Unfortunately, I only played it after the 3DS/Switch games and was therefore a bit underwhelmed. Mechanically, the game is actually pretty solid, but some of the mechanics really annoy me. Permadeath, which you can't turn off, is just a shitty idea^^ Especially in combination with units spontaneously appearing on the map as enemy reinforcements and one-shotting you. It's just frustrating and you can't prepare for it because you never know where reinforcements can come from...if you could turn off permadeath that would be forgivable, but you can't :/
Then there's the writing - it's absolutely average, not really bad but nothing special either. Some "heavy" topics like racism are dealt with, but remain very superficial. Some dialog and plot points are also downright nonsensical - e.g. At a certain point you get a recruit who belongs to the enemy and joins us. Instead of questioning her or even taking her prisoner, she's just part of the group, even though she could have super important information about the enemy's troop movements etc. :D Things like that happen all the time. Maybe I'll give it another chance but I honestly wouldn't know why, I liked the later games more.