I went into this game looking for a strategy game that offered different gameplay as opposed to something like a more tactical-style game like Fire Emblem would. What I got was a kind of run-of-the-mill story with decent gameplay, that was frustratingly difficult at times but not impossible.

The gameplay itself is interesting enough - strategically moving units around a 3D space, dodging enemies and hiding behind cover to avoid getting hit, and aiming yourself rather than relying on hit% or a dice roll. I appreciated the way the maps used verticality a lot, and line of sight as well. The leveling system was a little weird - having levels tied to classes meant that none of your units necessarily fell behind, but it did make me feel more disconnected to the playable characters moreso than something like Fire Emblem or a Pokemon nuzlocke would. The upgrade trees for weapons was a nice touch, and although it was interesting that you could pick up enemy weapons off certain corpses, I never found the enemy's weapons useful enough to use practically.

The story, as alluded to before, is very run-of-the-mill; but that's not necessarily a bad thing. It does do a good job exploring the various natures of the gravity and seriousness of war - but it can be hard to take the story seriously when it seems like the characters, outside of Welkin and Alicia, don't? If that makes sense? The Valkyrur and their connections with the Darcsen tribe give a sense of intrigue, but I feel like these sort of themes explored better in something like Fire Emblem's Tellius duology.

Other things: the music was not necessarily a favorite, and even became annoying at parts (especially the book mode music), but the cel-shaded style mixed with storybook style art were gorgeous to look at and kept me going.

Overall not a bad time, but I feel like I could have spent my time a little better.

This game has a lot of good, but it has a lot of bad too. The game has an incredibly touching narrative with great characters that actually left me crying in a few scenes. It however has a lot of content that detracts from that story, basically every report. Having quite a few characters being given what felt like negative development, or forced beach episodes that are painful to watch. I accidentally left all the reports until the end (besides the one regarding Faldio/Alicia), and frankly that is the best way to play it. I got a better more well rounded story out of it, and started losing some of my love for the game after watching them, because that story started to crumble a bit. The DLC exacerbated this problem even more, and left me wondering why I would want any of this? The gameplay also is a chore. It is so laughably annoying that I felt like I was in a hostage situation when playing it. I had to do it, or else I wouldn't see the story I loved so much, but it turned out not to be worth it at all considering everything before. Everything is down to RNG from all units movement and accuracy to even how the enemies conduct their turn that time. There were times I was reloading a save, because an enemy got an impossible angle on the Edelweiss' rear (the back engine being pressed against an object and fully surrounded by it on all 3 sides), instantly killing me over and over until, miraculously, they finally missed, and I could play the game again. Every miss you make has the chance to be so debilitating that it is not worth playing the doomed save, so it is a save and reload every action kind of game. It is absolutely worth nobody's time, and you would probably be better off watching the anime, or reading (or even playing) a better written war story.