FE Echoes: SOV really was the best game to come out of 2017, mainly because it was a return to what made fire emblem great for me in the first place with so much more added. To start, full voice acting was something that I was not expecting but definitely appreciated. I know that a lot of people enjoy voicing the characters themselves when they play, but some of the voices that were given to characters were perfect. The art style was also refreshing, as was the way that they showed combat scenes. In my opinion, the cutscenes in echoes were the best that we have gotten in any FE game, and any game that came out this year. BOTW's cutscenes were great as well, but I like how the cutscenes of Echoes differentiated themselves from the way the game normally looked, making every cutscene seem important and something worth paying attention to. This difference is something that I feel other games lacked this year, and it's just something that I like to see in games. Those are just aesthetic preferences, though. The game itself was pretty well balanced, save for a couple levels where there could be trouble with cantors. The maps could be called empty and bland at points, but I feel that these similar maps that you would find in the countryside worked better with their emptiness, making the concepts of travel, distance and exploration stand out. In simpler terms, bigger maps feels more adventurous. The class system in Echoes was also very well designed, as tier 3 units were what I had missed the most from Radiant Dawn. The changes to healing and magic and the removal of axes also didn't really affect my enjoyment of combat that much. The only thing that I do have to complain about with the combat is the minimum 1 damage you have to take, as it kind of weakens tanks in this game when they're facing down hordes of enemies. Echoes' gameplay was not perfect, but it was intuitive and I understood their reasoning for every choice that the developers made. As for the story, Echoes had the best story by far this year. Although there was already a framework in place thanks to Gaiden, the story was fleshed out completely in Echoes. The dual lord concept was also done very well, and the progression of the plot worked wonderfully with the progression of enemy strength. The last thing I have to touch on is the soundtrack, and the only thing I have to say about that is that I've listened to the music for more time than I've spent playing the game. In the end, Echoes was a refreshing installment in the FE series that deserved more recognition than it got, with an engaging cast, powerful story, well paced combat and an almost unparalleled soundtrack. Other games this year were also great, but Echoes did two things that no other game did: beat all of my expectations and keep my attention to this day.
