Fire Emblem is a medieval style strategy RPG game. This may instantly sound like Chess in some ways. In fact, it is similar in quite a few ways, despite being very different. You have different units that can do different things on battle, and the goal is usually to kill an onslaught of enemies and seize their base. Fire Emblem revolves around many recurring themes. Characters that die are gone for good. The storylines for each game are usually structured similarly, if they use different characters. You have a continent, a protagonist (usually of noble birth and his character class is a "lord"), and you have an intelligent enemy who seeks to conquer the continent. The "Fire Emblem" in each game is usually an artifact of great power that pushes forward the ambitions of either the protagonist or the villain, hence the namesake of the series.
So anyway, each Fire Emblem in the series is its own story. They are not related to each other. Okay, more accurately, if you count the ones from Japan and the one that will come out for the Wii, each story tends to be wrought out in two games. Number 8 in the series known as Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones has not seen such a sequel though. The one I'm reviewing right now is number 7 in the series for the Gameboy Advance, and in Japan, the title is known as Fire Emblem: Rekka no Ken, which translates to something like Fire Emblem: The Blazing Sword. I will abbreviate this title to FE7 throughout the review.
Before the actual Review, I will answer an important question concerning Marth and Roy. Marth appeared in the very first and third Fire Emblem games of the series, and the seventh has nothing to do with his storyline. Roy actually makes a cameo in the very end of FE7 because he is the son of the main lord of this game, Eliwood. And believe me, I could have mistaken Eliwood for Roy if this game didn't come to the USA translated. Roy appears in Japan-only FE6, which is a storyline sequel to FE7, believe it or not. Okay, enough lengthy explanation. More reviewing! Along the way, you'll see me compare this game to other RPGs, as Fire Emblem is unique as an RPG in very specific ways that set it aside from the normal RPG format.
This game is reviewed on a system of 10, to celebrate the coming of the tenth Fire Emblem game in Japan, which came out on February 22, 2007, the day I started writing this Review. 10 is the highest score, and 1 is abysmal.
Storyline: 8
In my opinion, this game has quite a fun storyline. It partly gets the rather high grade for having an excellent conclusion in its storyline sequel FE6, but I'm not telling you why.
The story is introduced through the eyes of a nomadic girl named Lyn (your first lord), who goes off on a short adventure to rescue her grandfather over an inheritance dispute over Castle Caelin, as her grand-uncle intends to take title of marquess for himself. You, as the game player, are a tactician that trains her and some interesting characters that she meets throughout her adventure.
After Lyn mode is done, we move on to Eliwood mode. The tactician suddenly meets up with Roy's father, and leads him on an adventure to save his father (not to mention himself) from a mysterious group of assassins with shady intentions. Eliwood then meets with the third lord, Hector, who as Eliwood's bold, buff, and crazy axe-wielding friend, wants to help him out, as he too is being chased by this same group of assassins, who they learn is called the Black Fang. An enigmatic figure by the name of Nergal is the captor of Eliwood's father, and seems to be pulling strings from the background all for the ambition of power. But, what exactly is Nergal doing? Who is he anyway? It gets incredibly spoily if I continue further with the story.
The story gets even more interesting when we bring up Support conversations. Aside from the main storyline, which is decent, characters that fight side by side long enough have a talk option where they converse a bit, revealing each other's background and personality. When the conversation is over, they build a level in Support bonuses, which do nice things in combat in general. The conversations can range from very humorous to very dark and serious. Support conversations in general do a lot of good in terms of character development.
Why couldn't I give this story a perfect
score? The whole series of Fire Emblem overall has a very similar storyline.
If you've played other Fire Emblems, the storyline is slightly predictable
in ways. By no means is the story in this game actually horrible. It's
just a tad cliched.
Gameplay: Debatable
Some people love the battle system. Others hate it. I'm one of those that loves it, so I may be biased towards favoring the game with a high score. I'm gonna have to split this part of the Review into sections, considering the amount of unique detail this game has.
Combat Layout: 10
If you have played Advance Wars, you'll have a good idea what this game is like. Both games are in fact made by Intelligent systems. This is a completely turn-based RPG, firstoff. The player does not use a single reflex in the entire process of the game (unless you are the type that makes last-second decisions). Anyway, you move units around a grid-like map during your turn, and instead of random battles that you see so much of in the Final Fantasy series, units square off on the map and enter a battle phase. In a way, this makes the game resemble Chess, hence why Fire Emblem is notable for being a strategy game. The ways Advance Wars and Fire Emblem differ from ordinary chess is the fact that you have actual terrain, which affects the movement and performance of your units and enemy units. In Fire Emblem, you'll get used to taking cover in the woods or mountains to increase your defense and evasion. One problem with this helpful terrain is that things like mountains, sea, forest, etc. take a lot of energy to bypass. Units can only move so far in one turn. On the other hand, you also have flying units, which are valuable because they can bypass rough terrain without movement penalties, which makes them quite agile on the map. However, you also need to be mindful that because they ignore terrain, they do not get bonuses for resting in special terrain either. Overall, the game does an excellent job of using the environment as part of the battle. The system of battle also makes the location of your units absolutely critical. This is a lot better in my opinion than the typical staged random battle format. It doesn't make sense to me that a lot of RPGs use an RNG to determine one's ability to run away. Like in the Secret of Mana, to truly be able to run away from combat, you have to outpace the enemy. It's a much more realistic system, and one that engages the player into the conflict.
Weapons and Magic: 9
Like Final Fantasy, there is a large number of weapons and magic abilities to acquire in this game. His/her class and weapon skill rank determine the weapons or magic tomes a character is able to wield. The better a weapon skill rank, the more weapons of that type someone can use. The system immediately differs from that of almost every RPG series I can think of, because weapons and tomes break after used so many times. This means rather than entrusting your characters to a single weapon, you have to prepare them with multiple weapons to keep them ready for the moment their weapons break. This also has one other major effect on the gameplay. It forces you to rely on the cheap iron weapons throughout the entire game, rather than progressively bolster yourself with better and better weapons, a very common theme in Final Fantasy, Super Mario RPG, EarthBound, you name it! Hey, Iron weapons actually are among the best in the game, not just because they are cheap, but because they also are durable (Iron Sword has about 45 uses, while a Silver Sword has only 20). They are lightweight in this game, and the weight of weapons is important to note, because heavier weapons slow down your characters and actually can decrease their performance rate. One last thing, magic in this game is not PP based. A magic tome is wielded like any other weapon. A mage needs to carry a variety of tomes to use different magical attacks, and these have uses, and they break. The only real difference and the most important one between weapons and magic is the stats used to defend against them.
Now that you know that it is important to stockpile weapons in a budget friendly manner, that is also one of the minor frustrations I have with this game. There are Fire Emblems that allow characters to buy weapons at a home base, but this is not one of them. In this Fire Emblem, you have to put buying weapons as part of your tactical agenda, meaning you need to send someone to make a stop by a local armory or vendor (shop of magical items) with a shopping list while the battle is going on. In this case, I guess it is just one more thing a good tactician needs to take care of.
The other thing about weapons (and magic attacks) is Fire Emblem emphasizes two rock, paper, scissors formulas known as the Weapon Triangle and the Trinity of Magic. Axes>Spears>Swords>Axes, with the heavy Axes having the highest attack power and lowest accuracy, and Swords having the highest accuracy and lowest attack power. Magic comes in order of Light>Dark>Nature>Light, and Light magic is statistically to Swords as Dark magic is to Axes. Archery has no effect on either triangle, slays flying units, and is limited to ranged combat (which is especially awesome in this game, if you can consider the potential advantages of picking off units from the other side of a wall). Because of everyone's advantages and disadvantages, it is essential to plan out carefully the position of each of your many types of units to find the optimal way of holding off your enemy.
Character Classes: 9
There are a large number of character classes and individual characters for each class type. Each class has different weapon, movement, and statistical proficiencies. Each class type has a base, and a more powerful promotion.
The most important class is the Lord. Lords represent the main character(s). Lyn, Eliwood, and Hector are all lords, and if any of them dies, it is game over. To counterbalance this, they have among the best growth rates, thus making it an important priority to keep your Lords well leveled up.
There is a class for just about every purpose. You have Axe-wielding Fighters, which have excellent Strength and Skill, if poorer defensive skills. There are Lance-wielding Knights, which are like tanks. They hit hard, and they take little physical damage in return, but they are slow and have weak magical resistance. There are Sword-wielding Thieves, which are sneaky, incredibly fast, but have low strength and defense. There are many classes I have not mentioned here, each with a unique purpose.
And now, about promotions. Most, but not all Units that get to at least level 10 (the maximum experience level for any class is 20) have the option of using a special item to promote. Beyond just gaining new abilities and a cooler outfit, units get an big one-time stat bonus, and their stat caps increase in unique ways. (Did I mention that units can only gain so much stat before it won't go up anymore?) Fighters become mighty Warriors, which have the ability to wield Bows, which can slaughter flying units. Knights become the super-strong Generals, which can wield Axes and overall have insane defense scores. Thieves can become Assassins, which have an ability that gives them a small chance to land a guaranteed instant kill on enemies dependent on their chance to land a critical hit. There are also a few recruitable characters that are already promoted units. Especially in this game, most of the prepromoted units have amazing starting stats, and inferior growth rates compared to base class units. That doesn't make these units bad, as most of them have better balanced stats, and they don't have to go through as much leveling-up trouble with the RNG as base class units.
My only complaints include that some prepromoted units actually were made a bit too strong. Some of them average statistically better than some of the base class units. This takes away quite a bit from the difficulty of the game (as I have clearly heard that you can quite easily win this game without promoting a single unit). There are a few classes that are a tad redundant. Mercenaries, Myrmidons, Lyn, and Eliwood similarly wield swords, and they all have a focus on speed to an extent. Granted, this is balanced by the fact their promotion class and growth rates are significantly different in many other ways. The other thing this game lacks somewhat that other Fire Emblems have is an advanced special skill system. Granted, there is the Assassin class and the ability to one-hit KO an enemy, and the Berserker/Swordmaster ability to land many critical hits. You'll have to believe me when I say that Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance has a much better unique skill system. That doesn't change that overall, the programmers did a great job of making a number of unique characters that have significant strengths and weaknesses.
Statistics: 10
The game has a very detailed statistic system. It is very hard to understand immediately, and understanding it is key to enjoying the game. I have taken it upon myself to explain the system to those new to it, and there will be snapshots to refer to in my explanation.
One of the most fickle parts of this game is the random stat gains during level up. Units that gain 100 EXP gain an experience level (keep in mind, the more experienced you are, the harder it is to gain 100 EXP), which is a chance to increase their stats. Each unit has different growths for each stat in this game. There is always a random chance none of or all of your stats will increase by one. Just because a character was awesome one game doesn't mean he's always going to be lucky. Now I actually like this concept better than the fixed stat growths most RPGs like to use. Because of this, strategies should usually vary somewhat from file to file. A game player should still take the time to research the growth rates of characters and calculate how well they will average. It should serve well as a guide to how good a character truly is.
So what are all these stats anyway? Let's take a good look at the following picture.
Here, we have Lyn, our female lord. She's level 3 (unpromoted), and has 47 EXP out of 100 needed to reach level 4. She has 18 out of 18 hit points at this instant. Now see that big chart? Going from top down, left to right, her stats right there are the following:
Strength. Your attack power is the sum
of this stat and your weapon Might. This stat is replaced by "Magic" if
the character in question is a mage.
Skill. For every point of skill you
have, your to hit percentage is increased by 2, and for every two points,
your percentage for critical hits (triple damage) is increase by 1.
Speed. Anyone whose speed is at least
four points greater than the enemy's is able to attack the enemy twice
in one combat phase. Every point of speed also increases your dodge percentage
by 2.
Luck. Every point you gain in luck
increases your dodge and critical hit evade by 1. Every five points of
luck you have also gives a minor accuracy bonus of 1.
Defense. Should be self-explanatory,
but it subtracts from the damage your character takes from attacks. This
means if your character's defense equals an enemy's attack power, the enemy
is completely helpless, even if they are able to land a critical hit on
you.
Resistance. This is the same as the
Defense stat, but applies to magical attacks.
Movement Range. Lyn is able to move
a maximum of 5 squares on the field.
Constitution. This is a number referring
to Lyn's physical size. It affects the ability to be rescued, and the ability
to rescue others. It is not clearly stated, but Constitution is a very
important stat determining a character's speed when attacking. A weapon
with a weight greater than this value will grant a speed penalty to the
character, reducing his/her evade and ability to double attack.
Aid. Lyn can rescue any unit with a
constitution that is equal to or less than this value.
Travel partner. This would list the
name of a unit Lyn has rescued, or who has rescued her.
Elemental affinity. Her particular
affinity happens to be Wind, and this value determines the bonuses she
and other units acquire when they have a support conversation. There is
also a stat and growth rate bonus if her affinity matches that of the tactician.
In fact, in this case, it does, so I am terribly sorry if this confused
any person with strong analytical skills of the pictures. Anyway you don't
really need to know the specifics of this… yet. Unless you want to get
serious with this game.
Health condition. Lyn's healthy in
this picture. There are stats like Mute, Poison, Sleep, and Berserk, which
are quite alike the ones I know of from Final Fantasy.
Here, we can now see her inventory. She has a special weapon, and a Vulnerary (which restores 10 HP per use). The weapon has 42 out of its 45 uses left, and the Vulnerary has not been used once. We can see her attack power, her to hit percentage, the allowed range of her attack, her critical hit percentage, and her dodge percentage.
Here are Lyn's weapon experience levels. From worst to best, they are E, D, C, B, A, S. The higher the value in any category, the more weapons of that type you can wield.
Here is an examination of Lyn's equipped weapon. It is a sword, and where there would be a weapon ranking like E or A, it is a weapon of her profession (Prf), meaning only she can wield it. It has a range of 1, a weight of 3, a Might of 8, an 80% chance by itself to hit the enemy, and a critical hit rate of 20%.
Let's now sum it up together. Look back at the bottom of that chart. Her attack power is 12. The might of her weapon is 8, and her strength is 4. Simple addition. Now her accuracy is 99%. The weapon itself has an 80% chance to hit, Lyn has a skill value of 8, and a luck value of 7, and she has the tactician's bonus. Remember that accuracy bonus from skill is 2% for every point, and for luck, it is 1% for every five points. Add all that up, you get 97, which is bumped slightly by the tactician's bonus. Now about her critical rate of 24%, the Mani Katti has a 20% chance to land a critical. Lyn's skill is 8, which adds the last 4 points to her critical hit rate. Now finally, her ability to dodge. First, let's note that Lyn was not hiding in special terrain like the woods, mountains, etc. when this snapshot was taken. Her speed is 10, and her luck is 7. Her constitution is 5, and her weapon weight is only 3. She passes the constitution test without penalty. Now let's recall, speed influences dodge by a factor of 2% for every point. Luck does so by only 1% per point. That adds to 27%, no?
The statistical system has great rigidity,
that most standard RPGs I know of don't have. Paper Mario series (which
is also made by Intelligent Systems!) is one of just a few RPGs that I'm
aware of that have statistical rigidity to this extent, where the amount
of damage you do is very precise, and where this precision counts. Damage
results can be calculated precisely, and instead, you have an RNG that
influences the chance of hitting an enemy, and your chance to gain stats
when leveling up. This rigidity makes decision-making much more pressing,
and knowledge of the uses of every character essential. Where maybe Square
Enix focused a lot on keeping up with a battle timer, this game series
loses the need for reflexes, but in exchange makes up for it in the need
to calculate to an extent. Oh don't worry, the game does not require you
to compute nearly as much as I just did right now. It is just that you
need to be able to understand this so that you will understand what all
your specific possibilities are when you engage in combat. If persay you
have a 100% chance of hitting a lone enemy, and you can finish the guy
off in one hit, you'll want to go for it!
Graphics: 7
I've seen very mixed Reviews on Fire Emblem's graphics. Crazy Packer's Fan says they stink, and Ninja-Z says they are totally awesome. I don't think either case is completely accurate. First, understand that there are a few types of graphics. The first is the overworld, where you view tiny sprites that represent your units on a grid position of the battlefield. These aren't bad, as they serve their purpose well, distinguishing unit types from each other at a quick glance. If anything, I did have the most trouble understanding why the Wyvern rider sprites looked like the way they did. The overworld also has different types of tiles to represent terrain (VERY IMPORTANT), treasure chests, doors, forts, houses, the thrones you need to conquer, and maybe a few other exceptions I haven't listed here. None of the graphics are bad, and once you get into the system, it flows pretty fluently for the eyes. I can't exactly say the graphics are outstanding here.
There are character mugshots. Self-explanatory. If you like the anime style as demonstrated by the pictures of Lyn I showed you, you should be very satisfied with the rest of the characters in this game. I only complain that this game doesn't use very fancy techniques to demonstrate action outside of battle. You can only do so much with just mugshots and overworld sprites. The game really leaves the rest up to dialogue, which isn't bad I guess.
The next type of graphic is battle animations, which are completely optional, and you have the option to turn them off to speed up game progress. Battle animations are a purely cosmetic feature where you watch your characters perform their attacks. Each physical unit has two animations for every weapon they wield. One is a normal attack, the other a critical hit animation, and I can say in terms of sprite complexity, none of these animations are bad at all. Magic users have a stance for a normal and critical attack, but the real deal is the animation of magical attacks. Athos's Foreblaze is quite a sight to see. The animations, while they really don't serve much purpose, are entertaining to see at least once. I can't exactly give a good score for this though, because I've seen some Super Nintendo games achieve better effects than this. In my strict opinion, the animations used in the Super Famicom FEs are actually better than the ones on the GBA. I'll end that discussion here, to stay on topic about FE7 here.
Lastly, there are a few computer graphic scenes. These drawn out pieces of artwork are again in an anime style, and are appreciable, if you are like me and think anime in general is a great style of artwork.
I can't say the graphics all in all
are that amazing, but the overworld graphics serve their purpose perfectly.
The graphics aren't ugly at all, and allow for smooth progression though
the game visually, which is why I gave this an above average score.
Sounds and Music: 6
Starting with the sound effects, first, at least they use stereo sound in battle animations, but that is too simple to use purely for the grading premise of sound. The sounds in battle are okay… but a game like Chrono Trigger did quite a better job in making sound effects for different attacks hitting you and the enemy. Oh seriously, if a Super Nintendo game did that, why not a GBA game? Don't get me wrong, because the sounds make sense, and go well with animations. It's just that there has been better in variety. Okay, well, they do have a realistic bowstring sound, a few nice effects in the magic department… It is just that the sound of attacks hitting the enemy sound very alike.
I took off points for there being a rather annoying sound for characters talking. For every letter, you here a little sharp "blip" sound. I can't blame the fact that it seems to serve a psychologically fulfilling purpose to here that blip at every letter, but I've heard less annoying blips.
The music is not bad, but not the most exceptional I've heard. Part of the problem is that you need to have familiarity with older Fire Emblem games to be able to fully appreciate the music score. The only real way to do so, if you are like me and don't know Japanese, is to seek fan translations on emulation, which is illegal and requires quite a bit of searching for the right material. Now people may wonder what theme they used in SSBM for the alternate theme song for Hyrule temple. That one is a mix of the character recruitment theme in this game and the title screen theme. Regardless, there were a few music themes I liked in this game. Hector's theme is so loud and thunderous and full of ambition. It goes quite well with the fact that he's headstrong and reckless.
To sum it up, the sound effects are so-so. The music can be appreciated, but best only if you are familiar with the entire series including Japanese games.
Overall Fun Factor: 10!
In my opinion, this game is quite fulfilling. It has a source of intense gameplay and elements of a dramatic story, with some occasional breaks of humor, some of them quite outrageous. This game can be replayed multiple times, and still be rewarding, thanks to a variety of very different characters, a lot of secret items, sidequests, and an unlockable gameplay mode called Hector mode, where Hector instead of Eliwood leads the story, goes through some unique adventures, not seen in Eliwood mode, and overall has more chances to have his outrageous personality explored. This game has a few secrets that involve connecting it to a few GameCube games, which I'm hiding from you right now. There are a lot of support conversations to unlock. Have fun doing that! (Or cheat and look them up on the Internet.) Some of the funniest things I've ever seen involve support conversations. Bartre/Canas and Hector/Farina are among a few of my favorites. This game has a lot to offer. If you are a Mario/Nintendo nerd like I assume most of you out there are, you should remember in Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, there was a Toad in Petalburg who ranted about how Fire Emblem is such an awesome game (OMG advertising! =P). I too most definitely recommend buying this game, especially if you claim to be an RPG fan. For most, it should be a refreshingly unique experience that can potentially become and absolute favorite. So what are you waiting for? This game is on the old side, so if there aren't any video game stores selling it, try checking Amazon. In my opinion, it is definitely worth at least 30 dollars.
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