Is the hate on Shadow Dragon justified?

[Chiki]

I'm putting this in the General Fire Emblem section, because I'm going to make comparisons to other FE games, and I want this game to be considered in the context of all Fire Emblem games.

Shadow Dragon is by far the most hated FE game for a simple reason: despite being a remake of a NES game, it hardly has any improvements other than sound and graphics. The story is just as bland and as boring as the original despite being a DS game. We have far higher standards for FE games now: just compare the complicated, original plot of FE10 to FE11's boring plot. I guarantee you that the script in FE10 is many times longer than the script in FE11.

Another reason it's hated is because the game forces you to kill units to see the sidequest chapters.

What do you guys think?

Edited June 28, 2014 by Chiki

[The Geek]

Shadow Dragon was the first Fire Emblem I played, and coming into the series with a clean slate it's a great game. However, when I later played the other games in the series, I found that in many areas it didn't really hold up.

In other words, Shadow Dragon is not a bad game, it just isn't quite up to par with the other games in the series.

[Refa]

Radiant Dawn does indeed feature a script that is many times longer than Shadow Dragon's.

[Volug Vanguard]

It is justified because the game is pretty bad and poor in comparison to the rest of the franchise.

Its not just ALL that you said, now also add this things:

-Its an strategy game, yet the game pushes you to KILL your own units if you want to play it 100% (Going X/Gaiden chapters) what is the meaning of this? Isnt the point of an strategy game to keep them all save and alive while winning the war? This is so stupid.

It goes even more stupid, you need to kill your own units to go to gaiden chapters, and if you do so then the game gives you generic units so you have to kill them too! Really? XDDDD

-Most of the units are useless, they got nerfed hard (For example Navarre, wow poor Navarre what they did to you, and he is still usable unlike the 90% others), and basically almost all units have terrible stats and growths so the game is very limited in that sense.

Idk, that plus all the things you already said about the pure remake, scrip with 0 changes or explanations etc, is pretty much the reason why I dislike the game. FE12 was also a remake but got all the problems fixed and its in fact one of the best Fire Emblem in the series if you ask me, but FE11? No, that is the worst game by far

[Chiki]

It is justified because the game is pretty bad and poor in comparison to the rest of the franchise.

Its not just ALL that you said, now also add this things:

-Its an strategy game, yet the game pushes you to KILL your own units if you want to play it 100% (Going X/Gaiden chapters) what is the meaning of this? Isnt the point of an strategy game to keep them all save and alive while winning the war? This is so stupid.

It goes even more stupid, you need to kill your own units to go to gaiden chapters, and if you do so then the game gives you generic units so you have to kill them too! Really? XDDDD

-Most of the units are useless, they got nerfed hard (For example Navarre, wow poor Navarre what they did to you, and he is still usable unlike the 90% others), and basically almost all units have terrible stats and growths so the game is very limited in that sense.

Idk, that plus all the things you already said about the pure remake, scrip with 0 changes or explanations etc, is pretty much the reason why I dislike the game. FE12 was also a remake but got all the problems fixed and its in fact one of the best Fire Emblem in the series if you ask me, but FE11? No, that is the worst game by far

I edited the first post with your first reason that I forgot to mention.

[VincentASM]

Personally I don't think it deserves the flak, but I can see where people are coming from.

Most of the issues stem from the fact that it's a pretty straightforward remake of a ~20 year old game and it doesn't pretend to be anything else. Not saying that's a good thing or bad thing (as FE12 shows us how great a FE remake can be).

I get this suspicion that IS wanted to stay faithful to the original, so that fans of the original would appreciate it more. Like if Nintendo did a remake of the original Zelda, how many people would be happy with just a simple graphical upgrade and streamlined gameplay? And disgruntled if Nintendo messed with Hyrule too much?

But in the West, however, pretty much nobody played the original so they wouldn't have appreciated how close FE11 was to the original.

That said, they did throw in some "weird" additions like the nonsensical sidequest chapters and Reclass. Guess they wanted to shake it up a little for people who played the original? Plus a lot of these things can be ignored or skipped--even the Prologue on Hard mode.

Also FE11 has the redeeming feature of introducing the skip enemy turn function.

Edited June 28, 2014 by VincentASM

[Shin]

It is justified because the game is pretty bad and poor in comparison to the rest of the franchise.

Its not just ALL that you said, now also add this things:

-Its an strategy game, yet the game pushes you to KILL your own units if you want to play it 100% (Going X/Gaiden chapters) what is the meaning of this? Isnt the point of an strategy game to keep them all save and alive while winning the war? This is so stupid.

It goes even more stupid, you need to kill your own units to go to gaiden chapters, and if you do so then the game gives you generic units so you have to kill them too! Really? XDDDD

Note how the gaidens were probably intended for you to get replacements if you were to get too many units killed. None of them are terribly amazing.

-Most of the units are useless, they got nerfed hard (For example Navarre, wow poor Navarre what they did to you, and he is still usable unlike the 90% others), and basically almost all units have terrible stats and growths so the game is very limited in that sense.

Idk, that plus all the things you already said about the pure remake, scrip with 0 changes or explanations etc, is pretty much the reason why I dislike the game. FE12 was also a remake but got all the problems fixed and its in fact one of the best Fire Emblem in the series if you ask me, but FE11? No, that is the worst game by far

Most characters are at least somewhat usable. I managed to clear H3 with Biraku, Matthis and Gordin as my main attack force. Whilst some characters are certainly worse than others, but most have at least some usability.

I personally don't like FE12, I feel the inclusion of MU and the assassin subplot were bad ideas. Growths were super inflated. But hey, opinions! I guess I have a soft spot for FE3!

[SB.]

I disagree with pretty much everything that's been said in this thread so far?

Yes, you have to kill off characters for gaidens, but are they compulsory? No. Most of the characters there aren't that great anyway. Contrary to popular belief, you don't need Berserker!Etzel to beat the game. These gaidens were likely just there as backup units for people who struggled with the game, and the generics were there for people who were in really dire situations.

And no, 90% of the game isn't unusable. If you think that's true, then I don't think you've actually tried to use most of the game seriously enough. Statboosters, forging and reclass exists, if you can't figure out some way to make a unit usable with these features on the lower difficulty levels then I don't really know what to say to you? On stuff like H5 you have a bunch of units who are pretty bad, but then it was the same thing with Hector Hard Mode which nobody ever complained about?

People also get mad because it's a remake that didn't change very much, but nobody got mad at Pokemon FireRed/LeafGreen for doing the same thing at all? New content is there, even if there isn't an awful lot of it, and the writing is probably better than most of the FE series.

I don't think Shadow Dragon is a perfect game (far from it) but I do think that it gets a lot more hate than it deserves.

[Chiki]

Yes, you have to kill off characters for gaidens, but are they compulsory? No. Most of the characters there aren't that great anyway. Contrary to popular belief, you don't need Berserker!Etzel to beat the game.

That's not the issue. People just don't like to kill off their characters. It's like killing off Neville in the Harry Potter series. People get attached to fictional characters.

Edited June 28, 2014 by Chiki

[Tryhard]

I have a personal dislike for FE11, but I don't think it should be considered the worst in the franchise. I still don't like the gaiden requirements, but that's because I'm a completionist for the most part.

-Most of the units are useless, they got nerfed hard (For example Navarre, wow poor Navarre what they did to you, and he is still usable unlike the 90% others), and basically almost all units have terrible stats and growths so the game is very limited in that sense.

The game is balanced around most of the characters being "bad", because the enemies aren't great either (well, until higher difficulties of course).

[Volug Vanguard]

I disagree with pretty much everything that's been said in this thread so far?

Yes, you have to kill off characters for gaidens, but are they compulsory? No. Most of the characters there aren't that great anyway. Contrary to popular belief, you don't need Berserker!Etzel to beat the game. These gaidens were likely just there as backup units for people who struggled with the game, and the generics were there for people who were in really dire situations.

And no, 90% of the game isn't unusable. If you think that's true, then I don't think you've actually tried to use most of the game seriously enough. Statboosters, forging and reclass exists, if you can't figure out some way to make a unit usable with these features on the lower difficulty levels then I don't really know what to say to you? On stuff like H5 you have a bunch of units who are pretty bad, but then it was the same thing with Hector Hard Mode which nobody ever complained about?

People also get mad because it's a remake that didn't change very much, but nobody got mad at Pokemon FireRed/LeafGreen for doing the same thing at all? New content is there, even if there isn't an awful lot of it, and the writing is probably better than most of the FE series.

I don't think Shadow Dragon is a perfect game (far from it) but I do think that it gets a lot more hate than it deserves.

Where is your point? They are bad units so I can kill them? Really? Its an strategy game, the fact that you have to kill them its pointless and unjustified no matter how you want to put it.

Many units are just bad and thats how it is. Statbooster? Forging? Ladies and gentlemen welcome to preference, then all units are usable in all FE games. Lets take Sophia horrible stats, we can always give her 20 statboosters items for her and wow she becomes good ._. The thing is most units are just bad, the reclass doesnt help them much and most are just usable for 1-2 chapters, but the thing is unlike most other FEs where you can use a large variety of units, here you cant have those unless you struggle to death in training/preference etc, its just a very limited game

[Irysa]

I actually thoroughly enjoyed Shadow Dragon, and I played it after playing all of the games from 6 to 10.

SD impressed me beacuse it did quite a lot with very little. I can't speak to the original japanese script, but the music and writing manage a staggering amount, considering I have sat through the same general FE plotline 5 times already. The later game chapters with "A Hero's Destiny" playing in a minor key was a fantastic juxtaposition to the early game major key optimstic sounding "The Time To Act", and really set the mood for what was going on. Somehow, a character with barely any dialogue and screentime like Camus came off as more authentic than any other "tragic antagonist" chars from earlier in the series, and somehow even the small choices in player unit death quotes and theme that plays when someone dies just FELT more compelling than any FE game I'd played up till then.

Playing H5 first raw was also great because whilst it can be trivialised, it was still a significant difficulty increase over everything else I had played in the series up till then. Admittedly, a large part of this is due to the fact I simply refused to warpcheese the game, but regardless, it made me think about how I play in a different way. The game may be missing features I'd come accustomed too, but in a sense it brings out the best thing about FE's core design philosophy; consider your positioning properly, because making a mistake matters. That is in essence why I find many other srpgs to be comparatively rather dull, where your moment to moment movement to mow down weak enemies is a far more frequent occurance than neccessarily having to think about risks and rewards and the like. And by a latter extension of that, your attachment to your own characters isn't as strong as it can be in a game where you know they're all capable of dying very easily.

In short, FE11 is a game that to me, was more than the sum of its parts. I can't disagree to anyone's complaints about any part of it, but I also think I had a great time playing it, far more than I did with a game like Radiant Dawn, despite it being a sequel to my favourite FE. That game I felt was incredibly bloated and all over the place, trying to do too many things at once and falling flat at most of them. SD is a game that I felt was close to acing exactly what it wanted to do and because of that, I think its hate is unwarranted.

Edited June 28, 2014 by Irysa

[SB.]

That's not the issue. People just don't like to kill off their characters. It's like killing off Neville in the Harry Potter series. People get attached to fictional characters.

That didn't stop Rowling from killing a lot of other characters that people liked? And if they don't like it, they don't have to do it, so what's the issue?

Where is your point? They are bad units so I can kill them? Really? Its an strategy game, the fact that you have to kill them its pointless and unjustified no matter how you want to put it.

Many units are just bad and thats how it is. Statbooster? Forging? Ladies and gentlemen welcome to preference, then all units are usable in all FE games. Lets take Sophia horrible stats, we can always give her 20 statboosters items for her and wow she becomes good ._. The thing is most units are just bad, the reclass doesnt help them much and most are just usable for 1-2 chapters, but the thing is unlike most other FEs where you can use a large variety of units, here you cant have those unless you struggle to death in training/preference etc, its just a very limited game

Again, you don't seem to understand what you don't have to kill characters off? The option is just there if you choose to take it. I could choose to kill off Lowen and then proceed through FE7 just fine, there's barely even a difference.

You're aware of how stupid "all of the units are bad because I don't want to use forges or statboosters" sounds right? They're there to be used, and if you want to ignore them, that's your choice, but saying that half the game is unusable because of that is just being ignorant. Reclass does a lot more than you give it credit for too. Yes, reclass doesn't always work out perfectly and can start slow, but Hardin reclassing to Archer and just moving his B lances to bows to have instant silver would just be stupid. The game is only as limited as you make it, and from what I can see here you've limited it a lot.

[Elieson]

Fmpov: Gaiden units exist so that way players who are less talented at the game can get a little bit of help if they are getting badly beaten in their run.

The only thing that irritates me about this game is the supports that "exist", that your never notice unless you really crunched numbers and saw consistent changes when X is near Y, or if you look it up here like on SF.

I enjoy the simplicity of this game though; the lack of rescue adds a more traditional feel to the game. Sure the plot is pretty uhh, bland, but its an updated modernization of an old game, not a retelling of an old game (if that makes sense)

Edited June 28, 2014 by Elieson

[Chiki]

That didn't stop Rowling from killing a lot of other characters that people liked? And if they don't like it, they don't have to do it, so what's the issue?

Exactly. People didn't like it when Lupin or Fred died. Though it served a purpose in darkening the story: but character deaths don't darken the story in FE games. People don't like to kill characters off, period.

Edited June 28, 2014 by Chiki

[Volug Vanguard]

Again, you don't seem to understand what you don't have to kill characters off? The option is just there if you choose to take it. I could choose to kill off Lowen and then proceed through FE7 just fine, there's barely even a difference.

You're aware of how stupid "all of the units are bad because I don't want to use forges or statboosters" sounds right? They're there to be used, and if you want to ignore them, that's your choice, but saying that half the game is unusable because of that is just being ignorant. Reclass does a lot more than you give it credit for too. Yes, reclass doesn't always work out perfectly and can start slow, but Hardin reclassing to Archer and just moving his B lances to bows to have instant silver would just be stupid. The game is only as limited as you make it, and from what I can see here you've limited it a lot.

Does any other FIRE EMBLEM (xD) game reward you for killing your own units? Where is the point in being the strategist of the game if you have to kill your own characters in order to play it fully? Of course you can kill Lowen and any other unit and the game goes on, thats the magic of Fire Emblem, every mistake is forever and if someone dies he is dead for good. So, you are changing one of the biggest things in the franchise by making the player to purposely kill their own units? The game itself lacks sense then, if there should be any kind of reward, should be for playing well, not for playing "bad" either your units dieing because your lack of skill or because you intentionally killed them, the whole thing its pointless, and even more considering this is an strategy game

You say that I am limiting the game, but Imnot. The game itself is limiting the player by giving such a high number of crap units. Every single fire emblem game has better and worse characters, and I have been using both kinds, because I like some of the "bad units" in many games, but they are still somewhat usable after some preference or help. The thing is the case is HUGE here, there is a lot of crap units, a lot of mediocre and just a few are really good. And the ones who are bad are basically destined to be bad forever, because its not just the initial stats, also his growths or reclasses are horrible, how isnt the game basicaly "forcing" me to use only the good ones? Its not like I can train or use a team made of those "bad units" unless my head explodes trying to train them, wasting all my money in giving them weapons or wasting 200 sstat boosters. Teams lack a lot of variety in comparison to any other Fire Emblem game due this

Edited June 28, 2014 by Volug Vanguard

[Alertcircuit]

I disagree with pretty much everything that's been said in this thread so far?

Yes, you have to kill off characters for gaidens, but are they compulsory? No. Most of the characters there aren't that great anyway. Contrary to popular belief, you don't need Berserker!Etzel to beat the game. These gaidens were likely just there as backup units for people who struggled with the game, and the generics were there for people who were in really dire situations.

And no, 90% of the game isn't unusable. If you think that's true, then I don't think you've actually tried to use most of the game seriously enough. Statboosters, forging and reclass exists, if you can't figure out some way to make a unit usable with these features on the lower difficulty levels then I don't really know what to say to you? On stuff like H5 you have a bunch of units who are pretty bad, but then it was the same thing with Hector Hard Mode which nobody ever complained about?

People also get mad because it's a remake that didn't change very much, but nobody got mad at Pokemon FireRed/LeafGreen for doing the same thing at all? New content is there, even if there isn't an awful lot of it, and the writing is probably better than most of the FE series.

I don't think Shadow Dragon is a perfect game (far from it) but I do think that it gets a lot more hate than it deserves.

Pokemon's a series that doesn't really change much anyways. Fire Emblem introduces new mechanics all the time and shakes up the gameplay, whereas when it comes to Pokemon, the biggest changes that happened between Red/Blue and their remakes were double battles, physical/special split, steel/dark, and contests. FR/LG got most of those. Fire Emblem had loads of changes, from battle damage being spelled out, rescue, abilities, supports and etcetera. The only one of those Shadow Dragon really took was the battle damage thing. Still no abilities, still no support conversations, still no basic mechanics like rescue.

Edited June 28, 2014 by Alertcircuit

[Irysa]

Does any other game reward you for killing your own units?

Valkyrie Profile: Covenant of the Plume. You can supercharge a unit for a map but they die afterwards, but you get a permanant new ability. I actually love the implementation of that mechanic, because it functions on a morality bar, you actively get the harder game if you want to maintain your humanity and not sacrifice anyone, and each amount of people you kill puts you on routes closer to being bad endings. Its the way morality mechanics SHOULD be handled, good and evil do not get the same benefits, going evil is meant to be the tempting decision. (of course the system is abusable via multiple replays, but the idea is fantastic!)

That being said, SD's gaiden chapters don't work like this at all and like Elieson said, function more as a catch for people who are letting their units die. There should have been an alternative way to get into the gaidens without letting units in your army die however, and its a poorly thought out concept on the whole. But I had to play devil's advocate to prove that killing your party members can actually be an interesting thing.

Edited June 28, 2014 by Irysa

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

Of all FE games I've played so far (7-13) FE11 is my least favourite for these reasons:

The story is still bland. There's a short story and maybe conversation of 2-3 sentences between two chapters. That's it!

The story is so short and superficial and the characters have no personality except for Marth and Caeda/Shiida and maybe Linde and Merric. So the game is very short. Due to the short story, I only need two days to finish this game.

Only for comparison: The playtime of FE10 is 3-4 times longer than in 11.

The growths of the characters are still unbalanced like in the orginial game. Characters like Bantu or any early prepromoted units are unusable because of their terrible growths. It's a shame. So I have to use almost the same units in every run.

And I do not understand, why mages don't have any growths in strength to use their tomes without any speed penalty. I like the idea that the weapon weight influences the attacking speed like in previous FE parts, but it nerfes the mages completly.

And why cannot get physical units except for pegasus knights and Marth any growths in resistance? It's pain on harder difficulties, because mages can "one shot" physical units, if they have low HP.

PS: I never had access to the sidechapters except for Nagi, because I don't like to do massacres to my units.

Edited June 28, 2014 by TalesOf Hysteria

[Shadow Mir]

Pokemon's a series that doesn't really change much anyways. Fire Emblem introduces new mechanics all the time and shakes up the gameplay, whereas when it comes to Pokemon, the biggest changes that happened between Red/Blue and their remakes were double battles, physical/special split, and contests. FR/LG got two of the three. Fire Emblem had loads of changes, from battle damage being spelled out, rescue, abilities, supports and etcetera. The only one of those Shadow Dragon really took was the battle damage thing. Still no abilities, still no support conversations, still no basic mechanics like rescue.

Actually, the physical/special split wasn't until 4th generation. I'd say that it was move tutors that were another one of the biggest changes that happened between RB and their remakes (though FRLG happened to introduce those)..

Edited June 28, 2014 by Levant Caprice

[Alertcircuit]

Actually, the physical/special split wasn't until 4th generation. I'd say that it was move tutors that were another one of the biggest changes that happened between RB and their remakes (though FRLG happened to introduce those)..

Maybe my wording was weird, I meant how they separated stats for physical and special when in gen 1 it was just attack and defense.

[Tryhard]

The only one of those Shadow Dragon really took was the battle damage thing. Still no abilities, still no support conversations, still no basic mechanics like rescue.

It's not like FE12 added these except for support conversations, and people (generally) consider it the better game, so I don't think a lack of skills or rescue is really the reason why. Yes, I did enjoy the fact that FE12 have support conversations, but the writing quality in FE11 was a lot better for what little there was. On the other hand, most of the side characters in FE11 are completely blank slates.

You say that I am limiting the game, but Imnot. The game itself is limiting the player by giving such a high number of crap units. Every single fire emblem game has better and worse characters, and I have been using both kinds, because I like some of the "bad units" in many games, but they are still somewhat usable after some preference or help. The thing is the case is HUGE here, there is a lot of crap units, a lot of mediocre and just a few are really good. And the ones who are bad are basically destined to be bad forever, because its not just the initial stats, also his growths or reclasses are horrible, how isnt the game basicaly "forcing" me to use only the good ones? Its not like I can train or use a team made of those "bad units" unless my head explodes trying to train them, wasting all my money in giving them weapons or wasting 200 sstat boosters. Teams lack a lot of variety in comparison to any other Fire Emblem game due this

It's not like the game is bad for having a bunch of "bad units". For example, my favourite Fire Emblem, which is FE2, has pretty much the worst growths and some of the worst player characters in the series. I still enjoy it. The enemies were bad in FE2, as well. The game was balanced around those stats and growths. You may have a personal preference of consistently gaining 4-5 stats like in FE12 (which I did like a lot, don't get me wrong) or consistently getting less stats and occasionally getting great level ups. Some may find that more rewarding. Well, aside from Wolf and Sedgar, because everyone knows how ridiculous they are.

You don't need to put in nearly as much effort to make some of the worse characters in FE11 usable over Sophia from FE6, because she is so far away from everyone else.

Edited June 28, 2014 by Tryhard

[Cymbalina's Revenge]

I actually thoroughly enjoyed Shadow Dragon, and I played it after playing all of the games from 6 to 10.

...

In short, FE11 is a game that to me, was more than the sum of its parts. I can't disagree to anyone's complaints about any part of it, but I also think I had a great time playing it, far more than I did with a game like Radiant Dawn, despite it being a sequel to my favourite FE. That game I felt was incredibly bloated and all over the place, trying to do too many things at once and falling flat at most of them. SD is a game that I felt was close to acing exactly what it wanted to do and because of that, I think its hate is unwarranted.

What he said. The plot is simple but the excellent script makes the most of it, the characters that do get developed are engaging, reclass and the Gaiden chapters are options nobody to use and the latter is there to aid people who are doing poorly. Same goes for generic units. And I had a great deal of fun playing this game and still do.

It's flawed. I can't think of an installment of the series that isn't. And while FE12 went off in a different direction from FE11-- a "reboot" rather than a straight remake-- I'm not sure I like FE12's flaws any better than the ones that are unique for FE11.

A perfect game? Nope. But "hate" is definitely unwarranted. Save hate for games that don't play, or that brick your machine, or where the developers didn't give a rat's ass about collision testing or other things that make a game, ah, playable. There are plenty of those.

[Shadow Mir]

Maybe my wording was weird, I meant how they separated stats for physical and special when in gen 1 it was just attack and defense.

Ahhh. I see. I'd have simply referred to it as the special split, given that was the stat that they wound up splitting..

Edited June 28, 2014 by Levant Caprice

[kingddd]

I went up to about chapter 10 and then I just stopped. I couldn't handle the game anymore for some reason. It was really boring. I mean sure it was the same FE game we always played and it is faithful to the original but something about it felt really really off.

I didn't not like the gritty brownish grey artstyle at all. It used a similar art assets as Days of Ruin but it worked well with that game because of the post-apocalyptic setting. In FE11, it didn't work and it didn't make sense for everything to be so greyish.

The animations were pretty bleh. Nothing amazing to look at. It's smooth but nothing up to the imagination.

I wasn't mad about the gaiden chapters being required to have less units but the units that I did gain, I felt like I had too many of them and not many of them useful at all. Especially considering i have terrible RNG level ups whenever I use any of them.

In terms of soundtrack, I think I only like the preparation music that was about it. The remixes for most of the songs from the original NES game and maybe the Strike theme on the other hand were eh at best. I couldn't get into it.

While I don't really hate the game, I felt it could of been so much better. It felt like a lazy hack job made by a company that could do so much more with a remake. But felt flat and short of a potentially great game.

Edited June 28, 2014 by kingddd