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Albert Odyssey (review)

© Chuck Bednar

This is an amazing time for fans of gaming.

The Sega Dreamcast, though supposedly a dead system, has a wonderful library of great games like NFL2k1 and Soul Caliber. The Playstation 2 is starting to hit its stride, as evident by the recently released Zone of the Enders and the packed-in Metal Gear Solid 2 demo. Even handheld gaming is on the rise, with the pending arrival of the incredible Game Boy Advance and its seemingly unlimited potential.

So it may surprise you that, in this wondrous era of gaming, Albert Odyssey: Legend of Eldean -- a four-year old Saturn RPG with plenty of flaws but enough charm to make up for them -- is one of the most enjoyable games this reviewer has played in months.

Albert Odyssey looks and feels like a tweaked version of a 16-bit RPG. The game features turn-based battles, a decent but ultimately forgettable musical score, hand-drawn graphics, old-school animation, and sprite-based characters. Yes, the same super-deformed kind of sprites that ancient gamers rave about and that cause players weaned on Final Fantasy VII to shudder in fear.

However, while the style is the same, the quality is not. Albert Odyssey's character designs are every bit as good as those found in Tales of Destiny and Star Ocean: The Second Story. Considering that both of those games were released in the U.S. after Legend of Eldean, that is quite an accomplishment.

The old-school look and feel of the game won’t surprise you once you learn that it was brought to the States by Working Designs, the company behind the localization of the Lunar series and the upcoming Arc the Lad Collection (they seem to have a thing for older games). Of course, that knowledge invariably brings to mind the next question. How good is the writing? The answer is a firm 'not bad.'

Anytime you talk about a Working Designs game, you have to talk about the translation. The company has gained quite a reputation for their use of humor and their fine Americanization of Japanese RPGs. Albert Odyssey is no exception. The thing that impresses me most about the job Victor Ireland and his staff did on the game is the use of player interaction. Pike is quite often forced to offer his input or make a comment, and you are given one of two choices. One is what a traditional hero would say and the other is a more offbeat, often suggestive comment. While the choices won't affect the ultimate outcome of the game, they do let you make Albert Odyssey as serious or as silly as you want.

The copyright of the article Albert Odyssey (review) in Console Role Playing Games is owned by Chuck Bednar. Permission to republish Albert Odyssey (review) in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.