Being able to re-class your characters to level one in Awakening breaks the class and RNG character build aspect of the series, and basically makes everyone interchangeable. It's super easy to max the top 4-5 stats for every unit, especially since you can fight infinite side battles. Awakening is sort of Baby's First Fire Emblem from a strategy standpoint. You still have individual map strategies to worry about, but the team building and exp division strategy aspect is gone.
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Fire Emblem Series
- Thread starter NYCrooner
- Start date
Garou
Member
I think that's intentional due to streetpass feature. Everyone wanna show them green numbers to both friends and strangers yes?
wow I'm going to have to play the other games in the series now for sure
I played a bit of the GBA one from the Ambassador program and thought it was pretty cool but it didn't hook me. picked up Awakening and I just loved it. started on casual mode for a few chapters and then restarted on classic mode. I'm about half way through right now and this is probably my GOTY and for 2013 that's quite the feat, even on just Nintendo platforms
I played a bit of the GBA one from the Ambassador program and thought it was pretty cool but it didn't hook me. picked up Awakening and I just loved it. started on casual mode for a few chapters and then restarted on classic mode. I'm about half way through right now and this is probably my GOTY and for 2013 that's quite the feat, even on just Nintendo platforms
I didn't mean to say complex, but simply hard. My go-to example is usually "Battle Before Dawn" in FE 7. The whole game is just incredibly unforgiving if you want to do a no-death playthrough.
The next question is what makes people nervous though: Will such success will make Intelligent System bolder with FE design, potentially shooing away the newly gained audience or they will accept FEA as their comfort zone, try to cater the widest audience.
old
Member
Awakening and Sacred Stones are your best entry points specifically because they allow infinite optional level grinding to save you from being under-leveled later in the game. Most other FE's don't allow optional grinding. If you don't level your party right you will be screwed later in the game, with your only option being to completely start the game over. Not a fun experience.
Enjoy those two. Develop a leveling strategy while you have the safety net of infinite optional battles to save you, then take on the other FE's.
Enjoy those two. Develop a leveling strategy while you have the safety net of infinite optional battles to save you, then take on the other FE's.
Fire Emblem 1 is the first NES game
Fire Emblem 2 is Fire Emblem Gaiden
Fire Emblem 3 is Mystery of the Emblem/Monsho no Nazo, which included a remake of FE1 as well as a sequel campaign
Fire Emblem 4 is Geneology of the Holy War/Seisen no Keifu
Fire Emblem 5 is Thracia 776
Fire Emblem 6 is The Sealed Sword/Fuin no Tsurugi (the first GBA game)
Fire Emblem 7 is Fire Emblem for GBA (The first localized game. A prequel to FE6)
Fire Emblem 8 is Sacred Stones
Fire Emblem 9 is Path of Radiance
Fire Emblem 10 is Radiant Dawn
Fire Emblem 11 is Shadow Dragon (also a remake of FE1 and the first half of FE3)
Fire Emblem 12 is Heroes of Shadow and Light/Hikari to Kage no Eiyu (also a remake of the second half of FE3)
Fire Emblem 13 is Awakening
FE 1-6 and 12 were Japan only.
FE 7-11 and 13 have official localizations.
All of the Japan only entries have complete or near complete fan translations.
FE 1-2 were on NES
FE 3-5 were on SNES
FE 6-8 were on GBA
FE 9 was on GCN
FE 10 was on Wii
FE 11-12 were on DS
FE 13 was on 3DS
Whiteshirt
Member
Yes, remakes count as individual numbers. Basically:
FE1 = Fire Emblem aka the one with Marth (Ankoku Ryū to Hikari no Tsurugi)
FE2 = Fire Emblem Gaiden
FE3 = Mystery of the Emblem aka sequel with Marth (Monshō no Nazo)
FE4 = Genealogy of the Holy War (Seisen no Keifu)
FE5 = Thracia 776
FE6 = Fūin no Tsurugi aka the one with Roy (Sword of Seals/Sealed Sword)
FE7 = the first GBA Fire Emblem game localized in the West
FE8 = Sacred Stone
FE9 = Path of Radiance
FE10 = Radiant Dawn
FE11 = Shadow Dragon aka remake of FE1
FE12 = New Mystery of the Emblem aka large remake of Mystery of the Emblem
FE13 = Awakening
Edit: Welp.
It isn't difficult for someone playing normal mode as the pre-promotes you get in FE7 are actually all very good to handle Battle Before Dawn. Even Marcus, he's actually a good fighter in FE7 and only useless in Fire Emblem: Sword of Seals. I think unless you don't have a means of opening doors (possible), its not the most difficult to chapters to complete after one or two resets. FE7 is a pretty fair game regarding difficulty and throws you enough new units who are all good enough to handle themselves, which is probably why a lot of people look at their first experience with Fire Emblem fondly.
The bullshit happens when you play the real hard mode
where Maxime has like 30 additional stat points and a silver lance, Nino can actually be hurt by the monks, she's standing like two squares from Ursula's bolting, swordreaver fighters fuck with Jaffar and Zephiel is forced to fight a battle he will lose starting from turn 5 and will get doubled by any sword user
Let's hope the map design will be better at least :/
equippedwithtowel
Member
PoR better be close to first on the list of gamecube VC games.
Not that I really need to (hugs copy) but it'd be a day one buy.
Not that I really need to (hugs copy) but it'd be a day one buy.
All this talk about awakening has me sad since I still have it sitting here as I go through other 3DS games first. I liked Fire Emblem how it was and now apparently this series was also nailed with the streamline virus. Damn Nintendo
It's not as bad as some people make it out to be. It's still a great game, and the streamlining wasn't necessarily for the worse in many cases. I'd say a lot of the "flaws" are subjective, and even the more glaring ones are really only noticeable if you've played the earlier games. Regardless, there are plenty of features in Awakening that I want the series to move forward with.
For me it''s completely the opposite. I've played through the first 4 and sacred stones before I played Awakening and I adored Awakening totally.
FreedomFighter
Member
Awakening is a great place to start. If you want to experience the best the series has to offer storywise, play Path of Radiance followed by Radiant Dawn. And amazing experience. And Radiant Dawn is probably my favorite in the series. It did everything Path of Radiance did even better.
I had a lot of fun with Awakening. I've played 7-13 (imported 12), played through all of them multiple times. I still love Awakening's characters and the way they work the child system into the story, and the return of real support convos was great.
I mean, it wasn't Path of Radiance, but if I held every game to that standard, I'd just be disappointed in everything.
InsaneZero
Member
The SNES games are very well worth looking into if you can understand it, though.
MissDeviling
Member
:/ Wish I got to play PoR. Missed out on it and RD because I was LTTP with the Wii.
This is really all I care about. I'm assuming they'll keep the same artist (since they usually retain styles for entries on the same console), but I desperately hope that the map design is actually satisfying this time around. I hated even attempting Hard mode because the open fields made it too difficult to shield squishy units from same-turn reinforcements, rendering them near useless.
Are people really recommending a newbie play Thracia 776?
You're right, he should start out with Gaiden.
InsaneZero
Member
Are people really recommending a newbie play Thracia 776?
What's the best way to learn how to walk? By running a marathon, of course.
Riposte
Member
Are people really recommending a newbie play Thracia 776?
lol what could go wrong
Starwolf_UK
Member
A bit off-topic but its not just a Fire Emblem problem. Pokemon suffers from newer species feeling less fleshed out due to Gamefreak deciding to cut Pokedex entries down to 1 page (it was 2 pages in gen 2 and 3...gen 2 initially was going to be 3 pages). It is not helped how older Pokemon are still using the same text they had in Platinum (which for gen 1-3 Pokemon is the same as the Diamond/Pearl text). I don't mind the recycled text but when it is worse than what you had before, I'd rather recycle the old.
You can make the case how instruction manuals used to have text for every Mario enemy while now there is no such thing and how Metroid Prime had extensive text from the scan logs but if another Metroid ever comes along there is unlikely to be anything like that.
The problem with the map sprites in FE4 and 5 is they did not feel much faster than Awakening battles running at max speed. Quick example (awakening fans:spot paralogue 2). Well okay...it feels faster than the PoR/RD ones.
It might also be one of those things of who can sprite them these days (it is a rare art).
I'd say the hardest (that I enjoy playing) lie between hard and lunatic. Well merceless in shadow dragon is similar to lunatic in that "oh look high numbers, hope you find the broken unit and get good rng" but imagine if you had a cast 90% of who were rather weak (you can understand with Awakening having a strong cast that you have to go to extreme measures to challenge them...power creep has been going on in fire emblem for a while).
Reinforcements is an odd thing that may change challenge though. In the non-Shadow Dragon or awakening English games they appear at the end of an enemy turn (so there is no reinforcement appears and kills your healer *restart map*). In Shadow Dragon you don't get warnings like Awakening either.
One thing, Sacred Stones hard is easier than Awakening Hard.
The really old games are hard to quantify. Gaiden has serious EXP problems if you don't promote ASAP (there is basically no penalty in doing so) and use easy mode, FE4 is easy when you to get to grips with its systems (some units really are one men armies). Although it is cruel in ranked play (its survival rank uses losses which don't go away with a reset button press).
FE5 well, it throws spanners into the wrench. Nothing has 0% or 100% accuracy...including staffs (thats right, you can have someone using heal and it misses), it also has a fatigue system that will see you using more of the cast (if a unit takes too many actions they have to rest for a map). The maps have varied objectives and unlike future entries, escape and defend really mean it (also the MC has to leave last in an escape map, anyone left behind will unlock a side story late in the game where you can rescue them). Some characters are a total pain to recruit, getting a good rank is difficult (I mean both game completion and weapons) and weapons are a bit more scarce (few shops, weapons are mainly acquired from capturing enemy soldiers).
You forgot how it all ends though.
Ursula can move and will start to do so at the end of the map...this once happened
Save 'N Quit
Banned
Path of Radiance and FE7 are still the best games in the series to be released outside of Japan.
Shadow Dragon though is by far the worst in the series and any newcomer to FE should steer clear of that game.
Even if someone wants to play Marth's game, they're better off ignoring it instead of suffering through a bland story, truly awful art style, and the worst mechanic for all FE players who dislike killing any of their units.
Shadow Dragon though is by far the worst in the series and any newcomer to FE should steer clear of that game.
Even if someone wants to play Marth's game, they're better off ignoring it instead of suffering through a bland story, truly awful art style, and the worst mechanic for all FE players who dislike killing any of their units.
equippedwithtowel
Member
All this talk about awakening has me sad since I still have it sitting here as I go through other 3DS games first. I liked Fire Emblem how it was and now apparently this series was also nailed with the streamline virus. Damn Nintendo
Make sure to play Hard/Classic and don't use the DLC to grind and it's still got a comparable difficulty, plus less useless characters and a metric ton of content. Not all of the streamlining of the presentation is bad and it's still an 8.5/10 game, it's just POR is a 9.5.
AlteredForms
Banned
The GBA titles soaked up several hours of my time. Excellent games.
Dougstyles
Banned
I think Shadow Dragon gets a bad rap for having absolutely stone dull characters. The gameplay is still good stuff.
It's like the anti-Awakening.
It's like the anti-Awakening.
Booty Patrol
Banned
All the Japanese ones have been translated, correct?
MissDeviling
Member
Normal is mind-numbingly easy if you've played 7, and the latter wasn't even that hard to begin with on Normal. I've done some of Hard on Awakening but was turned off by the combination of same-turn reinforcements and terribly open maps. Give it a try?
This, so much! The maps are really fun, but the characters are meh. Depends how much importance you place on the latter, but I almost always skip FE dialogue anyway, so it didn't matter to me. It's a shame that a lot of the characters were garbage to use though. You had to really know who was worth investing time in. When you did, though, it was amazingly fun.
yes but the sad fact of it is(to me anyways), is that the original is better than the remake
All this talk about awakening has me sad since I still have it sitting here as I go through other 3DS games first. I liked Fire Emblem how it was and now apparently this series was also nailed with the streamline virus. Damn Nintendo
Its the incredible depth of the 3DS library that is to blame at this point.
shadyspace
Banned
So how should I go about getting a copy of Fire Emblem 7 then. Like can you even buy used GBA games anymore that aren't fakes.
Laurentius
Member
LOWXr
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If you have any local game shops that sale older stuff, check there. In my college town FE7 or Sacred Stones is usually there for $25-30.
Laurentius
Member
LE5qt
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SmackAttack
Member
One of my favorite series. Haven't played Awakening yet (missed the BB sale the other day) since I have no money after buying my 3DS. Hope I can get it around or for Christmas. Heard great things about it.
My list and my thoughts, summed up perfectly right here. I have played Shadow Dragon though and easily tack that on the bottom. You were wise to skip it, unless you get to the point where you have nothing interesting to play. Even then, I would recommend replaying any of those 5 over playing SD.
Dougstyles
Banned
RD Part 2 Endgame is one of my favorite FE chapters period. It really does feel like a desperate last stand.
I'm more on this side of the fence but in hindsight I do see their reasoning for some of their desicions, good or bad. An overworld map was a must because, unless they made getting supports extremely easy, it would have been near impossible to get all the supports needed to unlock some of the prologues before the end of the game. It's a shame because some of their maps are amazing and they have a variety of objectives but if you're NOT interested in getting every character it can be tedious at times to try to.
Having that part of the game locked kinda makes the main quest seam a little bare at times but it is still great, imo. And since you're basically have the incentive to pair up you will more than likely unlock those extras naturally. And again it made me want to get supports and learn more about the characters.
The only thing I remember from Shadow Dragon is Marth. :/ I hate to be overly critical of the series but that one was not really good.
Laurentius
Member
Eh5SZ
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