14 replies to this topic

[bookwormbabe29]

Hi all! As warned, I am making a new topic here to begin playing Mystery of the emblem. My first question is this: should I play book 1 and get the full experience of this game, or say, replay Shadow dragon instead? I know there are supposed to be a lot of differences between the two versions, missing characters and translations, etc, but I don't know the full list (if anyone does, like who's missing and such, I'd love to know!) I'm kind of leaning towards playing book one for completeness sake, but it bothers me that levels and characters are missing. Does that make sense? I'd love to hear thoughts/opinions.

Also, any tips/tricks/codes/etc to watch out in this one? When do support conversations and different endings come into play? So much to learn, so much to experience... I can't wait! :)

[Vorena]

I'd say its worth doing the next book instead of starting over. Although, it could be fun to play through with healers getting experience on healing. The only advice I have is that any mounted unit must dismount before entering a building. This means all mounted units are forced to use the light weight swords over the heavy lances. There is absolutely no reason to wait until level 20 to promote since the experience is the same regardless of level and promotion you have. So, since stats are capped at 20 for everything, promote as early as you can. Spread around the growth shards to your favorite units.

[bookwormbabe29]

A temporarily set back, but I seem unable to get the translation patch working properly, so I am putting this game on hold until my friend comes next week and tells me what I'm doing wrong lol. I'll guess I'll skip ahead to do one of the english games instead. Maybe Sacred stones for now, and then back to them in order.

[WindMage25]

What exactly is the problem with the translation patch? Perhaps we can help out.

[Celice]

Make sure you apply the patch to the intended version of the game. There's the 1.0 release and the 1.1 release, as far as I remember. The patch should also specify if your rom need be headered or not.

[bookwormbabe29]

Um, well, thing is... I have NO CLUE what is wrong, or what a header even is. I'm very much inexperienced when it comes to this stuff, hence calling a favor in with my friend who told me how to do all this stuff in the first place. I appreciate the offer of help, but I am a tad out of my element. I figured since I could get my NES game to work no problem, I'd have none with the SNES stuff, but I can't for the life of me figure out why it's not working.

[WindMage25]

A header is a piece of code that some of the roms do have and some don't (in the case of SNES roms, the first $200 bytes if I recall correctly). It doesn't make any difference so a header could be considered useless, but it does make difference for a patch, since a patch changes fixed locations within the rom.

The file size of a headered rom is therefore also a bit larger than a headerless rom. You can check that by right-clicking the rom -> properties. A headered FE3 rom is 3.146.240 bytes and a headerless rom is 3.145.728 bytes. So check that, you need a headered rom for the patch to work correctly. And check whether you have V1.0 or V1.1 of the rom (or try both patches).

If you have a headerless rom you can either search for a headered rom or add it with the help of SNESTools.

[bookwormbabe29]

Well, after beating Sacred Stones and getting my friend to fix my problems, I am once again playing Mystery of the Emblem! Woo hoo! I am playing book 1 against my reservations as I need a refresher course on the story, and figured this would be a good way to get the full experience of playing the old games. Now all I need to do is remember what all the differences are from this version and Shadow dragon version. I mean, how hard could that be? :)

[Celice]

Basically, expect the games to play a bit less like the GBA game, and you got most of the differences squared away :p Glad you got things working again!

[bookwormbabe29]

Hehe, me too. The odd thing, it took her like, less than ten minutes tops to realize how I had messed up lol. I'm on book one, chapter two now with my shiny new Oguma. I was going to use Bartz, but then read they can't promote in this one! How utterly inconvenient. At least the weapon triangle doesn't exist to require an axe user yet. (Incidentally, when does supports and weapon triangle come into play?)

Anywho, I think I know most of my old favorites, but I need to decide who to use. I'm debating Marth, Sheeda, Cain, Abel, Oguma, Julian, Rena, Navarre, Marich, Hardin, Maria, Minerva, Linda, Palla, Catria, and Est. I *think* you get to use 15 units at the end of the game, so I'm trying to think of how to rotate these people to fill those spots. Only I picked 16 instead of 15! How terrible. I'm thinking of dropping Navarre myself, but wanted a second opinion.

[Celice]

I think you have the major lineup that will stomp the game for you. Julien might be the only one worth dropping, but, eh.

[SRC]

Pegasus Knights and Magic users get their promotion items awfully late in this game, and promotion items are limited in general since they are split between class types instead of all being hero crests. You can pick up some promotion items in a chapter 17 secret shop, but I would not suggest it unless you REALLY want an extra character of that class. (On the other hand, it wouldn't be much of a wait for, say, Est.) You might even consider picking up Kashim or Gordan if only to get some use out of the orion's bolt and Partia even though bow users are kind of mediocre in this game.

Because of the hero crest thing and units having to mismount several chapters, it might not be a bad idea to move your team around a little bit. Barts is actually still pretty decent despite no promotion because his growth's are some of the best in the game, so I would suggest giving him a go and see if he can gain some speed and defense. Wendell is also cool since he's the only guy you have that can both heal and use magic for the majority of the game. I usually just have him and Marich fill my magic needs with Rena pinching in for extra healing when I need it.

Support bonuses are not a huge help in this game. The bonuses themselves are okay and characters can be within 3 squares of each other, but there are not that many of them.

Edited by SRC, 12 July 2012 - 11:17 PM.

[bookwormbabe29]

(Dusts off account) Whew! Been a while. I had a few real world distractions to deal with that left little time for fun and games, but hey, I am back. I finally finished "Mystery of the Emblem" but I have to say, I was a bit disappointed with the ending. (spoilers follow).

I mean, so many characters get "disappeared without a trace." Est, Abel, Oguma, Malliesa, Banutu, Chainy, Samto, Sirius, even Nina! I could understand maybe one or two people doing this, but Abel and Est (for example) makes no sense to me. I want to know what happened, but now I never will and that just leaves a bad taste in my mouth, you know? And so many of the endings are just "they live." i'm not going to list them all, but like Navare and Machis. They just keep doing what they always have. Then others don't make sense, like the above Abel and Est, or Minerva abandoning her country to work in a monastery. Maybe it's just me, but I thought most of the endings were just bad, and that infuriates me. Did it bother anyone else?


Oh well. Maybe "Holy War" will pick up my spirits. Next game!

[SRC]

The earlier games aren't exactly known for their story and characters(lol Biraku). But, if those are what you're looking for, FE4 won't disappoint.

[Celice]

And if you end up loving it, there are at least six complete fan hacks which change up virtually all pairings and characters, weapons, and even skills at times. One even has custom maps, albeit a bit bland (and difficult >_> ).

If you want a game just like FE3 though, you may want to skip ahead to FE5 or the GBA ones. But FE4 is definitely an enjoyable game all-in-all.