Valkyrie Profile

"Valkyrie Profile is Valkyrie Awesome!"

This is BS... BLADE SWORDMAN, here to review one of the Blade's personal Favourite games, Valkyrie Profile. This is not your ordinary RPG, this a really fun and original RPG. It maybe the most creative idea for a game ever. Anyway, that's enough boasting about how good the game is, it's time to start the review. Let's start with the battle system, probably the best part about the game. It's very differant from the battle system in other RPG's, in VP, you have a 4 man party, and each character is connected to 1 button on your controller (X, Triangle, Square, O), and you attack with combos in the order you press their buttons. You should usually start the combo with Magic from a Magician. If not, than the enemy will usually block your attacks. Also, when you're done attacking, if you got the hits meter up to 100, you have characters with 0 CT (chance Turns), you can perform their awesome Special Attacks. It's very fun how you have to strategically use your characters attacks in th right order to do the most damage. Another good thing about the battle system is how they eliminated the old MP system. This game is all about going to dungeons anf fighting it up. Towns play a very small roll in this game. The story is basically taken from Greek Mythology. You are Lenneth Valkyrie, sent by Lord Odin to form an army of the dead to save Asgard. It's a very cool game, you will surely find it hard to stop playing. VP has 3 differant Difficulty settings, Easy, Normal and Hard. Hard is by far the best difficulty to go to, mainly because there are a lot more dungeons in Hard. But if you are kind of a rookie, or feel you should just try an easier game first, and than try Hard, than you should play Normal. Just don't play easy, because it's not nearly as good. VP has about 24 differant playable characters, but you can't just use the same party for the whole game, you need to train warriors and send them to Asgard to fight in the war. The game is divided into 8 differant chapters, with a brake between each chapter. You should try to send up 1 character each chapter, to keep your Evaluation high. If your Evaluation drops below a certain point, than the game is over. Other than chapters, there are also Periods. You lose periods every time you go to a town or dungeon. Once you run out of periods, you move on to the next chapter. Well, that's about it for this part of the review, it's time to move on to the ratings.

GRAPHICS: 10- This game's graphics are very differant from most other RPG's. VP is a 2D side scroller, and it has a real Anime feel to it. But the 2D graphics are very well done, and really give a differant feel to the game. There are a LOT of games with better graphics, but VP isn't about having the best graphics, it's about being really fun to play.

GAMEPLAY: 10- The gameplay is probably the best part of this game. It is just so fun to play. The battles are just so creative and good. VP has the best gameplay of any game that Swordman has ever played.

SOUND: 10- This game's sound is incredible. Not only does it have an amazing soundtrack, but all the characters have very good voice acting. You will probably recognize a lot of the voice cameos from the Anime series Pokemon. This game has probably the best sound ever in a video game.

STORY: 10- VP has a very memorable story. It's very original. Each character that joins your team has a very interesting background. You learn a lot about your characters. Also, you see all of your characters die in differant ways before they join your team, making it a very original story.

REPLAY VALUE: 10- There are a lot of ways to go through this game, and it has 3 differant endings. You may want to beat the game just by renting it, but if you want to explore everything that this game has to offer, you should buy it.

Closing Statements: Valkyrie Profile wasn't made for everyone, but you should at least try it. The Blade hopes that Swordman's review has helped you decide wether to play it or not. Well, that's about it. Good Luck!

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 05/23/01, Updated 05/23/01