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VW as dlc would've make 3H better


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I'm glad it was included, even if it absolutely did not live up to it's potential. Though I actually prefer Silver Snow, thematically. That said, I think both routes should have been incorporated into one bigger route, that or both needed to be significantly different than what we got.

 

Verdant Wind should have focused more on Leicester/Almyra happenings before Edelgard either forcing their hand or them catching her off guard in a surprise attack of some sort (the couple mini surprise attacks that we actually got in VW part 2 don't count, much of it was just active war which didn't do Claude any favors). Leave TWSITD out of it, mostly.

 

Silver Snow should have been the only route with Garreg Mach as a main base in part 2. We needed more Edelgard confrontations and... I dunno. Something more I guess. It does feel empty, in a way.

 

But if we combined them, we could have both stories seamlessly put together, since they are essentially the same. Have the Church take The Bridge of Myrdin, play as Alliance in Gronder Field while the Church recuperates, have Claude come up with the infiltration plans for Merceus and Enbarr but the Church would lead the charges there due to heavy Alliance casualties from Gronder, then both take out TWSITD together. The Edelgard moments would still have meaning, versus coming out of the left field like it does in VW. I mean, it's basically what we got, but the flavoring would be different and hopefully better.

The biggest change is having both final chapters from SS and VW featured in the same route. The Church and Alliance come out of Shambhala, Rhea is wounded and taken to Garreg Mach, Claude and the Alliance stay for a bit before moving out back into their own territory. End of the month, Rhea goes crazy, much of the Church is decimated, just like in SS. Nemesis has been revived around this time and only NOW starts carving a path to Garreg Mach. The Church is in no condition to fight, so the Alliance has no choice but to be the final bastion of defense. There, now Nemesis feels appropriate to part 2.

 

This was basically me just brainstorming, but these are some ideas I think could be built on.

Edited by Slyfox
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why can’t Claude alone can’t make the plot (subjectively) better? There are parts in VW which do handle the same plot beats better than SS which are facilitated by him and are confusing when Seteth attempts to replace him (Judith’s involvement, the Fort Merceus mission, possibly something else I’m forgetting). Sharing the spotlight with Claude, who sticks with you throughout the story, is still better than having the narrative centered around a self-insert character with few discernible character traits and none of the fun customization bits.

edit: I guess the better question is what the church route actually add plot wise that isn’t covered in CF/AM. It’s not like you have a shortage of Edelgard or Rhea there and I don’t think the church is given more characterization. You got the Byleth origin stuff, but I wouldn’t genuinely want to play through the entirety of SS just for that... cuz it’s boring.

 

 

Edited by Crysta
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1 hour ago, leesangstar10 said:

First I'd like to address. I do not mean get rid of Golden Deer, the Alliance, or even Claude. I said instead of VW being a route on its own, it would've been better without it to add more to other routes and make them more unique. They could just make Claude an important secondary character. Heck maybe having Claude's route be dlc would have given it more time for the developers to make the route more fleshed out. Pull a revelation and have it the "golden" route.(but make the actual plot good thou)

What I'm saying though is that I don't think there is a winning situation from sidelining the Alliance. They are very likely to end up underdeveloped when just existing as a segment of the other routes. Even while VW exists the Alliance's history and structure is relatively unexplored. And that would just draw the same complaints as people already have now, especially since they're 1/3 of the entire country in a three-pronged war. If they do spend more time fleshing out the Alliance, that is to the potential detriment of the other routes' existing plot as well.

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5 hours ago, FoxyGrandpa said:

Haven't played Silver Snow yet, but based on what I've seen online, it seems pretty apparent that the route's main character is Byleth, what with his crest being the new banner of the resistance army, his past being delved into further, & him being crowned king of Fodlan at the end of the route. Edelgard & Rhea are both humanized more, making the points where you fight them more heartbreaking. 

When I played Golden Deer, a lot of this stuff, like Byleth's crest being the banner of the resistance army seemed weird. Wasn't Claude suppose to be the main character? Why is the resistance army fighting under Byleth's name? As his teacher, I felt Byleth should have been the one to help Claude deal with his struggles like he did for Dimitri or Edelgard. However, there was no point in the story where I felt Claude was sufficiently challenged. He's still a good character, but I wish the devs had delved much more in his secretive past since that's something he's clearly not comfortable about & it would have challenged him more. A confrontation with Count Gloucester in particular would have been a really good way to challenge him about his background, while also help tying up Rapheal, Ignatz, and Lorenz's stories. 

All that being said, even in its current state, I don't think Verdant Wind's inclusion is bad for the game. Its the closest thing this game has to a golden route & the game ends on a happy note rather than a bittersweet one like in other routes. Even though I felt Claude should have been challenged more, his presence always made the events going on in the route more interesting.

 

 

A couple of things you mentioned were explained in the game.

1. Claude makes the Crest of Flames their banner because the Alliance is too split for them to use that. It also goes into the next point.

2. Claude putting Byleth in front is all part of his plan to give Fodlan a new unified leader before he goes off to be Almyras king.

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1 hour ago, Crysta said:

why can’t Claude alone can’t make the plot (subjectively) better? There are parts in VW which do handle the same plot beats better than SS which are facilitated by him and are confusing when Seteth attempts to replace him (Judith’s involvement, the Fort Merceus mission, possibly something else I’m forgetting). Sharing the spotlight with Claude, who sticks with you throughout the story, is still better than having the narrative centered around a self-insert character with few discernible character traits and none of the fun customization bits.

edit: I guess the better question is what the church route actually add plot wise that isn’t covered in CF/AM. It’s not like you have a shortage of Edelgard or Rhea there and I don’t think the church is given more characterization. You got the Byleth origin stuff, but I wouldn’t genuinely want to play through the entirety of SS just for that... cuz it’s boring.

 

 

I think one thing that could have helped Silver Snow is it embracing the Nabatea side more.

You got Seteth and Flayn as direct advisors. It would have been a good way to delve deeper into the people the Nabateans were since we really don't learn all that much about them. This could even help to make the first boss less of a left field choice.

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Verdant Wind might even have weakened Silver Snow further by taking it's content, for example, why isn't The Sleeping Sand Legend present in Silver Snow too? Wouldn't it make more sense that Seteth and Flayn asking Macuil to assist them in the war? Seteth should know where was Macuil hiding at more than Claude did just from a few books.

 

I don't think we should remove Verdant Wind whole as a route, but it should not be a copy of Silver Snow, which weakened both routes

From game developing perspective (rather than marketing), given the limited time and resources,

what they should do is keep Verdant Wind back from the release and focus on improving current routes (SS, CF particularly), then focus on VW as a post release content, preferably free to keep complains away.

Edited by Timlugia
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1 hour ago, Timlugia said:

Verdant Wind might even have weakened Silver Snow further by taking it's content, for example, why isn't The Sleeping Sand Legend present in Silver Snow too? Wouldn't it make more sense that Seteth and Flayn asking Macuil to assist them in the war? Seteth should know well where did Macuil hid more than Claude does.

I agree; that was really weird. That said, I've played two routes so far (Crimson Flower and Verdant Wind), and in both routes, the House Leader's paralogue was ill-fitting and rather detached from who they are as a character:

In Crimson Flower, Edelgard's post-timeskip paralogue is weirdly similar to Hilda's pre-timeskip paralogue: Hilda's brother Holst is sick from food-poisoning at the exact same time as Nader is at Fodlan's Throat, demanding a rematch. What does any of this have to do with Edelgard?

In Verdant WInd, I guess finding Macuil reflects Claude's curiosity about Fodlan. But it's really only very loosely related to Claude and it would've made more sense as something that you could also do in Silver Snow. 

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That's a pretty good point on 1. I didn't think about that since VW was the third route I played, but I would've been confused too. The cutscene however makes perfect sense in SS. Yeah I definitely agree with Claude being the least important. I do enjoy the character though, even though he's a bit scummy in VW. Yeah my biggest problem with the whole route is that it's so similar to SS, but I usually pointed that critique towards SS not VW. But all of what you say makes perfect sense and I agree, but Claude as a lead character is still good. The fact that Byleth is basically the lead character of SS is . . . troubling.

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On 5/3/2020 at 4:20 PM, Crysta said:

why can’t Claude alone can’t make the plot (subjectively) better? There are parts in VW which do handle the same plot beats better than SS which are facilitated by him and are confusing when Seteth attempts to replace him (Judith’s involvement, the Fort Merceus mission, possibly something else I’m forgetting). Sharing the spotlight with Claude, who sticks with you throughout the story, is still better than having the narrative centered around a self-insert character with few discernible character traits and none of the fun customization bits.

edit: I guess the better question is what the church route actually add plot wise that isn’t covered in CF/AM. It’s not like you have a shortage of Edelgard or Rhea there and I don’t think the church is given more characterization. You got the Byleth origin stuff, but I wouldn’t genuinely want to play through the entirety of SS just for that... cuz it’s boring.

Sure Claude sharing the spotlight makes it better so players aren't stuck with the blank slate character as the primary focus. And yes some moments VW made more sense like anything to do with Judith. However, during the important and peak moments of the game(Edelgard's betrayal, Byleth killing Edelgard), for VW, it was confusing and just bad.

What SS adds is the emotional impact through the Edelgard vs Byleth drama. What SS is different from other routes is no prior relationship with Edelgard. SS is the only route you get to know Edelgard before going war against her. If you played CF before VW, then this wouldn't be a problem. However, if you play VW first time around, this scene has very little impact and ruins it. 

On 5/3/2020 at 5:38 PM, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

What I'm saying though is that I don't think there is a winning situation from sidelining the Alliance. They are very likely to end up underdeveloped when just existing as a segment of the other routes. Even while VW exists the Alliance's history and structure is relatively unexplored. And that would just draw the same complaints as people already have now, especially since they're 1/3 of the entire country in a three-pronged war. If they do spend more time fleshing out the Alliance, that is to the potential detriment of the other routes' existing plot as well.

That is true didn't think much about that. 

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7 hours ago, leesangstar10 said:

However, during the important and peak moments of the game(Edelgard's betrayal, Byleth killing Edelgard), for VW, it was confusing and just bad.

How is it confusing that she betrays you when she isn't your student?

Byleth killing Edelgard isn't the confusing part, either, it's why she's suddenly calling him teacher and being unusually deferential to him. And honestly it took me reflecting on it afterward to notice it doesn't really fit. It's certainly not enough to recommend it over the other routes. If you want to explore a complicated relationship with Edelgard rife with drama AM does it much, much better and has more than just two pretty cutscenes covering it before you have to murder her. Hell, I'd argue you get to know her much better there too and she isn't even your student.

The "emotional impact" of Byleth versus Edelgard in SS may work better if you play it first, maybe. And I wouldn't be surprised if it was still disappointing, because it certainly was for me (but I played it last, so...).

EDIT: Hard agree that both the Church and the Alliance are criminally unexplored, particularly when they have routes where it would make sense for them to be explored more thoroughly. Claude getting bits that make more sense in SS also points towards it being a rough draft they didn't bother to return to; VW cannibalizing the plot outline of SS makes more sense if there were time/resource restrictions at play later on in development. Not sure why they didn't drop the Saint paralogues in SS when it already existed.

Edited by Crysta
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I would much much much prefer we just do away with SS entirely. VW isn't the mistake SS is and always will be the mistake imo. Three houses main appeal will always be the three lords Claude, Dimitri and Edelgard. The story heavily invests in all three of them so thinking that a route with no of them is going against exactly the whole point of the game.  I mean the game makes it a point that only the two other lords Hubert and Dedue are not recruitable as students for a reason. Yes yes I have heard of SS supposedly being the initial concept route but I think that is a case of the devs getting too attached to an early idea tbh.  Once they fleshed out the lords more they should have realized just how much investment they put into each of them and how much they make the story more interesting and how much a lack of one of them goes against the entire appeal of the game. People don't play VW, AM or CF for the students as much as they do the lord of there choosing. The recruiting students system only makes this much much more of a thing seeming as you can recruit literally everyone else with only minor exceptions in every single route.

Edited by vikingsfan92
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I wouldn't say any of the routes need to be gotten rid of I would say that vw just needs a massive overhaul. I understand that it was for budget restraints but literally copying an entirely different route was uncalled for and Claude deserve better.

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On 5/3/2020 at 7:35 AM, Ottservia said:

But at least in SS there’s an actually meaningful thematic conflict in the form of Byleth vs Edelgard. We don’t have any of that in VW like at all. Sure Claude may make the route feel a little more substantial and fun to go through but it’s no less empty than SS cause there’s no deeper more meaningful conflict here besides the whole surface level “can’t let the empire win”. There’s no depth to that conflict at least as far as Claude or Byleth is concerned. Neither of them have really any stake in it and that’s why I peg it lower than SS cause at least with SS the conflict is actually meaningful to the characters involved.

You don't need meaningful thematic conflict all the time. Moreover, the absence of thematic conflict in VW sorta feels like the point of the route. 

VW was never about thematic conflict, and honestly with CF and AM being full of thematic conflict, I don't think we needed ANOTHER thematic conflict in SS. Sure it sounds great on paper, but it's just redundant and unrealistic.

What I think made VW stronger narratively and realistically than SS, is that not everyone WOULD have some thematic conflict. That's not how real life goes. That's not how history goes. Claude's route is about being the outside in a war that's not even his. It's about having a far off perspective of the conflict and understanding it goes deeper than some silly war between Edelgard and the Church. 

Sometimes conflict isn't meaningful, it's just conflict and I think that's what Claude's route portrayed in the best way possible. Stuck in a war that's not even his own, and fighting against two tyrants vying for their power and control. We don't always get a stake in war, and that makes the conflict both painful and meaningful to the characters. 

To me what made Claude's route strong (not that it didn't have numerous flaws), was that it was truly the route free of bias. Edelgard had a LOT of bias. Dimitri had a LOT of bias. Rhea had probably the most bias. And so when you follow their stories you miss so much because none of them look at what's happening objectively. Claude offers that objective look at the war and the situation, that I think 3H really needed.

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10 minutes ago, Kiran_ said:

You don't need meaningful thematic conflict all the time. Moreover, the absence of thematic conflict in VW sorta feels like the point of the route. 

VW was never about thematic conflict, and honestly with CF and AM being full of thematic conflict, I don't think we needed ANOTHER thematic conflict in SS. Sure it sounds great on paper, but it's just redundant and unrealistic.

What I think made VW stronger narratively and realistically than SS, is that not everyone WOULD have some thematic conflict. That's not how real life goes. That's not how history goes. Claude's route is about being the outside in a war that's not even his. It's about having a far off perspective of the conflict and understanding it goes deeper than some silly war between Edelgard and the Church. 

Sometimes conflict isn't meaningful, it's just conflict and I think that's what Claude's route portrayed in the best way possible. Stuck in a war that's not even his own, and fighting against two tyrants vying for their power and control. We don't always get a stake in war, and that makes the conflict both painful and meaningful to the characters. 

To me what made Claude's route strong (not that it didn't have numerous flaws), was that it was truly the route free of bias. Edelgard had a LOT of bias. Dimitri had a LOT of bias. Rhea had probably the most bias. And so when you follow their stories you miss so much because none of them look at what's happening objectively. Claude offers that objective look at the war and the situation, that I think 3H really needed.

that's great and all but then that begs the question, why should I care about anything that happens? If the characters don't care, then I sure as hell won't care. If there are no stakes personal or otherwise, there's no tension and without tension you lose interest. The fact the characters have no stake in the conflict at hand just makes everything kind of boring. There's no struggle. Nothing to really overcome you're just kinda going through the motions. There's nothing learned or gained by the end. There's no build up to anything and without that you have no payoff. There's just nothing really here. There's nothing to really keep me invested. I like claude and he's a fine enough character if he doesn't care about what's happening, why should I? Things in this story just kinda happen because plot really. It just feels like the plot is just kinda dragging the characters along instead of the other way around. Like it doesn't feel like characters are doing things in this story out of some kind of agency but rather because they just need an excuse to exist within this story. I dunno if that made sense but that's how I feel

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9 minutes ago, Ottservia said:

that's great and all but then that begs the question, why should I care about anything that happens? If the characters don't care, then I sure as hell won't care. If there are no stakes personal or otherwise, there's no tension and without tension you lose interest. The fact the characters have no stake in the conflict at hand just makes everything kind of boring. There's no struggle. Nothing to really overcome you're just kinda going through the motions. There's nothing learned or gained by the end. There's no build up to anything and without that you have no payoff. There's just nothing really here. There's nothing to really keep me invested. I like claude and he's a fine enough character if he doesn't care about what's happening, why should I? Things in this story just kinda happen because plot really. It just feels like the plot is just kinda dragging the characters along instead of the other way around. Like it doesn't feel like characters are doing things in this story out of some kind of agency but rather because they just need an excuse to exist within this story. I dunno if that made sense but that's how I feel

Even if Verdant Wind doesn't have a meaningful thematic conflict, I'll take this route over an empty hollow route where a blank slate mute with no personality is forced to carry the story all by himself any day of the fucking week. A meaningful thematic conflict isn't enough to make Silver Snow better than Verdant Wind

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11 minutes ago, Gregster101 said:

Even if Verdant Wind doesn't have a meaningful thematic conflict, I'll take this route over an empty hollow route where a blank slate mute with no personality is forced to carry the story all by himself any day of the fucking week. A meaningful thematic conflict isn't enough to make Silver Snow better than Verdant Wind

maybe in a subjective sense. VW is definitely more enjoyable. I will agree to that but personally I'd rather my narratives have ideas and fail to execute on them rather than none at all. Cause that's really the difference between VW and SS. SS has bad ideas while VW has no ideas.

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5 minutes ago, Ottservia said:

maybe in a subjective sense. VW is definitely more enjoyable. I will agree to that but personally I'd rather my narratives have ideas and fail to execute on them rather than none at all. Cause that's really the difference between VW and SS. SS has bad ideas while VW has no ideas.

Ideas isn't enough to make something good you know. That's like saying the Star Wars prequels are better than the sequels cuz "they had original ideas" while the sequels "had no ideas." Who the fuck says shit like that?

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13 minutes ago, Gregster101 said:

Ideas isn't enough to make something good you know. That's like saying the Star Wars prequels are better than the sequels cuz "they had original ideas" while the sequels "had no ideas." Who the fuck says shit like that?

That analogy doesn't work, as the analogy's statement is comparative ("The Star Wars prequels are better than the sequels") while your statement is an absolute ("Ideas aren't enough to make something good"). Both can be true: having original ideas can be considered a valid metric for one piece of media being considered better than another while at the same time saying ideas aren't enough to consider something good. 

 

Also, the prequels are better than the sequels, and that is one reason why they are better, but that's beside the point.

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3 minutes ago, vanguard333 said:

That analogy doesn't work, as the analogy's statement is comparative ("The Star Wars prequels are better than the sequels") while your statement is an absolute ("Ideas aren't enough to make something good"). Both can be true: having original ideas can be considered a valid metric for one piece of media being considered better than another while at the same time saying ideas aren't enough to consider something good. 

 

Also, the prequels are better than the sequels, and that is one reason why they are better, but that's beside the point.

Rise of Skywalker, maybe. But that's a can of wormholes for another day.

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8 minutes ago, Gregster101 said:

Rise of Skywalker, maybe. But that's a can of wormholes for another day.

In any case, having ideas is a valid metric when it comes to analysing a piece of media. It's not enough on its own, as it's all down to the execution of those ideas, but something bad that's at least trying to be original and has good, creative ideas is better than something that isn't trying at all. 

For an example, as much as I can't stand Code Geass and I think it's a writing trainwreck, I would still say the first season at least is worth watching for its neat concepts, even though the execution is terrible. I would not say the show is good; far from it, but I also can't say it's all terrible when it isn't. 

Going back to Three Houses, I would say that both Silver Snow and Verdant Wind have something to contribute in terms of their ideas and concepts, but, for both of them, the execution falls short.  

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But VW presents some ideas... It's literally about how u need an outside view sometimes to see the big picture since all three Edelgard,Rhea and Dimitris point of views are way to disturbed by emotions and personal bias.

Rhea wants to protect her own and wants what she had lost back so much that she doesn't care how Fodland and its people are affected by it.

Dimitri also is trapped in the past, his whole story is about letting go of the guilt and rage he had for almost his entire life, he's so focused on his own inner doing that he's unable to see the big picture.

Edelgard is so overfocused on the future and the destruction of the church that she wants to get to it asap, without thinking of the long time consequences and without even questioning if the believes she backs those on are true in the first place.

So the only one left to uncover the truth is Claude. Someone who is not affected by the tragedies Fodland has seen and the trauma that came with it.
While i think the execution is poorly done something THs story suffers under a lot i still think VW had some ideas

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3 hours ago, Ottservia said:

that's great and all but then that begs the question, why should I care about anything that happens? If the characters don't care, then I sure as hell won't care. If there are no stakes personal or otherwise, there's no tension and without tension you lose interest. The fact the characters have no stake in the conflict at hand just makes everything kind of boring. There's no struggle. Nothing to really overcome you're just kinda going through the motions. There's nothing learned or gained by the end. There's no build up to anything and without that you have no payoff. There's just nothing really here. There's nothing to really keep me invested. I like claude and he's a fine enough character if he doesn't care about what's happening, why should I? Things in this story just kinda happen because plot really. It just feels like the plot is just kinda dragging the characters along instead of the other way around. Like it doesn't feel like characters are doing things in this story out of some kind of agency but rather because they just need an excuse to exist within this story. I dunno if that made sense but that's how I feel

Why would you not care? If the other routes are all biased perspectives without anyone really searching for the truth, you can be sure I REALLY care about the route that is all about solving the mysteries left behind from the other routes. 

Also it's sorta like you missed the whole struggle. They all have stakes in the conflict, they're just not thematic stakes. You're acting as if because there's no thematic message there aren't stakes/struggle/agency of the characters?

Claude is struggling to keep the Alliance whole. He's struggling against racism. He's struggling against a war that's killing people for a history that's been warped.

The build up is everything to do with the mystery presented before him. The mystery of what is the true story behind Edelgard's version and Dimitri's blind acceptance/anger and Rhea's built up lies of the church. That's the build-up. And therein lies the payoff.

Just because you weren't personally invested in the mystery, doesn't mean you can say it didn't exist. And you're right—the plot does happen to VW characters—but at the same time, that's what makes their story powerful. Because they're trying to regain and find their agency that was stolen from them by the war. I think it's actually a brilliant thing to do. A story focused around characters who fight for their agency. To me that doesn't feel like an excuse to exist, it feels like a story we don't get told very often, which is why I appreciated it so much. Could it have been done better? Absolutely. But at the core, there's nothing wrong with a story like that.

I understand what you're saying, I'm just saying I think you're focusing on one issue—themes—and ignoring that everything else does in fact exist in that route. VW has great ideas. I just think the execution wasn't the best.

And I say all this with VW being my least favorite of the main 3 routes between the house leaders. I felt VW gave me a much more interesting perspective that was also highly more realistic (to me) than SS did. And I feel like there was a lot more potential in VW with the story they were *trying* to tell. 

Edited by Kiran_
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37 minutes ago, Kiran_ said:

Why would you not care? If the other routes are all biased perspectives without anyone really searching for the truth, you can be sure I REALLY care about the route that is all about solving the mysteries left behind from the other routes. 

Also it's sorta like you missed the whole struggle. They all have stakes in the conflict, they're just not thematic stakes. You're acting as if because there's no thematic message there aren't stakes/struggle/agency of the characters?

Claude is struggling to keep the Alliance whole. He's struggling against racism. He's struggling against a war that's killing people for a history that's been warped.

The build up is everything to do with the mystery presented before him. The mystery of what is the true story behind Edelgard's version and Dimitri's blind acceptance/anger and Rhea's built up lies of the church. That's the build-up. And therein lies the payoff.

Just because you weren't personally invested in the mystery, doesn't mean you can say it didn't exist. And you're right—the plot does happen to VW characters—but at the same time, that's what makes their story powerful. Because they're trying to regain and find their agency that was stolen from them by the war. I think it's actually a brilliant thing to do. A story focused around characters who fight for their agency. To me that doesn't feel like an excuse to exist, it feels like a story we don't get told very often, which is why I appreciated it so much. Could it have been done better? Absolutely. But at the core, there's nothing wrong with a story like that.

I understand what you're saying, I'm just saying I think you're focusing on one issue—themes—and ignoring that everything else does in fact exist in that route. 

let me put to you another way. Let's say we have two characters and we make them fight one another. There's no unique strategies, no motivation for either of them to be fighting each other, nor do either of them have any personal stake in the fight. They are simply just a random obstacle that is in the way. Now you tell me how interesting that fight would be from a storytelling perspective. It is the same deal with verdant wind. There's definitely conflict in this story but why should I care? None of the characters seem to really care about what's going on. They just kinda want it to end which is fine if a bit basic. This war doesn't mean anything to them. It doesn't advance any of their arcs. It's just kind of an obstacle in their way. Yeah there's a mystery but that mystery is very poorly built up and the pay off is negligible at best. It's only really brought up a couple times in part 1 only to be unceremoniously info-dumped on you once you rescue Rhea and then you go fight mole people. Nothing is really gained out of solving that mystery nor is that mystery really properly addressed in any real capacity. No one is searching for any leads or anything. Also(and I could be very well be misremembering here) there's no real as to why this mystery needs to be solved in the first place. Obviously we, the audience, want to know because world building but why does Claude want to know so badly? I don't think that's ever really addressed. Like given what we know about his character there's really not much of a reason for him to care. He just kinda wants to fuck off to Almyra and end Racism or take over Foldlan and end Racism either way solving the mystery and fighting nemisis has literally nothing to do with that. It's just something he just happens to do. It's basic storytelling 101. You give a character a goal and make them take steps towards attaining that goal. The conflicts they encounter along the way should be thematically relevant to that goal. That's just how you write a story.

In terms of mystery stories specifically, the mystery needs to be intriguing, properly built up, a reason to solve, and have a satisfying payoff. To build a proper mystery you need lay clues, hints, even red herrings so that the road to solving that mystery is interesting and engaging. VW doesn't really do any of that if I recall and the answer to the questions the mystery raises aren't really all that satisfying in my opinion.

Edited by Ottservia
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What? They definitely care about the Empire invading their home.

Claude's ThEmAtIc CoNfLiCt is Edelgard's war and Rhea's dogma, which are conflicts not unlike many presented in Fire Emblem (it's usually one or the other, sometimes both). He does have a clearly stated goal and obstacles, and an invested interest in how the war unfolds. You can complain about him not having nearly as strong as a personal connection and internal conflict as the other two, I guess, but that's not what you're complaining about so...

The rest of the Golden Deer have the same amount of stakes as the members of the two other Houses.

You know who has even less internal conflict? Byleth. There's no vehicle less suited for spinning a compelling mystery, and SS has the added disappointment of not fleshing out not one (Edelgard) but two (Rhea) significant sources of conflict. You don't really explore them, interact with them much more meaningfully than in the other routes (though the fight scene between Byleth and Edelgard is something more, I guess), and they end up essentially being two more things you just have to defeat on your way to God Emperor-ness. It's a bowl of fake fruit. VW never really presents itself as anything beyond what it is, and what it is does have value.

Edited by Crysta
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