Oh man, where do I even begin with this one.. there's so much to adore here.

Right off the bat, the gameplay's probably the most fun it's been in the series for me - there's some questionable bosses with an overreliance on egregious status effects (the Trails classic, honestly) but the gameplay loop itself has come such a long way.
The newly added Quick Arts during Field Battles to give casters a bit more oomph on the field and Ex Chains to punish stuns with during Command Battles have made the combination of Field and Command battles an absolute blast, rewarding you with incredibly fast-paced normal encounters as long as you use Field Battle properly. It feels great!

But that's not what I'm here for - the thing that has made me such a massive Trails fan that I'd play through a whopping twelve (god, we're really at TWELVE already?) of these games is it's massively expansive world and casts, and that continues to be absolutely fantastic in this game, which I'm absolutely over the moon about.
Kuro 2 picks up the story themes of Kuro 1 incredibly well - where nearly all of the Spriggans are dealing with grief in one way or another and are slowly, but surely, learning to appreciate the precious present for what it is despite it all. And god, does this game nail that aspect. Including Swin and Nadia into the Spriggans, the fabled Three and Nine who have certainly got more than enough grief left to unpack was an absolutely genius idea. They blend into the cast SO well, and the way this game ties a bow on their character arcs is easily my favorite thing about it.
I loved em a lot already, and I didn't think I could love em even more. They're easily some of my favorite characters, not just within Trails itself; and this game added to that feeling tenfold.
Beyond them, it picks up the character arcs of the regular Spriggan cast really well too, and the newly-included villains add a lot to it's themes in that regard as well. Absolutely no notes on it's story, it's fantastic.

I've heard a lot of complaints about Act 3 before jumping into it myself which made me expect the worst but honestly I didn't.. really mind it, at all?
It's definitely where the game starts running out of steam and relying on old assets more than it did before (which is sadly not surprising when it came out only a year after the original) so it's definitely a case of making the most out of what it's got but man, it definitely pulls that off in my opnion.
I think having a long, drawn-out chapter making you aware of how much the connection you have with pretty much every single NPC you've come to love across these two games is great, actually! It makes it all the easier to appreciate what the game's going for, and I love the way it's handled that.

It's such a feel-good game for me.
Bittersweet, but it really makes me appreciate everything I've got going for me currently despite what it took to get here; and being able to resonate with this bizarre family of misfits like that has been such a blast.
It's just a genuinely great time and a perfect reminder as to why I love this series so damn much.

80 hours of pure unadulterated bliss.

Fire Emblem Engage is no exaggeration one of my favourite games I’ve ever played. Yeah I’m fully aware of just how polarising this title has been for a bunch of people but they are absolutely wrong, don’t even listen to them. This game bangs SO hard & it’s better than I ever could’ve expected.

Now I’m saying this as someone who has only played Fire Emblem Three Houses & Fire Emblem Warriors Three Hopes, the latter I still haven’t finished so honestly I’m pretty late to the party when it comes to FE as a series…but if Engage is anything to go by then the future of this franchise is in very good hands.

My entire experience with this game I never wasn’t having a good time with it. While the story itself is nothing to write home about as it is very basic & simplistic… honestly that’s mainly why it works so well. It’s not trying to be deep & meaningful. This is a game which doesn’t try to confuse you with multiple routes & completely different perspectives like 3H did. It’s straight forward but most importantly, easy to digest & take in. It’s a story about war but it doesn’t try to be overly serious about it constantly & that’s something a lot of games forget nowadays. Games are meant to be fun. Fire Emblem Engage is fun. It knows when to take itself seriously & when to not. And the experience that it gave me is something I absolutely do not get from a lot of games these days.

I really enjoyed the emblems mechanic. It’s sort of like the battalions in 3H where you can break through an enemies defences or give your allies a major buff in support skills. The emblems are sort of like that only way more busted especially on certain characters. The abilities that they in turn give you can be inherited even without the emblems which I thought was really neat. The maps are also incredibly fun for the most part. There’s a bunch more variety to them & they don’t feel like they’re copy pasted unlike 3H. In terms of the strategy gameplay itself, it’s rock solid. I admit I did play on normal/classic which is what I always do for a first run through of games but it never felt too ridiculously easy or too much of an unfair challenge. Definitely gonna do my second playthrough on hard though as I did with 3H.

One gripe I’ve heard a lot of people complain about with Engage is a lack of compelling characters…again, they’re absolutely wrong. Yes not all of them are hits, in fact I found myself majorly indifferent to a number of them. But characters like Yunaka & Ivy are just absolutely peak & have so much depth to them. The base of the Somniel is also much better than the monastery in 3H & I just think in general there’s so much less tedium as a whole. Oh & the supports in this game are always entertaining. Especially when everyone acts weird around poor Alear & she just stands there all confused, it’s pretty great. Speaking of Alear, I think she’s a really good protagonist. She may look like colgate toothpaste but as the game goes along I found myself majorly warming up to her. And the voice performance by Laura Stahl is absolutely stellar especially in the final act of the game.

Fire Emblem Engage isn’t perfect by any means but in terms of strategy RPGs I really don’t think you can go wrong. There’s just so much content & I found myself so invested I couldn’t put the game down. And it honestly makes me want to check out the other Fire Emblem games that came before this one because as a celebration of this series as a whole, I was pleasantly surprised by Engage. It’s so ridiculously fun & I absolutely adore it. What an incredible way to kick off 2023 for gaming!

I am eternally destined to like games that are divisive because people are too joyless to appreciate em, and Fire Emblem Engage is absolutely no exception.

Don't get me wrong - my first impression of this game was far from stellar too. I had half a mind to avoid using Alear entirely because I hated their design so much.
But with every bit of gameplay features we got to see, I got more and more excited for this game - and man, I'm so glad I did. It is such a ridiculously fun game.

We haven't had such a heavy focus on player-phase combat in the series since FE12, which was already my favorite FE gameplay-wise - but this game just goes above and beyond. The Break system took me a while to get used to, but when it finally clicked it was so ridiculously satisfying.
The low deployment slots and gigantic amount of Emblem Ring combinations you could pull off means it's gonna be great fun to replay too, and I can't wait to give that a shot.

The story definitely takes a while to get going, and I don't blame anyone for losing interest relatively quickly, but I'm glad it picks up as well as it does.
Didn't think I'd ever say this about Fire Emblem but the ludonarrative harmony is what especially fascinated me about this game - there's some really impactful moments where you're supposed to feel powerless and it shows SO goddamn well through the gameplay that follows. It's incredible.

Despite the story being pretty basic at first, the characters are still as enjoyable as always - and although it takes more of a GBA FE approach of having some quick and simple supports, there's still plenty of meaningful and enjoyable ones. Ivy was a really stand-out character to me, because she's one of the few that tackles issues that are very specific to the game's setting. I think you could've taken any other character in a different setting and they'd still work - which doesn't bother me too much, honestly - but she's definitely the most layered character I've seen in the supports in my playthrough. Pleasantly surprised about that!

All in all, I'm really happy with this game. It's not perfect by any means, but I think any long-time fan should really be able to appreciate what this game's going for. Tons of subtle nods to older games and tons of direct fanservice with the Emblem Rings and how they play.
Couldn't think of a better (regrettably delayed) anniversary celebration!

Really excited for Fire Emblem's future after playing this game. Fantastic gameplay, a story that works more than well enough for what the game's supposed to be, great fanservice, incredible animations and hell - the game looks gorgeous in general, honestly.
With so much going well for it, I can't wait to see what's next!