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By Lonnie on November 5th, 2001
Introduction In the beginning there were only a few RPG titles for the Playstation 2. Two as a matter of fact available at launch. These were Orphen and Summoner. While Orphen is not your traditional RPG it was all we got. Orphen showed us a lot of cool things the processors in the Playstation 2 could do. In fact Orphen was the first title to use the whole image blur effect.
Presentation Where most RPG’s cause you to fallow a linear story line. Orphen : Scion of Sorcery is a little different. The game starts with Orphen, a young man who thinks he is funny and cool, and worst of all, Gods gift to women (You can tell, by the way he usually acts), well anyway, Orphen is with his two pupils, Magnus and Cleo are in a port town, and are attacked by Volcan and Dortin, two young boys, who lead Orphen and his pupils on to a ship. You see a familiar RPG scene... a long pink haired woman with jewelry with her eyes shut, you’ll instantly think that this is one of those Mystics who jabber on about nothing, but you’ll just have to wait and see. During the journey, the ship is in a middle of the storm and begins sinking. The ships passenger, Zeus fights monsters whom are attacking the ship, The pink haired girl is escaping and the two boys, Dortin and Volcan are thieving (Neither the time or the place). Orphen get near the deck with both Cleo and Magnus, but both take different directions, you choose which one now, both lead to different stories. There is another story hidden away, you’ll have to explore a bit first. Orphen has a lot of surprises, and you might be surprised on some of the things what happen, you might class some of the things emotional
Graphics & Sound Orphen looks a lot more of a Dreamcast game then a Playstation 2 game. The character models are like that of a Dreamcast as well, I don’t mean like character models off Shenmue Orphen is based on a Japanese Animation Cartoon called Orphen and the game, takes a few cut scenes from the show, showing Cartoons instead of blocky characters. I am a big fan of Japanese Animation, and its good to see a Playstation 2 game to have it as an element. A lot of Orphen is set inside, so Backgrounds aren’t much of a thing you’ll see. When you are outside, and you see a background, you’ll find out that they have been done very well, The sunsets in the game look great, but its not exactly pushing your Playstation 2 to its limit. I don’t like the character animation’s all that much, but in Battle mode, the animation’s do look a bit good, but I have seen better on the Playstation One. The game is far too dark in dull places, like the ship graveyard, I had to scrunch my eyes up small just to see the characters, I think it was because it was a bit sunny outside, and was shining in, but I thought I’d just add that.
Gameplay Orphen is Very different from other RPG games. You have your "Field mode" or your basic action/adventure gameplay, you will have to solve puzzles to get to your destination, or sometimes, take control of another character. Controls are easy in field mode except for jump, jumping simply put at its best is "a pain in the ass." Next there is battle mode. Sometimes, you fight alone with a character. When you fight alone you will use your weapon, be it a sword or a chain, or what ever weapon they use, and they can use other skills, like magic. A character can also defend them self from enemy attacks, but not for long. If your character attacks an enemy when you just tap a button, it may not do big damage, but if you hold down the button, it will charge up, and the character will do a massive attack, doing massive damage. If you are fighting in groups, you can do everything I explained above, but the other characters will help in combat, or just stand there and do nothing. Unlike most RPG’s, there is no random encounters in the game, and no leveling up either. Battles only occur on events, or if you enter a special place, enemies will get you with no warning.
Lasting Appeal With three endings and tons of extra items to unlock the game should last you a fair amount of time. If you beat a story you can take all your spells and magic to the next. Which will indeed make it a lot easier.Conclusion Orphen is indeed an alight RPG, you can tell Activision have put a lot of effort in to this game, but it needed a lot more work for it to be a classic. Orphen is a good choice if your waiting for a RPG, much better then Summoner and better then Evergrace. You might as well buy something else, or wait for Final Fantasy X.
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