Role playing games have become so by-the-numbers that when one comes along and offers us a little something different, people line up to sing its praises and preach its divinity. Such is the case with Odin Sphere, a truly inspired and stunningly beautiful action RPG from Atlus. It’s a deep, intelligent, well-crafted game that has so many fresh ideas wrapped up in its lovely trappings that everyone who’s ever counted hit points is going to want to play it, but not everyone should. Its particular approach to combat and inventory management , though elegant, will leave some players too frustrated to make it past the first few levels.
The action of Odin Sphere unfolds as a little girl reads through five different thick and dusty volumes in an attic. Each book tells the story of a different hero, though the plots intertwine as the story progresses. War has come to the land of Erion, and each heroic character must play his or her part to put the world right once more. Though the plot of saving the world is pretty well-worn fare for RPGs, the books of Odin Sphere tell a story that feels genuinely epic and grand. The cutscenes aren’t dialog-heavy interruptions meant to advance some unintelligible and achingly dull plot, they’re tiny, well-acted slices of theater that draw you in and make you care about what happens next to these people. When you take the field as the young Valkyrie trying to earn her father’s respect by fighting an unwinnable war, the last thing on your mind is experience points or leveling up.
Set in a 2d world, Odin Sphere looks less like a game and more like a lovingly illustrated book of fairy tales, with rich, vibrant colors and larger-than-life characters. This is the kind of game that is simply begging for an art book companion, so that we might better appreciate and consider each intricately-fashioned creature and character we encounter during our adventures. To enhance the feeling that you’re playing through a storybook, the game is broken into chapters, and then further into sub-chapters. Not only does it help keep the story straight, it also nicely breaks up the combat.
The fighting in Odin Sphere is fast, furious, and not for the faint of heart. The battlefields are circular paths that fold back upon themselves—no matter what direction you start off in, you’ll eventually wrap back around to the beginning. Given their 2d nature, you’ll only be able to see a fairly limited amount of real estate at any given time, but a small map at the top of the screen lets you know if trouble is on the way. You’ll encounter all sorts of wildly fantastic enemies, usually in packs and droves. Fortunately, there will always be enough dead space in a level for you to run away—er, that is, make a strategic withdrawal, but the longer you take to wipe out the bad guys, the less loot you’ll haul in at the end of the day. If you don’t like the grade you received after polishing off your last enemy (those C’s can be so humiliating), you’re welcome to play through the level again, and the lure of more and better rewards means you probably will.
The combat itself is combo-based hack-and-slashery, with a wee bit of magic thrown in for good measure. To keep you from simply whaling away at the buttons, a POW meter keeps track of each and every thrust and parry. String too many strikes together and you’ll end up temporarily exhausted on the battlefield leaving yourself wide open to attack. This is where some players will consider the game “balanced” or “challenging,” while others will consider it “cheap” and “teeth-grindingly aggravating.” How much you enjoy Odin Sphere’s combat will ultimately be determined by how much you enjoy carefully weighing the pros and cons of a given combo or attack whilst being pummeled from all sides.
Similar choices must be made when sorting through the inventory system, which is similarly “measured” or “friggin annoying,” depending on your point of view. Although you eventually wind up with plenty of room in your set of backpacks, it’s not until the game has forced you to adapt to travelling light. You’ll usually have just enough space for what you really need to take into battle—you’ll just have to take the time to figure out what that is. There isn’t a lot of room for “maybe” or “just in case” in Odin Sphere’s inventory system, so if you’re the type of person who brings three extra pairs of shoes on an overnight excursion because you never know when one might get wet, this is not the game for you.
