Feeling pissed at myself for missing out on Persona 3 (thank heavens for FES!), I decided I should stock up on a few quirky Atlus titles while the going was still good out there. So I wound up purchasing both Odin Sphere and GrimGrimoire last week, the two ultra gorgeous PS2 exclusives from George Kamitani's VanillaWare studios. Needless to say they feature some of the most lovingly crafted 2D visuals I've seen in games and I've been enjoying them both. Odin Sphere was riding quite the hype train upon release so I sort of knew what to expect from it going in, but so far I've spent way more time addicted to it's pleasantly surprising sister release, the Japanese Harry Potter-meets-RTS in creepy stairwells saga of GrimGrimoire.
Now I usually hate real time strategy, I much prefer the slower, more methodical pace of games like Advance Wars or Civilization. But the manageable scope of the battles, a control scheme that makes sense and the four balanced and interesting schools of magic found in Grim equals fun gameplay that I've really taken a liking to. The fact that you are encouraged to stop the action often to modify or make decisions gives the whole thing more of a turn based feel anyway. And even if you're meeting the enemy in the same damn hallways every time it's still a very engaging, intense and unique experience.
The story is also entertaining - wizard school, demons, Philosopher stones and all that. A bit of Groundhog Day in there as well as you keep reliving your first 5 days at wizard school tower, which was going swimmingly until Mr. dark lord shows up and everyone dies. Only you have the power to stop him! But the characters are cool and the story bits are impressively presented in a next-gen Fire Emblem manner with full voice acting and stunning floaty artwork that is never static. The look and feel of these scenes really keeps you involved in the plot and I find myself doing the "one more battle" thing just to see what's next.
Odin Sphere is a much stuffier affair by comparison, not a lot of smiling going on with these high fantasy folks. It's clear that years were spent on perfecting the visual look of the game as it's not only vibrantly beautiful and hand drawn but there is an impressive attention to details, both in the lush backgrounds and with the action on screen. Every icon is pretty, every animation is stylish. The level of polish is frankly the best I've ever seen for a 2D game. Gameplay wise it's a hybrid of beat-em-up and RPG, but it's certainly not a button masher - there's a fatigue bar you must keep an eye on, not my favorite gameplay mechanic and even if it is a hindrance at times it forces you really think about balancing your attacks with defense.
Each side scrolling level is broken up into circular and self-contained chunks which provides a few interesting gameplay moments and branching pathways but I really don't see the huge benefit of this design choice. It's like Viewtiful Joe with more loading times in that each chunk gives you a grade, with different goodies dropping out of the sky depending on how well you did. The bosses are huge and overall the game gets quite frustrating, some of the enemies are flat out cheap and grinding is a viable but unwelcome option for evening the tables a bit. There's also a deep instant alchemy system to experiment with and a clunky inventory to navigate for creating said alchemy, but it's worth it. Cooking is in the game as well, and that's always a plus.
Either of these games would make a great addition to any PS2 collection, personally I never owned a Saturn or Princess Crown and I've been very impressed with what VanillaWare has to offer from what I've played of these two titles so far. Excited to see where they're headed next. Both games have flaws, some more serious than others (what game doesn't?) but there's plenty of substance to go along with the captivating visuals. These are fun and quirky titles full of attractive cartoon females and Eastern developer charm and they'll surely remain on store shelves long enough for all interested parties to find themselves a copy at a reasonable price. Right, Atlus?
