Atlus is showing off yet another demon in Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance, and this time around, we’ve got a look at Odin. This creature has been prominently featured in the RPG going back to the original reveal many years ago.
Thanks to the Shin Megami Tensei Wiki, we have the following background information about Odin:
Odin (Old Norse: Óðinn), meaning The Furious, is considered the chief god (known as an All-Father) of the Aesir (and sometimes the Vanir as well) in Norse mythology. He is associated with wisdom, war, frenzy, knowledge, battle and death and also magic, sorcery, poetry, the gallows, healing, royalty, prophecy, altered states of conciousness, victory and the hunt, and is the husband of the goddess Frigg.
Odin is often portrayed as being an eminently honorable ruler and battlefield commander, but to the ancient Norse, he was nothing of the sort. In contrast to more straightforwardly noble war gods such as Tyr or Thor, Odin incites otherwise peaceful people to strife with what is a downright sinister glee. He maintains particularly close affiliations with the berserkers and other “warrior-shamans” whose fighting techniques and associated spiritual practices center around achieving a state of ecstatic unification with certain ferocious totem animals. He is also known by hundreds of names some which includes: Wodan, Aldagautr, Biflindi, Bileygr, Draugadróttinn, Dróttinn, Fengr, Fjölnir, Forni, Grímnir, Hangi, Hávi, Jölnir and Vegtam.
He only has one eye because he bartered the other in order to drink from the well of Mimir and gain its knowledge. He had many abilities like astral projection, shapeshifting and control of the elements and weather. He also could read magic runes that no one else could since he had hung himself from the World Tree Yggdrasil while inflicting self-torture in order to gain great knowledge.
Odin is the chief god of the Norse pantheon. He and his brothers Ve and Vili killed the frost giant Ymir and built the world from his body. He is also the father of most of the gods, including Thor, Vidarr and Baldur, who was later killed by a manipulated Hod with a dart of mistletoe. He is associated with his spear Gungnir, the wolves Geri and Freki and the two ravens Hugin and Munin, and the eight-legged horse Sleipnir.
Odin is given primacy over female beings associated with the battlefield, the Valkyries, and he himself oversees the afterlife location Valhalla of Asgard, where he receives half of those who die in battle, the Einherjar. The other half are chosen by goddess Freya for her afterlife location, Fólkvangr. In Ragnarok, he gets devoured by the great wolf Fenrir.
Come see the new Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance Odin video below.
