A unique premise and immersive story brought down by wildly uneven difficulty and illogical gameplay mechanisms
The game is set in the land of Europa, where the continent is ravaged by war. The greedy Empire is set on conquering the land to increase its stock of "ragnite", a precious mineral used to power pretty much everything. The main two players in the war are the Empire and the Federation (huh, never heard that matchup before), but the small country of Gallia, known for its rich ragnite sources, becomes a target in the war as well. The main character, Welkin, is a 22 year-old college student who becomes the unlikely hero in order to protect his country and loved ones.
The battles are set up to pit your squad against the enemy army. Welkin pilots your team's sole tank (until later) and the rest of your characters are foot-soldiers equipped with rifles, machine guns, and bazooka-like "anti-tank lances". The player and the enemy both take turns, in which they can move their units around and attack the opposition. If the unit moving comes in range of opposing troops, they may take fire, prompting strategic positioning to ensure your units don't get destroyed. The enemy AI in these battles can range from laughably incompetent to ruthlessly efficient, sometimes running straight to their death at your squad's fire, and other times focusing all of their units to attack your tank multiple times (if the tank dies, it's game over). This can take some getting used to, and would be okay if the battle's events weren't so unpredictable. Before each battle, the player is given NO idea of what the battlefield looks like (except for a vague map which tells you where your troops in relation to a pencil drawing). This often leads to poorly placed troops, simply because the player is not allowed to look at the actual battlefield before hand. I often found myself placing troops randomly and starting the match just so I can see where they're supposed to go, then load up my last save and start again. This is a ridiculously illogical choice by developers, as placement is incredibly important to how battles turn out. Also, story battles have a tendency to simply have enemies come out of nowhere. Though they usually spawn at base camps, the occasionally come out of nowhere with no warning, resulting in a number of cheap deaths. Other random story-related events (such as invulnerable enemies and certain objectives appearing mid-battle, with the necessary units being faaaaaar away from these objectives) occur quite often, sometime making adapting to the battle simply impossible. Other stupid mechanics include a huge number of chance related "potentials" (character abilities that activate randomly; my belief is that having too many chance-related mechanisms detract from real strategy) for characters, the lack of ability to see how potentials or statuses work mid-combat, and newly spawned snipers repeatedly attack a unit until it dies.
The narrative becomes increasingly complex, bringing in both fantasy and sci-fi elements to tell a story of political ambition and dark histories. This is truly the best part of this game, and if you can stomach the uneven battles, then it's worth experiencing. The voice-acting is fairly well-done for the most part, and though the writing sounds cheesy occasionally, it is mostly solid as well. There are some really emotional moments and crazy plot-twists, making for a damn good story.
As a veteran of SRPG's including Fire Emblem, Final Fantasy Tactics, and Disgaea, I've played my fair share of the genre. Valkyria Chronicles is, of course, very different than those games, which is something I was ready to embrace. However, chance and unpredictability are, in abundance, not welcome in strategy games. A mild amount of unpredictability makes things interesting and forces the player really think to adapt to the situation. But a large amount of chance weighed against the player can often render strategy useless. Difficulty is a given for a strategy game, and it is welcome as long as the player is given the tools to work against this challenge. But forcing trial and error and the consulting of guides is simply over-doing it. I don't necessarily see this as a step-back for the genre, but its innovation is still squandered.