Odin Sphere [PS2]

[Spatial]

I had that and it confused me a bit - I got around it by just dropping and items and rejigging things. Stumped me for 20 minutes though

Regarding the slowdown, it's clearly down to hardware limitation given the amount and size of the stuff its moving around rather than lack of play testing. Personally I've found slowdown can be a blessing as well as a curse. It's come in handy a few times as it's allowed me an opportunity to blink, collect my thoughts and adapt mid fight

Same with the item management - I think that if they'd given you infinitely deep pockets then it would have totally broken it by allowing you to mass store Napalm and Painkiller.

There is a lot of item management and I can see how it would totally turn some people off. I didn't think I would, but I'm actually enjoying the balancing act ala Resident Evil's inventory space system.

[Bassman]

I managed to get stuck on items yet again. Trouble is I have too many potions etc. I'll have to sell some of them off to create more slots. Roll on the point where I can buy another bag.

Now running off HD which does at least speed up the loading times.

[SunLolly]

To be honest, I would say the fight with the underworld boss (infact nearly all of that level) was down to poor design. It was mostly because of way too many enemies on the screen. The reienforcments (very annoying) for that boss created massive slowdown which made it nearly unplayable, comeplete mess imo.

I agree with the item management making it too hard to see what you are doing. A menu for all that stuff would of been better and assigning them to the shoulder buttons for instant use would be much better.
Having to stop constantly to heal and stack items breaks the flow of the action based gameplay. Even worse with the slowdown !!
You would think that would of made more sense for a game like this, oh well.

That aside, I am enjoying the story, I LOVE the artwork and its very good for short bursts of play (well it is a brawler :P ) though I dunno if I will ever finish this one since you are playing the game 5 times over, so I will probably get bored of it by the 3rd character :P

[Spatial]

Hammering through this now and I'd say you're right regarding Odette and the massive slowdown (hadn't gotten to her when I posted yesterday).

It's definitely a combination of the hardware limitations and the game design since she's one huge sprite and those reinforcements swamp the screen (not helped by them fading in and out of existence and the Phozon flying around). They certainly could have held back a bit there as they managed it quite well with

->Open Spoiler<-

Lord Brigan

and he wasn't a small bloke

Even more so given that, even chucking all that stuff at you, she's still now a hard boss to defeat.

Still, as I said before, the slow down is a bit of a blessing on times especially when Odette

->Open Spoiler<-

starts throwing around that multi headed scythe

. It's allowed me to see the cues of what she's up to and move Gwendoline out of they way as fast as the slideshow will allow

Generally out and about in the levels though I'm not finding it too much of a problem. I suppose they could have increased the waves of enemies but have them smaller in number to prevent it happening at all, but I can forgive it because it's just so lovely.

[Shearie]

This game is absolutely wonderful. I don't see any of the balancing issues that were brought up earlier and the game let's you level up and effectively tackle situations in different ways. It's probably the only game I have ever played where constant item management is fun.

[Eight Rooks]

Okay, clocked it with Gwendolyn and that was just amazing. Slideshow or no slideshow, that was a fantastic boss fight (if fairly easy after a bit of powerlevelling - 1300 hit points, some takeout chocolate and cookies, spamming on the phozon special that doubles your attack power and she's really not so tough). Plus a beautiful ending; I really don't get the reviews complaining about the narrative. I loved just about all of Gwendolyn's story and the final scene made me feel all warm and fuzzy.

I still stand by my complaints regarding balance and little niggling design decisions - it's certainly not perfect - but just going by that first section alone it's got to be one of my games of the year. Flawed, but gorgeous nonetheless. I should probably get to bed now, but I can't wait to play more.

[eastyy]

well only played this briefly but

blimey this is good.....the animation is great and the combat is really satisfying indeed

[SunLolly]

wow that fight with Odin as Mercedes was hard, his Balor will one hit you. Guess I should of chose 'normal' mode, hard mode can be very annoying sometimes :P

I am about 22 hours in and on chapter 1 with Oswald, very fast but his shadow form drains too fast. Might need to stock on unlimited power potions (doubles the time) for that.

I would give the game 7/10 so far, maybe an 8 if it picks up alot later on.

[SunLolly]

Beat Oswald (stopped playing for a few days) and thought it was okaaay (get to fight a new boss!!) but his story was pretty meh.

Now on Velvet and erm........easily the worst character unfortunatly :/ boring attacks, very slow and weak. Will take alot effort to get through this one me thinks. God knows how this game got 8's 9's.... :P

[Eight Rooks]

I'm not playing it that much any more - got RL stuff to do, sadly - but eh, I don't know what the hell the reviews were talking about saying it gets better after the first of the five. Cornelius is far less interesting and the recycling of all the art/sprites/other resources just seems plain bloody lazy a lot of the time.

->Open Spoiler<-

Like Velvet's father, King Valentine - no, you're not a vengeful demon from the underworld; you're one of the regular lantern bearers wearing a stupid crown and all the monologues in the world about pain and suffering can't stop me from reacting with a "meh", for Chrissakes. Really not good enough.

Still fun grinding, I do admit, and I'd like to keep playing it to put the whole story together - but I'm getting uncomfortable memories of Prey here. Spectacular initial sampler that just descends into tedium as time goes on. Fingers crossed, and Gwendolyn's story was good enough I don't regret picking this up, but still... starting to look a little disappointing.

[SunLolly]

Just finished this after having a long break from it.

I have to say I am rather impressed with the final book. Everything made sense and came together very well. The final bosses were excellent and the music fit them all (especially the very last one, excellent stuff!!) perectly. I actually enjoyed the story more in this than the gameplay :P

8/10

[HHarm]

good news for all US importers the game has the choice of japenese voices and english subtitles or US voices which are the standard type for this kinda thing.

How's the US version? Also with the same choises or US voices only?

[Spatial]

He's on about the US version - you get a choice of US or Japanese voice work.

[Flinty]

Ok so this is out this week finally anybody getting it other than me?

[erhgiez]

I really really want this, but why did they change the artwork? It looks so much better with the darker background! Any heads up on the cheapest places to get this?