izigame.me

Valkyrie Profile is one of my all-time favorite JRPGs, but as a series it took a huge nosedive in quality in my eyes. The first game on the PS1 I absolutely adored and enjoyed thoroughly from beginning to end but I did not particularly like Silmeria, I absolutely hated Covenant of the Plume and I'm not gonna talk about the mobile game because I don't want to wake up in some Cambodian re-education camp.
Generally I have zero expectations for this series anymore and this game being a spin-off by a third party developer I've never heard of made me go in with even less than that.
And to my absolute surprise I ended up loving it. Now the game has some problems, but it's the most fun I've had with a Valkyrie Profile game since the original.
I'm gonna get the two biggest problems out of the way right now before I talk about the actual game.
1) UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES SHOULD YOU BE BUYING THIS AT FULL PRICE
Do not fall for Square's tricks. This is clearly a AA budget title and there's nothing wrong with that, BUT they are trying to sell as a full priced AAA release. It went -50% off very fast after it was released and I believe that is the real price.
I got it for 30 bucks off the Christmas Sale and for that much I can thoroughly recommend it.
But for 60 bucks? Yeah, nah, f*ck off.
2) The Deluxe Edition on PC is a scam as it currently is
PS4/PS5 owners of the Deluxe Edition got a port of the original game for free (granted I'm not overly fond of the PSP version that the port was based off, but it's fine). On PC all we get is a an extra weapon that's essentially a reskin and is pretty much useless throughout 80% of the game. If this changes in the future and we do get Valkyrie Profile 1 for free with the Deluxe Edition then you can grab it but for now save your shekels.
With that out of the way onto the actual game.

STORY

The story is more or less a cut down and re-arranged version of the first game's story, but it takes place in an alternate universe and has no connections to previous games. If you've beaten Valkyrie Profile 1 you already know what will happen. It does have its moments though and I did enjoy it overall. There are four endings to unlock and thankfully they are fairly easy to get unlike the cryptic bullsh*t that was ending A of the original game.

muh grafix

For a budget title (which is what this game really is) the visuals are fine. I was originally a bit put off by the cell shading effect, but it grew on me and I enjoyed checking out the different areas you visit (Valhalla looks glorious). The characters and enemy designs are pretty cool even if a good chunk of the enemies are reskins (I'm writing this off as a budget thing).

MUSIC

My opinions on the actual games aside if there's one thing I've consistently loved throughout the entire series it's the music. My man Motoi "JRPG Jesus" Sakuraba is back at it again with another killer soundtrack. The style is quite different compared to the older games. It feels closer to his work in Tales of Arise mixed with a tiny bit of his Dark Souls days, but despite that it managed to subconsciously make me think of Valkyrie Profile the moment I started playing the game, so he's once again nailed it in my books.

GAMEPLAY

Unlike the previous games Valkyrie Elysium is an action rpg, though a few elements from the old games are present once more.
I love the combat in the original Valkyrie Profile because it's fast and to the point, Silmeria and Covenant turned it into a tedious slog and completely ruined it for me. Thankfully this time around the combat is once again great and easily the highlight of the game. However it takes making a good bit of progress before it really starts to shine. You're very limited by what you can do in the beginning and it can give a terrible first impression to most people. Progression is very spaced out (you don't even get Nibelung Valesti until the last few chapters) and I feel like they should've given you more stuff earlier because you can really do a lot later on.
There are only 4 Einherjar this time around and they function quite differently compared to the old games. Here they work as timed summons that you can call upon at will as long as you have enough soul energy. They will fight alongside you (you can unlock more moves for them by doing their respective side quests), but their most important function is changing your weapon's element.
Enemies are weak to a particular element and weapon. Using the right weapon results in greater damage. Using the right element also fills up another bar that will stun them for a while when it reaches 100% (similar to how it works in modern Ys games). There are 6 different weapons you can find (7 with the deluxe edition), each with its own moveset. You unlock more moves by upgrading the weapon.
You can upgrade the Valkyrie too which will give you stat bonuses and more abilities (a highlight is being able to auto summon Einherjar during certain actions). All upgrades cost a certain amount of CP to be active, but on normal difficulty you've got enough to have everything active simultaneously. On hard and above you'll have to mix and match.
You have the ability to block, parry, dash and do perfect dodges, but one thing to keep in mind is that you can't cancel out of attacks and I'm pretty sure this is by design. You can probably button mash through the early chapters, but you'll end up getting heavily punished later on. There's a small bit of strategy involved during combat as you're meant to exploit elemental weakness and use your Einherjar to help you build up the stun bar as well as keep some enemies busy while you deal with others. Once you're a good bit into the game and have unlocked a good deal of divine arts and abilities the combat really opens up and it's an absolute blast to go through.
The actual game is linear and mission structured, but said missions are fairly long. You pick where to go to from Valhalla whether it be a main mission or a side quest. On Valhalla itself there's also an Arena where you can practice fighting enemies you've faced before. Everything can be replayed as much as you want, so there aren't really any permanent missables. I do recommend doing all the side quests, because the rewards are worth it and all the extra combat will net you the materials you need to upgrade everything. Once you beat the game you unlock two extra modes. The Seraphic Gate returns as well as a new game mode that lets you play as Hilde.
The game isn't particularly long and I had a nagging feeling throughout my playthrough that there was meant to be more to it, but the budget Square gave the devs didn't let them do everything they wanted. Even so, what's here is quite good and despite the slow start once it got going I had a blast playing through it.

TL;DR

Given that this is a spin-off by a third party dev it's a perfectly solid and very enjoyable game that unfortunately takes a while before it really begins to shine, so it'll probably turn off some people. If you're expecting Valkyrie Profile 3 or something on par with the first game you'll be solely disappointed, but I admire your optimism nonetheless.
F*ck Square for trying to sell a budget title as a full priced game though. DON'T fall for their tricks. Wait for a sale, preferably 50% off or more. For 30 bucks this is a solid recommendation. Also avoid the Deluxe Edition like the plague unless Square updates it to include Valkyrie Profile 1 like on PS4/5.