Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth can be a complicated, difficult game. It has a pretty involved combat system that requires good timing, a varied skill system that requires forward planning, and there are platforming elements that can get downright frustrating at times.
It's only natural, then, that its difficulty modes should be as complicated as the rest of the game. They change the gameplay experience up rather significantly, and for reasons we'll explain in this article, it's actually detrimental to play on any mode other than Hard.
Difficulty Modes
In Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth, there are three different difficulty modes: Easy, Normal, and Hard. The game will give you some explicit details on the differences between the modes, as detailed in the table below.
|
Difficulty |
Easy |
Normal |
Hard |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Experience Points |
Multiple times that of normal |
Normal amount |
Lower than normal |
|
Item Types |
Limited |
Most |
All |
|
Dungeons |
Fewer |
Most |
Most |
|
Characters |
Fewer |
Most |
All |
|
Initial Level |
Fixed per character |
Fixed per character |
All characters start from level 1 |
|
Possible Endings |
Only B and C |
All endings |
All endings |
Let's take a closer look at what some of these mean.
The most important things to look at here are the dungeons and the characters.
- There is no difficulty mode that lets you play through every single dungeon in the game. This is because there are some dungeons, such as the Forest of Woe, that are exclusive to Easy and Normal mode, and some dungeons are exclusive to Hard mode.
-
The dungeons that are exclusive to Hard mode have items called Flame Jewels inside to find - these are used in the post-game dungeon, Seraphic Gate, to unlock new areas and characters. This is why it is only on Hard mode can you get every single character - on Easy and Normal mode, you won't be able to explore the entire Seraphic Gate.
- In addition, one character - Lyseria - is only recruitable from a Hard mode playthrough.
This limited access to dungeons also explains the disparity in item type access - many items in the game can only be found in dungeons that are exclusive to Normal or Hard mode.
What Makes Hard Mode The Easiest Difficulty?
There are a few factors that go into Hard mode actually being the best experience in Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth, for both beginners and experts. The first is actually in the mechanic that sounds the scariest - every character beginning at level one. There are two items in the game, the Emerald Necklace and the Bracelet of Zoe, that give you much larger bonuses upon level-up if they are equipped.
This, paired with oodles of Event EXP you'll get on Hard mode thanks to all the extra dungeons, make it incredibly easy to acquire all the most powerful skills at even the lowest levels, and the extra DME will offset any defensive downsides to being a low level.
In addition to the ability to control level-ups with such precision, the added access to powerful items is also a great boon for Hard mode players. They get earlier and wider access to the best weapons and the best skills. They also get more characters in general, making it easier to stretch parties through long dungeons even without lots of healing items.
Simply put, Hard mode offers so much of the game's content that it's effectively hampering yourself to play on a lower difficulty - the only reason you'd play a lower difficulty is to play those Normal mode-exclusive dungeons.