Fire Emblem

I finally bought and played Fire Emblem Echoes. And it is great! I am still early in Act 3, but I am enjoying myself quite a bit. I know this is super old stuff for people here (specially when a new game is in the horizon), but I wanted to talk about it for a bit. I was not sure how to structure this post, so I guess I will do bullet points, in no particular order:

The Good:

• The Characters. They are, so far, all well established with clear personalities and motivations, and are mostly fun and enjoyable to read. And all without being caricatures or without women wearing absurd clothes! I am never a Awakening and Fates hater, to be clear, and I do think they did do some things right with its characters. But, still, a lot of bullshit was present in a way that it is not here.
• Weapons. I liked Fate's system well enough, but some aspects of it never sat quite right. In particular I hated how silver weapons gave significant stats debuffs when used. You were encouraged to just hold them back or "cheat" by having a secondary attacker use it. Here the solution for the lack of durability is simply not to worry about balance too much. Steel weapons are still of dubious use when compared with iron (some characters prefer one or the other), but from what I could find (looked weapon charts in the internet) silver is close to being just better, which is fine enough by me.
• Arts. Related to the previous point, arts are an interesting way to discourage fiddling with weapons. Each unit will have its favored equipment and you will avoid changing it unless really necessary. Because attack arts can't double and positioning arts aren't that impactful, I've been using them less than I wish but, still they can give variety of options.
• The RPG/visual novel-ish exploration. Walking around in safe areas talking to people and doing sidequest is fun. Give a better sense of downtime than any other Fire Emblem I've played. Also justify the overworld map in ways that other games didn't. Now it is not just a mission hub, but a world you can actually explore and visit.
• Class system. I like there isn't much of an incentive to hold off promotions. I never felt this was an interesting decision anyway. Also, like you don't need to have an item. That is just a way to punish using multiple units, which is silly as using multiple units is already an unoptimal strategy anyway.
• Magic. Cast from Hit Points is way less annoying than I expected! And they actually feel like spells instead of weapons only certain characters can equip! Furthermore, now I think about it, the HP loss is an interesting way to balance magic against weapons. They now can be just plain better in many aspects, as they carry a inherent and tangible risk. This might be my most positive surprise, as it was the element I was most concerned with.
• Archers. They are good! They have an unique niche! It is great! They being able to hit from close do seem weird, specially since their other advantages (range!) are actually pretty significant. I remember hearing people mentioning they are overpowered in this game, but I don't quite agree. They miss quite a lot and even being able to counter, they still are quite fragile. They have amazing utility and are vital to safely hurt certain bosses, but they aren't broken in my experience so far. Anyway, I certainly hope they keep this system in future games. Maybe no the 1 range, but certainly the 3+ range. It makes them feel like actual archers and give them a purpose other flier killers and bad mages.
• Celica's class. She is a mage lord, and this is great. She uses swords too, which is a bit played out but, still, the sword+magic combo is cool and she can be good in both roles.

The Neutral:

• The story. I still feel I am too much in the beginning, but I am liking it so far. It is classic Fire Emblem affair, but it is well executed. Still, there are some really bad moments that hurt it quite a bit. Alm just randomly becoming the leader of the Deliverance is a big one. I actually liked how earlier he subtly pushed Lukas aside and became the defacto leader of their initial band. It showed he, Alm, had a sense of leadership while Lukas very clearly had not. But then Clive just went and made him general and pretty much king out of nowhere and, save the one asshole, everybody went along with it. Now I am learning more about Clive, I think I am understanding his decision a bit better, but there needed to be a bit more conflict. At least Forsyth and the random soldiers should have voiced the misgivings, even if following along due to loyalty to Clive. To give a sense this decision was crazy. Another big story failure is Alm meeting with Celica.
• The protagonists. I like their chemistry when children (though the sense of time they spent together is distractingly vague) and the way they continue to pine for each other even after years feels a bit much, but not too much. However, their meeting at the end of Act 2 was disastrously bad. And because it is such a major moment it genuinely hurt their believability as a pair. For starter, the meeting is too short. A bit of nitpick, but the other characters in base conversations act as if they hung around for at least a day, as opposed to just meeting, immediately fighting and splitting off. More importantly, though, the focus of their fight is all off. Celica's misgivings are justifiable for many reasons, but the way she focus on the mere act of fighting the empire is just weird, specially considering she is not a pacifist. And then she suddenly becoming offended when Alm (reasonably) blamed her father and accusing him of wanting to be king out of nowhere makes she feel way too unsympathetic and hypocritical. There is nothing inherently bad in the scene, it could have word with some changes, like Celica being concerned with Alm's plans of advancing on Rigel (instead of "fighting") and some previous scenes showing her worried about Alm's true motivations. Instead we got a scene so bad that tainted their relationship.
• Supports. On average, they are much stronger than Awakening and Fates. They are solid character work, without being repetitive or just clearly there to fill space. On the other hand, there is a pitiful amount of them. Despite that, they do work surprisingly well. Most characters feel well realized enough, specially because base conversations are basically a support with the main character, but a few single support characters are really hit by this. The two clerics are the biggest offenders so far. Despite being there since very early on their respective routes, they are basically nothing characters. Which character can support with who feels quite arbitrary as well. In particular, Saber not supporting with Celica feels so weird. He is basically her lancer in Act 2, but they don't support at all. Faye and Genny not supporting with any of their friends is also an obvious absence.
• Enemies moving on maps. Terror aside, I like how the move with a clearer purpose than the random monsters in some of the previous games. And, as I mentioned well above, I like having a better justification for the world map. Still, I can see these encounters becoming annoying and repetitive as a backtrack for sidequests and such.

The Bad:

• Maps. I think this is one of the main consensus, right? The map design in this game is bad. It is so weirdly uneven. Some maps have a clear idea and purpose to them, but others are just big open spaces with enemies scattered at random (like this one early map with a single horse far a way, for no reason). Then there are stuff like the repetitive boat levels in Celica's route. Multiple back to back maps with the same basic idea and same strategy (at least the cantor one was a cool surprise). They are not so bad to the point of ruining the game, though, specially because the main mission maps tend to be, at least, passable.
• Dungeons. Boy, they get repetitive fast. Fuck corals man. The main problem is you have to fight multiple groups of enemies in bland maps. And because the game mechanics, each fight is a bit of a shore. I guess I am supposed to just use the AI command on those fights? Still, there are good moments. The surprise gargoyle attack in the sea dungeon caught me by surprise and the side quest boss in Deliverance hideout was a nice challenge.
• Difficulty. Kinda easy so far. Playing on normal and classic, no intentional grind (doing sidequest, though). It is not exactly a walk in the part, but I hardly feel my units are in real danger. It is way too common for my front units to take just 1 damage from most enemies, so even being surrounded is no treat. Nowadays, there is at least a couple units per map that can deal serious damage (specially if they are magic) but this little is just not enough. I hear there are some difficulty spikes, so my opinion on this will change but, still, the early game difficulty curve is kinda boring.

I guess this is it? There is probably more I could talk, but I am sleepy and been writing this for far too long. Sorry for just randomly dropping a weird outdated review like thing, but I felt like talking about about the game and, once I started, I couldn't stop.

Playing through Awakening again, I really hope some of the voice actors in it come back for future games. Would love to see Bryce Papenbrook voicing someone in a future game (being as delightfully crazy as Henry is optional).

The thing is his attitude was about Royalty in general, and even with a parent who has made a lot of mistakes, Celica would be angered by his attitude about it.

Forsyth got as far as he did because of Clive so him or the other lowborn soldiers wouldn't really question it. Only Lukas is from Nobility I recall.

Also yes the maps are bad like that. This was a flaw of the original game that they tried to be as faithful as possible. Its a situation where updating over nostalgia would be better. Though I know he director had strong nostalgic factors in it because he played the game with his deceased father as a kid.

My point is not that Celica's reaction was unrealistic. It is that they come from nowhere and are shockingly unsympathetic, which I believe it was not the intent. It is particularly noticeable because afterwards the game seems to take her side, given how other people react. Anyway, as I said, her opinions aren't the problem per se, it is the execution that is awful.

The problem with Alm leading the army is not that he is a peasant. I have no problem with only Ferdinand being so much of an asshole to think that way. The problem is that he is a random kid from nowhere. He lead at most one successful major battle, and even then, technically Lukas was the leader, not him. Why should other soldiers, specially soldiers who have been there from the start, trust him? Not to mention that he was promoted solely based on his bloodline. Ferdinand was mad he was not a noble, but the peasant born soldiers should be mad he was being favored for being the grandson of a hero.

I know why the maps are like that, but that is a bad excuse. They have not been as faithful as possible. They changed a fuckton of things, most of them for the better. They even added a very non Fire Emblem-like element like the dungeons. If they wanted, they could have gone through each map, figured the basic concept and remade them so they don't suck so much.

Edited by Heatth on Feb 10th 2019 at 9:45:30 AM

A lot of Echoes story notes are basically "This is an NES game we made when we didn't have a dedicated writer whose plot we're trying desperately to justify."

"Hey Alm here's our entire army" worked better when we only had three scrolling boxes of text to deliver plot advancement I guess.

What frustrates me is that this could be better. They did try to justify why Clive gave command to Alm, I think. Despite all his talk, he does seem to hold bloodlines in high regard. His difference to Ferdinand is less ideological and more pragmatic (though he is more open to what a "worthy blood" is in comparison). So to me, his decision make sense, even if it still very stupid. The problem is the fact it was universally accepted, even by people who know nothing about Alm. I can buy most of them they will go along with it out of pure loyalty, but doing so without even voicing a concern is a bit much. I jut got a base conversation of Python complaining about the privileges the nobles have in the military, it is kinda weird that he doesn't recognize Alm benefited from the same mindset. Just a few extra lines would have made this whole thing be more credible.

Of course, the fact Alm is a successful commander even though teenager farm boy with practically no experience is quite silly. But changing that probably involve larger changes to the plot which are a bit more complex. That I can accept more easily it is just a product from its time

Uh Dungeons were in the original game. Like I said it was one of the things they did not change, other things, like Dungeons, were also in the original game. What they changed was how they were explored.

I understand wanting some NP Cs to oppose it, but the characters themselves wouldn't.

As for Alm and Celica, she went on this journey in the first place to 1. Avoid the vision she saw of Alm getting killed by Rudolf, so shes going to Mila to stop him form being involved. While hes trying to resolve it personally and this is making her start getting frustrated. 2. He starts making it about class the moment he calls her a blue blood due to her attitude while he himself is a royal who thinks hes a commoner.

Of course the true irony is that Valentia still favors Royalty over the common man, a fact Alm never changes because he perfectly represents it as a royal who took charge as was his destiny.

Edited by OmegaRadiance on Feb 10th 2019 at 10:36:45 AM

It's more the Archer's line than anything that's overpowered, as it has a major snowball effect where each successive promotion adds more range. Granted, even though their early Hit can be a little shaky, Archers are still the king of cheese strats, thanks to their ability to outrange the most dangerous targets in the game (the high-Mt dark magics when basically no one has good Res). Curved Shot (Iron Bow) does much to fix their accuracy problems until they can get their hands on a Killer Bow (though even just getting to Sniper, then Bow Knight, makes them ridiculous enough).

Well technically, most FE protagonists are guilty of this. Marth is a 16-year-old royal with no field experience when he assumes command of his army. Seliph is an 18-year-old sheltered noble in hiding with no practical experience when he assumes command. Roy is a 15-year-old noble who's spent his time studying in Ostia with no practical field experience...etc., etc.

A Child Shall Lead Them is a very common trope in the series. Granted, each of them have advisors and such, but in the end, they're catapulted into command far too early with far too little experience, but they're all so well-adjusted and noble that they adapt and thrive.

And Alm wasn't just a random kid from nowhere, despite himself and other people thinking that he's a commoner. Him being Mycen's grandson earns him a ton of clout among the Deliverance. Lukas was there to get Mycen first, after all. Alm was the next best thing, and he's a fighter a cut above the rest, so they accepted him.

The Deliverance was in pretty dire straits at the time, and Alm was pretty much its savior, so they didn't have a lot of room to complain and grouse. Ferdinand was a special case, as his hatred for commoners stems from his loved ones being killed by them. He's classist like the majority of Zofian nobility, but that was likely the last straw for him.

As an aside, I do like that SoV made bows so much more useful after being the Butt-Monkey class in so many games (alongside armors). Sure, they might have gone a bit too far and made them too good, but a slightly nerfed version of them would make them more useful later on. Keep the counterattacking at one range, at least.

Edited by ILikeRobots on Feb 10th 2019 at 11:52:56 AM

And that is a huge change, considering exploring the dungeon is most of your experience inside them. It is also the mos unFire Emblem-like thing about them. My point is that they made considerable changes to make the game better, and maps could have been one of them. I mean, it doesn't break the game or anything, but I think saying "they wanted to be faithful" is silly, considering they weren't.

Why they woudn't, though? I mean, Lukas and Clair knew Alm by that point, of course, and they trust him. But to Forsyth and Python Alm is just a nobody who jumped ranks for no reason. They wouldn't go against Clive, but I see no reason why they would just accept uncritically. Specially Python who shows particular awareness to this sort of stuff (though, of course, it is not like he would take an action one way or the other)

I haven't seem Archer become that broken, though I can see how they can be abused in cheese strategies. Part of good design would be to recognize those and counter them. Still, if they are too broken then they should at least have more penalties up close, like not being able to do range 1 and/or having stats penalties up close. At any rate, I like there is now a point to them. And I like they feel like archers, firing from real long distance.

Yeah, this is recurrent problem in the series and also why I think it is a relative minor point. But even then, these have the excuse they were explicitly trained and raised for command. Alm was trained in arms, but there is no much indication he was trained in leadership and strategy. If the other games are silly (and they are), this one is even more so.

I know? I talked about this? But he is still very unproven. And considering the Deliverance did outwardly place a value on actual personal experience as opposed to only value nobles, this shouldn't make him being universally accepted to readily.

Was he? He saved Clair, and they reached Clive. But I didn't get the sense these were major strategically important victories. Just personal victories for them. And presumably Clive and the other commanders did similar things. Alm first real major victory was conquering the castle, at which point he definitively proved his leadership. But, before that, it is just a shaky decision Clive did for his own personal reasons.

Edited by Heatth on Feb 10th 2019 at 7:03:56 AM

Thabes (the bonus slog—I mean, dungeon) eventually counters Bow Knights being able to uncontestedly murder any target they want by... giving the opposition Bow Knights with equipped bows so that they have the same attack range (and can counter the Bow Knights unless they're using something like the Longbow's or Parthia's artes).

Thinking a bit more, I guess you could say it's more that that's overpowered in tandem with Alm. Alm can only be remotely be threatened by mages most of the time, and stuff like Mire and Death remains consistently scary for the entirety of the game. The Archer line can reliably remove those key enemies without any danger to themselves, allowing Alm to sweep everything else without breaking a sweat, thus making the game completely safe (except for the back 20% of Thabes). Celica's team doesn't need it as badly thanks to her Dread Fighter spam, though it's really nice to have strong ranged support when most of her units get stuck moving 2 tiles at a time across a lot of her worst maps.

Huh? No they weren't. At the most, Marth was trained in swordplay and scholarly subjects. He was never intended to lead an army; his father had that taken care of before his death, and Marth, as the last male of Anri's line and only remaining non-captured/dead Altean royal, was forced into command.

Seliph lived a regular, sheltered life in a common village underneath the Empire's notice. Lewyn had to press Seliph to get out there and start fighting the Loptyrian Empire to get him to take up command.

Roy was in Ostia studying. He was never intended to lead anything, but circumstances sorta just...elected him after his father was too sickly to jump into command.

Really the closest I can see to someone having the experience to lead is Ephraim with his small band or maybe Chrom and his Shepherds, and those on a vastly smaller scale than the huge logistics of an army.

The DLC goes into a lot of detail for how pressed the Deliverance was in the days before they sought out Mycen. It was pretty hectic. A lot of the Deliverance's problem was morale. Mycen was basically the be-all answer to their struggle. He was beloved by both commoners and nobles. They were short on men, had been pushed into basing in a crypt with terrors...they were extremely on the back foot, even close to being wiped out completely.

Alm was that figurehead they could rally around in Mycen's absence. Clive realized that Alm would unite the army and raise its morale more than he ever could on value of being related to Mycen, which is part of why he stepped down. Alm is an unusually good fighter as well, as commented on by several characters, Gray being the first one I can think of.

Him rescuing Clair and Mathilda were maybe not the most important strategic victories, but they did a lot for the morale and trust people had in him. Basically I think he was riding the coattails of "Legendary Mycen's grandson," and people accepted him based on that alone. When he proved himself, it just got better from there.

Edited by ILikeRobots on Feb 10th 2019 at 1:22:44 AM

All they did was flip the exploration of Towns with Dungeons. Towns in Gaiden you could physically explore then including buildings.

Whereas they altered it to be the Dungeons instead.

The whole point is that they did a number of things purely for Nostalgic reasons, and while some were changed others were not.

Like Nosferatu killing Duma or the Dread Fighter loop because of how well know these became to players who enjoyed he original.

What about Ike and the Greil Mercenaries? (I know Greil was in charge at the start of the game, but he was clearly grooming Ike for command).

The group had members leave because Greil was respected for his strength. Like in a Meritocracy.

He had to get stronger before he found those members and recruited them again.

Ike was learning the sword and sparring with Greil, but he definitely didn’t have the leadership training to lead the company until he was already thrust into the position for a while.

He kinda bungled a lot of his early leadership attempts. I mean, Shinon left out of protest at the untrained teenager being handed command on reason of being Greil’s son alone.

Shinon is an asshole, but he had a point about that one. It’s one of the minor Reality Ensues things that I like about Tellius. Soren being heavily pragmatic but also a good guy is another thing that felt super refreshing to me.

edit: I wouldn’t exactly call it a meritocracy. They didn’t just respect his strength, but his proven leadership and how much he’d cared for them through the years. Greil was also a kind family man and wise decision-maker.

Edited by ILikeRobots on Feb 11th 2019 at 7:35:00 AM

It was to Shinon. Its why he quit and joined Daien because Ashnard promoted one.

Him coming around even has him required to get injured I recall.

Shinon rejoining the mercenaries is the most unintuitive process in a Fire Emblem game, even more than recruiting Stephan. You have to talk to him with Rolf, then kill him with Ike. If anyone else kills him, he'll die for good.

x2 The reason Shinon gives for joining Daein isn't just about strength, but that they were the only people who would take a commoner in where Begnion refused him based on his social class despite his skill.

It's been a while since I played, but I remember Shinon respecting Greil for more than just being a strong guy. He really looked up to him for his leadership skills too. The guy respects competence and independence, and seems like he saw Ike as neither until he proved himself.

edit: At least you can reasonably find Shinon without needing a guide. Getting Stefan without knowing how is literally pure dumb luck.

Edited by ILikeRobots on Feb 11th 2019 at 12:15:56 PM

Yes like a Meritocracy. Its why he hated Ike getting made leader because he saw it as nepotism. Greil is as skilled as he is kind.

And its precisely because of said past he joins Daien since strength is he only thing that matters to ashnard.

Edited by OmegaRadiance on Feb 11th 2019 at 12:27:15 PM

The more I hear about Ike, the less impressed I am about him bucking the trend of the lords being nobility.

Hah, why so? Genuinely curious.

x2 If all Shinon cared about was strength then he wouldn't have tutored Rolf in the bow. His soft spot for kids didn't come from strength being the only thing that mattered to him, or even the most important thing.

edit: This as well.

Edited by ILikeRobots on Feb 11th 2019 at 12:33:19 PM

To be fair, it's not Ike that wanted to be in charge of the Greil mercenaries. If I recall correctly, as far as he was concerned, Titania would become the new leader. She decided to name him leader instead, and most of the mercenaries were willing to follow Ike as well. Shinon, who never liked Ike and half of the other mercenaries, immediately quit, while Gatrie is a tool and followed Shinon out.

Edited by Resileafs on Feb 11th 2019 at 3:32:02 PM

x2 It is a major factor. Because despite caring about Rolf he left him behind. I never said him caring about kids is incompatible with him wanting his skills to be recognized, and in his eyes Ike was not skilled or worthy of being the leader at the time.

Also as mentioned him being a dick towards people in general.

Edited by OmegaRadiance on Feb 11th 2019 at 12:40:17 PM

I could be wrong, but I thought that you were saying that the only objection he had with Ike was that he wasn't strong enough (battle-wise), or that the mercenaries were purely a meritocracy based on battle strength, when they have a variety of other factors that contribute to who they respect as leader. It's clear that he has other problems with Ike's leadership other than the fact that he's not great at swording at first.

Him being in charge of the company meant that their lives were in his hands, as well as his general inexperience with management and such. Gawain was skilled in battle, but it wasn't just his skill in battle they respected and followed.

Ashnard was very much "strength in battle being the only thing that matters." The rest of the mercenaries were not. Strength of conviction and kindness/competence and whatnot also played a large part in their adoration of Greil.

Edited by ILikeRobots on Feb 11th 2019 at 12:45:39 PM