{"id":67,"date":"2016-07-09T21:03:24","date_gmt":"2016-07-10T01:03:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/?p=67"},"modified":"2016-07-09T21:03:24","modified_gmt":"2016-07-10T01:03:24","slug":"game-ramblings-15-odin-sphere-leifthrasir","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/?p=67","title":{"rendered":"Game Ramblings #15 &#8211; Odin Sphere: Leifthrasir"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/atlus.com\/osl\/\">More Info from Atlus<\/a><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Platform:<\/strong> PS4<\/li>\n<li><strong>Also Available on<\/strong>: PS3, Vita<\/li>\n<li><strong>Originally On<\/strong>: PS2<\/li>\n<li><strong>Genre<\/strong>: Action\u00a0RPG, Platformer<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The remakes continue, though in this case a remake of a much more niche title. \u00a0Following up on the Wii to Vita remake of Muramasa, Vanillaware and Atlus\u00a0have now brought the even older PS2 title Odin Sphere to newer consoles. \u00a0The question then is whether this game is only for new players to the game, or will players of the original still enjoy the experience a second (or more&#8230;) time through.<\/p>\n<p>The original release was great at the time, but\u00a0suffered from some major performance issues on the PS2. \u00a0This is absolutely the first thing returning players are going to notice as an improvement. \u00a0 Obviously the now 1080p redone visuals are fantastic, and Vanillaware&#8217;s art continues to not disappoint, but the framerate is significantly more stable than in its previous life. \u00a0There&#8217;s still a handful of spots where I noticed the framerate dip a bit, but it was never damaging to the experience, and certainly not to the level of the PS2 original.<\/p>\n<p>For new players, this is definitely a great game to hop into Vanillaware&#8217;s games if you haven&#8217;t already. \u00a0The game takes place over five\u00a0core books staring different main characters, and two wrap up books to complete the overarching story. \u00a0The five characters all have very different play styles, from close-range swords to mid-range chains up to crossbows, giving the 25+ hour experience a nice variety of different gameplay types. \u00a0The stories weave characters and locations together, and end with a split ending to wrap up, depending on how the player tackles the sixth book.<\/p>\n<p>Combat takes place within arena-style side-scrolling rooms, typically containing between 4-10 enemies, as well as your occasional mid-boss or end-boss in each chapter. \u00a0Generally speaking, combat is extremely fast paced, more similar to fighting games than a typical RPG, with the player trying to do their best to string together high combo counts, and throwing various potions to apply ticking damage to enemies. \u00a0Overall, the skills available allow the player to customize their general attack rotation to fit their comfort level, adding a nice touch of depth to the system to bring it back in line with your more typical RPG games.<\/p>\n<p>For returning players, it&#8217;s worth noting that there are two options, the Original Mode, which is simply the PS2 version with redone visuals. \u00a0There&#8217;s also the Leifthrasir mode, which includes additional areas, additional cutscenes, and a generally refined experience.\u00a0As an example, here are the first few minutes of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=XB1dp8Dhp9w\">Original<\/a> vs <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=C-b5WJ8oDgg\">Leifthrasir<\/a> modes. \u00a0In general, I expect most returning players will enjoy the full remake variant, as it generally massages what was already a great experience into something more refined.<\/p>\n<p>Then what&#8217;s the verdict on buying it? \u00a0Probably. \u00a0I suspect fans of fighting or action games will get more out of this than your typical RPG fan. \u00a0In general I never got to a point where I felt underleveled, so the fast-paced action is definitely more of the gameplay focus, with the RPG elements serving to enhance the gameplay, rather than being the core progression. \u00a0That said, fans of games with great art in general have a lot to love here, with the hand drawn visuals being even more stunning now in 1080p. \u00a0If it came down to a choice, I&#8217;d probably still play the Muramasa remake over this, but I don&#8217;t think you can really go wrong either way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>More Info from Atlus Platform: PS4 Also Available on: PS3, Vita Originally On: PS2 Genre: Action\u00a0RPG, Platformer The remakes continue, though in this case a remake of a much more niche title. \u00a0Following up on the Wii to Vita remake of Muramasa, Vanillaware and Atlus\u00a0have now brought the even older PS2 title Odin Sphere to &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/?p=67\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Game Ramblings #15 &#8211; Odin Sphere: Leifthrasir&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":68,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42,11,6],"tags":[48,50,19,29],"class_list":["post-67","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arpg","category-platformer","category-ps4","tag-arpg","tag-odin-sphere","tag-platformer","tag-ps4"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=67"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":69,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67\/revisions\/69"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/68"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=67"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=67"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=67"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}