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I finally understand what I'm doing in this and it's fucking brilliant. Thread get.
Official site
Port of the PS1 game, which was released late in that console's life and has become fairly expensive on eBay as a result. I don't think it got a release in Europe. I'm sure I read somewhere that the US version of the PS1 game incuded some extras over and above the Japanese original, and that as this PSP port is based on the JPN release it misses out on those extras. It adds in some new FMV sequences to replace what I think used to be anime-style cutscenes. That's possibly a shame - I've heard good things about the old style - but at least the FMV is quality.
Intro movie
As ports go, it's another good one - it's all proper PSP screen ratio. What isn't so hot is the way that backgrounds and sprites become super-blurry when they're in scenes that are viewed up close. I'd imagine that this is a decision on Squenix's part to prevent pixelation, but I'd rather have had that, if I'm honest. It can be a little strange going from one screen to the next and having the resolution change on you between them. Hardly a fault limited to this game, though - the same thing's true of Namco's Tales of Eternia port.
So, basics. It's an RPG in a 2D world. Characters are all hand-drawn sprites, the backgrounds are flat pre-rendered layers with parallax scrolling in full effect. I miss parallax scrolling 
When the game starts, Odin's heard whispers on the grapevine that Ragnarok's just around the corner. Shits it - fuck, we need an army. So he sends Lenneth to Earth to gather and train warriors to send to the frontlines.
When you first gain control of her, you're floating in the sky over the world (represented by a 3D map, a little like the overworld map from Final fantasy VII, say). Pressing the Start button makes her focus her powers and search for a suitable soul - she spins around, you get a snatch of dialogue relating to said soul, their location's indicated on the map.
You fly to where they are and enter the area and get treated to a great long in-engine cutscene showing their plight and how they come to agree to join Valhalla's troops. It's generally stuff like sacrificing their own lives to save others. These bits are played pretty nicely - the voice work isn't the best ever, but neither is it too painful, and the scripting - while definitely overwraught - is affecting.
So you've got another soul on yr team. now you've got to get them up to hero standard. There are dungeons dotted around the map - indicated by orange markers - and others may be discovered by, again, pressing Start and focusing Lenneth's powers.
Dungeons are also 2D scrolling affairs, but with this weird 3D structure going on, a little like a pop-up book. it's quite difficult to describe, so I'll take a photo and stick it in here later.
As you scroll from left to right, arrows appear to show when you can move backwards or forwards a layer.
There's also some platforming stuff going on here, which works nicely. Lenneth's equipped with a jump, an attack and a move that fires a crystal. Crystals can be fired downwards or sideways to create temporary platforms, to allow access to hidden areas. You can only have three on the screen at any one time - throw a fourth out and the first collapses to make way for it. There's some trickery available with these, too - fire a crstal twice at the same spot and you'll get a bigger one. Fire a third time and it'll explode, knocking you back if you're standing close enough to it. The trick is that you can use this knock-back effect - it doesn't cause you any harm - to get to even higher or further hidden areas. Smart stuff, if fiddly. Very surprising to see this odd, deep platforming mechanic in an RPG.
Dungeons also contain monsters. Hit one with your sword and you initiate the turn-based combat, with you getting the first strike. collide with one in any other manner and they'll get first dibs on you.
Combat is very innovative. You can have a mxaimum of four characters on your team at any one time, and each is assigned to one of the four facia buttons. Hit one of the buttons and, providing that they're able to, the corresponding character will attack. If you time your attacks properly, you can get a combo going, break an enemy's guard, or create the opportunity for a finishing move.
Down the bottom left of the screen is a counter that shows the number of attacks you've strung into the current combo. There's also a meter underneath it that counts up from 0 to 100 depending on the strength of attacks in the combo. If you get this to 100, you can fire off a finishing move with any character whose charge guage is full. Finishing moves top this meter back up, so if there are enough hits in one you can immediately throw a second character's finisher into the mix. Or a third, or a fourth. Maximum hurtage.
And that's the combat. The basics, anyhoo - there's a shitload more depth to it - some characters can hit multiple times within a single turn, some can use magic, some can forgo their turn and use an item or equio themselves with different weapons instead, etc. Lots and lots of stuff in there.
Combat gives you EXP. EXP is shared by all members of the active team. EXP levels you up. You also get another form of points reward that is specific to each character and can be used to modify their personal skills or change their hero value.
Four types of skill. The first is an automatic type that characters have a percentage chance of using at any relevant point in battle. The only one I've found so far is the first aid skill, which allows them to heal each other without using a healing item and without wasting a turn doing so - very useful. The next is... I forget. The next... I forget again. No, wait. It's one that you have to use manually during battle - one allows character to cause an explosion at the cost of some of their own health, another allows magic users - who normally have to wait a few turns to charge their powers - to attack with a familiar while they're charging. The fourth type are stat boosts - % chance of evading an attack, % increase to health, % increase to defense vs magic, etc. This stuff, I've only discovered today, after a good few hours of play.
But, like I say, you can also spend these character-specific points on bumping their hero value up. each character has a set of traits that's specific to their personality and that affects their value to Odin as heroes in his army. Most characters, when they first join you, have a negative value. All traits can be maxed out for the best hero value possible. Hero value also increases based on level and, i think, length of time that the character has fought alongside Lenneth on Earth.
But that's not all. The game's split into periods and chapters - 24 periods make up a chapter. At the end of a chapter, you'll be contacted to be informed on how the war in heaven is progressing. If you've not sent any heroes up there, it'll be going pretty bad for Odin and chums. So you need to make a decision before the chapter ends as to which of your heroes you'll send - once they're sent, you lose them from you party and will need to replace them by starting the whole process - world map, pressing Start, search for candidate, etc - over again.
This end-of-chapter report will also let you see how the heroes you've developed and sent have been faring in the war. If it's going well and Odin's chuffed with you, you'll get a wad of cash and maybe - if he's vey happy - some items and equipment. If it's not, you'll get fuck all.
Oh yeah - items and equipment. There are no shops in this game. Well, there is one, but it's not classed as a shop. Serves the same purpose, though. What you do is enter the main in-game menu and buy stuff from there. Because the money is only dished out at the end of a chapter, the only way of getting it mid-chapter is to sell some of the crap you've collected along the way. Again, the game doesn't call it selling or buying - you're 'converting' unwanted items into the unit that you can use to exchange for other items.
And the game's on a turn-based timer. Once a certain number of chapters are over, it's game over, and the war's either been won or lost depending on the quality of the warriors you contributed. Whenever you go back to the world map, you're told how many periods have passed in this chapter, along with a message down at the bottom of the screen: X periods until the end of the world.
No pressure, like.
You know what? It's fucking awesome, this game. It takes so many risks, invents and introduces so many new mechanics, and they all work fantastically well. The only negative thing I can say about it is that it's terrible at explaining itself - it's taken about eight hours of not relly knowing what I was doing to get to the point where I've got a handle on it.
I wish Square still had the balls to brave development time and cash on games this original.
PS2 sequel - Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria - has been out in Japan and the US for a while now, comes out over here in about a month.
[edit]
Bits and pieces I forgot:
You can transmute most items that you find - that is, change them into something else. Sometimes it'll be a better item, sometimes a worse one. each item always changes into the same thing, though - a feather will always change into an elixir, for example. It means that you've got three things to think about when considering items - trade them, transmute them, or keep them for use in battle. Same applies to equipment.
Lenneth has a stat called 'evaluation point' - it's Odin's rating of her performance. If you fuck up - don't send enough warriors, don't send powerful enough warriors, ignore the whole warrior thing and just spend your time faffing about - her EP drops and it's game over. Apparently, anyway - not had that happen to me yet.
When you complete a dungeon and beat its boss, there'll be a couple of treasure chests behind it. Opening these presents you with legendary items that are otherwise unavailable. Problem is, they belong to Odin, so keeping them for yourself means that your EP drops. Sending them up to Odin rewards you with Party EXP - sending all of the legendary treasures up rewards you with mondo Party EXP (like, 20,000 points worth). So you need to balance that out, too - so far, I've sent everything up, as I've managed to keep all characters strong enough to face the dungeons without having to kit them out with legendary equipment. Remains to be seen whether that's still the case as I get further in, though.
Party EXP = EXP that you can distribute as and when you like. Can be highly useful when you get a new team member, as they always start off well below level, compared to those characters you've had with you for a while.
And here's a blurry example of what I was saying about the dungeon layouts and the maps:
Looks fairly flat, yeah? Spin it around, though...
.. and you can see that it's got paths in and out, like onion skins. This is a relatively simple dungeon - some of them have seven, eight or more layers of depth to them. |
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