ODIN SPHERE: Velvet

Velvet is the final character and her tale, "Fate" is the final book in the main story. At this point both NPCs and texts of prophecy have hinted at a story after the current one, but the focus of this post is of course on the chain wielding vixen herself. Tooling about with her is about as different as I think would be possible in the game engine.

Now my assumption earlier that she was a 'stick and run' kind of character was correct, but I only barely scratched the surface there. As a matter of course when Velvet uses her dual-psypher chain against enemies, they do not take any knockback. That is that when you are comboing into an enemy Valkyrie, she's comboing right into you at the same time. Your weapon does less damage than the average, and at the same time will not keep anyone from attacking you up close. It is also very easy for enemy attacks to knock you out of your combo, creating a real offensive lack in comparison to the other characters.


Another layer in the failcake that makes Velvet's combat skills inferior is that her combos in general are longer. This means that it takes more time to get to the most damaging attacks which are invariably at the end of the combo. During this time she is standing stock still, getting attacked from behind or above. She does excel in a few areas though. First thing to remember is that she is a range fighter first, and whenever she can you have to use the range advantage because of the lack of knockback from her chains. The upshot of this is that she is a menace against smaller enemies, including flying enemies. Her special trick is a "homing chain" attack that basically just streaks out beyond the screen and wreaks havok with any number goblins, frogs and various spirits so long as they are in range. At higher psypher levels this is usually a one shot kill.


Secondly her spinning dance-like attacks seem to shield her from whirling swords, arrows and fireballs while she is attacking. The value of this is felt especially against wizards, who's many crimes have already been discussed. Lastly she is a good mover and can get around quickly, using her chain in a tarzan swing across the screen during which she is totally invulnerable to attack for some reason. Using this often is sometimes key to nailing down the bosses because it falls perfectly into the 'run' part of the 'stick and run' strategy. These positives though fun to play with, and while not failing to make fighting with her interesting, don't really make up for her overall lack of punch in most cases. Chalk this one up to your usual increase in difficulty over time of gameplay.

Now there are many good things about Velvet, not the least of which is that she is a bastard princess that dresses like a old-timey burlesque dancer. Always appreciated. Her voice work is easily the best in the game outside of Odin himself. The voice actor in this case really conveys the correct emotion in all instances and enhances the game to the effect of my next point. Velvet's story is the most compelling in my opinion. It is ultimately tragic, (I think they all could be eventually...) but it deals with some real issues and carries the player a little bit beyond the screen in the way the FFVII did.


"Fate" is actually about Velvet and her brother, Ingway. Ingway is a fav of mine despite the fact that he is never actually controllable. He figures in major ways in two of the other four tales so you do get to know him pretty well by the time Velvet is the subject of the game. His story is a bad boy makes good kind of tale, which meshes nicely with Velvet's fight against her prophesied destiny. Being at the end of the main game, Velvet's tale plays a little of the 'clean-up' role in Odin Sphere. So she does spend a little time re-treading some ground already traversed by others, but in return she also ends up learning the most about the game world and seems to have complete dominion over the 'shockers' in the story. Events here go most of the way in explaining why things are the way they are, so story wise she is easily the best character.

Now strictly speaking the end of Velvet's tale is not the end at all. At this I have to admit that I was a little disappointed, after all I am ready to move on to something new. What awaits on the other side of her tale is the Armageddon Mode, which at the moment I do not understand in the slightest so I'm not commenting on it now. I am taking a break from this one for a week or so however. So expect something different next time.