Odin Sphere: Leifprasir

(Norse) God-fucking-dammit.

Odin Sphere is next in line to receive an HD remake, which excites and frustrates me all the same! I picked up Odin Sphere when it first dropped on the PS2, admittedly because of it's beautiful art. The hand drawn environments and sprites were so alluring on the pages of my GameInformer magazine and even turned out to surpass this beauty in motion. I didn't have too much experience with side-scrolling dungeon crawlers but as a fan of action-RPGs I grew to love the battle system and absolutely loved the alchemy system (I'm actually a huge sucker for games that allow me to channel my inner potion-brewing witch). But the battle system's sudden and sharp increases of difficulty (leading to many-a cheap kill) turned me away from the game...

When Odin Sphere made it's way to the PSN and I instantly sprung for my wallet. I had vaguely fond memories of the game, despite remembering the game's difficulty, but wrote it off as being younger and dumb with video games. I played through the game with ease, surpassing my initial progress by nearly 500% before I hit yet another sharp increase in difficulty. Even as I type this, I'm still stuck as Oswald trying to defeat the boss of Titania Capitol. No matter how much grinding, or whatever unique blend of Potions or I used, or whatever Pyspher skills I tried, I always met the same cheap two-hit kills. The game suddenly didn't feel worth it. With great sadness, I gave up and figured I'd just watch the remaining cut scenes in some movie format on YouTube. (Yes, I know; I'm part of the reason why Masahiro Sakurai claims he didn't put cut scenes in SSB4...)

Fast forward to the recent announcement of Odin Sphere: Leifprasir and I'm torn. The remake promises increased framerate (you're welcome, Queen Odette boss fight), gameplay changes, new enemies, new maps, tweaks to the alchemy and combat system, and the elimination of repetitive gameplay. It all sounds fucking fine and dandy but I don't know if I'm willing to buy and play it all over again. I mean, it'd be nice to see the story line through to the end - especially since I didn't end up watching the cut scenes on YouTube (Suck it, Sakurai! ;D). I mostly just hate that developers and publishers are spending all their time on remakes/remasters/reboots/re-imaginings or definitive/special/game-of-the-year editions but I can't blame Atlus for wanting to maximize the potential of a gem that didn't get the chance to truly shine.

But that doesn't mean I'm going to buy it.
Even though I probably will.

... :(