Last week, we looked at the story of PS1 RPG Valkyrie Profile, a game that frequently finds its way onto hidden gems lists and other such conversations. I think I made it clear that while it had its high notes, the story and characters were just a bit disappointing for me. So now, it's time to talk about the gameplay. Could this bring the game up? Or will it knock it down to unplayable status? Well, it definitely won't make the game unplayable, but there is a lot to look at here.
You see, VP is very, very different from just about any JRPG of its era. Heck, it's pretty different from most entries in the genre ever. I have to give them a ton of credit for originality, though the expirimentation doesn't always land. But there is not denying that, for better or worse, VP is a different breed in terms of combat, exploration, pacing and structure.
First, let's start with the combat. Even here, it's probably where you will spend most of your gameplay time. And that's good, because VP's combat system is both unique and exceptional. If there's one thing that single handedly elevates that games score out of mediocrity, it's going to be this. You have a party of eight characters, with four entering battle at any given time. Each character is tied to a specific weapon type, bows, wands, light swords, katanas and heavy swords, with Lenneth able to equip the former three types. You have two characters in the front and two in the back, with each one assigned to a face button on the PlayStation controller. There are no individual turns, just player and enemy. Your characters attack in any order they want by pushing the button they correspond to. How many attacks you perform, and what attacks those are, correspond to the weapon you have equipped.
The goal is to string as many hits together as possible to charge your hit gauge, which will allows you to perform super moves to deal massive damage. There are also rows at play here, as characters in the back row can only be hit with magic or bow attacks. Magic as a whole is it's own animal, as mages can only attack once their charge time goes down to zero. However, their attacks are also incredibly powerful and can also be used to target multiple enemies or heal. It's a fun, complex system that provides tons of variety. Almost every weapon is different in some way, whether they offer differ attacks or more hits. And it's not just weapon types that are different, like, one short sword might be completely different from the other one you just unequipped. No two battles feel the same and that's to say nothing of all the different abilities your characters can learn. It's a similar system to Star Ocean, where leveling up provides you with points to put into these abilities.
While the combat is great, I did have some issues with the the equipment system. For better or worse, equipment matters more than just about everything else when determining party strength. Levels may increase stats and abilities provide support, but equipment is really what determines how much damage you will do to an enemy. It's to the point that you could be massively overleveled, but if you have the wrong gear you aren't going to be able to do more than a single damage to certain enemies. Many of the weapons you find will be specifically designed to defeat a certain type of enemy, like dragons or spirits or whatever they may be. That's fine, but the game doesn't really do a good job of explaining how any of this works. You have a very convoluted stat screen with a bunch of x's, o's and numbers that will be incredibly confusing. I did eventually figure out what most of this stuff meant, but it wasn't until much later in the game. Most of your strong weapons can also break, the game usually puts it at a 5% chance or less on this but it feels like it happens way more frequently. You can create weapons (as well as other items) with transmutation points, which you can earn between chapters, but these points are incredibly limited. It isn't the worst equipment setup ever, but it is very convoluted and I felt it was pretty poorly implimented.
Exploration is also very unique, though whether it is a good thing is sort of up for debate. Like the combat, the dungeon exploration is as unique as it gets as far as RPGs go. You don't explore from a top down perspective like you would in most games. Instead, the dungeons are explored like a sidescrolling 2D platformer. Lenneth can jump and use crystals to create platforms and freeze enemies. Encounters are touch based, though enemies that are frozen can be contacted or even used as platforms if need be. You can slash with your sword, and hitting an enemy with this attack will allow you to attack first when the battle starts. If the enemy touches you first, they will have the advantage. Most of the dungeons are relatively short, though some of the later ones can become quite complex. There is a good variety of layouts, some are very mazelike and require exploration of both the foregrounds and backgrounds, while others require puzzle solving or extensive combat.
The problem is that while this is all nice and original, the actual execution of the platforming just isn't great. It seems like there were a lot of points where treasure chests or other items were just thrown on ledges to force you to make ridiculous jumps, which was frustrating. I frequently found it difficult to see where I was supposed to go, or even that I could go up to a certain platform to move to the next part of the dungeon. There is an in game map here, but it is absolutely nonsensical and referencing it often hurt me more than it helped. In a more traditional RPG, not having a map can work, you might even want the player to get a little lost. But in an exploration based platformer, or a Metroidvania style game, you really need to see where you are going and where you have been. I found myself aimlessly wandering a lot, though the fact that enemies don't respawn made this a little bit more bearable. Making matters worse were the controls, which felt unresponsive and difficult to manage. Typically, RPGs are one of the few genres, they may be the only genre, where you can get away with having less than optimal controls. But with the precision of some of the platforming here, it was really frustrating that the jumping was so loose and inconsistent. I guess it's not a huge deal at the end of the day, you aren't jumping over pits or losing lives or anything like that. But that doesn't change the fact that the controls made it a chore to get around at points and made it feel like I was wasting time repeating what should have been simple or moderately challenging jumps over and over again.
It's back to the positive, and the unique, to discuss the fairly open-ended structure of Valkyrie Profile. The game is divided into eight chapters, with each one allowing for a set number of actions. You can use these actions to enter towns, enter or re-enter dungeons or explore the various Forbidden Caves that will open up. Each chapter is separated by a sacred phase, where you will receive and update from Freya on the war in Asguard while also hearing about the progress of any of the Einherjar that you have sent up to fight (more on that in a moment). Some chapters will have a set dungeon, or two if you are playing on hard mode, but outside of the first and last the events will be largely randomized. While exploring the overworld, Lenneth can use spiritual concentration to locate potential Einherjars before visiting the town or area where they appear. While a few of these are locked to certain chapters, most can appear in any order. Many of them also have dungeons associated with them, which can also be located through spiritual concentration. I kind of like this system and it really makes the game feel really different. I also feel like it would make multiple playthroughs more interesting. You will always have enough points to get everything required and then some, so you are free to explore or visit already completed dungeons if you so choose. It may not seem like much now, but this was a major differentiatior from other RPGs of the era.
But in case you haven't noticed, for every pro here we seem to have a con. And while I think the overall system for sending up Einherjar is actually pretty cool, the execution of it is fairly poor. During each sacred phase, Freya will outline what kind of fighter Odin's armies require, stuff like a warrior, with a high hero rank who is charasmatic and a strong leader, or something to that effect. During the next chapter, it is up to you to send one or more party members to Asguard based on those requirements. Most of these match pretty clearly with skills that you can learn, so there really isn't much of a mystery on who you are supposed to send up. Each character has a hero rank, which you can use skill points to increase, which is easy enough. The whole ability system is kind of like what you saw in Star Ocean, it's fairly simple and straightforward. The only minor issue I have is that it doesn't really tell you how much you need to put into a certain skill for that character to meet Freya's requirements. I am pretty sure you only need one point in, but I can't say for certain. I also don't love giving up my party members, but you will get them back during the endgame.
My major, major problem with this is its impact on your evaluation score and how this impacts which ending you get. Remember in Part 1, where I talked about the requirements for the good ending being incredibly obtuse? Well, it's time to explain why. Lenneth will carry an evaluation score, from 0-100, with her throughout the game. You can increase this score by sending up the correct Einherjar, offering up the artifiacts you get from bosses to Odin and recruiting certain characters. Additionally, you can decrease it by sending up an unfitting character or by viewing certain events throughout the story. So, it sounds like you want to boost this as high as you can as quick as you can, right? Well, not so fast. I won't get into it here, but you need to have your evaluation score hit very specific levels at very specific times if you want to get the best ending. Boost it up to 100 early and you have absolutely no chance of seeing the B ending. To me, that is incredibly counterintuitive and very unfair. The game actively pushes you to build this score up, it makes an especially big deal out of sending up artifacts and fitting characters. It also gives you more transmutation points, which are required for creating items and weapons, if your score is higher. But in doing so, it's pushing you away from the true ending. I guess that isn't the end of the world, but the problem here is there is absolutely no indicator that what your doing will have such a major impact. Again, I would actually kind of like this if it were something you needed to do to get an alternate ending. But the B ending is essentially the "true" ending, and, as I discussed in part 1, is essential to making the story of VP actually make sense. Maybe I'm misunderstanding how it actually works, but I found it to be a major frustration.
So, where does that leave VP in the pantheon of PS1 RPGs? How do I consider the uniqueness against the frustration? The ambitious content of the story against the poorly executed storytelling? It's kind of tough, because VP did a lot of things that I typically like about games of this era. It's unique and different and attempted to put its very own stamp on what was becoming a very stale genre. But it also had what I felt were some pretty serious issues that I found difficult to overcome. I have to give some level of credit for trying something new, I always do. But at the end of the day, I just didn't enjoy VP like I thought I was going to, or like a lot of folks seem to. Don't get me wrong, it had a lot of things I liked and it's far from a bad game. I can name quite a few golden age JRPGs that I would put below it. But I kind of went in with pretty high expectations, largely from the hype surrounding the game and my enjoyment of other Enix/Tri-Ace games, which were certainly not met. I found myself frustrated almost as much as I had fun, despite the excellent combat system and genuine originality.
7/10
You see, VP is very, very different from just about any JRPG of its era. Heck, it's pretty different from most entries in the genre ever. I have to give them a ton of credit for originality, though the expirimentation doesn't always land. But there is not denying that, for better or worse, VP is a different breed in terms of combat, exploration, pacing and structure.
First, let's start with the combat. Even here, it's probably where you will spend most of your gameplay time. And that's good, because VP's combat system is both unique and exceptional. If there's one thing that single handedly elevates that games score out of mediocrity, it's going to be this. You have a party of eight characters, with four entering battle at any given time. Each character is tied to a specific weapon type, bows, wands, light swords, katanas and heavy swords, with Lenneth able to equip the former three types. You have two characters in the front and two in the back, with each one assigned to a face button on the PlayStation controller. There are no individual turns, just player and enemy. Your characters attack in any order they want by pushing the button they correspond to. How many attacks you perform, and what attacks those are, correspond to the weapon you have equipped.
The goal is to string as many hits together as possible to charge your hit gauge, which will allows you to perform super moves to deal massive damage. There are also rows at play here, as characters in the back row can only be hit with magic or bow attacks. Magic as a whole is it's own animal, as mages can only attack once their charge time goes down to zero. However, their attacks are also incredibly powerful and can also be used to target multiple enemies or heal. It's a fun, complex system that provides tons of variety. Almost every weapon is different in some way, whether they offer differ attacks or more hits. And it's not just weapon types that are different, like, one short sword might be completely different from the other one you just unequipped. No two battles feel the same and that's to say nothing of all the different abilities your characters can learn. It's a similar system to Star Ocean, where leveling up provides you with points to put into these abilities.
While the combat is great, I did have some issues with the the equipment system. For better or worse, equipment matters more than just about everything else when determining party strength. Levels may increase stats and abilities provide support, but equipment is really what determines how much damage you will do to an enemy. It's to the point that you could be massively overleveled, but if you have the wrong gear you aren't going to be able to do more than a single damage to certain enemies. Many of the weapons you find will be specifically designed to defeat a certain type of enemy, like dragons or spirits or whatever they may be. That's fine, but the game doesn't really do a good job of explaining how any of this works. You have a very convoluted stat screen with a bunch of x's, o's and numbers that will be incredibly confusing. I did eventually figure out what most of this stuff meant, but it wasn't until much later in the game. Most of your strong weapons can also break, the game usually puts it at a 5% chance or less on this but it feels like it happens way more frequently. You can create weapons (as well as other items) with transmutation points, which you can earn between chapters, but these points are incredibly limited. It isn't the worst equipment setup ever, but it is very convoluted and I felt it was pretty poorly implimented.
Exploration is also very unique, though whether it is a good thing is sort of up for debate. Like the combat, the dungeon exploration is as unique as it gets as far as RPGs go. You don't explore from a top down perspective like you would in most games. Instead, the dungeons are explored like a sidescrolling 2D platformer. Lenneth can jump and use crystals to create platforms and freeze enemies. Encounters are touch based, though enemies that are frozen can be contacted or even used as platforms if need be. You can slash with your sword, and hitting an enemy with this attack will allow you to attack first when the battle starts. If the enemy touches you first, they will have the advantage. Most of the dungeons are relatively short, though some of the later ones can become quite complex. There is a good variety of layouts, some are very mazelike and require exploration of both the foregrounds and backgrounds, while others require puzzle solving or extensive combat.
The problem is that while this is all nice and original, the actual execution of the platforming just isn't great. It seems like there were a lot of points where treasure chests or other items were just thrown on ledges to force you to make ridiculous jumps, which was frustrating. I frequently found it difficult to see where I was supposed to go, or even that I could go up to a certain platform to move to the next part of the dungeon. There is an in game map here, but it is absolutely nonsensical and referencing it often hurt me more than it helped. In a more traditional RPG, not having a map can work, you might even want the player to get a little lost. But in an exploration based platformer, or a Metroidvania style game, you really need to see where you are going and where you have been. I found myself aimlessly wandering a lot, though the fact that enemies don't respawn made this a little bit more bearable. Making matters worse were the controls, which felt unresponsive and difficult to manage. Typically, RPGs are one of the few genres, they may be the only genre, where you can get away with having less than optimal controls. But with the precision of some of the platforming here, it was really frustrating that the jumping was so loose and inconsistent. I guess it's not a huge deal at the end of the day, you aren't jumping over pits or losing lives or anything like that. But that doesn't change the fact that the controls made it a chore to get around at points and made it feel like I was wasting time repeating what should have been simple or moderately challenging jumps over and over again.
It's back to the positive, and the unique, to discuss the fairly open-ended structure of Valkyrie Profile. The game is divided into eight chapters, with each one allowing for a set number of actions. You can use these actions to enter towns, enter or re-enter dungeons or explore the various Forbidden Caves that will open up. Each chapter is separated by a sacred phase, where you will receive and update from Freya on the war in Asguard while also hearing about the progress of any of the Einherjar that you have sent up to fight (more on that in a moment). Some chapters will have a set dungeon, or two if you are playing on hard mode, but outside of the first and last the events will be largely randomized. While exploring the overworld, Lenneth can use spiritual concentration to locate potential Einherjars before visiting the town or area where they appear. While a few of these are locked to certain chapters, most can appear in any order. Many of them also have dungeons associated with them, which can also be located through spiritual concentration. I kind of like this system and it really makes the game feel really different. I also feel like it would make multiple playthroughs more interesting. You will always have enough points to get everything required and then some, so you are free to explore or visit already completed dungeons if you so choose. It may not seem like much now, but this was a major differentiatior from other RPGs of the era.
But in case you haven't noticed, for every pro here we seem to have a con. And while I think the overall system for sending up Einherjar is actually pretty cool, the execution of it is fairly poor. During each sacred phase, Freya will outline what kind of fighter Odin's armies require, stuff like a warrior, with a high hero rank who is charasmatic and a strong leader, or something to that effect. During the next chapter, it is up to you to send one or more party members to Asguard based on those requirements. Most of these match pretty clearly with skills that you can learn, so there really isn't much of a mystery on who you are supposed to send up. Each character has a hero rank, which you can use skill points to increase, which is easy enough. The whole ability system is kind of like what you saw in Star Ocean, it's fairly simple and straightforward. The only minor issue I have is that it doesn't really tell you how much you need to put into a certain skill for that character to meet Freya's requirements. I am pretty sure you only need one point in, but I can't say for certain. I also don't love giving up my party members, but you will get them back during the endgame.
My major, major problem with this is its impact on your evaluation score and how this impacts which ending you get. Remember in Part 1, where I talked about the requirements for the good ending being incredibly obtuse? Well, it's time to explain why. Lenneth will carry an evaluation score, from 0-100, with her throughout the game. You can increase this score by sending up the correct Einherjar, offering up the artifiacts you get from bosses to Odin and recruiting certain characters. Additionally, you can decrease it by sending up an unfitting character or by viewing certain events throughout the story. So, it sounds like you want to boost this as high as you can as quick as you can, right? Well, not so fast. I won't get into it here, but you need to have your evaluation score hit very specific levels at very specific times if you want to get the best ending. Boost it up to 100 early and you have absolutely no chance of seeing the B ending. To me, that is incredibly counterintuitive and very unfair. The game actively pushes you to build this score up, it makes an especially big deal out of sending up artifacts and fitting characters. It also gives you more transmutation points, which are required for creating items and weapons, if your score is higher. But in doing so, it's pushing you away from the true ending. I guess that isn't the end of the world, but the problem here is there is absolutely no indicator that what your doing will have such a major impact. Again, I would actually kind of like this if it were something you needed to do to get an alternate ending. But the B ending is essentially the "true" ending, and, as I discussed in part 1, is essential to making the story of VP actually make sense. Maybe I'm misunderstanding how it actually works, but I found it to be a major frustration.
So, where does that leave VP in the pantheon of PS1 RPGs? How do I consider the uniqueness against the frustration? The ambitious content of the story against the poorly executed storytelling? It's kind of tough, because VP did a lot of things that I typically like about games of this era. It's unique and different and attempted to put its very own stamp on what was becoming a very stale genre. But it also had what I felt were some pretty serious issues that I found difficult to overcome. I have to give some level of credit for trying something new, I always do. But at the end of the day, I just didn't enjoy VP like I thought I was going to, or like a lot of folks seem to. Don't get me wrong, it had a lot of things I liked and it's far from a bad game. I can name quite a few golden age JRPGs that I would put below it. But I kind of went in with pretty high expectations, largely from the hype surrounding the game and my enjoyment of other Enix/Tri-Ace games, which were certainly not met. I found myself frustrated almost as much as I had fun, despite the excellent combat system and genuine originality.
7/10
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