PS3 Review: Valkyria Chronicles

This is what I bought a PS3 for. Sure, MGS4 was epic, and there have been tons of other great games on the platform, but nothing makes me more eager to pick up my Dual Shock 3 and push that on button than a solid strategy game. Suffice it to say that Valkyria Chronicles is the only game I’ve got right now that’s so good I log out of Wrath of the Lich King to play it.

The game is set in an alternate earth where Europa is divided into two major nations: the Federation in the west and the Empire in the east. Located between the two nations, nestled in the north by the coast, is the small neutral kingdom of Gallia. The game follows the adventures of the young Welkin Gunther and his exploits in defending his small home nation against vicious invasion. Or, more specifically, the historical account of his exploits: the entire game is presented as if it were a book telling the story of the Gallian Front.

The “book” motif permeates the entire game. Most notably, the graphics: Valkyria Chronicles takes the PS3’s cell-shading rendering engine to a whole new level by making the entire game look like a real-time colored pencil drawing, complete with shading and outlines. Moreover, the edges of the screen are designed to look like the edges of the picture, where the coloring comes to an end and all you see are black pencil outlines on paper. The strategic map looks like something drawn up beforehand, but it’s actually a real-time render of the battlefield. Anything that alters the field (like when you drive over a tree) will later be reflected on the strategic map. And the ‘zoom in’ animation when you move from map to unit is fantastic. The overall effect of the pencil drawing style is absolutely gorgeous; despite the low, grainy resolution (the game runs at a max of 720p).

The sound is also masterfully done. Not only is every word of dialogue spoken by voice actors who really do their characters justice – so much so that I wasn’t immediately compelled to switch to the original Japanese – but throughout missions your commanding officers and troops will toss out hints and suggestions and other situational notifications that are actually helpful and don’t interfere with the pace of the game at all. You just feel like you’re actually in that fight, watching over someone’s shoulder, and hearing all the combat chatter.

Of course, this isn’t just some movie: it’s a serious strategy game. Each turn, you get a number of command points. Each command point can be spent to move a unit (or two to move a tank). You can also issue orders that cost different numbers of CPs. When you actually move the unit, the game zooms in and you take control in a third person real time interface. This is where it gets trickier than most strategy games. Enemies that have their sights on you will make intercept attacks on you as you move around. However, you can hide behind cover, then pop out and move forward while they’re reloading. All this sensitive timing takes some getting used to and certainly adds a measure of skill and excitement to an otherwise methodical strategy game.

When it comes time to actually attack, the action pauses and you can carefully pick your weapon and target. You can only make one attack per activation, however, so don’t squander it. If you miss, you’ll have to back out and spend another CP to take another shot! In order to help you out, there are line of sight guides, which indicate who you can see and who can (or can’t) see you. The attack panel also tells you how many of your shots it would take to kill the enemy, though it doesn’t tell you percentage chance that your shots will have of hitting; you’ll have to get a feel for each character’s accuracy before deciding if 5 shots needed out of 5 shots fired is a risk worth taking. You can also aim for heads or radiators of exposed units or tanks in order to score critical hits, which, of course, deal much more damage.

Despite the real-time combat action, don’t overlook the value of strategically planning your moves either. Your own units also lay down interception fire, so make sure to position them in such a way that you catch your enemies off-guard and avoid getting flanked. You also need to plan your moves carefully so you don’t run out of CP halfway through a critical push. Units can be re-activated many times per turn, at the cost of a new CP each time, so it can be tempting to take that front line unit and have it attack again and again. But careful strategy is needed to win each round, employing things like team attacks by bringing multiple units together to concentrate fire on an enemy, or spreading units out to control multiple strategic points of the map.

The game is also very forgiving if you do make a mistake. If a unit is reduced to zero health, they fall to the ground unconscious, waiting to be rescued by an ally. If you reach them in time (before 3 turns or an enemy touches them) the medic rushes the downed unit off the field for treatment. So, unlike more ruthless strategy titles like Fire Emblem, where a defeated unit is immediately and permanently removed from the game, defeated units in Valkyria Chronicles can be saved. This makes the game much less of a head-bashing experience, as you don’t have to quit and restart the mission every time someone goes down. You’ll still want to avoid casualties, however, as it costs a CP to call a reinforcement, assuming you still have any available, and certain units contribute to the CP you get each turn, so if they fall you’ll have fewer CP available for the rest of your squad.

Between missions you can level up your squad as well as improve their gear. The level system works by class rather than unit, however: you level up all the scouts together. On one hand, this means that you can replace units without having to level the new unit up again; on the other hand, this reduces the sort of RPG-esque attachment that you develop with your favorite units. Nevertheless, each unit has unique potentials that they develop as you play, ranging from personality traits like Lone Wolf or Unbreakable Will to class skills like Undercover Fire and Stealth Assassin. The various traits, along with the various friendships, will determine which units you bring into battle together. There are a lot to choose from – fifty of them, according to the back of the box – and each has a unique personality, appearance, and voice.

The weapon customization system lets you improve your squad’s gear, eventually unlocking alternative weapon configurations. Do you want your scouts to have more firepower, more accuracy, or a special attack that reduces enemy attack power? The choice is yours; and you can even have all three if you spend enough money to develop them all. You can also research upgrades for your tanks, improving their basic stats – which also changes how they look, a very cool feature – and developing various optional components that you equip in a sort of tetris-block style system. Can you fit them all on your tank? No, so you’ll have to pick and chose which ones will work together.

The game itself is broken into a series of chapters, each in turn featuring a number of episodes, including one or two combat missions and a bunch of cut-scenes. Expect a lot of dialogue and storytelling in Valkyria Chronicles, which is great if you enjoy the exciting adventure but tiresome if you just want to kill things over and over again. There are also skirmish battles available, but these are just re-issues of past fights, with no randomization at all. You can’t re-do any main story fights once you’ve completed them.

Valkyria Chronicles is a fantastic game, but not the kind of game that I’d say “everyone must play.” It definitely reaches out to the Strategy gamer in all of us, and the real-time action of combat makes it a lot more exciting to actually play, but not everyone wants to think strategically about how to move their squad. The game is forgiving when you make a few mistakes, but also very challenging and too many mistakes will lead to certain defeat. You most often have to out-think the enemies rather than out-power them.

{slot15}

There are two little things I would have liked to see in this game. First and foremost would be a randomization to the skirmish battles so you don’t simply face the exact same enemy force every time. I would have loved the skirmish mode to become a ‘jump in and play’ style mode to supplement my journey through the main game with some random battles when I don’t have as much time to play. Instead, they’re just tedious repetitions as a means to farm up extra XP and money. I also would have liked to see more uniqueness in character customization; maybe a chance to give them some advice or counseling and picking out different personality or class traits that I wanted them to have. But neither really ruins how good the game is.

Vakyria Chronicles is fantastic, and I have no serious complaints or concerns with the game. For everyone wondering how much they’re missing out on this title: A LOT. It’s great. Go get it.

Score: 10/10

What's new with Review? Latest News In PS3

You can share this Review news story with your friends or family from our PS3 section. This article can be shared through e-mail or sent to online social Web sites including Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and others. You can choose from one of the options below.

Share Article Link:

Send Link via Email: