Odin Sphere

Wow. Thats all I can say. This game was perfect on almost every single facet.<br><br>Audio- Amazing musical score, fully voice acted<br><br>Graphics- Retro-ish 2-d sidescrolling, made to look like a storybook. Capable of such intense emotion that I can't even tell you. When the Halja kill people, you just cringe. Not much can make me do that.<br><br>Gameplay- Fun, light beat-em-up style mixed with a cool combination of magic and experience. Easy to learn, hard to master- the way it should be.<br><br>Difficulty- The one flaw of this game is, frankly, at some parts it is too hard. Gwendolyn's last boss fight made me wet myself. Velvet's Armageddon fight made me kill someone. Its brutal. But in the same sense, it's also very rewarding when you finish it.<br><br>Overall: PLAY THIS GAME. DO NOT MISS IT.

Odin Sphere is a solid action-RPG release, hearkening back to classics like Valkyrie Profile. It's a beautiful, story-rich, side-scrolling crafting game disguised as a battle between fairies and demons.<br><br>I say it's a crafting game, since a good 50% of your time will be spent crafting food and potions and otherwise managing your inventory. Your character has two channels for character development: weapon level and hitpoint level. Monsters you kill yield phozons, which you can use to level up your weapon or make food. Food is the only way to increase your hitpoint level.<br><br>There are 5 main characters in Odin Sphere with parallel plots. Each character has their own special weapon and different kinds of attacks. Every character moves differently, too: some characters have wings, some fight solely in melee range, and some have special jumps. The stories are compelling and grand, though a little humorless. I appreciate that the characters aren't always the most noble or heroic warriors. It's often the case that a boss you fight within one story becomes the next character you play.<br><br>The major criticism that can be leveled against Odin Sphere is repetition. For 5 characters and 5 story lines, you visit the same areas with the same monsters over and over again. New game mechanics are not introduced in subsequent characters - you learn them all with your first character. However, your characters are different enough that the game remains fresh between the stories.<br><br>The result is that by your second or third character, you know how to control your character and the best way to defeat certain monsters, so the game becomes a kill-and-collect fest, regularly interrupted by stunning art and story. The combat may be a bit too shallow for some. The collection may be too tedious for others. But I appreciate eliminating a screen full of poisonous frogs with my fairy-gun in three seconds flat, and being rewarded with lamb chops and a story of treason, dragons, wizards, and intrigue.

This is a one of the games that the style and quality of the art just add to the enjoyment. It is much different than any of the action RPG's out there and that isn't a bad thing. The game play is fast and fun. The worlds are broken into tree path stages and each level is a circular path that connects to itself. You have a few attacks to choose from but the statagey is really in how you use the world and special moves with each enemy. My only complaint is that the difficulty ramps up fairly quickly.

First off allow me to say this game is extremely beautiful to look at. The visuals alone should make anyone want to rent it,just for the initial ooohing and ahhhing.The story is solid,a little sappy at times, but solid and entertaining. The music is good,gets a little repetitive after a while, especially in the dungeons!That brings me to my one big grip with the whole game...the horrible repitiveness of the dungeons and bosses! You will find yourself fighting through the same areas and kicking the same bosses butt AGAIN and AGAIN! Once is enough!

A game that opens with a cliched death sequence usually spells mediocrity throughout, but i stayed hopeful for this one as i trudged on. Unfortunately little redemption was to be found in this dated and clumsy side-scrolling RPG hybrid.<br><br>On a handheld like the PSP, this game's classic 2D sprite-based graphics, simplistic control scheme, watered down story, and the ability to save at any time would feel right at home. On a big console, however, the game flounders to provide much reason to take a seat and really devote some precious free-time to it.<br><br>In theory, combining classic side-scrolling beat'em up gameplay with RPG elements sounds like a good idea. Unfortunately, the game fails to make particularly compelling use of either genre. Firstly, the control scheme is clunky and unresponsive. The game likes to throw numerous enemies at you at once, but since the game takes place on a flat 2D plane, it's impossible to discern one from the next what with the constant slashing effects and some foreground elements that actually get in the way of the viewing angle. Whoops.<br><br>In an act of reverse genius, the attack button and the guard button are one and the same. Tap the square button to attack, hold it to block. Problem is that in the situation described above, it's impossible to anticipate an enemy attack and throw up your block in time when you're in the middle of a combo yourself. The safest way is to throw a couple of attack and blindly throw up your block. Unfortunately you take damage either way. What's the point?<br><br>The RPG elements are also hardly worth a mention. Character interaction is extremely limited and NPC's are few and far between. There are no stats to allocate, no additional weapons to select from other than your character's default, no armor to gear up in, and only one special item can be equipped at a time.<br><br>Think navigating a flat grid from one flat gamespace to another while killing countless flat enemies can get boring? I can't recommend it.

I love this game and I hate this game, at a certain point the difficulty of this game sharply increases....but once you learn how to play it, it becomes easier....<br>graphics are freakin awesome!!<br>gameplay is simplistic, yet deep in execution..<br>i honestly have never played a game quite like this, but if you like challenging, beautiful games then rent or buy this.<br>THESE ARE THE BEST GRAPHICS YOU WILL SEE ON YOUR PS2...PERIOD!!!

Hello<br>Odin Sphere, what too say about this game. Well 1st off some may call it a Action Role-Playing, but you really can include the words ROLE PLAYING as the like only element of a ROLE PLAYING Game is like the UPGRADING of your weapon but you don't upgrade it, it's automatic(the game does that 4 you) It could have better graphics considering the PS2 is about all tapped out and on it's last leg. But considering it's only a SIDESCROLLING 2D game it's not that bad, but not for the price of $30, I'd recommend this game only for the Gamers who CRAVE this kind of game. Rent it for a few days, it does grow on you !!<br>

People often talk about the Next Gen games, games that take advantage of the Next Gen console power. Well this game is distinctly old school. The game play and style of the game are ridiculously uncomplicated. Yet somehow I can never hit the button I ment to and I inadvertently find myself opening the item menu rather then the powers menu. Combat consists of a very unresponsive button smashing combination of between 1 and 4 presses of the square button. In the time Ive played this game I have determined that the only way to get a 4 hit combo is by rapid pressing of the square button, well over 10 times. Frustrating. One attack button, what is this an Atari? Game play is poor in general, with little relationship to attack range, enemy attack patterns, and generally a lack of creative expressions of the 1 to 4 button smash combo. Also load time becomes longer and longer as the game progresses, the PS1 didn't have load times this long. Finally I experienced the first frame rate issues I have ever encountered on my PS2, literally with very few objects on the screen the game begins to lag, yes LAG, the problem they have with MMORPGs somehow found its way to this glorified Super Nintendo game thats playing on my PS2. Did the company just not test this game? The story is utterly uninteresting, disjointed and full of flawed dialog. I could careless about the story, thats a bad element to any RPG especially one thats a flaw as this one is. Presumably the creators of this game figured that the one appealing area of the game, the graphics would push players to play through the muck. I have no intention of playing through any farther, unless you really have nothing better to do I suggest you save yourself the effort and avoid this game.