|
Thracia 776 is such a masterful game. Anyone who likes Fire Emblem at all and hasn't played it is doing themselves a huge disservice. That map design is just perfect (provided you ignore 24x, I guess).
|
#
¿
Dec 24, 2013 21:46
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 20, 2024 06:34 |
|
|
Sex Beef 2.0 posted:What does the OP mean by Thracia being released as a "download" as well as cartridge? Nintendo had a service in Japan called "Nintendo Power" where you could buy blank cartridges, and then pay to have games written to them for a cheap price. FE5 was only available through that service for a while.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 25, 2013 05:11
|
|
|
Playing Sacred Stones for the first time. I've heard the game was on the easier side so I've been playing on hard mode and haven't used the tower or skirmishes at all. It's been pretty smooth sailing so far - up until the ghost ship chapter, anyway. What a vicious level lol. Been trying it for a week and I haven't managed to get a consistent strategy yet. (I almost beat it once through a series of lucky crits but lost a character afterwards, painfully.) It's a really cool concept for a map, though, probably one of the most memorable stages in the first eight games (which are about all I've played). I have to say I'm enjoying the game more than FE7 (less than 6 though), but probably only because FE7's default mode was too relaxed (and because I'm ignoring chunks of the game to keep what balance it has from being thrown off). Really looking forward to playing Path of Radiance after this on.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 23, 2017 01:16
|
|
|
Yeah, I'm actually using both Seth and Duessel, and Moulder is liberally using the torch staff when he doesn't need to heal people. Still rough though. My current strategy is to try to push ahead into the second ship, getting everyone off the first ship as quickly as possible, while using my flying units to take out the mogalls before they descend on my main team and inevitably kill someone. The big problems are the boss squad (I can kill them if I leave Duessel and Seth on the first ship but I need them on the second to clear it) and the gargoyles who show up later in the chapter (they dick over the flying units). I think I could probably actually beat the chapter by only deplying Ephraim, Seth, and Duessel (and loading them up with healing items) lol. I want to avoid compromising like that though.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 23, 2017 02:04
|
|
|
Finished the ship chapter in Sacred Stones. Maybe one of the more memorable chapters in the series, honestly. So my goal is to eventually play all the series. I kind of want to go through the remaining games in order, but the next ones up would be Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn and... yeah. I'm curious about something - a lot of people say Shadow Dragon is one of the weaker games in the series (I'd agree, although I only played through it once on normal mode) but also highly praise New Mystery of the Emblem. What is it about FE12 that makes it highly regarded?
|
|
#
¿
Oct 23, 2017 20:14
|
|
|
Endorph posted:edit: Also FE12 has some of the best map design in the series, some pretty good unit/enemy difficulty balance, and a decent subplot. The main plot's pretty bland and there are a bunch of random filler cavaliers and such that take away some of the shine from its unit balance, but it's still a good game. FE11's main issue, besides the obvious artstyle issues, is that its map design isnt great besides a few chapters. Wooden Cavalry is way worse than anything in Gaiden/Echoes. FoolyCharged posted:Basically FE12 did level design so solid, they made a pretty good escape map before that was even a real objective. Shadow Dragon's map layouts were very faithful to FE1, to its detriment. FE3 did have solid levels (I wouldn't put it over FE5 or the GBA games though) - is FE12 a notable improvement on that or is it also very faithful to its source?
|
|
#
¿
Oct 23, 2017 21:34
|
|
|
I think the final chapter of Thracia 776 is pretty cool. Of course Veld is a weak boss enemy, but it feels more like the entire stage is the real "last boss", which is more appropriate for Fire Emblem anyway.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 24, 2017 04:47
|
|
|
That is, I think, a big part of what makes Thracia 776 able to sell its world / scenario so well. Most Fire Emblem games have you as a small guerilla army standing up against some invincible empire, but you never really feel that except in Thracia, where the types of battles you go through and the enemies you fight constantly reinforce the idea that you are drastically underequipped to fight such a powerful enemy, often leaving you on the back foot. But I do think that the ultimate purpose of stories in video games is not for them to be interesting on their own, divorced from the rest of the work (it's just a nice bonus if this happens), but to act as one of many components meant to help immerse the player in the world, or "experience", of the game - the same purpose that mechanics / gameplay ultimately serve. To this end I don't think a story needs to be particularly detailed or rich on its own to serve its purpose; I'd say that even the first Fire Emblem has a perfectly acceptable story for what that game is trying to do. I haven't played Radiant Dawn or Fates, the games which seem to have the most complaints leveled at their narratives, but I don't think any of the other games have had anything worth complaining about storywise; they all serve their purpose of complementing the rest of the games' elements.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 1, 2018 04:51
|
|
|
I'm actually playing through Path of Radiance for the first time too! Just reached chapter 27. I'm surprised that I'm actually finding the game less challenging than Sacred Stones (didn't enter any optional battles in that game, haven't used any bonus EXP in this aside from giving Mist a few levels at a friend's insistence). I probably enjoy it more than the GBA games though; level design is generally varied and interesting, and I like shoving and the return of skills and full re-move a lot. Definitely wish the game were a bit more challenging (disappointing that Maniac was removed in the US version, although I've heard from some people that it wasn't a very interesting hard mode anyway?) but this is probably my second favorite in the series after Thracia.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 5, 2018 07:02
|
|
|
Playing Radiant Dawn for the first time. Relatively early on (just got to the giant storm-the-castle chapter with all the NPC units in part 2, died near the end because I left Astrid out in the cold) - I'm enjoying it a lot but man, this is definitely the weirdest Fire Emblem game (barring, uh, Gaiden I guess). Feels like you get two or three units who outclass most of your army every chapter in part 1, and now in part 2 you're switching out parties every chapter instead. I assume there's going to be some kind of "everyone comes together" setup down the line, but for the moment it definitely feels like the usual long-term planning aspect of Fire Emblem is downplayed here. Enjoying the level of difficulty overall too. Playing on normal (which is actually hard I guess), it's a bit tougher than Path of Radiance was at this point in the game - easier than Binding Blade or the one playthrough of Sacred Stones I've done, but like PoR the mechanics and level design are complicated enough that that doesn't really bother me. I'll also say that although I don't enjoy the story in this game as much as Path of Radiance, since I really loved the slow burn there - definitely my favorite narrative and world in the series, just getting another fun look into Tellius is nice.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 20, 2018 13:20
|
|
|
On the subject of New Mystery of the Emblem, I'm curious about something for when I play it soon - which difficulty is closest to the original FE3: Hard or Maniac?
|
|
#
¿
Feb 22, 2018 07:06
|
|
|
cheetah7071 posted:normal, the original wasn't remotely hard So in terms of how strong enemies are relative to you, normal is actually the closest to the original game? I was mainly asking because of how much easier Shadow Dragon's normal mode was than the first game and Fire Emblem's propensity for making "normal" mode actually a kind of easy mode.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 22, 2018 13:46
|
|
|
I started playing New Mystery of the Emblem. What are you supposed to do at the end of the prologue when you fight Katarina (Maniac mode)? The thieves don't move until Katarina does, so you have no choice but to let one of your units take a hit from both a thief and Katarina - which literally none of your units can do. I did manage to complete the stage without any deaths (after multiple restarts) only because Katarina and the thief went after separate targets for some indiscernible reason, which feels like some sort of AI failure because they both had the capability to gang up on and kill Marth. So what is the intended solution here?
|
|
#
¿
Feb 28, 2018 23:27
|
|
|
That's strange - Katarina definitely attacked first. (Marth was at the very limit of Katarina's range and Cain was one space below him; then Katarina moved up to attack Marth and the thief went after Cain). I don't think Cain gained any levels during the stage, and checking his base stats he definitely would have died if both enemies attacked him - so does the AI just not realize it has the opportunity to kill your units under certain situations? I feel like I need to understand what happened here now or it's probably just going to create more problems later in the playthrough. I never recruited Est. I think Caeda could have survived the boss group's attack, but I didn't field her in my last few attempts because she was overall less useful than Athena.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 1, 2018 03:59
|
|
|
cheetah7071 posted:Are you sure the thief was capable of hitting Marth in that formation? You may have stumbled into the same technique in reverse. Off the top of my head, a formation where you put Marth at the edge of Katarina's range, then block off the corridor with three units with at least 1 res (i.e., more res than Marth) should work. Katarina will move first and target Marth because she does the most damage to him. Then the thief can't hit Marth so he has to settle for someone else. Alright. I think you hit the nail on the head. Thanks for the help; I think learning to pay attention to the AI attack order is going to help me out a lot. I enjoyed Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn a lot but New Mystery is really refreshing for both its relative simplicity and high level of challenge.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 2, 2018 07:38
|
|
|
Finished New Mystery of the Emblem earlier on maniac. Definitely one of my favorite games in the series now; I'm honestly really impressed by how much they managed to get out of FE3's already reasonably-solid map designs by intelligently tweaking the AI / enemy layouts / enemy loadouts. Not really a fan of how many characters the game heaps on you despite half of them being useless, though - it feels like most of them could only have any value on normal or maybe hard mode. FE3 was actually the first game in the series I played back in 2010, so it was interestingly nostalgic going through 12. With that, I've beaten the first twelve games in the series. I'd probably rank them like this. Thracia 776 - kind of a mess, but I love its weird mechanics (especially the imbalanced staves and capturing) New Mystery of the Emblem - feels like the most refined game in the series, I might like it better than Thracia Radiant Dawn - the cycling parties have their low points and there might be too many OP characters, but conversely I appreciate that you're forced to use weaker characters a lot too. Plus the level design is generally very good and the height system is a great addition. Path of Radiance - the difficulty starts to drop off a cliff around the time Ike promotes but until that point I feel this is one of the high points in the series for interesting levels. Just wish this game weren't one of the easiest in the series; I wonder if Maniac mode is actually fun or if it is as tedious as people make it sound. The Tellius games definitely have the coolest worldbuilding in the series (Path of Radiance moreso) for what that's worth. Binding Blade - not a fan of the weird weapon accuracy but I do like that most of your characters usually have some kind of notable weakness, as well as how drawn-out some of the stages get. Easily the best GBA game. Sacred Stones - I really enjoyed my playthrough but if I hadn't handicapped myself by completely avoiding all optional battles I feel it would have fallen apart. Blazing Blade - good, compact levels, but the difficulty is so low it really lets the concepts some of the stages try to play with down. Whenever I unlock Hector's hard mode I might really get into this. Mystery of the Emblem - solid, but on the easy side compared to what came later; FE12 really brings 3's stage concepts to life. Genealogy of the Holy War - I like a lot of the gimmicks this game introduces, it's conceptually interesting, but the levels are often repetitive and not even as interesting as FE3's. Shadow Dragon - I only played this once on normal (one of my first FEs) and wasn't very impressed. I should play one of the harder modes someday; I know the game has a lot of broken poo poo but maybe it's at least somewhat more interesting when it isn't comically easy. Dark Dragon and the Sword of Light - neat first try, obviously almost all the later games are better but I enjoyed playing this one Gaiden - lol I'll have to play the 3DS games later. Mainly I'm really excited to give Fates Conquest a shot, and sometime after that I'll at least need to play Awakening too.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 20, 2018 06:23
|
|
|
Mysticblade posted:Shadow Dragon's early game on higher difficulties is kind of a loving mess. Hyman (C3 boss) has 14 speed and 22ish attack. He'll double most of your army including Jagen. The strategy I hear for dealing with him is just "give Ogma the Killing Edge and hope for a crit". Yeah, this is what has me a bit wary. Given FE1's not-especially-great map design, I wonder if annoying scenarios like that persist throughout the entire game unless you start exploiting broken things like warp staves / Sedgar and Wolf / the wing spear. I'm not expecting anything near New Mystery's level of quality but whenever I replay Shadow Dragon I do want to see how H4 or 5 holds up.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 23, 2018 00:17
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 20, 2024 06:34 |
|
|
FoolyCharged posted:Literally every other time fe has done two maps, no saves its been dumping you into an arena with the final boss and more or less no mooks. The original Mystery of the Emblem didn't; you had to play through the three portions of the Dragon's Altar chapter (shrine with dragons and mages -> Gharnef -> Medeus) all in one go.
|
|
#
¿
May 16, 2018 01:33
|
|