mcz117chief
Member
Nah, I get it. It was just a joke on my end. I was always reminded of that Little Hitler skit
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Fire Emblem: Three Houses |OT| The Romance of Three Houses, or "Hogwarts SRPG"
Danjin44
The nicest person on this forum
Its currently my 3rd best game I played this year, the first two are Astral Chain and Sekiro.
mcz117chief
Member
Sigh.
So I'm looking at another several lost weeks, am I?
(I actually loved Awakening, and spent an unwholesome amount of time tweaking my "no-deaths squad".)
Shaqazooloo
Member
As someone that did something similar and spent at least a hundred hours on awakening, yes you would be looking at something similar with Three Houses. I myself love the grind and buffing my units. I'm addicted to the game, something I haven't felt since awakening (fates was alright but the grind was meh). This is easily gonna be my most played Switch game and favorite game of this gen (Please note though that I only mean that for Nintendo).
TheSadRanger
Banned
There's a lot of things FETH does better than Awakening. On higher difficulties the game is much better balanced with limited grinding. Where Awakening kind of encouraged you to get the grinding dlc.
There's no pair up mechanic so it's not all about just pairing up two OP units and slaughtering everything. Yes there's OP characters like Dimitri but there is a chance he can get knocked out. Positioning matters much more here. Even then Dimitri isn't as OP as Donnel who was a freaking god with his insane stat growths.
Overall I like FETH way more than Awakening and I liked it. (Fates can go suck a fat one)
TheSadRanger
Banned
Think we'll see a Genealogy remake next or a remaster combo pack Path/Radiant Dawn?
The maps of the Tellius games would translate easily and the main thing that would have to be done is replace the character models with ones similar in design to Three Houses. Sort of like how the new Xenoblade Chronicles remaster has the new character models. Also include dialogue scenes more similar to TH and replace the static art dialogue scenes from the Tellius games.
Plus it's already officially translated. The only thing is those games just didn't sell well but maybe they deserve another chance post Awakening.
Komatsu
Member
I'd love to see remakes of FE9/10 and I do believe that the franchise's profile was completely changed by Awakening - it's on another level now and Three Houses' sales figures kinda speak to that.
That said, I don't think they'll revisit the Tellius games. Same for Genealogy - I'm not super fond of the Jugdral games, but I admit they're probably some of the most mechanically robust of the whole series and it'd take significantly reworking to make them palatable to a modern audience. The latter half of Genealogy is brutal and Thracia 776 is something else altogether.
I do hope we get new entries in the series or even another Fodlán game. That'd be really sweet. I don't expect us to see another FE for another 2 to 3 years though.
Komatsu
Member
Yeah, but Gaiden was a special case, as it was originally a minor title with very little purchase. Valentia is basically a whole new game, they had plenty of freedom to elaborate on the original.
Shaqazooloo
Member
I was not aware that the Church route only had 18 chapters, it makes sense considering it's not a main route like all the others but still it caught me off guard, I still need to master some of the master classes for my next playthrough and now i'm not sure i'll have enough time to.
Also not sure why people were saying Church route was similar to Golden Deer route, I mean I haven't played Golden Deer yet and I haven't finished Church route yet but this felt more like Blue Lions with some major sections cut from it. Their was only one map that was actually different from Blue Lions (so far), unless it's referring to story I don't really get it.
Speaking of story, I don't really feel like it goes anywhere, you're pretty much just an outsider looking in throughout and don't encounter anyone of note outside of Judith I guess. You get insight on what Edelgard is doing and vague hints towards what Seteth, Flayn, Byleth and Rhea are but it doesn't seem like it'll materialize into anything. I was also hoping to actually get Rhea at some point (not recruitable but at least at the monastery) but I guess she stays kidnapped in all routes I guess.
Final note for now, screw chapter 17 of this route! Everything up until that was pretty much a cake walk but now they throw in the Death Knight, reinforcements from 5 spots on the map and the Death Knight could be triggered into running away. My first attempt at this map I actually ran out of divine pulses because I kept triggering Death Knight to escape and didn't know what the reason was, a few times I got close to him, other times it was because I hit some other unit on the other end of the map and I didn't know when it would happen. The position that I was in when it would happen pretty much guaranteed a game over. Next time around I had to pay close attention to my moves and constantly look up at him to make sure he wasn't gonna run away, which by the way is really stupid considering he's the Death Knight and supposed to be a imposing figure, but he just runs? Yeah, I guess it was because they nuked the fort but still having him run like that is embarrassing, though I guess it wouldn't be the first time he ran...
Other than that, I really enjoyed my time on this route once I finish up i'll probably go for Golden Deer to compare.
Also not sure why people were saying Church route was similar to Golden Deer route, I mean I haven't played Golden Deer yet and I haven't finished Church route yet but this felt more like Blue Lions with some major sections cut from it. Their was only one map that was actually different from Blue Lions (so far), unless it's referring to story I don't really get it.
Speaking of story, I don't really feel like it goes anywhere, you're pretty much just an outsider looking in throughout and don't encounter anyone of note outside of Judith I guess. You get insight on what Edelgard is doing and vague hints towards what Seteth, Flayn, Byleth and Rhea are but it doesn't seem like it'll materialize into anything. I was also hoping to actually get Rhea at some point (not recruitable but at least at the monastery) but I guess she stays kidnapped in all routes I guess.
Final note for now, screw chapter 17 of this route! Everything up until that was pretty much a cake walk but now they throw in the Death Knight, reinforcements from 5 spots on the map and the Death Knight could be triggered into running away. My first attempt at this map I actually ran out of divine pulses because I kept triggering Death Knight to escape and didn't know what the reason was, a few times I got close to him, other times it was because I hit some other unit on the other end of the map and I didn't know when it would happen. The position that I was in when it would happen pretty much guaranteed a game over. Next time around I had to pay close attention to my moves and constantly look up at him to make sure he wasn't gonna run away, which by the way is really stupid considering he's the Death Knight and supposed to be a imposing figure, but he just runs? Yeah, I guess it was because they nuked the fort but still having him run like that is embarrassing, though I guess it wouldn't be the first time he ran...
Other than that, I really enjoyed my time on this route once I finish up i'll probably go for Golden Deer to compare.
Shaqazooloo
Member
New update is out:
nintendoeverything.com
Fire Emblem: Three Houses update out now (version 1.1.0), patch notes - increased save files and more
Tying in with the third wave of Expansion Pass DLC for Fire Emblem: Three Houses, a new 1.1.0 update has been issued for the game. It includes additional save files, a battle option to choose the monastery outfits, new allies that will join in Part 2: Crimson Flower, and more. Below are the full...
nintendoeverything.com
- New and Updated Features
- Increased the number of save files from 5 to 25. Note: Increased number of save files will require approximately 12MB of additional system memory space. If you don’t have enough space, you can delete some application data or images saved in the album.
- Added a new option, In Battle, in Appearance Options, allowing the player to select the monastery outfits for battle as well.
- Note: You can set this from the Unit Appearance menu in Personal Quarters.
- Note: Depending on the outfit/character/class combination, some outfits may not be reflected for mounted units.
- Added feature that allows players to hide the UI when viewing a character in Unit Appearance.
- Added new allies that will join in Part 2: Crimson Flower.
- Changed the song that plays in the opening movie to the Korean version when the system language is set to Korean.
- Added additional quests and new outfits (Servants Attire, Summer Wear, and Evening Wear) from the Expansion Pass.
- Note: Additional quests include new activities, such as the sauna, feeding cats and dogs, and recruiting new battalions.
- Note: Additional quests are marked with a light-blue icon during Exploration.
- Note: New outfits (Servants Attire, Summer Wear, and Evening Wear) are provided for the protagonist and for the playable characters. They can be selected via Personal Quarters in the monastery.
- Added an additional element of the Expansion Pass, making Anna available for recruiting in the monastery after the third chapter, Mutiny in the Mist.
- Note: Anna can participate in battles and activities.
- Note: Anna does not have Support relationships.
- Note: Recruiting Anna unlocks a new paralogue after a certain chapter.
- Note: It’s possible to set Anna as a traveler, but the recipient cannot recruit her as an Adjutant unless they also own the Expansion Pass.
- Note: If a player has not purchased the Expansion Pass, only one of the new characters in the Expansion Pass can visit as a traveler.
- Added Gifts for Dogs and Cats to the viewable rankings during the loading screen and the calendar screen while playing online.
- General
- Fixed a bug that accidentally turned students who aren’t from the protagonist’s house into allies in Chapter 1: Three Houses.
- Fixed a Ver.1.0.2 bug that caused an unintended sound to play at the beginning of Chapter 1: Three Houses (“The Academy “in the Movie Gallery) when the language is set to English.
- Fixed a bug that caused Dimitri’s face to sometimes display incorrectly.
- Fixed a bug that prevented a support conversation event from happening when certain inputs were made after increasing Support levels while exploring the monastery.
- Fixed a bug that did not display the upward arrow during the Choir Festival day (though the bonus was still being added, despite the missing arrows).
- Fixed a bug that displayed an incorrect stage name screen sometimes during the screen transitions.
- Fixed a bug that caused the game to freeze when talking to a character in the monastery on rare occasions.
- Fixed a bug that incorrectly displayed the character HP when selecting Convoy during battle.
- Fixed a bug that set the Adjutant Follow-Up activation rate lower than intended for certain Support levels.
- Changed the item the sniper holds from Spear to Silver Bow in the final episode of Part 2: Crimson Flower on Maddening difficulty.
- Fixed a bug that sometimes showed blank epilogues.
- Revised some text.
- Improved gameplay by addressing a few additional bugs.
Shaqazooloo
Member
I appreciated getting some back story on Sitri and the Ashen Wolves were fun to hang with but the end game stuff with the betrayal was kind of bad and leaves me confused.
I don't know how Byleth factors into any of it, if he hadn't of gotten their when he did the whole thing could've gone south for Yuri (or not apparently since in the main story it still happens just without Byleth and friends?)
Honestly Yuri brings up a lot of questions for me that I don't know if there are anwsers to.
I don't know how Byleth factors into any of it, if he hadn't of gotten their when he did the whole thing could've gone south for Yuri (or not apparently since in the main story it still happens just without Byleth and friends?)
Honestly Yuri brings up a lot of questions for me that I don't know if there are anwsers to.
Overall the DLC was enjoyable and fun, I look forward to getting to know the Ashen Wolf's through the main game and having a new area to explore.
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Shaqazooloo
Member
Fire Emblem: Three Houses devs reveal that Claude's real name is "Khalid"
In the most recent issue of Nintendo Dream, the Japanese magazine published a massive Fire Emblem: Three Houses developer interview. Directors Genki Yokota (Nintendo) and Toshiyuki Kusakihara (Intelligent Systems) weighed in on various topics concerning the Switch game. At one point of the...
nintendoeverything.com
Kusakihara: You guessed it: it’s a false name. Claude’s real name is “Khalid”. I wanted to include it somewhere in the game but there wasn’t really a good opportunity, so here we are (laughs). We actually had a scene about halfway in where Nader calls him by the name “Khalid”, but we couldn’t find a good place for it to fit so we ended up cutting it.
Yokota: Yeah, you know I wondered why we decided on giving him the name “Claude”.*
*Note: There’s a character by the same in Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War.
Kusakihara: That was also pointed out by Masahiro Higuchi (producer on FE3H), but the name was originally intended to be an alias, so I didn’t worry about the overlap in names. I always wanted to reveal his identity during the game, but… Oh, well. There’s other characters throughout the series whose names overlap with each other, so I’m not bothered by it. Anyway, his real name is “Khalid”!
Yokota: Both names sound so cool. I feel like Claude is the character whose appearance changed the least after the 5 year time-skip. His new beard makes him look a little more adventurous. I remember when I first saw his time-skip design I thought it made him look even shadier than before (laughs). But he’s a really good guy.
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Shaqazooloo
Member
Interesting interview with IS that goes over quite a few things about the game development and DLC.
Had to split this into 2 posts since the final part is massive.
nintendoeverything.com
Had to split this into 2 posts since the final part is massive.
Fire Emblem: Three Houses devs on Cindered Shadows, user feedback, increased save slots, new outfits, Nintendo's requests, creating houses and students, more
This month’s issue of Nintendo Dream has a massive Fire Emblem: Three Houses developer interview. Directors Toshiyuki Kusakihara and Genki Yokota addressed a variety of topics, including Cindered Shadows, user feedback, increasing the amount of save slots, the new outfits, the roles of Nintendo...
nintendoeverything.com
Shaqazooloo
Member
Since this is Nintendo Dream’s first interview concerning Three Houses, I’d like to ask you both to give us a brief rundown of how the game was produced and how those roles were divided internally.
Yokota: Well, the game was developed by Intelligent Systems alongside Koei Tecmo games. We’ve collaborated with plenty of companies during development before, but this is the first game we developed alongside a company that wasn’t Nintendo. Nintendo’s role hasn’t changed much from previous titles. From a bird’s eye view they essentially determined what direction the new Fire Emblem game was going to go in and whether or not the gameplay was interesting. We all worked on those aspects together. From there, Kusakihara-san set the foundation for the world and the story, as well as the main characters.
Kusakihara: First, I came up with the plot for just one of the game’s routes to set the foundation on which I’d base the rest of the in-game universe – most of the characters were just prototypes at that point. From there, Koei Tecmo expanded on a lot of the more minute details, at which point I was basically a general supervisor making sure that everything had that special Fire Emblem– ness to it. I also served as a consultant for new gameplay mechanics and made sure that we stayed on track in implementing things I wanted to realize. Intelligent Systems handled most of the artistic aspects: things like design, music, sounds, et cetera.
Yokota: Compared to previous projects, Intelligent Systems was working with a considerably smaller staff this time. As for Koei Tecmo, they were responsible for the whole of programming, writing the scenario, planning for both battles and monastery gameplay, as well as – of course – the entirety of the game’s online functions and its difficulty settings. They were also at the heart of 3D modeling, mocap, effects, the UI design, as well as the graphics displayed during event cutscenes. In addition to Koei Tecmo, we also sought out the animation studio Sanzigen for its assistance while working on the game’s movie cutscenes.
How did relations with Koei Tecmo work during the game’s production?
Kusakihara: About two or three times a month we would go on a business trip to meet with the development team in Yokohama. Aside from that we set up a private chat so we could hold one- on-one meetings. Things generally went smoothly despite the distance.
Was this your first time working as an off-site director?
Kusakihara: As a director, yes, but I’ve been on the other side of the table before. (laughs)
Yokota: I let Kusakihara-san handle communications until about midway through development. When we had a more solid idea of what the game cycle should look like, we went out to Yokohama and buckled down on consolidating some of the finer details.
What were the requests coming from Nintendo like? Does anything stick out?
Yokota: They had a lot to say about the flow of the game. Three Houses’ setting largely revolves around a “school,” so building up that sense of immersion was critical for them. Alongside Kusakihara-san and Koei Tecmo, we all worked together to set up what that system might look like in a game. School life in a fantasy world – it’s a dream, isn’t it? Over the course of the game the horrors of war would tear that dream apart, of course, but we thought: wouldn’t it be nice if players got to experience living happily at the monastery for a little bit?
All: (laugh)
And what did you have to think about those requests, Kusakihara-san?
Kusakihara: There’s a certain appeal to being able to live with a bunch of friends in close quarters like that, don’t you think? In previous entries in the series, characters would join your party as the story progressed. In Three Houses, by contrast, you start off with all of the main characters gathered in a single space, allowing the player to develop deeper emotional attachments to the members of the cast. I feel like we had an incredibly well-structured thing going.
Yokota: I was a little excited from the get-go, it all had me wondering if it was even okay to have that many characters around from the very beginning.
It might’ve, for instance, made it harder to remember everyone’s names? (laughs)
Yokota: It’s easy to remember the people that call themselves by their full name, at any rate.
All: (laugh)
Kusakihara: I think it might be better to start with the people in the class you choose, then move onto remembering everybody else.
How did you go about creating each house and its students?
Kusakihara: We started by using the rough drafts for each character as a base and expanded upon them from there. Depending on the character, some of the more prevalent details had been decided upon in advance. Take, for instance, Mercedes’ background: she bears the crest of a family that no longer exists… That kind of thing. From there, we could expand upon and flesh out other concepts like her older brother, Emile. Following that process would lead to how things ended up looking in the final product.
Let’s use the Black Eagles as an example: it’s a house filled with strong people that hold even stronger beliefs. It almost feels like certain characters belong in certain houses…
Kusakihara: Each class’ students make up a microcosm of the country that they represent. Since Faerghus is a country of knights, its students are a little more disciplined. The Adrestian Empire once flourished but over time lost some of its holdings, almost as if the sun is setting on it as a nation. At its core, it’s a bunch of nobles coming from a country in decline. (laughs) As for the Leicester Alliance… Just imagine a group of people with a few colorful individuals holding the rest back.
All: (laugh)
Kusakihara: Originally, the concept behind the Leicester Alliance was a “republic based on round-table governance where the nobles are all out to get each other, so nothing really gets accomplished.” That was the key idea we started out with, but they all ended up being good kids! (laughs) The goal was to have each class’ students embody the characteristics of the place they come from.
Yokota: In terms of character design, the hairstyle and its color were also pretty much essential. If either of those traits are too similar the characters start to blend in with each other.
Kusakihara: A player’s impression of a character is greatly influenced by what color the character’s hair is, so we consulted with Kurahana-san (Kurahana Chinatsu, the game’s main character designer) and carefully went with what we came up with in those meetings.
So, for a noble country like Faerghus, there would be a fairly large number of people with blonde or similar hair?
Kusakihara: Well, there’s also quite a large number of people with hair colors that don’t naturally occur in the real world. (laughs) Making those kinds of decisions was actually kind of difficult, particularly when we had the students from one class lined up beside the entire student body.
The Golden Deer are pretty colorful themselves, I thought. (laughs)
Kusakihara: I guess they are, as a whole. (laughs) From a design standpoint, they were a class where we did a lot of fooling around.
Yokota: For Byleth and the house leaders we had Kurahana-san whip us up some designs considerably early on in development, and she pretty much nailed them in one go. We wanted them to exude an air of aristocracy, and I think those designs expressed that pretty clearly.
Three Houses sees its story branch into four separate routes come the second half of the game; could you elaborate some on the themes you wanted to depict through each story?
Kusakihara: The theme of Edelgard’s route is literally “military rule.” Her story depicts a hard road where you have to cling to her beliefs and values, even in the face of opposition from those you once cared about. In contrast, the concept for Dimitri’s route started with the idea of “righteous government.” That being said, there’s quite the gap between that Dimitri and the fragile Dimitri from the beginning of the story due to… Unfortunate circumstances.
All: (laugh)
Kusakihara: Once he experiences that fall and all of its twists and turns, he wakes up to what that “righteousness” really means. I wanted to write a kind of paradoxical conflict between his and Edelgard’s routes. Claude started with the keywords “scheming hero;” I wanted to make somebody who would have his own machinations behind the scenes, the kind of guy you couldn’t hate despite his character. As I was writing him, I guess I ended up making him more of a “pure” good guy than I had originally intended. (laughs)
Yokota: Each route had its own concepts specific to it, but we ended up deciding on the overarching story being “split into two parts” and having it “revolve around a war.” Genealogy of the Holy War was on our minds at the time; we’re both fans of the game and wanted to see how we could fit the radiance of its nobles into a new game. We split Three Houses into two acts with Genealogy in mind. That being said, it’d be boring if the games were exactly the same, so I proposed that we split the game into different routes at the beginning of planning.
Kusakihara: By making it about nobles, I wanted to draw out the drama from the differences in perspective inherent to a story like that. With the worldview and the story’s backbone in place, I think I did a pretty good job evoking the drama from the class divide present throughout the story.
And then, of course, religion enters the fray.
Kusakihara: Right; I did my fair share of studying about religion.
So, the game’s worldview was essentially born from Kusakihara-san’s affinity for fantasy stories about war and Yokota-san’s love for the world of Genealogy.
Yokota: Yes, I feel pretty accomplished in that we were able to get from the beginning of planning to the end of development without changing the story’s focal point.
And that kind of genre is basically Koei Tecmo’s forte.
Yokota: They really did cook up something great. Even within the company itself, they were able to get together a team that really likes Fire Emblem.
Kusakihara: They were all incredibly passionate about the project – everybody gave it their all.
Yokota: The scenario team did plenty of research into tropes present throughout the series, and the planners and programmers looked at the series’ gameplay and made proposals accordingly. They would come up with questions like, “that title had this sort of feeling, but are we really going in that direction this time?” Intelligent Systems would then come back with “go with something like this,” in turn. I feel like there was a lot of great communication going on. We did butt heads on occasion, though. (laughs)
Kusakihara: We did end up squabbling a lot. (laughs)
Everyone has their own tastes!
Yokota: And then I’d say something like, “simmer down, now.” (laughs)
All: (laugh)
Kusakihara: I feel like all of the development team’s passion and investment in the project served as its foundation, and coupled with the massive amount of data poured into it, I think it really gave the game a life of its own. Even among the development team, I don’t think there’s a single person that could claim to understand everything about the game itself in a meaningful way. As I watched the game rapidly go through changes during development, I couldn’t help but think to myself: “it has a soul.”
While we’re on the topic of change, it’s pretty incredible how some of the smaller details can change depending on your supports or how you’re going through the game.
Kusakihara: Most supports in Fire Emblem don’t necessarily have an affect on the game outside of the conversations themselves. I met with the scenario team early on in development and talked with them about what we could do to change that. I felt like in general more horizontal connections were necessary. For instance: if a particular point came up in one person’s support conversation, I’d want it to have some bearing on the other characters as well. They ended up implementing that pretty well!
Yokota: Even if you were to lose a unit in Classic Mode, the conversations would still hold up! I thought, “wooooow, that must’ve been really difficult!” (laughs)
Kusakihara: They were pretty much prepared for anything.
Interviewer: The game’s dialogue can get pretty complex from time to time; why not just use loan words? For example, “cheese” is written as “kanraku” in-game.
Yokota: You can thank Kusakihara-san for that, too.
Kusakihara: When I was mulling things over with the scenario team, I touched on how I wanted to raise the age range a bit for this game. They ended up going with a “historical fiction” vibe moving forward. With that in mind, things like proper nouns and coined terms don’t really mesh with the aesthetic. For instance, having the house names written out in katakana clashed with the feeling the rest of the setting created. In the end, I feel like everything clicked together quite well.
Yokota: Memorizing the house names ended up taking a bit of time. (laughs)
Kusakihara: The members of the scenario team present at the voice recording sessions were incredibly particular about the more complicated words’ intonations.
When we interviewed Takehito Koyasu-san (Seteth’s VA) about the same thing, he also brought up the fact that he had to do a lot of intonation-related retakes. What he ended up telling us was that he doesn’t normally get that many requests regarding intonation – the instructions weren’t necessarily just limited to how he should say proper nouns.
Yokota: There really were a lot of hard-to-read and underused kanji, I can only imagine how difficult that must’ve been. The testers raised some concerns about the same thing, but I felt that being picky about small things like that would help contribute to the game’s overall atmosphere. In the end I just used my best judgment.
Kusakihara: Everyone had quite the time pronouncing “Black Eagle Strike Force” [in the original Japanese], and if they mispronounced one sound, they’d have to do a retake.
All: (laugh)
Kusakihara: Balthus’ voice actor – Subaru Kimura-san – read it perfectly from the first take, though. I later learned that he grew up in Germany, and everything clicked.
Yokota: Ohhh, that’s actually pretty interesting.
The katakana was based on how it would’ve been pronounced in his first language, after all.
Yokota: I’m going off on a bit of a tangent here, but since we’re talking about proper nouns I thought I’d bring up the fact that “Divine Pulse” [“Tengoku no Hakudou”] isn’t pronounced how I originally thought. I had always thought it was pronounced “Tenkoku.”
Kusakihara: Whenever you come up with an unfamiliar word, I find that it’s easier to just give it a reading that you’re already familiar with. I decided I’d have it pronounced similarly to the word for “Heaven” [“Tengoku” written with different kanji].
Yokota: And Kusakihara-san is great with little details like that; I think it’s just incredible. You wrote out an extensive history for Fódlan from the beginning just to use as reference materials for development, even if we weren’t going to use all of it in-game. You’re the kind of guy that’d write about things happening thousands of years before the era the story would even take place during – that’s incredible.
Kusakihara: There’s probably a good ten-thousand years’ worth of material there. I’m also the kind of guy who wouldn’t release said chronology, though. (laughs)
It’s like you’re telling the more inquisitive players to take all of the fragments of information found in-game and fill in the holes themselves.
Kusakihara: Right. We, on the other hand, will start to forget about all of that. I think in the end the players might end up knowing more than the both of us! (laughs)
Yokota: Well, I guess there’s really nothing we can do about that is there? (laughs)
Yokota: Well, the game was developed by Intelligent Systems alongside Koei Tecmo games. We’ve collaborated with plenty of companies during development before, but this is the first game we developed alongside a company that wasn’t Nintendo. Nintendo’s role hasn’t changed much from previous titles. From a bird’s eye view they essentially determined what direction the new Fire Emblem game was going to go in and whether or not the gameplay was interesting. We all worked on those aspects together. From there, Kusakihara-san set the foundation for the world and the story, as well as the main characters.
Kusakihara: First, I came up with the plot for just one of the game’s routes to set the foundation on which I’d base the rest of the in-game universe – most of the characters were just prototypes at that point. From there, Koei Tecmo expanded on a lot of the more minute details, at which point I was basically a general supervisor making sure that everything had that special Fire Emblem– ness to it. I also served as a consultant for new gameplay mechanics and made sure that we stayed on track in implementing things I wanted to realize. Intelligent Systems handled most of the artistic aspects: things like design, music, sounds, et cetera.
Yokota: Compared to previous projects, Intelligent Systems was working with a considerably smaller staff this time. As for Koei Tecmo, they were responsible for the whole of programming, writing the scenario, planning for both battles and monastery gameplay, as well as – of course – the entirety of the game’s online functions and its difficulty settings. They were also at the heart of 3D modeling, mocap, effects, the UI design, as well as the graphics displayed during event cutscenes. In addition to Koei Tecmo, we also sought out the animation studio Sanzigen for its assistance while working on the game’s movie cutscenes.
How did relations with Koei Tecmo work during the game’s production?
Kusakihara: About two or three times a month we would go on a business trip to meet with the development team in Yokohama. Aside from that we set up a private chat so we could hold one- on-one meetings. Things generally went smoothly despite the distance.
Was this your first time working as an off-site director?
Kusakihara: As a director, yes, but I’ve been on the other side of the table before. (laughs)
Yokota: I let Kusakihara-san handle communications until about midway through development. When we had a more solid idea of what the game cycle should look like, we went out to Yokohama and buckled down on consolidating some of the finer details.
What were the requests coming from Nintendo like? Does anything stick out?
Yokota: They had a lot to say about the flow of the game. Three Houses’ setting largely revolves around a “school,” so building up that sense of immersion was critical for them. Alongside Kusakihara-san and Koei Tecmo, we all worked together to set up what that system might look like in a game. School life in a fantasy world – it’s a dream, isn’t it? Over the course of the game the horrors of war would tear that dream apart, of course, but we thought: wouldn’t it be nice if players got to experience living happily at the monastery for a little bit?
All: (laugh)
And what did you have to think about those requests, Kusakihara-san?
Kusakihara: There’s a certain appeal to being able to live with a bunch of friends in close quarters like that, don’t you think? In previous entries in the series, characters would join your party as the story progressed. In Three Houses, by contrast, you start off with all of the main characters gathered in a single space, allowing the player to develop deeper emotional attachments to the members of the cast. I feel like we had an incredibly well-structured thing going.
Yokota: I was a little excited from the get-go, it all had me wondering if it was even okay to have that many characters around from the very beginning.
It might’ve, for instance, made it harder to remember everyone’s names? (laughs)
Yokota: It’s easy to remember the people that call themselves by their full name, at any rate.
All: (laugh)
Kusakihara: I think it might be better to start with the people in the class you choose, then move onto remembering everybody else.
How did you go about creating each house and its students?
Kusakihara: We started by using the rough drafts for each character as a base and expanded upon them from there. Depending on the character, some of the more prevalent details had been decided upon in advance. Take, for instance, Mercedes’ background: she bears the crest of a family that no longer exists… That kind of thing. From there, we could expand upon and flesh out other concepts like her older brother, Emile. Following that process would lead to how things ended up looking in the final product.
Let’s use the Black Eagles as an example: it’s a house filled with strong people that hold even stronger beliefs. It almost feels like certain characters belong in certain houses…
Kusakihara: Each class’ students make up a microcosm of the country that they represent. Since Faerghus is a country of knights, its students are a little more disciplined. The Adrestian Empire once flourished but over time lost some of its holdings, almost as if the sun is setting on it as a nation. At its core, it’s a bunch of nobles coming from a country in decline. (laughs) As for the Leicester Alliance… Just imagine a group of people with a few colorful individuals holding the rest back.
All: (laugh)
Kusakihara: Originally, the concept behind the Leicester Alliance was a “republic based on round-table governance where the nobles are all out to get each other, so nothing really gets accomplished.” That was the key idea we started out with, but they all ended up being good kids! (laughs) The goal was to have each class’ students embody the characteristics of the place they come from.
Yokota: In terms of character design, the hairstyle and its color were also pretty much essential. If either of those traits are too similar the characters start to blend in with each other.
Kusakihara: A player’s impression of a character is greatly influenced by what color the character’s hair is, so we consulted with Kurahana-san (Kurahana Chinatsu, the game’s main character designer) and carefully went with what we came up with in those meetings.
So, for a noble country like Faerghus, there would be a fairly large number of people with blonde or similar hair?
Kusakihara: Well, there’s also quite a large number of people with hair colors that don’t naturally occur in the real world. (laughs) Making those kinds of decisions was actually kind of difficult, particularly when we had the students from one class lined up beside the entire student body.
The Golden Deer are pretty colorful themselves, I thought. (laughs)
Kusakihara: I guess they are, as a whole. (laughs) From a design standpoint, they were a class where we did a lot of fooling around.
Yokota: For Byleth and the house leaders we had Kurahana-san whip us up some designs considerably early on in development, and she pretty much nailed them in one go. We wanted them to exude an air of aristocracy, and I think those designs expressed that pretty clearly.
Three Houses sees its story branch into four separate routes come the second half of the game; could you elaborate some on the themes you wanted to depict through each story?
Kusakihara: The theme of Edelgard’s route is literally “military rule.” Her story depicts a hard road where you have to cling to her beliefs and values, even in the face of opposition from those you once cared about. In contrast, the concept for Dimitri’s route started with the idea of “righteous government.” That being said, there’s quite the gap between that Dimitri and the fragile Dimitri from the beginning of the story due to… Unfortunate circumstances.
All: (laugh)
Kusakihara: Once he experiences that fall and all of its twists and turns, he wakes up to what that “righteousness” really means. I wanted to write a kind of paradoxical conflict between his and Edelgard’s routes. Claude started with the keywords “scheming hero;” I wanted to make somebody who would have his own machinations behind the scenes, the kind of guy you couldn’t hate despite his character. As I was writing him, I guess I ended up making him more of a “pure” good guy than I had originally intended. (laughs)
Yokota: Each route had its own concepts specific to it, but we ended up deciding on the overarching story being “split into two parts” and having it “revolve around a war.” Genealogy of the Holy War was on our minds at the time; we’re both fans of the game and wanted to see how we could fit the radiance of its nobles into a new game. We split Three Houses into two acts with Genealogy in mind. That being said, it’d be boring if the games were exactly the same, so I proposed that we split the game into different routes at the beginning of planning.
Kusakihara: By making it about nobles, I wanted to draw out the drama from the differences in perspective inherent to a story like that. With the worldview and the story’s backbone in place, I think I did a pretty good job evoking the drama from the class divide present throughout the story.
And then, of course, religion enters the fray.
Kusakihara: Right; I did my fair share of studying about religion.
So, the game’s worldview was essentially born from Kusakihara-san’s affinity for fantasy stories about war and Yokota-san’s love for the world of Genealogy.
Yokota: Yes, I feel pretty accomplished in that we were able to get from the beginning of planning to the end of development without changing the story’s focal point.
And that kind of genre is basically Koei Tecmo’s forte.
Yokota: They really did cook up something great. Even within the company itself, they were able to get together a team that really likes Fire Emblem.
Kusakihara: They were all incredibly passionate about the project – everybody gave it their all.
Yokota: The scenario team did plenty of research into tropes present throughout the series, and the planners and programmers looked at the series’ gameplay and made proposals accordingly. They would come up with questions like, “that title had this sort of feeling, but are we really going in that direction this time?” Intelligent Systems would then come back with “go with something like this,” in turn. I feel like there was a lot of great communication going on. We did butt heads on occasion, though. (laughs)
Kusakihara: We did end up squabbling a lot. (laughs)
Everyone has their own tastes!
Yokota: And then I’d say something like, “simmer down, now.” (laughs)
All: (laugh)
Kusakihara: I feel like all of the development team’s passion and investment in the project served as its foundation, and coupled with the massive amount of data poured into it, I think it really gave the game a life of its own. Even among the development team, I don’t think there’s a single person that could claim to understand everything about the game itself in a meaningful way. As I watched the game rapidly go through changes during development, I couldn’t help but think to myself: “it has a soul.”
While we’re on the topic of change, it’s pretty incredible how some of the smaller details can change depending on your supports or how you’re going through the game.
Kusakihara: Most supports in Fire Emblem don’t necessarily have an affect on the game outside of the conversations themselves. I met with the scenario team early on in development and talked with them about what we could do to change that. I felt like in general more horizontal connections were necessary. For instance: if a particular point came up in one person’s support conversation, I’d want it to have some bearing on the other characters as well. They ended up implementing that pretty well!
Yokota: Even if you were to lose a unit in Classic Mode, the conversations would still hold up! I thought, “wooooow, that must’ve been really difficult!” (laughs)
Kusakihara: They were pretty much prepared for anything.
Interviewer: The game’s dialogue can get pretty complex from time to time; why not just use loan words? For example, “cheese” is written as “kanraku” in-game.
Yokota: You can thank Kusakihara-san for that, too.
Kusakihara: When I was mulling things over with the scenario team, I touched on how I wanted to raise the age range a bit for this game. They ended up going with a “historical fiction” vibe moving forward. With that in mind, things like proper nouns and coined terms don’t really mesh with the aesthetic. For instance, having the house names written out in katakana clashed with the feeling the rest of the setting created. In the end, I feel like everything clicked together quite well.
Yokota: Memorizing the house names ended up taking a bit of time. (laughs)
Kusakihara: The members of the scenario team present at the voice recording sessions were incredibly particular about the more complicated words’ intonations.
When we interviewed Takehito Koyasu-san (Seteth’s VA) about the same thing, he also brought up the fact that he had to do a lot of intonation-related retakes. What he ended up telling us was that he doesn’t normally get that many requests regarding intonation – the instructions weren’t necessarily just limited to how he should say proper nouns.
Yokota: There really were a lot of hard-to-read and underused kanji, I can only imagine how difficult that must’ve been. The testers raised some concerns about the same thing, but I felt that being picky about small things like that would help contribute to the game’s overall atmosphere. In the end I just used my best judgment.
Kusakihara: Everyone had quite the time pronouncing “Black Eagle Strike Force” [in the original Japanese], and if they mispronounced one sound, they’d have to do a retake.
All: (laugh)
Kusakihara: Balthus’ voice actor – Subaru Kimura-san – read it perfectly from the first take, though. I later learned that he grew up in Germany, and everything clicked.
Yokota: Ohhh, that’s actually pretty interesting.
The katakana was based on how it would’ve been pronounced in his first language, after all.
Yokota: I’m going off on a bit of a tangent here, but since we’re talking about proper nouns I thought I’d bring up the fact that “Divine Pulse” [“Tengoku no Hakudou”] isn’t pronounced how I originally thought. I had always thought it was pronounced “Tenkoku.”
Kusakihara: Whenever you come up with an unfamiliar word, I find that it’s easier to just give it a reading that you’re already familiar with. I decided I’d have it pronounced similarly to the word for “Heaven” [“Tengoku” written with different kanji].
Yokota: And Kusakihara-san is great with little details like that; I think it’s just incredible. You wrote out an extensive history for Fódlan from the beginning just to use as reference materials for development, even if we weren’t going to use all of it in-game. You’re the kind of guy that’d write about things happening thousands of years before the era the story would even take place during – that’s incredible.
Kusakihara: There’s probably a good ten-thousand years’ worth of material there. I’m also the kind of guy who wouldn’t release said chronology, though. (laughs)
It’s like you’re telling the more inquisitive players to take all of the fragments of information found in-game and fill in the holes themselves.
Kusakihara: Right. We, on the other hand, will start to forget about all of that. I think in the end the players might end up knowing more than the both of us! (laughs)
Yokota: Well, I guess there’s really nothing we can do about that is there? (laughs)
JareBear: Remastered
Banned
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Shaqazooloo
Member
So, I played through all the routes and I am currently replaying Blue Lions and will possibly be doing Golden Deer and Church route again sometime.
I really want to rant about Crimson Flower but i'll hold my tongue, I just gotta say, I don't know why people like Edelgard.
I disliked her more in her own route then I did in any of the other 3, she's pretty messed up, I don't understand why she's popular.
I really want to rant about Crimson Flower but i'll hold my tongue, I just gotta say, I don't know why people like Edelgard.
I disliked her more in her own route then I did in any of the other 3, she's pretty messed up, I don't understand why she's popular.
theclaw135
Banned
Brilliant writing. She's dedicated to her cause, even if it entails becoming thoroughly despised by orchestrating one of the most epic betrayals in a video game.
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Danjin44
The nicest person on this forum
I like her because I understand her motivation, and she will do whatever it takes to achieve it. Basically I like Edelgard same reason I like Zero in Drakendard 3.
Shaqazooloo
Member
Kind of a crap reason imo. You could say that for any decent villain but that doesn't make them likable..
Do you excuse her of the questionable actions she takes to achieve her goal?
Also you could argue that what she does is going completely overboard and is mostly a result of her being slightly bigoted.
Shaqazooloo
Member
Depends on if you want to save the really good game for later. Awakening had a meh story, good gameplay with not so good maps. Three Houses has quite very good story and good gameplay, plus it's fully voiced, so it might be difficult to go back to awakening after playing it.
Danjin44
The nicest person on this forum
No, she does questionable things to achieve her goal but I also understand why she does it and that what makes her interesting character.
In original Nier the MC and his friends doom entire humanity but it doesn't change that I still love those characters.
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theclaw135
Banned
It has nothing to do with liking or sympathizing with her. I relished every minute of waging a war of revenge upon Edelgard.
mcz117chief
Member
I am about 2/3 done with the Golden Deer route (my 2nd run after doing Crimson Flower) and this time I tried to optimize as much as possible to unlock as many support conversations as possible, for that reason it now took me longer to get this far than my original playthrough Well anyway, I have grown to like characters which I didn't in the original playthrough especially Seteth. Seteth's interactions are some of the most lovable in the entire game, I almost got teary-eyed during Bernadetta/Seteth conversations. Just incredible character and as female Byleth he is now my chosen one Another characters which I have grown to adore is the Felix-Ingrid-Sylvain triangle, all 3 very complex and compelling characters, especially Sylvain, his A conversation with Ingrid is honestly the cutest thing . Lastly Lorenz surprised me a lot, his character has incredible development throughout the game and I respect his so much now, really just great writing. This game has firmly cemented itself as my "game of the generation" easily, I can't imagine a better game than this.
Well anyway, I have grown to like characters which I didn't in the original playthrough especially Seteth. Seteth's interactions are some of the most lovable in the entire game, I almost got teary-eyed during Bernadetta/Seteth conversations. Just incredible character and as female Byleth he is now my chosen one Another characters which I have grown to adore is the Felix-Ingrid-Sylvain triangle, all 3 very complex and compelling characters, especially Sylvain, his A conversation with Ingrid is honestly the cutest thing . Lastly Lorenz surprised me a lot, his character has incredible development throughout the game and I respect his so much now, really just great writing. This game has firmly cemented itself as my "game of the generation" easily, I can't imagine a better game than this.
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Shaqazooloo
Member
Seteth has the best line of supports in the game imo. Even with a character that a lot of people dislike (Cyril) he makes it into an excellent support chain that everybody is on board with.I am about 2/3 done with the Golden Deer route (my 2nd run after doing Crimson Flower) and this time I tried to optimize as much as possible to unlock as many support conversations as possible, for that reason it now took me longer to get this far than my original playthrough
In general the supports have been a huge step up from Awakening and Fates. The characters having deeper relationships with each other, (although that mostly only applies to the Blue Lions) makes the supports far more engaging.
John2290
Member
I'm looking at the gameplay and I don't get it... this isn't an RTS. Why are all these journalists and reviewers telling people it's real time strategy. I'm so disappointed but glad I looked at some footage before I hit buy. It's turn based, games journalists man. It's like they don't even play games.
Shaqazooloo
Member
It's a SRPG, so it fits with the strategy tag. It's not real time though.
mcz117chief
Member
It is just turn based, no real time gameplay at all.
I mostly dislike Cyril for his insane simping for Rhea, like hot damn. Even after the 5 year gap he just won't let up for a second.
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John2290
Member
Aside from the tactical gameplay what other strategy elements does it have. I know you have the X-com like hub and have the dialogue choices along the way but is there something deeper than that?
Shaqazooloo
Member
Understandable, he does go pretty hard on the Rhea simping, given his backstory though I feel it's justified, she saved him from his miserable life in his homeland and gave him a place to belong, the way he see's it, he owes everything to her similar to Catherine, she's just slightly less annoying about it, also she's a badass so far more forgivable for her.
mcz117chief
Member
Well you play a teacher so you interact with your students and other faculty members, guide them and help them grow as well as go on missions and personal quests to help them out. Then you also got other activities like fishing, organizing troops and equipment, cooking, singing, reading anonymous notes from students and such. It is really quite briliant and there is no x-com hub at all, it is an abbey and you can't expand it or do anything with it in any way.
Yeah, Catherine is fine, Cyril really needs to take a chill pill.
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Shaqazooloo
Member
Unit and time management I suppose, the game operates on a calendar system were you only have so many days in a month and you only have so many actions in a day that you can take, so you have to manage how you spend activity points, what you use them on and who you use them on, to build up a well equipped team to take on opposing armies.
S
SLoWMoTIoN
Unconfirmed Member
Shaqazooloo
Member
The side story has good gameplay and characters , but the story is the low point.
It adds a fair bit to the main campaign though with new characters and dialogue, extra supports and new classes, it makes it feel like a new game plus, and if you're playing with new game plus already it makes it feel like a new game plus plus with all the stuff you're able to do. You can get some pretty wild builds with the DLC.
John2290
Member
Yeah, I've read about the system and it's one of the factors of why I wanna pick it up, the fact that Persona won't evolve with their consumer base and up the age of their characters is infuriating. Sick of playing teenagers in this games and feeling like a pedo when the eventual Japanese sexual inuendo or school girl dressed like a stripper turns up.
I'll put up with this archaic looking combat system if it's the Persona killer people are touting it as but man, reviewers really don't know what the acronym RTS stands for these days.
John2290
Member
10 hours in, It's really interesting and still has that new game feel everytime I boot it up. Fantastic pacing, exactly what I wanted in a Persona replacement. I'm a bit disappointed that it doesn't have real time strategy or an overmap that could have layered on into one hell of a strategy game but what's here is fantastic. There is a few niggling things like another game where the characters highschool students even in this damn fantasy world, this wouldn't have been a problem if they hadn't listed the ages of the characters in the rooster... why? Just let me imagine they're all adults at least, don't shove it my face and make me feel weird, evolve with your audience who are growing older now or your genre will die. Other things like characters who have died and are off my rooster still existing in the Monastery. Way too many speech bubble in one given month that require you to actually engage if you want to find who likes what or who owns what to get their motivations up.
Eh, small things but this shit is good, digital drugs and I love the method of pushing you to avoid save scumming, that's fantastic progression. I wish games like Divinity OS and what not would employ continued progression like that on death to keep the temptation away.
Eh, small things but this shit is good, digital drugs and I love the method of pushing you to avoid save scumming, that's fantastic progression. I wish games like Divinity OS and what not would employ continued progression like that on death to keep the temptation away.
John2290
Member
Would you recommend playing the vanilla game first time around or playing the DLC version? I'm 10 hours in and if there is a better version I'd wipe the save for it...?
Shaqazooloo
Member
If you think theirs a chance you might do another route, I would suggest just going vanilla for now because it works best as an add-on to make a replay of the game more refreshing imo. If not, I guess it depends, the DLC adds 4 really good classes, 4 new characters and another area to explore, makes grinding easier as well as makes some items more accessible in exchange for a different currency (which opens up some pretty good unit options), plus the side story and some other little bonuses. If you're invested enough in the game I would go for it if not probably not worth.
Also, you wouldn't need to delete your save to get that stuff, as long you aren't at part 2 which starts at chapter 10 (I think...) then you can get access to it, you'd just have less time with it.
That becomes less of a problem later.
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John2290
Member
Wait, without spoilers, the three houses choice actually has three meaningfully different story paths beyond just the characters? Wow. I'll stick with vanilla for now if so.
Shaqazooloo
Member
Yeah, the story branches off into different directions depending on the house you chose, although on all routes part 1 is basically the same with the only differences being how the House leader reacts to events, the plot points that it sets up for when the plot splits and what the game focuses on (such as a mystery/conspiracy or characters and there backstory).