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I've not played the Age of Wonders, but I have played their great great grandfather, Master of Magic. I greatly enjoy it, and still play it from time to time, but it's definitely not a well calibrated game, lol. Would be interesting to see how they expanded on and mutated the formula into its own thing.

TO Reborn is...weird. It makes many improvements over the PSP version. But, at the same time, it still keeps a lot of its mechanical bloat, and also overcorrects in some particularly cruddy ways. I would say it's a good SRPG that was almost great, and the fact that it sabotages itself out of greatness frustrates me plenty. At least we can mod a decent portion of it now, which means it could, theoretically, achieve greatness someday. When that will happen, though, is anyone's guess. ...I am hoping they will do a better job with the FFT remake, though I understand that there are certain core aspects of it that don't hold up today, and that, being a popular game, it's likely going to come under fire if it attempts any drastic changes. Square Enix could very well surprise us, however. We will see.

Well I was unaware this place had an effortpost on FFTA. I would like a link to it.

TBH, I do find it weird how both of the FFTAs decided to take place in an explicitly fantastic "made up" world and largely go for a structure of "random", loosely tied missions in contrast to FFT. I'm not sure why they chose this direction, but it probably had something to do with the games being on handhelds, and those consoles largely being aimed at a young audience. I do wonder if FFT will ever get a new notable entry, and if it will be worth playing. I'm sure people will be expecting something like FFT, and it will definitely have modern sensibilities, but I'm not sure Square Enix will see the value in it. Maybe if the purported FFT remake comes out and is received well, I guess.

Loved the intro to this one, lol. This Tahra expedition seems to be taking forever. I really wonder how far Leif is, and how much padding Kaga wanted to put in this game.

Ah yes, honor. Such a simple yet enticing thing that drives people to madness. So the standard Fire Emblem formula for enemy formations. 😄 A+ trash talk here, lol. Would love to see more of that.

LOL oops. Looks like I jinxed you. Or perhaps the game? This whole bit is very very funny. "Ah yes, how dare they use...strategy in battle! What cowardly nitwits!!"

Soooo I've played enough Tactics Ogre: Reborn to give my final thoughts on it. I was initially turned off by some of its annoying choices, most notably the bloated stats on late game bosses, but after adjusting to the game's quirks, I've become far more amenable to it. It's a good SRPG by its own merits, and pretty good for a remake, but I would say it is rather overcosted at its base price. At 50% off, it's well worth picking, especially if you are a fan of the Ogre series of games.

Seems like you're finally in the part where Thracia gets good. And all it required was suffering through 4-5 generic opening levels.

One of the few times a Fire Emblem level actually deals with very real problems, like resource scarcity and political tensions causing misery to the common folk. Still don't get how a poor state like Thracia can maintain such a big army of wyverns though. 😛

Dagdar's men must be pretty crappy if they could be made to turn on him so easily. I guess he couldn't do better for a bandit gang, but still.

And so begins the long retreat. Fun little chapter, loved the clever callbacks to Genealogy.

Wait, so the Evil Empire actually has preserved bodies of the victims of Bellhalla? That's interesting, if not also quite morbid. Does Galzus do anything notable or is he there just to stand menacingly at the entrance of the evil castle? It seems like he spawns quite far away from the team. Also, I finally have an answer to my dilemma: I voted for the GBA FEs, while I am no big fan of the animu portraits they definitely nail the mood and style quite well otherwise. Meanwhile, Thracia's art so far has mostly been a mediocre copy of Genealogy's, with the only noticeable change really being the portraits, which, while technically better, are not above the bar of animu slop enough to make up for the rest.

LOL Toothpaste Game. Guessing that's a mild mockery of Alear's weird hairstyle.

This came up while debating how they should be ordered in a randomizer list. I'm curious as to how this community(and possibly the FE community at large) chooses to refer to them. So I made this. 😄