Cheap Odin Sphere (Video Games) (PlayStation2) Price

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Customer Reviews of Odin Sphere

Odin Sphere gets it all right
Odin Sphere is a triumph of game design, plain and simple. The hand-drawn art and character designs definitley take the cake, as every screen of Odin Sphere is lush and gorgeous. But add quality voice acting, beautiful music, intuitive gameplay, and 40+ hours of gameplay with 5 charming playable characters to an already impressive game and you've got an absolute classic. <
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>Odin sphere is a unique sort of action-RPG which definitely requires tactical thinking. You aren't just going to mutton-mash your way through this game. As you enter a new level or approach a boss you've got to think about your inventory and how you can make what you've got work for you-- or go back to previous levels to gather more items (you can combine items to create healing as well as destructive potions; or plant seeds that grow into healing edibles). And since inventory space is limited, you've really got to pay attention. <
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>The fighting is intuitive, each character with various strengths and weapons that require you to consider your style of attack. Also to be considered is whether to power up your weapons by conserving the energy used in special attacks, or whether to go all-out with powers like becoming immaterial for a short while (giving you time to heal and gather energy, or avoid your enemies), or releasing a surge of energy that delivers massive damage. Again, strategic thinking is required. <
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>Odin Sphere is a sprawling story of nations at war, told from multiple perspectives (a total of 5+ hours of theatrical cut-scenes) and inhabited by characters struggling to make difficult choices in the face of adversity, making for a rich and complex experience that won't quit your imagination just because you've put down the controller. <
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>A must-play for anyone who's a fan of either RPGs or great games.

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The End of the World Times Five
Lately, I've been really disappointed with the PS2's RPG offerings. Final Fantasy XII was the logical evolution of the graphics over gameplay mentality, a game that basically played itself. Valkyrie Profile 2 had some neat ideas but completely dropped the ball with its unbalanced difficulty and messy battle system. Almost six months after the console has become obsolete along comes Odin Sphere, the RPG swan song I've been waiting for. <
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>The story of Odin Sphere tells the tale of a war between the Odin and his Aesir against the Vanir, the fairy people, to control a device known as the cauldron. It follows the journey of five different characters over the course of roughly the same time period as the events that herald the end of the world come to pass. Their paths all converge at the end when they take part in one last, futile battle against the beasts of the apocalypse. Even if the individual stories of the characters do lean a bit towards the melodramatic, they are excellent, interesting, and develop the characters well. All five stories fit together nicely like pieces of a puzzle. <
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>Its story alone is enough to cover quite a few worts that gameplay has as far as I'm concerned. For one thing, Odin Sphere is a throw-back to older games in difficulty as well as its visual design. Odin Sphere is a 2D side-strolling action game primarily with RPG elements thrown in. Watching it is like a seeing a gorgeous painting come to life. It is almost mind-blowingly difficult at times. At first, the difficulty level almost had me hating this game. Odin Sphere has a terrible learning curve that has to be overcome to find the gameing goodness within. For one thing, the player must learn that mindlessly attacking will get you killed quickly. Secondly, you must learn that given the limited space in your inventory, items are meant to be used, not stockpiled. Dropped items are plentiful so you can easily find or make another one. Thirdly, the character must use the food cultivation system to gain levels and healing items. The food you grow at first doesn't heal you up very much and you are open to enemy attack should you need to consume it in the heat of battle which makes it nearly useless. A bit later on you'll gain a healing potion alchemy mix which you can synthesize at any time and at last the game becomes bearable. Also I don't think it helps that the starting character, Gwendolyn, tends to get stuck in long combo animations that leave her open to attack. I found it to be a ton of fun after I learned the ropes because, rather than being a mindless hack and slash you can just plow through, Odin Sphere requires some smart thinking and quick reflexes. I also don't think that it helps Odin Sphere's case at the beginning that the first character's story arc takes place the latest in the time line and feels like it has large gaps in it, which are actually covered in other characters' scenarios. <
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>In the end, Odin Sphere is a wonderful game, but its only going to appeal to a select audience. If you love RPGs and hard action games, your ship has come in because this blends the best of both into one package. If not, its probably only going to make you frustrated.

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Such a beautiful game, but such lousy game play
I really tried to make myself like this game but aside from the being quite pretty to look at, and listen to this game has nothing going for it other than its somewhat original approach to the RPG genre. <
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>The inventory system is completely inane and does not allow you to stack the majority of items when given already very limited inventory space. The combat is fairly difficult but is made even worse by the fact that each area you enter typically consists of about 6-7 sections before it is complete, completely resets if you leave, and you can only heal by using food items that are quite expensive considering the small amount of money you may or may not receive after each section...or you can grow your own food in the middle of battle but if you let it grow too long it becomes over ripe and no good...and also it steals Phozons (which are basically like your experience points and Magic Points in one) to grow. <
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>Monsters will sometimes drop treasure chests when you kill them but you have all of about 5 seconds to knock it open before it disappears. <
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>You can equip ONE item at any time, but this item still takes up inventory space even when equiped for some odd reason... <
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>A lot of people seem to honestly enjoy this game, you may be one of those people but I'm not. Rent it first and see for yourself before you drop 40 bucks.