Odin Sphere: Leifthrasir is a 2D fantasy action Japanese role playing game (JRPG) made by the developers Vanillaware, which was first released back in the beloved PlayStation 2 era. This era is the generation where the Japanese role playing genre thrived and dominated above all else with classics that will be remembered forever such as Final Fantasy X, Persona 4, Dragon Quest VIII and Kingdom Hearts 1 and 2 are just a few of the games of that golden age. So for me, playing Odin Sphere: Leifthrasir for the first time, having missed it back in 2007, has flooded my mind with great memories and reminded me why I first fell in love with the JRPG genre thanks to a very well told story and some of the finest, fastest action-packed gameplay I’ve played in recent times.
Welcome to the beautiful world of Erion, a land which consists of several different nations inspired by Norse mythology. These powerful great kingdoms are ragging war against each other for dominance and sovereignty but then a powerful strange device called the “Cauldron” is discovered and trying to unlock the secrets that the mysterious cursed weapon holds could be the key to winning the war. A dangerous tool that, in the wrong hands, could be disastrous because it single-handily destroyed and wiped out Valentine, one of the kingdoms, killing nearly all of its people and leaving nothing behind but ruins.
The story of Odin Sphere is that of a mature tale about love, conflict, betrayal and revenge that is told in superb fashion as it interlocks and changes its point of view with five different protagonists. The five characters you play as are Gwendolyn, a proud and honourable Valkyrie warrior. Although a fearless and fierce fighter on the battlefield, Princess Gwendolyn lives in the shadow of her older sister, Griselda. In a bid to win the love and affection that she desperately craves so much from her Lord Father, Gwendolyn ends up caught up in her father’s plot to gain control of the Cauldron.
We also have the Shadow Knight Oswald whom has been manipulated by his rulers all his life and turned into something of a killing machine. Velvet, the Princess of the fallen Kingdom of Valentine, that the Cauldron destroyed before the events of the game. Mercedes who finds herself leading her kingdom of fairies into war under unfortunate circumstances but must work hard to take on her new role as queen. Last but not least we have Cornelius who got cursed and turned into a Pooka than sadly banished to the Underworld where he needs to discover a cure for his curse but lands upon more than he could have imagined.
My favourite feature of Odin Sphere is without a doubt the battle system. The best way to describe the gameplay would be to compare it to a 2D beat em up brawler with role-playing elements. Combat is fun, fluid and chaotic that runs at 1080p and a smooth 60-frames-per-second. Each character has a powerful weapon called a Psypher made from crystals from the Netherworld. You’ll use these weapons to go up against various groups of minions and bosses. You will need to use a combination of weapon attacks, special abilities and a mix of powerful alchemy potions that can turn the tide of a battle to dispatch the hordes of enemies you will come across. It’s insanely fun when you build up a chain combo of over 100 hits which always looks cool making you feel like a powerful badass. Though it’s very important that you chain these attacks together effectively so you can build up your combat skill ranking which in turn will provide you with better loot.
There are other additional aspects to the gameplay however. Firstly, you have to maintain your Psypher weapons using floating collectable sparkles called Phozons. As you get experience points and level up your character, you can use your skills points and Phozons to gain new abilities and level up your special abilities making you a lot stronger. The alchemy mixing mechanic plays a huge part in the game. You can make all kind of concoctions on the fly mid-battle by combining two items to generate a new item. These potions are absolutely vital to progressing in the game, healing potions are used to regenerate health, antidotes to cancel out poison and other potions such as toxic, napalm and blizzard that causes extraordinary amounts of damage that are best saved when fighting big bosses with your back against the wall. You will also need to plant seeds and acquire food items and recipes so you can cook food within the appointed “rest” areas. The main purpose for this is so you can level up and gain extra health-points quicker. These systems give you a little break from the constant fighting but the menus are a little tricky and confusing and there isn’t enough storage space for the amount of loot you can pick up.
With five different playable characters, you get a slice of the story from very different perspectives. You start off with five chapter books in which you play as the five main protagonists. You will have to play through them all to understand the entire story but then once you finish each characters own personal chapter, you unlock book six and a potential book seven depending on the choices you make.
Odin Sphere is visually striking thanks to the gorgeous 2D detailed environments and character designs it’s a beautiful game that plays like a dream with the help of a soundtrack that helps bring the game to life with great voice acting for the most part that will help keep you immersed within its world.
Unfortunately, over the course of the 40-50 hour game, repetition tends to hit the game hard around the half way mark. This is simply down to the way the game has been designed with the interlocking stories which causes the main protagonists all go through mostly the same areas. They fight some of the same enemies and bosses that have been previously defeated so some won’t enjoy the same repeated content at times. Luckily though, each character does play a little more unique than one another with their own weapons, skills and abilities which will help remedy the repetitive nature of the game since the best feature in Odin Sphere being the battle system is also the games biggest curse, that will become stale and tiring especially since the majority of the game is constantly combat orientated.
Developer: Vanillaware
Publisher: NIS America
Platforms: PS4, PSVita
Release Date: 24th June 2016