Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes 'Shez' And 'Arval' Official Artwork Released

I like the art style.

This will only be like the 3rd FE game I ever play. Too many things prevented me from playing previous games. Some seemed too hard, some got scarce and expensive too fast. Some seemed too time-consuming for my busy schedule. Really looking forward to this one!

Shez and Arval........sounds like Aussie slang words.
"See you this Arval Shez"
Translated:
"See you this afternoon, Sharon"
😜

So we're playing as the bad guys this time around? Interesting.

@Thoughts That's where "scarce and expensive" comes in. If you have a 3DS or Wii U then you have more options that aren't scarce and expensive (though not for long due to the 3DS and Wii U eshop shutdowns in March 2023) but if you don't, the only viable Fire Emblem options are the Switch ones (Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light localization was delisted in March 2021 though).

Props to Nintendo for making me extremely excited about a game I was only previously mild interested in.

Hopefully this is another aspect of Sothis as it’s obvious she still isn’t whole. Not too interested in the protag currently though. Byleth needs more work but I can see why at the point of time the game deals with that they don’t reuse her. I was sorta hoping for a post time skip game.

This game looks great and seems to be running better than Age of Calamity (probably because Koei Techmo co-developed FE Three Houses and are able to use the same assets).

Is it worth playing Three Houses before this or could I go into this blindly? From the looks, it seems to be some sort of alternate reality to the base game.

@Axecon

It looks to me to be a parellel universe type thing. So IN THEORY, you shouldn't need to play 3 house to understand the plot. Mousou games are usually designed with the ability to have a self contained plot, though you'd probably get a kick out seeing where differences arise in the plot due to the change of protagonist had you played 3 houses.

The turning point for this game appears to be outcome of a standard mission the previous game's protagonist, Byleth (nicknamed the ashen demon for their terrifying unnatural stoicism in battle). If things had proceeded normally, Shez should have died in the fight and Byleth should have gone on to have the chance encounter which led them to become the teacher of the academy of students.

This time, a previously unknown being is involved and likely saved Shez. And Shez is the one who has the chance encounter and appears to be mentoring these students instead, albeit in a more mercenary style vs Byleth's acedemic style. The goal this time appears to be taking down Byleth. Whether the new protagonist is ultimately good, bad or being manipulated by the mysterious being remains to be seen but there are a lot of spoiler-y plot reasons as to why many groups or powerful beings might want to take down Byleth, the least spoiler-y reason being Byleth has their own magical being in them.

@Axecon
I would have to assume this hits the same scenario as Age of Calamity and Persona 5 Strikers. You don't necessarily "need" to play the base game, but it'll massively benefit your understanding and opinions on the game.

@ModdedInkling arguably you need to play persona 5 to play strikers. That game assumes you know what happened in each characters arc and know who each character is. It doesn't recap at all. I mean, I f you don't care about the story in any way you it doesn't matter, but if you want to know what's going on you need to play p5. Age of calamity being a prequel means botw doesn't matter (until the end) because the plot events of botw haven't happened yet.

@Xansies
I've been told otherwise for Personal 5 Strikers, and their main reason was being that the gameplay of Persona 5 just took too long if I was interested in story.

Age of Calamity is not a prequel to Breath of the Wild (Nintendo and Koei Tecmo subverted expectations in their marketing). It's actually a partial-sequel to Breath of the Wild, with Breath of the Wild characters travelling to an alternate timeline to save Hyrule. Almost everything said or seen in the game is a reference to Breath of the Wild. In order to understand Age of Calamity, you technically need to play Breath of the Wild.

@ModdedInkling for the guys basically time travelling, it's a last minute twist. Up until that actual moment it's a prequel.

But I mean, if you just want to play the game it's cool, but strikers assumes you know Morganas deal and it's referenced without being explained like 100 times, every single thing about the what happened is talked about as "last year" without saying what that was, the game treats all the characters like you know who they are and they talk about what they did in persona 5 without really explaining or recapping constantly. Like the game makes sense plot wise if you never played p5, but the game also assumes you have.

@Xansies
There are many factors that prevent Age of Calamity from being a prequel, stemming from the moment Terrako travelled back to the past. The malice of Calamity Ganon in the BotW timeline effectively changed the return of Calamity Ganon in AoC: Recruiting Astor (because of the DLC, it's now very unlikely he has caused the Great Calamity), forming a large horde of monsters not seen nor mentioned in BotW's flashbacks, and activating Sheikah Towers much earlier, whereas in the BotW timeline, they never rose at all until Link woke up 100 years later.

This is also completely disregarding any contradictory inconsistencies such as when Link obtains the Master Sword, but that's a whole different discussion.

AoC will never be a prequel unless, and only unless the Terrako from the AoC timeline was not possessed by Calamity Ganon and travelled back in time in the same manner as the BotW Terrako