Valkyria Chronicles

[easytarget]

This one is easily good enough to warrant its own thread, so here it is. For those not aware this was easily one of the best games that ever came out on the PS3, and Sega, showing a bit of what I'd call unusual wisdom decided they owned some quality IP that could without too much effort be ported over to the PC and decided to do so.

The PC version launched yesterday and amazingly enough launched itself into the top spots on steam, for a game this old and an art style that some might find a bit off putting that's really rather amazing. It speaks to the strength of the game play, and if you enjoy turn based gaming, as I suspect some of you do, this is worth a look.

I never played it through on PS3 (which I only own because a gaming website I purchased PC games gave it to me for free in a drawing) because to be honest I'm so old school PC I owned the original IBM PC. But I've made it through a few missions so far since the launch on the PC and the console port is tolerably workable and the game play mechanic of the battles as brilliant as everyone has always raved about it.

I'll circle back to discuss as I play through it, I'm glad I picked it up before launch on sale for 13 bucks because this is looking like a true gem, I'd recommend anyone remotely interested in turn based combat pick it up even at full price (20 bucks).

http://www.pcgamer.com/valkyria-chronicles-review/

http://www.ign.com/articles/2014/11/...s-steam-charts

[Fragony]

Oh so seconded. The price may seem steep for a port of a game this old but it aged gracefully, and it's HUGE and full of little touches, I can't imagine how much time it must took to make and how much it must have costed to make it. Things are going to get very tricky halfway the game (it's never not pretty challenging) and you are going to get your butt kicked if you make a stupid decision, and you WILL feel like like a faillure if you lose soldiers you have grown attached to, but simply cannot save.

A classic for sure.

[easytarget]

Yeah, I'll admit to being a little concerned about what I'm researching and what I'm putting XP into for the team, but there's no way to know where it best fits till you see how it plays out in action. So far it has given me the impression in battles there is often more than one way to succeed and usually one critical element you need to pay attention to in order to make the battle winnable. As an example, I just finished a battle yesterday where we went across into an enemy held town and in order to take it you had to overcome like 8 tanks. I didn't know this in advance of course, so I didn't have a bunch of the right class to deal with this. But as it turns out the layout was such that containers of explosive material (ragnite) they use to power everything in this alternate world were positioned near tanks and could be set off by anyone with a gun. So even though I was not well situated in terms of the unit make up for this mission I managed to complete it (under some pretty tight time pressure).

I can only hope this sort of intelligent level layout for battles continues such that it doesn't turn in the late part of the game into a save scum exercise where the only way I can win is by recon'ing it the first time, going back to a save, loading out the right team, and playing through. I'll be ok if that's the case, just hopeful it's not. On that same note, it is nice they allow a bit of grinding through the skirmish feature where you can basically farm some money and XP if you need to update your team a bit before the next mission.

So far for me this year, this and Divinity are GOTY, and given what I see on the game horizon for the rest of the year I doubt that will change.

This one so far is really rather brilliant.

[Fragony]

It's going get much better and you (checks watch and date) got about at least 30 hours more of it comming your way. This game is HUGE. And you WILL make a second playthrough, trying to do everything perfect (you won't). You are probably already thinking of starting a new game and get everything right if you are like me.

[easytarget]

Finished the game, played a bunch of skirmishes to rank up my guys, some of the chapters you encounter in this one have difficulty spikes that are rather dramatic. Came in right at about 60 hours to complete first run through, I'm heading back in again, not sure if I'll play all the way through again or not, we'll see.

This is a really well made game, I'm a bit surprised that back in the day, seemingly out of the blue, SEGA saw fit to develop and publish such a unique and well crafted work.

This ranks in my top 10 or 15 games of all time.

On a similar note, that of older games brilliantly made, I was digging around in the attic looking for my CD of Homeworld (they are re-releasing it on steam and it made me wonder if I still had it, I did, but it's really graphically a bit of a mess, so I'll just wait for the re-done version to go on sale and pick it up) when I stumbled across another game masterpiece that I sure hope some day gets updated: No One Lives Forever. I installed it and got it working, the graphics are a bit blocky but workable enough to play, having a great old time in this one, the comedy that runs through the entire game stands the test of time, rarely has a PC game done a better job of infusing humor into the whole design of their work so well.

[Neric]

This one really looks interesting, especially the combination of real-time and turn based action. Also the style of the art seems to fit - although normally not my cup of tea. Is the campaign absolutely linear, or are there some choices to be made? You mentioned doing some skirmishes before continuing with the story mode.