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Rank The GBA Games


Ilboss
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Best - Blazing Blade/7: Pretty darn great story, amazing characters, extremely memorable maps (even if it was difficult, I will never forget how much fun I had in Battle Before Dawn, that map is the definition of epic)

Decent - Sacred Stones: Alright story (had some really great dark moments, Orson's wife, etc.), pretty good characters (I'm not a huge Ephraim or Eirika fan but they get the job done, nor do I like Lyon as the villain, but the side characters are great... I love Forde and Kyle, Gilliam is great, Colm and Neimi, etc. etc. etc.), and the maps were fine too

Eh, it was okay - Binding Blade: Story was very typical but still alright I guess, I actually liked the characters a lot in this game (except boring ol' Roy... I swear he has so little actual character it disturbs me... but other characters like Deke, Shin, Fir, Rutger, and Clarine always stood out to me), and the maps were decent I guess

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Yeah, same order that others listed.

Granted, Blazing Sword is the only one I've done a complete playthrough of...

But the game had the best balance.  Even the Fog of War maps weren't terrible (I still am not a fan of FoW, but in Blazing Sword the maps are at least manageable).  It's also one of the few FE games with a story that left me saying, "You know, I actually felt something for the main characters," and that's a pretty big deal.

I'll give Sacred Stones props for being the most accessible, but it's a smidge too easy for me to consider it the best.  I do have a bit of a soft spot for it though 'cuz a DM and friend of mine likes Eirika, and I believe it was the first FE game one of my best friends played as well.

Binding Blade... is a bit rough.  I like the characters, but...  Well, the story isn't all that impressive (I do like Zephiel as a villain), and I really am not a fan of the gameplay.  In fact, I think the level design and other such gameplay changes (e.g. Roy's late promotion, Gaiden Chapters being mandatory for the true ending, etc.) are this game's greatest drawbacks.

Edited by Ertrick36
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Blazing Sword: Its one of the Fire Emblem games with the best balance. Good story, good cast, good world building, good gameplay, good map design. Its all good. In most areas its not the best of the series but its consistently competent in anything it does. I don't find there to be any glaring issues in Blazing Sword and if its good to decent in anything it does without much to detract from the experience then the balance shifts very easily to the positive end of the spectrum. And I guess there's some nostalgia too. 

Sacred Stones: Very decent on all accounts but I personally think its often too busy being decent and not being busy enough at being great. The villains are good but its worldbuilding is among the worst in the series and the cast is decent but ultimately not as charming as Blazing's cast. The game is also a tad too easy at times and the monsters get really dull at the end. 

Binding Blade: Its....eh. Binding Blade is the only GBA game that's showing its age. The story is still conveyed in the Shadow Dragon style where the lord is forbidden to talk to anyone but his adviser and the plot princess in cutscenes. Its the first time the series had supports and in a lot of instances it really shows. The cast has some very lovable characters but also too many forgettable ones and most characters in the game being recycled from Archenea kinda hurts the cast. 

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Blazing Blade > Sacred Stones > Binding Blade

I love all three to death, but Blazing is the best overall. It has such a good balance, a great cast and great world-building, and is overall just a very well-designed game. Sacred Stones comes very close to it, but doesn't quite reach it, in my opinion. Binding Blade is good, but you can definitely see the "growing pains" in the first handheld FE.

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  • 4 weeks later...

My order is a bit different from everone else's.

Binding Blade > Blazing Sword > Sacred Stones

While Sacred Stones is a nice game for beginners, I don't find anything lately to get back to that game. Blazing Blade was my first Fire Emblem game and I think it had a fair balance to it, however the story gets uninteresting over the time, I don't find the villain anything special to be honest.

Binding Blade was something else. Not recommended for first time players, but it gives you an interesting challenge if you play it after Blazing Sword. It has a some interesting characters for your squad, and I actually really enjoyed the story. It's easy to follow and the enemies have their motivations well explained, I'd say much better than most of the units that joins to you. Not as difficult as Thracia 776, but it took a couple of things from it and made it even better. Hard Mode is hard, but it sure gives you the satisfaction of beating a challenging game. (also it has the biggest arguments when it comes to tier lists)

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FE6 > FE8 > FE7

FE6 is simple, clean, it relies executing basic ideas well rather than any level of gimmickry or anything. It has this mind-blowing level of deliberation in its unit and chapter design. For example, Marcus falls off right as you get Zealot / Zelots / Jerrot / put this guy in Heroes just so I know what to call him, and then he falls off right around when you get Percival.

People complain about blank slate characters, and I'll admit that not all the supports are winners, but I honestly think that the cast is much stronger than its given credit for. I really like how things that come up in one support chain have a tendency to pop back up in another, makes everything feel so much more coherent. There are surprisingly decent characters like Lott and Yoder and then series highlights like Trec and Gonzales.

Really though, it's the really good map design that sells this game. Maybe the unit balance isn't perfect, but who cares? The game is really fun to play, provides a good challenge, and a sizable roster so each playthrough can be radically different from the very earliest chapters.

Oh, and you can buy boots.

***

FE8 is fine, in terms of gameplay. It has some interesting maps but its really easy overall, even without the grinding. I actually enjoy the story in this game, or at least the villains. Everyone talks about Valter and Lyon, but Orson is an more deeply unnerving character than Valter and I think Caellach is overlooked as a villain as well. Sacred Stones also has some really solid playable characters not named Ephraim or Eirika or Seth, characters like Kyle and Forde, my favorite cavalier duo in the series.

I love the cast of Sacred Stones, but it's also the games biggest weakness. It has a roster of 34 characters, which sounds like enough on paper but is ridiculously small in practice, reducing replay value unless you use a randomizer or something. This limited unit variety means that you get, at most and with great effort, two summoners, which sucks because summoner is actually a really fun class.

***

FE7 gets overhyped just for being the first game a lot of people played. The story is really bad, it honestly feels like someone's Binding Blade prequel fanfiction. That, admittedly, is part of the appeal of the story, but that should be limited to premise and not execution. I could go on a long rank about how the plot and characters in FE7 are lackluster, but I don't have to. Like a gift from the heavens above Medina, Mekkah has just started a series literally doing just that.

The maps are worse than either Binding Blade or Sacred Stones, and the game's structure baffles me. Lyn Mode is an unfunny joke and some of the gaiden requirements are hilariously stupid. It's still fun to play, but Fire Emblem is inherently fun to play. It falters the most in the most aspects.

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FE6 > FE7 > FE8

Unlike a lot of people here, I love Binding Blade (Though I have more controversial opinions if you look at my favourite game that I have listed). I thought the characters and story were good and the maps fun. The music was also really good.

While I don't think the story of FE7 is very good, it's quite overhyped, the gameplay is a lot of fun. The only lord I really like is Eliwood. However, there are lots of good characters here.

FE8 was a bit of a snoozefest though. There wasn't a whole lot to it. Story was servicable but boring, gameplay was boring and way too easy, but the characters were at least good.

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Blazing Blade >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Sacred Stones > Binding Blade. The former is just that much better than the latter two in just about everything imo. It's the only one of the three that had a decent villain and decent story. The only thing I could say that's bad about it is that it's easy. Though imho, I'd rather a game be that than be hard for all the wrong reasons. Speaking of, that's one problem with Binding Blade. Out of many. It also has a copy > paste story, a poor main villain, some of the worst balance in the series, and the gameplay is pretty bleh too. Sacred Stones isn't much better, owing to poor story, poor characters (especially the villains, where it's obvious they went for quantity over quality), and being really easy.

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  • 2 weeks later...

FE6 > FE7 > FE8

 

FE6 is less refined and characters are bland, but the overall story is better, it has much more reasonable difficulty, and a post-game exists even if the trial maps are kind of meh.

FE7 has improved game play mechanics imo and better characters, but it's overall story is extremely underwhelming. No post-game either.

FE8 has forgettable characters and a meh story, didn't really add anything other than branched promotion, and an unreasonably easy difficulty. It's post-game is the best of the three, but that isn't saying much.

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I'm gonna go FE8>FE7>FE6. I don't really think any of these are the peak of the series though.

Sacred Stones is an easy game no doubt about that but I still enjoyed it. Having Post game in a FE game was fun, and I really enjoyed the plot. Difficulty is low, but I don't think that means the maps are bad though. Some really interesting characters but some real snoozers though.

I always knew FE7's conflict with the Black Fang wasn't anything good but man Mekkah really pummeled FE7's plot into the ground. Whatever, I still think Eliwood and Hector are great lords and leads that just stumbled into lackluster plot. Lyn as a character is good, but she didn't need to be a lord the main campaign however, I still think one of it's greatest strengths is establishing characters [Primarily in Lyn Mode but it helps you indirectly care about more characters ex Erk -> Priscilla Lucius -> Raven Florina -> Fiora]. Maps are a of a mess at times however, but still has my favorite bunch of characters in the series.

I just don't like FE6, like SO MANY aspects about it just bothered me. I also feel like the plot is quite poor overall where it's most of the time being a bland journey of Roy just winning place to place with it's only possibly interesting ideas being in Zephiel and Idunn who get completely undermined where you get an exposition dump from another character and Roy just blandly accepting it as he goes on to have no moral qualms about whatever he is supposed to do. iirc he has a smaller loss count than Corrin if that says anything about Roy. I also feel like the game does a horrid job of getting you to care about half of the cast, like you just have so many characters thrown at you when they give you a reason to care about the one half (Clarine then Rutger then Klein for example) but it just really makes the characters you just get thrown at you even more jarring (Roy's starting crew+Ostian Knights). I also just find hit rates being low is just counter intuitive to having fun and thinking strategically, it may have been a player phase based game but I always felt like I had adequate tools to absolutely slaughter anything I came up across assuming I hit (outside of 8x's boss in particular). Maps were bleh overall. Gaidens absolutely blindsided me with how terrible they were, like worst sets of maps outside of Revelation I've touched. The final stretch was pretty garbage because I didn't know how to avoid endless reinforcement zones in 21, thankfully was warned about the Garbage treasure chests in 21x, went through the large corridors of 22 without boots, went through the mess of Wyverns/Ballistas/Staffs in 23, and basically had to rush along 24 for not hording so many Divine Weapons, and then I got to witness a boss that's more of a pushover than Grima. I went Ilia which wasn't good, but I hear Sacae is abysmal so that's something too.

I don't quite understand why I have such a hateboner for this game. I think I just had fairly high expectations and I had them crash fairly hard. Maybe I'll play Hard Mode one day.

It's funny I have much stronger and complex opinions than FE6 and FE7  but I'd rate them lower than FE8 overall.

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On 7/10/2019 at 8:31 AM, Garlyle said:

Binding Blade > Blazing Sword > Sacred Stones

On 7/11/2019 at 3:16 AM, AnonymousSpeed said:

FE6 > FE8 > FE7

On 7/11/2019 at 4:23 AM, Michelaar said:

FE6 > FE7 > FE8

On 7/20/2019 at 5:47 PM, Camus The Dark Knight said:

FE6 > FE7 > FE8

FE6 hypesquad unite.

Also I am the only member of the hypesquad to prefer Sacred Stones to FE7. Huh.

Edited by AnonymousSpeed
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To do a chapter blow-by-blow:

FE7:

Spoiler

Lyn Mode- Tutorial!/Not Counting It/Admitting Its Bad

 

Using Hector Mode numbering in most cases:

  • Eliwood 11- Not bad for a first map. About what you'd expect.
  • Hector 11- A bit questionable that it only gives you two units, a Thief and a bulky Axe unit.
  • 12- Either way, it works as a map for me. Can be more difficult if you don't rush to the chokepoint mountain as I always do.
  • 13- Eh, only real issue is recruiting Guy.
  • 13x- Fog of War on a fair Defend. Not sending Marcus or Oswin northwest and it can be difficult to go northwest and kill the boss, but otherwise not hard, if not quite braindead easy either.
  • 14- Decent. Erik moves.
  • 15- I forget how this small and short Defend goes. Not hard to Defend, but the map isn't in any way a drag I recall.
  • 16- Noble Lady of Caelin, I think its good. Lyn's group of four has no real enemies to contend with, but I like the big mess of forests in the middle, even skipping them for a cross-mountain approach is possible.
  • 17- Attention! Marcus, Sain, Kent, Lowen! Lady Priscilla will be galloping forward as far she can every turn without regard for her life. She must reach her brother before he begins the massacre of three Caelin soldiers whose survival are necessary for this March's future. If Lady Priscilla should die, the vests you are wearing will immediately self-destruct! Failure is not an option! And whichever of you isn't doing any fighting will have to drag Matthew from the lower chest room to the north, the Crests are mandatory!
    • My recollection of this map. A cavalry rush with an annoying dragging of a thief.
  • 17x- Has an easy way of doing things that takes denies good enemy drops, and has a harder one that gives those drops and EXP. I like it.
  • 18- A Survive, which isn't hard if you don't try to kill the boss. But this is the first ship battle since FE2, and overall I like it.
  • 19- Fog of War and an okay challenge.
  • 19x- Made easy by virtue of Kishuna, different, but not bad.
  • 19xx- Annoying to unlock, but the map I don't recall being bad.
  • 20- Good I'd say, unless you want to visit both Secret Shops, that slows things a bit at the end. Much of the map I don't think is necessary to see, Darin is rather quick to be reached.
  • 21- Fog of War and a decent challenge, but I'd for some reason hesitate to call this a good map.
  • 22- Like 95% of Defends, defending is easy, but I like the map's design. 
  • 23- The desert chapter. Bearable on Normal. Hector Hard? Nope, the Fog was a step too far.
  • 23x- Fun and different, barring the Luna Druids, and Hector Hard status staffs against two separate army groups, despite having only one Restore available at this point.
  • 24 Lloyd- Easy for Eliwood, but Fog of War and moving Light Brand Lloyd? This map is punishment, albeit quick if you know what to do, on Hector Mode.
  • 24 Linus- I like this map, despite being maybe a little too big shoving Linus in that distant corner.
  • 25- The enemy is divided into monoclass groups, that always makes things easier when they aren't all brokenly strong, and they aren't here. The triple seize objective is fun.
  • 26- A Survive, so easy, and pretty boring. You do have to find a way to bait Vaida for shopping on Hector Mode, and the triple divide of the army was nice idea, if not meaningful in practice.
  • 27 Kenneth- Simple, a little slowed by the snow, but okay. 
  • 27 Jerme- Takes much longer with the change to a Rout and the map being much more open and scattered. But it might be better designed, I forget.
  • 28- Battle Before Dawn. Jaffar might die, Zephiel too. Maybe you waltz accidentally into Ursula's range, or the FoW gets you in another way. This map is infamous.
  • 28x- Vanishing bridges slows this map a lot, and adds frustrations. Unless you happen to have some good fliers and or Dart and Hawkeye. Bad? I guess.
  • 29- A big grand open melee of physical units on Normal, on HHM, it's a memorable magic fest. I'd call it decent.
  • Valorous Roland- Not a terrible idea having Eliwood go it alone in the middle, but with the menacing boss Georg that can move on him is a blow against that idea. And has lava tiles. I'd rank it lowly.
  • The Berserker- Chests, more open, poison walls, fewer deployable units. Since Hector doesn't have to go through what Eliwood does, I'd rank this slightly higher, but it still isn't good.
  • 30- Easy peasy lemon squeezy. Archers abound, and their arrows hit for so little, I bare my nether regions against them without fear of pain. I'd call this a real bad map, it exemplifies FE7's weaknesses, 1-2 range is too good for the player, and enemies are much too weak.
  • 30x- Dedicated shopping chapter, and Karla the terribly under par. Not good, just weird.
  • 31- A grand big open battle, is it worthy of being the penultimate? Enemies are still one too many unpromoted! But I kinda like this?
  • 31x- Okay on Hector Normal. But Boundless Berserker Beefcakes on HHM is nasty!
  • Final- Not a bad idea, quality over quantity. Athos diminishes the difficulty however. And the final boss is dull. 

 

FE8:

Spoiler
  • Prologue- Quick and small tutorial.
  • 1- More tutorial, more quick, more small, nothing special.
  • 2- I think it's fine.
  • 3- First indoors map, it's fine.
  • 4- First monsters map, it's fine.
  • 5- Joshua's recruitment is tricky, and its something of a challenging village rush. But the difficulty on Hard for this fight is fairly balanced.
  • 5x- Too big, and too slow or dependent on Orson. I'd eat Kyle's right kidney for a staff unit here. 
  • 6- First FoW. Very open, rush to protect the civilians. Not sure if it is bad or good, but my gut says bad.
  • 7- It's average.
  • 8- It's a trap! And maybe a little fun.
  • 9 Eirika- A village rush on a great big map, unless you have Seth end things prematurely via a ferrying from Vanessa. I don't like its size, but the northern initial corridor up until you save that most challenging village is a good and fair fight.
  • 10 Eirika- Other than Gerik maybe getting Sleeped before he recruits Marisa, I find this map fun.
  • 11 Eirika- A forgettable FoW map on the easier side.
  • 12 Eirika- Relies on enemies approaching from the peaks where you cannot reach them with most units, an okay idea. A little big, and I'd say it's dull.
  • 13 Eirika- A good fight for survival, unless you kill the boss early. When Pablo shows it gets mean.
  • 14 Eirika- A poor indoor map, with a wily runaway Rennac, and a dodgy boss.
  • 9 Ephraim- I like it.
  • 10 Ephraim- A good bit of challenge getting Cormag, and overall a tight map.
  • 11 Ephraim- The Deathgoyle shows up too soon for a cruel backstab, and the middle ship is too much "death by a thousand cuts".
  • 12 Ephraim- Maybe a little easy, but I'd call it fine.
  • 13 Ephraim- Selena with Bolting right in the middle and some village rushing on the sides. Might be a little unfair, but I think it leans on being good.
  • 14 Ephraim- Status Staffs might drag down some, but I like this map. A fair challenge.
  • 15- Ephraim's version is better. A desert map that isn't too sandy, FE's best in this category. I actually like it, and only wish Valter moved out on Hard for maximum devilishness.
  • 16- This map is good, it isn't too far to the throne, and the push is easy. Promoted enemies on Hard are strong. But then those two terrible siege tomes show up and the map suddenly becomes unexpectedly hard to avoid deaths on because those siege tomes have so much map coverage, they reverse player momentum.
  • 17- For the first few turns, the map can be tight-ish. But then it loosens up into an EXP fest, if you don't opt to just land a quick kill on Lyon. Average.
  • 18- A big, fun, EXP run to smash the Gorgon Eggs! I like this map, but if you don't use plenty o' powerful mounted units, it will be much harder. Can I call this good?
  • 19- The last challenging chapter. If you don't blitz to Riev, the enemy reinforcements in the southwest can certainly kill someone. You've Mage Knights, Rangers, Swordmasters, Paladins and Great Knights, all weapon types are covered. I'd call this good.
  • 20- Big, many reinforcements, but the enemies barring selective ones- Morva, Riev, the Gorgons, any Arch Mogalls with Shadowshot- should be considered weak by this point. I'd consider this below average.
  • 21- An unspectacular final battle. Nothing bad, just nothing outstanding for a final fight.

 

FE6, note that I've only played this once, so no Hard, nor Echidna Western Isles or Ilia:

Spoiler
  • 1- A standard bandit chapter, a bit tough on your starting team.
  • 2- I'd say it's good.
  • 3- First indoors, I thought it was okay.
  • 4- At first this looked intimidating, but it wasn't bad. Challenge was fine. Ordinary.
  • 5- I forget, was there anything remarkable about this map?
  • 6- Bad. Too many doors to open, too many chests for just one Thief. Some doors are just traps with enemies behind them.
  • 7- Nefarious on Hard I hear. And even on Normal, I could see how this map is challenging. In a bad way maybe, for being too open.
  • 8- First map in FE6 to be just too big. It could use fewer folds at the start, there are one too many before you get to the breakable wall, it just favors mounted units.
  • 8x- Setting aside the boss, no reinforcements and no significant threats from what I recall, made this an unremarkable map.
  • 9- On Normal, I felt the game was rather restrained with the enemies to account for the Fog of War. Maybe the area around the two northeast villages was tricky, as is the boss, but that is about it.
  • 10 Bartre- It was fine, barring the notion of getting the Orion's Bolt and Elysian Whip, since I didn't know where Tate and Klein would spawn.
  • 11 Bartre- Rather drab, deal with the Berserker and his companions to the north and that is cleared up. The rest of the map in south is basic.
  • 12- I can't remember much, other than this being tighter on the turn count than I expected.
  • 12x- FoW, too many chests, some dangerous enemies up in the northeast. I don't recall liking this map very much.
  • 13- I think I liked this map? The northern bridge is unneeded however, and Perceval is nearly impossible to recruit in this battle.
  • 14- EVIL!
  • 14x- Why the two Boltings?! Wasn't one enough? And if you don't use many fliers, I found them all weak except for Melady, and if you don't plow ahead, this map will screw you by taking forever to complete. The floor tiles at the start will eventually all vanish, and if your van is stuck in water with no land to walk to, you'll have to wait a bazillion turns until the floor reappears. I dislike this one very much.
  • 15- Maybe a little too big, but otherwise it's unremarkable.
  • 16- I don't remember too much of this map. Other than Hugh moving in the wrong direction, which forced me to play cat and mouse will him for a long time. And Douglas is so inelegant to have to deal with. The only effective way to neutralize him is to surround him with walls and unarmed units.
  • 16x- I forget the annoyance level the magic bolts, but its map where you have to to gradually deplete enemy siege tomes before you can advance.
  • 17 Sacae- Fog of War initially meant I thought this map would be easier on the enemy front. But I recall running into more Bolting at some point, that wasn't fun. And I let the northeast village get destroyed, the village run in this case is too tight, and not worth it being just an Eclipse. Map might be a bit too big.
  • 18 Sacae- The yurt reinforcements are concerning, but I like this actually! This is sorta how Central Asian nomads should be fighting.
  • 19 Sacae- I think it was at least average? I might have liked it.
  • 20 Sacae- Ballistae, siege, and status in a cramped FoW map. One way is almost door-free, the other is door heavy? I've mixed feelings about this map.
  • 20x Sacae- Mixed feelings. I like the multiple seize points, but the traps they spawn if false? Eh...
  • 21- A final grand outdoors battle. Not sure, but I guess I can say good, it's a challenge, as a map at this ending point should be.
  • 21x- The enemies are okay. The FoW isn't unbearable. The random traps are odd. But THAT trap makes me wish it involved bunny suits.
  • 22- A big final indoor map. The fights to the switches are fair, but the throne room is a bit devilish.
  • 23- I guess I'd call this good?
  • 24- Bad, since it's all about just using up the Divine Weapons against powerful Manaketes. And too many Roy seizes. And then its a joke of a fight in Idunn.

 

Doing these individual chapter breakdowns makes me realize very few maps in FE are so remarkable and amazing that they evoke strong emotions from me. But FE is still good. Average is enough to be good?

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4 hours ago, Garlyle said:

Bartre route and Sacae? Honestly I enjoy the other routes more than those. The only chapters that were less memorable for me were 10, 15, 17 to be honest. Other chapters give you something that you'll probably going to remember for.

I decided to save Echidna for whenever I do a Hard Mode playthrough, since she is supposed to be the better unit. And Sacae was chosen for similar reasons of difficulty. Although there was no real choice about which route I'd take. Shanna and Tate were simply too difficult to raise. The only units I did train up were Rutger, Deke, Melady, Lance, Alan, Sin, and Lugh (BORING! I know). In other words, if you needed real effort, I pretty much skipped you as being Too Much Effort, on Normal. My liking for good prepromotes made that choice not so hard.

Edited by Interdimensional Observer
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On 7/22/2019 at 11:20 PM, Interdimensional Observer said:

To do a chapter blow-by-blow:

 

FE6, note that I've only played this once, so no Hard, nor Echidna Western Isles or Ilia:

  Reveal hidden contents
  • 1- A standard bandit chapter, a bit tough on your starting team.
  • 2- I'd say it's good.
  • 3- First indoors, I thought it was okay.
  • 4- At first this looked intimidating, but it wasn't bad. Challenge was fine. Ordinary.
  • 5- I forget, was there anything remarkable about this map?
  • 6- Bad. Too many doors to open, too many chests for just one Thief. Some doors are just traps with enemies behind them.
  • 7- Nefarious on Hard I hear. And even on Normal, I could see how this map is challenging. In a bad way maybe, for being too open.
  • 8- First map in FE6 to be just too big. It could use fewer folds at the start, there are one too many before you get to the breakable wall, it just favors mounted units.
  • 8x- Setting aside the boss, no reinforcements and no significant threats from what I recall, made this an unremarkable map.
  • 9- On Normal, I felt the game was rather restrained with the enemies to account for the Fog of War. Maybe the area around the two northeast villages was tricky, as is the boss, but that is about it.
  • 10 Bartre- It was fine, barring the notion of getting the Orion's Bolt and Elysian Whip, since I didn't know where Tate and Klein would spawn.
  • 11 Bartre- Rather drab, deal with the Berserker and his companions to the north and that is cleared up. The rest of the map in south is basic.
  • 12- I can't remember much, other than this being tighter on the turn count than I expected.
  • 12x- FoW, too many chests, some dangerous enemies up in the northeast. I don't recall liking this map very much.
  • 13- I think I liked this map? The northern bridge is unneeded however, and Perceval is nearly impossible to recruit in this battle.
  • 14- EVIL!
  • 14x- Why the two Boltings?! Wasn't one enough? And if you don't use many fliers, I found them all weak except for Melady, and if you don't plow ahead, this map will screw you by taking forever to complete. The floor tiles at the start will eventually all vanish, and if your van is stuck in water with no land to walk to, you'll have to wait a bazillion turns until the floor reappears. I dislike this one very much.
  • 15- Maybe a little too big, but otherwise it's unremarkable.
  • 16- I don't remember too much of this map. Other than Hugh moving in the wrong direction, which forced me to play cat and mouse will him for a long time. And Douglas is so inelegant to have to deal with. The only effective way to neutralize him is to surround him with walls and unarmed units.
  • 16x- I forget the annoyance level the magic bolts, but its map where you have to to gradually deplete enemy siege tomes before you can advance.
  • 17 Sacae- Fog of War initially meant I thought this map would be easier on the enemy front. But I recall running into more Bolting at some point, that wasn't fun. And I let the northeast village get destroyed, the village run in this case is too tight, and not worth it being just an Eclipse. Map might be a bit too big.
  • 18 Sacae- The yurt reinforcements are concerning, but I like this actually! This is sorta how Central Asian nomads should be fighting.
  • 19 Sacae- I think it was at least average? I might have liked it.
  • 20 Sacae- Ballistae, siege, and status in a cramped FoW map. One way is almost door-free, the other is door heavy? I've mixed feelings about this map.
  • 20x Sacae- Mixed feelings. I like the multiple seize points, but the traps they spawn if false? Eh...
  • 21- A final grand outdoors battle. Not sure, but I guess I can say good, it's a challenge, as a map at this ending point should be.
  • 21x- The enemies are okay. The FoW isn't unbearable. The random traps are odd. But THAT trap makes me wish it involved bunny suits.
  • 22- A big final indoor map. The fights to the switches are fair, but the throne room is a bit devilish.
  • 23- I guess I'd call this good?
  • 24- Bad, since it's all about just using up the Divine Weapons against powerful Manaketes. And too many Roy seizes. And then its a joke of a fight in Idunn.

 

Doing these individual chapter breakdowns makes me realize very few maps in FE are so remarkable and amazing that they evoke strong emotions from me. But FE is still good. Average is enough to be good?

I feel like I see people saying FE6 has good map design but I feel like if you go step by step it really doesn’t have a good balance of good and bad maps with it leaning a bit more on the bad honestly. 

Not to deny the good ones but eh there’s just a lot of maps that feel like they depend on prior knowledge to play them well unlike other games. Not to say that most games aren’t easier on revisits but FE6 in particular has a lot of “if you know this”

Edited by SubwayBossEmmett
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6>8>7
 

6: Despite its flaws it was the most enjoyable one for me gameplay wise. Story was fine, nothing special. Not my favourite cast but many of them were likeable enough. Final boss sucked.

8: Like the music and gameplay. Story was decent enough imo, but the game feels short. Favourite cast among the gba games. Final boss wasn't really spectacular.

7: Good gameplay but booooring plot. Couldn't really motivate myself to play the game at times since the plot was often boring. That said, some parts I liked, such as the Dread Isles. Most of the cast is fairly likeable. Final boss was decent but I'm not too much of a fan of Nergal overall.

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22 hours ago, SubwayBossEmmett said:

I feel like I see people saying FE6 has good map design but I feel like if you go step by step it really doesn’t have a good balance of good and bad maps with it leaning a bit more on the bad honestly. 

Not to deny the good ones but eh there’s just a lot of maps that feel like they depend on prior knowledge to play them well unlike other games. Not to say that most games aren’t easier on revisits but FE6 in particular has a lot of “if you know this”

Personally, I don't see how its map design is good when it is too in love with long, winding maps, which get really old really quickly.

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