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Beautiful game with one huge flaw...
To start off, I'd like to say that I loved Odin Sphere. I searched all over my town for a copy of the game and I was elated when I finally got my hands on one. When I first started up my game, I instantly fell in love with it, and enjoyed every moment...until Cornelius' storyline. In his storyline, the boss fights are great and there are enemies everywhere which happens to be the reason this game can't get five stars. The slowdown is AGONIZING. There was one particular boss fight that involves a dragon that spits out trash and sucks it back up. This fight was the reason that I gave up on the game and traded it back in, it is THAT BAD. I recommend that if you plan to buy this game, either get a PS3 or a boatload of patience, because you will need it. Otherwise, the game is great. The story is very intriguing, the characters are deep, and the music is wonderful. If you can deal with the excrutiating slowdown, I recommend giving this game a chance.

The most fun I've had with a video game in a long time...
Odin Sphere is simply a great game. This side-scrolling, hack and slash, RPG, is one of the best games for the PS2, if you like that sorta thing. The 2D graphics will take you back to the good ol' Sega Genesis days, and thats not a bad thing!

Its strengths are its gameplay (if you like side-scrolling hack & slash/Action RPGs), the music & sound in the game is very good. Odin Sphere is very original in many aspects and a very odd game, which is a good thing, its different and I like that. (example: During, after or before a battle you can plant seeds so they can grow into trees so then they can produce fruit for you to eat, which gains experience...) The boss battles are simply awesome, most of the bosses take up nearly the whole screen and are difficult to beat. As the story progresses, you'll eventually end up using 5 different characters, which have different skills and weapons. You can even make potions in the game, which will help you in battle.

I have only a few dislikes with Odin Sphere, which prevents it from being 5 out of 5 stars. At times it can almost be too difficult, and has no difficulty option. I consider myself pretty good at games, in general, and there has been times in this game where I would die nearly 6-7 times in the same stage, having to restart the stage each time. It can be frustrating to lose in a stage where there is a ton of monsters, because you'll have to restart the stage when you die, which means having to battle the same monsters all over again. My only other complaints are that I wish the stages were longer, that there were more stages/areas/levels, and more boss battles.

All in all this game gets 4 stars overall from me. I hope to see a sequel to this game.

Total garbage
What idiot decided to label this abomination an RPG? Because it isn't. It's a mediocre 2-D sidescrolling beat-em-up with some RPG elements poorly integrated into the game engine. And by 2-D, I mean really 2-D. You can move forward and backwards, and jump. You can't move up and down, something that has been standard in beat-em-ups since the NES.

Sure, the graphics are good, but that doesn't mean anything when the game is monotonous and annoying. The game engine is hardwired for contradictory goals. To get more HP, you need to use healing items. But to get good items from a level, you must win fights without getting hurt, which obviates the need for healing items. I also never saw any results from levelling up my weapon.

The game was also shipped with what I consider a showstopper bug. Neat trick: Go into a tutorial that involves picking items up with a full inventory. Since your inventory is full, you can't pick anything up, so you can't progress in the tutorial. And since you're in a tutorial, you can't drop anything. You're stuck.

I played this game once, put it on a shelf, and traded it for store credit against Growlanser: Heritage of War a month later. I find the fact that Sony refused to publish Ys I & II Eternal in America because it was 2-D when it allows 2-D games like this, which are inherently inferior, to be an insult.

Great Old School Side Scrolling
Odin Sphere is a great game, fun to play with AMAZING graphics. It feels like your playing a children's painting. The story is well written and draws you in. Even if it starts as the typical RPG fair. At least nobody is missing their memory. All in all a great game, works great on a PS3 too. If you can grab a copy definitely worth a buy.

Vastly Underrated
This may be the most beautiful game ever made. The art is like none other and is so detailed it's amazing. There are less than a dozen areas to visit in this game, yet every time I returned with a different character, they never got old or repetitive. The same with the bosses. Each of the five characters are a different experience to play, although they are all in the same overall plot. Areas are set up as "stages" connecting together shown on the map as circles and are rated by difficulty from 1 to 5 as well as shops and bosses. I liked this set up because it was simple and told me exactly what I was getting into before I got there. The option to play using the original Japanese voice track was a big plus for me as well. I was skeptical of the growing and cooking food aspect of this game at first, but it is actually fun and easy. The only minuses are occasional long load times and slowdown. There is one boss battle where the slowdown is huge, but the battle is still doable on each character. Likewise when there are a lot of enemies on screen it can slow a little. It's a little annoying but is only a real problem with that specific boss. Odin Sphere follows a linear path so that you never have to guess where to go next which makes it easy to play and yet still challenging. It's a shame that this game hasn't gotten all the recognition it deserves.