Even in times of war, the ladies still wear miniskirts!
The events of Valkyria Chronicles take place in an alternate, World War II-themed world in the continent of Europa. Pressed between two giants – The Empire and The Atlantic Federation, the small nation of Gallia finds itself between a rock and a hard place when The Second European War breaks out. The villainous Empire seeks to seize control of Gallia`s rich natural resources, namely a special mineral called ragnite – a near miraculous element that can be used both for civilian and military means. In the middle of this, a mild-mannered biologist, Welkin Gunther, son of a late Gallian war hero, and a trainee baker Alicia Melchiott join their nation`s army to help repel the invasion.
Before venturing further into my review, I should point out that this is a purely Japanese game, so it has to be approached with a certain mindset. While Valkyria Chronicles offers a refreshingly interesting and likeable characters with a few clichés, mostly on the villain end, be braced for the occasional clumsy dialogue and kawaii (cute) moments. Another issue Western gamers might find strange is the humanization of war, as the game is a little hypocritical on the whole "war is hell" thing. Imagine a bunch of teenagers shooting at dudes, but looking absolutely adorable while doing it.
Of course many won`t even pay any attention to such trivial matters. Instead, some criticism should be turned to story itself. The plot is slow to start moving and is kind of on the predictable side, with some exceptional moments that remind how devastating war can really be. One thing that Valkyria Chronicle deserves to be praised about is the characters. The slowly progressing romance between Welkin and Alicia is touching, but then again, it may be *too* slow and mellow for the Western audiences.
As you are given control of an entire squad, you have to hand-pick twenty soldiers from almost 50 recruits, each with their own unique set of traits and a piece of back story that is unveiled along the course of the game. And, believe it or not, these you *will* grow attached to these people, whether it`s their hairstyle, set of skills or attitude. Having around characters YOU chose makes combat twice as satisfying as it already is.
Speaking of combat – and gameplay in general – we`ve got a real gem of a game here. Valkyria Chronicles is a part-turn based strategy, part-third person shooter, part-role playing game. And this cocktail of genres has been carefully stirred and shaken, making it an organic and satisfying experience.
Here`s a quick rundown of basic gameplay: before any mission, you position a limited amount of your squad members into predetermined locations on the map. When the mission starts, you enter Command Mode, observing the battlefield from birds-eye view. You can select any of your positioned troops and when you do, the view switches into one of a standard third person shooter. As you assume control of a character, you lose a Command Point, a limited quantity of available actions during a turn. You can move freely around the battlefield, however your selected character has a limited movement gauge that depletes as you move. There is one action that the soldier can perform during its turn, whether that would be shooting, tossing a grenade, healing oneself etc. When you are done, the camera switches back to the map of the battlefield and you can select another soldier until your CP run out or you can simply end your turn and the unused CP carries over to the next turn. When you finish your turn, the enemy does pretty much the same as you did seconds ago.
Each mission`s objectives are almost always either capturing enemy`s home base or destroying a certain enemy, however combat situations are quite varied and it is obvious that the developers wanted each level to feel different and, to a certain degree, they have succeeded in this task.
Your squad consists of 5 types of troopers: scouts, shocktroopers, lancers, engineers and snipers. Oh, and you get a tank too.
Scouts, as the name suggest, are good for exploring the area and locating the enemy but not exactly fit for combat. They can run quite long distances and carry rifles with low attack power but good range. Shocktroopers are heavily armored infantry, equipped with machine guns. Absolutely devastating at a close range, they have a significantly reduced mobility and attack precision. Lancers carry, well, lances, that are good enough or both tanks and fortified enemy positions. Slowest of all the units, lancers also have a limited amount of ammo and the rockets aren't always the most reliable weaponry. Engineers first seem like slightly weaker scouts, however their ability to fix the tank, repair fortifications, disarm mines and resupply soldiers are a good reason to keep at least one around. Snipers are low on fatigue, low on armor and low on ammo, but these shortcomings are rewarded by their incredible range and powerful rifles. Lastly, tanks are moving fortresses, good for both heavy fire support and as a mobile cover. On the less bright side of things, tanks aren't exactly long distance runners and it costs two CP instead of one to fire these crackers up.
Another layer of depth of combat is achieved by adding individual traits to every one of your mates, for an example, some soldiers have a pollen allergy, that makes them less useful in forest combat, some characters work better in groups, some – alone, one can be an effective shocktrooper killer while the other panics near lancers, a troop can have Lady Luck on his or her side while their mates` rifle jams on occasion.
The RPG part comes into play soon enough – as you earn money and experience from combat, you can develop and upgrade new weapons for your infantry and tank as well as assign the hard-earned XP to any of the soldier`s classes to unlock new skills and traits and improve their combat ability. To put the icing on the cake, every single trooper can be equipped with different weapons you either develop, seize from enemy officers or receive as a reward for performance in battle. Also, if you don`t like any member of your team, you can easily replace them with anyone from the ever-growing list of recruits.
In case if you *really* have overwhelming resources, you can purchase a number of "episodes" from a journalist about squad seven. These are optional missions that expand certain character`s back stories and usually end up rewarding that person with an useful combat ability. What`s more, an aged gentleman can teach you combat orders at the expense of your XP.
These orders range from accuracy boost to a specific squad mate to increasing every units evasion ability, from evacuation of a character caught in crossfire to mortar support. These perks are achieved either by training your troops or taught by the aged war veteran. While not cheap – one or more CP per order – these things can get you out of hairy situations and close calls.
While the core gameplay is fine and dandy, under the hood I found there to be some issues. First of all: before starting a mission you are briefed about the situation and shown the map of the battlefield, however the briefing is somewhat vague on the enemy positions and figuring out the map is impossible. Therefore, at the beginning of the level you will most likely realize that your positions are disadvantageous and, when entering the third person view, you`ll see that the terrain looks and feels very different from the on seen on the map, often forcing to go back to menu and reposition the troops. While this could be considered cheating to a certain degree, you should bear in mind one of Sun Tzu`s teachings: knowing the enemy is key to victory (or maybe this was from G.I. Joe, I don`t know).
Another minor gripe about Valkyria Chronicles is that the game loves trolling on you. Nothing is more annoying than SUDDEN ENEMY REINFORCMENTS on your ass when you`ve almost nailed their frontal defenses. While this doesn`t happen often (about 4-5 times over the whole game), these occurrences can easily ruin two to three hours (yes, battles are *that* lengthy) of progress. And speaking of frustration, you`ll come across plenty of that in Valkyria Chronicles – since stat-based combat loves to pull off such tricks as missing a shot from point-blank range or launching a rocket half across the map precisely into a tanks` weak spot.
Luckily, the game has a convenient save system that lets you save during any moment during your turn while in Command Mode. This helps A LOT, but abusing save/load function isn't a legitimate strategy and takes a lot of fun out of the game. However you *will* have use it – or watch your hair turning gray.
The biggest flaw of all is the unbalanced classes. Soon enough you`ll discover that scouts are incredibly overpowered – their fatigue and rifle precision makes them perfect for hit-and-run attacks. Shcoktroopers, on the other hand, are useless in large, open areas due to their low mobility. Lastly, snipers are absolutely useless for the first 1/3 of the game, unable to land a shot without having a whole lot of XP invested in them. Although there are lots of illogicalities in the game, like, you can`t run over people with tank, lancers easily survive blasts from grenades and soldiers crouching behind sandbags have equally high defense even when attacked from rear, when you think about it they are very important to keep the game balanced and fun.
A disappointing aspect of Valkyria Chronicles is the enemy AI. While the enemy is quite aggressive during the first few turns, as you decrease their forces it becomes gradually more and more helpless. Also, in some missions the enemy is maddeningly passive, choosing to sit in cover instead of attacking. This problem, however, can be easily overlooked, since the opposing forces are always better equipped, better trained and in larger numbers than your squad.
Valkyria Chronicles utilizes Sega`s CANVAS engine, creating the feeling of watercolor painting in motion. The anime style fits the game very well and everything from aesthetical point of view is as good as it gets. There is no necessity to delve into the tech stuff – VC looks gorgeous as it is. One minor gripe of mine is that all of the cutscenes should have been fully animated but I guess the developers were trying to save resources for more important areas of the game.
The sound design is top-notch. Believable FX and random radio chatter creates brilliant mood during combat, accompanied by a fantastical musical score. Voice actors have also done a great job, giving a feel of personality to every, even minor, character and successfully avoiding the usual annoyances what are common in english-dubbed anime.
I spent nearly 40 hours on my first playthrough of Valkyria Chronicles, completing almost every optional task. I don`t think I`ll replay the game anytime soon, but these 40 hours have been tremendously satisfying and I feel that my purchase of the game has been worth every penny. However I find this game difficult to recommend to a random person since Valkyria Chronicles isn`t for anyone. My advice is to download the demo from Playstation Store and decide for yourself.
The Good:
+A deep and fun blend of genres
+Heartwarming story and likable characters
+Beautiful graphics
+Great soundtrack and voice acting
+Lengthy game with replay value
The Bad:
-Some minor balance issues
-Requires patience
-Not all cutscenes are fully animated
-I kinda wish it was longer