What the heck. If we're tackling all-time favorites anyway, now might be a great opportunity to replay this one. Valkyria Chronicles is a 2007 strategy/shooter hybrid. Originally a Playstation exclusive before later being ported PC and eight gen consoles. It's a game very close to my heart, but I'll also be the first to admit that it's highly flawed. There's a reason I put off replaying it for so long.
Valkyria Chronicles is set in a fictionalized take on Europe circa World War 2. The continent is dominated by two great powers. In the east, a mighty empire with vast military power and an aggressive stance in global politics. In the West, a loose federation of allied democracies. Caught in the midst of these two giants is the independent grand duchy of Gallia. A tiny, neutral state made rich thanks to its access to a precious resource called Ragnite. Yet when war between The Empire and The Federation inevitably breaks out, it's not long before The Empire sets their sights on Gallia also.
Players take control of Welkin Gunther. A university student, who happens to be the son of a beloved war hero. Upon returning to his home village, Welkin finds it under attack by The Empire's vanguard. Fortunately, dear old dad had the foresight to leave him and his sister a functional tank—for emergencies. Though a single tank can't hope to repel the entire Empire, this does get Welkin immediately promoted to lieutenant when he is drafted into the army.
From there the campaign chronicles Welkin's many desperate battles as leader of Squad 7. A misfit gang of militiamen who are regularly scoffed at by the professional army, even as they achieve unbelievable results with every battle.
A tiny nation fending off a mighty empire is already plenty exciting for a story, but there is also a supernatural angle. It soon turns out that Imperial prince Maximilian has other ambitions besides just conquest. He is looking for a mystical power set to be hidden away in Gallia, which is tied to the legendary Valkyrur who roamed the land a thousand years ago. If this power were to fall into his hands, Maximilian could guarantee the Empire's domination of the continent.
I like the story a lot. There is a lot of meat to it and the characters central to its narrative are very likeable. Welkin is selfless and fiercely loyal, though very unconvincing as a leader figure. He has an awkwardness to him, emphasized by his lack of focus and dorky personality. He has a great arc to him though, as he assumes ever greater responsibilities while always staying true to his principles and belief in the goodness of other people. Even when others would call him naive for doing so.
What fascinated me the most is how Valkyria Chronicles touches on the most painful topics related to the war. Usually media that fictionalize World War 2 do so exactly to avoid having to interact with the holocaust and other controversial elements. Valkyria Chronicles instead makes these a central component of its story, even if doing so through analogues. The Darcsen people are a racial minority without a homeland, who face abuse and suspicion wherever they go. The Empire openly discriminates against them. They are killed, imprisoned, and enslaved just for the crime of existing. Leading to at least one memorable, gut-wrenching chapter where Squad 7 has to liberate a concentration camp.
This also translates into gameplay. Each soldier has a variety of traits that influence their effectiveness in battle. Despite ostensibly being the good guys, several of your men are themselves racist against the Darcsen. They will refuse to fight alongside them and perform worse when you force them do so regardless. Similarly, some Darcsen characters you recruit also prefer to only stick with their own community. Providing them with buffs whenever you make sure that need is met.
Valkyria Chronicles shows incredible bravery in its storytelling, never shying away from difficult topics. There are many touching moments throughout and drama that draws you in like nothing else. Though I will admit that the dialogue writing and acting don't always succeed in matching the tone. It's usually fairly solid. A lot of memorable moments the game nails perfectly. At other times, however, the tragedy is undermined somewhat by the anime influences. Leading to silly moments and awkward conversations that contrast jarringly with the gravity of the overall plot.
In battle you pick characters from your roster of troops to place in set starting points on the map. You must then defeat The Empire's troops while achieving other objectives like destroying certain targets or occupying base camps.
This is done in turn-based fashion. During your turn you have a number of medals representing actions you can take, which usually means using your soldiers to attack the enemy. Selecting a soldier shifts you into third-person shooter mode, where you can move them around until their stamina is depleted. At any point you can then aim your weapons to shoot at enemies, at which point your chosen soldier will fire until they need to reload. There's no conserving ammo or picking multiple targets. Even if you kill the enemy in the first shot, your soldier will keep firing until they're empty.
It's simple stuff, but I like it. It's very tactical once you wrap your head around the possibilities of these systems. You can send scouts ahead to spot enemies for your snipers to then take out. Or you can charge the enemy trenches with your powerful shock troopers to open up the path for your support units. Alternatively, you can use those medals to call upon special orders. These provide special buffs that are so powerful, it's well worth sacrificing a bit of movement to call upon them. So long as you use them strategically, that is.
The game is intuitive to control and it's satisfying to mow down the Imperial troops when your plans work out. At the same time, you can be punished harshly for making mistakes. Isolated soldiers can be overwhelmed with ease and snipers will gleefully pick off anyone you leave standing outside of cover. Enemy tanks are also a nightmare to deal with. If you don't take them out quickly they'll make quick work of any infantry they can get in range of. Any soldier of your own that is taken down can be rescued if you can get to their body, guaranteeing a full recovery. If you leave them behind or the enemy gets them first, then they are permanently killed off unless you reload a save.
Your ace in the hole is the Edelweiss, Welkin's tank. It's a fearsome machine that can dish out a lot of damage and serves as a mobile bulwark for your footmen. The trade-off being that anti-tank units (or enemy tanks) can make quick work of it if you're caught out of position. And if the Edelweiss is blown up, you instantly lose the mission.
Each unit type has its own weapons, strengths, and drawbacks. Scouts are light-armored rifle troops who map out the area and carefully poke at the enemy from a distance. Shocktroopers are your mainline soldiers with assault rifles and lancers are anti-tank specialists in explosion-proof armor. Then there are the engineers and snipers, which fill more obvious, niche roles. While that sounds like a healthy roster, the class balance is completely fucked when you get down to it. You'll mainly be using Scouts throughout the game and little else.
The maps in Valkyria Chronicles are actually quite large with lots of distance between objectives and enemies often scattered few and far between. The Scouts are the only troops capable of navigating these spaces in a timely manner. At the same time, their rifles are incredibly powerful and accurate. A few headshots can take out almost any enemy, often at distances from which they can't retaliate. Then later on you get grenade launchers for them that can dislodge fortified enemies and clear objectives with ease. While they are less armored than shocktroopers, they're not so fragile that they can't handle a few risky moves. As a result, many missions can be won turn 1 by taking out whoever guards the enemy base and then running a scout past all the remaining enemies.
You can play the game properly, of course, but that is often a painful, slow going. For example, the Fouzen map starts you on one end of a bridge with an enemy shocktrooper behind some sandbags at the end. The Edelweiss can drive over and kill that guy no problem. A scout can run across that bridge and toss a grenade on him. A shocktrooper, however, will need 3 movement actions to get across that very same bridge. It takes forever to get anywhere with these guys. Remember, that's just to get to 1 enemy. All the objectives you need to do are at least 3-4 full turns away if you're going to keep up that pace. Assuming nobody gets shot and you need to call in reinforcements back on the other end of that bridge.
Of course not every battle is a slog. There are plenty of missions where you can use the full roster in more interesting ways and distances are more manageable. It just feels like these don't come around often enough compared to the larger maps and gimmick missions. An impression that isn't helped by those latter mission types being harder to beat, so you end up stuck on them for much longer.
It's hard to remember that one fun map you fought on when the mission right after is a nightmare boss fight against some oversized tank. Or a gimmick level on a very tight timer. Some of these I got stuck on for days before eventually looking up how to beat them online. Usually I'd then find out that the solution was to trivialize the challenge with a scout.
The pacing of the story is also not ideal, owing to its storybook format. Each mission is spaced out by an assortment of cutscenes that constantly switch between different styles. Some are fully animated, others are narration over still images or visual novel segments. Some "cutscenes" are mere seconds long, before booting you back to the storybook so you can manually select the next scene. It's annoying, particularly as the game keeps asking you to confirm that you indeed want to watch each scene you select. It's not like you have choice unless you spontaneously decide to quit playing.
Another pacing issue lies in the extra management layer you need to sort through back at headquarters. Here you spend money and experience to train your soldiers and develop weapons for them. Both of which are made bothersome by obnoxious menu design and other issues. You can't just research what you want, when you want. The tech tree is mostly linear with new options only appearing as you progress the story. Meanwhile, training involves leveling up classes instead of individual soldiers, which takes a lot of experience points to do. You'll have to grind skirmish missions for hours to keep up with the difficulty curve, lest some of your unit types become even more unviable.
All these gameplay issues caused no small amount of frustration across the game. I threatened to drop it a number of times or bored myself grinding out the same skirmish maps over and over again. In the end, though, I always warmed up to Valkyria Chronicles again when the plot would resume. I was so invested in the character arcs and the dramatic war story, that any anger I felt at the gameplay dissipated as soon as it was over. Especially if I'd then get a string of better missions right after.
I was especially invested in the characters. Squad 7 and the rest of the militia are a colorful bunch of ragtag soldiers, who undergo a lot of growth over the course of the story. They're initially guarded around each other and even hostile at times. Yet through their shared hardships, grow closer together and become a tight-knit team. It's also through the dynamics between them that the anime influences pay off tremendously. You're with Squad 7 as they wage war for their homeland, but then also get to enjoy their charming banter with each other or watch them goof off during breaks in the tension.
The game's art is also something else. I actually own multiple artbooks of it, I love it that much. The watercolor aesthetic lends the game's cutscenes a painterly touch that gels incredibly well with the anime influences. Those idyllic landscapes are particularly nice to look at and go a long to way towards making Gallia a place you'd want to protect. The characters also look phenomenal and cover a wider range of archetypes than you'd expect from its anime inspirations.
With all that in mind, a recommendation for Valkyria Chronicles depends heavily on how much a good story can excuse. A meaningful plot full of drama and touching moments, with a deeply interesting conflict and characters. Its art, music, and gameplay concepts are also exceptionally strong and inspired. Yet its one glaring weakness is that the gameplay never comes together. Its an unbalanced mess where battles are either unbearably frustrating or too easy to trivialize. It's always worth pushing through that to see where the story takes you next, but God damn do I wish this process were smoother.
I do have to caution against trying to settle for the anime. While this would seem like an ideal compromise to circumvent the gameplay issues, the Valkyria Chronicles anime shirks that captivating artstyle in favor of a more generic look. It also amateurishly rewrites some scenes and some plot beats are just missing entirely. There's only one way to experience this amazing tale and that's through the hard way. Sorry.
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