RSS
Home
Valkyria Chronicles review: one of the best Playstation 3 exclusives
Print
Email
RSS
Subscribe
Box art for Valkyria Chronicles.
The Playstation 3 had a stellar year in 2008 with plenty of AAA titles released. Lost in the shuffle was an exclusive title called Valkyria Chronicles. While it didn’t garner as many sales as it deserved, Valkyria Chronicles is still a critical hit.
Just one look at Valkyria Chronicles and you could tell that this isn’t your typical game. The game sports a one-of-a-kind look with cel-shaded water color textures in addition to a pencil sketch filter.
Not only is the game nice to look at, it is also pleasing to the ear. This shouldn’t surprise anyone since the music composer for the soundtrack in none other than Hitoshi Sakimoto (Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter, Odin Sphere and Final Fantasy XII). What is surprising, however, is the solid English voice-acting. Pretty much all the important characters in the game sound just about right. Sega is also kind enough to include the Japanese voice track.
Amidst the beautiful presentation in Valkyria Chronicles, is an engrossing story of a war fought by a small country in order to fight off the invading evil empire. While the story is filled with clichés, it never fails to keep you interested in what is going to happen next. You will certainly care about the characters by the end of the game.
Another unique element to Valkyria Chronicles is the gameplay. The Playstation 3 game mixes turn-based strategic maneuvers with some real-time action.
The game will alternative turns between you and the enemy. You then get certain amounts of points for moving and performing an action with your unit. Valkyria Chronicles allows you to move the same unit more than one time under this system. Alternatively, you can use up your points to give out orders to boost the statistics of your squad.
Once you select a unit, Valkyria Chronicles becomes a real-time shooting game of sorts. You must manually move your unit in order to perform tasks like attacking the enemy, occupying a base or looking for cover.
Finally, you will earn money and experience points after completing the missions. You can use these to boost up your squad with new orders, new abilities and new equipment. Furthermore, you can unlock side missions if you have the right amount of cash.
The added real-time elements make Valkyria Chronicles a real standout. The missions in the game can be done in any way you want and you will end up successful most of the time. This is because the game is pretty friendly with mid-mission saves in addition to several unintended exploits. So although strategy games may be too daunting for some, Valkyria Chronicles offers the perfect balance of deep gameplay mixed with accessibility.
The pacing in Valkyria Chronicles may be slow at times but it will certainly reward you for sticking with the progress. You won’t regret the 30+ hours you spend with this great title.
So if you are one of the many who still haven’t play this Playstation 3 exclusive title yet, go out and buy yourself a copy of Valkyria Chronicles.
Related Articles:
Comments
