And they completely butchered the spelling.

Here is a very cool video about Valkyria Chronicles.

 Edit: Oh hell. I can't put up a video. Can someone who is competent do it for me. Link.

And here is the article without the video.

EDIT 2: This video also answers just about every question we have about the game. Great interview.

Just to clarify a few things.

Firstly, Vyse is not available to me yet. Maybe his arrival is random, maybe not. I'm up to chapter 9.

You can have a max of 20 members in your unit, but the actual number you can use in a battle is limited and depends on the battle / map. Around 9 or 10 seems to be the average. Before the battle starts, you select which units you want to use, and where you want them to start. Basic starting points are fixed in groups, usually about two, so you have two groups of troops starting from different locations.

Yes, there is a training area. Here you can use up the experience points you gain from battle (or don't if you perform badly). Here you can rank up your troops by category, so, you can say use all your experience points to rank up your snipers several levels, or you can spread the points more evenly across all groups, or whatever you like really.

You can also upgrade weapons and the tank in a separate R&D area. Doing this costs money, not experience points. You can upgrade weapons, clothing (defense), parts for the tank etc.

You can also use your points / cash to buy extra commands for Wilkin (sp) who is the main character and the tank commander. These are kind of like special moves that you can use on your troops in one off situations.

Also, you can buy news/gossip from the journalist chick. Doing this unlocks sub-chapters in the game. These aren't essential to the main story.

There are also museum/weapons encyclopedia/people encyclopedia sections where you can do a (ton of) reading up on the characters, weapons, and locations/themes etc in the game. You also get to play with the awesome 3D models in the weapon and people sections.

Oh, thanks for the clarification hanafuda.

Sorry guys, I was wrong. :(


I already have planned what to post for the next update to this thread for Saturday. Stay tuned.

The reason you (can) have 20 in your squad is for when people die.

If one of you crew goes down, then you only have a couple of turns to get to them before they die. If you get someone to them, they call the medic, who will steam in and carry them off. This will ensure they get saved. If you don't do this and they die, then that is it and you won't be able to use that person again in that particular game save (as they are dead).

So say you have 20 in your squad, but 2 get killed, you can then go to HQ (assuming you win the battle) afterwards and top up your team with new recruits. The list of new recruits increases as you progress through the game, and this is where I expect Vyse will show up at some point.

You don't actually have to have 20 in your squad if you don't want, but I don't really see any reason not to.

Also, some of the soldier types are fewer in number than others. Snipers seem to be particularly thin on the ground, so you want to be pretty careful not to let your snipers die, or you could find there is nobody to replace them.

Suit yourself, at least it will save me 20 Euro in my pocket I pay in this forsaken expensive Europe already enough as it is.

Also I won't be reading this thread anymore, there are people who don't like to be spoiled and there are some spoilers around here.

No spoilers from me if that is what you are inferring.

I haven't posted anything that you can't find out by spending a couple of minutes with the instruction booklet.

Back on topic, if anyone is interested, I got the ltd box edition of the game, and it is very nice indeed.

Watched that 1UP video, WOW!!

This is now my second most wanted game this year after LBP. It just looks phenomenal. The art style is breath taking. This could be the RPG of 2008.

Thanks Outlawauron for this great thread :)

I like how you can use so many characters at once. This will make for some intense battles.