japanese games. There's a vast gap between localized product and genuine stuff made for people with completely different mentality. But of course someone can just persuade himself that he gets it all right :) Unless you've played 360 version 50 times and perfectly remember all the dialogues by heart, you will be forced to constantly switch versions to check what's really going on. You will probably be fine with skits (of course you wouldn't get them, especially cooking ones, but that doesn't affect gameplay, so no worries). Same with artes, i suppose (even if you set wrong one, you can just try it out and reset it right away). Skills will become your hell. You will constantly set wrong ones, fail to unset useless (and harmful) ones, just because you cant read them properly. Aselia will be perma-opened on your smartphone. Now ask yourself if that play style sounds enjoyable for you. Yet if it was me, i will probably go for it, even after admitting that it'll not be that enjoyable.. just to experience all the frustration of failing to get repede snowboard trophy :D

It's not going to be as enjoyable if you're constantly flipping back and forth between a guide and the game, although the combat is exceptional.

360s are dirt cheap these days though. Gamestop often sells them for around $70, and a new copy of Vespiria is only $25 on amazon right now.

Yes! I played it with the patch that you mentioned, but before i played with the patch i did with the translation guide opened with the pc by my side, it's not the best experience because you need to constantly change your attention from the game to the guide, but in general it is playable. But if you really want to grasp the plot and play the game with more focus and without a guide i would personaly recommend that you hacked your PS3 rather than getting the 360 version just 'cause in the PS3 there's Patty, which is a very good character.