Fate's problem

[Tolvir]

Today I decided to load Awakening back up. I haven't touched the game in a little over a year, and saw it on the shelf. Decided to load it up, and when I did, maybe it was nostalgia but I remembered a lot of the fun I had with the game, and the type of enjoyment I have had with all the other past Fire Emblem games. The interest in the story, even if it wasn't that great and full of holes, the connection to the characters, the world.

Then it hit me. I think what Fate's problem for me, and might be for a lot of others, is it feels so disconnected and not like Fire Emblem. Don't get me wrong, I like Fates, and think it did a great job gameplay wise over Awakening (story not so much, but that is debatable). The durability system being removed and replaced with the stat debuff and buff system, the refined pair up system, refined reclass, even features like My Castle and Multiplayer are steps in the right direction (My Castle leaves a lot to be desired, but a base building system in Fire Emblem is a great idea) and add another layer of strategy. But somewhere along the way of all the improvements and changes it lost something. It lost what Fire Emblem is somehow, and I am not entirely sure what that was. Maybe it was the drastic changes over one game, like the magic being so drastically different compared to the past, or maybe it was the newly designed classes. Part of it was definitely the lack of dialogue in the story, Fate's story content itself just felt so lacking even when compared to Awakening. Past Fire Emblem games I felt could really grab your attention with the characters and setting, even if it wasn't all that great. Fates didn't exactly do that. I will also say that while I like the characters of Fates, they aren't nearly as memorable as those in past games.

So my reason for posting this was my curiosity on how others felt about this. Does Fates not have that feel of a Fire Emblem game to you, or does it fit in with the others for you?

[Moonstone]

I absolutely agree. I have to say, for me, the downside is the My Castle and the removal of durability on weapons. Don't get me wrong, I love My Castle and the ability to stock up between battles, and seeing other people's castles, but the castle and the lack of weapon durability really takes away from the feeling of desperation the other Fire Emblem games had.

For me, what really made a Fire Emblem game feel special was the emotional impact it gave me. Most of the series is about a rag tag group of mostly do-gooders with little to their names fighting a corrupt and heavily armed army. Fates did not provide that same idea in my opinion. The redeeming feature of Fates, to me, was to play Conquest and fight the evil army from the inside out.

[Integrity]

i've put a bit of thought into this but this will probably still be a rambling post

fates' story content was more anime than the previous fire emblems, and definitely (pretty quantifiably) worse, but i don't feel like it wasn't a fire emblem story. it was just a really bad fire emblem story. it tried to do something different, and failed by ultimately not managing to be anything but a fire emblem story in the end. if it had managed to sever a little better and play less to type, i reckon it would have been much better

similarly most of the gameplay changes felt like improvements or distillations of the fire emblem formula - fates was, to me, largely, a better fire emblem game from strict gameplay. pair up was well, if not perfectly, done; weapon durability has only ever been a meme, far from actually being effective; the magic triangle has been consistently ignored in the games it wasn't straight-up forgotten about; etc. etc. hosido's weird redesigned classes were just reskins, not particularly more novel than whatever that shitty online versus fire emblem sim we played back in the day was.

i think the only thing that dragged it down for me was that fartes felt too connected. the base building was shambles, the between-mission resource gathering was just weird, and the thing that killed me was all the einherjar recruitments and visiting other peoples' castles and all that jazz. that's the thing that killed the fire emblem vibe - it no longer felt like a singleplayer campaign. awankening kind of had traces of that, but it wasn't quite as aggressively pushed as a base you went back to and looked around with actual mmorpg dailies to complete between every single mission.

no my castle, way better game

[Tolvir]

I absolutely agree. I have to say, for me, the downside is the My Castle and the removal of durability on weapons. Don't get me wrong, I love My Castle and the ability to stock up between battles, and seeing other people's castles, but the castle and the lack of weapon durability really takes away from the feeling of desperation the other Fire Emblem games had.

For me, what really made a Fire Emblem game feel special was the emotional impact it gave me. Most of the series is about a rag tag group of mostly do-gooders with little to their names fighting a corrupt and heavily armed army. Fates did not provide that same idea in my opinion. The redeeming feature of Fates, to me, was to play Conquest and fight the evil army from the inside out.

I can understand that. My Castle itself definitely was a little out of place, though I would love to see it refined a bit and made better because I think it can work. I can also understand your point about weapons in Fire Emblem. While I think the new system is better strategically (now the different weapons all have uses and there is a strategy of what to use and when), but it definitely lost a bit of the sense of desperation like you said.

I definitely agree with your second statement. Especially with Revelation the reason just wasn't there for any of it. In the last you know why the characters were fighting and who they were fighting. In Fates that wasn't as big, especially with Revelation. I think part of the big problem was lack of almost a ladder when it comes to the bad guy.. Before the bad guys all were almost in a tier in their "ranks" if you will. Over he course of the game you really climbed that ladder and fought the more important bad guys over time. Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn come to mind where it wasn't just Ashnard and Ashera that were he total focus the whole time. Smaller bad guys like Petrine or Jarod might of taken focus for a time. It gave a sense of accomplishment and growth to the characters, where Fates lacked that. Even though over time you fought Iago, Hans, and Garon they just lacked that focus and importance that characters like The Black Knight, Jarod, or Walmart had in the past.

[___]

To me what makes Fates so unlike what the other FEs are is the approach to the story and the character designs. It's too much like anime in its approach to character design that I really don't like most of the characters. It seems they wanted to push the series forward in some way, but they decided to do so by appealing to the crowd in an approach that is drastically different in atmosphere than previous FEs had done. I look back at the way character design was done back in games like PoR, RD, Sacred Stones, Shadow Dragon, etc, beautiful designs, and then I look at Fates, and I don't understand why the change was done.The story was narrowed down on just the main cast of characters, making the rest of the cast feel like standing ornaments, and it was so focused just on that handful of characters that the feeling of a group of underdogs taking on impossible odds to win a war, dethrone a tyrant, right all wrongs, and/or save the world wasn't there. This was a family matter, with just a side helping of some random villainous dragon that never had any impact as a character to be memorable.

For gameplay, I didn't find it lacking much in comparison to past FEs, I think for the most part it improved in almost every way. I say this about the combat system. The buff/debuff system needs polishing imo if they plan to keep it around and make it acceptable, but I do miss the weapon durability mechanic. The class divisions exist purely for story reasons, so that didn't really add much to the series.

[saisymbolic]

Fates was one step forward and another two steps back for me.

I like the game, don't get me wrong. It improved game play in terms of mechanics, map design, difficulty and soundtrack - to the point where I want such features to be refined and brought back in the next game - but the characters, the world, the narrative and the overall presentation lost a lot of what made a Fire Emblem game distinguishable from any other series.

My main issue with the game is the number of missed opportunities and apparent lapses in judgement. There are so many misuses of characters and concepts that it is ridiculous, and it just leaves me absolutely baffled. There are character conversations and interactions that should have been in the game, and they aren't (How come no one thought Azura and Shura should have a support? How come no one thought Reina and Orochi should have a support? How come no one thought Flora and Gunter should have a support?). The same can be said about the story line (Who thought it was a good idea to make Garon a cackling bad guy when we are forced to fight in his name during one route?) and how each faction is portrayed in the game (What ever happened to the whole "Nohr Invades Because of Famine" angle?). And, I know the previous games aren't perfect, and they themselves have some missed chances, but it seems as if the people working on Fates deliberately ignored using common sense for some of the mistakes and choices in the game.

Like . . . I don't know.

I can call it Fire Emblem. It was advertised as Fire Emblem. It plays like a Fire Emblem game. It's a part of the Fire Emblem series. But, it doesn't feel like a Fire Emblem game.

I just don't know.

Edited January 9, 2017 by saisymbolic

[NekoKnight]

I think part of the big problem was lack of almost a ladder when it comes to the bad guy.. Before the bad guys all were almost in a tier in their "ranks" if you will. Over he course of the game you really climbed that ladder and fought the more important bad guys over time. Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn come to mind where it wasn't just Ashnard and Ashera that were he total focus the whole time. Smaller bad guys like Petrine or Jarod might of taken focus for a time. It gave a sense of accomplishment and growth to the characters, where Fates lacked that. Even though over time you fought Iago, Hans, and Garon they just lacked that focus and importance that characters like The Black Knight, Jarod, or Walmart had in the past.

The story was narrowed down on just the main cast of characters, making the rest of the cast feel like standing ornaments, and it was so focused just on that handful of characters that the feeling of a group of underdogs taking on impossible odds to win a war, dethrone a tyrant, right all wrongs, and/or save the world wasn't there. This was a family matter, with just a side helping of some random villainous dragon that never had any impact as a character to be memorable.

This is the central weakness of the story. Despite Fates spanning 3 games, it was actually a massive scale reduction compared to past Fire Emblems. Most of the bosses you fight are your siblings or random generics with no lines (Faceless or Invisible Soldiers). There is no feeling that Nohr and Hoshido are living nations, it's just people who are directly relevant to the Avatar. How is it that in 3 games we have only 4 true villains (Garon, Hans, Iago and Anankos) none of whom are particularly interesting? Even the supporting cast is weak since the majority are the personal retainers of your siblings. There are only 2 major factions and we learn so little about either of them that the world feels empty and without character. So what we have left is a personal conflict and no overarching sense of purpose in the world. But even that story is told poorly. It's a black and white conflict that uses the deaths of the Avatar's loved ones as cheap fuel for drama.

Don't get me started on how morally perverse the story is. Fates is practically a manual on how to do everything wrong in a Fire Emblem story.

Edited January 9, 2017 by NekoKnight

[Azure Sen]

Speaking as someone who has admittedly been pretty critical of Fates as a whole, I don't know if a disconnect from what Fire Emblem "is" was a problem I had with Fates. How do we even begin to define what Fire Emblem "is" at its core? Is there even a universal experience of what Fire Emblem "is"?

That being said, I do agree that the removal of weapon durability and the addition of MyCastle were mistakes. The former had been badly implemented for a while, and its removal was probably inevitable, but removing it did get rid of a strategic element from the game (plus, it lead to even worse weapon balance than before). The latter was just a poorly balanced, poorly implemented failed effort to address the issues with Awakening, on top of the issues Integrity mentioned about it killing the single player feeling of the game.

It's too much like anime in its approach to character design that I really don't like most of the characters.

FE's always more or less followed the modern trends in anime when it comes to character design, though. FE 1 was the only exception, being strangely cartoonish in its designs for its time.

[Ryo]

Well, in one of the early interviews the developers did say that they intended to shape Fates up like "an anime where the player can live in", or something along those lines, so I guess it's only natural for us to have an anime feel from it, not just in terms of character design.

Edited January 9, 2017 by Ryo

[Tolvir]

Speaking as someone who has admittedly been pretty critical of Fates as a whole, I don't know if a disconnect from what Fire Emblem "is" was a problem I had with Fates. How do we even begin to define what Fire Emblem "is" at its core? Is there even a universal experience of what Fire Emblem "is"?

That being said, I do agree that the removal of weapon durability and the addition of MyCastle were mistakes. The former had been badly implemented for a while, and its removal was probably inevitable, but removing it did get rid of a strategic element from the game (plus, it lead to even worse weapon balance than before). The latter was just a poorly balanced, poorly implemented failed effort to address the issues with Awakening, on top of the issues Integrity mentioned about it killing the single player feeling of the game.

FE's always more or less followed the modern trends in anime when it comes to character design, though. FE 1 was the only exception, being strangely cartoonish in its designs for its time.

Fire Emblem at its core has always been about a group of characters. Chrom and the Shepards, Ike and the Greil Mercenaries, Miciah and the Dawn Brigade, etc. Fates didn't have that, it was about Corrin. All other characters were just props and devices used to further Corrin's story. No side characters matters like before. In Path of Radiance we had characters like Volke, Jill, Haar, Shinon, etc who were essentially side characters, but they still had something to do with the story. In Fates, no one really mattered outside of Corrin and the royals. Not even some of his retainers like Felicia, Jakob, or Silas really had that much importance. They just didn't matter. In Path of Radiance, if Volke went unhired or got killed, you would miss out on a bit of the story of Ike's father and Volke's backstory. In Fates, if Felicia dies it doesn't mean anything.

I don't think the inclusion of My Castle is completely a mistake. multiplayer has a place in Fire Emblem, but it's probably better served as late or end game. And I think if done correctly, a base building type of addition could work well with Fire Emblem. My Casltes problem was it was immersion breaking. It was in an out realm, held no story relevance at all, and took you out of the atmosphere between chapters. I think if next time it is placed on a map and is a location you can go to like in Awakening, that you build up yourself, it would work a lot better. That way it isn't breaking immersion every chapter. That and make the invasions and the castle itself a little more relevant. Put it at an actual location, and make the invasion a part of the story, like an actual defense chapter.

I also disagree with the strategic part of the durability system, j think the new system adds more strategy to weapons, though admittedly it is overpowered and can use some refinement. The old system was progression based. Once you moved to Steel Weapons, you had no reason to ever look back at Iron, and the same with Silver, outside of maybe what you could afford. Once you got to late game it became a game of just buying as many silver weapons as you could, with a couple of slayers or specialty weapons thrown in the mix. Now you have choices to make. Do you go more offensive and use the silver weapon, but leave yourself more vulnerable in the enemy phase, or so you use a bronze weapon to add more defense during that phase, etc. At the same time there is a glaring issue of balance wih some of the weapons, like the daggers/shuriken this time around.

Edited January 9, 2017 by Tolvir

[Thinks Their Own Way]

I think future games should be like Fates honestly; coming from who doesn't have nostalgia for the older, every time I see people talking about the more I don't want to play them. They just sound like chores to play gameplay wise and gameplay is the most more part of any video game that's what they are designed for and just give me good gameplay I'm happy and I think Fates gameplay is flawless.

[___]

FE's always more or less followed the modern trends in anime when it comes to character design, though. FE 1 was the only exception, being strangely cartoonish in its designs for its time.

Unfortunately true, but where older games give me this sense of it just being a general approach to the way the characters are designed across the two media, in Fates I'm left with the feeling that the anime-style approach was the focus of the designs, not the means to an end, but the very end goal itself.

Well, in one of the early interviews the developers did say that they intended to shape Fates up like "an anime where the player can live in", or something along those lines, so I guess it's only natural for us to have an anime feel from it, not just in terms of character design.

Guess I'll resign myself to the idea of never seeing anything like the previous games showing up again...

I can always ignore the story, but I hope they at least continue to improve the gameplay, that much is doing well I think.

[eclipse]

Honestly, I think the problem is the hype.

No, I don't have high expectations of the story. No, I don't really care about how sympathetic Character A is. What I care about is whether or not the game has the strategic elements and randomness that I've come to know and love, and the answer is YES. However, there was a LOT of hype early-on, and when the game released, I think the ensuing "but what about hype" killed it for people. I didn't expect the second coming of sliced bread, hence why I just shrugged at the elements I could skip (THE STORY, bad models), and enjoyed what I wanted (the actual gameplay).

[SalShich10N]

Honestly, I think the problem is the hype.

No, I don't have high expectations of the story. No, I don't really care about how sympathetic Character A is. What I care about is whether or not the game has the strategic elements and randomness that I've come to know and love, and the answer is YES. However, there was a LOT of hype early-on, and when the game released, I think the ensuing "but what about hype" killed it for people. I didn't expect the second coming of sliced bread, hence why I just shrugged at the elements I could skip (THE STORY, bad models), and enjoyed what I wanted (the actual gameplay).

More than hype for the story itself, is all the wasted potential. The mere idea of the game, to choose between siding your biological family and saving your birth nation or to side with your surrogate family and leading the invasion is already better than the final product. Just by glossing over the plot you get hype since the skeleton of the story is pretty well made, but once you get in it's disappointment, after disappointment. You don't even leave the bloody prologue and you're already wishing things were done differently. It's difficult not to get expectations specially being a fan of this series, specially if you're a fan of the Jugdral games since the plot is relatable to those.

[NekoKnight]

Honestly, I think the problem is the hype.

No, I don't have high expectations of the story. No, I don't really care about how sympathetic Character A is. What I care about is whether or not the game has the strategic elements and randomness that I've come to know and love, and the answer is YES. However, there was a LOT of hype early-on, and when the game released, I think the ensuing "but what about hype" killed it for people. I didn't expect the second coming of sliced bread, hence why I just shrugged at the elements I could skip (THE STORY, bad models), and enjoyed what I wanted (the actual gameplay).

IS is responsible for people thinking it would be the second coming of sliced bread, however. Hiring a professional "big name" writer and splitting the game into 3 parts had many of us convinced of their genuine effort to make the story good.

[Time the Crestfallen]

IS is responsible for people thinking it would be the second coming of sliced bread, however. Hiring a professional "big name" writer and splitting the game into 3 parts had many of us convinced of their genuine effort to make the story good.

つ ◕_◕ ༽つ

If hype was a problem with this game, it's because IntSys generated too much hype for them to live up to.

[Azure Sen]

Fire Emblem at its core has always been about a group of characters. Chrom and the Shepards, Ike and the Greil Mercenaries, Miciah and the Dawn Brigade, etc. Fates didn't have that, it was about Corrin. All other characters were just props and devices used to further Corrin's story. No side characters matters like before. In Path of Radiance we had characters like Volke, Jill, Haar, Shinon, etc who were essentially side characters, but they still had something to do with the story. In Fates, no one really mattered outside of Corrin and the royals. Not even some of his retainers like Felicia, Jakob, or Silas really had that much importance. They just didn't matter. In Path of Radiance, if Volke went unhired or got killed, you would miss out on a bit of the story of Ike's father and Volke's backstory. In Fates, if Felicia dies it doesn't mean anything.

Fair point. I don't necessarily agree regarding focus because there are other games in the series that don't focus on a group of characters (Binding Blade is mostly about Roy and Guinevere and by the end has about three nations' armies combined into one, for example), and that's not even getting into the people who don't care about FE's story. I will agree that death is pretty meaningless in Fates, although not for the same reasons.

I don't think the inclusion of My Castle is completely a mistake. multiplayer has a place in Fire Emblem, but it's probably better served as late or end game. And I think if done correctly, a base building type of addition could work well with Fire Emblem. My Casltes problem was it was immersion breaking. It was in an out realm, held no story relevance at all, and took you out of the atmosphere between chapters. I think if next time it is placed on a map and is a location you can go to like in Awakening, that you build up yourself, it would work a lot better. That way it isn't breaking immersion every chapter. That and make the invasions and the castle itself a little more relevant. Put it at an actual location, and make the invasion a part of the story, like an actual defense chapter.

I think a good contrast to why FE doesn't work as a multiplayer game is Pokemon, which, in many ways, is designed for multiplayer. There are many moves, items and strategies that a player can use in Pokemon that the computer can't, and thus there's an element of gameplay that doesn't exist in its single player campaign. The problem with Fates in particular and Fire Emblem as a whole is that it really isn't designed for multiplayer, nor does its mechanics work well in multiplayer. Nothing about the multiplayer is unique to it; everything you can experience is already in the single player campaign.

As for the base-building aspect, I think it could have worked if, instead of what we got, the various themes that the castles have, those themes were instead locations where the army had set up camps, and the explanations for the facilities moving with the army is that the areas they're set up in have high concentrations of whatever power fuels Dragon Veins and so Kamui was able to recreate the shops from memory. Not the best explanation, but one I think could work as long as they didn't draw too much attention to it. However I will agree that the base-building was actually really fun and would support it coming back with some tweaks, and that having invasions show up occasionally on their own instead of at fixed points would be good too.

I also disagree with the strategic part of the durability system, j think the new system adds more strategy to weapons, though admittedly it is overpowered and can use some refinement. The old system was progression based. Once you moved to Steel Weapons, you had no reason to ever look back at Iron, and the same with Silver, outside of maybe what you could afford. Once you got to late game it became a game of just buying as many silver weapons as you could, with a couple of slayers or specialty weapons thrown in the mix. Now you have choices to make. Do you go more offensive and use the silver weapon, but leave yourself more vulnerable in the enemy phase, or so you use a bronze weapon to add more defense during that phase, etc. At the same time there is a glaring issue of balance wih some of the weapons, like the daggers/shuriken this time around.

Alternatively, you could bypass the problem entirely with a 2+ Iron or Steel weapon. With a 2+ Iron, you'd only trade the loss of 2 or 3 Mt from Silver for slightly improved hit/crit and, more importantly, avoid a stacking debilitating buff while also still being able to crit (and also not making it more likely that you'll eat a crit, as Silver has -5 Crit Avoid). With a +2 Steel, you'd have a little less hit and a slightly harder time doubling, but you'd have Mt equal to or better Silver with the same benefits of being able to crit and avoiding the debuff. And that's not even getting into how overpowered shuriken/throwing/anything that can debuff enemies are, forged or not.

I'm not saying the weapon durability system was perfect, far from it, but replacing it with a system that was ultimately far more unbalanced and exploitable wasn't the answer.

IS is responsible for people thinking it would be the second coming of sliced bread, however. Hiring a professional "big name" writer and splitting the game into 3 parts had many of us convinced of their genuine effort to make the story good.

I think this plays into one of the larger problems with Fates, which is that IntSys just tried to appeal to too many different groups of people, and so all of the moving parts don't really work well together. Like Awakening's gameplay and want a similarly light story? Birthright's for you. Like classic FE gameplay and a darker plot? Conquest is your game. Like both, but also want a more classic FE narrative? Revelation is this way. Kibayashi was brought in to address complaints that Awakening's story was too simple, both morally and in terms of actual plot development. Many, many, many of the characters are meant to appeal to various fetishes, and while I don't necessarily think that automatically makes them bad or poorly written, they end up becoming poorly written because IntSys just didn't bother fleshing a lot of them out beyond that pandering. To paraphrase someone much more clever than me, they tried to cram so many elements together that the story just ended up being this thin, watery mush of everything.

Edited January 9, 2017 by AzureSen

[Quetzalcoatl]

While I do feel that your discontentment with Fates and subsequent enjoyment of Awakening can be attributed to nostalgia-more specifically that slight inexplicable dissatisfaction with a sequel that just doesn't match the enjoyment you had previously and the desire to return to the 'good old days', It is true that Fates does indeed diverge from traditional Fire Emblem; whether that is an evolution or degeneration depends both on player experiences and how IS will take the series from this point.

Fates took steps forward, sideways and backwards: a perplexing snarl of refinements.

Weapon durability is removed streamlining inventory and gold management which means the clutter of in-between-chapter-shopping and innate hoarding behavior towards rare or unique weapons such as Levin Swords, Killing Edges, or Silver weapons are removed; however, the pros of these additions are discounted because of other features. Fates has arguably the most in-between-chapter clutter out of all Fire Emblems with My Castle: character convos, support convos, lottery, hot tub, kitchen, mine, x resource farm, jail, Lilith, My House convos, and weapon and item discounts which even encourage players to check on stores anyways; this all clogs up the chapter-to-chapter transition, so instead of a simple shopping spree before jumping into the next chapter, the player has a veritable checklist to do before proceeding. Due to unbreakable weapons, the Forge system had to be changed, but they changed it so that the player has to run back and forth to the Armory and Forge buying, forging, and reforging the same weapon over-and-over, a tedious process that removed the customization of letting the player choose what property they wanted to upgrade. Conquest's tagline included 'limited resources' and 'no grinding'/ a classic, grueling Fire Emblem experience to appeal to long-time fans, but without any weapon durability(a mainstay mechanic that has been with Fire Emblem since the beginning before even the advent of the weapon triangle), the resource management that fans were expecting is simply nonexistent; furthermore, Conquest constantly throws gold at the player even though they really have no need to spend on anything besides Heal Staffs. Speaking of Heal Staffs and the 'no grinding' tagline, Conquest has two Seize chapters( 8 and 9) both with bosses on thrones or forts which regenerates their HP. Because there is no need to actually buy anything in the shops besides Heal Staffs because of unbreakable weapons and a player can use any weapon for as long as they want without restriction, it is extremely easy to grind these two bosses, limited only by a stockpile of Heal Staffs; as such, a player can have a Tomebreaker servant by CH 9 and a Strategist Elise by CH 10. Finally, the removal of weapon durability did not-in my case-increase my weapon variability; in fact, it just made me use the same weapons throughout the entire game. As a player who preferred using high durability weapons such as Bronze or Iron, I never ventured out of my comfort zone or touched the Forge, but on higher difficulties, I had to utilize all my resources and weigh the pros and cons of each weapon. For example, on Lunatic Awakening, I had to decide between using the unbreakable Falchion or the Rapier where the +10 hit and increased Crit. could make the difference, or deciding on whether or not the reduction to Attack Speed is worth the increase in damage with higher Weight weapons. There was strategic weight put into the decision of choosing what weapon to use. Fates lacks that strategic weight(when choosing weapons) as there is wide comfort zone when players no longer have to worry about losing that weapon when they may need it later, and though they try to add pros and cons to each weapons such as Bronze and Joke weapons getting +10 avoid and Steel and Silver getting debuffs, they feel negligible, excluding 2-range melee weapons but I'll get into that later. Kaze is still going to double with Steel Shurikens, and Effie will still OHKO even after the Silver debuff.

The removal of True Hit is ...interesting. While I'm all for a more fairer battle ground and I admit that, despite Radiant Dawn being my favorite Fire Emblem, a single RNG is far more effective at leveling the playing field than removing the weapon triangle, the results of this new system can often be quite baffling at some times resulting in a rather 'random' RNG. Attacks hit and miss all over the place. While one could argue that that is the point, SRPGs have always made it a point to present all information to the player so that they can make the appropriate decisions. Players know the enemies stats, weapons, range of movement, and when engaging the damage done, dealt, whether or not either unit can double, the critical chance and the accuracy of the attack; therefore, they can make their decisions with confidence with the exception of the two random factors: critical chance and accuracy. While these factors are random, players can still reasonably weigh whether or not an attack will hit or miss, but with the wide dispersion of hits and misses, that confidence does decrease. A player cannot be sure if WTD 42 Hit attack will miss or not...and I cannot argue against that being a flaw considering that is the point of a RNG after all. However I will argue that the current system needs tweaking in order to find more precise degrees of randomness. For the most part I've gotten used to this system even if dodge tanking like in past FE is no longer as valid as a tactic, and eventually you just expect every attack and laugh at the 88 Hit miss or 30 Hit, hit(...except when your WTA!Speed Tonic!Bottle!SamuraiOdinPairUp!Villagesitting! Severa gets hit by every single Oni Savage in CH 10 including the one with a Throwing Club that had 27 Hit!).

The inability of 2-range melee weapons to double is another curious revision. The reasoning behind it was to increase the effectiveness of Archers(especially Archers after their poor performance in Awakening), Mages, and arguably Ninjas, Butlers and Maids-I say arguably as Hidden Weapon users serve another role as debuffers rather than attackers. In past Fire Emblems, Archers were mainly used for safe chip damage that would enable another unit to finish that enemy off without taking damage and had to be protected because of their inability to counterattack at 1-range. Of course, there were exceptions to this with great Archers like Innes, Rebecca, and Shinon, but in general Archers were in their nice little niche of ranged attackers whose true effectiveness came with their bonus damage against flying units. On the hand, mages had 1-2 range and hit on a different scale-Resistance which most units besides Mages, Priests, and Pegasi units are weak in-so they were generally pretty useful. Come Fates, and Archers have jumped tiers and have become quite the powerful class; I can't say anything about the Diviner class since I've only played Conquest, so I've used Dark Mages which were heavily nerfed from Awakening. The increased MT of bows, the prevalence of Ninjas who they've WTA on, the higher emphasis on Player Phase which means that their inability to counter at 1-range is less of an issue(which is further irrelevant with skills like Point Blank and the various 1-2 range bows that aren't as weak as Crossbows), great skills like Quick Draw which capitalizes on their strengths and Bowfaire which combined with Quick Draw gives a hearty +9 to damage. Archers are great in Fate, and it's great to see one of my favorite classes getting some love;however, the problem here is that Archers are great on their own merit; they don't need to stand over other units because of their inability to double at 2-range. In Fates, not only are 1-2-range physical weapons unable to double, but the wielder eats a -5 Speed debuff which is rather superfluous. 5 Speed greater is the benchmark for units to double; as a result, an unit with equal or only slightly greater speed would be unable to double the enemy anyways; in fact, they open themselves up to be doubled. There's no reason for this penalty other than to disadvantage an unit using a 1-2-range physical weapon whether in close quarters or long range as such the inability to double is quite pointless because that chance would rarely come anyways. One penalty is enough, but both of them render each other superfluous. Even without these penalties, Archers, as proven above, are still great units and could probably outspeed and double 1-2-range melee wielders. Furthermore, the true strength of 1-2-range melee weapons in past Fire Emblems came from the coverage they provided in Enemy Phase(from my own personal experiences);however, Fates places a greater emphasis on Player Phase, so they had already lost some of their versatility. In an odd reversal of roles, units using 1-2-range melee weapons have become the damage chippers that Archers used to be, unable to kill an enemy without Attack Stance, unless their name is Effie or Xander(who actually can double...as long as he has Speed Tonic, Speedwing-boosted, and Charlotte/Severa Pair Up). Fun fact, back in FE 3 Javelins were so absurdly heavy that nobody in the game could actually double with them, so this change could arguably be seen as 'returning to the roots'.

Okay, onto something Fates did right: the introduction to the Hidden Weapon and debuffs in general and the restructuring of Dual Stance and Skills. In past Fire Emblems, it was pathetically easy to block off enemies with a Jeigan or tank or cruise through armies with high-leveled units(granted still completely able to do that but not as easily), but with the introduction of Hidden Weapon debuffs, Poison Strike, Savage Blow, Lunge, and the Seal Skills, there is a whole new layer of complexity added to the game, and that's not the only thing Fates added. In Awakening, Dual Stance was overpowered; there was frankly little to no reason not to have units paired-up, and with certain builds, Dual Attack and Dual Guard were practically guaranteed. Fates split Dual Attack and Dual Guard into Attack Stance and Guard Stance each with pros and cons;furthermore, whereas in Awakening Dual Attack and Dual Guard were set to the RNG, Dual Attack and Duel Guard are always a guarantee in their respective Stance. This means that the player can reliably implement them into their strategies;also, the application of the Stance system adds an incredible depth to combat with considerations on unit placement and when units are better paired-up or separate. Unfortunately, Guard Stance just trumps over by Endgame since the onslaught enemy units means constant Dual Attacks from them unless paired-up and S or A-rank support bonuses are easier to utilize when the two units are in Guard Stance. And finally, Skills, and how many of them affect damage output or input. The clearest example would be the Demoiselle change from reducing Avoid to reducing damage. Accuracy and Evasion, though they can be adjusted, are set to RNGs; however, damage is always set and clear. As such, just like how Dual Stance was changed into something that can be reliably counted on so to were many skills as they provided straight simple damage additions or reductions. This added to the numerical strategy of the game.

Ok, while I would get into story, this post has gotten way too long. To make a long story short, Fates made quite a few changes, some good, some bad, and some in-between. Do I think these elements betray the 'feel of a Fire Emblem' game? Nope. Change is never inherently a bad thing, and even though I will bemoan the lost potential of the story and curse child abandonment, Fates is a great strategy game to play with numerous additions and improvements to the Fire Emblem system ,and as long as it never renegades on that core, it remains a Fire Emblem to me. Besides, plenty of people praise Thracia 776 and Genealogy of the Holy War as the pinnacle of Fire Emblem, and they had fatigue, chapter-long status ailments, individual inventory, and doubling locked behind a skill(maybe that's just their nostalgia).

Anyways, I apologize for the lengthy post, but I hope it's a half-decent analysis.

[eclipse]

More than hype for the story itself, is all the wasted potential. The mere idea of the game, to choose between siding your biological family and saving your birth nation or to side with your surrogate family and leading the invasion is already better than the final product. Just by glossing over the plot you get hype since the skeleton of the story is pretty well made, but once you get in it's disappointment, after disappointment. You don't even leave the bloody prologue and you're already wishing things were done differently. It's difficult not to get expectations specially being a fan of this series, specially if you're a fan of the Jugdral games since the plot is relatable to those.

IS is responsible for people thinking it would be the second coming of sliced bread, however. Hiring a professional "big name" writer and splitting the game into 3 parts had many of us convinced of their genuine effort to make the story good.

In the end, the amount of excitement you feel. . .is YOUR responsibility, and yours alone. This doesn't mean "don't get excited for anything". It means keep your expectations realistic. I didn't expect the story of Fates to be the world's best thing, which is why I was only mildly annoyed by Revelations' story (which I feel is the worst of the three).

[NekoKnight]

In the end, the amount of excitement you feel. . .is YOUR responsibility, and yours alone. This doesn't mean "don't get excited for anything". It means keep your expectations realistic. I didn't expect the story of Fates to be the world's best thing, which is why I was only mildly annoyed by Revelations' story (which I feel is the worst of the three).

つ ◕_◕ ༽つ

If hype was a problem with this game, it's because IntSys generated too much hype for them to live up to.

Hype was part of the problem but the game wouldn't have stood up to criticism, even if we had no expectations. Birthright is the Fates strongest portion and the best anyone can say about it is that it's unremarkable. The runner up is Conquest whose best defense is "At least they tried something different?"

The only winners in this situation are those who don't care about video game stories.

[SalShich10N]

In the end, the amount of excitement you feel. . .is YOUR responsibility, and yours alone. This doesn't mean "don't get excited for anything". It means keep your expectations realistic. I didn't expect the story of Fates to be the world's best thing, which is why I was only mildly annoyed by Revelations' story (which I feel is the worst of the three).

Well I am pretty sure I kept my own expectations pretty realistic, I expected it to be bad because the game had already been out and importers said it was pretty bad. It says quite A LOT when it manages to betray low expectations (and this comes from someone who likes Big Top Turnabout).

[Quetzalcoatl]

I absolutely agree. I have to say, for me, the downside is the My Castle and the removal of durability on weapons. Don't get me wrong, I love My Castle and the ability to stock up between battles, and seeing other people's castles, but the castle and the lack of weapon durability really takes away from the feeling of desperation the other Fire Emblem games had.

For me, what really made a Fire Emblem game feel special was the emotional impact it gave me. Most of the series is about a rag tag group of mostly do-gooders with little to their names fighting a corrupt and heavily armed army. Fates did not provide that same idea in my opinion. The redeeming feature of Fates, to me, was to play Conquest and fight the evil army from the inside out.

Can't believe I forget this. One of the largest grievances I have against both Fates and Awakening is the lack of recruiting enemy units and the absence of Together We Ride ; the sheer thrill you got whenever it started kicking in was amazing. It's as indicative or even more so of Fire Emblem than the main theme. It reminded the player that there were good, simple people fighting on the other side. And it really contributed to the feel of gathering up an army from a band of rag-tag misfits.

However, recent Fire Emblems just have the units pop up and basically give them to you. There's no sense of accomplishment, no Together We Ride. Just imagine how great Fates would be if instead of units being locked behind different games they were recruitable,albiet, incredible hard to recruit. Corrin could actually be fighting for peace-and earning it instead of it being given-by gathering up a troop of Nohrians and Hoshidans and proving they could work and fight together, trust their backs and lives to each other. They could have Nohr and Hoshido locked in an 100 years war expy instead of it being because of a contrived assassination attempt where Nohrians and Hoshidans were raised hating each other; then Corrin would be fighting against all that built-up prejudice and hate and achieve peace between the two nations.

[eclipse]

Hype was part of the problem but the game wouldn't have stood up to criticism, even if we had no expectations. Birthright is the Fates strongest portion and the best anyone can say about it is that it's unremarkable. The runner up is Conquest whose best defense is "At least they tried something different?"

The only winners in this situation are those who don't care about video game stories.

The runner-up is Conquest, because it's not Revelations.

So what if the story is criticized? It doesn't make either of us better/worse people at the end of the day. Fates got one thing right - the choice is yours, especially when it comes to emotion.

Well I am pretty sure I kept my own expectations pretty realistic, I expected it to be bad because the game had already been out and importers said it was pretty bad. It says quite A LOT when it manages to betray low expectations (and this comes from someone who likes Big Top Turnabout).

Yet I kept my expectations down when it came to Fates' story, and my reaction is extremely muted in comparison. Furthermore, it's a pretty small subgroup that has something to say about Fates' story - apparently, it isn't worth posting about otherwise. Why is that?

[Roflolxp54]

Fire Emblem isn't really known for having stellar story or story elements. The original Archanea games have limited-to-no characterization. I've heard that Radiant Dawn's plot was considered "laughable" when compared to its predecessor. Awakening has a filler arc. Fates tried to do too many things at once with its 3 storylines only to break its own spine. And many Fire Emblem games (Awakening and Fates in particular, but other FE games are guilty of this, too) have the whole cliche "chosen one" character trope going on seen in several other media franchises such as Pokemon or Harry Potter.

For me, it's the characters' designs and personalities and, to a lesser extent, gameplay, that draw me to Fire Emblem the most. For story scenes, I can always just not read the text or skip cutscenes entirely on subsequent viewings.

[Topaz Light]

Other people have already weighed in with thoughts very similar to mine about the approach to worldbuilding and constructing the main plot, so I'm gonna offer my own two cents on a personal issue I have that I feel really takes a toll of its own on the atmosphere and appeal of the world and story.

I think part of it is that it feels like characters, world, and story were each sort of designed in a vacuum before being crammed into the same thing and having what few connections between them exist hastily thrown in afterwards, with very few exceptions. Contrast previous Fire Emblem games, where certain characters, such as Matthis, Ninian, Guy, Nino, etc. were practically introduced with their relationships to other characters. It felt like characters had a reason to be where they were, doing what they were doing, and a reason to join your team, which, in turn, made the setting feel more alive and interconnected, like everyone kinda had their own story going on in the background that you occasionally got some neat glimpses into.

And then there's Fates (and Awakening, too) where the vast majority of the characters who join your team do so without any interesting circumstances surrounding their recruitment in what very often feel like purely-utilitarian scenes with little to no plot, character, or world relevancy whatsoever. As a result, the characters end up feeling much more like designated party members joining at their appointed times than individuals living in the world who have their own histories, motivations, and reasons for joining up with the heroes. There's also the fact that it's pretty rare to have characters who don't simply join you automatically during the plot, and as a result of that combined with the aforementioned issue, pretty much nobody's recruitment is really interesting or memorable.

Now, I'm not saying that previous Fire Emblem games never had characters who came off like that, but for the most part it felt like there was genuine effort put into giving the characters meaningful connections with each other that manifested not only in supports, but occasionally in the main story, as well. Even when the characters had no shared history together, they still often had something interesting to talk about, and conversations would frequently have interesting implications about the future of one or both of the characters. While there were still some support conversations that were basically just three sessions of two personalities bouncing off of each other for a bit for giggles, those supports weren't really the minority, instead being just another flavor in which support conversations came.

Meanwhile, the 3DS Fire Emblem games' support conversations are primarily just three or four sessions of two personalities bouncing off each other for giggles, sometimes with them hooking up at the end. What few deeper supports there are are rare treats, rather than being pretty frequent. I kinda get the impression that Intelligent Systems, although not really wrong in their assessment that the characters and their relationships are usually the main draw of Fire Emblem writing, gravely misunderstood just what about previous characters and their relationships made them so appealing to begin with.