The demo came out on the Japan PSN a couple weeks ago. I had a blast playing it, even though it's... it's very different. I am still in the mindset of "why, Sega, Whyyyyyyyy" That is, why the PSP T__T

I've been playing this the past couple days, and it's not that bad.

Basically, because of the jump to PSP, stages are broken up into multiple, smaller battlefields (instead of one gigantic field). When you capture a camp and 'withdraw,' you can go to a new mini-battlefield and bring out that party member. It's... annoying, but it works.

There's some new classes and the ability to promote units, which is a very welcome addition. And, of course, there's more than enough new and inconsequential party members. There's some pretty neat codes you can input to bring back some old party members too, which I've abused quite a bit.

Minor bummer for me was how cheesed-up the story/characters got in its transition from a serious war scenario into a military academy of what appear to be 15-year-olds. It's only an occasional annoyance that thankfully doesn't interfere with the undeniable meat of the game (the combat), but it's still a noticeable change.

Game is solid overall though. Good battles, as expected, and good updates to the troop management. Won't let me make a separate save file though, which is highly annoying.

I don't care what the biographies said, the first game was a war fought by 15-year-olds.

True as this may be, the cheese level of the first was about 1/100 what it is in the second.

I was afraid that was going to be the case, taking some story/setting and slapping on a high school theme just seemed like it would be a bad idea.