Just finished all 4 routes

[Gilad Pellaeon]

And I truly wish they had opted for more of a Revelations "true path" for SS as DLC over what we got. The Cindered Shadows was a real let down as a DLC for a few reasons, and I wouldn't mind it if it wasn't the only story DLC. 

I really do love 3H, but the game is plagued with some puzzling flaws and a solution that seems obvious to me. SS needed to be cut and reworked. That would allow for more time for CF and for VW to be worked into better states than they are in now. Edelgard and CF is my favorite route, but AM is the only route that feels complete and fully fleshed out. 

[Ertrick36]

I think if anything Verdant Wind is the one that needed a rework the most.  Claude's role in the story really doesn't feel all that relevant, and a lot of character buildup for him didn't amount to much.  They originally intended for him to employ questionable ethics, but they didn't follow through, so his troublemaker nature remained that of a fun-loving prankster instead of that of maybe changing to a man willing to use underhanded tactics to win the war.

Although yes, Silver Snow is also kind of a let down.  It's mostly due to them trying to push Byleth as the lord when Byleth is such a non-character.  While you may feel a connection with the students, you don't actually feel you have any connection to Byleth him/herself.  And while the characters all get their times to speak their minds about certain events, Byleth's story is really the focus of the big plot elements unique to SS, and really the only reason you care about it is because of the implications it has for the rest of the world.

I do think CF and AM were good, though.  CF is pretty short and probably could've done with an expansion, but AM is the definitive path in this game with the most polish.

I also think that they should've made the first part of the game more interesting in subsequent playthroughs.  Offer more than what we had to differentiate the three houses - perhaps different missions or spins on missions aside from just the different narratives offered.  As awful as the story in Fates was, as was the practice of dividing the game into three separately sold paths, they did well to make playthroughs of the different paths feel very different from one another.  I'm not sure if TH could do it in exactly the same way, but they should've done something to better differentiate the houses in Part 1.

[Gilad Pellaeon]

VW and SS are basically the same, with VW needing minor tweaks and a changed final boss to Rhea over Nemesis, but is otherwise much closer to a finished product than SS. 

CF just need to have more to it. 

But reworking and remaking SS from the ground up into a more "correct" route would be the most optimum solution to me, as Fódlan has a lot going for it, but with 4 radically different endings, we won't ever see this world again. 

Tellius is and was my favorite world, and the hints that this might share a glove with Tellius would be great if IS could follow up on it, but they can't. 

[Boomhauer007]

4 hours ago, Gilad Pellaeon said:

And I truly wish they had opted for more of a Revelations "true path" for SS as DLC over what we got

This would have completely subverted the entire point of what the game was trying to do. 

[ciphertul]

14 hours ago, Boomhauer007 said:

This would have completely subverted the entire point of what the game was trying to do. 

They make a good point. Without a canon ending the is little to no chance of a sequel to 3H

[Gilad Pellaeon]

20 hours ago, Boomhauer007 said:

This would have completely subverted the entire point of what the game was trying to do. 

The entire point of the game was that you cannot have a singular end to media? Because I really doubt that was IS's entire thesis here.

 

6 hours ago, ciphertul said:

They make a good point. Without a canon ending the is little to no chance of a sequel to 3H

I'm not even saying that you have to have a happy ending, but I really don't think that any of the current 4 endings are the canon one. 

[Alistair]

7 hours ago, Gilad Pellaeon said:

The entire point of the game was that you cannot have a singular end to media? Because I really doubt that was IS's entire thesis here.

I think the argument is that a Revelations-style "true ending" would undermine the idea that all of the choices are equally valid, which I think most would argue is a point in the game's favor. The difficult-to-answer questions at the heart of TH's narrative (how and why do institutions contribute to societal problems? what is the best approach to remedy those societal ills?) are appealing in that context because the player arrives to their own conclusion. And it's not like the routes are completely open-ended: each has a conclusive ending, if not necessarily a satisfying one, so it's not as if each position isn't given the platform to argue for itself.  And if we're talking in terms of IS' (really Koei Tecmo's) intentions, then  the Nintendo Dream interview from around when Cindered Shadows released seems to imply that their intent was for people to play a single route and discuss amongst others what their preferred position is. 

 

7 hours ago, Gilad Pellaeon said:

I'm not even saying that you have to have a happy ending, but I really don't think that any of the current 4 endings are the canon one. 

Genuinely asking here: what is the difference between a "canon" ending and a "happy" one?

[SimplyUnknown]

43 minutes ago, Alistair said:

Genuinely asking here: what is the difference between a "canon" ending and a "happy" one?

According to the internet, "In fiction, canon is the material accepted as officially part of the story in the fictional universe of that story. It is often contrasted with, or used as the basis for, works of fan fiction."  The idea, for Three Houses at least, is that one of the paths would be the 'canon' path, or the path confirmed in the Fire Emblem universe that Byleth took. If the people who made this game posted that 'yes, this specific path is canon', then that makes the other three paths non-canon and thus false.

But a canon ending doesn't have to be a happy ending. Let's also say that when the people who made this game announced a path as canon, they also announced that there were no recruitments and thus everyone else died in this canon ending. For a lot of people, that would be considered a non-perfect or a not happy ending because probably a lot of characters they liked ended up dead. But it would be the canon path that the developers decided was true.

The thing is that for a lot of video games, it is generally accepted that the 'golden ending' is usually the 'true ending' as well, because it typically requires players to do certain specific things and wraps things up neatly. A good example of this would probably be FE: Binding Blade, where if you completed all the Gaiden chapters and kept the legendary weapons intact, you unlocked the true ending which had more chapters and wrapped things up more neatly than the other endings. So the golden endings are treated as canon more often in other media based off the games because they usually provide more information and a more complete story than alternate paths.

It's also more awkward for games like Three Houses with separate paths because considering the morality that goes into each path, having one path be the 'canon' path would make the other paths, and thus the other moralities, wrong. And considering how fluid morality is, that isn't really a great message to send.

[Gilad Pellaeon]

17 hours ago, Alistair said:

Genuinely asking here: what is the difference between a "canon" ending and a "happy" one?

A canon ending is just an ending that is the one that is chosen to continue the narrative. Not that any of the current routes aren't capable of being declared canon, just that generally there isn't a declared ending when they are all so radically different. To put it another way, if in the Knights of the Old Republic game back in 2003 the Dark Side ending was declared the canon ending, it means that the following games and universe would treat it as such. That would obviously not be a "happy" ending, but just the ending.

So if they remade SS to be the canon ending and had Edelgard play the villain and have her die at the end, I would not consider that a happy ending, but it would be the canon one. Currently, the AM feels the closest to a canon ending because not all the other house leaders are killed.

Another example I just thought of is XCOM2, in which you lose the first game. The canon path of the current XCOM universe is that the player did not win in XCOM1.

 

16 hours ago, SimplyUnknown said:

It's also more awkward for games like Three Houses with separate paths because considering the morality that goes into each path, having one path be the 'canon' path would make the other paths, and thus the other moralities, wrong. And considering how fluid morality is, that isn't really a great message to send.

That's why I would have advocated for a more nuanced route that combined them all, because almost all of the routes could have been combined if the leaders had talked to each other, because in general, none of their goals are even opposing. All want to destroy Those Who Slither in the Dark, intentionally or otherwise, all want a better future for Fódlan, and the issue between them all in their past hurts and their inability to trust others.

Even with a canon path I don't think you need to imply that the morality espoused there is per se the correct one. You could even have options where Byleth openly disagrees with the chosen path, but for moral or ethical reasons can't join the other side either. If you keep Edelgard the villain, Byleth may just find it more egregious to work with TWSitD than Rhea and crew despite them also being flawed.

Edited May 28, 2020 by Gilad Pellaeon
Added a quote.

[Pikappa93]

I'm in my Verdant Wind playthrough, and yes, I also wish they'd give Claude more character. I love him to death nonetheless. 

I still have to play Silver Snow. 

Crimson Flower and Azure Moon both satisfied me (even though Crimson Flower really needed more of it). 

But I can say that overall I love the worldbuilding TH has, opposed to the letdown that Fates was. 

EDIT: Speaking of worldbuilding, if we ever get a sequel of sorts, I'd like it to take place out of Fódlan, like in Dagda or maybe even Almyra. There's so much potential in there. 

Edited June 2, 2020 by Pikappa93

[Gilad Pellaeon]

On 6/2/2020 at 6:42 PM, Pikappa93 said:

Speaking of worldbuilding, if we ever get a sequel of sorts, I'd like it to take place out of Fódlan, like in Dagda or maybe even Almyra. There's so much potential in there. 

There's almost no chance of anything set after 3H unless it's thousands of years later à la Awakening. 

Prequels, yes, but Fódlan has amazing worldbuilding. I don't know if Dagda could measure up. Or Almyra. 

At this point, I think the world is dead and buried. 

[Crysta]

Why couldn't they measure up? Fodlan is pretty standard fantasy fare, tbh.