Sports Legends - Gamers Welcome: Exclusive Valkyria Chronicles PS3 Review

Sports Legends features reviews from our panel of experts, including our editors as well as editors from our sister sites. We rate games on a scale of A+ through F. Anything we score in the A+ through A- range is considered excellent, B+ through B- is good, C+ through C- is average, D+ through D- is bad, and F is terrible. At long last, here is our exclusive Valkyria Chronicles PS3 review.

Valkyria Chronicles is an innovative, vibrant and beautiful strategy RPG from SEGA that truly breathes new life into a tired genre.

THE BOTTOM LINE: A beautifully vibrant, innovative and incredibly rich game, Valkyria Chronicles is a simply stunning experience from the first battle to the last.

From the start of the game, you will be immersed in the incredibly awesome hand-drawn graphics.

Like most of you, I wear my socks firmly ensconced within a pair of sneakers, which are themselves strapped tightly to my feet with strong, cordlike shoelaces. Imagine my disappointment in my footwear-securing preparations, then, when Valkyria Chronicles knocked those same socks clean off my feet. This is, without question, the best tactics game on the PS3 -- and it's one of the best games on PS3, period.

Taking place in an alternate Europe around the 1930s, Valkyria Chronicles tracks the exploits of a group of youths as they fight to defend their homeland, Gallia, from the invading forces of the Empire. Yes, "the Empire." Blah. Imperium seems to be the default "evil" government type in all media. Thankfully, some interesting plot twists crop up to save the game from your standard "player = beatific, A.I. = wicked." For example, a minority ethnic group called the Darcsen -- apparently based on Gypsies or Jews -- are the focus of a major subplot concerning discrimination, oppression, and extermination, involving some of the Gallian heroes of the game. Overall, the story does a good job at keeping you guessing about characters' motivations and the war's ultimate goal.

Lots of big guns at your disposal? Yes please!

What the game doesn't have, though, is the ability to tell its story without gobs of expository cut-scenes. I like anime as much as the next guy, and Valkyria Chronicles' beautiful artwork kept me enthralled longer than most games would, but even Otaku McLolicon, PhD, would balk at the amount of talking-head watching you're obliged to do here. Sure, the Japanese love their cut-scenes...and I guess it's unrealistic to expect developers to pare them down for Western audiences. But with so much downtime between battles -- especially late in the game -- one gets that Metal Gear Solid 4 feeling: that the designers would rather be screenwriters.

When you are controlling the action, though, you get an innovative blend of strategy, tactics, roleplaying, and action that rocks harder than Metallica. While the core of Valkyria Chronicles mirrors the rock-paper-scissors dynamic of games like Fire Emblem, the manner in which you access that core is radically different. Gameplay unfolds via a two-step approach: First, you get an overhead map of the battlefield, along with a limited number of command counters. Units, both friendly and enemy, appear on the map as icons, and friendly ones can only be "activated" by spending a command counter. Once a unit's activated, the game pulls you into the map -- it becomes a 3D realization of the game world, with the activated unit at front and center. This unit controls as though it's a 3D action-game character: Move with the left stick, aim with the right. You must take advantage of cover and concealment, surmount obstacles, and aim accurately to get the most out of each turn. Of course, it's not exactly real time -- an action bar depletes with every movement, limiting your active characters' options, and typically, weapons can only be fired once per activation.

With great power comes great responsibility

Other than these limitations, though, combat's freer and more visceral than any tactics game I've ever played. Enemies reserve action points for opportunity shots, so you often move under fire, adding to the thrill. Too bad the enemies don't think very well -- as with most tactical games, Valkyria Chronicles relies on numerical advantage and preexisting conditions to provide the challenge, as the enemy A.I.'s about as clever as a soup sandwich. But, honestly, this is so innovative and so polished a game that if you pass it up, the real moron is you.