"An Old School Game Given New Life (Spoilers)"

As an avid lover of the first VP for PSOne. I have to say I'm both pleased and disappointed at the same time.

In all honesty, the positives do outweigh the vast majority of the negatives, as there aren't too many negatives to this drastic make over of the VP series.

Game Play: 8 out of 10

It was an amazing thing to see the changes and innovation that went into the battle system and skill sets in VP 2 from VP 1. The arena styled movement/engagement system transformed the simple button mashing combos from VP 1 into a tactical and strategic strike system that wracked your mind against some of the toughest of opponents since the damage system was greatly toned down from the massive two hundred thousand damage hits seen in VP 1.

The magic concepts made many poorer physical fighters useful with the sparse magic they knew, I went through the first play through with no spell users other than Lezard for his items after Chapter 4.

SFX and BGM: 7 out of 10

The sounds of the bow being strung and pulled taught and the clash of blades were classic and made more realistic to some degree in the Silmeria game. The music was brilliantly and classically done as well. The town themes, dungeon themes and definitely the world map music was also toned down from the wailing, upbeat tunes in VP 1, but the storyline of VP 2 didn't demand such musical scores unless in battle, which is where the music shines. Even then, however, it isn't as heartpumping as VP 1, but it suits the game, so more power to it. The only thing that ruins this section's score was the voice casting.

The voices, though well done with Hrist, Silmeria, Lezard, and Alicia, have lost their luster with everyone else who is recognized in the first VP. Lenneth's voice lost the cold edge that we all came to love and admire. Odin and Freya also drastically changed from what we knew. The generic voice casting done with the Einherjar this time around was what nearly made me mute the game's Voice option. Unlike VP 1, where every Einherjar was different in storyline background and voices, all the voices were practically identical with female and male voice overs. Sure the lines varied occasionally, but even then, most lines and all Purify Finishers were the same for all characters save the main storyline movers.

Storyline: 10 out of 10 up to chapter 5. 5 out of 10 during Tower of Lezard.

Many people are going to hate me for this one, but after playing the first VP so many times and getting the A ending each time, the story of Silmeria was lacking. Sure, seeing the events of Dipan redone to Silmeria and Hrist's view instead of Lenneth's during her escapade to kill Dallas, Walter, and Gyne in the future was an awesome concept. The fact that we could see how Silmeria came into Brahm's possession in the first place made my mouth water. However, when Lenneth shows up during the final segments of the game and gives her schpeal on Lezard and her world, I couldn't help but feel the need to gag.

An alternate reality? Time travel distorts reality? It sounded so much so like Star Ocean TTEOT that I couldn't help but feel quite slighted. Sure, TTEOT was as great a game as it's predecessors, but they could get away with that as it was in a sci-fi future setting. Doing so with a video game version of Norse Mythology was too much for me. If they had gone on and shone a showdown of Hrist and Brahms and Silmeria saving him as she was supposed to attempt and he ended up saving her as Lenneth said he should have, that would have been the greatest tie into the VP 1 world and story if there ever was one. But their alternate view of past and future just blew everything out of poportion.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 10/17/06