Fire Emblem it’s a Nintendo intellectual property, with a long story behind, this is the 19th entry on the series that have been lasting more than 30 years since the first release in 1990.
The SRPG saga was localized to the west until 2003 with the 7th game Blazing Blade, hereafter the franchise started getting famous for the crossover tittle Smash Bros Melee where Marth and Roy are invited to the fighter’s roster.
Intelligent Systems it’s the developer of the saga, despite being independent from Nintendo they make exclusives for them, they also work on other IPs like Warioware, Advance Wars and Paper Mario.
The long-standing franchise has been receiving various releases for every Nintendo console until the recent and successful Switch. Despite the big increase in numbers and new players interested in the best seller game FE Three Houses, the last game didn’t receive the same treatment.
Fire Emblem Engage sold over 1.5MM until date. As new player starting this franchise, I must say that this game took over the format of the 3DS games instead of the 3H formula.
Highlights for Fire Emblem Engage
Story
The plot isn’t really that complex, or new to the series, despite having a true divine dragon as protagonist for the first time. I felt that IS put together all the previous protagonists and decided to make a new game where you can use them all, a kind of crossover preventing one taking over the protagonism.
The war between the Divine Dragon and Fallen Dragon took thousands of lives as dragons as well, after the conflict where Sombron was sealed and the protagonist wounded fell into a deep slumber to recover his strength.
Alear wakes up from his long rest and has amnesia, reminiscing fragments of the past is able to remember his name and Marth fighting alongside him to defeat the fallen dragon.
After the news are passed to the Queen Lumera, the Divine Dragon and mother of the protagonist, the sudden apparition of undead known as corrupted are plaguing the world of Lythos.
After some talks and tutorials, the Divine Dragon who lost her power is assassinated and the emblems stolen for a mysterious girl. The same patron as every FE parent, all dead.
Gameplay
The genre Strategy Role Player Game is a kind of turn based battle system where every member of the party od units in your battalion are moving around the map to hit the opponents or protect a certain non-playable character, the strategy is usually not appeal for all players.
The true and best topic that shines on this entry. The gameplay has a big revamping from the previous title coming back to the classic system “rock-scissor-paper” or sword, spear and axe. Making them unable to answer the hit by “break” a kind of stun.
The new features are the chains and weapon triangle:
- Chain Guard: certain classes can cover the blows from an adjoining ally.
- Chain Attack: Certain classes and jump in to help dealing damage by a little hit before the unit performing the turn.
- Weapon triangle: sword beats axe, spear beats sword and axe beats spear, also the brawling classes beat bows, tomes and daggers.
The core new mechanic and main focus of the game where it gets all the attention is the engage system. We call an emblem to fuse with him to get its skills and bonuses to perform one time use skills, usually very strong ones such as teleporting for a big hit, area hit, big heal around the whole map and others, even the dancer effect.
Engage an emblem from the other worlds:
- Marth Emblem of the Beginnings:
- Emblem skills: Perceptive, Break Defenses, Unyielding
- Engage skills: Divine Speed, Lodestar Rush
2. Celica Emblem of the Echoes:
- Emblem skills: Holy Stance, Resonance, Favorite Food
- Engage skills: Echo, Warp Ragnarok
3. Sigurd Emblem of the Holy War:
- Emblem skills: Canter
- Engage skills: Gallop Override
4. Leif Emblem of the Genealogy:
- Emblem skills: Adaptable Vantage
- Engage skills: Quadruple Hit
5. Roy Emblem of the Binding:
- Emblem skills: Advance, Hold Out
- Engage skills: Blazing Lion
6. Lyndis Emblem of Blazing:
- Emblem skills: Alacrity, Speedtaker
- Engage skills: Call Doubles, Astra Storm
7. Eirika Emblem of the Sacred:
- Emblem skills: Lunar Brace, Solar Brace, Eclipse Brace
- Engage skills: Twin Strike
8. Ike Emblem of Radiance:
- Emblem skills: Resolve, Reposition, Laguz Friend
- Engage skills: Great Aether
9. Micaiah Emblem of Dawn:
- Emblem skills: Augment
- Engage skills: Great Sacrifice
10. Lucina Emblem of Awakening:
- Emblem skills: Dual Strike, Dual Assist
- Engage skills: All for One
11. Corrin Emblem of Fates:
- Emblem skills: Quality Time, Dragon Vein
- Engage skills: Dreadful Aura, Torrential Roar
12. Byleth Emblem of the Academy:
- Emblem skills: Divine Pulse, Mentorship
- Engage skills: Instruct, Goddess Dance
In battle we can use only once every skill per fusion, but there are some puddles on the battlefield filled with an aura that refills the engage gauge, also you can fill it fighting but it’s very slow way to do it.
Somniel
Its floating isle where the Divine Dragon lives, only Lumera and Alear have access to it. They can invite people to get access to the isle. This is the main base for the game.
There are plenty of facilities and activities to do around the Somniel, but to get access to them you have to invite and unlock certain characters as long ads the main story progress.
The main activities are:
- Your room: a different ally will wake Alear up.
- Plaza: There are the main shops such as smithy, item shop, armory and boutique.
- Café terrace: to eat with companions, bulletin board and music box.
- Ring Chamber: to inheriting skills, bond rings.
- Arena: Push-ups, squats and sit-ups.
- Training yard: standard and emblem trainings.
- The grotto: spend time with Sommie.
- Tower of trials: face different kind of trials.
- There are more activities to do like wyvern riding, pool, fishing, stable and fortune teller.
All the activities increase the support bonding and unlocks new gadgets for the battle.
Graphics
The graphic engine used for this entry it’s an external one, Unity the same one that was used for the Pokemon Diamond and Pearl remakes.
The results are very accurate, the improved graphics, motions, and strategy in general are very fluid and colorful. However, the story didn’t use the chance to step up and shine as a gem release.
The gameplay was favored to the spot, the Engage mechanic was going to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the franchise, sadly the pandemic delayed the release by a year and this time they polished the gameplay.
The visuals are amazing and the color palette is vivid to the point to see them as a totally different series than the previous entry Three Houses.
The main artist and designer was Mika Pikazo, a new artist to the Fire Emblem series, known by the colorful and vivid style appealing to the younger and abroad fans.
Sound
The original soundtrack was composed by Kazuki Komai, Hiroki Morishita, Takeru Kanazaki, Fumihiro Isobe, Takafumi Wada.
The trials and other music from previous tittles are rearrangements from the medley from each emblem’s original games.
On my own opinion the last chapter, the final battle, didn’t hit the spot to be a memorable soundtrack for the climax of the story.
The whole set of tracks are very good as general and the nostalgic feeling fighting some of the iconic maps for the emblem’s trials are very proper for a commemorative release.
Performance
The game runs smoothly without any issues in the handheld mode, tested on Nintendo Swith Lite, there is no bugs ot glitches at all. The cutscenes, battles, animations and interactions are polished without any frame drops.
Battery life lasts more than 4 hours with brightness at minimun.
Conclusions
- The game is the commemoration to the 30th anniversary of the franchise, that’s why the idea of the emblems engaging is the core mechanic.
- The gameplay is the strongest topic on the game, music and art style appealing younger audiences by colorful art.
- The story isn’t really the best in the series, sadly isn’t on the same level as the rest of the project.
