This review contains spoilers
Do I have the right to jot my thoughts down on this game? I mean, I only finished half of the Blue Lions route and all of the Crimson Flower route, and I am planning on... well, eventually getting back to do Golden Deer, but I want to believe punching through a route is enough. This game took me like eighty hours as is.
Picked this up around release. Was very Fire-Emblem lapsed. I'd picked up Awakening on release, could not get into the story, dropped it. Picked up Conquest, thought it sucked, dropped it. Three Houses, though, people were talking about. And I'd just gotten a shiny new switch.
Fire Emblem Persona started out pretty nice. Customize your class, learn about the deep world, fight some low-stakes battles. I was getting kind of anxious about going back to the monastery instead of doing a more traditional, linear Fire Emblem campaign, but I was open to it.
Then the shift happens, the time skip the trailer promised. Here we go, I think. We're going on a war campaign (I was with Dmitri of the Blue Lions) and this is going to kick ass. It uh. It sort of did.
See, the issue here is that the gameplay had sort of broken down. I was playing on hard, but no map presented even an iota of challenge. I'm not trying to toot my own horn, here - at the time of playing, I was an absolute shit gamer, a strategy buffoon, a tactical caveman. The gameplay simply did not hold my interest.
Turning to the plot to provide hope, I got to THE map. It was going to be the coolest one, the class reunion. The gang is fighting. What was supposed to be the climax, the emotional peak of the game... just utterly shat the bed for me. I, the player, was fighting against the Golden Deer while the Empire was right there. The Golden Deer explicitly did not want to fight me. One of my former students bum rushes me and some emotional dialogue plays: "Sensei, why are you attacking us?"
It was the worst shit. I dropped it then and there.
A good three years later I get into Fire Emblem again. I boot up Maddening. I stream. The friction is incredible. The first few maps, while terrible on replay, are entertaining in their bizarre challenge. I go with Edelgard this time and the catharthis of fighting my former students, their former friends, family members... it rules. The penultimate map is one of the most exciting strategy challenges coupled with emotional release. It is why I play Fire Emblem.
7/10
Picked this up around release. Was very Fire-Emblem lapsed. I'd picked up Awakening on release, could not get into the story, dropped it. Picked up Conquest, thought it sucked, dropped it. Three Houses, though, people were talking about. And I'd just gotten a shiny new switch.
Fire Emblem Persona started out pretty nice. Customize your class, learn about the deep world, fight some low-stakes battles. I was getting kind of anxious about going back to the monastery instead of doing a more traditional, linear Fire Emblem campaign, but I was open to it.
Then the shift happens, the time skip the trailer promised. Here we go, I think. We're going on a war campaign (I was with Dmitri of the Blue Lions) and this is going to kick ass. It uh. It sort of did.
See, the issue here is that the gameplay had sort of broken down. I was playing on hard, but no map presented even an iota of challenge. I'm not trying to toot my own horn, here - at the time of playing, I was an absolute shit gamer, a strategy buffoon, a tactical caveman. The gameplay simply did not hold my interest.
Turning to the plot to provide hope, I got to THE map. It was going to be the coolest one, the class reunion. The gang is fighting. What was supposed to be the climax, the emotional peak of the game... just utterly shat the bed for me. I, the player, was fighting against the Golden Deer while the Empire was right there. The Golden Deer explicitly did not want to fight me. One of my former students bum rushes me and some emotional dialogue plays: "Sensei, why are you attacking us?"
It was the worst shit. I dropped it then and there.
A good three years later I get into Fire Emblem again. I boot up Maddening. I stream. The friction is incredible. The first few maps, while terrible on replay, are entertaining in their bizarre challenge. I go with Edelgard this time and the catharthis of fighting my former students, their former friends, family members... it rules. The penultimate map is one of the most exciting strategy challenges coupled with emotional release. It is why I play Fire Emblem.
7/10