Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon & The Blade Of Light Switch eShop File Size Revealed

I'm sure every reader here was worried out of their mind about having to buy a second hard drive to store an NES game, so this should put them at ease.

I'm a little disappointed that this isn't just a NES online release. Had added a lot more value to the online subscription.

How did the game go from 400kb to 30mb? That is almost as large as an N64 game. In fact Ocarina of Time is only 32mb, how did Fire Emblem for NES get to 30mb? Even if the game had graphical filters, fast forward and rewind options, border frames, button mapping, in-game manual, English translation patch, and/or save-state features it should at least be around 1 to 5mb at most.

Should have been a nes online game like it is in Japan.

@Xiovanni You may be correct but so far the many NES emulators I had seen don't go up to the 20 or 30mb range unless they are using a multi-emulator which support more platforms than just Famicom/NES.

@Slowdive I guess that means the translation patch makes it larger then.

Timed release nonsense.

OOT on the Wii U was 76 MB, most GBA VC games were over 50 MB, it's known that those releases had high quality multi-lang scans of the original manuals that were not hosted online.

If that's the case here then case closed. People really shouldn't expect the English script to take more than 500 KB, and that's without compression.

A shame there will be no release on cartridge, but at least it's not expensive, so might download it.

Curse you, Nintendo, forcing people to buy a separate memory card.😖😆

Seriously, though, this is a whole lot for NES (whose entire library, albeit with every rom zipped, I recall taking barely 300-400 Mb of my storage - back then, first carrying it all around on one's tiny palmtop felt 50 shades of SURREAL), but not surprising in the least. UI, extra mechanics, some graphic tweaks (the original resolution might sport quite a blur on the 720p screen, which rarely bodes well for a JRPG with its lot of text) - that's usually the bulk of the storage, ironically dwarfing the rom itself.

Wow 30 MB! Better clear off some space LOL! It's crazy how PS5 games are said to be over 100 gigs but back in the Nes days they were so tiny!

Yes, nes fire emblem cartridge is like 400kb. This is super huge but it probably has an emulator inside it.

Looking forward to playing this! Woot!

It will be interesting to see if an actual ROM is used to deliver the game. That way it may be possible to extract and play on an original NES - like the Pacman "Demastered" release.

This won't be bothering my wallet. Got more than enough NES games to play via NSO, many of which haven't even been started.

This will be and insta-download. I am a fan of the series

If a kilobyte never falls in a forest (or a SSD)... is it still a kilobyte? ... Sorry.

Having never played a Fire Emblem game before, I was intrigued until I saw the manner in which this is being released, digitally and cartridge-free. I will wait for the inevitable major announcement (Direct?) concerning their plans in the new fiscal year before I decide what to do about this release.

I have awakening and three houses and haven't even touched those. So I might pass on this one. But this game being sold as a separate download instead of being included in the online service is really an awful move on nintendo.

I really wish we still had virtual console releases so I can buy the NES metroid and not be bothered with going online to play it or to worry about it getting pulled from the online options. It would really suck if they do decide to sell NES games separately, they will all be like this release--hyped, overpackaged and overpriced for a limited time. I truly miss having the virtual console copies as an option.

Inconceivable! Every game should be 1MB. I mean, holy cow, it's 2020. We have advanced enough in technology that this is feasible. Even the Witcher 3 should be 1MB. Hehe

Kidding aside, there are some big games out there. I mean over 100GB! Can you imagine trying to download a 500GB or 1TB game in the future?

Is this basically the same game as shadow dragon for ds?

Code in box? No thanks then. I'll wait until the limited offer ends, to see how they'll offer this game as well as Mario 3D all stars. Boycott fomo and anti consumer practices

Might have to leave this one running overnight...

Can we stop this nonsense now with the complaining that there’s no physical cart.. Who in their right mind is going to put a 30MB game on a cartridge? The only time we’ve seen that(correct me if I’m wrong) is the DQ collection games but there was three of them on one, even then I doubt it was more than 200MB(prolly less than 100 lol). I’m upset that the physical collection only comes with a code but I’m not loosing sleep about it. Game is 6 bucks so ion get the sense of complaining for the limited release. I’m sure you can spare that amount if you really do want this game before March.

That aside I’m super excited that this is finally officially translated in the west, I hope this means mother 3 and SMT 1/2 also has a better chance of coming soon as well. November & December can’t come sooner!!!

I will be buying on day one instead of pre-ordering. Using my eshop credit for another game, just not sure what game yet.

I think the download is cool, but the most important thing in a physical release is a cartridge (and a manual), and not posters, artbooks, stickers, keychains and other tacked-on kitsch. These can be added as bonus after the cartridge is manufactured.

For example, I don't mind having a 24 MB game like Retro City Rampage on a 25000 MB Wii U Disc either. It's the game that matters, not the size.

Also, I love it when tons of crap and shovelware gets released at retail and many good games only come out digitally.

PS. I think Pokémon Stadium 2 was another 64MB game for the N64 next to Conker's Bad Fur Day and Resident Evil 2.

PPS. On my eShop page Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon & the Blade of Light is 100MB, not 30MB.

@Northwind it has all new menu's, save functions etc. it isn't merely the original rom.

I’ll stick to the superior DS remake. I don’t see a reason to get the old version.

So that's where the '30MB' size came from.
The actual eShop says 100MB, though Nintendo UK's website says "100.00 MB (estimated)" so maybe that's just an estimate.

There's bound to be a minimum amount of things included which could be several MB on its own, so a game being under 1MB on the Switch eShop is likely impossible. It looks like the smallest known game on SKTTR's list in the forums was Venture Kid's demo, at 8.9MB at launch.
Even 'unlock key'-style DLCs are now shown as 4MB in the eShop. (but install as 0.4MB - four 0.1MB files rounded up to 1MB each)

To compare it to some SNES game filesizes on Switch...
Dragon Ball Z Super Butoden = 24.1MB
Super Famista 2018 = 18.6MB
so 30MB isn't too far from similar games' sizes.

30MB is still a large filesize for an emulator.
The Famicom ROM itself is only 384KB.

30 MB is still like a mid-DS era in terms of filesize.
Though the DS remake itself was 64 MB.

@Predator Why do people play the NES versions of the Mario games when the All-Stars versions exist?
Some people like to see the original.

@LinkSword quality humor from a quality cucco wearing majoras mask

@KingMike I just don’t personally see a point in playing the original when there is a better version of the same game already made. Same applies to Super Mario All Stars.

@Predator I'd argue the looks, the cost, and the fact that it has never been released in the west but to br honest I see your point. I'm getting this just because I want that anniversary bundle

@Xylnox it's weird to think about now but maybe in 15 years a Tb will be a small little piece of data lol.

It's funny; 30 MB is nothing today, but a couple of decades ago it was considered to be a ton of space!

@meltendo yeah I know what you mean. I think this is just a separate release because it is localized in the west for the first time and one of the best nes games

@Zoda_Fett
The DQ games were actually mobile ports totalling 837MB, but...
all of these have their own carts, from various limited publishers:
(launch sizes from SKTTR's forum thread)

100 MB Fairune Collection (Flyhigh Works)
100 MB Momodora: Reverie Under the Moonlight (Dangen Entertainment)
98 MB DOOM 64 (Bethesda)
84 MB Xeodrifter (Atooi)
68 MB Windjammers (DotEmu)
65 MB Downwell (Devolver Digital)
57 MB Kero Blaster (Active Gaming Media)
52 MB Mighty Gunvolt Burst (Inti Creates)
44 MB Mutant Mudds Collection (Atooi)
32 MB Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon (Inti Creates)
24 MB Retro City Rampage DX (Vblank Entertainment)

...so there are companies willing to waste a 2GB cart on a tiny amount of data.

I keep seeing these file size reveal headlines. How much do people really care about these things, though?

@komodo182 Shadow Dragon for DS is the remake to this title. So it's basically the same game, but has lots of changes to update it and extra chapters that weren't present in the NES game.

What I remember most ist that the DS game has the weapon triangle (that wasn't introduced until FE4), it has extra Intro chapters for easy mode and you can get Nagi as a character when you lost both Tiki and the Falchion (as these are the only two options to deal effective damage to the final boss in the game).

If any dataminers can pull up info that the emulator that runs this game can also support SNES and GBA games, this this confirms my sneaky suspicion that this was supposed to be a Fire Emblem collection of Fire Emblems 1-8

The reason why I say this is because the emulator is much too large for a NES game when you consider all the assests, and Nintendo commonly loves to do collections to celebrate anniversaries, such as Kirby's Anniversary Collecton or the recent Super Mario 3D All-Stars Collecton.

It just seems odd that a single random NES rom is given this treatment and its so large in terms of file size.

I think this was intended to be a collection of Fire Emblem 1-8, with 3-6 getting their first translations ever, while Shadow Dragon and Gaiden were getting translations for the first time on their debut platforms.

But Covid got in the way, and the project fell apart. Due to changes in development and other things, only Shadow Dragon got translated.

So, Nintendo is trying to at least make something out of the little bit they put into the project by selling the translated version of Shadow Dragon and retooling the Physcial Release to focus on that game alone.

I could be wrong, but 30MB is a massive size for a Famicom rom, even if they do include some extras with it.

It all depends on what dataminers find.

But if they discover that the Emulator can support NES, SNES, and GBA games or hints of those games somewhere, then Covid just robbed us of what could have been a major project to celebrate Fire Emblem's Anniversary.

@komodo182 But de-maked, yes. If you really want to play all the games in the series, there is merit to the original, but if you've played any of the remakes of the original game, you've already seen the story with better graphics and less bad RNG.

I'm getting it in futile hopes that they'll some day bring over ones like Genealogy of the Holy War and Binding Blade.

@MarzoriuM On the bright side, those who don't have an NSO membership or have their memberships expiring don't have to worry about losing access to this game.

@Kieroni @BowtieShyGuy Thanks you two

Sorry, but as a massive fan of Fire Emblem and Advance Wars, I just could not get on with the NES/SNES games in the series. The graphical style just doesn't age well, and the menus look and feel extra clunky. When the games transitioned to the GBA, that's when they really became special imo.

@bluesun 24MB /2GB = about 1.1% used.

I heard the Game Boy Player boot disc for GameCube used around 2MB of the 1.35GB capacity disc. (and Pac-Man Vs. was probably a similarly small game)

That's less than what I previously thought was one of the most wasteful games, Pong: The Next Level on GBC, which used about 117KB out of a 1MB ROM (around 11% capacity). Though supposedly that was on Nintendo for enforcing a 1MB minimum size then (I'd imagine a 128KB ROM wouldn't have been out of production by that point)... much as I'm guessing by this discussion that 2GB is the minimum Switch card size?

@KingMike I doubt anything can beat that Game Boy Player size for amount used. xD
Maybe some Blu-ray disc with an exceedingly tiny game or something...

Lists of theoretical Switch cart sizes always seem to include "1GB", but in practice I don't believe anyone's actually found one, with even tiny games like Retro City Rampage having 2GB carts.

My only issue is that they’re doing another limited release. I could understand if they were gonna offer it for a cheaper price for a while to drive up initial sales but this artificial scarcity nonsense is abusive of patrons and needs to end.

Just quoting above:

Keep in mind, the 30th Anniversary physical release of the original Fire Emblem on Switch comes with a code instead of a game cartridge

THEREFORE NOT A PHYSICAL RELEASE

That's an outrageous file size for a NES game

This is going to be a ridiculously, unnecessarily difficult release to get our hands on (I'm referring to the limited collector's edition). Nintendo seems to once again have made a pitifully small amount. Nintendo really treats their loyal fans terribly. They make so few and then retailers like Best Buy Canada launch their online pre-orders at 4am and they're all bought up by eBay bot scum. I'm just lucky I was able to secure a pre-order over the phone through EB Games Canada. All of this would be alleviated if Nintendo would just go back to the time when they made enough collector editions for people to reasonably get their hands on it rather than spend weeks hitting refresh on various websites in the hopes you can beat the eBay trash-bags of humanity.

@Xylnox

I vividly remember Red Dead II eating up 115 gigs of my PS4’s HDD.

@Northwind There isn't a single NES game that was ever 10mb., thats triple most 16-bit games. The max was 768kb.

@Northwind MB. NOT GB.

@Northwind Yes, exactly that.