Anomalocaris

As I've said before in other threads, a Chain Challenge mode where you play five consecutive maps using a set of 4-8 characters, with your characters' health carrying over from one to the next. Enemy Str and Mag stats would be abnormally high so that dying is an actual realistic possibility, forcing you to play carefully like a real FE game. Like in FEH, I think that would be a more creative implementation of FE's permadeath mechanic than how the current game just forces you to buy them back if they die in any mode.

I don't think it's likely. Breath of the Wild has a lot of canon characters in its past that it can draw on, including Link and Zelda themselves. A hypothetical Three Houses prequel game would only really feature Seiros, the Four Saints, and Nemesis. Most everybody else would have to be an OC.

So I previously posted my idealized roster here, but now I'll try and devise some general structure to this hypothetical sequel. Startup: When beginning a new game, you're no longer asked to choose a difficultly setting or choose between Classic/Casual mode; Classic mode no longer exists as it was in FEW1, perma-death isn't a thing except in a mode I'll outline later. From the main menu, you can access Story Mode, History Mode, Chain Challenge, Gallery, and Settings. Gallery and Settings are exactly what you'd expect so I won't be covering those. Characters: I already outlined the roster and movesets in the previous post, but for some more detail: Every character (except the playable villains) has two movesets; the secondary one is unlocked by using a Second Seal on them, which can be acquired as rewards from the various modes just like Master Seals. Maybe some characters could even get a tertiary moveset as part of DLC, but that may be excessive. The OC heroes, new characters, and a small handful of important returning veterans (Chrom, Marth, ect.) would be unlocked during the story. Other returning vets such as Cordelia, Navarre, and Sakura would be unlocked in History Mode or Chain Challenge. The villains, in addition to only having one moveset, would probably also have no support conversations. They can still earn support ranks with other characters for gameplay benefits, however. They're meant more as non-canon bonuses. Weapons/Skills: All characters' Prf weapons for their primary class are available in the base game; some start out with them, some acquire them during the story, and some have to unlock them in History Mode or Chain Challenge. These weapons can also be upgraded to full power with Weapon Scrolls; rather than each Prf weapon having a personalized scroll, you can instead find Sword, Lance, Axe, Tome, Bow, Dagger, Gauntlet, or Stone Scrolls, which can be used on any weapon of the given type. Prf weapons for secondary classes (and enough Scrolls to bring those to full power) are unlocked from DLC content; until then, characters will have to rely on generic Brave/Hero weapons. All Prf weapons, primary or secondary, have a built-in Attribute in their seventh slot. For example, Chrom's Falchion has Dragonslayer like before, while Navarre's Wo Dao now has Critical+ or something. Bows all still have innate Wingslayer independent from the personalized Attributes. All characters have personal Skills like before; they can no longer un-equip their own Skill, but can equip up to four additional Skills learned from other characters, for a total of five. Tharja's may be re-balanced to make it not a nuisance you're stuck with. Costumes: All characters have four basic costumes: Normal appearance (available by default) Promoted appearance (available after using a Master Seal) Secondary class appearance (available after using a Second Seal; there's no promoted secondary appearance, that'd be excessive) Broken Armor appearanace (forced into this costume if subjected to the Armor Break attribute; maybe can now be chosen as an actual starting outfit if you so desire?) Three Houses characters would have both pre-timeskip and post-timeskip appearances, if applicable. Byleth would have both male and female versions. All extra costumes from the first game return (including female Robin and male Corrin), and there'd be a handful of new ones as well. Story Mode: Exactly what you'd expect. Difficulty is chosen on a per-level basis (Easy, Normal, and Hard by default, Lunatic added after finishing the story). You are not prompted to choose a protagonist as was the case with Rowan and Lianna; the three new OC protagonists are simply given to you within the first level or two. After clearing a stage, you can replay it with any characters you want. To accomodate Three Houses content, some stages (here and in other modes) may now allow for four separate factions; the player's blue team and three separate enemy teams in red, yellow, and... purple, since green is already used for NPC allies. History Mode: Functions like it did in the previous game. There are several maps to begin with: Shadows of Valentia map Blazing Sword map Three Houses map Binding Blade map: Roy is unlocked here Path of Radiance map: Ike is unlocked here. Warriors 1 map: A map based on the first Warriors game. Includes Rowan, Lianna, and a handful of other veteran characters. Villain Challenge (Free DLC): A map contrasting to the first game's free Hero Challenge map. This one has you playing as (and unlocking for general use) villain characters such as Darios, Validar, Berkut, ect. Additional paid DLC maps for SoV, Blazing Sword, and Three Houses, and maybe a fourth pack based collectively on Shadow Dragon, Awakening, and Fates. Character restrictions are somewhat more common than in the first game, with some missions requiring you to use a specific character as your leader. As before, though, clearing the map with an S-rank will remove this restriction. As before, Anna's Mementos can be collected here as well as in Story Mode. Rather than unlocking a new difficult mission on the History Mode maps, however, they'd unlock a Chain Challenge. Chain Challenge: This is how I'd implement Fire Emblem's signature perma-death mechanic, instead of having it intrude in Story and History mode. In this mode, you are tasked with choosing eight of your characters. These eight characters must then complete five consecutive maps (you may suspend your challenge between maps and come back to it later), with any damage they take-- and any deaths that occur --carrying over from one map to the next. Healing options are limited and enemies deal more damage than usual, so you cannot afford to take risks with your characters. If all eight characters die, you'll get a game over and have to start the challenge over from the first map. Successfully completing a Chain Challenge would earn you a large trove of rewards; first-time clears would give you new Prf Weapons, Scrolls, costumes, or even characters, while repeat clears could earn you rare materials or weapons. There'd be several Chain Challenges available at varying difficulties (with the Anna ones being super-hard), with the paid DLC adding more.

Nemesis is now the final boss of Silver Snow (and properly foreshadowed there). Verdant Wind is completely changed to actually be about Claude and the Leiscter Alliance/Almyra, instead of fighting against the off-topic Agarthans and Nemesis. No gender-locked classes. Males can become Pegasus Knights, Falcon Knights, Gremories, Valkyries, and Dark Fliers; females can become Brawlers, Grapplers, War Masters, Dark Mages, Dark Bishops, and Heroes. On New Game Plus, after the five-year timeskip, a new option is added to the renown shop allowing you to buy Einherjar versions of certain characters. These replicas do not appear in the story and do not have supports, but can be used in battle just like any other unit: Jeralt (Cleared any route) Rhea (Cleared any route) [includes Seiros costume if Crimson Flower has been cleared] Sothis (Cleared any route) Kronya (Cleared any route) [includes Monica costume] Solon (Cleared any route) [includes Tomas costume] Thales (Cleared Verdant Wind or Silver Snow) [includes Arundel costume if Azure Moon has been cleared] Cornelia (Cleared Crimson Flower or Azure Moon) Lonato (Cleared any route) Miklan (Cleared any route) Kostas (Cleared any route) Pallardo (Cleared any route) Metodey (Cleared any route) Acheron (Cleared any route) Gwendal (Cleared any route) Ladislava (Cleared Crimson Flower) Randolph (Cleared Crimson Flower) Nemesis (Cleared Silver Snow) Rodrigue (Cleared Azure Moon) Judith (Cleared Verdant Wind) Nader (Cleared Verdant Wind) Aelfric (Cleared Cindered Shadows) Edelgard, Hubert, Jeritza, Dimitri, Dedue, Gilbert, Claude, Hilda, Catherine, Cyril, Flayn, and Seteth may be purchased as well, but only on routes where they are not normally available, and only if you've already cleared a route where they were available. Cindered Shadows: I dunno, I thought it was pretty perfect as-is. I guess if I had to impose one change it'd be removing Constance's split personality gimmick, and making her purely her haughty "indoor" version, but that's more of a change to her general characterization than the mode itself.

I just want a sequel in the same style as the first game, with more characters and games represented. Age of Calamity is cool-looking but I don't want that for FEW when it's still got so much more to bring in from past games.

Veronica: The fact that she's an actual character with some growth offered to her in Book III and now to an extent Book IV. Surtr: His design is A++ and genuinely fierce and badass. As drawn-out and anticlimactic as Book II's end was I can't deny he doesn't succeed at being intimidating just by showing up on the map. Hel: She... looks like grape Jell-O? She's basically just Surtr but with the fire fetish replaced with a death fetish, and none of his intimidating presence. She's just an old Jell-O lady who runs away from battle. I really struggle to say anything kind about her. She has a cool crit artwork at least. Freyja: The incest jokes we've gotten out of her.

I've done these before with a hypothetical FE Warriors 2 roster, but I may as well do it again here and go a little crazy with way more characters than is reasonably acceptable. Obviously this is way over-the-top, but it was fun to come up with.

Mileage varies, indeed. I guess I just found him too unremarkable to really care much about his design or voice. I don't usually play as him and he doesn't show up much outside of the comparatively short Story Mode. I dislike Camilla and Tharja (and that whole big-tiddy goth stalker archetype in general), but I feel like it'd be a waste of my energy to fixate on them and their inclusions in the roster.

Nowi. That's it, that's the full roster. It's just Nowi Warriors. She's the only playable character in the game, and every enemy is just Nowi too, even the low-level grunts.

Why is Rowan so worthy of obsessive fixation upon? He's insipid and unremarkable, maybe mildly annoying at worst, but some people act like he and/or his sister burned their crops, poisoned their well, and murdered every firstborn child. I don't really understand how he can inspire much feeling beyond apathy.

What a coincidence, I just finished Cold Steel 1 at around the same time. Gonna 100% it in NG+ before I move on to Cold Steel 2. Thankfully I found a save file editor and the game now thinks I have all 15 NG+ points to spend.

Sakura. Sure, everybody else is big and strong and can maul you to pieces with an axe or whatever, but here comes this dainty, quiet princess with a bow calmly apologizing before she puts an arrow through your eye socket. Before you die you wonder what you've done to become her enemy, of all people. To make the gentlest person in the world want to kill you. Was your side in the wrong this whole time? Have you been fighting for nothing? What do you even do now, draw your sword and try to fight back? Stab a fifteen year old girl and have her blood on your hands? Can you even do that and live with yourself afterward? No. All you can do is accept your death, and pray that her physical weakness doesn't cause it to be drawn out and painfully slow. That's terror.

I voted for "wouldn't have acknowledged Divine Pulse in the story to begin with", but I do appreciate that they at least showed Byleth trying it and failing anyway, instead of just forgetting about it. In future games I'd just call it "Battle Rewind" and make it a non-diegetic QoL feature. It doesn't need to be explained in-story any more than being able to save and reset does.

As much as I'd hope for FEW2 on the 27th, I'm guessing Nintendo would rather reveal any further Warriors collabs on their own presentations. A third-party collaborator showing it off on their own would be weird for them.

I mean... isn't that the problem this game already had, focusing too much on Awakening and Fates at the expense of older titles? But yeah I'm fine with it taking a while, I just hope it happens some day.