Valkyria Chronicles is a game set in a fictional continent loosely based around Europe during the early stages of the Second World War. The Principality of Gallia, where our protagonists hail from, hold massive reserves of a highly flexible natural resource called Ragnite. Due to this, Gallia finds herself embroiled in the conflict between two larger superpowers, the East Europan Imperial Alliance and the Atlantic Federation.

In the game, the player assumes the role of Welkin Gunther, a lieutenant serving in the Gallian militia. Together with his trusty squad mates, you must direct them such that they win the battles they find themselves caught in, and lead them to victory for Gallia.
Game play sample: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ub8c-6aFfQE
Steam store page: http://store.steampowered.com/app/294860

Lens of Challenge

The game provides players with four different levels of challenge for the free missions (Story missions have a fixed difficulty). Each map and difficulty requires that the player learn a new play strategy in order to proceed.

Even as a seasoned player, I find myself occasionally drawn back to the expert level challenges just to try out that one new tactic I thought of. Unfortunately, the game does not offer anything new once I have cleared every expert-level challenge. On the other hand, I was awarded a shiny medal along with a Steam achievement so that evens it out.

I introduced the game to a friend, one who had never played a game like this before. While Easy and Normal modes proved to be basic enough to master, the Hard mode was too much of a challenge for a novice, and he easily spent 4 hours experimenting with various strategies until I pointed out that the winning requirements were slightly different from normal, and that going straight for the requirements was the key. Nonetheless, he mentioned that the game did not feel as tedious as he thought it would be because of the cheerful characters and beautiful visuals.

Lens of the Elemental Tetrad

Mechanics

This game does an interesting twist and has commonly been described as “XCOM with anime visuals and shooter elements”. The player is both the commander and the soldier, and selecting a unit from the tactical overhead view causes the camera to dive down into the soldier where the player assumes control. While not terribly realistic in terms of real life combat, it does its job well as a strategy game, and should be considered as such.

 Story

See: Lens of Story

Aesthetics

Despite being marketed as a romance within a war tale, the game does not shy away from utilizing vivid, colorful visuals. This is in contrast with the very much dour and dark color palette that plagues other war-themed games. Even more unique is the vignette-like frame that constantly wraps the game scenes and the graphics engine this game employs, called ‘Canvas’. The blend of cell-shading and hand-drawn art that makes the game look like a moving watercolor picture rather than a “3D game”.

Technology

Due to the Canvas engine, players have reported that the game works wonderfully well without needing a beefy gaming machine, which is a plus because this allows the game to reach a wider audience without sacrificing fidelity. Even though this game debuted in 2008 for the PS3, the graphics and art direction has withstood the test of time and still looks modern today, when it was ported to the PC in November 2014.

Lens of Story

Valkyria Chronicles is primarily a story-driven game. The downside is that the majority of the game is cut scenes of characters interacting with each other. Fortunately, the game does a very good job developing each character over time, and the player will feel invested as they watch the characters grow over the 30~40 hour run time of the game.

As a person who enjoys prose as much as play, I did not mind the large amount of story that the game contained. I believe that gaming is a very powerful storytelling medium, and not telling a story through a game is very much a waste of the gameplay.

My friend, however, disagreed, as he is not inclined to storytelling and would rather see more action. He bemoaned the fact that this game did not have a multiplayer mode, despite the gameplay being ripe for multiplayer. My observation is thus that some players would rather be the ones telling a story, instead of having a story told to them.

Lens of Moments

Valkyria Chronicles manages to wring out some unexpectedly emotional moments from what appears to be a fairly bog-standard war story. This game also wins the distinction that it is the only well-known game so far that attempts to portray issues such as concentration camps and oppressed minorities.

Valkyria Chronicles is also a tale of brotherhood and romance. As the team comes to trust Welkin and his developing romance with Alicia, the game culminates in a no-one-left-behind moment that has won the hearts and accolades of many a gamer.

Lens of Character Transformation

The unique and entertaining mix of characters in the game serves as a platform for the player to bond with the characters. Some of the character developments that occur are so important that they unlock new abilities that can alter the course of combat or provide a significant advantage (although there are some that are a disadvantage too – Susie Evans’ Humanitarian ability causes her to refuse an order to shoot down an enemy randomly. However, I think this is a good thing because the story does portray her to be a kind, caring person, and the game would not contradict that)

Over time, as the player progresses, they will also unlock individual character profiles. These profiles document the characters’ motivations, background and dreams, adding a new dimension to them. The character profiles also gets updated as the player clears the game, or if they die, then the game will state exactly so.

My friend and I both developed attachments to different characters in the game, and a common point of discussion on message boards is which character is the ‘best’. This very easily develops into arguments where each side defends and espouses the virtues of their favorites, which is both amusing and frustrating. Personally, I liked a character named Lynn, a quiet lady unique for her work ethic, while he liked Audrey, a cheerful girl who could ‘crush a watermelon with one hand’.