The best thing in Three Houses

[Garlyle]

Support Conversations.

I believe these support conversations are the best I have seen written in Fire Emblem until now. I actually found myself anticipating the follow-up of C and B supports to see where these characters are going with all this - there are a couple of funny ones, a few touching ones and sometimes sad ones. The main reason why I'm going slowly in this game is due to me trying to unlock as many of these as I can. Heck, even I found support conversations that started me theorizing about a certain character, and there was an A conversation with another character that confirmed my theory. No wonder I really like the characters with this quality of conversations.

Still, the story is good by Fire Emblem standards, and it could use a few more maps to give us more variety. I am having a lot of fun times.

Edited August 18, 2019 by Garlyle

[nocturnal YL]

There are an awful lot of supports that end at B, though. I think it's partly done to save on writing and voice acting, but it's still a bummer.

[Humanoid]

Ehh, I might concede that there's probably a smaller percentage of outright awful ones this time around, but it still isn't great and is a notable downgrade from the main story writing and there are plenty of times I'm left wondering why I wasted time listening to the whole conversation. That said, the full voicing does help a ton, though it's often undermined by the woefully primitive animation system they're using. I mean, they can't even animate the actors touching each other or holding even the simplest object, it's laughably bad.

Worst of all is when someone goes "look, a three-headed monkey", and then a tiny box with a 2D image pops up in the middle of the screen to show whatever they're looking at. Just... why?

Edited August 17, 2019 by Humanoid

[Vince777]

Loved a lot of them. 

The Flayn/Raphael support line stands out to me as the most adorable thing I've experienced in a Fire Emblem game.

[redlight]

Eh. I'd say it's moreso the voice acting. I'm surprised that they managed to have so many characters sound sho good

[timon]

Yeah, but there's stil a fair share of downright terrible ones (eg. Bernadetta), I find myself skipping through most of Annette's one, even though I like her character a lot. It's just that half of her supports are "hey, I don't understand that thing about that thing (and the reader has no idea what she's talking about), can you explain?" - flash black screen - "Ooh! Now that you explained in that way I get it!"

What are we talking about? It's so vague it's ridiculous, the worst one is with Ashe, it's just so dumb.
On that note, I don't really like how a lot of supports treat the whole Academy deal like actual high school just switching subject. "hey, did you understand that book on lance fighting (?????), oh shit! here's the bell! Better get back to class or the professor's gonna be angry!". The hell? You're literally soldiers, lol.

Biggest criticism is, don't get ahead of yourself. If the switch or the developers can't handle it, don't go full animated, because then the result is... that. People waving their hand for everything, the camera going above because the engine is not powerful enough to show people sitting, so they need to focus the camera on the face, everything that isn't talking shown as black screen with random noises... Honestly at this point let's just have the portraits talking and be done with it.

 

That said, some are very nice, and I like how they provide background not only on the characters themselves but on their world. Worldbuilding at its best. On that topic though, I'm not a fan of how they handled Petra, she's just a retarded American that switches words around, if the idea is to make her feel foreign just give her an accent, would work a lot better.

EDIT: since it has been misunderstood, I don't mean that Americans are retarded, but that she has a perfectly natural American accent and just misplaces words around, it doesn't make for a very believable "language learner" at all.

Edited August 17, 2019 by timon

[eclipse]

The trend I see is that C supports establish a gimmick, B supports try to explain that gimmick, and a possible A support tries to resolve it.  The gimmick explanation may or may not work, but at least it's better than sticking to said gimmick throughout the entire chain (hi Fates).  Definitely an improvement!

[FoxyGrandpa]

I think that the support conversations being animated now is a pretty big net benefit overall despite its flaws. Seeing the same animations constantly get reused gets pretty annoying and comes off as lazy, but support conversations are now able to immediately establish setting though visuals and adds a good amount of context to each support. 

[Dark Holy Elf]

I definitely agree that the supports being animated is a net benefit. Yeah, I know, there are some places where it gets awkward, like not being able to show characters hold things. But being able to use camera work, body language, and facial expressions to improve the storytelling of a support is a big deal. Not to mention the voice work which is top-notch; characters are even able to affect accents and imitate each other, as well as communicate their moods and opinions far better than old text and maybe a slight facial expression modification ever could. These are definitely the best supports in the series overall.

 

3 hours ago, timon said:

On that topic though, I'm not a fan of how they handled Petra, she's just a retarded American that switches words around, if the idea is to make her feel foreign just give her an accent, would work a lot better.

Gonna disagree hard with this one. She doesn't just switch her words around, she actually has some consistent issues with the English (i.e. Fodlanian) language: her errors are almost always due either due having trouble with idioms (idioms being something any language learner will tell you are hell) or making use of the verb "to be" or "to have" where English normally wouldn't, suggesting that's how Brigid sentence structure works. (e.g. she says "I am having understanding" instead of "I understand"). The writer(s)/translator(s) actually thought about this one and as someone who has studied languages and linguistics, I find it credible.

They didn't bother giving her an accent, and arguably she should have one, but meh, either you'd have to concoct a fictional accent somehow or use a real one from Earth (e.g. Russian, French, etc.), both of which are problematic ideas.

Also I would politely ask that you consider trying to avoid the use of the word "retarded", as many people find it offensive when used the way you are using it.

[timon]

12 minutes ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

Gonna disagree hard with this one. She doesn't just switch her words around, she actually has some consistent issues with the English (i.e. Fodlanian) language: her errors are almost always due either due having trouble with idioms (idioms being something any language learner will tell you are hell) or making use of the verb "to be" or "to have" where English normally wouldn't, suggesting that's how Brigid sentence structure works. (e.g. she says "I am having understanding" instead of "I understand"). The writer(s)/translator(s) actually thought about this one and as someone who has studied languages and linguistics, I find it credible.

They didn't bother giving her an accent, and arguably she should have one, but meh, either you'd have to concoct a fictional accent somehow or use a real one from Earth (e.g. Russian, French, etc.), both of which are problematic ideas.

Also I would politely ask that you consider trying to avoid the use of the word "retarded", as many people find it offensive when used the way you are using it.

idk, I'm not english myself and had to learn the language (mostly through exposure not school) and some of those mistakes are just bizarre, but that might depend on the language one comes from. That said an accent would really change my perception of her, because it would make her sound foreign, not just read like a foreigner. And I don't really see the problem with giving her a real accent, Gregor had a pretty obvious one and I doubt anyone had a problem with it? She also takes quite obvious inspiration from real world population, adding that to her voice would make her more believable and immersive.

And yes, sorry about the retarded thing, as I said I'm not english and I guess the direct translation in my head is not really anything harsh or offensive. Language problems while discussing how language problems should be written, the irony.

[zuibangde]

I find the supports can get a bit repetitive at times. I lost count how many times Ingrid talked about a certain someone (gonna avoid spoilers here). Or Dedue mentioning that he’s a man of Duscur. Or how Ignatz really likes to paint. 

I had hope that there would be a balance between ‘slice of life’ (where they talk about something they experienced together outside of battles) and conversations that explore their backstory. Most supports end with the characters talking about their personal struggles and backstory to the point that it feels redundant. 

Also, someone please tell me if Lysithea’s character improves because as of now, she’s just an angrier and ruder version of Hayato. I hate how she goes off on people like Ignatz in the C supports and they don’t react to it in any way other than ‘meh’.

Edited August 18, 2019 by zuibangde

[eclipse]

34 minutes ago, zuibangde said:

Also, someone please tell me if Lysithea’s character improves because as of now, she’s just an angrier and ruder version of Hayato. I hate how she goes off on people like Ignatz in the C supports and they don’t react to it in any way other than ‘meh’.

My guess is that she explains herself in the B support, and it isn't totally off-base.  It's a pattern I've noticed with several different people (hi Sylvain).

[Vince777]

13 hours ago, timon said:

Yeah, but there's stil a fair share of downright terrible ones (eg. Bernadetta), I find myself skipping through most of Annette's one

Really?

Didn't mind Bernadetta at all and I thought Annette was a treat to hear whenever she spoke. She's adorable and imo one of the best voice acted character in the game.

The two I didn't like very much were Mercedes and Petra. Mercedes's voice was just extremely annoying and grating to me and just felt fake when compared to everyone else. No one speaks like that. She's become my least favourite Three Houses character because of that performance. That, and perhaps also for acting sweet and yet immediately taking Rhea's side when she proposes execution for the western church rebels. 

Petra would have been fine if the voice actress and whoever gave her directions understood what it means to speak a language that isn't your native one. She had no discernable accent to speak of and that didn't make any sense. It is really all I could think of whenever she spoke. Sure, the grammar was off but why were all the intonations impeccable? It should be impossible. 

 

Edited August 18, 2019 by Vince777

[Crysta]

Definitely prefer the animations over the talking portraits. Brings the conversation to life a little bit more.

Inevitably, some are better than others, but that's on par with every Fire Emblem game.

[timon]

1 hour ago, Vince777 said:

Really?

Didn't mind Bernadetta at all and I thought Annette was a treat to hear whenever she spoke. She's adorable and imo one of the best voice acted character in the game.

The two I didn't like very much were Mercedes and Petra. Mercedes's voice was just extremely annoying and grating to me and just felt fake when compared to everyone else. No one speaks like that. She's become my least favourite Three Houses character because of that performance. That, and perhaps also for acting sweet and yet immediately taking Rhea's side when she proposes execution for the western church rebels. 

Petra would have been fine if the voice actress and whoever gave her directions understood what it means to speak a language that isn't your native one. She had no discernable accent to speak of and that didn't make any sense. It is really all I could think of whenever she spoke. Sure, the grammar was off but why were all the intonations impeccable? It should be impossible.
 

Bernadetta is just extremely annoying, her being scared of literally everything and always thinking everyone wants to murder her is unbearable, as is the constant screeching (for the same reason you (and I as well) dislike Mercedes). I know she has "reasons" for that beahviour, but it's so extreme it gets too much.

On Annette I agree that she's adorable, and I really like her voice as well, it's more of a writing problem with her supports. As I said, they're all incredibly generic, talking of never specified school subjects (in what world does it make sense to talk about sword fighting like maths?) and treating everything like they're in middle school. I'm not sure how to explain this, but take this as an example:

• Ashe: Oh, that makes sense! Because the enemy line will be here!
• Annette: That's it! OK, now try using that same technique and applying it to this other problem.
• Ashe: If the walls are this high, and he enemy lines are that distance--ah! I think I see!
• Annette: I knew you'd get it.

It's ridiculous! What are they even talking about? "that technique" "this other problem", the hell?

Agreed on Petra, that's exactly what I meant, she just sounds like a native speaker who's randomly getting grammar wrong, not a language learner.

[xchickengirlx]

15 hours ago, eclipse said:

The trend I see is that C supports establish a gimmick, B supports try to explain that gimmick, and a possible A support tries to resolve it.  The gimmick explanation may or may not work, but at least it's better than sticking to said gimmick throughout the entire chain (hi Fates).  Definitely an improvement!

Yeah I agree. So many C supports are simply conversation starters. Some do better at pulling you in, wanting to lean more, others are kinda meh. Some of those character gimmick interactions are better than others too. Raphael is a mix of “ughhh” and warm fuzzy feelings for me. Not a big fan of a lot of Ignatz’s supports, he is another self deprecating character, and I’m just not a fan.

I recruited Caspar and Linhardt, and heard about howwwww great their support was, but their C support is solely about who’s dad would win in a fight, and their B support is somewhat of a continuation of that and Linhardt giving Caspar tips on how to win a fight. Which ok? I guess? Didn’t really make them come off as close childhood friends. Still haven’t unlocked their A support.

also, playing with the JP audio, Petra’s VA does a really good job struggling to speak the language, yeah she’s still speaking Japanese and not another language, so it might make more sense with the English dub I guess, but the JP VA delivers her lines so well. Petra’s and Claude’s support has been one of my faves so far. I’m gonna try and get their paired ending. I know Claude and Hilda are seen as the OTP if you don’t S support Claude as F!Byleth....but Claude and Petra go do well together too

[Landmaster]

I agree, lots of really great Supports this time around, a lot having really intrigued me. VA really does help add some life into these~ And I personally liked the animations~ There were only a few here and there that I found myself outright just not paying attention and they were mainly any that included Seteth with someone not named Flayn~

6 hours ago, zuibangde said:

Also, someone please tell me if Lysithea’s character improves because as of now, she’s just an angrier and ruder version of Hayato. I hate how she goes off on people like Ignatz in the C supports and they don’t react to it in any way other than ‘meh’.

Yes, she does do this to a lot of people but she generally realizes right away she was too harsh and does end up apologizing.

51 minutes ago, timon said:

On Annette I agree that she's adorable, and I really like her voice as well, it's more of a writing problem with her supports. As I said, they're all incredibly generic, talking of never specified school subjects (in what world does it make sense to talk about sword fighting like maths?) and treating everything like they're in middle school. I'm not sure how to explain this, but take this as an example:

• Ashe: Oh, that makes sense! Because the enemy line will be here!
• Annette: That's it! OK, now try using that same technique and applying it to this other problem.
• Ashe: If the walls are this high, and he enemy lines are that distance--ah! I think I see!
• Annette: I knew you'd get it.

It's ridiculous! What are they even talking about? "that technique" "this other problem", the hell?

Agreed on Petra, that's exactly what I meant, she just sounds like a native speaker who's randomly getting grammar wrong, not a language learner.

I agree that they are vague, but as for talking like they're in middle school...I mean, that is the case. They're at school to learn about war tactics, that is what Byleth is tasked to instruct. So they're learning about it in that manner. IDK, personally never had a problem with it, since it's not actually relevant  to the conversation. I never found myself asking "what is ACTUALLY on the pages in this conversation?".

As for Petra, I personally liked that she didn't have an accent. I would have found her too similar to Athena otherwise. I know people who have lost their accents when learning English, so it isn't particularly farfetched for her not to have one. Her problem is not really just grammar mistakes, it seems more specifically on verb structure and tenses, which seems more believable than just talking in broken English.

[DragonFlames]

18 minutes ago, xchickengirlx said:

I know Claude and Hilda are seen as the OTP if you don’t S support Claude as F!Byleth....but Claude and Petra go do well together too

Really? I never got that vibe from these two. Maybe that's just me.

One thing that I have to criticize is that some supports follow similar beats. Raphael/Ignatz is basically the same thing as Caspar/Petra: one party's parent allegedly killed the other party's and the killer's child feels very awkward about it while the other doesn't mind. The only difference is that Caspar and Petra weren't friends beforehand, and Caspar's father actually landed the killing blow on Petra's, whereas with Ignatz and Raphael, Raphael's parents died on an errand meant to be carried out by Ignatz' parents.

Another is that almost all of the A-supports have romantic undertones. I know this is to set up eventual paired endings so they don't feel as out of left field as they may have done in past games, but this makes getting multiple A-supports for each character feel very awkward because of that. Likewise if you plan on S-supporting anyone with Byleth. I basically cucked Lorenz by S-supporting Lysithea. I regret NOTHING!

6 hours ago, zuibangde said:

Also, someone please tell me if Lysithea’s character improves because as of now, she’s just an angrier and ruder version of Hayato. I hate how she goes off on people like Ignatz in the C supports and they don’t react to it in any way other than ‘meh’.

While it's not directly stated and more something to be read between the lines, Lysithea has her reasons for acting that way towards others. You'll find out in her later supports with them. Unlike Hayato, she eventually apologizes for speaking out of line, too.

As far as Petra is concerned, her speech patterns are actually quite endearing to me. She's also one of my favorite characters due to the many times she spoke directly from my heart (Bernadetta B-support; Caspar B-support, to name two instances). Same with Felix (support-line with Ingrid).

Edited August 18, 2019 by DragonFlames

[Vince777]

1 hour ago, Landmaster said:

As for Petra, I personally liked that she didn't have an accent. I would have found her too similar to Athena otherwise. I know people who have lost their accents when learning English, so it isn't particularly farfetched for her not to have one. Her problem is not really just grammar mistakes, it seems more specifically on verb structure and tenses, which seems more believable than just talking in broken English.

You don't hear Athena in Shadow Dragon/New Mystery and you only hear her a bit in Heroes.  For reference though, yeah I do think Athena's voice acting is how Petra should have been handled. 

You probably know people that have lost most of their accent but there are probably always remnants of it that remain. Unless they transitionned very young. People that begin to learn late will never lose their accent entirely. Petra isn't old but she didn't get to Fodlan when she was a child either. Besides, her speech pattern mishaps would have been the first thing to go. The accent much later. Speaking of, it's weird that she hasn't really gotten any better five years later. She's been immersing herself in Fodlan culture and it's language for over 5 years and she should by now be speaking with correct grammar and syntax. 

What I do know is amongst the people that you know have lost their accent, none of them speak like Petra does. Nobody loses their accent first and then begin speaking properly.  

Petra wasn't young enough and hadn't be there long enough. Her accent may get better over time but she would never entirely lose it. It doesn't matter anyway because she doesn't even have to lose in the first place. Before timeskip especially, it should be there and it should be thick.

 

Edited August 18, 2019 by Vince777

[eclipse]

13 hours ago, timon said:

On Annette I agree that she's adorable, and I really like her voice as well, it's more of a writing problem with her supports. As I said, they're all incredibly generic, talking of never specified school subjects (in what world does it make sense to talk about sword fighting like maths?) and treating everything like they're in middle school. I'm not sure how to explain this, but take this as an example:

• Ashe: Oh, that makes sense! Because the enemy line will be here!
• Annette: That's it! OK, now try using that same technique and applying it to this other problem.
• Ashe: If the walls are this high, and he enemy lines are that distance--ah! I think I see!
• Annette: I knew you'd get it.

It's ridiculous! What are they even talking about? "that technique" "this other problem", the hell?

Agreed on Petra, that's exactly what I meant, she just sounds like a native speaker who's randomly getting grammar wrong, not a language learner.

For you to understand this, you'll need to picture what they're doing.  Get a pen and paper out, and draw a rough map.  Draw another line - that's the enemy line.  I'm not sure what those two are going to do to the enemy line (scout/disrupt it), but it sounds like it requires distance.  Now, draw a wall somewhere else, and another enemy line behind it.  Whatever Annette proposed will work in that situation, too.

No different than applied coding, really.  Minus the debugging.

[Slumber]

I don't know if I'd say the best overall, but the supports in this game are quite good considering the sheer volume of them. The animations and voice acting help a lot.