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Another RPG has hit the PSP. Is this one a hit?
April 30, 2007 | 10:52 PM PSTby: Matt Furtado
Enter the world of Valhalla Knights. In a land of humans, elves, dwarves, and halflings the world was in a perfect harmony until demons destroyed their peaceful lives. The Dark Lord, who previously ruled the land, returned to reclaim what was his. One day, a youth wakes up in this land. In this land full of despair, the youth searches for his/her lost memory. What lie ahead is the discovery of his/her memories and the future of this forsaken land.
Valhalla Knights plays out like you would expect most RPG titles except you get to choose your own main character to play with. You begin choosing your characters sex and class at the start of the game. There is a great deal of "open-endedness" to character creation which goes with the theme of creative freedom throughout the game.
Players will be able to customize their own attributes including strength or magic. Some of the classes available at the start of the game include a fighter who is good with weapons and melee combat, a mage who will use magic attacks and healing techniques, a priest who will use healing techniques and cure your party, and a thief who is more efficient with a long ranged weapon such as a bow and arrow as opposed to a dagger. More occupations will become available as you play. Players will be able to teach their characters secondary jobs as the game goes on. This will help expand their move sets and allow them to do more attack power and damage on certain type of enemies.
After your finished making your character to your liking it's time to enter the world of Valhalla Knights. The main game plays very simply and straightforward which is basically you take your character and travel dungeon to dungeon conquering each boss. The main game will take around 40 hours for players to complete. However, outside of the main quest there are also several side-quests that you can partake in. In order to take part in this side-quest you simply walk into a town guild and take a look at what's available to do. Much like the quests in Final Fantasy XII the side quest have nothing to do with the main game itself but instead offer a nice break from the main game and gives players a chance to explore, earn money, and level up.
The main game is made of journeys into huge dungeons. Each dungeon has its own theme and these all vary. Some will have a jail like theme whereas the next will be more like an cavern. As your journey through the dungeons you will encounter countless enemies and portals which will allow you to transport yourself back to town for items, healing, or to buy weapons. Even if you use these portals you will still end of journeying through the same parts of the dungeon and battling the same monsters again and again. This can get old very fast for some gamers and leave you aggravated at the end of the day.
The monsters in this game are all very aggressive in the sense that once your character enters a room the nearest one will bounce all over you. In a battle you can up to six party members at a time. Unfortunately, you only have complete control over one of them and the others must use the customizable intelligence you made for them. You can switch to other characters by simply using the select button but its easier to preprogram the characters to do preset moves already. For each member of the party you will be able to give them points for attack, support, or magic. These will allow them to behave the way you want them to in battle.
Once engaged in battle, you will lock onto to an enemy by holding the R button, then select attack from the battle menu and then your character will attack. This is also how you will cast magic and other techniques as well. It’s simply and very fast to do. After so many attacks you will be ready to cast a special attack onto the enemy. To initiate the special attack you will simply hit the triangle button and then bam it goes. The special attacks are more powerful regular attacks for the most part and aren't anything mind-blowingly great.
The game does have an ad hoc wireless; the title hosts a two player co-op mode a two player versus mode where the two teams battle for gold. The game also features 30 exclusive missions for co-op players to engage in.
Graphically the game is solid on a technical standpoint. The game is colorful and the backgrounds are overall nicely detailed. The characters have a good design which keeps them from looking overly generic. The game does suffer from slowdown during battles especially when you have six party members battling against six enemies. Outside of this slowdown the game does load every time you enter a new area and it can take a little while to finish fully loading. This does slow down the overall experience a bit.
Valhalla Knights doesn’t do much to differentiate itself from other portable RPG titles outside of the full character customization feature. After making your own character you’ll find a generic RPG with little to no existing storyline to follow or care about. Although the game does look nice graphically the slowdown and load times are bothersome. The games battle system is very simplistic and the inclusion of ad hoc multiplayer was a nice addition to the title. The game has some cool ideas going for it but they were not fully utilized.
Valhalla Knights plays out like you would expect most RPG titles except you get to choose your own main character to play with. You begin choosing your characters sex and class at the start of the game. There is a great deal of "open-endedness" to character creation which goes with the theme of creative freedom throughout the game.
Players will be able to customize their own attributes including strength or magic. Some of the classes available at the start of the game include a fighter who is good with weapons and melee combat, a mage who will use magic attacks and healing techniques, a priest who will use healing techniques and cure your party, and a thief who is more efficient with a long ranged weapon such as a bow and arrow as opposed to a dagger. More occupations will become available as you play. Players will be able to teach their characters secondary jobs as the game goes on. This will help expand their move sets and allow them to do more attack power and damage on certain type of enemies.
After your finished making your character to your liking it's time to enter the world of Valhalla Knights. The main game plays very simply and straightforward which is basically you take your character and travel dungeon to dungeon conquering each boss. The main game will take around 40 hours for players to complete. However, outside of the main quest there are also several side-quests that you can partake in. In order to take part in this side-quest you simply walk into a town guild and take a look at what's available to do. Much like the quests in Final Fantasy XII the side quest have nothing to do with the main game itself but instead offer a nice break from the main game and gives players a chance to explore, earn money, and level up.
The main game is made of journeys into huge dungeons. Each dungeon has its own theme and these all vary. Some will have a jail like theme whereas the next will be more like an cavern. As your journey through the dungeons you will encounter countless enemies and portals which will allow you to transport yourself back to town for items, healing, or to buy weapons. Even if you use these portals you will still end of journeying through the same parts of the dungeon and battling the same monsters again and again. This can get old very fast for some gamers and leave you aggravated at the end of the day.
The monsters in this game are all very aggressive in the sense that once your character enters a room the nearest one will bounce all over you. In a battle you can up to six party members at a time. Unfortunately, you only have complete control over one of them and the others must use the customizable intelligence you made for them. You can switch to other characters by simply using the select button but its easier to preprogram the characters to do preset moves already. For each member of the party you will be able to give them points for attack, support, or magic. These will allow them to behave the way you want them to in battle.
Once engaged in battle, you will lock onto to an enemy by holding the R button, then select attack from the battle menu and then your character will attack. This is also how you will cast magic and other techniques as well. It’s simply and very fast to do. After so many attacks you will be ready to cast a special attack onto the enemy. To initiate the special attack you will simply hit the triangle button and then bam it goes. The special attacks are more powerful regular attacks for the most part and aren't anything mind-blowingly great.
The game does have an ad hoc wireless; the title hosts a two player co-op mode a two player versus mode where the two teams battle for gold. The game also features 30 exclusive missions for co-op players to engage in.
Graphically the game is solid on a technical standpoint. The game is colorful and the backgrounds are overall nicely detailed. The characters have a good design which keeps them from looking overly generic. The game does suffer from slowdown during battles especially when you have six party members battling against six enemies. Outside of this slowdown the game does load every time you enter a new area and it can take a little while to finish fully loading. This does slow down the overall experience a bit.
Valhalla Knights doesn’t do much to differentiate itself from other portable RPG titles outside of the full character customization feature. After making your own character you’ll find a generic RPG with little to no existing storyline to follow or care about. Although the game does look nice graphically the slowdown and load times are bothersome. The games battle system is very simplistic and the inclusion of ad hoc multiplayer was a nice addition to the title. The game has some cool ideas going for it but they were not fully utilized.
November 20, 2009
