The worst Fire Emblem thus far. Engage has a dreadful story. Villains switch sides every two seconds to unnaturally advance the story, the dialogue is cheesy and worse than even the most unsubtle of JRPGS, and most Unit supports don't have actual character arcs, and serve more to just be filler conversations. Engage has awfully designed female characters, it's odd as Engage is the Fire Emblem that has gone the furthest in terms of having a straight-up mainstream anime design. This means there are, at tops, 3 different base faces, so the outside designs have to make up for that lack of variety. All of the female characters are incredibly overcompensated, yet I find that the male characters are mostly completely fine? Perhaps it's because the male-to-female ratio of units is about 3/7, so it becomes less likely for the designers to step on their own toes.

But, what I find most compelling about this and every other Fire Emblem, is how engaging (ha) and thoughtful the strategy part of the game is. Engage really allows you to experiment with so many approaches to each situation, and the emblems, with their unique skills and abilities, allow so much room for experimentation. By the last few chapters, I was still forming strategies. I even formed a strategy to completely cheese most bosses, which was to have Alear engage with Marth, Lodestar rush the boss so their first revive stone gets used, then use Alcrest to engage with Byleth and use his engage ability to allow all adjacent allies to move another time in the same combat turn. I then use a smash weapon with Alear, and since my Alear has such a high Avoid stat, the bosses literally could never attack since I'd dodge everything. The combination of tactics and skills that the emblems allow you to mess with really sets this one apart from the other Fire Emblem games.

My core army consisted of:
Alear, Alfred, Celine, Pandreo, Merrin, Alcryst, Diamant, Jade, Ivy, Zelkov, Kagetsu, Yunaka, Mauvier