Reviving a much-loved series can be a gamble. Stick too close to the original, and the project can feel like a retread. On the other hand, reinventing it completely can alienate stalwart supporters. Over a decade after the last chapter of Square Enix’s Norse-themed JRPG series, Valkyrie Elysium departs from its predecessors’ turn-based roots in favor of a new action-heavy, hack-and-slash direction. In that transition, Elysium has established a fun and flashy combat system but sacrifices part of what made the original PlayStation game memorable: a focus on the characters and worldbuilding.
In many ways, Valkyrie Elysium feels like a Square Enix take on Falcom’s Ys RPG series rather than a return to Valkyrie Profile’s original PlayStation-era DNA. And in the way that modern Ys feels somewhat like a throwback to the PS3-era of games in terms of the structure of their worlds, combat, and progression, so too does Valkyrie Elysium. Although I’m largely satisfied with the action it serves up, Elysium is far less successful at establishing an intriguing tale.
The obedient and straight-laced deity warrior known as Valkyrie meets with her creator, the All-Father Odin, before each chapter. Their base of operations is the opulent yet sparse Asgard, which looks wonderful, but is very small with little to do besides choosing the next quest. Once she descends to the mortal realm of Midgar, the environments are much larger than Asgard. Unfortunately, the regions of Midgard, while more expansive than the godly domain, are far less fun to look at. The locations you visit are vacant of activities and life, offering an overly linear path to adventure down with little else to seek out. That’s not to say there aren’t plenty of crates to smash for gems, treasure chests with valuable loot, or minuscule lore drops called Hollow Blossoms to find, but I would have liked more reasons to stray from the critical path and spectacular sights to seek out.
Valkyrie’s ever-present mission on Midgar is to cleanse the spirits troubling the human world and claim its salvation in the aftermath of a disastrous war. Though the setup of Valkyrie Elysium deals with a war between gods and mythical creatures with figures like Odin, Fenrir, a rival Valkyrie, and a looming apocalypse in the form of Ragnarok in the mix, Valkyrie Elysium’s story has the potential to be an exciting Norse epic, but its story falters from the start. The main plot is slow to unfold, with Valkyrie and Odin being the only real characters in the opening hours, and yet it takes about half of the 20-hour campaign before it starts to crawl towards Valkyrie’s character development and for the central conflict to come into sight. Even when larger reveals play out in the climax, the impact of the plot is dampened by its overall predictability, and moments that should be eye-opening and emotional simply aren’t earned.
One of the biggest reveals in the final hour is completely missable if you don’t happen to explore a certain part of the map, and if you miss that you’re also locked out of one of a handful of potential endings. Your squad of Einherjar warrior spirits does add much-needed levity, personality, and exposition through their companionship and support to the battle-maiden, but much of it is for naught in the grand scheme of the story. The last few chapters focus on the humanity and agency Valkyrie has absorbed from being around her Einherjar, but when the crux of the finale comes down to a choice, whatever plays out is determined by whether you’ve collected certain items throughout the game rather than letting the player choose their fate. That lack of input from the player is disappointing, considering Valkyrie’s internal conflict of right and wrong is central to her character arc.
Despite the regions of Midgard being rather small, there are only a handful of areas to explore in Valkyrie Elysium. The world lacks life, which makes sense with its impending doom, but it often feels empty to its detriment rather than like a successful atmospheric choice. Luckily, each well-trodden part of Midgar is reused well in great sidequests that warrant the return. These optional adventures offer challenging and fun combat scenarios and reward you with meaningful upgrades and items, and are a better use of time than scouring the usually barren environments for the odd treasure chest.
While I found the exploration and storytelling to be underwhelming, the driving force – and saving grace – of Valkyrie Elysium is its combat. Valkyrie is a formidable warrior on the battlefield, and while controlling her is simple, she has plenty of moves and combos to explore. Once it gets going, that is – like the plot, the ramp-up to unlocking your full set of powers and abilities is dreadfully slow. Your combat options are incredibly limited in the early hours, with vanilla light and heavy strikes accompanied by a guard and a dodge. These are par for the course when it comes to action games, and work well enough here. What spices up combat are the swappable pool of spells called Divine Arts which provides a variety of elemental, ranged, and utility spells, as well as a nifty grapple maneuver called the Soul Chain. I love the mobility the Soul Chain provides, giving Valkyrie the ability to zip to a targeted enemy and start laying in a combo before she even touches the ground.
Most regions you travel to will introduce a new reluctant Einherjar spirit to join your crusade. While the task becomes repetitive after gathering the first two, the act of collecting them and completing their backstory sidequests brings some much-needed purpose to opening hours and adds some semblance of context to those who once lived in these decimated lands. These warriors, like Eygon and Cypher, helped me to care a little about the overall story arc. Their banter, anecdotes, and opinions on the mission at hand often bring lightness and warmth to what is mostly a sterile and uneventful tale. The Einherjar provide a human view of the unfolding events and help to soften Valkyrie's narrow-minded outlook on the world and expand her horizons.
You can also summon them to fight alongside you with elementally charged attacks (and also granting elemental effects to your own attacks), making them strategically relevant in certain enemy matchups. Einherjar make crowded fights much more manageable, and it's fun to decide which to call on to make swift work of enemy hordes that would otherwise be a slog to take out with Valkyrie alone.
However, because there are only a handful of Einherjar to call upon and counter the weakness of monsters, Valkyrie also has to use Divine Arts to deal loads of damage of her own. These are powerful spells like lightning bolts, holy piercing strikes, and fire storms that look great as they exploit enemy weaknesses to deal extra damage and potentially put them into a stunned state. A gauge restricts their use, but it’s refilled quickly enough that Arts are readily available as reliable combat tools that add a much-needed visual flourish to liven up the bland and empty areas when skirmishes arise. I often lose myself in the enjoyable tension of alternating between my Einherjar and Divine Arts and building their resources back up to continue the onslaught. It's an effective distraction from the dull world and slow story, though battles are far from exempt from issues.
Many times I’ve had to fight with the camera while in close quarters with enemies because it catches on walls when you get too close. When this inevitably happens, it becomes nearly impossible to tell what’s going on around you or whether you’re even hitting the enemy you’ve comboed into the corner. Likewise, because the targeting system is tied to the camera controls, the aiming reticle tends to bounce around to different targets, and it becomes a struggle to fire off a Divine Art or Soul Chain in the intended direction. Several settings exist to tweak for the desired camera distance or lock-on preference, but I never found a good solution that left me feeling in full control most of the time.