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Serenes Forest's Teehee Thread


MisterIceTeaPeach

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  • Shrimpy -Limited Edition-

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41 minutes ago, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

I am trying to write down my Engage thoughts atm

in the meantime

MnM31St.png

 

…The mill of God may churn slowly, but it churns non the less. If Engage has done anything it has made me appreciate Dune, The Book of the Sun and The Coldfire Trilogy even more.

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5 minutes ago, Armagon said:

Shrimpy's Inti Creates arc?

Maybe? Who knows. I will try it some time this week it looks interesting.

Although not sure if i will get any new game atm with the backlog i have

17 minutes ago, Sidereal Wraith said:

If Engage has done anything it has made me appreciate Dune, The Book of the Sun and The Coldfire Trilogy even more.

Ok boomer

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8 minutes ago, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

Although not sure if i will get any new game atm with the backlog i have

It's an Inti Creates game so it's like 2-5 hours at most lol.

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I honestly didn't expect to like Merrin and Citrinne but I do now. Are there any characters you guys didn't expect to like but did?

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3 minutes ago, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

oh

lol ok

 

Yeah I think the longest Inti Creates game I played was either one of the ZX games or Blaster Master Zero 2. And even then, you shouldn't be going over like, 8 hours.

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LMAOOOOOOOO

Just now, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

So one real setting i see

Yeah pretty much.

Though maybe not Curse of the Moon 2 cause it's super repetitive. But that's when you bring friends over.

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I have to say, Engage makes some good silly Subversion Of Expectation jokes. The "run away" right at the start, and I just now saw Alcryst's introduction. Good kind of goofy.

Also, the player phase music is incredibly catchy.

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11 minutes ago, Armagon said:

Though maybe not Curse of the Moon 2 cause it's super repetitive.

Still need to play that

CotM 1 was fun, but way too jank sometimes

4 minutes ago, ping said:

Also, the player phase music is incredibly catchy.

If only it didn't get interrupted by EP music every time

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18 minutes ago, Armagon said:

Though maybe not Curse of the Moon 2 cause it's super repetitive. But that's when you bring friends over.

Curse of the Moon 2 with a friend was some serious fun. Iga is worse than Kaga.

10 minutes ago, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

If only it didn't get interrupted by EP music every time

Shrimpy be like:

"I fear no man.

But that thing...

It scares me."

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16 minutes ago, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

me: YES GIVE ALL THESE NEWCOMERS THE MIDDLE FINGER IS

Also ME: NO NOT LIKE THIS

Meanwhile I actually think it's one of the better enemy phase themes we've gotten. I kinda love the part where it goes "bop-bop bop-bop bop-bop" and the one where it goes "bobobop-bop-bop-bop" and the one where it goes "dooroo roo roo-roo roo"

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6 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Meanwhile I actually think it's one of the better enemy phase themes we've gotten. I kinda love the part where it goes "bop-bop bop-bop bop-bop" and the one where it goes "bobobop-bop-bop-bop" and the one where it goes "dooroo roo roo-roo roo"

It ain't that bad, i just hate interrupting music like this

and it's much worse than PP music. Like atleast be of the same quality...

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If only Alear could make money like Ness, then they would be able to donate to every country.

6 hours ago, ping said:

I'm not claiming that characters in other FE games are fully developed by chapter 6, but that Awakening, Fates, and now Engage (*) are a lot more in your face with their characters' quirks, and that even "more serious" characters are a lot more forthcoming with those quirks. I'm not talking characters that are all gimmick (like Arthur in Fates, or Treck or Ilyana before him), but characters that I assume are, well, actual characters, but whose dialogues still revolve around one or two gimmicks that are just there to be funny, endearing, or titilating - Peri being a murderous woman-child, Felicia's clumsiness, and Camilla's obsession with Corrin, to take three Fates examples.

That's just because it's probably easier to write unique dialogue for each character if they have a gimmick to make them distinct. There are only so many ways you can write "I leveled up" without it getting samey.

4 hours ago, Armagon said:

Compare it to Baten Kaitos Origins and Xenoblade 3, games that also introduced the cast at or near the start of the game. That is the central narrative, you need them to be there.

Yeah Xenoblade 3 has plenty of important characters... and Sena.

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3 minutes ago, Lightchao42 said:

If only Alear could make money like Ness, then they would be able to donate to every country.

I thought Leyf Faris Claus, pujee ass, Cowga and Reinhardt epicly taking children hostage was bad.

Geegagass, though. Hot damn that's on another level.

Also I like how his plan was just to take over Onnet specifically. What else? Was Porky's objective to epicly prank Lucas all along?

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19 minutes ago, Lightchao42 said:

That's just because it's probably easier to write unique dialogue for each character if they have a gimmick to make them distinct. There are only so many ways you can write "I leveled up" without it getting samey.

That might actually feed into my perception. I still think that characters in new FE games do fall back onto gimmicks more often than in older games in normal support convos, too, but level-up quotes and crit one-liners are also just things that didn't exist pre-Awakening and that naturally reference gimmicks very often.

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Fire Emblem Engage - Trials of a Hero

Fire Emblem. A tactical rpg series that always loves to change, and this time is no different, doing a complete 180 from the much beloved Three houses, the game sets out do  something, that being a tactical rpg...

And does it par excellence.

Story

Let's get the less important stuff out of the way first. The story in this game is...serviceable. Your average Fire Emblem story, good guys vs. Evil dragon played straight. Some really weak beats, especially early on, but also some really really strong beats.

Tellius Storytelling this ain't, but it's no Fates, either. 

Then again i am not a fan of most FE stories.

Characters

The Characters in this game are honestly quite cool, but they face two big problems

  • Frontloaded with the weakest characters
  • Slow support gains

Which will make the first impressions really bad to alot of people...but once you leave the early game the characters do get quite a bit better. Even the early characters get better with their support/interactions with later characters....but many people will sadly not see that.

Of note however is Alear & a certain spoilery character, both who are great and why some of the stronger story beats are as strong as they are. Alear in particular might now be my fav. FE lord...although tbf those very rarely do it for me, so props to Alear XD

Anyway, now to the meat of the game

Gameplay

The gameplay, oh the gameplay

I will qoute the devs from their interview here

Quote

 But in this title, we wanted to simplify the story structure by having one major goal, so that players can put their full focus into enjoying the tactical gameplay.

And i say they achieved that almost perfectly.

You start the game, your guard still down, learninig the mechanics and enjoying the tracks and then....

hVRm56Z.gif

Lumera & Sigurd bamboozle you and welcome you to the game, and set the tone for what's about to come. A challenge!

Let's start with titular Engage mechanic. Warps, multi tile nukes, strides and Ballista on demand. In any other game, these would've trivalized the game and made for a ROFLSTOMP...

Not the case here. Good luck surviving without them. They managed to give you tools that would be otherwise super op, and design a balanced and fun challenge around them....

And damn are the tools fun.

And thanks to that Engage mechanic, we got S++ Tier boss design. Bosses and enemy design have never been that good, and trying to figure out how to beat the bosse is damn amazing.

Honestly the boss design in this game is so good, that you could put on them on a flat map and they would still blow out most games out of the water...

The game thankfully tho doesn't go the lazy way and give us some actually really really cool maps. Maybe not Conquest tier in the map design, but the boss design elevates it to close Conquest tier. Heck, some of the late game maps really mirror conquest with how they were designed.

And even the unit design is amazing. Prime example being Alear. At early game looked like one of the weaker lords, but the amount of ultility they get thanks to their dragon typing, especially when you get Corrin later on elevates him to my fav. designed lord in the series, with Terrain manipulation and debuffs.

The game is also very anti juggernaut. Unless you inherit Pair up, a quite expensive skill in a game with tight resources, trying to juggernaut will end up with one of your units being on the wrong end of hearing this, and chain attack'd to oblivion. Especially with Brave Assist enemies.

Speaking about resources....i love how tight they are. This is like, the 2nd FE i have to think about the resources i have on hand. Many complain about the tight money and SP, but i think if it weren't for those the games wouldn't really work as it is. Fast skill learning would break the game.

Another thing to add to this wonderfully designed gameplay...the returnee maps. They remixed maps from older games....most of which sucked in their og game...

And made them fun! Some hella fun even!

Like, i didn't expect Ike to suddenly go "You thought you playing PoR? Nah, bro, we Conquest now" and suddenly gave me nam flashacks. Only 2 of the returnee maps i really didn't like, that being Lucina's and Celica's....but fixing Awakening and Gaiden is close to impossible, i guess lol. All others? Really fun! Even the FE4 map was fun, a thing i thought impossible before! Also all the remixed tracks from the older games. Nostalgia pur. Definetly a love letter to the long time fans.

The Final boss was also quite cool, although not the best in the series (i think), but definetly one of the better ones.

Music

The music in this game is really really good, with my (non remix) fav. being Bright Sandstorm, Determined Journey and Keeper of History. If there's something i have to complain about in this game....

Villain Dubstep, which sadly seems like a series mainstay now, and the return of Enemy phase music. I love most of the stuff they brought back, but this ain't it, chief. Should've stayed in the older games where even then it didn't belong, or atleast give us an option to turn it off....

Misc. Thoughts

  • This game has the best art design in the series and the cast diversity is really cool
  • Somniel was exactly what's needed after the chore that was the Monastery in 3H. Although i think some stuff to raise support between characters (other than the once per chapter food) would've been cool
  • The FIN art is probably my favourite official Art piece

Closing Words and hope for the future

FE Engage is a potential peak FE. Although for me to decide that i need to do a maddening run first to see if it will edge out Conquest Luna for me. If it does, that's my new fav. FE, if not, it's still top 3 FE after my current Hard/classic run.

You can see from that that when it comes to FE i am more of a gameplay person, even if i do enjoy the story titles quite a bit as well, that said...

FE had always had trouble balancing writing and gameplay (and different fans care about one or the other more), even though the gameplay integration in the series is really really strong, even in games with bad writing or bad gameplay, or bad at both, the integration tends to elevate everything further, bigger than the sum of it parts, so if they can make a game that get's both completely right, we might have peak gaming on our hands tbh, but it's pretty hard to do that.

Rating

Gameplay - S

Characters - B

Story - C

Music - A

Misc. - B

Score - 8.5-9/10, Maddening pending.

Edited by Shrimpy -Limited Edition-
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