Topic: Fire Emblem: Three Houses

There is no reason for me NOT to take an exam and turn into the next class if I mastered my previous one, is there? Or is it like awakening where I remember it was a good thing to fully lvl up before you upgrade.

If I’m not mistaken, “the star” on your 8 bit class portrait is proof of mastering, is it not? My god, this game has many systems. First impressions are very good.

Update: I got my answer

@JaxonH You're probably best placed in reading this once you've beaten the game but : I think Edel's ideals and dislike for crests and the church are clear - although I remember this more from conversations with her than anything (could be misremembering!). What isn't explained too well is her methods, IMO. Why team up with Jeritza/Tomas/Monica etc? I don't think that came out clearly.

Of course they stand out like a sore thumb. They’re meant to. The game never attempted to make every single enemy a morally gray area. Some characters are in the gray and some characters are in the black. And there’s nothing wrong with that. Better than every character being in the black like the vast majority of other games. Every single enemy plotline doesn’t have to be some morally ambiguous thing. You don’t have to “care” about every single villain. We’re lucky enough that the vast majority of the game was centered around a grey area, and the clearly evil people barely even played a part until the last couple chapters. So... what is the complaint? That a few evil characters on the sidelines are inherently bad and everything must have moral ambiguity? Despite the fact we already have that moral ambiguity in place with different characters? Thats ill informed criticism. The game does more than 95% of other games out there to create moral ambiguity in the conflict and you’re complaining about one group of characters that appears in 5% of the game, and critiquing the fact they’re not also morally ambiguous? You don’t have to care about every single villain’s actions. You can, but it’s not a requirement. We already have plot devices in effect to achieve that. There’s no need to do it for every single villain in the game. I don’t need the villains for 2 battles in the game to be interesting characters, because the main characters are interesting. The conflict with the villains is interesting. The conflict in the war is interesting. The morally grey antagonists in the war are interesting. And “care” isn’t the only emotion a game can go for anyways. Hate is another. And clearly evil villains are much easier to hate. That’s why so many stories have... surprise surprise, clearly evil bad guys.

At the end of the day, they are a means to provide an antagonist for conflict, NOT a means to provide character intrigue. We already have 50 other characters in the game that do that. Do you hear people complaining about Sauron being “clearly evil” in Lord of the Rings? One of the greatest fantasy tales of all time? Of course not. Because villains don’t have to be morally ambiguous. ESPECIALLY when the vast majority of the game already revolves around moral ambiguity. Fire Emblem Awakening didn’t have any “moral ambiguity” with its villains. Nobody cared. This is one of the few games that actually does offer a grey area, and for the main conflict no less, yet this is the one you choose to criticize for clearly bad bad guys that appear in 5 min of cutscenes and 2 battles? Is this a criticism you’re going to level against every other game out there that has “clearly bad” bad guys (criticism which should be doubly so for games that don’t have any moral ambiguity)? Genuinely curious.

I also completely disagree about Edelgard.

And the paths are meant to leave a bit of mystery. That’s the whole point. You still end the war. You still address those that slither in the dark. Those are the main plot points that need resolution. Everything else is just to satisfy your curiosity. And every play through offers its own handful of insight. If you don’t want to replay then, just go watch it on YouTube and be done with it. But just because the beginning chapters are the same doesn’t mean the entire experience is going to be identical. It’s different characters (which half the game is the characters), with different skills and a different team dynamic on the battlefield. Even identical maps will play out completely differently. Clearly it’s enticing enough given how many people are actually doing multiple playthroughs, something you rarely see for other games. Does that mean I’m going to do all 4 playthroughs before I get tired of it? No, probably not. But that doesn’t “upset” me. If I’m that desperate to know every single thing there is to know I’ll just Google it. The best part about the game is precisely the fact everyone gets a different experience and learns things from a different angle. Very few (if any) other games have managed to pull that off. Three Houses is Fates done right.

@Buizel
Shared common enemy. They even said as much in the dialogue. She needed help accomplishing her goal and their goals temporarily aligned with hers. As much as she resented their true goals and nature, she needed their help if she was to overthrow the church and social hierarchy. They don’t really dive into details beyond that but, it does explain her motives. The fact she was willing to align with such a group speaks to how driven she was to achieve her goals. And that... was her biggest flaw.

Holy moly.

The Camilla 1/7 scale statue is selling for $600 at the absolute minimum on eBay (and people are buying it at that price too, people are even buying it for $850). The Tharja is more around $250 (but price was brought lower due to the cheap $50 Chinese knockoff) and Cordelia is like $300.

I own all three, but I’m flabbergasted at the price of Camilla. I guess Fates still has a very strong fanbase. People sure do love Camilla.

@Snaplocket
Pro Tip for Spoiler tags.

(spoiler)INSERT WHATEVER YOU WANT HIDDEN HERE(/spoiler)

Except, use [ ] instead of ( )

@JaxonH thx 4 the tip.

Also, $850 for a statue? Holy moly indeed! And yes, people REALLY do LOVE Camilla. "REALLY" is sometimes an understatement.

My complaint is that them standing out ‘like a sore thumb’ ruins the feeling of the world and story. Being a villain for the sake of being evil is not good story telling. It’s lazy since it’s essentially just that, there is no twist or appeal to it. They’re so cartoonishly evil that it’s laughable. It would be like introducing Megatron into Wuthering Heights.

I don’t care about what other stories or games have done when judging its narrative on its own merits. If you don’t mind it then that’s fine, but for me the narrative puts a strong emphasis on its characters. Trying to make them believable and natural, but they more or less ruin that. More importantly though they’re not even entertaining or intimidating. They’re fodder. Thales was the closest to feeling like an actual Villain

Furthermore my issue with Edelgard as a main lord is that she paints herself as a logical and forward thinking individual yet despite that she seeks no alternatives to violence. She instead sets herself down her path of war with a very close minded viewpoint. I don’t hate her, nor do I think she is a bad character, but I do think that she is crazy and so dead set on never letting go of the past and seeking out her ideals that she comes off as the most villainous of the three. There’s also that point that she actually doesn’t know the truth about the past and what actually happened that it makes her wrong in that regard as well.

Being evil for the sake of being evil isn’t not good story telling either, especially when there are other evil characters. In fact the quality of the storytelling shouldn’t be based on the villain whatsoever. The story has to do with the struggle of a group of students and the professor and the church and the people of Fodland due to war, not the personal character quirks of a boss that only shows up for the final battle.

You might could call it lazy if that was the only villain (and yet even then it wouldn’t be different than 95% of other games, many of which are recognized as masterpieces), but it’s not. It’s a villain on top of a villain. They could’ve not added him in at all and it would’ve been amazing as is. Adding them in is just icing on an already delicious cake.

The narrative does indeed put a strong focus on its characters... and wildly succeeds in doing so. We already have a villain that meets the criteria you speak of. This is just an added bonus on top of it. And fits the story perfectly as a really evil character is needed to show the extent Edelgard is willing to go to to achieve her goal. Whether you personally find them intimidating sounds like a personal thing. I found them to be as intimidating as any evil character in any game I’ve played.

Edelgard chooses violence because clearly the church isn’t going to stand down on their own accord. Please Miss Rhea will you please cease and decist, and abolish your organization henceforth...? Of course violence is the only option she sees. And she very well might be the most villainous of the three. Maybe. Then again she just wants to upset the age-old societal structure. She still has morals as we clearly see from the Flame Emperor. The other group does not. They resent not just the church, but the people of Fodland at large. So now that I think about it, I would have to disagree she’s the most villainous. She wants a good thing but is going about it the wrong way.

Idk. This whole thing just feels like picking pepper out of fly poop. The game does such a good job of story telling, such a good job of world building and character depth, such a good job of fleshing out the antagonist and painting a grey area, yet, all this focus on a single band of villains that play such a small roll in the overall game. It feels like a disproportional response. It’s just a game. Enjoy it.

@Andrew_R_2000
Ya. Glad I grabbed it for $150 or however much it came out to be. She reminds me of Manuela a lot. The busty, flirty, slightly promiscuous (well, more than slightly 😁) older woman. Token inclusion for any FE game.

I am enjoying the game, I’m just offering my views on the narrative. In all honesty I don’t see how it can’t be seen as poor writing in this case. I understand characters like Kostas being bland nobodies. He's just a thief. He served his purpose to die and had very little to no bearing on the plot. Same for basically every other ‘antagonist’. Lonato, Sylvains brother and even the Death Knight. Each of them had something or a unique edge to them. Even Cornelia who was blatantly evil had a great moment at her death. That never really happens for any of TWSITD. Thales was probably the closest albeit he sort of just dies as well. Mind you these guys aren’t just fodder. They’re not bandits or vengeful family. They’re the Bad Guys. The head honchos. They orchestrated literally everything

Edit: I’ll think it more over. Read through points again. Don’t want to be too focused on my views

I can at least appreciate the sentiment towards Lonato. He made a great bad guy. He did have a unique edge to him and that was awesome. So does Edelgard. I agree that that’s amazing when they do that. However, I do not agree that every bad guy ever must be that.

I see it as no different than the Emperor in Star Wars. Or Sauron in Lord of the Rings, or Smaug in The Hobbit. They’re just evil characters. People like stories where you have really evil characters because it makes the lines of good and bad clearly defined. So I struggle understanding a point of view that says having evil characters is lame, when all the best stories do it, and almost everyone universally loves it. Why does this game get singled out and not Star Wars. Why not Lord of the Rings? Why not The Hobbit? Snow White? Chronicles of Narnia? Final Fantasy?

If you want a bad character that’s more defined and relatable that’s fine, I actually really enjoy that as well, but not every bad character has to fit that bill. It’s not lazy, it’s just popular. It’s what people like. So, in a sense it’s actually good storytelling because it’s telling a story with characters that people like to see. And I feel like that’s doubly true for a game that actually does already have a relatable bad guy (a couple, actually), something most games do not.

Gosh dang. Fire Emblem sold out on Amazon again. This is like the third time. I understand right at launch with demand exceeding supply but... this is crazy. Demand is still going super strong. Game was at like #13 still today before it sold out and started to drop.

I’m cheering this game all the way to 4 million sold. Nintendo games typically double their launch sales over the span of their lifetime sales. If it was able to break 2 million (which, with incredibly strong digital sales I think is possible), I think it has a shot. They said it was already just behind Awakening’s lifetime sales (2.2 mil). So ya. 2 mil is a fair estimate for first 2 weeks, digital included. I just hope that success is enough to garner a larger budget for the next entry. You can tell they really did the best they could with what they were given. They made the biggest game possible with the budget they had. But they could do so much more if Nintendo bankrolled a larger budget.

Also remember Edelgard's past, I think with what happened to her, it made sense that she thinks the only way forward is to plunge Fodlan to war. She just can't fathom any other way, and to be honest? I don't think any way other than war could topple things.

Granted she might be able to at least talk it out with Claude or something in an attempt to have another ally... (And since Claude is actually very reasonable guy)

But, she probably assumes that the other 2 won't agree with her (Dimitri I'm not sure, but Claude does give untrustable vibe even during the part 1)

So you can press + - L R to reset to the main screen. Do you think this is a deliberate throwback to the Game Boy Advance era reset?

Also if you didn't know you could do that, I don't blame you, I don't think it tells you anywhere in the game, but it's much faster than closing the software and reopening it.

@darkfenrir Really? I found Dimitri to be the least trustworthy of the three right off the bat. He seemed like two steps short of mass murderer to me.

@Heavyarms55 well yeah Dimitri is so, but it's like Claude could say a thing and then do another thing in the background I guess?

While Dimitri would be the one standing in front of you and honestly try his best to kill you if he disagree. He has that sense of "honorable" thing.

Admittedly I also think Claude looks less trustable but he's the one I want on my side if possible. I was sad I can't get him on my side even though I spared him at a battle in Black Eagle's route

@darkfenrir I don't know, Claude really struct me as more prankster than backstabber. He might say one thing and do another, but I really don't think he'd stab you in the back. Dimitri did seem like the type to be open about murdering you, but I think you are right in that he would murder you and anyone else he disagrees with.

Although I do still think they are going to release a DLC where either all 3 ally together or at least 2 out of 3. I could see a more serious Almyran or Dagda invasion forcing a Fodlan alliance of some sort. They certainly allude to that sort of possibility. And there is nothing like an outside party crasher to make the locals cooperate.

@Heavyarms55 Yeah that sounds like it will work. Then again there'll always be that Crest thing hovering behind I'm not comfortable with if it happens. (I really agree on Edel's view here, but man, the way we are doing it is kinda nuts. Not like I see any other way, really)

@darkfenrir I think a war that forces cooperation could lead to a compromise reform at the end. Fernidand alludes to it at some point, suggesting a public education system and elevating the best performing students into positions of authority. I could see them ending up in a system where the nobility must perform well to retain their status and the crests just remain as an unfortunate advantage some people have. It would still be far from perfect, but it would be a serious improvement over a system where authority is simply passed down by birth.

@Heavyarms55 Yeah that would work much better. Although I do hear about Hanneman's research... where it's said he's searching a way to give everyone crest? Where it would also pretty much able to let him take away crests like what is done to Lys. That way, with everyone having crest, it's also made it so that Crest system themselves are going to need to reform

@darkfenrir Yeah there's another potential solution to be sure.