Topic: Fire Emblem: Fortune's Weave

@Munchlax
There are Arts which cost HP to use, in addition to the special attacks present in TH, can't remember their name. Combat Skills? Idk. But ya, these new HP-fueled arts seem to be a new direction neither TH nor Engage featured.

We dont know all the intricacies of the game yet but I imagine they're not throwing everything away, but rather evolving the combat further, taking the best of both and adding some new as well. One thing you can always trust Intelligent Systems to do is improve combat with every game.

@Ryu_Niiyama
I haven't done all the routes either. Did Black Eagles Church route and about 75% of Blue Lions. Never finished the DLC either. Think I just got burned out (as much as I love FE, Three Houses was sooooo content rich it was too much for me to do without taking a break). Never beat Engage but I did get to the end of the game. I do that a lot. I'll play right until the end then set aside and never return. I literally saved at the final boss in Final Fantasy XII and never came back to beat him.

I've played all four routes in Three Houses, and I'd think that you need to, to get the full story and see both the best and worst of what the main characters can be.

I took some pretty big breaks in between though, because it is definitely something you can get burned out on. The depth that the game offers can also be its greatest weakness, if you spend too much time searching the monastery and min-maxing the characters, to the detriment of progressing through the story. Unless playing on maddening mode, you really don't need to do that and making use of the automated options sometimes isn't a bad idea.

Engage feels much simpler in comparison and that's not necessarily a bad thing. It might be a once-and-done story without a lot of subtlety to it, but I still managed to spend around eighty hours on the game, so it's not exactly lacking in mechanics.

I'm sure that they'll incorporate elements of both into the new game, but I won't be unhappy if they mostly lean towards Three Houses based on what we've seen.

Yea, I’ve played three of the four routes. I think I have more time in Three Houses than BotW or Tears lol

Claude’s route is my favorite by far.

Y'know, I've never played a fire emblem game, but that trailer was pretty slick. Can somebody give me the sales pitch? Basically, why should I play fire emblem? Cause I know it's a strategy game, but I don't know much else about the series other than that.

@JaxonH I spent most of my time in Engage’s DLC and just grinding. It’s entirely petty but part of the reason I was so hyped for the game was my favorite voice actress was in the game. But her character died so early plus the changes from 3H made me a lot less patient with the game, especially since I have so much of 3H to finish. I have done two routes and the DLC but need to finish up. I have enough distance that I can just hammer them out. Gonna finish Engage as well (as I liked the characters and gameplay (once they explained why Alear looks like that)) . Since I have new glasses I am considering finishing the 3rd route in fates/if. Mostly playing open world games right now so the tighter focus of a few tactics games will be nice.

@Ryu_Niiyama
I loved Engage's gameplay. Best in the series for sure. I almost beat it then got sidetracked.

@Bigmanfan
Let me put it this way. It's like chess but with cool characters and story and RPG mechanics where your "pieces" level up. And in Three Houses, the game this seems to be a successor to in some way, theres stuff to do between battles for downtime. Training your units proficiencies and the like. Also FE has a social aspect to it where characters form bonds, either by fighting next to each other or giving gifts, but eventually you can get C, then B, then A rank, each of which unlocks a support conversation (which many fans value as the prize jewel- the characters are so likable and their conversations are so funny and interesting, and it makes you feel more attached to them as real characters, which makes you really care about whether or not they die on the battlefield.

Granted, modern games lets you play without permadeath but I recommend keeping it on. Three Houses had a rewind mechanic (it was limited so it couldn't be abused too much), but i'm sure this game will have something similar. So if you ever get unlucky taking a critical hit or something you can just rewind. If you do so poorly you use up all your rewinds and then lose a character, you can restart the battle and try again, or, accept the loss and keep going. It's tough to will yourself to do that but it makes the game feel so rewarding when you do, because you really miss the characters you let die and it makes you want to protect the rest of them so much more.

But for first time you could play on casual mode, where fallen units don't permanently die and only "retreat" for that particular map battle.

I had just gotten a 3DS and I never understood the appeal of turn based games. I'd played Resident Evil Revelations and Street Fighter IV 3D. But a demo released for FE Awakening and my brother called and said dude, you gotta play this. So I did, and something clicked. I was super addicted. Suddenly, it just made sense to me. I understood the appeal and where the fun came from. I ended up getting so absorbed into that game I played after work every single day and would daydream about it at work each day. 100 hrs later I was ready to play my first turn based traditional JRPG. Went back to Final Fantasy X on Vita and beat that. The rest is history.

Beat FE Fates after that, then beat FE Echoes: Shadows of Valentia, then beat FE Three Houses, and almost beat FE Engage. Also went back and played FE on GBA and got all the way to the final battle but never finished it.

It's a game that's very hard to verbally communicate the appeal of, but I can tell you, it's emotional, and some characters will die in the story that were with you the whole time, and when you're playing that next map and it has that symphony music playing and it's raining, and you're still reeling from the death of one of your favorite units... that's when you put the system down and start pacing the floor with goosebumps because the game is so dang good and has its hooks in you deep.

Cautiosly optimistic that the main character isn't an avatar this time.

" I only wanna fight so I can save my fathers life" I hope this parent gets a decent amount of character development this time for us to actually care before he bites the dust .... sigh

That line drew a chuckle from me.

This is a Fire Emblem game and that poor father is toast.