Author Topic: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.  (Read 13128 times)

Offline Tad

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Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #15 on: July 06, 2017, 06:44:47 am »
There's no guarantee of that. Remember, we're in an industry where the media is dominated by kids who grew up loving Nintendo and even when they try to not be bias, it shines through.

Offline Shun-Di

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Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #16 on: July 06, 2017, 07:05:50 am »
There's no guarantee of that. Remember, we're in an industry where the media is dominated by kids who grew up loving Nintendo and even when they try to not be bias, it shines through.

True, nothing has changed since we were kids.  :p  Shining Force was my first strategy game though, and it is why I checked out Fire Emblem when it came out on GBA (mostly because there weren't any new Shining Force games coming out) and I liked it.   I did drop the Fire Emblem series after Gamecube, but a new Shining Force would be totally awesome.   Maybe an anime series too?  Eh?   :D
Be like water.

Offline max_cady

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Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #17 on: July 14, 2017, 09:28:39 am »
I am not surprised by these reviews (they aren't as bad as I thought). The fact that the game was getting released (aka dumped) during the mid-summer season, it's budget price upon release and the non-existent promotions from SEGA / Deep Silver it was clear that they had no confidence in the product.


SEGA's PR started softening the blow late last year when they claimed that they wanted to continue the Valkyria Chronicles series, while Valkyria Revolution would be a parallel series, a quasi-seperate series. It's clear that Valkyria Revolution as seperate series is headed to an early grave.

Offline Shun-Di

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Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #18 on: July 15, 2017, 11:49:08 pm »
I am not surprised by these reviews (they aren't as bad as I thought). The fact that the game was getting released (aka dumped) during the mid-summer season, it's budget price upon release and the non-existent promotions from SEGA / Deep Silver it was clear that they had no confidence in the product.


SEGA's PR started softening the blow late last year when they claimed that they wanted to continue the Valkyria Chronicles series, while Valkyria Revolution would be a parallel series, a quasi-seperate series. It's clear that Valkyria Revolution as seperate series is headed to an early grave.

If they knew it was going to suck, why bother making it?  Why is it considered a spinoff?  Did they just not want to make a new entry in the main series because it would take too much effort, time, and resources?  Were they going to replace the main series with it?  I hope not.  They better rectify this.
Be like water.

Offline Berto

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Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #19 on: July 16, 2017, 07:45:50 pm »
If they knew it was going to suck, why bother making it?  Why is it considered a spinoff?  Did they just not want to make a new entry in the main series because it would take too much effort, time, and resources?  Were they going to replace the main series with it?  I hope not.  They better rectify this.

They are not replacing the main series. They're just trying to replace Shining series with that. Here's some brief explanation I read from a Neogaf member :

Back then most of their strategic choices for their japanese IP were dictated by the japanese market, and Valkyria Chronicles didn't sell well at all, for all purpose it was mostly using the core gameplay mechanics used by Sakura Taisen since the third entry on Dreamcast, with the latest entry on PS2 being a huge disappointment in sales (at its peak the IP was a 500k seller, third entry was >300k, Sakura Taisen V is <200k) they probably decided to move forward with a new IP for a fresh start on PS3 instead.

The development costs for Valkyria were without a doubt notably higher and guess what?

The game had the exact same sales than Sakura Taisen V, which is the last entry this series ever got, on a financial basis Sega Japan probably took a hit there

In order to salvage the IP, Japan then got a budget version released one year later that started decently (because of good word of mouth likely) but really had a spike when the anime adaptation started on TV, anime adaptation which changed a few details in the story and clearly prefigured what was to come for the IP later on (a character design trying to appeal moe anime fans, some dumb love triangle with Welking Alicia Faldio etc.)
In the end it made the game go from 150k to 250k, that's better but still nowhere near enough to make it a relevant IP on the home console market considering the costs involved, PSP was also booming at that time in Japan so in that context it was not so stupid to make the jump which they did and... while it didn't sell wonder Valkyria Chronicles 2 ended up at 150k, yep the exact same sales the first one got on PS3 originally but for a lower cost.
It was still not enough, but with the investments done so far they decided to do a third entry one year later that went back to its roots, the game was made from a lot of rehash and done by an external team Media Vision (which kinda become the team developing RPG for Sega afterwards with two Shining and Valkyria Revolution) it was fine for what it was and a good product and sold... 150k once again.
They tried a cheaper extended rerelease 10 months later which didn't do much (20k maybe ?) unlike the original VC.

What happened for Valkyria Revolution is that after two Shining games made by Mediavision (the IP they decided to go with the next few years instead of Valkyria), the latest being an action RPG, it was probably decided that when pitching their next project late 2014, instead of doing a new Shining it was maybe better to go with the Valkyria IP instead, domestic sales would probably be rather similar (Shining are 100-150k seller) but the worldwide appeal of Valkyria will make it worthwhile to localize the game for western markets (the two Shining aforementionned never got there, although being on PSP and PS3 probably didn't help), at that time VC wasn't/was barely released on Steam, it was also a side project Sega Japan had nothing to do with.

As for western sales, it's still worth mentioning that the original VC didn't sold gangbusters at launch either, it was rather quickly discounted (I remember having a discussion on Gaf on that topic one or two years ago, I'll try to dig up what it was about in details later on), as for the PC release while its raw sales number is incredible (it's around 1M) it should never be forgotten that the game was released at the 20$ pricepoint and most of its sales happened when the game was heavily discounted (5$)
Overall 1M sales for an average 10$ makes the same money than 200k sales at 50$.

And let's not even talk about the "first to be there" syndrome where every japanese IP releasing games on Steam had a dramatic drop in sales for its second entry.

Valkyria Chronicles 4 may/will/is happen(ing), but if it does it was always a project that had nothing to do with Valkyria Revolution to begin with, which is also what Sega always said when they were asked the question.

Offline max_cady

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Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #20 on: July 17, 2017, 08:36:55 am »
If they knew it was going to suck, why bother making it?  Why is it considered a spinoff?  Did they just not want to make a new entry in the main series because it would take too much effort, time, and resources?  Were they going to replace the main series with it?  I hope not.  They better rectify this.

Like I said, I based my observations mostly off this article from Niche Gamer. A parellel series of sorts which would share certain elements  / themes with the original franchise. But the original franchise is still very much a thing.


Still, I haven't played Valkyria Revolution (still sittin' in the shelf while I play Yakuza 0)...

Offline Randroid

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Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #21 on: July 17, 2017, 12:25:03 pm »
Picked it up this weekend and gave it a go.

I like it, though it does feel more like a Vita game then a full blown PS4 game.

Still, I don't get the hate. It's fun. Reminds me of Star Ocean, but yeah, much more fun.

Offline Berto

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Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #22 on: July 17, 2017, 08:15:45 pm »
Picked it up this weekend and gave it a go.

I like it, though it does feel more like a Vita game then a full blown PS4 game.

Still, I don't get the hate. It's fun. Reminds me of Star Ocean, but yeah, much more fun.

Agree. It's a good addition for PS Vita's library, but not so much for PS4.

Offline Randroid

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Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #23 on: July 22, 2017, 08:45:20 pm »
Anybody still playing this?

The more I play, the more I like it. Especially the Boss battles. Having to use the right ragnites and keeping the squad on their feet, hella fun.

The cutscene loading drags things down about, but aside from that this game is pretty great when you figure out how setup and use your crew properly.


Offline max_cady

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Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #24 on: August 21, 2017, 11:01:04 am »
I started playing it as soon I finished Yakuza 0. 10hr in, at the 3rd chapter.


This game has Resident Evil 6 syndrome... It wants to be something new but it doesn't quite make the leap. This was focus-grouped to the max. The combination of Dinasty Warriors with this quasi-turned based action is strange at first, but you quickly adapt to it.


Story is interesting (compared to the good vs evil in Valkyria Chronicles, this is much darker / greyer), combat is actually pretty fun once you get the gist of it, upgrading and creating the perfect team and such.

Offline Saonioc92

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    • flirtlu
Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #25 on: August 21, 2017, 07:20:57 pm »
How long has it even been since the last Phantasy Star?

Offline Betwixt Thieves

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Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #26 on: August 21, 2017, 10:44:56 pm »
How long has it even been since the last Phantasy Star?

Depends if you count single player or online.

Phantasy Star Nova came out in 2014 and the latest edition of Phantasy Star Online 2 came out in 2016 for PS4.

Neither have made it out west though.

Offline max_cady

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Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #27 on: August 22, 2017, 06:06:20 am »
That has nothing to do with Valkyria Revolution. Speaking of said game, as I was tryin' to point out earlier, one of the main characters, Amleth has this permament brooding expression on his face. It's almost comical compared to this other more expressive co-conspirators.


Like I mentioned before, this game's plot is a little different from the WW2, with clear good guys and bad guys. It's a much greyer story with morally ambigious characters.

Offline Randroid

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Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #28 on: August 22, 2017, 12:26:04 pm »
I'm at chapter 5. Liking the story. Combat's fun, but I do have a gripe that perhaps you guys are handling better than I am.

Specifically, how are you handling the weapon upgrades?

I hate how you have to go to Basil's to do it. Also, why can't I just see what Ragnites I have? Is there seriously no way to just see your inventory of ragnites, or am I missing something somewhere?

Offline max_cady

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Re: So....Valkyria Revolution's reviews have showed up.
« Reply #29 on: August 22, 2017, 06:25:28 pm »
I suspect that going to Basil for upgrades, switching battle palletes and doing R&D is similar to how the R&D worked in Valkyria Chronicles. Though that latter was all menu-based this one, you have manually move around Amlet. I only just realized that ragnite wasn't just for upgrading the characters skill trees, you can attach ragnite into a character's battle pallet.