The early days of the Fire Emblem fandom

[False Prophet]

How was the Fire Emblem fandom looked like in the beginning? Was there many people? Discussions? Fan arts?

 

The first English translation of  Monshou no Nazo came out in 1999 (https://www.romhacking.net/translations/356/), so it probably means that there were dedicated fans before the turn of the millenium.

[Wist]

Any chance @VincentASM or another FESSer might know?

[SullyMcGully]

I remember the old days...

Actually, if people have been translating FE games since all the way back then, then the English FE fanbase might be older than I am. Kinda crazy when you think about it...

[VincentASM]

I can probably talk more later, but the Blazing Sword era in general was very explorative... If that's the right word.

From what I remember, there was a lot of gameplay and character discussions and sometimes shipping. At the time, there was a lot to talk about since everything was so new.

In terms of translations, there were a few WIP ones that didn't get far due to lack of resources and enthusiasm (*cough* Thracia). The most notable complete ones were the Genealogy and Binding Blade patches.

In particular, the latter was revolutionary at the time, because it was so feature complete and because it continued the unfinished Blazing Sword story that many were dying to see resolved.

I didn't really follow fanart back then, so I can't comment.

Edited December 14, 2017 by VincentASM

[Dandy Druid]

I became a fan around 2009ish, but didn't join Serenes officially until later. From what I can remember, the content of many posts weren't too different from now. The fandom was very much into tier lists and rankings, like now. Because I was a Radiant Dawn baby, the majority of people complained about Micaiah and overall didn't enjoy her character. She was a really polarizing character a few years ago, people loved her or hated her. Years later, people instead focused their complaints on Ike, but Micaiah was the least liked/most controversial protagonist for a while.

There weren't any discussions about too much fanservice though, probably because the older games didn't have too many risque designs. 

As for fan art, there were a lot of Japanese artists, but not so many Western. Deviant Art was huge at the time so most fan art was found there. Also, a YouTuber named atokad11 made a series of videos called "A Small Tribute to a Great Fire Emblem Girl", which showcased a lot of fanart for a particular FE female character. Interestingly enough, Micaiah was the most viewed character.

Translations were on the back burner IIRC, probably because everyone was playing RD at the time and having discussions about it.

[Jedi]

My early experiences with the fandom were back in 2005, on a forum that's dead by now, but I was a brat, since I was only 13 at the time.

From what I recall LTC and drafting weren't really a thing for quite some time, and it was commonly thought that units like Marcus or Seth were inferior due to being prepromotes while nowadays people are more on the side that prepromotes are generally solid or broken.

Blazing Sword shipping was a big part of the discussion too, as were support discussions, and also funny in hindsight some wanting Mark to be a unit and customizable with supports to end up with Lyn and so forth.

[Lord Raven]

2006-2011 had a lot of tier list debates around the fandom kinda taking over the Fire Emblem sections. I'm glad that's no longer the case.

The fandom was pretty hostile around that time due to this. FE7 was the most hotly debated game by far, because most people had played it and it had a ranking system that wasn't trivial at the time. (Tier lists were judged on S ranking the game, which made things wonkier).

4 minutes ago, Jedi said:

From what I recall LTC and drafting weren't really a thing for quite some time, and it was commonly thought that units like Marcus or Seth were inferior due to being prepromotes while nowadays people are more on the side that prepromotes are generally solid or broken.

Not quite! On gameFAQs, sure, but I distinctly recall the rest of the fandom doing away with that mentality.

Edited December 14, 2017 by Lord Raven

[Jedi]

1 minute ago, Lord Raven said:

2006-2011 had a lot of tier list debates around the fandom kinda taking over the Fire Emblem sections. I'm glad that's no longer the case.

The fandom was pretty hostile around that time due to this.

Not quite! On gameFAQs, sure, but I distinctly recall the rest of the fandom doing away with that mentality.

Oh my mistake! Thanks for the fix.

Oh yeah the tier list debates were a thing, although I missed those since I didn't really join another FE forum till this one. Hard to believe it's been 5 years now.

[Troykv]

1 hour ago, Dandy Druid said:

As for fan art, there were a lot of Japanese artists, but not so many Western. Deviant Art was huge at the time so most fan art was found there. Also, a YouTuber named atokad11 made a series of videos called "A Small Tribute to a Great Fire Emblem Girl", which showcased a lot of fanart for a particular FE female character. Interestingly enough, Micaiah was the most viewed character.

Translations were on the back burner IIRC, probably because everyone was playing RD at the time and having discussions about it.

Oh yeah, I still find that funny considering how old that video is (and was just recently surpassed in views for the Mia's and Mist's videos... I just check it to see what had happen.)

_________

I don't remember many things of the old days (I'm a fan since 2009), mostly jokes related to Smash (that still exists), the Micaiah's mad hate train (that still has some leftovers nowadays)... Oh! And those sites that hate Jeigan Archtypes unless your name was Seth.

[Zapp Branniglenn]

I lurked these forums before I signed up for an account in 2012 to keep up with information regarding an international Awakening release, but I can't confidently add or expand on anything that hasn't been said already. Definitely a lot more tier list discussions pre-3DS era. With the case of Shadow Dragon, I know some tier lists rated units exclusively based on how well they may perform in online battles with the right amount of reclassing and save abuse for better level ups, so that was weird. I remember some doom and gloom as the months went by with no word on FE12's international release. I remember my disdain for Shadow Dragon being painted by other disgruntled fans.

I sort of remember a backlash against Tellius since the internet was not so universally accepting of furries. But it wasn't so widespread that Tellius fans needed to be actively wary of voicing their love of those games. 

[Slumber]

I can't speak from before 2000, but the Smash to Sacred Stones era was... interesting.

From where I was from, it was a lot of hardcore "Is this character good at 20/20? No? THEN THEY SUCK." stuff, and a ton of arguing about how easy SS was compared to FE7. A lot of romanticizing the Japanese games as well.

Edited December 15, 2017 by Slumber

[Jave]

I joined the fanbase around the early FE10 era, and I clearly remember how the Tellius games were incredibly villified for ruining the franchise by bringing "furry animu shit" (actual words) into the series. The plot was also constantly shat on (specially FE10) and the characters were referred as walking anime cliches.

Also FE8 was constantly mocked for being too easy. Only the first seven games were "Real" FE games.

[Dandy Druid]

19 hours ago, Troykv said:

Oh yeah, I still find that funny considering how old that video is (and was just recently surpassed in views for the Mia's and Mist's videos... I just check it to see what had happen.)

_________

I don't remember many things of the old days (I'm a fan since 2009), mostly jokes related to Smash (that still exists), the Micaiah's mad hate train (that still has some leftovers nowadays)... Oh! And those sites that hate Jeigan Archtypes unless your name was Seth.

Mia and Mist surpassed her? I wonder if it's before or after Heroes.

I was young then (in elementary school), so I never understood Micaiah's hate. I just thought she was pretty and nice lol. Even now I get the complaints, but I can't bring myself to do anything less than like her because she was my first... protagonist.

Lmao I can't remember those sites. The only one I remember was an anime-based site where people voted for Roy's bride.

[arvilino]

I registered for Fire Emblem Sanctuary of Strategy back in the mid 2000's. I mostly just read what other people posted but the tier lists were quite a hot topic, the philosphies between how people valued units then and now were completley topsy turvy. With Ests like Nino considered the best kind of units based on their 20/20 stats and the idea of promoting a unit before level 20 being something unheard of or inadvisable.

There were still some focus on challenges as one thing I remember faintly was many people were impressed by someone's Blazing Sword playthrough in which they beat the game without promoting any units.

[shadowofchaos]

Ah yes I remembered lurking and keeping the hell away from the tier lists. I lurked never registering until I found a good niche of ROM hacking. So I don't remember that much about the days of old.

 

All I remember is Hextator/Xeld/whatever being friends with the OG Shadow of Chaos.

[Strullemia]

While I myself only joined around Awakening someone I know linked me to this: