Upon writing my Gaiden review, I pointed out that I plan to finish reviewing every Fire Emblem game on this site before moving onto other things, including Engage/Warriors: Three Hopes, which I finally managed to finish.

So yes, they will be added to help finish off this review Marathon, but what I failed to mention specifically was that I won’t include Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light, the first game in the series released in 1990, and the best selling game in the series before the advent of Fire Emblem 7, Mystery of the Emblem, the first SNES game, released in January 1994. Now why did I decide to leave those out? Well, it’s because there’s nothing to say about them. FE1 and FE3 are, in my opinion, obsolete and can be skipped for any reason besides curiosity. That’s not to say they are pointless games. They ARE in fact, very important, but because they have not stood the test of time, it’s only natural that Intelligent Systems would take its last intelligent initiative, to remake these two games into two DS games, for the purpose of localizing them to the West so we can finally witness the story of Marth, the mascot of the series.

And while Shadow Dragon was faithfully localized... New Mystery of the Emblem, Shin Monshou no Nazo, was not. It remains a Japanese exclusive to this day, and like GK2, the motive to keep it Japan exclusive was because of the poor sales behind its predecessor. Also like GK2, FE12 was developed using the same engine, with some new additions incorporated into it, proving that both games were relatively cheap to make compared to their respective box office flop predecessors. This is also proof of my belief that Fire Emblem and Ace Attorney are really not all that different from each other, considering everything released before and after 2010 and 2011 respectively speaking, was properly localized. However, that is not a real problem, because unlike GK2 fans who whine about GK2 being ignored by Capcom in favor of the “FAR INFERIOR” DGS Duology just because they got localized over it even though that decision makes more sense, which is something I explained in greater detail in a video I’ve already made...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdN4a-niEt0

Funny enough, I’m completely fine with FE12 being Japan exclusive. Not because I don’t want it to get localized, but because I am so happy to have played a FAN TRANSLATED PATCH of it. That’s right, this game was professionally translated by a group of fans who took it upon themselves to archive this forgotten masterpiece, breaching the language barrier. I owe my deepest respects to The Heroes of Shadow for localizing this game, just as I do the fan team who localized GK2 out of love for the series. Unlike GK2 however, the script for this game was incredibly expressive, resulting in a very smooth translation. The difference between FE12 and GK2, is that the latter is the worst game in its respective franchise, and should arguably remain JP exclusive because of its awfulness, whereas the former is easily one of the best games in the entire Fire Emblem series, and it is constantly overshadowed. I kid you not, GK2 is FAR more well-known than FE12 will ever be, as evident from the higher view count of any GK2 related content compared to FE12. GK2’s Pursuit theme has almost a million views on YouTube while the amazing Preparations Theme for FE12 is very difficult to find in full loop in a satisfying quality. That’s how obscure FE12 is, besides just being a JP exclusive game.

Considering hardly anyone ever talks about FE12, and whenever someone DOES talk about it, they usually call it out as an inferior remake to FE3, when that is hardly the case at all. If FE15 is proof of anything, people apparently like badly written garbage more than a remake that is actually faithful to its source material. I stated in the FE15 review that FE11 and 12 are fantastic remakes as opposed to FE15 because of that distinction. However, FE12 makes a lot of interesting changes that turned an okay SNES game into one of the greatest works of art I’ve ever seen.

Because this game is incredibly amazing, I must first get any grievances out of the way. For one, there’s this rather annoying cleric character whose name I forgot about, whose only personality trait is her flirting with Marth, but she’s an outlier and not the norm. The rest of the characters are fantastic, and because this game is so consistently perfect, I can’t find anything that can count as even a minor blemish outside of that. This game was also the first in the series to add Casual mode, which a lot of people hate for making the game easy, but I never once thought it was a problem, considering it makes complete sense. The best part is the fact that it’s optional, so if you want permadeath, play in Classic mode. This is how you add things without destroying what already existed – make them optional. I actually played it on Casual mode and enjoyed it immensely, not because it was on Casual mode, I would’ve still loved it to death even whilst playing in Classic mode.

Now let us look at the elephant in the room: Kris. Easily one of the most hated parts about this game, particularly because it was they who championed this self insert protagonist, a concept that often spawns a lot of problems in the later games. Now, I acknowledge that the self insert protagonist started here, and sadly became a staple in the series even after the damage has already been done thanks to Kouhei Maeda, who stopped directing Fire Emblem games after Heroes and Fates. However, the concept itself is not the problem. It’s the execution of said concept. For example, a story premise is a concept, and it can be executed well, or it can be executed poorly. As the final True Fire Emblem in the series, it makes sense that this idea was executed tastefully. Sure, Kris was still an important character in the overall story, but they were integrated as a SHADOW, in other words, not as the main protagonist. Using a self insert to be yet another vassal for Marth was the best possible way to make this idea work, and while most people despise the added story content to accommodate Kris’s addition, which is the assassination subplot, I actually think it enriches the entire narrative once you consider that it does make sense, and acts as yet another piece of the puzzle without retconning anything from FE3. The main point of contention with Kris is how they somehow shaft Marth in a way that is never explained by the detractors. This is a feeble argument that has no evidence to support it aside Marth not appearing in the tutorial chapters, which mimics Kaga’s omission of the main protagonist in some missions from Berwick Saga onward. Just because NEW content shows the avatar protag, doesn’t mean Marth’s screen time is reduced in any way, because that’s not what happened. Marth is still the main character of his story, and the writers understood this completely, keeping him the central focus amidst the additions. I still remember how Marth felt so bad for Lorenz (the cool guy with the eyepatch, not the ugly purple haired guy from Three Houses) when the latter committed suicide, and how guilty he felt over Hardin’s betrayal. All this was still in the original game, so the emotional tension remained, and it hit just as hard, arguably even harder once you consider the beautiful new images added to the game. The assassination subplot transitioned well into the main story, somehow not feeling off or forced. It ties in nicely with the fact that Jagen has grown too old to fight, considering he is now a drill trainer, which was a fantastic idea for a tutorial. Seeing Jagen, Athena, and Cain return from FE11 as drill trainers in the tutorial chapters is everything a Duology player could ever ask for, and they all retain the same voice and personalities, proving once and for all that FE12 is a sequel done right, unlike GK2. This is a perfect take on modernizing an already good story, making it completely timeless, a feat that is honestly difficult, and the writers must be commended for that.

New Mystery of the Emblem is pure perfection through and through. Though people tend to dislike Katarina, she is actually a really good character. Katarina is a creation of evil, forced to do horrible things, but even with all that, she is still able to feel emotion, and so much that it’s enough for her to cry when puppets like her supposedly cannot when you confront her for the final time. It was already shocking to see her betray you so early in the game, especially considering you were already building a bond with her as soon as she appears, because the writers knew how to utilize that limited screen time. It’s like Kristoph Gavin from GS4, if you ask me, considering Katarina was already acting as a tactician in much the same way Kristoph was a mentor to Apollo. The horrifyingly normal appearance of the evil bishop, Eremiya, is a compliment to the fact she saved many orphans from death, which is a contradiction to every game succeeding FE12. She and her team of orphan assassins bear ties to Gharnef, expanding on Gharnef’s influence and with it, the game’s narrative itself. Clarisse is an incredibly cool secondary antagonist, along with Roro (called Legion in Heroes, I assume), acting as villains in Gaiden chapters, perfectly tying together the new with the old. This is not even mentioning how perfect the additions to the old content were, proving that the writers were completely intent on not only modernizing, but also improving a story that was already great. Marth’s 2nd Book was already fantastic to begin with, and the fact that so much of that precious FE11 gold was added to it, even moreso than FE11, is why this game is so perfect. It was the most addictive game I’ve ever played, refusing to put it down ever since I picked it up. HowEVER, when I completed the game, I couldn’t help but feel so... Satisfied over how wonderful it all was. It was all a very cohesive experience, and despite falling in love with it, I never saw myself needing to play it again for a long time, even though I really should’ve played it over 10 times by now, considering I first picked it up in 2017 right after completing Fire Emblem Gaiden. I remember I would play it on road trips, and would use whatever opportunity I could to play it, but it wasn’t toxic addictiveness like with League of Legends. It was the kind that makes you look back on it fondly, and since I haven’t played it for like what, 5 years as of writing this? FE12 has had a profound impact on me, and I always considered it to be the peak of Fire Emblem, even when compared to FE7 and 5, which are better only for the fact that they’re longer and grander in scope, albeit only objectively, for I still consider FE12 my personal favorite. In the case of Fire Emblem 5, the story was better because of how much was done to show the darkness and grief, but this game has more than just a great story. It also has some of the best support conversations ever written in the history of this series. Xane’s shapeshifting shenanigans, Cecil’s fun training mentalities, female Kris (I STILL remember my Kris’s name by the way, even though I emulated FE12 on an eroding tablet. Her name was Sophia, as a reference to Sophia from FE6) sharing her sentiments with the broken Gra Princess Sheema, Barst’s awkward social interactions, Darros’s regret of being a bad pirate, among many, many others. Seeing FE9’s best feature, manifesting as the amazing base support conversations, return, was the greatest gift I could’ve ever had. So much for being a Japan exclusive – FE12 is the best in the series, hands down.

And I’m STILL not done. The good things just keep piling up, which creates an endless loop of happiness. The developers and writers packaged in prequel content from a nearly inaccessible platform containing four missions setting up the original Mystery of the Emblem’s story, the Archanea Saga, as bonus content. Considering they make up the hardest levels in the entire game, they were added in, alongside the Gaiden chapters, to make up for the main campaign’s rather short length, proving they cared about the complete package of perfection. No other game in the series does that, not to mention a music gallery, with awesome pictures showing the Starsphere shards, corrupted Emperor Hardin, Katarina crying, Marth meeting up with Caeda apparently to discuss something, Marth smiling towards the camera, a flashback scene of Nyna and Hardin, and those are just what I can remember off the top of my head. Despite playing this game over 5 years ago, I remember so much of it because it really is that good, and it is tied with GK1 for the best DS game of all time. GK1 has better gameplay, but that’s about the only difference between these masterpieces. Ask me every time what my favorite Fire Emblem is, and my answer will always be the same: it’s FE12, which is the summation of everything that makes Fire Emblem great. Besides the developers pouring so much care, love, and passion into this game, the new additions made it feel so advanced past the SNES that it never once felt like it originated from the SNES. It always felt like a game made for the DS, well after the series has lived long enough to implement so much nuance, which returned in the form of Shadow Dragon’s new mechanics and quality of life changes, the greatest support conversations since Fire Emblem 9, and the greatest OST in all of Fire Emblem. Can I take a moment to explain that last bit? Starting off with the remade FE3 tracks, they’re just as perfect as the remade FE1 tracks. The new songs, composed by Hiroki Morishita, are incredibly good, sounding surprisingly consistent with Tsujiyoko’s remade songs, to the point I used to think she was still the only composer until I finished the game and saw the credits. It’s like this game was made with the expectation that this would be the last one in the series, so the developers, writers, and composers gave it their all. I personally ADORE this game to the point I wish every game in the world was like it. All that heart, all these wonderful characters, the fact people from Intelligent Systems actually cared about not only preserving something, but expanding on it without destroying it. FE12 is a love letter, both from Intelligent Systems for making it in the first place, and the Heroes of Shadow for localizing it. Despite being directed by Kouhei Maeda, the very person who destroyed the series, it’s very clear that this game’s staff did everything in their power to save it, and made it not only the greatest Fire Emblem game of all time, but also the greatest retrogame remake of all time.

… It is here where the great Fire Emblem series should’ve forever rested. On its 20th anniversary, on a very peaceful high note. I would rather have Fire Emblem perish forever on July 15, 2010, with its profound legacy permanently unstained, than to have it revived and continue the rest of its life as a solace shadow of its former self. Fire Emblem as I knew it, was essentially revived by Shouzou Kaga himself, in the form of Vestaria Saga I: War of the Scions, originally in 2016 in Japan, then localized in 2019 worldwide. Heck, the best revelation of 2022, an overall awful year for many people including myself, was to hear Vestaria Saga II being released on said year. Perhaps Fire Emblem can live on, with its ardent, respected creator bringing an ancient series back to the modern day, which only furthered my respect for Shouzou Kaga. The fact he cares so much about Fire Emblem, a series he created over 30 years ago, to the point he would literally keep producing Fire Emblem games as an indie developer, is proof of his undying passion.