Awakening could have been the last Fire Emblem

[Miatt]

I just have one question: How much FE 12 was sold?

Edited May 23, 2013 by dymew

[Niddo]

At work so only quick replies

Oh please. Maps aside, which is a legitimate issue, everything else here is completely optional for you as a player. Everyone starts in a reasonable class, and has decent stats if you Seal them and level all the way to 20/20. You don't need to use Pair-up at all, you just simply use the adjacent support system and Dual Strike/Guard.

Play Hard without any of the things that you just complained about, and tell me that it's too easy.

Only the Pair Up "two units on same space" stats bonus is optional. Every other bonus will kick in if two units are side by side. They're rest are unavoidable and forced upon the player. I WOULD play Hard mode without Pair Up... but its impossible.

Again, I DON'T want the "Seal to get good stats" option to exist or be forced upon me. And yet its completely forced upon you in Lunatic. FE normally has 3 regular difficulty modes before going into "must play a certain way" modes like H5 Hard. Awakening if you really wanted to avoid ALL of the new stuff (any type of pair up bonus included) only has 1 difficulty mode where that's doable: Normal. Only because its braindead easy. Because Second Seals exist and grinding exist, Lunatic's balance is completely gone, and Hard Mode is only a good difficulty if your artificial handicap yourself. That would be like saying "You can make SS's Normal mode hard if you only use the Lords, the Trainees, and no grinding! Stop complaining that its too easy!"

I disagree, because if you're having someone rescued, you probably don't want them to see combat in the first place BECAUSE of the penalty, which makes this sound pretty stupid all in all.

I meant they chip in Dual Attack style. No danger to them, just random (low) chance of dealing damage. Probably reduced damage.

[VincentASM]

I just have one question: How much FE 12 was sold?

247,248 (as of 2010).

So just below the 250,000 "guideline".

[Shadow Mir]

I meant they chip in Dual Attack style. No danger to them, just random (low) chance of dealing damage. Probably reduced damage.

Which would still be pretty pointless because why would you have a unit that's rescuing be seeing any combat in the first place? The halved skill and speed would be reason enough for me to keep a unit with a traveler out of combat if I can help it. Especially if enemies had stats like in RD, where that wouldn't excuse risking being doubled by pretty much everything under the sun.

Edited May 23, 2013 by Levant Fortner

[Faye]

I don't mind the inclusion of Casual. I'd rather have a game that is challenging, but NOT frustrating. I hate agonizing and restarting when one of my men died. Thanks to Casual mode, I gave both Hard and Lunatic a fair try-out, and I rather enjoyed it. I love level-grinding, but I don't get carried away until Endgame, so for me, Hard and Lunatic gave me a good decent challenge, but I wasn't frustrated and pulling my hair out. THAT is my kind of fun, and I can't see something like cheap RNG perma-kills being fun.

Awakening was the step in the right direction, the Phoenix Down of Fire Emblem. I could do with less blatant and disgusting fanservice (no more female-rider panties please, ugh), but I hope FE14 follows Awakening's direction. Especially if the survival of the series depends on it.

[Shadow Mir]

And on the subject of difficulty, I actually liked that Awakening actually phased out unpromoted enemies entirely a good way before the end of the game, as opposed to most other FE games that made it stateswide, where you still saw a good deal of unpromoted enemies even when endgame was right around the corner (read: FE7, FE8, FE9, FESD; the first one in particular was pretty bad about this; it's bad enough that FE7 enemies suck horribly, but even when the game's supposed to be pulling out all the stops, they're still throwing more unpromoted enemies at me than they do promoted ones???).

[Interceptor]

Only the Pair Up "two units on same space" stats bonus is optional.

This feature is called Pair Up. The other things are Dual Strike, Dual Guard, and Support (which is old). You'll find that losing free stats hurts more than you might expect.

Again, I DON'T want the "Seal to get good stats" option to exist or be forced upon me.

Good news everyone: you can secure stat boosters for that purpose instead. It's not like other games allowed you to easily cap every stat, or that capped stats were required to do well in the first place. If you really want stats but would like to preserve the "single class" feel, just reclass back into your promoted class again once you hit level 20. Right? You still have to do the work.

That would be like saying "You can make SS's Normal mode hard if you only use the Lords, the Trainees, and no grinding! Stop complaining that its too easy!"

This analogy doesn't work unless you were complaining about the features in the first place. If someone was qq'ing about the grinding possibilties on SS, I'd tell them to... wait for it... not grind.

[Folt]

See, you can achieve anything when you're under pressure!

And this is why any project should be done as if it were your last.

Hironobu Sakaguchi approached The Last Story as if it were his last game.

Then again, I dig The Last Story.

Also, reminds me of Final Fantasy which could have been Sakaguchi's last game, and we all know what happened to that..

[Mr. Sinister]

Yikes! I'm really glad Awakening sold as well as it did--it would have been tragic for the series to die now after 23 years. (Isn't that crazy? The first Fire Emblem released a little more than 23 years ago!)

[Patiotayo]

Definitely a sad thought, though I'm really not too surprised. My impression of FE for a while has been that it's been barely clinging to life, and Awakening has always felt like a grand finale sort of game. I was sort of resigned to that, but I'm thrilled it sold so incredibly well. Here's hoping for more and better games to come.

[Rapier]

Of course, the last games failed miserably (FE11 and FE12). It doesn't really surprise me...

[Kirie]

Huh, I never really knew that FE's lack of sales for previous games was really a surprise to anyone. Go figure.

In some ways, the earlier games and Awakenings success showcase a lot of general video gaming issues at once, namely how to cater to older, more "hardcore" fans while still bringing in new blood and maintaining sales. And honestly, I think they nailed it. Classic mode, added difficulty, and tonnes of throwbacks to old games (directly via DLC and such, and indirectly through mechanics) was enough to bring the fans throwing their money at it, while Casual mode, intergrated gameplay with interesting mechanics, and easy starting difficulties welcomed newer, more casual players. Not to mention that the marketing was done well, the art and graphics were stellar, and it came at a good time in the 3DS's life cycle. Oh, and can't forget that it was actually a new game with some good effort put into it with fun characters; that was enough to bring back old, disenfrachised players like me.

In other words, Awakening brought together a whole lot of vary different elements to encourage a wide variety of players, but at it's core, it's still its own special kind of ridiculous, very Japanese turn-based strategy game. And I hope this doesn't change.

I'm definitely a crotchety veteran. I didn't use Pair Up or Second Seals my entire first playthrough. I'm replaying again and experimenting a bit with both options, though I don't really like pairing up at all; shared supports and dual strike/guard are more than enough for me, and I avoid slow moving classes anyway. Second Seal just overloads my brain with options, so I haven't used it much either yet, though I'm playing around with it in preperation for Lunatic mode. I don't really feel any of these things dimish the game.

I really hope the developers keep this lesson in mind when working on more additions to the series. They need to remember that its okay to innovate and that the main purpose of the game, like all games, is to have fun. If they can continue to offer "fun" to as many different demographics as possible, hopefully with the use of that aforementioned innovation, hopefully their sales will stay strong.

Edited May 23, 2013 by Kirie

[Sasori]

How expensive to make are the fire emblems anyway? I'm sure awakening and the Tellius series where quite expensive to make, but the gba games for example don't look like they needed a fortune to make, considering all 3 games used the same basics.

Same deal with the ds fire emblems.

I'm not really experienced with developing so I might have no idea what i'm talking about.

[sunshineYON]

Explains the increase in sex appeal in the game...

[Faye]

Explains the increase in sex appeal in the game...

Look no further than Olivia and Tharja (and dark mages sans pre-promoted Henry), as well as Aversa for not-even-trying-to-be-subtle sexiness. Cherche's outfit has a huge hole so you can see her back, which is not very smart for a Wyvern Rider. Nowi and Nah are loli bait, while Ricken and Donnel (?) are shota bait. Most mounted female riders aren't wearing pants, instead they're wearing simple panties or a leotard, which is blatant fanservice and rather disgusting. Female Grandmasters don't get pants either, which is entirely stupid. Those are examples off the top of my head.

[Anouleth]

Of course, the last games failed miserably (FE11 and FE12). It doesn't really surprise me...

Not really. Their sales were about on par with other post-FE6 titles, if not slightly better than FE9 and FE10 (which did seriously awfully). Off the top of my head, the sales figures were about 250,000 to 300,000 in Japan (in comparison to 300,000 each for FE7 and FE8). FE11 actually sold better than either FE9 or FE10, yet nobody ever calls FE9/10 "miserable failures" (although they were).

[shadowofchaos]

Look no further than Olivia and Tharja (and dark mages sans pre-promoted Henry), as well as Aversa for not-even-trying-to-be-subtle sexiness. Cherche's outfit has a huge hole so you can see her back, which is not very smart for a Wyvern Rider. Nowi and Nah are loli bait, while Ricken and Donnel (?) are shota bait. Most mounted female riders aren't wearing pants, instead they're wearing simple panties or a leotard, which is blatant fanservice and rather disgusting. Female Grandmasters don't get pants either, which is entirely stupid. Those are examples off the top of my head.

HOW DARE YOU INSULT MY WAIFU'S HONOR!?

Yeah... just look at Olivia's CG. That is borderline "those" kinds of CGs.

Inverse/Aversa's just blatant, HERE IS MY BOSOM.

All of the typical anime character types are there for EVERYONE'S tastes.

Not surprised the game did so well in sales in Japan. xD

[Faye]

HOW DARE YOU INSULT MY WAIFU'S HONOR!?

Yeah... just look at Olivia's CG. That is borderline "those" kinds of CGs.

Inverse/Aversa's just blatant, HERE IS MY BOSOM.

All of the typical anime character types are there for EVERYONE'S tastes.

Not surprised the game did so well in sales in Japan. xD

I do like the top half of Olivia's outfit. 8U I just wish she got a skirt or something. It wouldn't bug me as much if Kozaki didn't deny that they were fanservice just for the sake of it. It bugs me so much..."their personalities lead to the design". Yeah, of course... Especially her official art, augh. She doesn't look like a shy, demure dancer. I thought she'd be a cheerful, flirtatious woman.

I could rant about it all day, so I'll stop. 8U I wouldn't want to insult the honor of anyone's waifus.

[Miatt]

And we have a flat Lucina :(

But I don't think the fanservce has influenced the sales(Or a little)

Edited May 24, 2013 by dymew

[HeroMystic]

I don't know about it being a gap, but then again, I probably can't say much since I don't know that many people who play FE (outside this forum). But I can speak for my friend who really likes Casual mode -- it's more like he didn't like the stress than feeling his soul was being ripped out from a unit dying. I mean think about when you've gone so far and then you make one mistake or you get bad luck and a unit dies...

This was immediately fixed with battle saves, or FE11/12's save points. In fact, I'd say Battle Saves were all that were needed to bring in the casual demographic while maintaining a classic feel. I'm actually dissapointed that battle saves are only allowed in Casual Mode.

[darkkfan]

I'll be honest, I would not be sad if the Fire Emblem franchise did end, because it'd be ending on a high note.

I wouldn't really say that it could only go downhill from here, but even with that mentality I, for one, wouldn't care how bad the future games are relative to Awakening, I would keep buying them and enjoying them.

But random crossovers on the other hand...

[sunshineYON]

And we have a flat Lucina :(

But I don't think the fanservce has influenced the sales(Or a little)

Lucina needed to be flatchested for plot-reasons. :D

[Iridium]

Oddly enough, the sexualization of Aversa doesn't bother me in the slightest, since that's obviously her shtick.

Tharja and Olivia annoy me a little more, since their character-defining traits aren't "act sexy and speak in innuendo."

[shadowofchaos]

Olivia annoy me a little more, since their character-defining traits aren't "act sexy and speak in innuendo."

The contrast between what Olivia dresses like and her personality is absolutely hilariously cute to me.

Not that you guys didn't see that coming.

[Drgnquester]

Awakening possibly being the last FE didn't come as a shock to me. My first FE was Blazing Sword, and that was my only Fire Emblem until New Mystery, because I never HEARD of any other FEs. I loved the shit outta Blazing Sword, I would've totally bought Sacred Stones and the Tellius games if I heard about them. It wasn't until Smash Bros that I was first Introduced to Ike from FE9. If Nintendo really wanted to save the series, shouldn't they have tried to market the games some more? Especially in the West.

I only happened upon New Mystery because someone on an emulation forum asked for some cheats (and subsequently got banned). I dl'd the rom and played it in straight Japanese, and loved the hell out of it, I loved being able to create my own character and influence how they grew. That and the multi-generational system, was what made me want to get Awakening (I bought a 3DS on a whim because I wanted Awakening that badly). Out of all the systems in Awakening, creating your own avatar and the marriage system was the best thing ever (I want to play matchmaker in more games, dammit).

Since I have pretty low standards and high tolerance for tomfoolery, the grinding and pair up stuff don't bother me in the least. Then again, I'm the last person you'd want to ask about that since my standards are that low (and I love grinding, and the cute ways the devs try to come up with anti-grind measures *cough*ToD*cough*). The fanservice didn't bother me in the least, as it was pretty tame compared to the more outlandish JRPGs out there. Sex sells, and it looks like IS understands this.

My thoughts are going all over the place so I'll just end this with a question:

When's FE14?