What's Awakening/Fates is doing wrong

[yokokazuo]

I think most of my complaints with the game were touched upon already, but I'll say some of my thoughts (repeating a couple things already).

One of my biggest issues with the game revolves around certain character deaths in the games and one in particular so I will go into detail on this in a spoiler tab.

I don't have Birthright yet and don't really plan on doing so for awhile since there are several games I'm planning on getting soon. One thing I really hated was that they try to make some of the deaths feel tragic, but chances are that you hardly get to know the character(s) that is/are killed off. Playing Conquest then Revelation, I started to feel like I was supposed to play through Birthright first in order to get to know some of the characters. This is mainly related to Scarlet since she is killed off the chapter you meet her in during Conquest and IIRC it is even off screen. Then in Revelation you get her for one chapter and she is killed off again.

I also hope the three versions is just a one time thing since it can get expensive and I feel that the story suffers from it as well.

One final thing which was already mentioned, children characters felt really tacked on... If we get them in future games, I hope it will be implemented well.

Edited June 10, 2016 by yokokazuo

[Loki Laufeyson]

^ Dude, all the way.

I've always loved the conspiring ways of Gharnef in the Akaneia series. Or the mass confusion in the Lycian league in FE6 and 7. Or just Daein in RD attacking Crimea because they're just power-hungry bastards.

Political intrigue and international chaos are two things I love in a story about war. These things make everything so much more interesting.

No joke. With Fates, i kinda was rooting for this kind of story. Something like A Song Of Ice and Fire Emblem. A dark story with a lot of political ramifications. Im really glad i spoiled myself on the story pre-release. Otherwise, id be snapping mad and bitter af for dropping 80 clams on the game. I am glad that BR and Conquest have some political battles going on, but its not what i wanted. Its too one-sided and not deep enough. Its just "look at the avatar do stuff and everyone loves them" more than "whos really the bad guy, or is there even a bad guy?" which is what the series needs. We need this series to get fucking daring with its antagonists. Sephiran in Tellius was a pretty good step in the right direction, but then they kinda avoided going in that direction again and its disappointing.

Gharnef was really Obviously Evil. But it was fun to see him do the thing. I want to see more not obvious evil people doing dodgy shit. I want to see our lord get into a serious conflict that they may have indirectly (or directly) caused. And if theres children in a future game, i want to see the supports actually point out that majority of these among nobles are political marriages. I am so sick of supports in FE that result in marriage being "ohhh i just love you this much!" No. Some of them should be like that, but not ALL OF THEM. Something like Virion/Maribelle in Awakening would have made ALL the sense to be a political marriage. (Where Virion needs her resources to achieve his goal, and she needs another noble name to achieve hers in the judicial system.) Come on, dont be afraid to make your stories a bit more mature, IS. I get the desire or need to appeal to younger audiences, but theres also treating your younger audiences like they cant handle tough situations in game narrative.

[nordopolica]

No joke. With Fates, i kinda was rooting for this kind of story. Something like A Song Of Ice and Fire Emblem. A dark story with a lot of political ramifications. Im really glad i spoiled myself on the story pre-release. Otherwise, id be snapping mad and bitter af for dropping 80 clams on the game. I am glad that BR and Conquest have some political battles going on, but its not what i wanted. Its too one-sided and not deep enough. Its just "look at the avatar do stuff and everyone loves them" more than "whos really the bad guy, or is there even a bad guy?" which is what the series needs. We need this series to get fucking daring with its antagonists. Sephiran in Tellius was a pretty good step in the right direction, but then they kinda avoided going in that direction again and its disappointing.

Gharnef was really Obviously Evil. But it was fun to see him do the thing. I want to see more not obvious evil people doing dodgy shit. I want to see our lord get into a serious conflict that they may have indirectly (or directly) caused. And if theres children in a future game, i want to see the supports actually point out that majority of these among nobles are political marriages. I am so sick of supports in FE that result in marriage being "ohhh i just love you this much!" No. Some of them should be like that, but not ALL OF THEM. Something like Virion/Maribelle in Awakening would have made ALL the sense to be a political marriage. (Where Virion needs her resources to achieve his goal, and she needs another noble name to achieve hers in the judicial system.) Come on, dont be afraid to make your stories a bit more mature, IS. I get the desire or need to appeal to younger audiences, but theres also treating your younger audiences like they cant handle tough situations in game narrative.

The thing about Fates' story is that they obviously tried at one point or another to make it a mature story. The Conquest waifuwars and Leo's crush on Camilla, I think, are evidence of that. Hell, even the fact that the kids are half-siblings lends itself to a bit of intrigue. Even if the tacked-on incest seems a bit pandering if not there for the sake of 'edgy', if we had seen that side of the Nohrian court and Garon's ineptitude when it came to his ladies/obliviousness when it came to the problems surrounding these, there could have been the makings for some intriguing political drama.

Instead, those makings simply... stop there. Where that ends, the Nohr we get begins - a one-dimensional moustache-fest with the remnants of what seemed to have been a more fleshed out nation, and beyond that we have Hoshido, a paragon of everything Japanese and peaceful.

It's weird and makes for this very non-committal and basic world building with glimpses of things they seem to just have... made up on the spot? Or rather, they were meant to be a larger presence but weren't in favour of the more basic facets, but they shoved them in anyway?

[Loki Laufeyson]

The thing about Fates' story is that they obviously tried at one point or another to make it a mature story. The Conquest waifuwars and Leo's crush on Camilla, I think, are evidence of that. Hell, even the fact that the kids are half-siblings lends itself to a bit of intrigue. Even if the tacked-on incest seems a bit pandering if not there for the sake of 'edgy', if we had seen that side of the Nohrian court and Garon's ineptitude when it came to his ladies/obliviousness when it came to the problems surrounding these, there could have been the makings for some intriguing political drama.

Instead, those makings simply... stop there. Where that ends, the Nohr we get begins - a one-dimensional moustache-fest with the remnants of what seemed to have been a more fleshed out nation, and beyond that we have Hoshido, a paragon of everything Japanese and peaceful.

It's weird and makes for this very non-committal and basic world building with glimpses of things they seem to just have... made up on the spot? Or rather, they were meant to be a larger presence but weren't in favour of the more basic facets, but they shoved them in anyway?

More or less. Its almost as if they got cold feet and backed out of that, or were told to make it lighter. The fact that Hoshido doesnt have a lot of spots on its dress, so to speak, is really disappointing. I think its perfectly ok to depict the morally right nation as sometimes a little dodgy. Awakening tried this with Ylisse with the previous Exalt basically being a shithead crusader out to wipe out the Grimleal. Unfortunately, we dont even know this guy's name and hes the father of our protagonist. And theres no further explanation for any of that. So its not just Fates that pulls this kind of crap.

[Ertrick36]

One of the previous comments reminds me of a point I think FE in general can stand to improve upon (and a point which I think that Integrity discussed/proposed to discuss in his FE series LP): the appearance of villains.

You get bandits who are obviously bandits, which makes sense; you won't really find a bandit who doesn't look like a bandit because they live in a way that really beats up their appearance (missing teeth, broken noses, black eyes, etc.; all results of fights they get into). But then you get other "obviously evil" archetypes (Gharnef, Garon, Validar, etc.) for characters that don't particularly have a reason to look like that other than for you to foreshadow their evilness. Pale/sickly skin, robes/jagged armor (bonus points if they're dark), sinister looking eyes, and sometimes facial hair that they can twirl. And they're almost always ugly.

Enemies who aren't ugly are usually more regal-looking and are likely a tragic hero. Camus is a prime example of this. He looks very noble, and he even helps you on your way by handing you a tome for Wendell, but he ultimately ends up fighting you because... he's still loyal to that spineless coward of a king who has no idea what he's doing. Even though someone of a similar mindset is convinced to cut his ties and join Marth, possibly before you actually kill Camus. But I digress. Ryoma and Xander fit this bill as well.

I'd like villains who look more like our heroes. Hell, maybe even a change in the signature early-game bandits^tm. Instead, have them be some revolutionaries who are ransacking your home in the name of the enemy nation. Sort of like the Vietcong in the Vietnam War; people who aren't so skilled in war, but are fighting anyway because they hate their government. As a result, you might have enemies who look more like helpless villagers than rambunctious pillagers. And the fine-looking main villain won't ever come to appreciate you and what you're doing. After all, most monarchs and leaders don't just openly welcome an invasion just because it's being conducted by their brother/sister.

One last thing to say in this post as a disclaimer: I don't hate any FE games. I'm usually a fairly easy-going gamer, and there aren't many games I hate in general (one game I do hate is Simpsons' Skateboarding, but even then it was only as a young fella that I really hated it). I've actually enjoyed FE Fates, and can get a good laugh out of quite a few of the supports. FE Awakening was my vector into the franchise, and I cherish it for that and all the hundred-or-so hours it took out of my life. But as a fan, I do have complaints. And some of the stuff I enjoy I know is bad. When I riff on any of these games, I do it as someone looking to improve the game, not as someone wanting to hate.

[NekoKnight]

About the world map, I'd be fine with it being handled like Tellius, with no manual map checking but inter-chapter narration to keep us up to speed on who's who, what's happening and where we are going. Base conversations are also great.

No joke. With Fates, i kinda was rooting for this kind of story. Something like A Song Of Ice and Fire Emblem. A dark story with a lot of political ramifications. Im really glad i spoiled myself on the story pre-release. Otherwise, id be snapping mad and bitter af for dropping 80 clams on the game. I am glad that BR and Conquest have some political battles going on, but its not what i wanted. Its too one-sided and not deep enough. Its just "look at the avatar do stuff and everyone loves them" more than "whos really the bad guy, or is there even a bad guy?" which is what the series needs. We need this series to get fucking daring with its antagonists. Sephiran in Tellius was a pretty good step in the right direction, but then they kinda avoided going in that direction again and its disappointing.

Gharnef was really Obviously Evil. But it was fun to see him do the thing. I want to see more not obvious evil people doing dodgy shit. I want to see our lord get into a serious conflict that they may have indirectly (or directly) caused. And if theres children in a future game, i want to see the supports actually point out that majority of these among nobles are political marriages. I am so sick of supports in FE that result in marriage being "ohhh i just love you this much!" No. Some of them should be like that, but not ALL OF THEM. Something like Virion/Maribelle in Awakening would have made ALL the sense to be a political marriage. (Where Virion needs her resources to achieve his goal, and she needs another noble name to achieve hers in the judicial system.) Come on, dont be afraid to make your stories a bit more mature, IS. I get the desire or need to appeal to younger audiences, but theres also treating your younger audiences like they cant handle tough situations in game narrative.

All of this but especially the point on marriages. While King Desmond was undoubtedly a terrible person, the drama that came from his loveless political marriage was quite interesting. I'd be interested in seeing a lot more political drama in the story.

One idea I had for a future implementation of the Avatar system was requiring the Avatar marry into a faction for their military/political support ala Robb Stark in GoT. Players would be able to satisfy their shipping urges and the choice would affect gameplay and story. Allying with one faction would get you unique support but may put you at ends with rival factions. Marriage is a popular mechanic, and political marriages are a great source of drama. Why hasn't this happened yet?

Concerning Avatars in general, I see two ways the game can handle it.

1. Make them a minor character, whose personality is selected by the player at creation (which alters their support pool). They are the tactician of the group but they aren't any more integral than Soren is to PoR/RD.

2. Make them a main character with a pretermined personality, that doesn't try to be the generic "pleases everyone" everyman. Let them make mistakes, let them grow, and don't be afraid of offending players by making their self-insert less than perfect. You can customize their looks and gameplay but the character is their own. This is a more honest (and competent) approach to what they did with Kamui.

You get bandits who are obviously bandits, which makes sense; you won't really find a bandit who doesn't look like a bandit because they live in a way that really beats up their appearance (missing teeth, broken noses, black eyes, etc.; all results of fights they get into). But then you get other "obviously evil" archetypes (Gharnef, Garon, Validar, etc.) for characters that don't particularly have a reason to look like that other than for you to foreshadow their evilness. Pale/sickly skin, robes/jagged armor (bonus points if they're dark), sinister looking eyes, and sometimes facial hair that they can twirl. And they're almost always ugly.

Enemies who aren't ugly are usually more regal-looking and are likely a tragic hero. Camus is a prime example of this. He looks very noble, and he even helps you on your way by handing you a tome for Wendell, but he ultimately ends up fighting you because... he's still loyal to that spineless coward of a king who has no idea what he's doing. Even though someone of a similar mindset is convinced to cut his ties and join Marth, possibly before you actually kill Camus. But I digress. Ryoma and Xander fit this bill as well.

I'd like villains who look more like our heroes. Hell, maybe even a change in the signature early-game bandits^tm. Instead, have them be some revolutionaries who are ransacking your home in the name of the enemy nation. Sort of like the Vietcong in the Vietnam War; people who aren't so skilled in war, but are fighting anyway because they hate their government. As a result, you might have enemies who look more like helpless villagers than rambunctious pillagers. And the fine-looking main villain won't ever come to appreciate you and what you're doing. After all, most monarchs and leaders don't just openly welcome an invasion just because it's being conducted by their brother/sister.

Radiant Dawn did a lot to avert this in its endgame antagonists. Most of them were pretty clealry villains but Ashera, Lekain, Sephiran and Zelgius were fairly attractive.

[TanatatKnight]

Now I can't say for much, especially when I am one of the new players that joined, thanks to Awakening and I won't be beating anymore dead carcass than it needs to be, but if I am allowed to share some opinions on the matter.

The first I want to talk about is the anime pandering. It is very apparent in Fates and Awakening, and in my honest opinion, while it was okay with awakening, it definitely should be toned down for later in the franchise. I mean it is very enjoyable on some level and I don't dislike it, but if it wants to keep future audience from alienating the fanbase further, this part should be toned down. What I really loved from the original Fire Emblem games, was that most of the story is played really realistically or politically for that matter. A huge part of the plot was human vs human and while it had some anime parts to it. Those usually appear as a small character quirk to get invested and near the end when you get your ultimate sword to slay the dragon. With Fates and Awakening, a huge part of the political factor that Fire Emblem interesting went missing. It was all pure good vs evil throughout the entire story. It felt like the interesting aspect was cut out because it required too much thinking or it was going to be complicated. I loved how the old fire emblems were willing to not just cover but allow the player to feel the disastrous moments. Despite how primitive it looked, the Battle of Belhalla felt like something out of history. It was despairing to see those small meteors being showered upon your army as you watched helplessly as they all burned to death. Imagine if we got to control Sigurd in that event, as you desperately try to rescue your army from the meteors only for Arvis to come up to you with Valflame, in which he one-shots you and crits 100%. Heh, that was a poor concept I apologize. There is no doubt that anime plays an influence, but it's not wrong to try and keep things grounded, because that is what makes Fire Emblem interesting as a whole.

For the second one is the support system, I personally think the support system is a good system. I mean personal pairings and marriages aside, the support system was a great way to get invested into a unit or character. In some of the older games, the lack of interactions for some units aside from their intro to joining the army made it hard to feel for anyone. Everyone just felt like a blank paper, there was just imaginations and practicality. However, the support system allows players to feel more attached and thus make their death from our mistake a lot more sad and impactful. However, as people as mentioned with the whole anime tropes. Their is a limited to how much people can take with it, so I would hope they lower that down. Another thing is that people mentioned how much they dislike Fire Emblem going away from tactical RPG to dating sims. This didn't make any sense to me, because most of the supports in Fire Emblem were so small and sometime shallow that I can hardly call it a dating sim. In fact, I would appreciate a lot more if they had some scenes with couples doing cute stuff together. It would allow us to see more character from them, even if it is going to be cliche or anime. I would rather see some of that, if they want to go with the whole dating sim thing. Otherwise, make the supports more diverse and don't make everyone marriageable to each other. Just save some that would go together.

The last one I want to talk about are the avatars. Now I appreciate self-insert characters because I see it as it is, self-insert for me to put my shoes in, but if you want to put them in the story, make us choose or talk for them, otherwise just make them silent or a minor character that just observes. It is a little jarring when you give them their own personality yet tell us to play the character like it is ourselves. There is nothing wrong with the character itself, but don't you think we would have like it more to have some choices on our words that would allow us to develop the character. It could just be small dialogue choices that reveal some personality traits. Oh, how about some hobbies that we can choose in the beginning that affects conversation or personality. These are very small things that would allow us to feel more into the character and not feel like a cop-out. It's also better to have choices be consequential and not to have it play any role in the story. Otherwise, just remove this feature for the next game and focus on developing the main lord character to be interesting, as I would appreciate that story more than a story where I have absolutely no flaws and no consequences.

[Dualazi]

Oh yeah, because Bioware have such great writing nowadays, with their wheels and all...

If all the support with Kamui were 'automatic' with no dialogue, leaving things to the player's imagination, I'm sure it would be 90% better, simply because you have one character who can support hundreds characters, it is simply not possible to do it right. Nothingness is better imo.

If a FE4 remake ever came out, I'm hoping the MU will be just a mute character of whatever-ness. That was something FE4 did great, leaving things to the player's interpretation, so it's the logical step, but I'm hoping too much, they have otaku pandering to put on their games now. :p

That aside...

-I remember that in FE9, I stealed lot and lot of Physics staves. , and potions. Good times !

-I'm neutral about it, but the idea of 'friend ending' sounds good. Then again, nothing said that X characters was not Y's friend after the war.

-... Who wants to have the kids back ? Seriously, who ?

I do, absolutely. The hyperbolic time chamber was dumb, but that's only because it's really never acknowledged anywhere else in the story/worldbuilding. The kids themselves though are a big draw for me from the series, as planning out their inheritance and when yo recruit them offer a huge degree of replayability and customization for the various routes of the game.

As for the topic:

- I wish there were less one-note characters. While I don't think there are any that come to mind as much as Kellam did in Awakening, there are certainly some that push the limits. I know it's hard to make every character fleshed out with so much dialogue to write, but still.

- I wouldn't mind the topographical map if it actually had some interesting topography, but it doesn't. As such I'd rather have a political territory map.

- Better world building in general. We never find out much about the culture of either country, and we never see the rest of the world's continents at large. It's implied that this is the same world as in Awakening, so it would have been neat to contrast.

-More army DLC. By that I mean DLC that you use your own troops for. It's been refreshing to see what they can do with pre-built characters, but I'd really like some significant challenges to be posed to my army itself, eventually with another Apotheosis.

[Thane]

I think storywise, it's kind of over-exaggerated how badly written Conquest is. I mean, it certainly isn't very good, but it isn't on the level some put it at. It's just disappointing, which is why I think people throw it under the bus so often.

This sort of feel like a slap in the face of everyone who has written long posts detailing all the issues they have with the story, Conquest included. I think Fates is the only game that I've actually felt offended by since it seems to think I lack any sort of intelligence or logical thinking. I like to think I've got fairly thick skin, but because Fates never stops shoving bullshit down your throat, it left such a bad taste in my mouth that I feel no real desire to return to the game even though Conquest's map design was great.

Most of my issues come from Intelligent Systems' blatant pandering. Sure, it's been there in some form before, and it was amped up in Awakening, but to actually have several characters' personalities be defined by their love for the protagonist (which is you!) in spite of its utter lack of intriguing personality, as well as its ridiculous role in the story makes me feel as if the company is trying desperately hard to write some kind of self-insert, power fantasy shounen anime, which are a dime a dozen. It basically feels like a stereotypically bad fanfic.

I also believe, like Sunwoo said, they've lost sight of what makes Fire Emblem great, and what worked in earlier games. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not a cynical veteran - I dislike Blazing Sword almost as much as Fates - but here's something I've noticed in Fates that no other Fire Emblem game has failed with, at least not to this extent: the characters don't talk in the main story. What do they ever say to each other that isn't exposition or directly ties into the plot? How long does it last? Ryouma trying to talk to Corrin in Conquest (chapter 18, 19?) could've been a very interesting scene, but after one cheap joke, the plot happens, leaving Xander to be a hypocrite and Corrin looking like a complete idiot since they didn't use the time they had to actually, I don't know, avoid massive bloodshed. Compare this to the Tellius series which had base conversations and a lot of time spent on developing various supporting characters and the world they lived in.

That's just one example. One (out of admittedly many) problem as to why the story feels so bland is because the characters don't interact; they walk a straight line towards the goal, getting periodically interrupted, achieving next to no minor victories aside from getting some of your siblings to listen to you (a constant in all paths, one that makes no sense in Conquest); all that matters is the final map, and the siblings are just a tool to complete it.

Where are the scenes in which the siblings talk to Corrin about their choice, trying to comfort them? Where is the bonding with the Hoshidan siblings, since Corrin practically joined a group of strangers? Why don't they talk about Corrin's ability to shapeshift?

What we're left with is a watered down story with one clear objective and little else. The siblings are collected as plot devices to be used when Corrin needs more power, and the utter lack of chemistry between the characters in the main story barring one or two scenes in the prologue and beginning of Conquest leads there to be nothing memorable about the main story at all, save for the horrible script and just how many opportunities they wasted.

we somehow beat Thane here

Studying for finals abroad while also getting sudden, dire bank problems is a bitch.

Edited June 10, 2016 by Thane

[astrophys]

As for children, the Deeprealms were in my opinion a pretty stupid plot device. I do think the Fates children were better MECHANICALLY executed than in Awakening, but NARRATIVELY its awful. Now, admittedly, I tend to be a mechanics > narrative kind of guy, so I don't hate having the kids; I actually really enjoy all the tinkering I can do with them. But I'd still rather than we not get a repeat of something as ludicrous as the Deeprealms.

Honestly, the kids system is something that I can both take and enjoy or forgo and still enjoy; I liked the kids system in Genealogy, Awakening, and Fates, but I also loved SRPGs (like The Sacred Stones and Final Fantasy Tactics) that have no such thing. So I'd enjoy (from a mechanical standpoint) a kids system if it was there, but I wouldn't be upset if it were gone either and I'd still look forward to the games.

Its the same idea with the marriage system for me: I like the mechanics attached to it (particularly in Fates with the introduction of the Partner Seal), and I will confess I do actually enjoy pairing my player Avatar with one of the attractive female characters (generally Cordelia in Awakening and Caeldori in Fates). But again, I also love The Sacred Stones and Final Fantasy Tactics, and those don't have marriage systems, so basically I'm fine either way.

Regarding the points that not everyone should be compatible with the Avatar and you should be able to make character like you or end up alienating characters based on your decisions, I'd be fine with that as an alternate to the "support everyone" paradigm. Although I would recommend including some sort of fallback option character so that the Avatar always has at least one S-rank option available, just so you don't end up locking out stuff like paralogues. But regarding the reference to the Persona series social links, where in Persona 4 (and Persona 3 Portable's female route) you needed to trigger specific flags in dialogue trees to send the relation in a romantic direction rather than a platonic one…. if marriage does return, this could do a lot in making the Avatar marriages feel more natural.

I would really like future games to stop including characters like Nowi/Elise/etc. as marriageable characters. Of course, if the marriage system disappears, so does this problem. But if the marriage option remains, I would really like them to cut this out, as its not good when they need to practically force the localization to lie about their clear ages or use a cliche "really a 1000 years old excuse) to cover up for something that seems to be obvious lolicon pandering…… that's a type of pandering that shouldn't belong in Fire Emblem. If they want to include young characters like Tiki (Shadow Dragon) or Myrhh, fine, its following in a series tradition, so I'm happy to let that continue as a compromise, but don't make them actual marriage options. Unfortunately, with trying to pander to profitable demographics, I suspect this isn't changing anytime soon.

Narratively, the death scenes in Fates were generally badly done, obviously just trying to make the player sad, regardless of not building up the characters enough for us to care as much as they wanted us to, or by making them deus ex machina twists immediately forgotten by the plot.

And I agree, I'd like a less universally worshipped Avatar.

EDIT/ADDENDUM:

I'd also like them to entirely get rid of the skill-buying system - it defeats the point of the regular skill learning and skill inheritance system, as well as undermines the idea of inheriting classes so you can get the skills. Its also warped the online format into easy-seize castles rather than people coming up with creative defenses and challenging people to beat their defenses. (There are exceptions, but this is my general impression). Skill buying being implemented was bad decision, in my opinion.

Edited June 10, 2016 by astrophys

[Xenomata]

I actually would prefer it if they would stop locking children to 1st gen units of one gender. Mix it up a little, open up the possibility for units A and B to be siblings.

As for the Avatar... I've actually one idea in mind. Rather than force you to make an avatar who is worshiped and loved and notice-me-senpai by everyone, give the option to use a preset character with his own starting class, looks, stat/growth mods, etc. Limit his support options, make him be liked and hated in equal measure, so that there are at least a few people who will tolerate, like, and love him, but enough that the player doesn't want to BE that person.

And if that doesn't appeal, then go ahead and tack on the option to use the usual shipping lord.

[B.Leu]

Beating a dead horse is always more or less good imo, because it's an opportunity to so new point of views, opinions, and different take on them I describe the issue in a very few words, 'it's bad writing', 'it's bland', 'Why ?' 'It doesn't make sense', 'it's just so freaking anime cliche' But most of you guys don't do that, you explain things eloquently, it's always interesting. imo

That also means that the horse is not so dead, and obviously, beating a living animal is better than beating a dead one.

No dude I should've specified that I am not ok with children in this game either... just that my IRL friends like them and have said that they wouldn't have bought the game if there weren't kids. This I heard from other casuals (IRL) too, and even in this forum a lot of people wanted S supports and children back (they were quite about it).

There is still a lot of people, casual, newcomer, veteran, pro, etc, who are not very happy with the inclusion of kids too. I wonder if it's a vocal minority though.

A lot of kids scored low in the popularity polls, though (aside from the kids of the popular guys bar Kiragi). Let's hope it sends a message to IS, because to me making these units children was a waste of maps, gaiden chapters, and other fun things they could've brought back.

Actually I was saying what I said because one, your avatar is awesome, and two, I have the nasty tendency to put my foot in my mouth and causes misunderstanding, so I wanted to make things clearer.
But it makes me happy that you're in the club, the more the merrier

[Ngtunganh]

I hate old world map.It's take forever to move between two far chapter

[The DanMan]

we somehow beat Thane here

I actually prefer my castle to awakening's traveling overworld

the problem with Fate's overworld is that it uses a geographical map instead of a political map making it MUCH harder to tell where we are and where the countries are like previous games did

One of the few nitpicks from Mang's Conquest finale was that the world map literally looks like Google earth imagery.

[Medeus]

On the note of the Avatar, one thing I'll add to the conversation is that I think another issue is the lack of a proper Number 2/Mentor character.

In Thracia, one thing I really liked about August is that while he was there to support Lief, he didn't hold back when Lief needed a lesson or coddle him when he made a mistake. He was there to be the word of wisdom, and he was also there to challenge Lief's perceptions (ex. telling him about Lenster's tariffs and the effect it has on Thracia) and question him on his bad decisions (ex. blindly charging on Alster), and I feel it helped Lief grow as a character to have someone who wasn't afraid to do that for him. The same happens with characters like Soren, Ranulf, Jagen in the original Mystery (not so much Kris worship Emblem), and the like. They would help their respective lords, but they also weren't afraid to say something contradictory to them, and it helped having characters provide a second perspective that wasn't demonized for it.

Corrin didn't really have that, the story does give the opportunity for characters like Azura and the siblings to do it, but none of them are really allowed to fully evolve into that role. They suffer from either not having enough screentime, or (as mentioned before) their screentime only being used to further the plot. So instead of a character that's there to say "you know bro, that's probably not a good idea", we instead have characters that are just there to coddle Corrin or be plot devices. Corrin (and any lords that follow his example, which hopefully doesn't happen) I feel would benefit more from the above because he already has more then enough people praising him for the littlest thing, he can use someone who can catch his bad decisions and help him grow from their experiences.

Edited June 10, 2016 by Medeus

[Tolvir]

A lack of true choices. Fates was built around the idea of choices, yet the only ones to be made where what version we wanted and what wives/husbands we wanted to have. We don't have to have mass effect levels of branching dialogue, but maybe some true choices would be nice. Maybe a system like the paragon/renegade choices need to be implemented if we continue with an avatar. Both still staying in the good spectrum, but ranging from differences in actions. Like the differences between Batman, Punisher, and Moon Knight (justice, revenge, and twisted justice). The support system needs some overhauls too. Less supports overall, and with the new a+ supports we can use that to have some platonic endings again. Let's also make the characters a little more unique, and make the entire marriage aspect a little more meaningful. For example maybe the spouse should have a little more story relevance once you are in that relationship. You are life partners now after all. I also think they should expand the supports and add a few extra tiers before marriage that is like a bf/gf stage to get rid of the problems of sudden marriages that make no sense.

Edited June 10, 2016 by Tolvir

[steshii]

Okay so I've only played Awakening and Fates but I'll try to pinpoint some things I didn't like about each (aka copying what you guys already wrote :))) lol) , but mostly Fates because it was plain insulting in some aspects lol.

I don't want to see children if it doesn't make sense.

Take the world map from Fates, but add the roads, landmarks (chapters) and borders Awakening-style to it and I'll be happy.

Character designs need to be a tad more realistic. Most characters don't even look like they belong in an army!

Cutscenes before and after each chapter are too short.

Characters need more prominence during the story, not just the main characters.

I'd like to know more about the history and nations of the land.

Supports take too long to grind, as well as weapon proficiency.

Less exaggerated personalities/quirks for characters.

I love all of this, except for the character designs one. I loved the Hoshidan classes because the designs were really beautiful. Actually more so than Awakening because those were a bit more "realistic". Do most people actually care about realism? It's a video game. I guess I can complain about the fanservice on a lot of female characters (female cavalier, anyone? Awakening's dancer?) but I love that male ninja titty window so I guess I can't say jack lol. I wouldn't mind if any of the fanservice was gone though, it's definitely not necessary and I would love the characters just the same.

Also yes the story for the kids was implemented badly, but I wasn't extremely bothered since I love the kid mechanics. This isn't an excuse for the crappy explanation, of course. What irked me the most was something you stated above: those damn exaggerated quirks. The Awakening rehashes are the worst offenders of this, obviously. But as much as I love cute Midori, she never shuts up about that stupid medicine either. Same for Selkie and wanting to play. They were just really forgettable.

My sister is currently playing Awakening and that cutscene with Lucina and Chrom was so nice and then they even had art of her eye afterward when showing her mom wow!!! I joked that that was more content than Fates has in all three games lol. Seriously, what's with having the cutscenes and art (and barely any) of only the royals, but mainly Azura. I know they're the main characters but it would've been nice to see maybe the neutrals in ONE cutscene? Honestly. And imo, if a character dies they need a legit cutscene for it. No excuses. This goes with the "Characters need more prominence during the story, not just the main characters".

I agree with pretty much everything Thane said about Conquest's horrible story in relationship to what was said above. Maybe it was just me, but it was like the same characters every chapter who kept saying the same thing over and over again. Also after Corrin and Azura have their little secret they never shut up about it!! And then it's like the game might as well just have those two boring characters for the rest of the game with everyone else as puppets. This is why I liked the ice tribe chapter and Birthright's story more in general because there was a little more variety in this aspect.

And don't even get me started on those two cheap ass deaths which make you lose a unit (ya'll know which ones I'm talking about lol), because I could rage for days about that. Garbage writing just there for shock effect and to piss the player off because they lost a unit, not a character. If you're going to kill someone off, do it right and make it matter. If not, don't do it at all.

Awakening's story was meh but Fates was just so bad compared to it that I don't even know what to criticize about it lol. Fates did improve gameplay tremendously though and I'm happy about that. The world building definitely needed work in both, though.

I love MyCastle though and would be really sad if they scrapped it and turned it back into the Barracks. The barracks was boring. My birthday was yesterday and I enjoyed all of the characters vocally saying happy birthday to me in my castle. That was a really, really nice touch. (:

One of the previous comments reminds me of a point I think FE in general can stand to improve upon (and a point which I think that Integrity discussed/proposed to discuss in his FE series LP): the appearance of villains.

This is one major thing I agree for both. This is just bad design. And tacking on that stupid evil laugh just adds insult to injury.

-I would like a complete support system overhaul. The way the support system currently works, in my opinion, only serves to weaken the characters, particularly with the S-ranks. Having everyone supporting everyone inevitably causes some out of character moments because, quite honestly, everyone is not compatible with everyone, both in a romantic sense and a platonic sense.

-Tying in with the above, I would like more platonic and ambiguous relationships between opposite-sex characters. Honestly, I have no problem with characters getting married or having relations during a war—I'm fine with that. However, the way that the supports are set up, the characters tend to fall for each other over simple, frivolous things like being adamantly chased around by a fashionista to change clothes or being reminded of embarrassing childhood moments constantly. I don't mind the filler-ish tone some of the supports take on; I'm just asking that the "I LOVE U LETS GET MARRIED RITE FCKIN NOW!112121!@!!!" be toned down to something more like, "I think I may have some feelings for you... Can we maybe spend more time together?"

This and what others said about the support system is good. I'd rather no S support if they're going to be weird and out of character. Ugh. I'm almost positive the examples you used are Saizo's haha. No but he's an example of who would've been better off with a lot of platonic or ambiguous supports.

This is getting long so I'm just going to end referring to the loli pandering someone else brought up. This needs to die. It's way past its point of existing. Kill it. Kill it pleasepleaseplease. Also marrying the young kids ughh. Why.

[Etrurian emperor]

1: I think a big thing that the new style is getting wrong is worldbuilding. The Awakening world was very bare bones when it came to nations. No place is ever shown to be anything other then the exact thing they were introduced as. Ylisse is the good nations, Plegia/Valm the evil ones and Ferox are the bulky ally guys. Aside from Ylisse's past that's pretty much all the countries get.

With a big focus on two kingdoms Fate has some improvement...but just not a lot. Norh and Hoshido are distinct from each other but the way they are portrayed does damage the world building. Norh is said to be resource poor and desperate like Tracia and Kilvas but the game never adres that or has the motivations of the Norians themselves adres it. Therefore it can't be used to make the conflict much more then good kingdom vs evil kingdom.

The minor kingdoms have it even worse. You got a few tidbits of info, visit a total of one chapter and that's it. That I'm not entirely sure whether they are independent or vassals of the big two speaks volumes of how vague those places are.

I can get a handheld game not having the gold worldbuilding standards of Tellius but they fall behind when compared to Elibe as well. I'd say even bare bones Akanaia has Ylisse and the unnamed continent beat on the world building front. And despite the main conflict being copy pasted from Tracia it lacks all the nuance that decades old game with limited text had.

2: villains!

The villains of the new style are consistently lacking because a lot of them aren't anything more then the evil guy needing to be stopped. Now I said on here that I don't think every villain needs a sob story or realistic motivations. If a villain is both cool and have a great time being evil then I'l happily accept that. But no villain of the new style meets both of those criteria. A lot of the villains like Validar and Iago are actually kind of pathetic. And I think that was probably the very point of those characters but them not being respectable villains does hurt their credibility. And since there are the villains who do the most visible work that damages the plot.

The rational villain also seems to have gone missing. Villains are evil because they are evil or mad. There's hardly a villain who just has a lot of ambition or just is willing to step over corpes to get his way. Maybe Valhard but that's really it.

The two big bad dragons also fail to impress me.

3: supports

It could be me but I noticed the supports have a much smaller scope. Pretty much all supports heavily rely on ''Do you remember that conversation we had the other day?''. I feel I'm not learning as much new things about characters when its just the continuation of the same conversation.

Now that has always been in Fire emblem supports but I do think its used as a crutch more these days. When Jill returns to talk with Lethe I do feel that she sat down, had the conversation sink in and starts another conversation armed with the knowledge of what she has learned. Lugh's rejecting and making up to Milady are also clear reactions to the support that came before it but they are reactions to past talks and what they learned from it. With most new supports Its more like they are just continuing the same conversation that got aborted last time. Though some of the reasons the conversations get aborted can be pretty funny.

Edited June 10, 2016 by Etrurian emperor

[Book Bro]

I'm seeing some very insightful posts in here, this is good, this is a good discussion.

The avatar as a main/major character just doesn't work. You cannot write a good plot while at the same time making the main character untouchable because you don't want to offend the player who they're supposed to represent. There can't be real drama or consequences. If people really must have an avatar, I think it should be a minor character who is just there to witness the story, with almost no influence on or control of events. Like having Mark playable in FE7. He is there for almost all important events, and helps the lords, but it's never his story. Regardless of what you think of the quality of FE7's narrative at least we can say Mark isn't responsible for bringing it down, which we can't say for Kris, Robin, and Kamui.

Marriage and children should only be in in the capacity of Awakening/Fates if it's part of the story. We don't need shipping to feel a connection with the characters or to have character development. As Fates shows it can actually have a negative impact if done with no good reason. I like the idea that was thrown out about having a game based around political marriages, with your choices tying directly into the plot.

As for villains, they don't have to be amazingly well written, but evil for the sake of evil is boring. Look at Zephiel, Ashnard, or Lyon, they are on a whole other level than Validar and the Fates trio. Even Gharnef and Nergal have something other than evil motivating them. Something else that I miss are the scenes showing what the villains are doing and planning. Awakening hardly ever showed the villains on their own, and when Fates does it we don't get insight into Garon, we just get him laughing evilly.

Basically like others have said I think it would do a lot of good if IS reflects on what made FE what it was in the first place.

[Thane]

As for villains, they don't have to be amazingly well written, but evil for the sake of evil is boring. Look at Zephiel, Ashnard, or Lyon, they are on a whole other level than Validar and the Fates trio. Even Gharnef and Nergal have something other than evil motivating them. Something else that I miss are the scenes showing what the villains are doing and planning. Awakening hardly ever showed the villains on their own, and when Fates does it we don't get insight into Garon, we just get him laughing evilly..

I can't agree with this. While I'm only familiar with the localized Fire Emblem games, the villains are awful almost across the board, with only Lyon having some amount of depth and complexity to him.

I will never understand the love people have for Ashnard; he's a bully on steroids who keeps giving our heroes a chance, effectively going against his own so-called ideology. The one thing he's got going for him that no other localized villain has is that everyone has a reason for wanting to take him down, and I appreciate that - he also had one good line about killing off his family and people thinking it was a plague, but it was later neutered in Radiant Dawn. Also, and this might come across as nitpicking to some but it's a real complaint I have about Path of Radiance: his bloody armor. He wants the strong to rule, but as previously stated he gives the heroes a chance to try, and he's itching for a fight, but only Ike can kill him. It also doesn't help that there's no connection between him and Ike, the two only meeting in the final chapter.

Nergal is even worse, having the most boring modus operandi out of anyone in the series: collecting energy by killing people off-screen, and it can do whatever he wants it to. He's yet another villain who keeps letting the protagonists get away - at least Validar did some manipulation and always tried going for the killing blow when it fit his plans.

Of course, everything pales in comparison to Garon, but if there's one thing I want Intelligent Systems to improve that has been lacking for well over a decade now, it's the villains.

Well, unless you count Naesala as one. That guy's cool.

Edited June 10, 2016 by Thane

[Irony]

One thing I was thinking about is that we should combine S and A+ supports in a way. Ok, that probably doesn't make sense at the moment, but hear me out.

Ok, so every single character should support with at least 10-15 other characters (including the avatar, and who (s)he can support with depends on the personality you pick for him/her). That means that there would be no Corrinsexuals, Robinsexuals, Avatarsexuals etc. Etc.

Every character can S support roughly 5-8 of the other characters. But not all of these S supports lead to marriage, but they all lead to a paired ending.

For example:

Character A is an assassin hired by the Main character (who may or may not be the Avatar, and preferably I'd prefer it if it wasn't the Avatar) to commit some of the Main Character's Dirty Work. She is quite shy and quiet, and doesn't fully enjoy the life of an assassin, but she has a reason for being one.

Character B, Character A's younger sister, has an S support with Character A. In their support conversations, Character B and Character A discuss Character A's career as an assassin, which eventually leads to Character B deciding that she would also like to become an assassin. Their shared ending involves Character A training Character B to become an assassin, before detailing all of the missions that they go on.

Character C, on the other hand, is a priest who is appalled by Character A's decision to become an Assassin. In their support conversations, Character A explains why she became an assassin to Character C, whilst a Character C tries to dissuade her from continuing her career. In their shared ending, Character A eventually decides that, whilst she doesn't really want to be an assassin anymore, she still needs money in order to look after herself and Character B. So, she eventually becomes a hired guard who is employed by the Church to protect priests, such as Character C.

[Ren_Ambrose]

The villains are one-dimensional moustache-twirlers who just want to make you cry for some reason, and this was a problem one might argue was carried over from Awakening.

Ahh, but you're forgetting one thing. Awakening had the finest mustache-twirler to ever grace this planet.

Enemies who aren't ugly are usually more regal-looking and are likely a tragic hero.

I'd like villains who look more like our heroes.

I just wish we got to know more about Mustafa. I empathize with him way more than I do for Yen'fay in the Valm arc.

[ReaperGuardian]

Hey folks, most of what I think has already been said, so this post will mostly sound like an echo. I should also add that I haven't played FE Fates, so the things I might say may not be completely accurate. So what I say here about Fates is about what I only have heard and read. Nevertheless, I would like to add my 2 cents .

- What I dislike in both Awakening and Fates is the character/ Avatar pandering. Your character is the center of attention, in Awakening somewhat less than in Fates I believe, which I at first thought was a fun idea. Later now, I think it quickly gets old. I personally prefer your character to stay in the background, more as a traveller or as a mercenary, so that he/ she has less impact in the story. Why? I think it can give the character the freedom to interact with whomever he/ she likes and possibly the freedom of choice. While I have noticed they have tried to give the player a bit of choice in Awakening, his/ her choices didn't have an impact. Which is a bummer in my opinion.

- I believe the stories in the Fire Emblem series are very character driven. What I think IS has done wrong in both Awakening and Fates, is creating a huge bunch of characters (including children) and have tried to give them all a distinguishing personality. So that they stand out from one another. While I think it is a good idea to make a character stand out of the rest, I am personally not a fan of the gimmicks they have. Especially if a character revolves around a certain gimmick, as I believe it restrains character development. Even stronger, when you have a lot of characters, with each of them a different gimmick, I think there is a risk of creating monotonuous characters (if you folks can understand what I say). I would suggest creating a smaller cast, so that more time can be spend on (complex) character relationships, character growth and story development. Of course, gimmicks can be used, but I would love to see how a character can develop without falling back to its gimmick.

- Complexity of the story and the characters. I already talked a bit about it in the (wall of) text above here. What I think I've seen in both Awakening and (from what I have heard in) Fates, is that IS tries to make the story more morally grey. In my opinion it is hard to make such a story, with all of the other elements you need to take in consideration to create a story or a character.

What I however miss in both Awakening and Fates is character growth (here we go again ). When I think of character growth, I love to see a character overcome certain obstacles or challenges in order to progress not only the story, but his/ her personality as well. Show us what challenge X does to the protagonist, how other characters interact with it as well and how they give feedback to the protagonist about his/ her decisions. Hell, you could also make another noble, good protagonist. I would say, make an antagonist (or a group) that manipulates said protagonist into making dire choices that conflict with his/ her inner self. And show us that! Show us that his comrades hate him/ her for doing it, or applaud him for it. Let the protagonist make a rational choice to sacrifice civilians, even if protagonist hates him-/ herself for it (let alone the rest of his/ her companions whose family died because the choice). Or the protagonist gives the big F* you and stays true to his ideals, he saves those civilians and gains the respect of certain comrades whilst others call him a fool for it, as the antagonist gains the advantage in the war. I could go on with this (and frankly, I think I'm going on long enough), there are many possibilities without making it all too complex I think.

I need to add however, I think some of this is shown in both Awakening and Fates. So to conclude this, I think the focus should be (more) placed in the emotional judgement of a character.

Sorry for the long post. Respect to y'all if you read it all. *Thumbs up to you*.

[Roflolxp54]

Awakening and Fates do some things with DLC wrong here:

Awakening: this is a problem with the Einherjar DLC maps -- most maps get used 3 times and not having much of an adequate reward for justifying the price.

Fates: the high amounts of disc-locked content, made worse by the fact that quite a few NPCs are observed using disc-locked content in the main story (in Conquest, Takumi can be observed running Point Blank and Bold Stance in separate encounters and Hinoka can be seen with Wing Shield in multiple encounters).

[BruceLee]

Fire the writers that did this game's story. Conquest is shit, Revelations is stupid and Birthright is boring.