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StarTopic Fire Emblem Engage |ST| Your Hidden Desire to Have Neon Joy-Con-Coloured Hair. Mark spoilers!

That interview as transcribed is hilarious.

"We wanted to release it in 2020", "Delaying it let us polish the gameplay"

Well thank fuck for that then, since the gameplay is the only thing the game has going for it at all
 
Linkstrikesback said:
That interview as transcribed is hilarious.

"We wanted to release it in 2020", "Delaying it let us polish the gameplay"

Well thank fuck for that then, since the gameplay is the only thing the game has going for it at all
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I really don’t like this attitude. While the writing is bad.

There’s more positives then just the gameplay as well.
 
DecoReturns said:
I really don’t like this attitude. While the writing is bad.

There’s more positives then just the gameplay as well.
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The game absolutely deserves having the lowest metacritic score of a fire emblem in forever, and it's not just the writing being bad.

The character designs are a major step down. Alear in particular might be the ugliest lord in series history. The music is completely forgettable at best, outright bad at worst (looking at you, opening song), and the best stuff that's there is largely remixes from other games. The maps are plagued with infinite reinforcements because they couldn't come up with any other way to add challenge.

The only other upside I can come up with is, in the game they finally made a country of people of colour playable and not as a small side show, at least.

If they'd released this two years earlier and with worse gameplay, they'd have gotten absolutely destroyed for it, and rightfully so.
 
LuckyNumber69 said:


Thought you guys might find this interesting, it's from a recent Nintendo Dream interview.
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Very interesting interview. In part its cool they decided on this endeavor, why not try a bunch of ideas in two separate projects. Given that Nintendo had a solo HD console they needed to experiment to see what can be done.

Next up would be Geneology (super excited), but cant wait for FE 20 (18 not counting remakes I believe)
 
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LuckyNumber69 said:


Thought you guys might find this interesting, it's from a recent Nintendo Dream interview.
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"The developers deliberately went for a complete opposite direction in tone compared to Three Houses, for experimentation and exploration's sake as far what Fire Emblem could be."

big-trouble-if-i-speak.gif



Well, I hope they got the message...
 
Linkstrikesback said:
The character designs are a major step down. Alear in particular might be the ugliest lord in series history. The music is completely forgettable at best, outright bad at worst (looking at you, opening song), and the best stuff that's there is largely remixes from other games. The maps are plagued with infinite reinforcements because they couldn't come up with any other way to add challenge.
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I don't agree with any of this. Especially the criticism of the character designs in general and Alear in particular. Alear stands out for their design, but it's vibrant, fits the aesthetic of the game, and the color pairing also works at the thematic level (that suits the anniversary title nature).
 
I appreciate that they tried multiple ideas for the tone of Fire Emblem, but yeah, I think there's a resounding winner between the two when it comes to general reception and popularity. I'm not mad that Engage ended up as it did, it's nice to have variety and experimentation, but hopefully they stick with the Three Houses tone for future entries.
 
If FE4 remake is next people will get their more serious FE fix anyways, I'm more curious what they do with the gameplay because FE4 is pretty different from what people are used to. Though 3H is kind of like a really bad version of it in some respects.
 
Linkstrikesback said:
The game absolutely deserves having the lowest metacritic score of a fire emblem in forever, and it's not just the writing being bad.

The character designs are a major step down. Alear in particular might be the ugliest lord in series history. The music is completely forgettable at best, outright bad at worst (looking at you, opening song), and the best stuff that's there is largely remixes from other games. The maps are plagued with infinite reinforcements because they couldn't come up with any other way to add challenge.

The only other upside I can come up with is, in the game they finally made a country of people of colour playable and not as a small side show, at least.

If they'd released this two years earlier and with worse gameplay, they'd have gotten absolutely destroyed for it, and rightfully so.
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Literally nothing you just described is bad lol.
 
Engage has great gameplay for sure and hopefully they keep that quality of mechanics and map design going forward. With that said, like many others, I’d much prefer they lean more into the TH direction in style and tone going forward. I don’t think it’s a coincidence my two favorite games in the series, PoR and TH, both have a somewhat more “grounded” tone that deals with countries and politics more so than high-fantasy with dragons and whatnot (although those elements still very much exist in those games).
 
Hailinel said:
Assuming the next game is an FE4 remake, I guess the question is which team is working on it and when it started development.
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Considering there's a reference to "Iron18" in a Unity file in Engage, I assume IS is also working on FE4R. That and the fact that Engage has been finished since 2021.

It'll be interesting to see what comes after though, especially as the next next FE after the remake will probably be a Switch 2 game. Personally, I'm guessing KT's involvment was a one-off and IS will make all future games now that they have HD tools/assets/experience and an engine to use.
 
Still holding out hope that a PoR/RD remastered collection has been fitted in somewhere along the way. 🙏

Honestly, after Holy War, there’s not too much need for more full remakes. Maybe Thracia. But the GBA games definitely don’t need anything. PoR/RD need a massive face-lift and quality of life improvements, but even they don’t need full from-the-ground-up remakes.
 
Honestly I just want more new games not held down by the past

I'll take a Geneaology remake, grudgingly, but having it right after an anniversary game is spending too long in the past, for my money
 
Common Knowledge said:
Still holding out hope that a PoR/RD remastered collection has been fitted in somewhere along the way. 🙏

Honestly, after Holy War, there’s not too much need for more full remakes. Maybe Thracia. But the GBA games definitely don’t need anything. PoR/RD need a massive face-lift and quality of life improvements, but even they don’t need full from-the-ground-up remakes.
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Mostly agree with this. After Thracia, the rest can just get rereleased or maybe touched up a little at best. Not sure what QoL the Tellius games would need that the GBA games wouldn't. FE6's UI definitely would need just a little updating to bring to it to par with the other two.
 
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Common Knowledge said:
Still holding out hope that a PoR/RD remastered collection has been fitted in somewhere along the way. 🙏

Honestly, after Holy War, there’s not too much need for more full remakes. Maybe Thracia. But the GBA games definitely don’t need anything. PoR/RD need a massive face-lift and quality of life improvements, but even they don’t need full from-the-ground-up remakes.
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Counterpoint: Roy's game is bad.
 
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I do wonder if they continue with changing the artist for the next mainline. I really enjoyed recent entries but while 3H had grounded design but could not be more bland, Engage had colorful characters that belong in Cirque du Soleil act.

I cant wait for how weird the next lord will be lol.
 
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Thunder84 said:
I appreciate that they tried multiple ideas for the tone of Fire Emblem, but yeah, I think there's a resounding winner between the two when it comes to general reception and popularity. I'm not mad that Engage ended up as it did, it's nice to have variety and experimentation, but hopefully they stick with the Three Houses tone for future entries.
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If they go back to 3H gameplay because of that, I would NOT wan't that.Engage Gameplay, 3H writting pls.
 
bellydrum said:
Literally nothing you just described is bad lol.
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In comparison to three houses it all is, which is where the bar is.

Engage is the most forgettable FE since sacred stones, which is impressive in its own way.

The gameplay is the only place where the game isn't well below par, and the games reception, both critically and from the wider base reflect that, and it's for good reason.

And I eagerly await your explanation of how infinite reinforcements isn't terrible, since nothing I said was bad, apparently.
 
Oh there's definitely still elements of the Engage gameplay loop I'd want them to leave behind

The core mechanics themselves were (usually) very good, but the mission structure, particulalry the difficulty tuning, were often woeful

Cindered Shadows is still probably the sweet spot in terms of encounter design
 
LuckyNumber69 said:
Considering there's a reference to "Iron18" in a Unity file in Engage, I assume IS is also working on FE4R. That and the fact that Engage has been finished since 2021.

It'll be interesting to see what comes after though, especially as the next next FE after the remake will probably be a Switch 2 game. Personally, I'm guessing KT's involvment was a one-off and IS will make all future games now that they have HD tools/assets/experience and an engine to use.
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Wasn’t there a rumour that a FE remake meant for 3DS was moved to Switch at some point? That could have been Iron17. It’s possible that project was just straight-up cancelled, though, since I remember people saying it was a Blazing Blade remake and the current rumours are specifically that they’re working on Genealogy. (Besides, it would probably make more sense if a Genealogy remake were started after Engage.)

I remember the original leak about Engage mentioning that Gust helped out with the graphics. I’d believe it from a visual standpoint, but it doesn’t seem like anyone from them was credited for the game. Wonder what happened there. I personally think KT probably isn’t out of the picture entirely, but IS will go back to handling most aspects of development going forward.
 
AoiHana said:
Wasn’t there a rumour that an FE remake meant for 3DS was moved to Switch at some point? That could have been Iron17. It’s possible that project was just straight-up cancelled, though, since I remember people saying it was a Blazing Blade remake and the current rumours are specifically that they’re working on Genealogy. (Besides, it would probably make more sense if a Genealogy remake were started after Engage.)

I remember the original leak about Engage mentioning that Gust helped out with the graphics. I’d believe it from a visual standpoint, but it doesn’t seem like anyone from them was credited for the game. Wonder what happened there. I personally think KT probably isn’t out of the picture entirely, but IS will go back to handling most aspects of development going forward.
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The Gust portion of the rumor was a complete miss. Gust and KT did no work on Engage.

That being said, the working relationship between IS and KT sounds from the outside to be sound enough that if there's interest, they could develop another FE at KT.
 
Given how successful Three Houses was, I have to imagine that KT will be the go-to for future Fire Emblem partnerships

If Intelligent Systems is busy with other projects, like Paper Mario or a new IP or whatever, I could see KT stepping up to the plate
 
I enjoyed Engage a lot but I'm definitely in the "can we go back to Three Houses style now" camp. I liked Engage's characters and did warm up to the character designs, but Three Houses' art direction and writing is more my cup of tea. I appreciate variety, though, and in that regard Engage was fine to me. Better than Fates for sure (sorry to any Fates fans; I do enjoy the game myself but there's a lot to it that just drags it down for me).
 
AoiHana said:
Wasn’t there a rumour that a FE remake meant for 3DS was moved to Switch at some point? That could have been Iron17. It’s possible that project was just straight-up cancelled, though, since I remember people saying it was a Blazing Blade remake and the current rumours are specifically that they’re working on Genealogy. (Besides, it would probably make more sense if a Genealogy remake were started after Engage.)

I remember the original leak about Engage mentioning that Gust helped out with the graphics. I’d believe it from a visual standpoint, but it doesn’t seem like anyone from them was credited for the game. Wonder what happened there. I personally think KT probably isn’t out of the picture entirely, but IS will go back to handling most aspects of development going forward.
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Back when Shadows of Valentia released, there were several interviews with staff, which included a co-director or producer or something like that (can't remember exactly) mentioning that he'd like to do a Binding Blade remake next, so that might be what you're thinking of? I don't think there were ever any actual rumors about an FE6 remake though. FE4 has been the big remake rumor for quite some time now lol

As far as the false rumor of Gust working on Engage goes, I'm guessing someone saw the game itself and just made a wild assumption based on the artstyle and treated said assumption as fact.
 
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Engage is infinitely better than 3H in every way barring characterization. Simply because the story is consistent even if its basic, 3H was riddled with plotholes and incoherent shit. The route splits did not help. And its gameplay is garbage in comparison to Engage which is actually extremely good.

And its also aligned with the majority of the series. Which is a good thing. Being a black sheep isnt which 3H is.
 
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I'll just say a couple of things.
Going with a different tone to change and see what sticks is something commendable and probably a good choice, Fire emblem is not Zelda with 6+ years of development so trying new things is much easier and less dangerous, if the experiment is not to your liking you can just wait a couple of years and a new game will release. I do prefer the more serious tone of threehouses to the campiness of engage but for an anniversay title I think it was just fine. More variety is always appreciated.

As far as some criticism in this thread I just want to say
Linkstrikesback said:
The music is completely forgettable at best, outright bad at worst (looking at you, opening song)
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You take that back, the opening song is a banger.
 
Linkstrikesback said:
The game absolutely deserves having the lowest metacritic score of a fire emblem in forever, and it's not just the writing being bad.

The character designs are a major step down. Alear in particular might be the ugliest lord in series history. The music is completely forgettable at best, outright bad at worst (looking at you, opening song), and the best stuff that's there is largely remixes from other games. The maps are plagued with infinite reinforcements because they couldn't come up with any other way to add challenge.

The only other upside I can come up with is, in the game they finally made a country of people of colour playable and not as a small side show, at least.

If they'd released this two years earlier and with worse gameplay, they'd have gotten absolutely destroyed for it, and rightfully so.
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yet ironically 3H is already mostly forgotten outside the bubble the 3H fandom is in.
 
I don't know why everyone comparing Engage to Three Houses while Awakening is more in the league of Engage. Very similar story, cast and characters and even maps. Only thing Awakening has extra is two generation of characters and S rank support for most of them. Both games go for the traditional " let's beat up that evil dragon" story and Engage does that in a perfect "saturday morning cartoon" theme. From its opening song to the band of villains you have to beat. Expecting deep and detailed story should be the last thing to do here.

I think moving on IS should have two separate lines of Fire Emblem. New and experimental like Three Houses and traditional zombie buster ones like Engage. S rank supports for everyone should be in the Engage's line.
 
Linkstrikesback said:
And I eagerly await your explanation of how infinite reinforcements isn't terrible, since nothing I said was bad, apparently.
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We'll eagerly keep waiting, lol. Why would I explain anything? I said it's not bad. Am I unclear
 
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Hauke_von_Arding said:
If they go back to 3H gameplay because of that, I would NOT wan't that.Engage Gameplay, 3H writting pls.
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That’s definitely the dream. Personally though, I’d take Three Houses’s middling gameplay over Engage’s terrible writing and story, but that’s just my personal tastes.
 
I had fun playing Engage and consider it a good game but I still prefer Three Houses overall.
Both games have their ups and downs, but ultimately I am more fond of TH's style of writing and worldbuilding and I don't think its gameplay it's that bad to prevent me from still enjoying playing it.
I'm kinda glad that the developers confirmed that Engage was meant to be an anniversary game, I think viewing the game as a love letter to the whole franchise, as opposed to just a normal entry, is the most charitable way to look at it.

Going forward with the next mainline game, I hope IS can look back at what worked and what didn't for each game and make a Fire Emblem that can satisfy both those who play the series just for its gameplay and those who also want the narrative elements to not be terrible.
I still think that the KT staff who worked on TH's story deserve another shot, but if that isn't possible maybe they can try hiring an external writer that is actually familiar with the series (or at the very least how to write the story for a videogame) instead of going with a random mangaka as they did with Fates.
 
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Finally finished the game in Maddening, the last 2-3 chapters are really tight for me, that I always used up all rewinds by the end of each battle!

Overall I'd say that the story here is kinda an excuse plot lol. Like really, I found it to be just a backdrop for the series' protags/remarkable NPCs to gather, flaunt their strength and compete in the race to turn each Engage unit to be an one-man army xD. Gameplay mechanics and map design are however top notch. One example I remember the most is that warp skip is required  to win certain late game story battles (in Maddening).

That said going forward, I agree with many folks here that I'd rather take 3H's average gameplay + spectacular world building/narrative than Engage's tight/engaging (lol) gameplay + excuse plot. For me, the world building in 3H elevated the stake and put weights on gameplay decisions (killing former classmates in every playthrough always tugged my heartstring ...). Meanwhile in Engage, the excuse plot is just detrimental to my enjoyment and dampen what would have been a marvelous FE game. Overall I personally value cohesiveness in game design and 3H rose above Engage in this regard.
 
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So, I finally wrapped up my first play-through of Engage earlier. For me, I prefer everything about Engage over 3H, and I loved 3H, and I'm so serious. The story to me was enjoyable. It was CAMP! Very Saturday morning cartoon, simple but earnest, and extremely well acted so even though every emotional moment was undeserved script wise, I still went with the flow and greatly enjoyed the ride with it's passionate delivery. As for characters, it's interesting that 3H had characters I really loved but then characters I really hated. High highs and very low lows. Meanwhile for Engage, I equally loved everyone in the cast. Again, most of them are pretty simple, and the supports are very short, but I honestly enjoy the vibes. Everyone is really quirky and nice and I think all of them have a lot of interesting things to unpack in the later supports. Alear is a great foil to the rest of these geeks and he's just very charming. My favorite avatar in FE ever I think. Also want to shout out the husbands and specifically my lovely Pandreo. 3H was a dark time in this area and across the board, I think the lgbtq+ rep in this game is GREAT.

Gameplay wise, it was so addicting! The Engage system is so polished and fun to experiment with. The weapons being infinite use, the classes themselves and class changing simplified, how you learn new skills and weapon proficiencies, every gameplay choice to me was vastly improved over some of the issues I had with 3H, and it all really clicked for me to make it such a blast to play. Maybe the only issues I had were training units that fell behind towards the end of the game, and farming for money in general. Otherwise, it was such arush to come up with kits and strategies for each map and figure out what units I both gravitated to instantly and those I really grew to appreciate over time. Honestly, everyone (except poor Vander) was viable and had a use by the end, and I love that because previous games definitely felt more overwhelming in this case when it came to the roster.

Suffice it to say, I personally hope going forward IS pulls more from Engage than 3H, this game made me a very happy camper. Waiting with bated breath for the DLC xenologue to release in a few days, and I am definitely looking forward to a harder difficulty play-through sometime in the future! Now to start farming to complete the rest of these supports/bonds and try to also finish the last of these donations.
 
Rhisiart said:
So, I finally wrapped up my first play-through of Engage earlier. For me, I prefer everything about Engage over 3H, and I loved 3H, and I'm so serious. The story to me was enjoyable. It was CAMP! Very Saturday morning cartoon, simple but earnest, and extremely well acted so even though every emotional moment was undeserved script wise, I still went with the flow and greatly enjoyed the ride with it's passionate delivery. As for characters, it's interesting that 3H had characters I really loved but then characters I really hated. High highs and very low lows. Meanwhile for Engage, I equally loved everyone in the cast. Again, most of them are pretty simple, and the supports are very short, but I honestly enjoy the vibes. Everyone is really quirky and nice and I think all of them have a lot of interesting things to unpack in the later supports. Alear is a great foil to the rest of these geeks and he's just very charming. My favorite avatar in FE ever I think. Also want to shout out the husbands and specifically my lovely Pandreo. 3H was a dark time in this area and across the board, I think the lgbtq+ rep in this game is GREAT.

Gameplay wise, it was so addicting! The Engage system is so polished and fun to experiment with. The weapons being infinite use, the classes themselves and class changing simplified, how you learn new skills and weapon proficiencies, every gameplay choice to me was vastly improved over some of the issues I had with 3H, and it all really clicked for me to make it such a blast to play. Maybe the only issues I had were training units that fell behind towards the end of the game, and farming for money in general. Otherwise, it was such arush to come up with kits and strategies for each map and figure out what units I both gravitated to instantly and those I really grew to appreciate over time. Honestly, everyone (except poor Vander) was viable and had a use by the end, and I love that because previous games definitely felt more overwhelming in this case when it came to the roster.

Suffice it to say, I personally hope going forward IS pulls more from Engage than 3H, this game made me a very happy camper. Waiting with bated breath for the DLC xenologue to release in a few days, and I am definitely looking forward to a harder difficulty play-through sometime in the future! Now to start farming to complete the rest of these supports/bonds and try to also finish the last of these donations.
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I agree with everything you say. Exactly what I feel about Engage.

But I like to expand on the negatives you listed there, which I also agree. Game feels a little unbalanced when it comes to grinding. A normal run won't net you enough money to buy every outfit and upgrade every kingdom to the max. Only up to 2 skirmishes in each map refresh gives you money and at max each gives you 3.000. As you said, leveling up the underleveled becomes almost impossible as you move on as all free skirmishes are determined by your highest leveled unit. There's arena but sadly it only gives you 3 chances between battles and the unit you face is selected random. a higher level unit may decimate you without giving you any XP (Poor Amber, the alpaca master...). These all needs to be fixed in the next game and there has to be skirmishes that lower level units can participate.

Grinding for all support is a little easier compared to past games with all those Somniel activites. Still, I couldn't complete all before I finished the story...
 
DLC ain't out for midnight AEST or JST, I'm going to bed lol.

Also speaking of FE4, I find their large maps horrid so I hope they do something about that in a remake
 
zumaddy said:
DLC ain't out for midnight AEST or JST, I'm going to bed lol.

Also speaking of FE4, I find their large maps horrid so I hope they do something about that in a remake
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There are people that would absolutely cry foul if the FE4 maps were redone, but I wouldn't mind. Sigurd's Paralogue showed it's possible to cut those giant maps into smaller maps that retain the same layouts.
 
Hailinel said:
There are people that would absolutely cry foul if the FE4 maps were redone, but I wouldn't mind. Sigurd's Paralogue showed it's possible to cut those giant maps into smaller maps that retain the same layouts.
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I'm crying foul right just at the thought of that.

At my most ridiculous, I want them to do the opposite. Make the entire game 1 impossibly large map!! No breaks besides story progression! FE4 in one go!!!
 
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IS Dev 1: "I have the best solution for the big maps!"
IS Dev 2: "Lemme guess ... more Canto?"
IS Dev 1: "Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more Canto!"
 
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Wait we are getting Wave 4 already? I missed Wave 3...lol. ive been waiting to play more of game til rest of dlc comes out. Time to do research.
 
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I was excited to play the final wave today and I was wondering why Nintendo had not tweeted it out, I though it was later in the day. I just saw its tomorrow lol.
 
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Pretty sure Wave 4 is the 4th in North America, NoA even tweeted that it's the 4th in the initial announcement tweet, and the description of the video on NoA's YouTube channel says the 4th. iirc Wave 3 dropped at 5pm PST, so I imagine Wave 4 will drop at the same time tonight.
 
LuckyNumber69 said:
Pretty sure Wave 4 is the 4th in North America, NoA even tweeted that it's the 4th in the initial announcement tweet, and the description of the video on NoA's YouTube channel says the 4th. iirc Wave 3 dropped at 5pm PST, so I imagine Wave 4 will drop at the same time tonight.
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Yea it looks like April 4th 2023 (North America) / April 5th 2023 (Europe, Japan).

Hoping this the case!
 
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