Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth

"Are you tired of traditional RPGs?"

Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth was released in mid 2006 for the PSP console, made by Tri-Ace and produced by Square-Enix. Valkyrie Profile was earlier release on the PSX console, but due to a short print run, the game had been extremely rare to find for the PSX, and would usually go for $100 on online sites. I did not get to enjoy Valkyrie Profile on the PSX, but the release on the PSP made it all worthy of time spent.


Story - 10/10

The story in Valkyrie Profile is ridiculous.

The prolouge opens up with a girl named Platina, who is friends with a boy named Lucian. Platina's parents never treat her with kindness. One day, men in black suits show up at her house. Platina is curious to find out who they were and what their business was, but only gets scolded by her mother. Later that night, Lucian appears by her bedroom window and tells her to run away with him, that the men in black were actually at her house to buy her from her parents. A similar event happened with Lucian as well; Men in black showed up at his house, and the next day, his sister was gone. After her mother stumbles in and yells at Lucian, Platina finally gives in and runs away with Lucian. They end up stumbling across a weeping lily field, which Platina loves the sight of, but ends up inhaling the weeping lily pollen which is severely deadly. Although the main story is focused on Platina and Lucian, there are many more characters who you recruit, which transform into more episodes of the fantastic story.

When you actually start the game, it shows Lenneth in a field of flowers. Her opening words, "How nostalgic..." instantly indicate that she is Platina. She walks over to the Lord Odin's castle in Valhalla, where she gets informed that a war with the Vanir will break out. She then gets transformed into the Valkyrie. Her job is now to go to Midgard (world of Humans) and recruit lost souls (aka, Einherjar) to fight in Asgard (the world of gods) against the Vanir.

Your journey is an adventurous one as you can recruit around 25 Einherjar to fight for your cause. Along the way, more events unfold about Lenneth and others as the story becomes clearer and clearer. There are actually three endings in this game: C Ending, B Ending, and A Ending. The C Ending is basically a game over, the B Ending is a normal ending (but kind of dissapointing), and the A Ending is the most complete ending there is. You must recieve the A Ending to unfold the entire story.




Gameplay - 10/10

Valkyrie Profile is so unique. It is unlike most other RPG games out there, like Final Fantasy, Star Ocean, or Dragon Warrior. This game does however contain the main traveling elements of RPGs, mainly towns, dungeons, and the world map.

The game is dividing into Chapters and Periods. There are 8 Chapters in the game where the length of periods in the chapters depends on what difficulty you are playing on. If you are playing on Easy, you get 16 periods per chapter. Normal gets 24 while Hard gets 28. As soon as all periods are consumed, the chapter concludes and you go onto the Sacred Phase, which is updates on the war in Asgard. After the Sacred Phase, a new chapter begins. You consume periods by Spiritual Concentrations (2 periods), going into a dungeon (2 periods), going into a town (1 period), or resting (as many periods as you want to rest until all periods are used up).

At the end of each Sacred Phase, Freya (servant to Odin) asks you to find an Einherjar with specific class, skills, and hero values to send to Asgard. It is then your duty to find an Einherjar that would fit her description. You also get Materialize Points which are used to create items, and if you pleased the Lord Odin with your Einherjar, you will get bonus artifacts (items) from him. You find Einherjar and dungeons by performing Spiritual Concentrations on the world map. After each Spiritual Concentration, it will show you the location of that Einherjar or dungeon. You can get two to three Einherjar per chapter and one to four dungeons per chapter, depending on what chapter it is.

You then have to train that Einherjar to increase their hero value to where it is suitable for Freya. You gain hero value by increasing levels (+2 Hero Value per level) and increasing their traits, which you can do on the skills section in the main menu. Traits use capacity points, and you gain capacity points with each level up. You can increase their good skills and decrease their bad skills for an overall increase in hero value. It is best to just max out all of the traits for the Einherjar. Also, Einherjar need to be properly equipped for Asgard. If they are not well equipped or/and/or has a dramaticly lower hero value than asked for, there is a high chance that the Einherjar will die in Asgard, and you can't play as them again in the final chapter. Once your Einherjar is ready, you transfer them to Asgard through the main menu. After all periods are consumed and the chapter ends, the Sacred Phase begins and you get an overall update of the war and you can also check on how your Einherjar are doing. In Asgard, they participate in non-playable events, but you can watch text overviews, explaining what they did and if it was a victory or a defeat.

This goes on for 8 Chapters total. You can send two Einherjar per chapter but you really only need to send one to be satisfactory.



The game is set in a 2D environment, where you can walk and run around towns and dungeons, moving to the rear or to the front by just pressing up or down at certain spots, like pathways and staircases.

There are no random battles in this game. It's kind of like Chrono Cross where you see the enemy roaming about and you can choose to battle it or not. A battle initiates when you touch the enemy with yourself or if you brandish your sword and your sword touches the enemy. If your sword touches the enemy, you get the first turn of the battle. If direct contact happens, the first turn is random, but if you happen to get the first turn, your AP (action points) are reduced by 1. What this means is basically you have to wait until your next turn to do what you would normally do in a fight (cast magics or use special attacks).

In battle, you can have up to four characters fight. Each character is assigned a button; Circle, Cross, Triangle, and Square, the four main buttons on the right side of a playstation controller. You can adjust these to your liking but it doesn't really change anything on what positions they are in. You trigger an attack by pressing the corresponding button they are in. For example, if Lenneth is assigned to Square, you press the Square button to make her attack. Of course attacking is not that simple.

Most enemies can guard physical attacks, which is why it's good to have a mage in your party who can cast a spell which they cannot physically block. You can combine attacks by your party to create a chain of attacks. Your physical attackers could combine their attacks and force a guard break on the opponent, breaking their guard and leaving them open for attacks, or your mage can knock them off guard with a spell while you open up with your physical hitters. Thus said, it is smart to keep a mage or two (or three!) in your party.

More info on battle, characters only get enough strikes in battle as their weapon allows. If the weapon only allows one attack, they can only attack once. If it allows two attacks, they can only attack twice. The highest amount of hits a weapon can hold is 3. if you combine attacks and strike the enemy while they are in the air, they drop crystals, which add onto your total experience points gained at the end of the battle. If you hit them on the ground, they drop gems, which restore AP to those who's AP is drained and cannot perform at their fullest. Treasure chests can also be dropped by enemies by attacking them.

With each attack, the PWS gauge increases. PWS is Purify Weird Soul, another name for special attack, limit break, overdrive, whatever you call it. If you attack consistently enough so that the PWS gauge hits 100, you go into Purify Weird Soul mode, where your characters can unleash their special attacks. Each PWS is different as each character has their respective PWS moves. Mages do not have respective PWS moves, rather it depends on what spell you currently have them set on and what wand you have them equipped with. A higher quality wand will allow Great Magics, which are like second level spells of their initial spell, hitting all enemies though. PWS moves can chain with each other, meaning that if one characters PWS increases the gauge to 100 again, you are given the option to PWS again with another character. PWS drains AP, so you'll have to wait some turns or try to gather gems to restore that missing AP.


A main unique thing about this game is that there are no shops. You obtain items through the main menu through the Divine Item section. There you can use your Materialize Points given to you by Freya during Sacred Phases to create items from the menu, essentially "buying" them with Materialize Points. New items and weapons are added to the Divine Item Menu each chapter.

Another unique thing about Valkyrie Profile is that levels really do not matter on your battle performance. As long as you have the most updated weapons/armor/accessories and have good skills maxed out, you'll be fine. You do however have to gain levels to get capacity points for skills, so in essence, leveling up is good but level grinding can be pointless.



Overall, if it is your first time playing this game, you really won't get the hang of everything until mid chapters where you are consistently doing stuff and it becomes second nature.




Sound - 10/10

The music in this game is amazing, especially the battle theme. I actually put headphones into my PSP just to listen to the sound up close to my ears. The music is beautifully cast and is polished to perfection. I have not came across one tone that I did not like.

This game also delivers voice acting. Each character has their own respective voice, unique and whatnot. The voices are done so well and consistent that it is appauling to many. Although some character's voices may be considered annoying, it is supposed to be part of that character's nature, which is all good for the beauty of the game.

There is a music collection and a voice collection on the main screen, which is like a sound test room. All more for musical glory.



Graphics - 9/10

For a port of a PSX, this game on the PSP looks incredibly insane, The graphics are smoother and the widescreen setting is just added flavor. In the PSX version of the game, you had animated scenes. In this PSP version, those animated scene have been replaced with real-time computer generated graphics, aka new-sk00l graphics, which is totally insane. If you have a save file with CG scenes from the game, you can view them through the movie gallery on the main screen.

Graphics in a dungeon are nice as well. Being in that 2D environment forces the player to look in all directions, and it can also be sneaky and hide chests behind certain things that you cannot see, but leaving just enough so you can make out that it's a chest. Pretty standard, but glorious nonetheless.




Replay Value: N/A

It really depends on your style of game. You can play it once through on Normal Mode to get the hang of the game, then if you like it so much and really decide to plunge for the entire story (like me), you'll start a new file on Hard mode, go through everything, and obtain the A ending for the complete bag of chips.

Honestly, this game I could probably never get tired of for years. The story is that gripping and the gameplay is so unique that it's hard to drop the game. After I hit the A ending, I'll probably drop it for interest in more games that come out, like the new Valkyrie Profile that's coming out for DS, but that's a different story.





Rent or Buy:
If you are a fan of RPG games, I can say that this will not be a dissapointment like others have made it out to be. If you are looking for a truely unique gem and are getting tired of traditional RPGs, this game is perfect.

The game is discontinued, but a new US copy is $50. If you want to pay something cheaper, you can buy a European version for about $20 less. EU copies will work on the PSP because the PSP is region-free. It's also in English too, obviously.





Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth for the PSP scores a perfect 10/10

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 05/30/08

Game Release: Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth (US, 07/18/06)