Odin Sphere

Odin Sphere is hands down one of my favourite games ever made. While many see it as a 2d hack and slash the combat has a lot of depth. While some battles at first seem impossible with the right approach and equipment can become easy. The art is great with certain sections looking amazing. The only problem is you don't often get to look at it with so many enemies to deal with, but that is not really a bad thing. Finally the story is my favourite part of the game, while it might seem like your usual world is in danger affair the story is deep with characters you will care about and perfect voice acting. I don't want to give to much away. If you don't like this game then you are officially banned from playing games ever again.

Graphics are beautiful Story is extraordinary Characters are memorable and stylish Music is great The only thing bad about this game is the little bit of repition on enemies and bosses, but that is not enough to make this feel like a bad game.

Odin Sphere is a great game in every way except its gamplay. The first outing from mid-budget developer, Vanillaware, Odin Sphere is certainly not without effort and care, and was the first to showcase Vamillaware's signature, gorgeous art style -- it's the sort of game you actively want to like, but is held back by its woefully dull and repetitive gameplay. Furthermore, the original PS2 version is hindered by atrocious slowdown -- making it all but unplayable unless you stick with the recent remastered version.

Great Graphics and its gets addictive. This is more of a strategy game than action game. If you button mash you will not win. I think they should have allowed more action. The herb mixing system is very fun. I almost have to print out a guide because I do not have good memory. The story is OK and the voice acting is awesome. Its not a full RPG experience though. The levels are all round circles...hence the Sphere. That was disappointing to me. This is probably the best Atlus game, since every other Atlus game I've tried I consider for **** people (sorry). If you wanted streets of rage or devil may cry, you will be disappointed, but its an OK game and its pretty long. They could have made the levels more interesting. They could have also made the save system more apparent. Its a better than average game and you should probably get it if you have PS2. Its better than Persona and all those RPGs once you get the hang of it. Make sure you turn on easy mode though. Beautiful game so get it.

I see what Vanilla Ware were going for, but the game just isn't that accessible or consistently enjoyable. You will die without grinding for the right items for the right rooms. You will die without grinding for the right amount of experience points. You will die for trying to avoid stockpiling healing items to cope with the tons of unavoidable hits. Odin Sphere is a farming-intensive game, plain and simple, and if not for the gorgeous production values it would have raked in mediocre scores from every reviewer around. Even the graphics manage to hurt it, as the PS2 version suffers from terrible, unforgivable slowdown and the worst load times since Shadowman. Frequently, restarting a level (which you will do, all the time, either because you died or you're grinding), means a 30-second load screen, skipping a cutscene, then another 30-second load screen. Between each stage's 7 or 8 areas are 10 to 15-seconds of loading, and each room then takes another 15 seconds to load enemies in. Coming into a battle ill-equipped, which also happens constantly and can make some battles literally impossible, means at least 5 minutes of sitting around staring at a spinning icon while you replay the entire level. This is far too frustrating to merit the slim chance of a smooth playthrough. At the end of the day, Odin Sphere is fun very rarely, and only once you've mixed enough potions and slogged through enough repeats of the same dungeons to setup a perfect battle. That really disappoints me, too, because freed of all the limiting nonsense and flat terrain, the core game would revolve around solid 2D platforming goodness. I love to see experiments in game style, but originality can't hold its novelty when weak design keeps taking center stage.