Timed missions, poor translation, just... /sigh
My major problems with the game:
Computer AI: The computer's controlled units go straight for what makes you lose. They ignore certain units altogether, and completely blitz you as hard as they can. You're sitting with about 8 units, the computer board has 45 to 60 and they are all flooding for you, so you better kill everything in sight before they get to you. (or for whatever you have to defend, because they will ignore your units if they aren't blocking them). Even on easy, this is harder than 90% of games out there, and I've never had a hard time with a game before.
Translation: I don't know why, but I was having serious translation issues, the text translation just wasn't that good, and I felt myself struggling to know what was going on in the storyline because of it. Plus, the story itself was just exceedingly weak and disappointing.
Timed maps: You have 15 turns to do 25 turns worth of casual map domination, hit all the sites, be thorough, that sort of thing. You can't be thorough, you have to pretty much go at a mad racing pace and call out a hail mary, or you're just not going to get that "gold cup" for beating the level in a timely manner, which makes later levels even harder. It's hard to decide for me, sacrifice experience and possible items for item rewards for racing through a level every time instead of just enjoying it? This game doesn't allow for you to sit back and enjoy it. (This is better than Heroes of Might and Magic series where you fall asleep it's so casual, but come on, happy medium please?) Even the silver cup is hard to get on many levels, only giving you 3 or 4 more turns than the gold, and sometimes, you just can't move your units fast enough or you hit a solid enemy barricade that you can't compensate for because you're limited to very small armies.
Balance: Let's just throw balance out. I mean, when everyone out there knows pike and spearmen tear up cavalry, in this game, they just score about equal, no matter how high level your spear type unit is, they are going to get smacked around by that cavalry, but when you use the cavalry, they seem to just get smacked around themselves too. There just isn't a good balance that you'd find in traditional middle ages warfare rulebooks and rules of thumb for unit counters. This is a game of raw attrition, and the wall of melee followed by archers and magic is all that's going to win it for you. Regardless of what the melee is.
I will say though, that it is worth playing if you used to love Warsong and Shining Force, or the Flame Emblem series. Same style, about as hard as a few of the Flame Emblem games, and very basic. I'd want to say for the depth of gameplay, this belongs on a hand held console, not on a desktop.
Another positive point is the game does suck you in if you're into strategy, it is enjoyable in spite of it's difficulty.