What are your favorite things about recent FE titles?

[Guest Dreamyboi]

I know there's a lot of criticism being hurled at a certain two recent titles in this series (I guess I'm part of this camp?) so I felt like I should ask critics of Fire Emblem's 3DS era what their favorite things about those games are since all I fucking do here is ask people stuff.

[DragonFlames]

Replayability and music are the big ones for me. Awakening has a stunning soundtrack and while Fates has a few stinkers here and there, it's music is overall really fantastic as well. Then, Echoes blows both of them out of the water, but it loses out a bit in the replayability department.
If there is one thing the whole dating sim and child breeding stuff did right, it's adding replayability to the game in ginormous amounts. Fire Emblem Awakening still stands as my longest played 3DS game for a reason. 

[Guest Dreamyboi]

2 minutes ago, DragonFlames said:

Replayability and music are the big ones for me. Awakening has a stunning soundtrack and while Fates has a few stinkers here and there, it's music is overall really fantastic as well. Then, Echoes blows both of them out of the water, but it loses out a bit in the replayability department.
If there is one thing the whole dating sim and child breeding stuff did right, it's adding replayability to the game in ginormous amounts. Fire Emblem Awakening still stands as my longest played 3DS game for a reason. 

I don't exactly want it to return but that is a pretty good point. 

Music-wise the 3DS games are all tied for me.

[Zapp Branniglenn]

Full voice acting. What a treat. This and the above average dialogue writing makes Echoes a B tier game.

Bases. Because a shop not only being open in a warzone but selling wares to one side that might not even win the battle is about the dumbest, most video gamey thing in this series. I don't care much for designing my own base, but establishing and upgrading shops is pretty huge. Going from chapter to chapter is honestly very fatiguing in a Fire Emblem game, so the focus on down time really takes the edge off. 

Supports are back. There's a serious quantity over quality issue but just having them back in Awakening was the majority of what we were asking for.

Fire Emblem has a good example of a remake. Seriously, who was anticipating remakes before Echoes came out? Nobody.

The music track changes seamlessly when going in and out of a battle. Echoes has a hiccup in this department, but I bet this is a feature that's going to stay.

Recruiting your friends' avatars easily and going through the game with a unique cast of units. This is the most compelling multiplayer feature I can think of for Fire Emblem and it started with Awakening.

[Anacybele]

Let's see...

- Frederick.
- Pair up.
- Ryoma.
- Fates's Amiibo functionality.
- Frederick.
- Silas.
- Some of the music
- Full voice acting in Echoes.
- Frederick.
- Echoes's story.
- Lukas.
- DLC.
- And did I mention Frederick? <3 I especially love him!

Edited March 25, 2018 by Anacybele

[MCProductions]

I like the new FEs because they are games that are fun to play

[Jave]

No Weapon Durability: I love that Fates did away with this, and while it still needs a little refinement, Fates' weapon system blows every previous game out of the water by simply making every weapon infinite.

Support System: While a lot of Supports could be better written, I love the system used in Awakening and Fates where everyone can support everyone. They could cut the S Supports a bit and limit marriage options to 2-5 per character, but if they can pull it off, put in as many CBA supports as you can.

Full Voice Acting: Love it, love it. Hope it never goes away.

Reclassing: Adds a lot of replayability and potential for self-challenges. I do hope they keep it like in Fates and don't bring back the DS system.

Characters: While there are several things I don't like about some specific characters, I do kinda like the more light-hearted cast of characters in the 3DS games. Despite their gimmicks, a lot of them do feel more like actual people, and I do like watching them interact. I also like how some characters look quite unappealing on the surface, but they grow on you when you take the time to know them. I felt I couldn't bring myself to care for 90% of the characters in the pre-3DS games, and that's not a good thing in my eyes.

Casual Mode: One of those things that I'm glad it exists. Sometimes I like to use it if I want to do a light-hearted playthrough without caring for challenges and get through the game fast. And if it gets more newcomers towards the series, I'm fine with that.

[Eliza]

Echoes: I liked almost everything, so there's not much point in me talking about it here. 

Awakening: I liked the soundtrack, references to previous games, replayability (second seals were a great idea) and the ability to travel across continents.

Fates: The idea of multiple stories was interesting. Conquest had a nice soundtrack, and there were a few characters that I really liked. Birthright had interesting weapons. 

[NinjaMonkey]

26 minutes ago, Jave said:

No Weapon Durability: I love that Fates did away with this, and while it still needs a little refinement, Fates' weapon system blows every previous game out of the water by simply making every weapon infinite.

At the cost of having stat penalties associated with said weapons. Also, it's not as though weapons cost a tonne of money to replace or anything. So I really don't see how this is such a big deal.

Anyhow, Awakening mechanics and soundtrack were something I liked, as well as mages having hats.

Edited March 25, 2018 by NinjaMonkey

[Shadow Mir]

15 minutes ago, NinjaMonkey said:

At the cost of having stat penalties associated with said weapons. Also, it's not as though weapons cost a tonne of money to replace or anything. So I really don't see how this is such a big deal.

Has the trope "Too Awesome to Use" crossed your mind? Because that's why. Durability only encourages hoarding and the aforementioned trope, both of which are shackles that do nothing but inhibit strategy, instead of promoting it. Just look at Awakening. You can get a boatload of legendary weapons. I would imagine anyone without the DLC to get more would probably not bother to use them. And even if they did have said DLC, I still think they would be reluctant to use them because you don't know what you're going to get, and the DLC is pretty hard.

Anyway...

• The music
• The characters
• The gameplay
• The marriage system (Genealogy might have done it first, but the 3DS games kick its tail 6 ways to Sunday and take its lunch money in terms of execution)
• No worrying about durability in Fates
• Said game's idea of multiple stories 
• Reclassing

[Lewyn]

The art of Echoes is the best in the series IMO, I just absolutely adore every design.  Everything is so clean and it is all practical looking as well.  Yes and full voice acting, it will be hard to go back to not having it.  Echoes is a remake of gaiden which is of course very old, however I really like how bows and magic function.  Archers can attack from much further away, and aren't helpless up close.  Magic you have the basic attack at 1 or 2 spaces, but then it can be 3 or 4 or 5 depending on spell and mage ring.  Having these many other attack ranges I feel adds a lot to the game and strategy.  I really hope the new game keeps this.

Music has been pretty good in recent titles.  Fates might be the best soundtrack since Genealogy, IMO at least.  I actually also like the dual system a lot, however it needs to be further tweaked cause it was so broken in Awakening and in Fates it was still too strong.  This could also add a lot to strategy if done right.  

 

[DisobeyedCargo]

Music 

reclassing 

no durability

DUNGEON CRAWLING OH MY GOD I LOVE IT!!!!

Loveable characters

Echoes story was pretty good.

echoe's art style

and of course full voice acting 

Edited March 25, 2018 by DisobeyedCargo

[Ertrick36]

1 hour ago, Dreamyboi said:

since all I fucking do here is ask people stuff.

You, Ronnie, and CyberController are like a trio in this regard, lol

Here are a few of my favorite things:

• 'Boro
• Takumeme
• Frederick, please
• Okay, the characters are my favorite part of these games; especially the absolutely fabulous ones like Maribelle, Forrest, and you-know-who 
• No durr-bility post-Awakening; I never liked that shit in games
• No f'n fog of war chapters (especially not ones mixed with desert maps); I've recently been playing Binding Blade, and Chapter 14 is an abomination; the closest you get to this is in Fates when you're breaking the goddamn ice in that one chapter and pretty much the second chapter of Revelation
• Music is great, but most FE's seem to have at least one good track
• No support limits, so you don't have to force units to only befriend, like, two other characters
• Skills; they add some interesting flavor to classes and specific units (in the latter two games, anyway) beyond simple numbers, and I like that
• Fates' reclass system; Awakening's is annoying garbage on anything higher than Normal, and Echoes barely has reclassing, but Fates did it best (even better than Shadow Dragon, imo)
• Archers in Echoes; fuck bows not being able to attack from point blank, that should only be an issue if you're using a longbow
• That one scene between Lucina and Chrom when the former's identity is revealed
• Do the memes count?
• Dungeon crawling in Echoes...  I wish it was a thing in previous entries
• That one of them pretty much saved this amazing series and got me into it in the first place

[NinjaMonkey]

1 hour ago, Levant Mir Celestia said:

Has the trope "Too Awesome to Use" crossed your mind? Because that's why. Durability only encourages hoarding and the aforementioned trope, both of which are shackles that do nothing but inhibit strategy, instead of promoting it. Just look at Awakening. You can get a boatload of legendary weapons. I would imagine anyone without the DLC to get more would probably not bother to use them. And even if they did have said DLC, I still think they would be reluctant to use them because you don't know what you're going to get, and the DLC is pretty hard.

No, because they're meant to be used, and I do so. Also, I'd take limited use weapons than weapons with dumb stat penalties any day.

Edited March 25, 2018 by NinjaMonkey

[SoulWeaver]

1 hour ago, NinjaMonkey said:

No, because they're meant to be used, and I do so. Also, I'd take limited use weapons than weapons with dumb stat penalties any day.

Maybe you do, but there are others(myself included) who often go 'oh wait, this is too early to be using my only Luna spear and I don't even have Armsthrift yet, I should wait for later when I really need it' only to realize by the time I thought I'd really need it that my Units have access to Brave Weapons, which are just better almost every time. Dumb stat penalties are obnoxious, yes, I'll definitely agree there, but I end up slaughtering pretty much everyone half the time in Fates anyways so it's never been a huge issue for me.

On-Topic, I appreciated seeing the Cipher characters get in-game releases.

Edited March 25, 2018 by SoulWeaver

[Thane]

One small detail I enjoy is the character expressions. I mean sure we had them before but they were few and far between and often limited. It's one of the more jarring things about going back to older games. I guess it wasn't a priority since Marth and Minerva have two different sprites in the very first game, but then in some later titles they're effectively gone completely.

Not the biggest thing, but one that adds some emotion to the converasations.

[Jingle Jangle]

• Tharja
• Faster player phase/enemy phase
• Less cryptic on some requirements
• Greater amount of characters with hidden depths
• Camilla
• Support System
• Skills
• Energetic Cutscenes
• Good voice casting
• Bunch of references to older games
• Willing to experiment with older mechanics
• The normal and blase version of the same song.

[Shadow Mir]

2 hours ago, NinjaMonkey said:

No, because they're meant to be used, and I do so. Also, I'd take limited use weapons than weapons with dumb stat penalties any day.

You might be okay with using rare weapons, but there are others, myself included, who tend to avoid using stuff like the Luna lance until it's really needed... which never comes because by then, my units are capable of getting the job done without the need for the rare weapons. And I still think that durability's most notable effects on strategy are negative. I don't see much potential for making durability as a system better, either. The fact that Awakening (1) had a means to get infinite of everything and (2) had a skill to stop or at least slow weapon degradation didn't help.

Anyway... Other things that came to mind:

No plot-based promotion for main characters

Restoring my faith in the series after a certain disaster of an FE game

 

Edited March 25, 2018 by Levant Mir Celestia

[Guest Dreamyboi]

26 minutes ago, Levant Mir Celestia said:

You might be okay with using rare weapons, but there are others, myself included, who tend to avoid using stuff like the Luna lance until it's really needed... which never comes because by then, my units are capable of getting the job done without the need for the rare weapons. And I still think that durability's most notable effects on strategy are negative. I don't see much potential for making durability as a system better, either. The fact that Awakening (1) had a means to get infinite of everything and (2) had a skill to stop or at least slow weapon degradation didn't help.

Anyway... Other things that came to mind:

No plot-based promotion for main characters

Restoring my faith in the series after a certain disaster of an FE game

 

Which one was the disaster?

[Shadow Mir]

24 minutes ago, Dreamyboi said:

Which one was the disaster?

Shadow Dragon. I just felt it was a huge step backwards overall relative to the series at large.

Edited March 25, 2018 by Levant Mir Celestia

[Guest Dreamyboi]

11 minutes ago, Levant Mir Celestia said:

Shadow Dragon. I just felt it was a huge step backwards overall relative to the series at large.

Oh yeah, I get what you mean there. Especially the in-battle models, they just look so boring and lifeless

[Slumber]

I like the speed and pace of the gameplay. Going back to older titles, I almost ALWAYS turn off animations because as nice as they are to look at, I've seen them hundreds of times, and I don't need to see them hundreds more. 

Fast-forward and skip options help immensely. I can still get the thrill/dread of a critical hit or a skill going off as it happens. 

Tiny little quality of life things have fixed a lot of pacing issues like this. 

I consider Gaiden pretty much an unplayable mess. SoV, despite being faithful to a detrimental degree at times, is VASTLY superior, to where I'd say it is overall probably my favorite of the 3DS games, even compared to stuff like Conquest, which I'd put near the top of the franchise as far as moment-to-moment gameplay goes(Conquest gets dragged down by what happens between those moments, but that's a different topic). 

So yeah, I guess I'd just say that the progression of raw playability has been my favorite things as far as newer titles goes. 

[Strullemia]

Conquest's gameplay is really really good. Seriously one of the best in the series.

Full Voice acting is a thing of beauty. I remember playing my first FE game Awakening and one of the things that seriously bothered me is how characters only say a few things.

[Jave]

Oh, one more thing I forgot. I LOVE the Critical Quotes. Not only they look pretty great in battle animations and a lot of them sound absolutely badass, but they also add a lot to a character's personality.

It's amazing that sometimes the smallest things add so much.

[DragonFlames]

I want to add some things I enjoy about the newer games (I was tired yesterday and couldn't think of any more than I originally wrote):

• Echoes' artstyle is the best the series ever had
• I love that Echoes' cast feels more real and human-like than in any other game
• I like how Awakening is willing to poke fun at itself and the rest of the series and I enjoy its friendly, welcoming atmosphere
• Full voice acting is amazing and breathes much needed life into the characters and world
• The characters themselves, even if trope-y at times, feel more fleshed out than in past titles due to a wide range of support conversations. It's much easier to grow fond of Stahl as opposed to Abel, for example
• I love that the battles flow at a much faster pace than in past games, especially Tellius
• I also love the marriage and child system, even if it was poorly justified in Fates. But I don't mind that Echoes didn't have it and I won't mind if future titles don't have it, either.
• I like that there is stuff you can do besides the main story
• I like Awakening's and Fates' multiplayer aspects, though I wish they would focus and expand more on co-op stuff in the future.
• I love the traversable world map in Awakening and Echoes and I think it's a shame Fates didn't have one.
• This might be my inner JRPG fan and perfectionist speaking, but I like that you have the option to grind and I do want to see it return in the future.

Edited March 25, 2018 by DragonFlames