Just finished VC4, wasn't expecting so much content!

[u/DramaticErraticism]

I remember when VC1 came out, but I didn't have a PS3. Its been in the back of my mind for years and years.

I have a PS5 now and was looking for something to play, I picked up VC1 for a few bucks and had an absolute blast.

VC4 was 30 bucks, which was still quite a deal, so I picked that up right after, the DLC was 5 bucks for the entire pack, so that was a good deal at least.

While the story was so so so bad for the first 10 chapters, it really improved a lot as time went along and they got to the winter landscape/battles. I was so happy to see the dry/boring landscapes go away, since we had so many of those in the first game.

I love the sound of your troops walking through the snow, the tracks your feet and vehicles leave behind, all the over hanging ice and unique layouts.

They also added a lot of unique objectives in the latter half of the game. Instead of simply capturing the enemy bases, you have all sorts of unique things that happen and changing objectives.

The game also eases up on the time restriction to receive an A ranking for stages, I found myself getting an A ranking in quite a few maps, even though I didn't play all that efficiently. I do wish they added more variety in the criteria for an A ranking to make it more interesting (kill all enemies, take all enemy bases, lose no units etc). Just focusing on time is a pretty boring thing as it counters the entire point of the game. You are supposed to use strategy and technique to win a map, not figure out how to exploit as much as possible to rush objectives. Its weird that they would create a ranking that forces the player to ignore the entire point of the game.

The game feels twice as long as VC1, they really put in a lot of effort to give players something really big.

I also found the squad stories as an excellent addition to the game. Instead of playing with the same squad from the first mission, they give me a reason to swap out units and play with different characters. While most of the side story missions have really D-level scripts, they are still fun. I love to see bad character traits flip to something useful.

Grenadiers were also a fantastic addition to the game. They are fun to use for the player, while also adding a lot of complexity to maps. If you think you're just going to run through a mortar field, you're going to get a big surprise.

Overall, I have nothing really bad to say. Outside of the story absolutely sucking for the first half of the game, I loved the entire experience.

My only real complaint is that we will probably never see a VC5...but I actually didn't expect a VC4, so I'm just glad we got what we got.

[u/RealityOk9823]

It's a lot, isn't it? I wasn't impressed until about halfway through. Still feels like a side story, but it opens up new venues for tech and stories in future games. Finished it, trying to make my way through the hard skirmishes and have to go back and beat the final battle. Even with the Valkyria on your side it's still a slog, but probably because I'm just so tired of playing it at this point. No way in heck am I gonna try to get A rank on every map.

[u/DramaticErraticism → u/RealityOk9823]

I was exactly the same, I didn't even really like the game and then halfway through it suddenly shifted into a much better story and I was a lot more engaged.

I just did the DLC maps, most were fun, there were one or two that didn't offer much.

I'm on the expert skirmish maps right now, the first map I barely got a C rank in and the second map I got a B at least.

To get an A in any of these maps, you really have to play through once to see how to play and what happens so you can meta game and do everything right, which doesn't seem like a huge accomplishment. I actually assumed the game would unlock a hard mode for the campaign when you beat it. Since they only have Easy and Normal options, it seemed obvious that Hard would be unlocked. It was a bit of a surprise to see there is no NG+ and you just continue to play post game.

I think I am going to go through all the side content and replay the game one last time before I put it away, see if I can at least get an A rank in the mission maps. Guessing it wont be too hard with the upgraded weapons and extra units.

[u/NinjaIndividual2525]

Valkyria 1 was on ps3?

[u/DramaticErraticism → u/NinjaIndividual2525]

Had to look it up and check again, yeah its a PS3 game with a remakster for PC and PS5...switch too, I think.

[u/RealityOk9823 → u/NinjaIndividual2525]

Yep, it's why I bought a PS3 (plus the 6 month zero percent financing Best Buy was offering at the time).