This game is one of the better FEs as a story, yes?

[PresidentEden]

These are archetypes/stereotypes?

I don't claim the 'American tribeswoman' one, but yes, the traveling swordswoman whose family has been killed by bandits and who is out traveling the world to get stronger so she can seek revenge against the bandits who wronged her is a pretty common trope in RPG settings, I'd say.

[darkkfan]

Yes, this game has a great story featuring plot twists and betrayals by playable characters as well as a great villain with conflicting motivation for the Lords. It is certainly much better than FE7's.

[Tamanoir]

Yes, this game has a great story featuring plot twists and betrayals by playable characters as well as a great villain with conflicting motivation for the Lords. It is certainly much better than FE7's.

I will says that FE7 as a whole is better, but it asks far more investment ("than needed", you could say...).

FE8 is better paced, though, and more easily available, and enjoyable.

[darkkfan]

I will says that FE7 as a whole is better, but it asks far more investment ("than needed", you could say...).

FE8 is better paced, though, and more easily available, and enjoyable.

I'm not really seeing why everyone thinks FE7 is better, I mean it has a bland lord (I know Eirika isn't spectacular either, but Eliwood is so bleh) and very few choices and varieties. FE8 has all sorts of variety, with 2 routes, branched class promotions, traversable world map, and postgame Ruins content and unlockables. I don't see what FE7 has going to even match, never mind surpass, that. And that's not going into the plot depth that FE8 has over FE7.

[Samias]

FE7 is a little longer, a little harder (especially comparing hard modes), and some people prefer the linearity. Plus, even with the branched storyline of FE8, FE7 is still a longer game. It also has a larger number of characters to play, even if SS has every character able to promote into one of two classes (or more in the case of the trainees). And personally I think the battle sprites in FE7 were more detailed and had more customizations, plus I like the FE7 colour palette more. FE7 also has rankings whereas FE8 has no such thing, so you don't really have any lofty challenge in FE8.

There is also nothing in FE8 that really tops the feeling of tragedy Eliwood feels losing both his father and Ninian. Even though I love Lyon, I didn't feel like Eirika and Ephrain were as torn up and part of that is that they didn't have that gut-wrenching sadface sprite Eliwood has. This ties into the level of sprite detail I mentioned before. The main cast members of FE7 have a few additional facial portraits that make a big difference, and FE7 has more CGs for key moments to give them emotional weight.

Overall FE7 had a higher production value and it shows. I enjoy both games, personally, and I think the advantages FE7 can be overstated, but for the power gamer you'd get more out of 7 than 8. 8 is much more casual friendly in its design but that can also be a detriment to some of the more hardcore FE fans.

Edited March 7, 2013 by Samias

[Tamanoir]

I'm not really seeing why everyone thinks FE7 is better, I mean it has a bland lord (I know Eirika isn't spectacular either, but Eliwood is so bleh) and very few choices and varieties. FE8 has all sorts of variety, with 2 routes, branched class promotions, traversable world map, and postgame Ruins content and unlockables. I don't see what FE7 has going to even match, never mind surpass, that. And that's not going into the plot depth that FE8 has over FE7.

Who cares about the lord, honestly ?

I barely used them on my first playthrough, and eliwood is really bland. Hector and Lyn are more interresting.

But all the side characters are pretty great. Matthew is awesome

What I said was that if you consider all the side quest, and all the suppport, it ended up more interresting.

Also, it's a good middle ground between FE8 Casual, and FE6 Hardcore.

And I liked Kishuna.

[bottlegnomes]

Radiant Dawn is pretty much just - entire country goes to war, bad begnion god rises, let's unite and defeat it, the end. There's a lot of details in SS's plot that makes it much more compelling than you make it out to be. Not nearly as great as RD's plot sure, but they're still there.

SS's plot is basically whole country goes to war, Demon King comes back to life, heroes beat him. Oversimplifying is stupid.

Now you're just being inane. While her character could have been cut without having to rework the entire plot -- highlighting the error in development in making her a Lord with special combat frills -- more plot restructuring would have been required to cut her than to cut any non-Lord. That doesn't reflect on her as a character, only as a Lord, which has already been discussed... but even still, despite the fact that she's clearly out of place and shouldn't be a Lord, she's still more important to the plot than ~90% of the cast. I'm assuming you've actually played FE7, but you're not really doing much to validate my good faith on the matter with such outlandish statements.

To be fair, you could, but you could do that of just about any FE character. Hell, you could cut Hector without actually changing much, looking purely at Eliwood's mode, ie the main story. The only characters I can think of that you can't cut from 7, since that's what I'm talking about, without changing much are Nergal, Eliwood, Ninian and Nils (who are borderline cutable—one or the other, not both), and Athos.

As for the Wallace x Lyn support, I'm not seeing what that does for Lyn. It doesn't add anything new to her, just emphasizes her desire for revenge and gives her a moment of weakness, both of which are things we see in teh main story, if not in as much detail. Wallace, on the other hand, it does a hell of a lot for.

As for me, FE9 is by far the best IMO. It's proof something doesn't need to be terribly original to be good. Also, Ashnard is hands down the best FE villain. He's a fantastic combination of over-the-top, insanely evil and disturbingly understandable. Lyon is a sympathetic villain (much more so in Eph's route), and well done, but where Lyon makes you sympathize and empathize, Ashnard makes you hate him and still empathize. Then RD neutered him . RD had some really great/interesting parts and some shit parts to the story. Same goes for Awakening, but less-great great parts. 8 is in the same category as 9 (not original, but well done), but not as well done. So overall, it's about middle of the road for me. Then again, every FE is, save 9, which is above, and 1/3 book1/11, which is below for having a nonexistent story.

Edited March 7, 2013 by bottlegnomes

[CT075]

as much as i dislike lyn as a character i will contend that i found lyn mode's plot to be more compelling that pretty much any other FE game (aside from FE10 part 1 IMO)

it just had that intense personal feeling instead of the "oh god save the world from the evil empire" feeling that a lot of the other games give me

[just as another point both of those i enjoy for the plot, not the characterization]

[Constable Reggie]

SS's plot is basically whole country goes to war, Demon King comes back to life, heroes beat him. Oversimplifying is stupid.

>-my point---->

Your head

Edited March 7, 2013 by Constable Reggie

[Sundus64]

To be honest I fell in love with Radiant Dawn because of the story of how every one fights eachother and war will awaken the Dark God. I love the characters they are mad different from the other series and I love Sanaki's story how she wasn't the real apostle. Like I loved the story that's why I loved the game soooo much and the music has unique Fire Emblem elements but not exactly with the FE main theme. And I loved Ike and Zihark <3

[bottlegnomes]

^Really? The whole Sanaki thing was one of the parts of RD that I thought was stupid, especially with Miccy being her long-lost sister.

>-my point---->

Your head

You're right. I should probably read more than the first sentence of each paragraph.

Edited March 7, 2013 by bottlegnomes

[Florete]

Ashnard makes you hate him and still empathize. Then RD neutered him .

Huh? All RD "did" to Ashnard is explain how he took the throne, which had been noted as very strange from the beginning.

[darkkfan]

As for FE7, I'll grant you that Kishuna is a great character but Lyn is bland and Eliwood is terrible (he manages to be the most boring character or at least one of the most boring despite having the most screen time).

I think that FE10 had the best story by far for a number of reasons that I've stated before in other topics and don't feel like repeating right now. What I don't get is why people say that FE9's was the best. I mean, sure it had some great stuff like the serenes massacre and black knight duel, but all of that is completely overshadowed by FE10's sheer depth.

[Tamanoir]

As for FE7, I'll grant you that Kishuna is a great character but Lyn is bland and Eliwood is terrible (he manages to be the most boring character or at least one of the most boring despite having the most screen time).

I think that FE10 had the best story by far for a number of reasons that I've stated before in other topics and don't feel like repeating right now. What I don't get is why people say that FE9's was the best. I mean, sure it had some great stuff like the serenes massacre and black knight duel, but all of that is completely overshadowed by FE10's sheer depth.

In fact FEè'sside character arethe most interresting. I always find Eli boring and didn't really care about him (And that is how it promoted at level 6 in my first playthrough... Hilarious, really)

I never played FE9/10 though

[bottlegnomes]

Huh? All RD "did" to Ashnard is explain how he took the throne, which had been noted as very strange from the beginning.

I did exaggerate a bit, but it made him go from the one moving everything along to a toy in Sephiran's plan.

[Gone2Ground]

I won't comment on the writing since that may or may not be the result of us only having a fan translation. I will say that the second gen is not even half as interesting as the first and is sinfully boring.

I'm on the bench that says the overall plot of FE4/5 is amazing, but the little bits that make it up that we see are pretty badly done. Gen2's overall plot arch is disappointing compared to Gen1, you're right there.

[Rehab]

[spoiler=with respect to those of other minds, me on "gen 2('s story/plot/whatever) sucked" :]

It was more simply "just go everywhere and conquer shit" than the first gen, but that's the point, you're taking a tour of the continent and seeing how horribly wrong everything has gone after a decade-plus of rule by the corrupted Grandbell and Thracia et al. And you're playing as somebody who's set up from the get-go as a liberator, hero-of-the-people type with no real allegiance to anybody but the people being oppressed, somebody who it happens has the power to take down each regime he encounters by force, and hopefully fan the flames of rebellion across the continent.

It's a sticking point in the dialogue that Seliph wishes things could be resolved differently, but he can't really do anything except liberate by force, because there is no playing politics with, or even talking to most of the people he meets- they either don't want to let go of their power and/or actually enjoy abusing their subjects, they're too honor-bound to betray their masters (or maybe scared, I'm guessing the Grandbell Empire didn't engender a very endearing national culture but they were out to control pretty much everything and had a good enough grip in a lot of places that it probably seemed like they were unbeatable), they're mad at Seliph for having killed a friend/relative who was one of the above and won't listen to reason, or they're recruitable characters, who generally have motivations related to family and/or other grievances to join Seliph, and who don't usually have control of anything bigger than themselves, other than maybe holding a lot of power in their hands thanks to a holy weapon.

Hell, even if he's not that outwardly bitter about it, Seliph's own dad was effectively eaten alive by politics and conspiracy, and Seliph himself has been wanted dead by his own country and most of the continent since he was a baby. Like what was this dude gonna do if not REBELLION

I mean like what else is the Rebel Alliance supposed to do against the Galactic Empire? Unabashedly ruling through fear doesn't leave a whole bunch of ways to respond that don't involve "smash the fear." It was Seliph's big honking destiny, and against the odds he either convinced the wielders of the holy weapons to get on board with the whole "unite and fight for justice" thing, mirroring his legendary ancestors, or he was forced to destroy them.

Then he avenged both his father and most of the continent by killing Arvis, and finally killed the Antichrist, as if the game wasn't already on-the-nose enough about the whole "relive the legend" thing. I know I can't speak for you guys and all that, but man I think that's all just

(as in, awesome)

In general I don't see why we have to stack up every game in the series against every other, instead of just trying to see what things there are to like and in what ways to like them about every entry in the series, or at least why we have to call something bad in a way that makes it sound like there's nothing worth acknowledging as good in it, but man we've been at this forever, is this just what fans do or what

[Constable Reggie]

I mean like what else is the Rebel Alliance supposed to do against the Galactic Empire? Unabashedly ruling through fear doesn't leave a whole bunch of ways to respond that don't involve "smash the fear." It was Seliph's big honking destiny, and against the odds he either convinced the wielders of the holy weapons to get on board with the whole "unite and fight for justice" thing, mirroring his legendary ancestors, or he was forced to destroy them.

See, this is where the biggest difference comes from Gen1 and Gen2. There's no sense of overlying danger or doom. In Star Wars you were constantly at the edge of your seat, because you knew the rebels were always outmatched and hanging by a thread, which made the destruction of the death star all the more satisfying. There's nothing like that in Gen 2, while in Gen 1 you've got several failures (Mahnya's death, Cuan/Ethlin's death, barely escaping Agustria) that makes blowing through those assholes Langobart and Leptor all the more satisfying, only to pull al complete 180 on you right after. In Gen 2, there's nothing. You're steamrolling through everything with no real feeling of adversity or whatnot. What's even more blatant is that there's no epic third party battles at all, like there were in Gen1. I think the only non-civilian npc units in gen2 was Arione. So in Gen2, you lose that grand feeling of global conflict (this specifically is the driving point of Gen2's inferiority) and sense of constant struggle and failure that Gen1 did so well. While the struggle and failure thing isn't needed in spades, some of it would at least be better than none at all.

Edited March 8, 2013 by Constable Reggie

[bottlegnomes]

In addition to that, they gloss over all the emotional tolls of all the stuff you mentioned. If they had developed that stuff more, it'd be much better. Really the only emotion that comes through well is Llewyn's son's anger towards him.

[Shin Kishuna]

As a story? Eh. I like FE8, it's probably my favorite FE (not counting the nostalgia I get from FE7), pretty much everything about the game sans difficulty is awesome to me. The story though, is a classic cliche. That doesn't mean it's not good, it's just not very innovative or unique. As far as stories go, I think FE9/10 takes the cake on that one, more the former than the latter. Granted, I haven't played any games before FE6 and after 10, so my knowledge is limited.

I agree with what many people said about FE8's characters being great, but the plot somewhat lacking. To be fair, I think most FE plots are pretty lacking based off what I know.

[Avi448]

the plot is pretty great, and i like the characters, what it really needed, though, was more dialogue on the main script.

I'd have loved to see more discussions like that Seth and Ephraim had in Chapter.12, or a bit more of dialogue about Grado's invasion to Jehanna ( Jehanna's fall just happened and that was it ). Those aside, i don't have much to complain about the game's plot, and most Support conversations add even more to the story ( Valter's madness being by he using some cursed lance, according to CormagxDuessel support, and that's not all of it )

Edited October 23, 2015 by Avi448

[eclipse]

Erm. . .that's sorta. . .kinda. . .bah.

That's VERY much a necro!